Pathfinder Second Edition - PFRPG2 Ruleset - Status, issues and ongoing development

[kaernunnos]

3) Also in skills, when it added "Lore - Legal" from Bounty Hunter, she only found "Lore" in skills.

When the edit button up top is pressed, there are 2 options. Add skill, and Add Lore. The lore one creates a lore skill with an editable line to specify which lore skill it is. I think there are close to 2 dozen or more lore skills possible, with more added in Hellknight Hill and likely each future adventure, as well as any the GM wants to add for their campaign, so hard coding each lore skill would reduce functionality.

Edit: re-reading I think you actually mean the background wasn't adding the proper Lore skill, my mistake.

[Trenloe]

Let me state what has been stated before. Fantasy Grounds is not a character creation application. It aids you in putting your character together, but it is not a replacement for knowing the rules and it most certainly is not a full blown character creation application. It never will be.

Having said that, the chargen tracker gives you guidance in what you should be doing - but you still need to do things manually. It helps you by indicating what to do manually in big red text with +++ at the beginning.

Sorry if this comes across as patronising, it's not meant to be but I *really* want to get across how the chargen tracker should be used and how it guides you in what you should be manually doing to create your character.

1) The Fighter Feat 1 created a little confusion. It said Feature 'Fighter Feat 1' added to Ravahana, but it didn't show up in the Abilities section. Seeing the actual Class Feature explaining when she gets the class feats would have been helpful, she thought.

Guidance is given in the big red entries in the chargen tracker. Anything that is big, red and starts with +++ means it's something *you* have to do to your character. Having something appear in the abilities section, like "1 class feat" that you then have to remove is basically double-entry - so that won't appear in your abilities. Follow the instructions in the chargen tracker.



And, very important, scroll back through the log in the lower window of the chargen tracker and look for all of the big red +++ entries - these are things you need to do.

2) This one is a little more difficult to fix, and I think others mentioned it, but the Skills section caused some problems. Not knowing which ones came from class and background made it a bit harder for her and a total count of skills might have been nice so she knew how many she had trained. So if she had seen, when it was time to choose 4 new ones, that she already had 4, she could shoot for 8 knowing that was her target number.

Keep track of the big red text with +++ at the beginning - this will tell you how many skills you get to train - see the example screenshot above.

3) Also in skills, when it added "Lore - Legal" from Bounty Hunter, she only found "Lore" in skills.

I can't recreate this. Adding (drag/drop) bounty hunter does this for me:



If this didn't appear to work for you, please attach the character XML - click the blue down arrow button in the top right of the chargen tracker to export the XML to a file - please attach that file to this thread so I can look at it. Thanks.

4) Finally, having been spoiled by 5E, having the Adventurer's pack "explode" into the individual pieces would have made it easier for her to determine if there were things she wanted beyond what that contained.

This has yet to be implemented. But has already been logged as CR2.007.

[ShadeRaven]

For starters... Don't get me wrong! I think the Tracker is a tremendous aid and it's inclusion is a great boon! You could quite literally say, "That's all I am doing on that, folks!", and it would already be an appreciated inclusion. There are other more critical things, for certain. That said, her comments to me and my reporting are intended only as an aid to understanding how our personal experiences with it are going for you to take or leave as you deem appropriate.

Yeah, I tried to work with her on making sure that the red text was done, but I think there's some spam of items that get added all at once and sometimes it's slips down through the cracks. Any chance the +++ Critical Interaction items could be added after the spam or maybe the automatic items are added in a separate box?

As far as the skills go, the main problem was that she wasn't sure what skills she was supposed to have, etc. Again, new player to PF having only started with D&D 5E. We backtracked to see what she got automatically so that when she was back at her skill screen, she knew how many she was supposed to add. I think she missed the initial add 4 (in her case), so when I told her she had some skills to add based on intelligence plus class base, she was a little lost.

I went back and reviewed post 3 (on this thread) and realized some of her concerns were covered there. Ooops.

[yarnevk]

How about I add in an option that is "Exploration mode activity (10 mins)" or some other wording?

210 uses of 10 mins in the CRB .pdf - most commonly

for (at least) (only)
spend(ing)
with
cast/duration/lasting
take(s)
every/per/upto

How about the simpler 'Take 10 mins' as a bit of play on words for the classic 'Take 10' skill check for routine easy tasks which is probably where it came from to begin with.

Sometimes you are resting in that 10 minutes, Second Wind ... 'you’re fatigued until you rest for 10 minutes'

[Bidmaron]

I would not like the 'Take 10 mins'. Those familiar with PF1 will say "Hey, there is no take 10 (or 20) in PF2" (Assurance took the place of Take 10). We need to be careful and keep the terminology of the game in mind. Maybe "Explore 10 min"?

[yarnevk]

But that is what you would say anyways though - 'You take a short rest' becomes 'You take 10 mins' and you then describe what is being done in that 10 minutes: exploring, resting, casting, fixing, concentrating, fidgeting while you wait for other party members....

I highly doubt anyone will confuse it for a Take 10 skill mechanic as long as it is spelled out as "Take 10 mins" which is already conventional language outside TTRPG to mean take a break doing something else. Your DM/GM probably says that when it is time for a bio break IRL. Google the phrase and you get several billion hits.

Actually nowhere is the phrase 'exploration activity' used with '10 mins' in the book. Rather exploration activities are instead longer than a round and shorter riskier than downtime they can be seconds, mins, hours, or days. There are some things that you can be doing that are described as taking 10 minutes, there are other things that are not.

[Trenloe]

It's not a rest and it's not taking 10. The request was to not remove the "short rest" functionality from the PF1 ruleset - which triggered a discussion as to what was needed instead, with PF2 functionality and terminology in mind. Hence it was decided that reducing the effect duration timer 10 minutes, as well as resetting the combat tracker initiative values and round counter, was the most useful.

I'm going to implement this as showing "+10 mins Exploration activity" for the tooltip on the radial menu, and the chat window will say "Party carries out Encounter mode activities for 10 minutes."

[yarnevk]

The party sheet XP encounter award is splitting XP, when each PC is supposed to get all the XP. Not knowing this is a legacy change will leave your party way under level.

pg507 "Encounters with adversaries and hazards grant a set amount of XP. When the group overcomes an encounter with creatures or hazards, each character gains XP equal to the total XP of the creatures and hazards in the encounter (this excludes XP adjustments for different party sizes; see Party Size on page 508 for details)."

Implementing it fully would require the encounter table to track the adjusted total used to balance for the party vs. the original total used to award the party without splitting/adjusting. But until then it could at least award the total XP from the encounter table rather than splitting, as adjusted parties can then adjust the XP needed to level amount.

There are several workarounds

Tedious manual way is on the PC Class&Level page do XP math as you would on a paper sheet.

Semi-automated way on the encounter table is multiply the XP by party size so that when the XP award gets split it is proper

Set it and forget it way - on the PC Class&Level page manually divide the XP needed by the party size. XP needed is a static amount per level so only need to adjust if the party size changes or if this award issue is later fixed.

For all three methods if you adjust the encounter do not refresh the XP.

[sciencephile]

For what it's worth, Fall of Plaguestone and Age of Ashes should be divvying out xp correctly (at least for a party of 4) as I entered experience awards as value * 4 so when it did split, it would come out correct.

[Bidmaron]

Assuming there are four PCs....