How Returning to Pathfinder 2 Feels After Three Years?
Playing one game for some time and returning to it after several years can be an interesting experience. With tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs), it is much more about people than mechanics for me.
I have a lot of experience with different TTRPGs. And recently returned to playing them regularly. And almost coincidentally chose the updated version of my most-played system.
How I started with Pathfinder Society
Explanatory Distraction
Pathfinder is one of the games that originated in Dungeons & Dragons 3.5e. It is, for the most part, about solving problems with might and magic and exploring ruins/dungeons. And the whole story about the main characters can be played for years.
That is why TTRPGs suffer from people’s schedule issues. You need to organize at least four people to have an opening in their schedule for at least four hours. And have this regularly for weeks and months. Which is not a big problem for most people in their teens and early career. And can strengthen friendships, like most of the regular group activities. But with more real-life responsibilities or sudden changes, the whole group can be easily torn away from sitting down every other evening to move board pieces and tell epic stories.
This is where oneshot games shine. You only need to gather for one game. You can run another oneshot with a different group. Some can stick around or can return on their free time. Another thing is the open table campaign, where there is no fixed group of characters, and you can skip several games and return with little additional paperwork.
And Pathfinder Organized Play (or Pathfinder Society, or PFS) has a good structure for playing oneshots in the same universe by different groups globally. Which is why I entered my local Society group while looking for new experiences.
Me and Pathfinder Society
Before 2020 and the whole COVID pandemic, Pathfinder Society was a big part of my schedule. Both offline and online, with a constant stream of new players to the hobby, I’ve actively GMed more than a hundred games. It was a great educator in preparing for games, pacing the game, and introducing new players to the nerdest hobby.
But after that, my activity focus changed. Part of it is the pandemic and the closure of offline meeting places. Part of it was a new job that demanded more time. And part of it was me being more active in other social activities.
The Interlude
I’ve continued playing and GMing occasionally, maybe twice a year. Mostly, it was with familiar players and GMs. The main reason for moving away from the hobby was the limited time and different time zones.
Also, I started to look at the preparation time needed for Pathfinder Society, and didn’t have enough to run a table for new players. With experienced players, I enjoyed playing different systems, where the stories are more about explaining spectacular failures than managing your resources while exploring a new dungeon. And the amount of PFS events also dropped with Paizo (the Pathfinder publisher and the main driver for events), and the whole tabletop industry is having financial troubles. That contributed to the difficulties with finding the time to play.
But the hobby was always a big part of me, and I always had a great time spending several hours with complete strangers discussing which spell is better for finishing this encounter quickly. Or delivering a good mystery/characters/story to seasoned players with much more experience.
The Return
I’ve cleared most of my schedule to prepare for the PFS games in May during the online event Bridging the Gap. I’ve almost jumped at the opportunity to run four or more games, but I settled for just two. And helping at HQ during the event (couldn’t resist taking more responsibility where I could).
Being away from PFS for a long period made me nervous with new tools for GMs I was not familiar with. Running the game in a non-native language only made it more awkward.
Yet again, it was a great time with complete strangers arguing about how to lure zombies away from the target. And decided it was better to give them the final rest. As a player, I got familiar with rolling dice to overcome challenges. As a GM felt welcomed back to a familiar group.
Saying that, I haven’t continued with PFS at the pace I had before. The scenarios need a lot of time to prepare for the first time (it is much easier to run the prepared scenario later, though). The whole bunch of rules and little details feels overwhelming to remember (but it is easier if you are constantly playing). And my main problem was that with those options, there are still the same character archetypes you can play with, just the basic rulebook. I didn’t feel the need to learn or try the new stuff as a player. And it was harder for me as a returning GM to run a game for new players where I didn’t remember some specifics for the pregenerated characters.
This post started my journey with personal blogging. And I couldn’t for the life of me do it without some kind of challenge. So this is the first in many to come as part of the #100DaysToOffload challenge.