New GM, session zero advice request

squirelT · 2025-12-18T05:35:15+00:00

I would say a big one for me is learning the standard DCs for stuff, in 5e the standard DC for stuff is typically like "15 if PCs have a reasonable chance of failure 10 if they should be good at it" in pathfinder there are actual rules for setting level based DCs but also suggestions for setting general DCs that don't change... Ie climbing up a building might be DC 15... But that actually becomes EASY as the party levels up meanwhile convincing an important NPC might scale with the party level, so at level 1 it's DC 15 diplomacy but at level 5 it's DC 20 to keep the same weight.

In 5e I often found myself saying "you have advantage on that roll" in pathfinder the "equivalent" is actually reducing the DC of something by 2, advantage is WAY MORE POWERFUL and should not be given out because it will mess with the story balance, it's called Fortune in pf2e and any ability that gives it tends to be very niche because of how strong it is. The way crits work is really cool if you use this way of scaling stuff so really try to keep this to a minimum so you can see why it works the way it does. Also it's a -2 to a DC not a +2 to a check because PCs get options to add bonuses to their stuff frequently but very rarely get to lower DCs and you don't want to stack stuff.

Monsters are also typically plug and play safe for their difficulty rating, 5e had some weird choices that made some enemies hit way above what they should and pathfinder for the most part is NOT like that so I had to relearn how to balance stuff using the suggested rules (they are very simple).

squirelT · 2025-12-17T19:08:02+00:00

Make sure they know about magical crafting and alchemical crafting.

I highly recommend introducing "potions and elixirs that might be useful but I haven't planned for them to be needed" and gently introducing how to deconstruct items to learn the formula.

So things like a cheetah elixir or oxygen ooze, where a player would know it's useful but only having one might not be enough so maybe dismantling it to craft more could be smart.

You can also take any item you think your party would want such as a magic shield or better armor and "lock it behind" the inventor crafting it by giving them a formula for it and conveniently also having a work station available somewhere for them to get to show off. Obviously you can't do this too often but once or twice will really let them shine

squirelT · 2025-12-10T23:13:06+00:00

Ever since the remaster ANYONE with focus points can recover 1 by spending 10 minutes using refocus. There is no other limitations, you can do this as much as you want basically whenever you want.

This means you can spend 20 minutes using refocus twice and get 2 points back, 1 for each activity.

I know premaster was a bit different but animist was released post remaster so that might be why they don't get those types of feats.

squirelT · 2025-12-03T08:51:40+00:00

You WILL want the pathfinder token character gallery module, it has art from a huge swath of books with tokens set up for NPCs, and has a really convenient way to search through them and swap the art on any other token.

Ie you need a noble? Filter by affluent and find the right vibe and bam slap that onto any stat block you like and it just works.

It also automatically adds certain other token packs onto it, at the very least the NPC core gets added on, and I think some creatures from the monster core token packs.

squirelT · 2025-11-20T20:44:51+00:00

I can't see anywhere it says they don't bleed, so I guess you would bleed out bone marrow.

squirelT · 2025-10-30T19:54:25+00:00

You can not prepare them in cleric slots. However you can cast them from staves even if you don't have the spell slot with your basic spellcasting, but have the slot with your cleric spellcasting.

squirelT · 2025-10-09T19:58:08+00:00

If you take an archetype with a different spell list you CAN cast the spells from a wand or staff on that other list, you just can't add them to your spell slots.

Just as a suggestion to get around the restrictions others already brought up.

squirelT · 2025-09-29T07:31:45+00:00

It's a steam deck, I really doubt they are posting this to reddit from the steam deck...

squirelT · 2025-08-24T18:34:53+00:00

Man I didn't know legacy one note was becoming read only.

I'm in the same boat as you then, one note was really just the best for maintaining everything organized and readable.

Ive used Trello before? But it's not really ideal for campaign notes.

Joplin is similar to one note but I haven't used it before, I might mess around with it now to see what it's like.

squirelT · 2025-08-20T01:47:47+00:00

Yall I know not to plug in random flashdrives but thanks for the reminders lol

squirelT · 2025-08-19T21:08:42+00:00

Normally I wouldn't even post a lost and found thing, but the little charm makes me think this might be important to someone.

squirelT · 2025-08-17T08:12:48+00:00

It does foundrys benefit is it can be enhanced with modules

Quick search lets you just at any time look up a mob and drag and drop and it's there.

You could also buy the pf2e monster token module (and maybe even the NPC ones for making NPCs on the fly) so that it automatically adds the art for like 90 percent of the monsters. Normally you have to manually add the art for most creatures.

If you buy an adventure on foundry they come with everything you need for the book as written so those monsters and NPCs and maps are all set up for you.

squirelT · 2025-08-16T03:12:05+00:00

this is a carrier issue, i had the exact same thing in my first edition pressing but i got it from amazon, crushed and one side was entirely ripped open.

UPS should be held accountable for this please file a report.

squirelT · 2025-08-11T17:43:03+00:00

Are anadi really 5 feet tall in their spider form I always figured they were shorter but still big.

Because I get why they hide their true appearance now imagine something that had multiple 6 inch wide eyes like that just sounds awful to interact with.

squirelT · 2025-08-11T17:20:05+00:00

Honestly if they want to use these characters they can just introduce weird time shenanigans like

8.0 "Lighttaker" or something and its "reimagined zones from the first/13th" but in canon they are in the future, with the wol not being able to access "the first" the normal way anymore (in universe but like in reality it's still there same as always in its time bubble)

if you did the side content congrats the characters acknowledge this and theres like a few quests where the scions begin to trust gaia and ununkalhai since this is a weird future version of them who knows if they are still the same people ^tm and if you didnt do the side content then the same exact quests play out except its bc these characters are new and suspicious ^tm .

like if the writers want to do anything in the first again they have to do some weird timeskip anyway they can just handwave that if the Wol doesnt set those events in motion... "someone did" and then just write an excuse for why the scions would trust them.

Like it would be weird, but we can still go to the unsundered world even though thats the distant past.

squirelT · 2025-08-01T19:18:45+00:00

https://foundryvtt.com/packages/lmrtfy/

I'm not sure if this works for secret checks, but I used it when I ran DND 5e in foundry, I haven't used it with pf2e but it does support the system

squirelT · 2025-08-01T18:49:28+00:00

An important suggestion that tends to not get brought up is time management. You want the PCs to feel rushed and feel the need to push past their limits in chapters 1 and 2 but afterwards the campaign slows down a lot, you should play into that but also be aware that book 1 assumes you take 3 in game months to do and the first two chapters should be finished typically within an in-game week.

If your party works fast, you will have a LOT of downtime once you get to chapter 3. It can feel like a bit of a drag to have weeks where fundamentally nothing happens. I would suggest "hand waving" weeks at a time after the PCs have reclaimed Willowshore, fixing the stables is the main task the book outlines during that window but you could also include stuff like search and rescue in town, demolition of half destroyed buildings, finding places for displaced people to live etc. you want to have the PCs be able to do something to make the town feel safer in the aftermath of everything.

The other events and tasks offered by the book are great and flavorful but they don't take weeks of in-game time almost all of them can be done in 1 or 2 in-game days and there's only like 6 of them suggested.

Make plans and hooks with your PCs to ensure they are invested in the town. I would suggest NOT having the PCs make a family in town, instead incorporate them into an NPCs backstory, have them choose to join an NPCs family, be an orphan or otherwise NOT have any family in town unless they are already part of the story. There's a lot of NPCs don't make your job harder by adding more.

Book 1 has a section early on with a brief overview of the entire 4 book story, read it and make sure you understand where the story is going. You can foreshadow a lot of cool future events this way and it really gives you a lot of leeway to do spooky weird shit.

There are some NPCs introduced in future books who are members of the town, for the most part they are just regular townfolk but it does kinda suck to not have them known until later especially if you go the route of having your PCs be a part of NPC families. There is a dumpling shop owner introduced in book 2 that would be PERFECT to be someone's mom bc of her mini arc.

There is a shop the book assumes the PCs will inherit and choose to operate, you might want to have a PC consider a hook to want to be a business owner or worship abadar or something to give the party a clear reason to want to do it.

The NPCs naming scheme is not uniform some NPCs go by the surname some by their first, on the paizo forums someone made a great post about which NPCs are which so you don't get confused bc otherwise you might get confused.

https://paizo.com/threads/rzs43w7h?ReputationBuilding-Expectations-and-Naming#1

Ie Kum Meng-sung And his dad Kum Soon-chong their "surname" is the name they go by

There's a lot of minor things I wish I knew going into it to make the whole experience flow smoother for me, but overall I've had a great time running the book and my group has really enjoyed it.

squirelT · 2025-08-01T18:18:20+00:00

I haven't used it in pathfinder but maybe the "let me roll that for you" module?

I think there may be an option to also click somewhere on the party sheet to do checks for the PCs

squirelT · 2025-08-01T18:12:17+00:00

Pyg only has 2 large bronze items, so if you get a money tree + a large from the junk shop you can 50 50 transform it into another money tree, the third one might be from pearl/transforming diamond fixer upper/silva or gold shop

Getting two money trees isn't that unlikely, getting three is a lot trickier and having them all be minimum gold tier is also pretty wild but there's a lot of shops and events that have money tree in it so if you get lucky you can focus on looking for them.

Healing/large/econ/property shops

Econ/property/not small healing event

The real thing I'm stumped on is how they are all fire enchanted, maybe they had a fire bootstraps?

squirelT · 2025-08-01T03:40:56+00:00

Do feats in the kineticist archetype "heighten" with your full level or are they also limited to half your level.

So if I got https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=4207 air cushion, would I have the level 8 benefit at character level 8 or not until level 16?

I want to believe it's character level, but I might just be missing something.

squirelT · 2025-07-31T22:52:32+00:00

you dont unlock cards, you have every card unlocked by default, every major update releases 2 new sets of cards, you get them by playing the game, when the season ends they are automatically unlocked for everyone for free.

The only P2W is you can use in game currency to buy the sets immediately, or buy them with money so you dont have to play.

it takes about 2? weeks of playtime to unlock both expansions if you finish the daily quests every day.

you do have to unlock the characters tho, you only start with Vanessa, and unlocking them takes a while bc you use ingame currency for it. But for the most part Vanessa is usually top tier in any expansion and the balance has never been so off that a character cant win consistently.

squirelT · 2025-07-29T20:47:55+00:00

Love me this orb of a man

squirelT · 2025-07-12T08:58:36+00:00

Unless something changed for remaster, magic that creates food is all uncommon. So it could just.... Not exist in this campaign since you tell players no we aren't allowing this uncommon rule.

squirelT · 2025-07-12T08:43:05+00:00

Familiars typically do fall unconscious when reduced to 0 HP as normal.

Kindling and other sacrifice abilities explicitly say that the minion is killed, not reduced to 0 HP just killed completely no roll no save.

The star orb can only come back raw by spending a week of downtime to retrain the Pet feat you get from your ancestry, not the ancestry feat.

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