Post by Zyraen on Jan 18, 2020 2:14:25 GMT 8
EPISODIC
The current plan is to run one scenario per session, so each session is essentially Episodic.
However, if this is not well-received, or feels too rushed, or needs to be adjusted (see Encounters), it will be adjusted accordingly.
For avoidance of doubt, note that you regain all your Willpower, HP etc at the end of every scenario. You also receive gold at the end of a scenario.
===============
ALIGNMENT AND ROLEPLAYING
It is generally important (and satisfying from an RP perspective) to want to do the Right/Good thing.
That said, the rewards also incentivise accordingly, so even Neutral characters have considerable reason to want to do the Right/Good thing. Generally speaking, you get
A) 50% gold reward as long as you get reasonable progress (either reach last challenge, or for hard games maybe 70% done)
B) extra 50% if you clear the scenario and achieve the objective (generally dont cause unnecessary conflict or reputational damage to the society and allied parties, but i will make clear if its an issue or needs extra steps)
C) extra 50% for faction objective. Most of the time this is also contingent on B, but very occasionally not.
All this means that... its not only generally unsatisfying to play an "evil" character, you will likely be stopped outright if you disrupt the objectives of the scenario. Do bear this in mind.
Or in other words
- it is a satisfying and interesting campaign if you think not only of doing what youre told to, but what is Good/Best, since that is often not obvious
- if its just mucking along or dont care, it may not be as interesting, especially since quite a few scenarios can be run as a through train beatstick session (but generally not only as that)
- if its messing stuff up for the setting/party/scenario, its a no-go. I may restrict you from doing something even if the party otherwise is agreeable.
===============
ENCOUNTERS
Each Scenario typically consists of
A) 1-2 Easy/Avg Fights
B) Skill Challenge. Failure might lead to (partial) loss of an objective, a more difficult finale, or an extra Encounter.
C) 1 Avg/Hard Fight.
Unbound is designed to be non-swingy, but that tends to make battles take longer.
To deal with the 1 session format, typically the 1-2 Easy/Avg fights will be run as Easy to borderline Average Encounters (think about 0.5 or 0.75 Encounter)
However, players may by default only rest ONCE during the scenario. This can be perceived as a "Rest Token" the players must collectively agree to use.
As long as more than 5 in-game minutes have elapsed from the previous encounter, players may vote to take the benefit of a Rest.
This also means though encounters aren't actually that difficult to win, netting a decisive/efficient win helps to ensure there's enough resources for the rest of the scenario.
Sometimes, players may find themselves faced with a hard encounter despite not having rested (GM will usually pre-empt before action starts). This might happen if a Skill Challenge is failed, or if the scenario calls for an ambush, or a variety of other situations.
If more than 5 minutes have elapsed since the previous encounter, players may spend 1 WP to gain the benefit of the Rest, if they have a Rest token (and collectively agree to use it). Otherwise, the players may spend 2 WP to use Press-On.
Note that the spending of WP is a personal choice and a personal benefit. Players who have used up all their WP, or elect not to use it, do not gain the benefit. In a worse case scenario, players might have to spend up to 3 WP : 1 WP for using the Rest token when surprised, then 2 WP before the Avg/Hard fight.
Note that Pathfinder Scenarios offer a relatively large variance of events. Sometimes the hard fight might come earlier rather than later. Some encounters - even those one might normally expect to be unavoidable - might in fact be avoidable.
Others might be giving up some benefit to avoid an encounter, such as giving up a portion of your gold reward. This giving up is usually indirect, essentially you compromise a mission objective and lose out part of the reward. Others might be direct, such as offering a bribe.
There are even Scenarios you can get through with no fights at all. (Well, "can" does not mean "will." You might not be able to get through without a fight if your Skills aren't up to par or just happen to roll badly)
When running Encounters, I will endeavour to convey appropriately (what I deem) the difficulty of the fight is for a typical Pathfinder party, however I will also bear in mind the time constraints. For example, a scenario might have 3 hard fights and 1 average fight (actually, quite rare), I might consider it won't be possible to clear all 4 encounters, and provide a way to avoid 1 of them, alternatively adjust some of the hard fights down to average. Alternatively, I may collapse 2 lesser fights into 1 encounter.
Considering the above, I may plan so that a particularly involved scenario takes two sessions instead of one, and it is possible I won't tune down the difficulty, but maybe provide an extra Rest Token after the first session.
=============
LEVELING UP
For the first few levels, I intend to level the party up once every 2 sessions/scenarios, likely until the party is Level 4 or 6.
Depending on what is next, I may then slow the progression to one level up per 3 sessions/scenarios.
Generally speaking, I expect even at slowest, it should be 4 sessions before 1 level.
Assuming (again unlikely) we slow to every scenario taking two sessions, that is still two scenarios cleared every one level.
=============
DEATH
I chose to run UB as I feel it is a lot less deadly than Pathfinder, but it might so happen that someone dies.
If so, I would feel story wise it is appropriate to roll up a new character. The new character will start with gold as if he never benefited from any stipend, and then less any gold the party lost in any scenario so far.
However, if you are very high level and well known to your faction, perhaps a Raise Dead can be arranged, but it would be a size-able amount of gold. We will cross that bridge when we come to it, but expect it to be comparable to the loss if you were to roll a new character.
The current plan is to run one scenario per session, so each session is essentially Episodic.
However, if this is not well-received, or feels too rushed, or needs to be adjusted (see Encounters), it will be adjusted accordingly.
For avoidance of doubt, note that you regain all your Willpower, HP etc at the end of every scenario. You also receive gold at the end of a scenario.
===============
ALIGNMENT AND ROLEPLAYING
It is generally important (and satisfying from an RP perspective) to want to do the Right/Good thing.
That said, the rewards also incentivise accordingly, so even Neutral characters have considerable reason to want to do the Right/Good thing. Generally speaking, you get
A) 50% gold reward as long as you get reasonable progress (either reach last challenge, or for hard games maybe 70% done)
B) extra 50% if you clear the scenario and achieve the objective (generally dont cause unnecessary conflict or reputational damage to the society and allied parties, but i will make clear if its an issue or needs extra steps)
C) extra 50% for faction objective. Most of the time this is also contingent on B, but very occasionally not.
All this means that... its not only generally unsatisfying to play an "evil" character, you will likely be stopped outright if you disrupt the objectives of the scenario. Do bear this in mind.
Or in other words
- it is a satisfying and interesting campaign if you think not only of doing what youre told to, but what is Good/Best, since that is often not obvious
- if its just mucking along or dont care, it may not be as interesting, especially since quite a few scenarios can be run as a through train beatstick session (but generally not only as that)
- if its messing stuff up for the setting/party/scenario, its a no-go. I may restrict you from doing something even if the party otherwise is agreeable.
===============
ENCOUNTERS
Each Scenario typically consists of
A) 1-2 Easy/Avg Fights
B) Skill Challenge. Failure might lead to (partial) loss of an objective, a more difficult finale, or an extra Encounter.
C) 1 Avg/Hard Fight.
Unbound is designed to be non-swingy, but that tends to make battles take longer.
To deal with the 1 session format, typically the 1-2 Easy/Avg fights will be run as Easy to borderline Average Encounters (think about 0.5 or 0.75 Encounter)
However, players may by default only rest ONCE during the scenario. This can be perceived as a "Rest Token" the players must collectively agree to use.
As long as more than 5 in-game minutes have elapsed from the previous encounter, players may vote to take the benefit of a Rest.
This also means though encounters aren't actually that difficult to win, netting a decisive/efficient win helps to ensure there's enough resources for the rest of the scenario.
Sometimes, players may find themselves faced with a hard encounter despite not having rested (GM will usually pre-empt before action starts). This might happen if a Skill Challenge is failed, or if the scenario calls for an ambush, or a variety of other situations.
If more than 5 minutes have elapsed since the previous encounter, players may spend 1 WP to gain the benefit of the Rest, if they have a Rest token (and collectively agree to use it). Otherwise, the players may spend 2 WP to use Press-On.
Note that the spending of WP is a personal choice and a personal benefit. Players who have used up all their WP, or elect not to use it, do not gain the benefit. In a worse case scenario, players might have to spend up to 3 WP : 1 WP for using the Rest token when surprised, then 2 WP before the Avg/Hard fight.
Note that Pathfinder Scenarios offer a relatively large variance of events. Sometimes the hard fight might come earlier rather than later. Some encounters - even those one might normally expect to be unavoidable - might in fact be avoidable.
Others might be giving up some benefit to avoid an encounter, such as giving up a portion of your gold reward. This giving up is usually indirect, essentially you compromise a mission objective and lose out part of the reward. Others might be direct, such as offering a bribe.
There are even Scenarios you can get through with no fights at all. (Well, "can" does not mean "will." You might not be able to get through without a fight if your Skills aren't up to par or just happen to roll badly)
When running Encounters, I will endeavour to convey appropriately (what I deem) the difficulty of the fight is for a typical Pathfinder party, however I will also bear in mind the time constraints. For example, a scenario might have 3 hard fights and 1 average fight (actually, quite rare), I might consider it won't be possible to clear all 4 encounters, and provide a way to avoid 1 of them, alternatively adjust some of the hard fights down to average. Alternatively, I may collapse 2 lesser fights into 1 encounter.
Considering the above, I may plan so that a particularly involved scenario takes two sessions instead of one, and it is possible I won't tune down the difficulty, but maybe provide an extra Rest Token after the first session.
=============
LEVELING UP
For the first few levels, I intend to level the party up once every 2 sessions/scenarios, likely until the party is Level 4 or 6.
Depending on what is next, I may then slow the progression to one level up per 3 sessions/scenarios.
Generally speaking, I expect even at slowest, it should be 4 sessions before 1 level.
Assuming (again unlikely) we slow to every scenario taking two sessions, that is still two scenarios cleared every one level.
=============
DEATH
I chose to run UB as I feel it is a lot less deadly than Pathfinder, but it might so happen that someone dies.
If so, I would feel story wise it is appropriate to roll up a new character. The new character will start with gold as if he never benefited from any stipend, and then less any gold the party lost in any scenario so far.
However, if you are very high level and well known to your faction, perhaps a Raise Dead can be arranged, but it would be a size-able amount of gold. We will cross that bridge when we come to it, but expect it to be comparable to the loss if you were to roll a new character.