Pathfinder Society on Fantasy Grounds getting more organised?

[Trenloe]

This is an idea I’ve been mulling over for a while and I’d like to see what people think about it – and give it a trial run for a couple of months to see what the uptake is…

In Colorado, where I am a VL for PFS, we run lots and lots of regular PFS gaming events at local stores. Each store has its fixed slots for the month and they have an organiser/coordinator that takes player feedback, decides on scenarios to run each month, advertises for GMs and takes player sign-ups. All the GM has to do is sign up and then run the game – all organisation is done by the coordinator.

There are a number of advantages to this – people know when PFS games are going to run, even before they know what the scenario will be and can generally keep the time free to play; a lot of the work a GM has to do is taken off their shoulders with the admin tasks being done by the coordinator; it makes it more accessible for multiple GMs to cycle round and it is proactively getting game sessions out there.

I’d like to do something similar for PFS games on Fantasy Grounds – I’m happy being the coordinator and will do the admin.

The main issue I see is coming up with a good, solid bunch of timeslots a month that cover the main gaming times for people all around the globe.
Any thoughts on the above?

Any thoughts on a couple of monthly time slots that would be good for you?

I’d be keen to give this a go – if it doesn’t work out, or we learn from the process and get something better going then great!

To be clear – this will not effect the ad-hoc PFS games that go on now, GMs can arrange a game as normal, run it and issue the chronicles. Perhaps as another spin off of the coordinator idea, a GM could decide to run an ad-hoc game just like now, but pass the coordination onto an FG PFS coordinator so that the GMs load is reduced and they can concentrate on the game…

Let me know any thoughts/ideas/reservations on the above - I'd really like to get some regular PFS gaming slots going on Fantasy Grounds.

[Rose Claymore]

I'm interested in a regular time slot. About the only time I'm not available is Anytime Saturday, and most Sundays. Anytime during the week would be fine, especially if it's in the evening my time (starting around 11pm GMT) so my wife could play as well.

I'm also interested in running, but it's been slow going putting a scenario together as I'm still learning FG from a GM's perspective.

[hawkwind]

interesting idea, I tend to run my games in the same time slots fairly regularly. I might be interested if there was some incentive of some kind like say some free scenarios or special boons

[RobG]

Sounds good. I've found Saturday nights 8-midnight here in the UK work well since players in the US can also play in the afternoon. Also if the game runs long most people don't need to get up early next day.

[damned]

interesting idea, I tend to run my games in the same time slots fairly regularly. I might be interested if there was some incentive of some kind like say some free scenarios or special boons
i think the BIG incentive is not having to organise players :)
the co-ordinator does that and you can concentrate on getting your session ready.

[Swiss_Mercenary]

Here is something you should be interested in.

https://paizo.com/threads/rzs2pwey?Welcome-to-new-Online-Play-VC

There is now a VC for Online play.

[Trenloe]

Here is something you should be interested in.

https://paizo.com/threads/rzs2pwey?Welcome-to-new-Online-Play-VC

There is now a VC for Online play.
Thanks Swiss - Mike Brock made me aware of Joe's appointment and I've reached out to him...

[Trenloe]

interesting idea, I tend to run my games in the same time slots fairly regularly. I might be interested if there was some incentive of some kind like say some free scenarios or special boons
I'm afraid incentives like these are only available for conventions with a large number of tables.

As damned says above, the incentive is that you don't have to do all the admin - chronicle sheets, etc.. Also, you get to help the PFS FG community by running a game in a regular slot - which in turn should spur other GMs to run games and everyone gets more opportunities to play, plus it helps to spread the load around so it is not just the same GMs running games.

[Macgreine]

I love the idea of a co ordinater. Thats a great incentive to run a monthly PFS game.

[lachancery]

I like the idea of having specific regular time slots (ex: "PFS Thursdays!") that are "owned" by a coordinator, who can then make sure there's always a GM hosting on these slots. It makes the scheduling predictable for players and spreads the burden across many GMs. It would also allow the FG community to increase its awareness with the rest of the PFS community; I'm invested in FG and would love to see its user base and activity increase.

Personally, I don't mind the admin side of PFS as a GM, but if getting it handled by a coordinator will mean more GMs willing to host, I'm all for it.

[Talen]

I think the bigger sell would be not having to put the adventure together.

[Macgreine]

Yea I'm allergic to paperwork I think. Its the least enjoyable part of the experience for me.

[Trenloe]

I think the bigger sell would be not having to put the adventure together.
Nothing much we can do about that - at the moment anyway... I'll be meeting a number of people involved in the organisation of PFS over the next couple of months, and with the new online VC we may see options opening up to us. Nothing concrete as yet...

[lachancery]

Nothing much we can do about that - at the moment anyway... I'll be meeting a number of people involved in the organisation of PFS over the next couple of months, and with the new online VC we may see options opening up to us. Nothing concrete as yet...
I'll gladly give quotes and testimonials on the detrimental impact of each GM having to prepare his own conversion to FG if that'd help. Heck, I'd even start a lobby group and get a petition going! :p

[Rose Claymore]

Having some help organizing a scenario for FG would be great! I'm still learning things, and have no real way to test if I've got it right unless I actually run a game. If I could just load a pre-prepped scenario with some notes on where to find what I need in it I could get in some experience running online. I have no doubt I'll be prepping my own games eventually, but having a step up would speed things up considerably.

[Trenloe]

I'll gladly give quotes and testimonials on the detrimental impact of each GM having to prepare his own conversion to FG if that'd help. Heck, I'd even start a lobby group and get a petition going! :p
I think everyone involved knows about this, so no need for quotes and testimonials. Hang off on the lobbying until we know the direction online VTTs support may go. But thanks for offering! :)


Having some help organizing a scenario for FG would be great! I'm still learning things, and have no real way to test if I've got it right unless I actually run a game. If I could just load a pre-prepped scenario with some notes on where to find what I need in it I could get in some experience running online. I have no doubt I'll be prepping my own games eventually, but having a step up would speed things up considerably.
In all honesty, I wouldn't hang out for anything like this in the short to medium term. We all know that it is a lot of work to get a PFS game ready in Fantasy Grounds. On a side note, I reckon it actually takes about the same amount of time for me to prepare for a face-to-face game, but I digress...

Without an agreement with Paizo to create and sell PFS scenario modules for FG, we are limited to only distributing the OGL content. Let's not beat around the bush here - Paizo are a commercial organisation and production of scenario modules would have to be tightly controlled both for quality and ordering/distribution. Creating a FG module that is commercial quality takes a lot longer than putting the basics together for running your own PFS scenario. So, even if there was an agreement with Paizo to create and sell PFS Scenario modules, I would expect only a trickle of modules available to buy and use.

Paizo are more open than quite a few companies to allowing a bit more than OGL stuff to be distributed for free - read their community use policy, but this still precludes creation and distribution of full modules needed to run a scenario: https://paizo.com/paizo/about/communityuse

So, at the moment we are left to distributing only what is covered by the OGL - basically the NPC statblocks, which we have done for a few scenarios here: https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?t=18726

[Blackfoot]

I'm not sure I see the advantage of a coordinator... is he going to handle issuing chronicles? The reporting to paizo is the simplest part and actually helps me with my chronicles... I generally tend to do it first so that I have all the numbers and so forth organized and in one place.

Thinking it through a bit more I guess I can see a coordinator possibly helping with:

Posting game announcements.
Following up with Players pregame to ensure all their info is up to date.
Keeping a Chronicle Archive so that previous chronicles are only required when players play a game outside the group.
Collect and Provide GMs with files and Chronicles all together in a timely fashion before the game.
Completing and Posting Chronicles after the game.
Acting as Advocate for Players and/or GMs with regards to whatever might come up.


If the coordinator handled the chronicles and the game schedule, all the GMs would be required to submit would be a list of who showed up, items purchased in game for each, money earned for each, fame earned by each, PP used by each, boons earned by each. The coordinator could handle any 'special boons chronicles' that might be on tap at Paizo..

This would be a fair amount of work but would make it quite easy on the GMs... especially novice ones... still thinking about this idea... will post more later.

[Trenloe]

This is all about primarily 2 things:

Getting regular PFS games running.
Taking some of the strain off GMs so that GMs run games more regularly or more GMs step up.

Yes, there would be a lot of work for the coordinator(s) but not much more than store coordinators do for face-to-face games now.


I'm not sure I see the advantage of a coordinator... is he going to handle issuing chronicles? The reporting to paizo is the simplest part and actually helps me with my chronicles... I generally tend to do it first so that I have all the numbers and so forth organized and in one place.
As mentioned in the first post, the intention is not to stop GMs doing ad-hoc games like we do now. If you're happy running games like you do now and do all the admin yourself then that is absolutely fine and I would encourage GMs to do that too. I was thinking that the coordinator might issue the chronicles as well - as a few GMs on the forums have stated their dislike of how we are managing the process for FG PFS chronicle sheets.

[Blackfoot]

My issue currently is that I've filled my 'regular' slots with other 'regular' games for the most part so I'm running a lot less PFS games. I'm not sure I have a regular time to play.. except maybe Sunday afternoons or maybe Saturday morning/afternoons... but not TOO regularly... or I'm dead meat. :)

[Trenloe]

My issue currently is that I've filled my 'regular' slots with other 'regular' games for the most part so I'm running a lot less PFS games. I'm not sure I have a regular time to play.. except maybe Sunday afternoons or maybe Saturday morning/afternoons... but not TOO regularly... or I'm dead meat. :)
The whole idea of getting regular slots each month is that people can play the odd game if they are available - but they know that there will be slots at X, Y and Z and so if they're interested can plan accordingly. I hope that this will grow and more new players/GMs will get involved.

This is exactly how face-to-face PFS is organised for the vast majority of games - there is a store/play location and a coordinator advertises the upcoming games, gets GMs and signs up players. Will this work for online games? I don't know, but I'd like to try it...

I'll be posting a call for GMs next week when I return from PaizoCon.

[hawkwind]

https://groups.google.com/forum/m/#!topic/pathfinder-society-online-collective/l7k4yTDgcHM

this may be of interest

[Trenloe]

First attempt at arranging a game and calling for a GM has gone out!

https://www.fantasygrounds.com/forums/showthread.php?p=152187