Pathfinder 2E Hero Point Deck

[!DWolf]

At the request of one of my players, I have been using the critical hit deck for a while now and it has been working really well (we use it any time a player rolls a critical hit and any time a creature of at least the players level rolls a critical hit) so I unilaterally decided to try out the new hero point deck.

Having just played my first game using them (a Legacy of Fire conversion) I figured I would share my thoughts:

• I chose the usage where the players are individually assigned cards and can’t swap.
• I was a little worried purchasing it because I house-ruled hero points into “fortune points” that only allow a reroll but none of the cards deal with stabilizing using hero points so this was a non-issue.
• It made it very easy for the players/me to track their points (we play in person).
• The effects on the cards are powerful but they didn’t impact play that much because either the players had cards that were useless for them or they would rather save it to reroll.
• I was worried that the powerful effects on the cards would lead to hoarding (which is what my houserule is made to prevent), but that didn’t happen and the players spent the points freely. Though this may be because of my custom magic item system in the game conditioned the players not to hoard (almost all items are custom consumables I printed on index cards to encourage spending).
• The cards didn’t slow down the game at all.
• At the end of the game all the players said they liked the deck and wanted to continue using it.

Note: rather than assign one hero point every hour, I just give each player a point every two hours.

 

[Philip Benz]

Can you give us one or two examples of the hero point deck card details?
Back when we were still playing face-to-face, we also used the critical hit and critical fumble decks for PF2. With a few caveats, they worked great.

• PCs always get to draw from the critical hit deck when they score high enough, but adversaries only get to use it on a nat 20 and if they are named NPCs or creatures above the PCs' level.
• Adversaries always use the critical fumble deck on a nat 1, with no save, while PCs use it on a nat 1 but also get a reflex, fortitude or (more rarely) will save, whichever is more appropriate, with a DC set by the level of the nearest adversary (DCs by level).

 

[!DWolf]

Can you give us one or two examples of the hero point deck card details?

I certainly can!

Last Second Sidestep
Play when you are targeted by a ranged Strike.
The Strike automatically misses.
Over here!

Run and Shoot
Play when you take a Stride action.
You make a ranged Strike at any point during this movement.
Remembering to breathe is the hard part.

Reverse Strike
Play after you fail an attack roll.
You get a success on the attack roll rather than a failure.
You missed!
Did I?

Reckless Charge
Play after taking two consecutive Stride actions.
Make a melee Strike. You are flat-footed until the start of your next turn.
Was that wise? No. But it worked.

Spark of Courage
Play when you have the frightened condition.
You lose that condition and instead gain a +2 status bonus to attack rolls and skill checks until the end of your next turn.
You don’t scare me!

Shake it Off
Play it any time.
All persistent damage affecting you immediately comes to an end.
The fire went out, the poison stopped burning through me, and I finally got that bard’s tune out of my head.

 

[Philip Benz]

Those are indeed powerful options. Can't wait to get my deck from the subscription.