Pathfinder 2E Pathfinder 2e: Actual Play Experience

[CapnZapp]

I understand that initiative is rolled when the opposing parties are present and ready to take action.

Where is the discrepancy?

Please first read post #146:

Pathfinder 2E - Pathfinder 2e: Actual Play Experience

I have created a thread that gets at this issue, but with my own spin that is more oriented towards game play than game balance. Game play is related to game balance though.

www.enworld.org

 

[Numidius]

Ok, I read it. My question now is: why roll for initiative since neither lurker or heroes decided yet to take action?

 

[CapnZapp]

Ok, I read it. My question now is: why roll for initiative since neither lurker or heroes decided yet to take action?

Okay, fair question.

So lurker does decide to take action. Wait, maybe heroes spot him first! And what about McSneak? Shouldn't there be a chance he isn't spotted by the monster?

Let's see what the rules has to say about resolving these issues...

 

[GrahamWills]

Imagine a classic prison escape scene. Maybe the one at the start of Out of Sight with George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez. You know, a cleared area, fences, guard towers, the works. Somewhere there's a hole with people crawling out.

The GM calls for initiative, but the guards don't see anything. All they can do is sound the alarm, and Seek (using searchlights). Then it's the inmates turn. All they do is try to avoid an encounter. The rounds pass by and not a single attack roll is made.

See? It's not that PF2 is exactly weird, strange or bad. Just... different.

I guess ... I'm not sure what you've been playing all these years CapnZapp. It's really so strange to you to start an encounter scene where one group is unaware of another? All your combats are just about people charging and attacking first round?

To me that sounds more like the odd viewpoint. I mean, I've played and run countless 3.5 and 4E games and this happens all the time. In fact THIS EXACT SCENARIO YOU DESCRIBE has happened many times. Are you seriously telling us that PF23 has introduced you to a new concept by having encounters that do not start with an attack?

Completely regardless of system, this would be a normal sequence in any game I run:

Player: I sneak across the yard, taking cover in the trees
GM: Ok, Let's go to initiative <People roll>.The Guards go first, but they don't see anything. Your turn
Player: I sneak across <moves figure>, getting a <X> result
GM: They don't notice you. Their turn, they have no reason to do anything ...

As a GM I'd usually run this not as an encounter, but there are plenty of reasons I might want to (and often do) ; there might be a trap or terrain feature that the players blunder into, or a guard they haven't seen taking a piss behind a bush they head to; or I expect someone to fail their stealth check and so expect a fun starting position on the tactical map.

Am I missing something? I honestly find it hard to believe this is something nw to you in PF2. But if so, congratulations! Pathfinder 2 has helped you improve your game!

 

[Imaro]

I guess ... I'm not sure what you've been playing all these years CapnZapp. It's really so strange to you to start an encounter scene where one group is unaware of another? All your combats are just about people charging and attacking first round?

To me that sounds more like the odd viewpoint. I mean, I've played and run countless 3.5 and 4E games and this happens all the time. In fact THIS EXACT SCENARIO YOU DESCRIBE has happened many times. Are you seriously telling us that PF23 has introduced you to a new concept by having encounters that do not start with an attack?

Completely regardless of system, this would be a normal sequence in any game I run:

Player: I sneak across the yard, taking cover in the trees
GM: Ok, Let's go to initiative <People roll>.The Guards go first, but they don't see anything. Your turn
Player: I sneak across <moves figure>, getting a <X> result
GM: They don't notice you. Their turn, they have no reason to do anything ...

As a GM I'd usually run this not as an encounter, but there are plenty of reasons I might want to (and often do) ; there might be a trap or terrain feature that the players blunder into, or a guard they haven't seen taking a piss behind a bush they head to; or I expect someone to fail their stealth check and so expect a fun starting position on the tactical map.

Am I missing something? I honestly find it hard to believe this is something nw to you in PF2. But if so, congratulations! Pathfinder 2 has helped you improve your game!

To be fair it seems that he's trying to suss out how you would run this in PF2e officially via the rules... I don't think he's asking what your way or anyone else's way would be. But I could be wrong.

 

[Campbell]

We do not disagree about the facts on the ground. I just disagree that it is not intuitive.

I feel you are placing way too much emphasis on the fact that some characters are rolling Perception for Initiative. You are not rolling Perception for initiative because your character is being hyper vigilant. You are rolling it because it is the default setting. You were not doing something that means you are more likely to spot a hidden adversary than someone who rolled Stealth or Survival.

We roll Perception for Initiative in all sorts of situations that have nothing to do with spotting a hidden assailant. We could be having a tense conversation and someone reaches for a blade. Players roll Perception for Initiative when their characters are sleeping.

Initiative does not correspond to any action taken by our characters. It is a simple determination of who goes first. For the purpose of Initiative Perception is simply measuring basic situational awareness and intuition. It carries a pretty heavy load in this edition. You use it as a defense against stealth, to locate hidden enemies and objects, Initiative, and Sense Motive among other things.

You are already benefiting from your Perception as a defense against the lurker's Stealth check. We do not use opposed rolls because you are not actively trying to find the hidden assailant and because rolls are not opposed because of degrees of success. They gain the benefit of that check because they were already using Avoid Notice which is basically just Sneak repeated over and over.

The way I see it when you roll high for Initiative, but do not see the lurker coming is that your character has the intuitive sense that something is up. They do not know what. They have no idea a creature is there, but something just feels wrong.

Except in the case of a critical failure you are not like actually going to see the lurker anyway. You might have an idea of where they are, but they are at least hidden to you unless they really flub their roll. Before they reach you they will need to make at least one more Stealth roll and need to still be concealed or under cover when they attack. Otherwise they automatically become observed.

I do agree there is some potential weirdness with asking a player to act when they have no information to act on. This happens regardless of what you rolled for Initiative though. I also do not see that as license to provide a character with the benefit of actively scanning for a hidden enemy.

This is something that should have been addressed in more detail. It will be in the Gamemastery Guide. I really wish they would have had that book available alongside the Core Rulebook and Bestiary. While I love this game it really is not complete yet. Some very crucial bits are coming in the GMG.

 

[CapnZapp]

I guess ... I'm not sure what you've been playing all these years CapnZapp. It's really so strange to you to start an encounter scene where one group is unaware of another? All your combats are just about people charging and attacking first round?

To me that sounds more like the odd viewpoint. I mean, I've played and run countless 3.5 and 4E games and this happens all the time. In fact THIS EXACT SCENARIO YOU DESCRIBE has happened many times. Are you seriously telling us that PF23 has introduced you to a new concept by having encounters that do not start with an attack?

Completely regardless of system, this would be a normal sequence in any game I run:

Player: I sneak across the yard, taking cover in the trees
GM: Ok, Let's go to initiative .The Guards go first, but they don't see anything. Your turn
Player: I sneak across , getting a result
GM: They don't notice you. Their turn, they have no reason to do anything ...

As a GM I'd usually run this not as an encounter, but there are plenty of reasons I might want to (and often do) ; there might be a trap or terrain feature that the players blunder into, or a guard they haven't seen taking a piss behind a bush they head to; or I expect someone to fail their stealth check and so expect a fun starting position on the tactical map.

Am I missing something? I honestly find it hard to believe this is something nw to you in PF2. But if so, congratulations! Pathfinder 2 has helped you improve your game!

I don't care for your attitude, and so won't bother replying.

Rephrase if you want to discuss further.

 

[Numidius]

Meanwhile I read on Paizo forum that this issue had been discussed one year ago, with many solutions provided by posters, without an official rule, AFAIK.

From what I read here by @Campbell, the rules say it's up to the Gm to make the transition between Exploration mode and Encounter mode.

My opinion so far is that until no one at the table wants (or is forced) to engage in the three Actions economy of actual encounter/combat mode, the game proceeds using the slower Activities by the party and/or npc involved.

 

[Kel Ardan]

Last night I ran the initial session for Hellknight Hill and it had a few bumpy moments but it went pretty well.
I've been a big fan of the Adventure paths since they started coming out for PF and so I figured I'd go with this
book to start my group on Pathfinder 2nd Ed to see the balance of their encounters and the difficulties the writers think work well.

The book isn't written all that well and you can kind of tell the rules were still be decided while it was being
written and it feels rushed (ie. just like Horde of the Dragon Queen for D&D 5th Ed). Hopefully the path gets better as the you get deeper into the book series. My 3 players are all long term players of RPG's (all in their 40's) and they all really liked character creation and found it was fun. The 3 action economy definitely runs smoothly and they enjoyed it but you can tell it makes them think about their choices wisely. They used some social skills in the Tavern and were able to gather info well during that scene. The initiative runs pretty much like any initiative but the change to perception went ok and the rogue using stealth instead didn't really cause much confusion (basically he was in stealth mode and when an encounter started he stayed in stealth mode when everyone rolled perception and his stealth number is compared to the others perception number).

We have a wizard and cleric and both players enjoyed their spell selections and cantrips really have enhanced how good a caster can be (just like it did in D&D 5th Ed). The fighter had a run of bad luck and really had a hard time hitting his targets but he understands that sometimes it is just luck or bad luck. I'm thinking conditions are going to take a minute to get used to the new rules but I think after a couple more sessions it will all become second nature.

I'll keep you all updated as the game goes on.

 

[qstor]

Lack of Legendary Monsters/Layer Actions: I get that Pathfinder monsters have more actions on the aggregate, but I really dug how a 5e Dragon affected the very terrain it occupied in a gameplay manner.

Nothing prevents from you as GM, say having a dragon or a lich casts spells on its lair before hand or build traps. There's examples in the 3E Draconomicon and Libris Mortis, I think.

As an addendum, my players are deadset on making a permanent switch to Pathfinder, but honestly I want to see what Paizo adventure paths are like before I commit myself. We're diving into Rise of the Runelords converted into 2e. TBH this looks really promising, but the D&D official stuff has been phenomenal so we'll see.

Kingmaker is being officially converted to 2E and has a lot of great reviews. You might take a look at that. I'd love to see an official conversion of Rise of the Runelords.