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Covok
May 27, 2013

Yet where is that woman now? Tell me, in what heave does she reside? None of them. Because no God bothered to listen or care. If that is what you think it means to be a God, then you and all your teachings are welcome to do as that poor women did. And vanish from these realms forever.
This is a thread for discussing Paizo's new card game. The thread for discussing the Pathfinder Role Playing Game System can be found here.



Pathfinder the Adventure Card game is a new title from paizo publishing, creators of the role playing game of the same title. The game is a deck building game. It comes with an 500 cards, 7 characters, and a number of adventures for players to play. Players choose a character, make a deck, go on adventures, and levels-up. The game has planned post release support: adventure decks with added characters, items, spells, adventures, etc. are planned to release. The first Adventure deck has already been released.

Characters
The character, essentially a class, the player chooses decides how many of each type of card they can put in their starting deck. The cards that can put into deck can be categorized as weapon, spell, armor, item, ally or blessing cards.



As you can see, Ezern can put 1 weapon, 8 spells, 3 items, and 3 ally cards in his deck. All of these cards must have B in the upper right corner to be used in a starter deck.

Characters also have attribute statistics which are represented by dice. During checks, the appropriate dice are rolled.



As you can see from these cards, attributes can have traits. Valeros will always add 3 to his strength checks and 2 to his Charisma checks. Sometimes these traits can be required to interact with certain cards. Spell cards often can't be used by characters without the Arcane or Divine trait. Other times these traits can enhance a cards effect. Often armor cards can protect against a lot more damage if the character is proficient in certain types of armor.

As you can also see from these cards, each character has a list of different powers they can use on a check. Valeros can put a weapon card back into his deck rather than discarding it and Kyra adds 1d8 to checks against Undead.

The x-factor for this game are the empty boxes on the cards. Some have called this game a roleplaying without a GM. That's not really true and the game does bill itself as a "cooperative strategy card game," but one could see where one draws this train of thought: characters level up from adventure to adventure. While I wouldn't recommend writing on the cards themselves as Paizo has character sheets available online, boxes are checked off as the player gains feats. These feats can give flat bonuses to checks, increase the max hand size of the character, enhance powers, and increase the number of each type of card a player has in his deck. The last of which is very important as one's deck is their health points. Leveling-up allows players to try the tougher adventures included in the game.

Considering the fact a single adventure can take about an hour or so, the intent is for players to come back to the game with their seasoned characters.

So that was all characters, but how does one play the game?



Players pick an adventure card. On one side, it will say who the villain of the adventure and what minions he has. It will also say if there are any special rules for the scenario as well as say what the reward for completing the scenario is. On the other side, it will say what location cards are to be used based on the number of players. As you may notice from the above example of Black Fang's Dungeon, this game can be played with one person. If one person were playing black fang's dungeon, he would have to explore the Temple, the desecrated vault, and the shrine to Lamashtu during this scenario. If three players were present, they would also explore the throne room and Thassilonian dungeon. If 6 players were present, they would explore all the listed locations.



Location cards spell out how many of each type of card can be found at the location as well as give special effects that occur when at the location. They also give rules for closing a location. One closes a location to stop the villain from escaping. One closes a location by using fully exploring it and then rolling a check. One can also temporarily close a location if one of their teammates are in a different location fighting the villain. Locations give boons when permanently closed.

After creating the location decks, players randomly shuffle up the villain card and a number of henchmen equal to the number of locations. They then add these cards at the random to the location decks and then shuffle the location decks.

So that was still all set up, what is the gameplay like?

Players take turns exploring locations. They get one free exploration per turn: they flip a card from the location deck. They then have to respond to the flipped card. If its an item, spell, armor, ally, blessing, or weapons (boons), then they check to acquire the card. The difficulty is decided by the card itself. If its a monster or barrier, they check to get past it.



If the monster is the villain of the adventure, then it gets reshuffled into the locations deck after the encounter if he can escape. If you defeat him, you shuffle him into the locations deck with a number of blessing cards (number of open locations minus 1). If you lose to him, then you shuffle him into the locations with a number of blessing cards equal to the number of open locations. If he can't escape because there are no open locations, the players have won.

Players can move from location to location on their turn.

The players are on a timer. There is a collection of cards known as the blessing deck. Every turn, one card is drawn from the deck and put on the table. If the deck runs out, the adventure has failed. If all players die (run out of cards), the adventure has failed.

Players take damage when they fail to defeat a monster. They take damage equal to difference between their roll and the monster's difficulty. When damage is taken, players have to discard a number of cards from their hand equal to the damage. If you don't have enough cards in your hand to take the damage, discard them all and ignore the rest of the damage.

Well, the game sounds fun. Anything else I should know?

Despite the amount of time I spent explaining the set up, it doesn't take too long to set up. Its not immediate, but its not ridiculous either. I think it took me and my friends about 15 minutes to set up our first game. That's not including the time spent reading the rules for the first time, but you'll probably only do that once. The rules themselves are pretty intuitive and simple in play. Your first few turns might take a little while, but, once you get the feel for the game, it starts picking up pace. When we played a second time, we set up pretty fast and the game moved quickly.

Also, as I mentioned earlier, there are character sheets. They're nice to have if you are one of the people who view this as a "roleplaying game without a GM." I don't agree with the notion, but I did find it helpful to keep a list of my advancements and deck configuration.

If you're thinking of buying the game, I suggest Amazon. It's twenty dollars cheaper for a new title at the time of this writing. Never hurts to save a little.

If you want learn more about the rules, they are available for free download from Paizo's site and I have set them up so you can view without downloading.

Covok fucked around with this message at 22:20 on Sep 25, 2013

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Winson_Paine
Oct 27, 2000

Wait, something is wrong.
How much of an ache in the rear end is the deckbuilding? If like, four of us are brand new how long is it going to take for us to sort through our options?

Covok
May 27, 2013

Yet where is that woman now? Tell me, in what heave does she reside? None of them. Because no God bothered to listen or care. If that is what you think it means to be a God, then you and all your teachings are welcome to do as that poor women did. And vanish from these realms forever.

Winson_Paine posted:

How much of an ache in the rear end is the deckbuilding? If like, four of us are brand new how long is it going to take for us to sort through our options?

The rulebook comes with a list of recommended starter decks. You're best off starting with those. While I don't know the exact number of cards you can put in your starter deck (has a B in the upper right corner) in comparison to regular cards, there is probably a paralysis of choice if you start off trying to make a freeform deck on your first run through. I don't know for sure since we just used the recommended ones instead of making custom decks, but I imagine so since there are alot of cards. I should mention all characters only start with 15 cards.



The game box is good in keeping everything separated and organized. That does speed things up quite a bit. Every type of card is separated and put in its own slot. The box even comes with open slots to save character decks. Since you're supposed to develop your characters, being able to save your deck as-is is helpful. People who tend be messy with their board games will probably find this game becoming more annoying set up on subsequent playthroughs.



From personal experience, first time we played, it took us about six, seven minutes to pick our character decks (since we just used the pregens) and six minutes to set up the game world itself. It was pretty fast, but it is worth noting that one of us had played the game before at a con. I also imagine the time it takes to set up can go up if more people are playing. We only had three people, but it can go up to six people.

Also, talk about day one DLC. I just realized they have characters for their add-on in the rules for their base set. I didn't realize that the first time I read it.

Covok fucked around with this message at 02:46 on Sep 26, 2013

Penguin Patrol
Mar 3, 2005

by Fluffdaddy
I'd written this game off because it just looked too clunky and random, but I might have to change my mind because drat grrl you got some nice lookin' card organization you know how i like :fap:

Meepo
Jul 30, 2004

I've played this a couple times, first as a playtester and again after it was released. I'd say it's fun, but it doesn't seem to have as much replayability to it as it could. As you level up, your bonuses just become a +1 to this or a +1 more card in your hand or change a d4 to a d6, but none of it really seems like gamechanging abilities like you might get in a RPG. I'd honestly consider it somewhat like a card game version of Diablo, constantly regrinding the same dungeon to get better loot. That's not necessarily a bad thing, per se, but I feel like they could have done more to make each scenario feel different.

Covok
May 27, 2013

Yet where is that woman now? Tell me, in what heave does she reside? None of them. Because no God bothered to listen or care. If that is what you think it means to be a God, then you and all your teachings are welcome to do as that poor women did. And vanish from these realms forever.

Meepo posted:

I've played this a couple times, first as a playtester and again after it was released. I'd say it's fun, but it doesn't seem to have as much replayability to it as it could. As you level up, your bonuses just become a +1 to this or a +1 more card in your hand or change a d4 to a d6, but none of it really seems like gamechanging abilities like you might get in a RPG. I'd honestly consider it somewhat like a card game version of Diablo, constantly regrinding the same dungeon to get better loot. That's not necessarily a bad thing, per se, but I feel like they could have done more to make each scenario feel different.

You playtested the game? Any interesting stories? I remember there being a big hullabaloo over the pathfinder rpg playtest, wondering if the same stuff that pissed people off then happened with this one. I should mention I don't really know why people were pissed at pathfinder rpg playtest.

The low level curve helps out with how I plan on using the game. I attend a board gaming club every week. A game that has incentive to come back to -- level-up, get loot -- that new players can play with old players with little disparity seems like a good fit. If nothing else, it would just be nice to have a new game on the club shelf. Even if the game isn't as replayable as it could be, I don't think that will affect our members appetite for the game too much. I swear, every week there is atleast one battlestar galatica game, one cards against humanity game, and every year someone starts a pathfinder game.

To anyone who has played the add-on characters, are they broken by any chance? I can't help, but think that the monk (Sajan) is terrible and the Paladin (Seelah) is mad strong.

Heatwizard
Nov 6, 2009

Winson_Paine posted:

How much of an ache in the rear end is the deckbuilding? If like, four of us are brand new how long is it going to take for us to sort through our options?

One thing that I don't believe was mentioned is that of all the cards in the box that could potentially exist in your deck, only a specific subset is actually available to assemble your deck initially. Anything marked 'basic'; these are your plain short/long swords, your hired NPC burglar-types, crowbars, etc. I want to say these compose just under half of the potential cards, but I haven't actually counted. This stuff will go reasonably fast as you replace it with better grade stuff you find in the wild, although some things like crowbars and the other 'use your strength check in a rogue-y situation' were staples for my sorry Fighter rear end, especially in a team with a Sorcerer and a Cleric where I was the designated trapworker.

e: The 'suggested decks' in the back of the rulebook will get you through the first set of missions fine, although I have minor gripes about some of the selections. Mainly, they like to suggest allies for people that buff their already strong checks, but it became clear pretty quickly to me that things will go more smoothly if you diversify out; a guy who buffs Constitution checks is kind of redundant on the Fighter, when he could instead bring a guy who can help patch his godawful Wisdom and give him a chance to pass traps that call for Wisdom-based perception checks.

Heatwizard fucked around with this message at 08:10 on Sep 26, 2013

omnibobb
Dec 3, 2005
Title text'd
Combat:

Valeros has a d10 and +3 on melee checks. Does that mean he just has to beat Black Fangs 12 to beat him? Or am I missing monster HP somewhere?

Winson_Paine
Oct 27, 2000

Wait, something is wrong.
Is there any competition between players inherent in the game (i.e. is there a "winner" at the end) or is it pure co-op where we just need to collectively get to the end?

Melloran
Nov 3, 2004

omnibobb posted:

Combat:

Valeros has a d10 and +3 on melee checks. Does that mean he just has to beat Black Fangs 12 to beat him? Or am I missing monster HP somewhere?

This is correct. You just have to beat the Combat check of 12.


Winson_Paine posted:

Is there any competition between players inherent in the game (i.e. is there a "winner" at the end) or is it pure co-op where we just need to collectively get to the end?

The game is setup as a strictly co-op affair.

Melloran fucked around with this message at 15:05 on Sep 26, 2013

Covok
May 27, 2013

Yet where is that woman now? Tell me, in what heave does she reside? None of them. Because no God bothered to listen or care. If that is what you think it means to be a God, then you and all your teachings are welcome to do as that poor women did. And vanish from these realms forever.

omnibobb posted:

Combat:

Valeros has a d10 and +3 on melee checks. Does that mean he just has to beat Black Fangs 12 to beat him? Or am I missing monster HP somewhere?

You're right that you only have to beat a 12. However, villains escape if the other locations are not closed. If you fail to defeat him, he gets shuffled back into the other location decks with a few of the blessing deck's cards. Since the blessing deck is your timer, you just lost a few turns. That still happens if you defeat him and locations are open, but the cards are taken from the box instead of the blessing's deck and the location he is in is immediately closed without any additional checks.

Henchmen, like the ancient skeletons, do not escape. Beating them will also close the location they are in.

If there are no open locations when you defeat a villain, he is dead for good.

If your allies are in other locations when you're fighting a villain, they can temporarily close the location to stop him from escaping.

Covok fucked around with this message at 16:07 on Sep 26, 2013

malkav11
Aug 7, 2009

Covok posted:


Henchmen, like the ancient skeletons, do not escape. Beating them will also close the location they are in.

Beating them will give you the option of immediately attempting to close the location they are in. It's not mandatory, nor is it automatically successful unless the location specifies that attempts to close it autosucceed.

Sometimes you might want to skip the attempt, either because you want cards further down in that location deck, or because you don't want to pay the cost associated with closing right then. (So far it's mostly been checks in my experience, but sometimes you have to dump or even return cards to the box.)

omnibobb
Dec 3, 2005
Title text'd
One a complexity scale, how does this game rate?

My wife is good with the game Smash Up! but assumes everything else is way above what she wants to get into. I think the theme of the game lulled her into a false sense of security.

She was vaguely interested in a real RPG, but when I started describing how to really play in detail she was out.

Dr. Doji Suave
Dec 31, 2004

The game is pretty easy to pick up and learn, and is definitely a fun little game. :) I would say it is only a tad more complicated than Smash Up! and that is mainly because of the persistent decks and leveling.

I can't wait until the mats are available from Ultra Pro.

omnibobb
Dec 3, 2005
Title text'd

Dr. Doji Suave posted:

The game is pretty easy to pick up and learn, and is definitely a fun little game. :) I would say it is only a tad more complicated than Smash Up! and that is mainly because of the persistent decks and leveling.

I can't wait until the mats are available from Ultra Pro.

Mats? Link that poo poo, holmes.

edit: http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2q1b2?Announcing-Ultra-PRO-play-mats-for-the-PACG

Uggh, just like every game I gotsta buy everything for it and will rarely to never play it.

omnibobb fucked around with this message at 13:51 on Sep 27, 2013

Angrymog
Jan 30, 2012

Really Madcats

I'd like some blanks for custom characters, monsters and adventures.

That's one of its failings compared to the D&D board games - less customisability of game, even as you have more customisation in terms of your playing piece.

Covok
May 27, 2013

Yet where is that woman now? Tell me, in what heave does she reside? None of them. Because no God bothered to listen or care. If that is what you think it means to be a God, then you and all your teachings are welcome to do as that poor women did. And vanish from these realms forever.

Angrymog posted:

I'd like some blanks for custom characters, monsters and adventures.

That's one of its failings compared to the D&D board games - less customisability of game, even as you have more customisation in terms of your playing piece.

Custom Characters? That's a pretty cool idea. I mean, I suppose it wouldn't be too hard to make one since you just have to decide how to divide 15 cards among 6 categories of cards, assign 6 dice, and come up with two powers. The hardest thing would be the dice.'

Gropey C
Feb 26, 2004

Groping one generation at a time
I've been playing a lot of this and I will say that there is some replayability there, especially if you like other character mechanics. The characters do change as you level up and once you've completed most of the first adventure pack you will feel more powerful then when you started, but that's almost 5 sessions deep. Considering they're coming out with an adventure path (110 cards) every month this does have some viable options to carry on.

For the record I think the monk is broken as poo poo because he can recharge (place on the bottom of your draw deck) of any blessings used in combat and you can use as many as you want. I was routinely going for 2d10 + 1d4 + 2 on almost every combat, I can only imagine what it would be like after I was able to replace the blessings in my deck with better blessings. The other thing to account for is helping other people in combat, something the ranger excels at, giving other people a good bonus to try and finish off tough combat.

I REALLY like this game and so did everyone else I played with, but I also did a story narrative for each card played...

omnibobb
Dec 3, 2005
Title text'd
So you flipped a card and were like "and then a skeleton jumped out!"?

Rutibex
Sep 9, 2001

by Fluffdaddy

Angrymog posted:

I'd like some blanks for custom characters, monsters and adventures.

That's one of its failings compared to the D&D board games - less customisability of game, even as you have more customisation in terms of your playing piece.

I just bought this today and I'm quite excited; I've always thought cards where perfect for a more structured D&D type game. The box is of particular interest to me; there is a lot of room for extra cards and as I have just checked the rows are wide enough for sleeved cards. This means you can put all of your cards in sleeves (I've already done this :v:) and you can make custom cards easily by putting a normal playing card into a sleeve and printing a card face to slip in.

I've already started on templates for Magic Set Editor, as a DM there is no way I can play this without making new cards.

malkav11
Aug 7, 2009
Just remember that a lot of that space is so that you can fit the cards from the next five adventures.

Rutibex
Sep 9, 2001

by Fluffdaddy

malkav11 posted:

Just remember that a lot of that space is so that you can fit the cards from the next five adventures.

Yeah with the basic set and the first two expansions it's getting a little tight with the sleeves on. I don't think I'm going to be putting the expansions back in their boxes once I get them so I am appropriating the area for the empty expansion boxes to hold additional cards. You can get quite a few in that big recess.

Meepo posted:

I've played this a couple times, first as a playtester and again after it was released. I'd say it's fun, but it doesn't seem to have as much replayability to it as it could. As you level up, your bonuses just become a +1 to this or a +1 more card in your hand or change a d4 to a d6, but none of it really seems like gamechanging abilities like you might get in a RPG. I'd honestly consider it somewhat like a card game version of Diablo, constantly regrinding the same dungeon to get better loot. That's not necessarily a bad thing, per se, but I feel like they could have done more to make each scenario feel different.

This just might be wild speculation on my part but I think the complexity of the cards may increase in the higher level sets. They are going for a D&D type feel here; and low level D&D basically is Diablo. Character complexity grows exponentially with levels in D&D so the 6th set may be quite challenging. The card engine is perfectly capable of much more complex MtG style effects they would just need smaller text

Rutibex fucked around with this message at 03:18 on Oct 13, 2013

Radio Talmudist
Sep 29, 2008
Someone explained this game to me as a sort of dungeon crawler in card form. Is that accurate?

Diosamblet
Oct 9, 2004

Me and my shadow
Well, I've learned my lesson with the Bard. He seems like everything will be OK, combat-wise, but as soon as he actually loses a combat using the suggested deck, he's screwed. Only bringing one weapon into the scenario means once he's taken some damage and discarded it, he's stuck with a d4 in combat until it either gets cured back into his deck and then drawn, or he stumbles onto/a friend tosses him a weapon which he can swap with the sling in his discard (that power is amazing).
I've swapped in Inflict for him, since it has a nice low recharge threshold, so he has some alternative.
Other than that he was interesting to play, since between his class power, spells, and blessings, he's frequently getting involved in other people's turns.

Rutibex
Sep 9, 2001

by Fluffdaddy

Diosamblet posted:

Well, I've learned my lesson with the Bard. He seems like everything will be OK, combat-wise, but as soon as he actually loses a combat using the suggested deck, he's screwed. Only bringing one weapon into the scenario means once he's taken some damage and discarded it, he's stuck with a d4 in combat until it either gets cured back into his deck and then drawn, or he stumbles onto/a friend tosses him a weapon which he can swap with the sling in his discard (that power is amazing).
I've swapped in Inflict for him, since it has a nice low recharge threshold, so he has some alternative.
Other than that he was interesting to play, since between his class power, spells, and blessings, he's frequently getting involved in other people's turns.

I adore the Bard. They really managed to make the whole concept of "jack of all trade, master of none" fit perfectly. He can do almost anything anyone else can do, but only occasionally or not as well. The way they manage to put D&D mechanics into card form is always impressive to me.

I recently got the second expansion set and am waiting on Wednesday to try it out. Lots of interesting cards it should be fun. I sleeved all my cards in anticipation of making my own and have made up some template in Magic Set Editor. They don't look exactly right but they blend in well enough with the normal cards to not create too much of a contrast. Wizards of the Coast has all the art from their 3.5 books up on their web site, it blends well with the pathfinder art and is pretty perfect for making cards:

Set File:
http://www.mediafire.com/?xygm52hur5kqwpa

D&D art:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/arch/ag






Radio Talmudist posted:

Someone explained this game to me as a sort of dungeon crawler in card form. Is that accurate?

This is exactly what it is. Kind of Like Munchkin but with multiple dungeon decks for different areas.

Rutibex fucked around with this message at 19:27 on Nov 9, 2013

Rutibex
Sep 9, 2001

by Fluffdaddy
Anyone else looking to make custom cards I have found template someone has made for adventure, scenario, location, villain and henchman cards in Photoshop (as well as some scenarios he made with them). All the card types I was missing and hard to make in Magic Set Editor:

http://jrd.eu5.org/pacg/pacg.html

Stelas
Sep 6, 2010


Thank you for reminding me that the Magic Set Editor exists. I've been looking for ways to coax this into Vassal or work out how to do a thread game of it, and that would be perfect for actually making up the card images in lieu of finding a scanner and scanning a billion cards in.

Korlac
Nov 16, 2006

A quintessential being known throughout the Realm as the 'Dungeon Master'. :rolldice:
Apparently the game is doing well enough for them to create a second game off another Adventure Path.

quote:

PAIZO ANNOUNCES PATHFINDER ADVENTURE CARD GAME: SKULL & SHACKLES

Follow-Up to the Acclaimed New Card Game Slated for August 2014 Release

New Cover Art by Daryl Mandryk Debuted

REDMOND, WA (November 18, 2013): Paizo Publishing, LLC, leading publisher of fantasy roleplaying games, novels, game accessories and board games, announces today Pathfinder Adventure Card Game: Skull & Shackles will be the follow-up to 2013's wildly popular Pathfinder Adventure Card Game: Rise of the Runelords. The game goes into private playtest in December, and is scheduled for release at Gen Con Indy, August 2014.

The Pathfinder Adventure Card Game: Skull & Shackles Base Set is based on and features the characters, locations, monsters, and villains from the pirate-themed Pathfinder RPG Adventure Path: Skull & Shackles, and offers seven character classes – including four all-new ones (Magus, Oracle, Gunslinger, and Swashbuckler) for players to choose from. The game will come packaged in a 13" x 14" box, featuring brand-new cover art from artist Daryl Mandryk, as well as dice, nearly 500 illustrated cards, and everything one to four players need to create characters and begin their adventures. The Skull & Shackles Character Add-On Deck expands the maximum number of players to six, and adds four more character classes, including three all-new ones (Alchemist, Warpriest, Witch). Players can expand their game play with monthly Skull & Shackles Adventure Decks containing 110 cards featuring new scenarios, villains, loot, weapons, items, and more.

Subscribers to the PACG receive 20% off the MSRP ($59.99 for the base set, $19.99 for the Character Add-On Deck and monthly Adventure Decks), as well as discounts on UltraPro PACG playmats and accessories.

The Pathfinder Adventure Card Game (PACG), created by Mike Selinker and Lone Shark Games, translates the world's best-selling Pathfinder Roleplaying Game (RPG) into an entirely new breed of card game, where players adventure, battle monsters and villains, and acquire new feats, items, weapons, and allies – all without a Game Master. The first game, PACG: Rise of the Runelords, made its debut at Gen Con Indy 2013, where it sold out in the first four hours, and has been receiving rave reviews from players, press, and the hobby game industry...

Rutibex
Sep 9, 2001

by Fluffdaddy

Korlac posted:

Apparently the game is doing well enough for them to create a second game off another Adventure Path.

This is excellent, I hope they try and keep the basic cards somewhat different than Rise of the Rune lords so that the two sets can be mixed. I don't know if I would want an entire new base set if it had to be played independently.

malkav11
Aug 7, 2009

Rutibex posted:

This is excellent, I hope they try and keep the basic cards somewhat different than Rise of the Rune lords so that the two sets can be mixed. I don't know if I would want an entire new base set if it had to be played independently.

It's definitely going to have some different characters and the two sets will be compatible, mechanically speaking. There's no telling at this point how many basic weapons/spells/items/etc they might have to repeat for a new independent base set, though.

medchem
Oct 11, 2012

It looks like there's a version of this on OCTGN:

http://octgn.gamersjudgement.com/wordpress/pathfinder/

I haven't had a chance to try it out yet.

medchem
Oct 11, 2012

I finally got the OCTGN version installed after having to mess around with updating .NET Framework. I noticed the module doesn't have all the information on the cards, so you either have to have the physical cards on hand or you need to scan each card and replace the default images with your scans. Having to constantly look up the card information is inefficient, so I think scanning is the best option. Has anyone already done this? Would anyone be interested in pitching in on this? The author of the module said his scans are at 200 dpi (about 500 x 700 pixels).

malkav11
Aug 7, 2009
Generally that sort of thing is done to avoid cease and desists by making sure you have to have your physical copy on hand to play. I don't suppose anyone could fault you for scanning your own copy and playing with those, but distributing them would essentially be :filez:.

medchem
Oct 11, 2012

malkav11 posted:

Generally that sort of thing is done to avoid cease and desists by making sure you have to have your physical copy on hand to play. I don't suppose anyone could fault you for scanning your own copy and playing with those, but distributing them would essentially be :filez:.

In lieu of :filez:, it would still be better if we had something like what was posted above just because we wouldn't have to constantly look up cards:

Stelas
Sep 6, 2010

medchem posted:

In lieu of :filez:, it would still be better if we had something like what was posted above just because we wouldn't have to constantly look up cards:



I've been doing something like this in my off time. I think I got the base set done? I can check later on and let you know.

Stelas
Sep 6, 2010



Looks like I'd done all the base set armors, barriers, henchmen, scenarios, villains, monsters, locations. Weapons, items, spells and allies to go.

Gravy Train Robber
Sep 15, 2007

by zen death robot
How does this compare with other co-op adventure card games like the LOTR LCG?

PlotDevice
Oct 10, 2007

*For the Ghost Who Flies Through Space
My group has been playing this quite a bit as a lightweight alternative to times when work makes me too busy to come up with an actual session to DM (or I'm lazy) and it's fun as heck. The character building between missions is really fun and you do get attached to your dude and his deck. The other great thing is it's super easy to drop people in and out if you have a group like mine where people are randomly busy some sessions because you can always just give them a base deck and then a few random draws from more advanced stuff and poof they're up to speed.

Also having tested this on people that have no idea wtf pathfinder or even roleplaying is it's fairly friendly for total newbies. You have to get past the hump of the scary odd dice but after that it's easy.

Fat Samurai
Feb 16, 2011

To go quickly is foolish. To go slowly is prudent. Not to go; that is wisdom.

Gravy Train Robber posted:

How does this compare with other co-op adventure card games like the LOTR LCG?

I have played LOTR only a couple of times, so take this with a grain of salt.

- There is no (ok, some) deckbuilding in Pathfinder. You start with only 15 cards and the game gives you few options for customization: Each character class can pick up a set number (5 or less) of “basic” cards of each type. Also, some of the cards are objectively better than others (i.e. Heavy Armor is better than Light Armor if you are proficient with it), so most of your deck comes pre-built. At the end of each game, most of the cards you've picked up during the adventure will be clearly better or worse than what you have, so there is usually an easy choice about what to discard for the next adventure. Most of the flexibility comes from choosing the spells and items your character has, because there is more variety there, so your non magic user warrior is going to be very similar to every other warrior.

- Pathfinder is easier, or at least there are less ways to screw yourself. Heroes are more durable and you can probably shrug off a couple of bad rolls. Healing is commonplace. According to the rules a total party wipeout means you lose all progress, so this is not a bad thing.

- In bigger groups, your loses in Pathfinder will come from the clock running out, rather than the death of characters.

- LOTR is more tightly "scripted", with most of enemies appearing in each scenario being thematically appropriate for it. In Pathfinder, you may find the Mayor of a Sandpoint (an Ally card) hanging around the fortress of the monster of the week, just because that location was dealt one random ally during setup. Or maybe a dragon is attacking a rundown farm. Or the villain is getting drunk in the local tavern, enjoying an IPA. We have house ruled that a non-active player is the GM, reveals the encounter and gives an appropriate hook for it. It helps with the suspension of disbelief.

- The power and difficulty curve in Pathfinder is just right. You generally end up finding enough loot to remain competitive, even if it's randomly generated. There is also a feeling of character progression that LOTR doesn't have. It’s probably the main appeal of the game.

- Pathfinder adapts better to more players, because there are ways to help the active character with spells, blessings, shooting arrows from another location or what have you. There is less dead time.

- There is way more shuffling in Pathfinder, and the set-up is more cumbersome. It doesn't become annoying (more than 5 minutes) unless you're playing solo with 4+ characters.

- There is a planned end for Pathfinder. After 6 adventures (around 30-ish scenarios), you’ll have finished the Rise of the Runelords campaign. The first adventure is included in the basic box, rest are add-ons. Paizo is preparing a different basic box, with a new campaign, but we don't know whether you'll be able to use the old one and buy only the adventure cards.

- I'm not sure how easy is to create your own scenarios in LOTR, in Pathfinder is very easy. Just deal 3-8 locations, draw random cards and you are set.

tl;dr: Pathfinder is easier, lighter and more random. The appeal of the game is watching your character grow, not creating an efficient deck.

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Rutibex
Sep 9, 2001

by Fluffdaddy

Fat Samurai posted:

tl;dr: Pathfinder is easier, lighter and more random. The appeal of the game is watching your character grow, not creating an efficient deck.
This doesn't have to be the case. I have been playing around with a different way to play Pathfinder and make it more of a strategic competitive deck builder then the coop game it is. Basically it works like this: play it like Thunderstone. I just set up the Thunderstone board with the stacks of 10 random face up Pathfinder cards by category (with blessings and armor in the Longspears and Torches slots). The Dungeon deck consists of 20 Monster cards and 10 Barriers shuffled together with Villains and some minions shuffled to the bottom.

Each person picks an adventurer and gets a deck of 8 Blessings of the Gods. Play consists of two steps. You draw up to your hand size; Then in succession you go to the town and then the dungeon and try to acquire one card from each. You must go to each on your turn. If you acquire an item from the town (as you normally would) it goes into your hand. If you beat a monster or barrier it also goes into your hand. Monsters and Barriers in your hand can be used as Blessings of the Gods (blessings can be used to go again in both the dungeon and town). Players do not have their own discard piles. Buried and recharged cards go to the bottom of the deck and discarded and banished cards go to the common discard pile on the table (as well as any cards failed to be acquired from the town). Healing is done from this common pile.

You may attack any face up monster in the dungeon but they have penalty's for being deep in the dungeon. The closest to the deck is +6, the second is +4 and the one on the end is +2. You may not go further into the dungeon than a face up barrier. If there is a barrier in the +2 slot you must encounter it. Each time a monster is beaten the others move up and a new one is drawn in the +6 slot. After you have beaten the monster you recharge your entire hand, shuffle your cards and draw up to your maximum hand size again. Your hand does not carry through you will have a new set of cards each turn. If you can not draw enough cards you lose. For the purposes of card mechanics every character is effectively at the same location; so cards that effect everyone at a location always effects everyone.

The object is to get the most victory points by the end of the game. The game ends and you count score when then Villain is defeated. Everyone loses if the Villain reaches level one of the dungeon. To figure out how many victory points you have simply count up the cards in your deck at the end of the game. Each card is worth the highest number on it that it used to acquire it. Monsters will be worth the most, with basic equipment being worth a few points. Blessings of the Gods are worth no victory points so trade these up as soon as possible!

Edit:
I almost forgot the XP system! Thunderstone comes with a set of 5 different coloured beads but you can use anything (coins, or trains from Ticket to Ride would be good). Each time a monster/barrier is put down a random coloured bead is pulled from the bag and put on it. Each time the monster/barrier moves up a level another bead is put on it it. Every time someone loses to it another bead is put on it. Whoever defeats it gets the "Experience" in addition to the Monster/Barrier card itself. You can cash in two beads of the same colour to check one box on your character card for the rest of the game. You can cash in three bead of the same colour to check off three boxes for the rest of the game.


Rutibex fucked around with this message at 22:48 on Jan 14, 2014

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