3/18/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
I dipped my toe into the deep end tonight. Just a little. I bought the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook tonight. I wish I could say I dropped fifty bucks for the hardcover edition, but no, we went for the $9.99 downloadable PDF version. Having dug around in the online Pathfinder Reference Document for the past couple of weeks, I can say this is definitely an upgrade. 576 pages with beautiful artwork and a lot more depth than just the rules.
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3/17/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
I want to play. No, not just run a game as Game Master, but I'm also starting to get the itch to play as a Player Character. My wife says we can trade off on GM duties, so that might work out as a future option, but I think my real issue is that I spent some time learning about the alchemist class today, with all the crazy different options you could play that class, and it really got me itching to explore playing the elf huntress that I've (halfway) created as an NPC.
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3/16/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
Today, I'm going through withdrawal. This is the first time since starting this blogrimage over two weeks ago that we didn't have a Pathfinder game session on both Saturday and Sunday. That, and I didn't really spend much time at all developing anything, although I did take a closer look at a couple of monsters, and reviewed the map I made yesterday to start thinking about where I need to make the rooms bigger to accommodate a six-character team, something I didn't really consider carefully enough on my first draft.
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3/14/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
I listened to an interesting podcast today. It was a panel discussion on Developing Pathfinder from the 2013 Gen Con gaming convention. It wasn't what I expected, but it was an interesting look into how the team at Paizo, the makers of Pathfinder, produce their products.
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3/13/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
I was chatting about Pathfinder over IM with a coworker this afternoon, and we got onto why we've both wanted to get more into tabletop RPGs. "I love rules," my friend typed, and then he added, "constraints".
I've seen people characterize this type of game by the huge amount of rules that are involved. And it's true, to become truly immersed in game play means buying more books than the typical college student. And if memory serves me correctly, they read a lot like textbooks, too.
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3/12/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
I said last night that I felt like I was at the point of constantly doing homework. Well, I decided to share the wealth and assign some homework to my players. I asked them to think about their characters and answer a couple of fairly simple questions. I figured this would be an interesting exercise, because none of them really know anything about the world we're playing in, and only my wife has even played RPGs before.
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3/11/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
Well, we've gotten to the point where it feels like I'm constantly doing homework. No matter how far I go or don't go with gaming, I'll never be in this position again, but right now, the only way out is through. I know full well that I've brought this on myself, of course. It would be a lot easier if I just guided the players through some relatively straight line path from adventure to adventure, and I suppose that's all that's really expected of a new GM, but I would really like the characters to have some options about how they proceed.
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3/10/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
In the past couple of years, my job description has started including project management tasks. I've never had any formal training in that area, but I've picked up some tactics here or there and lately have been trying to fold elements of Scrum, a framework for Agile development into my workflow. I've also been talking with a coworker from another department, trying to resize projects down into completable, manageable tasks.
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3/9/2014 in Pathfinder RPG by micah
We finished the Black Fang's Lair adventure from the Pathfinder Beginner Box today. I won't tell you how it went, because I don't want to let any spoilers slip. Our fledgling heroes rested well after the final battle, and had an uneventful trip back to Sandpoint, but as they arrived at dusk, they were greeted by a man (a priest from the cathedral, as they'll find out) running around yelling about strange happenings at the graveyard. It looks like they'll have to deal with that problem in their next session before getting any down time.
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