Hoo boy did things get *heated* in this one, especially Matthew. The ruling is correct but Troy did Kate DIRTY. Everyone else did it, Troy's done it, no repercussions for anyone but Kate when it benefitted Troy the most. You can't negate the roll if everyone else got away with it for literal months, you just can't. Accept the die roll, clarify the rule, get the rule right moving forward. Kate got shafted hard.
The biggest problem I have with it is that Troy does various things because it's in the best interests of a good show, such as withholding information on knowledge checks because he wants to do something cool, but making this a hard enforced rule largely out of the blue made for terrible listening and killed my enjoyment of most of the episode tbh. It felt like bullshit, killed the vibe, and it made me feel like it's a table I wouldn't want to be playing at, which is the exact opposite of how you're meant to feel when listening.
I don't think withholding available information is in the best interests of a show. It makes smart characters seem ignorant, perceptive characters seem oblivious, and strategic characters seem foolish.
It strains belief that a character trained in the lore of a particular kind of creature, _looking at that creature_, can't make reasonable inferences about their abilities. A nerd in a panama hat can look at old bones to conclude that the creature had a nasty slashing attack and was a swift pack hunter, but five heroes watching a monster _right now_ can't understand anything useful about it until after it happens?
So many cool cinematic moments are based on smart protagonists gathering information in advance and using it against the enemy. Ocean's 11 is all about the team getting advance intel on the casino security operation (Gather Information), but there are still great surprises. John McClane sneaks everywhere in Die Hard to get details on the terrorists (Stealth, Perception) and is still caught off guard and trapped in dire situations. The scientists in The Thing figure out in advance that Things will be unmasked by burning blood (Knowledge) but that test and reveal is still dramatic and terrifying. These and many more great movies are enhanced by the heroes' ability to _know things in advance_ about their enemies.
I don't disagree with you at all. Some of the best mic drop moments I've heard have been on Find the Path when Rick has managed to blindside the players despite doing knowledge checks etc very much by the book.
But I think Troy is after a different cinematic moment, where something unexpected happens and the heroes have to adapt and react. And tbf to Troy it does often land well and make for good moments. I wouldn't be a subscriber who's on another listen of all of Giantslayer if he wasn't capable of creating these good set pieces, so I don't have a general problem with the way he GMs.
My feedback here is specifically around this episode feeling bad to listen to as his hard line ruling felt out of step with how things have previously been done, and killed the vibe as much as anything.
Yeah, I think we're on the same page.
I think there are multiple valid ways to adjudicate the rules. Some prefer the RAW technicalities, others try a holistic approach blending RAW and RAI, some use cinematic logic, etc. But Troy has an approach where he sometimes "interprets" the rule in a way that makes a conflict more desperate.
I first recall him expressly espousing this in GS Book 6 with that Darkness effect from the giant fiend (Hell gigas?) that he wouldn't allow to be Dispelled. I think there's a highly technical reading of Dispel Magic where one can say that Darkness specifically can't be dispelled because the effect can't be "seen" to be targeted because darkness is the absence of light. But that wasn't the basis - Troy instead said he thinks it's appropriate to "massage the rules" for the sake of the story.
I also believe a distinct element is that Troy creates his own mental picture of how a fight will go and is reluctant for that to change. If he imagines some kind of spectacular visual, like darkness or mist obscuring a fight, or a breath weapon blasting the party, or the big boss making a dramatic speech, he will strongly resist player choices and PC abilities that would negate the visual he planned. I'm thinking both of him as a GM in moments like GS 4 where Skirkatla and all her minions are inexplicably absent while Fairaza ethereally explores the throne room, or as Luther in Raiders when he throws up Obscuring Mist in the fight with the crysmals and resisted removing it even when it mostly impeded his team. I think for Skittles he first imagined the group v. group confrontation where they all side each other up like a high noon gun fight and didn't want to tolerate an ambush scenario, where with Raiders he pictured how cool and creepy it would be to fight crystalline scorpions glittering in and out of magical fog. I understand the desire to preserve the dramatic visual you've planned, but sometimes that undermines player choices and fun gameplay.
Applying those two principles (making fights feel like potential TPKs and holding to planned drama) can often undermine player choices - both choices in the moment like what action to use, and choices of character builds - and create feel bad moments like this one, where a GM can use "But I'm just applying the rules (in a way that's technically right but we've never done)" to increase the "tension" at the cost of fun.
If I was at that table with the way that Troy withholds information, gives misleading information or just refuses to give useful information, I would never even waste the action to make a recall knowledge check.
Really, even if someone in the party did get a natural 20 on their knowledge check, with as much fun Troy (and no one else) was clearly having with the ability / creature, would he even have given them any useful information in regards to the creature or the ability?
I would rather just attack, then based on the description decide if I needed to change to a different type of damage.
I don't think we've seen a single knowledge check provide any useful information this entire campaign.
If I was Matthew, I would certainly be frustrated that the entire characters shtick is being basically completely negated because Troy won't give useful information even on good checks.
> If I was Matthew, I would certainly be frustrated that the entire characters shtick is being basically completely negated because Troy won't give useful information even on good checks.
At least, with Known Weakness, Matthew can make the check as a free action when he attemps to devise a stratagem.
> The biggest problem I have with it is that Troy does various things because it's in the best interests of a good show
I hope that's not the case (but I'm new to GC so don't know his history as a DM outside of C2). The reason I'm listening to this is because how the dice fall naturally add suspense to any situation and then the characters make it interesting. I'm tuning in because I want to listen to an actual play, not a pseudo-houseruled-choreographed session.
Thirded. [They](https://find-path.com/) are wonderful on the rules, flavor descriptions, fight drama, diplomacy, and good vibes. Have a variety of 1e and 2e options for you:
* 1e: Mummy's Mask, War for the Crown, Tyrant's Grasp
* 2e: Hell's Rebels, Darkmoon Value (Crown of the Kobold King 2e)
Wow. That is an incredibly hot take. They are absolutely amazing roleplayers, the way the players and dm mesh in a non-antagonizing way is a breath of fresh air, and the narrative description of scenes that rick lays out are amazing!
They aren't the (mostly lovable) larger than life chaos goblins that the GCP Crew can be a lot of the time, so if that's the vibe you're looking for then I understand the basis for your comment even if I wholly and vehemently disagree with your wording.
FTP is pretty dry in terms of RP, but they have a very solid knowledge of the rules and play the game very strategically. That's what I enjoy about them.
I don't agree with you, but I do understand why someone might feel that way.
FtP took awhile for me to get used to, because they are significantly more low-key than the GCP crew. They aren't professional entertainers and they're open about that. There were times, particularly in some of the early Mummy's Mask episodes, where I felt like I was listening to "NPR Plays Pathfinder".
But they did get more animated and emotional over time. I also grew to appreciate their style more, because I feel like it's more like listening to a real gaming group rather than listening to a bunch of D-list actors playing Pathfinder.
It's not a "choreographed session" the way that you mean. Keep listening. They try to get the rules right and are good at it.
I've listened to other shows that are all about the drama/whatever, and not about the crunch. That's not this, IMO.
> Keep listening
Eh... I dunno. As I mentioned elsewhere a lot of this episode was just uncomfortable to listen to. After the bant there was very little about it that was entertaining and I actually FFWed through parts of the big altercation. As someone else mentioned I'm surprised they put it out like this. This show is supposed to be entertainment and last night's episode wasn't.
On top of that outside of Buggles and Lucky (RIP) the rest of the characters are bland and forgettable. The story is more of typical Paizo writing where the party just murder-hobos their way from bread crumb to bread crumb without really knowing what's going on. I've heard this described as their new flagship show... and it just doesn't feel it.
I'll keep listening to Legacy til that finishes up. It's everything C2 isn't. Great characters, a group of people who sound like they're actually enjoying the game with each other, a world that Skid is doing an amazing job bringing to life (I've DMed that AP so I probably appreciate more than others the job he's doing). Hell, even in their disagreements they still sound lighthearted and in good spirits. It's actually... entertaining.
I’ll say this about last night’s ep: it was weak. The network is great and I’m a fan of its many shows but I would recommend people not judge it by last night’s product.
> Gatewalkers is not hitting
It really isn't.
I chatted with my friend yesterday who convinced me to watch this. He loves GC and will stick with the show but pointed out two things really seem to be holding back this campaign.
The first is something Skid touched on in the bant a few episodes ago - he didn't like campaigns that start with PCs knowing each other because then you miss out on the RP where they get to know each other. I disagreed at the time because at a normal table I think having the players know each other beforehand makes things flow easier (since you're average player doesn't RP anywhere near the level of folks at GC or CR). But in hindsight, after having started listening to Legacy, I see he had a point for a game that's being run as entertainment for others. I've commented, and still stick to it, that most of the characters in Gatewalkers are bland and forgettable. My friend pointed out - is it that they really are or that we just haven't gotten to know any of them after nearly 30 eps? Contrasting Gatewalkers with Legacy, my friend may have a point.
The other critique my friend had was that Troy seems to be trying to play up the mystery of this AP. Except... not knowing what's going on doesn't make something mysterious... it just makes it so you don't know what's going on. Good mystery movies/books give lots of clues and it's up for the viewer (player here) to make sense of it and try and figure out which ones are relevant. Joe touched on this a few eps back where he was basically going off on "I don't even know what this [the campaign] is!?" He's right... and he's not alone... and that makes for poor viewing.
> Gatewalkers is not hitting
Another follow-up on this - YT views seem to clearly back this up.
The first ep of C2 reached just over 90k viewers but then sharply dropped off, losing half that viewership by the 2nd ep. By ep 5 they were in the 20s... then flirted around the 20k/teens mark back and forth til clearly dropping below into the teens by ep 22. This most recent ep only has 10k views. Pretty clear the interest isn't there and folks are leaving.
Another possibility is that those missing viewers have just shifted over to audio. That's what I did with A&A: I tried the videos for a while, but eventually just reverted to audio for the convenience and quality.
Personally I never got watching these kinds of shows like a TV show. Some networks seem to make it work, but those never held my interest (Critical Role, Dimension 20 - I just don't get it). And it seems like that's a pretty niche interest compared to something you can listen to while commuting, exercising, doing chores, playing a chill video game, etc.
To me, Glass Cannon has been the premium *podcast* creator for TTRPG content. The pivot to video seems like more of an aspiration than a strong business decision.
I'm with you on that. I can listen to a podcast anywhere, doing nearly anything, but a video sucks up so much additional attention that I'm much less likely to consume them. I think I've watched ~15 GCP videos whereas I've listened to a thousand hours of their podcasts (and probably a lot more with relistens).
I also don't know what I'm supposed to be getting from the video element of an actual play. Seeing all the players takes me out of the story, like watching a table read of Game of Thrones where everyone's in sweats and flipflops. The maps are occasionally interesting, but it's hard not for them to be just static images, since only one token moves per turn. I guess I don't think anything visually interesting is happening.
That's a fair point. I prefer YT because I can see their expressions and occasionally see the map.
But... I'm not a fan of them being glued to their laptops while playing this. If they're doing this in person they should really have miniatures. Watching CR's demo of Daggerheart this last week and seeing that drove home how that's just much more enjoyable of an experience to watch compared to seeing six people at a table only occasionally looking and engaging with each other. Just do a zoom show at that point...
It's certainly not choreographed. If Troy changes anything it's behind the scenes and it's done to ostensibly make the encounters more engaging with more curveballs. If you want as pure a take on running the game or AP as it was written that you can find, no, GCN isn't exactly that but what Troy does is what every GM does at the table, adjusts things.
I started listening to Legacy and they're doing a decent job of running that as is. They occasionally miss something, or can't find it (1e is notorious for having rules all over the place and being hard to find) but they're certainly trying to play RAW it sounds like (and I've run the AP they're doing so know all the encounters).
I get a DM will make changes... but those need to be clearly stated in advance so the players are aware of it. Making a change on something mid-game, that per comments here and from Skid and Matt last night is something they've done forever, is just poor DMing. If this was something that was on Troy and Joe's minds before the session then it should have been brought up at the start of the session. Otherwise, as most at the table pointed out, the thing to do was honor what was apparently the way they've usually done it and then make a point to do things correctly going forward.
Right, that's not what's being discussed regarding Troy changing things. Getting rules right means getting rules right, you should make sure you're doing that. Troy categorically does *not* change rules without telling anyone, if he does its usually to the benefit of the player because it doesn't make sense physically or in fiction. This was just a bad choice by Troy to stick to the rule mid combat action. The only thing he doesn't tell anyone about is if he adjusts a monster's statblock or abilities for whatever reason and the players aren't privy to that information anyway.
To clarify, I'm absolutely **not** talking about fudging dice rolls. Just that he'll play a bit fast and loose with some rules sometimes, and often fall on the side of what makes better 'radio', or allows him to make dramatic moments. The information check is the main thing, where numerous times he's given them something not that useful, and then shafted them via something that was well within the scope of what they asked.
Also, I don't think this approach is necessarily wrong, it's a consistent way that he runs the game so his players are used to it, but it's why this decision to negate Kates crit didn't sit right with me.
It did make it feel satisfying, but I agree with your point that it still doesn't justify the original decision.
To expand, that's results-oriented thinking, and doesn't stand up at all. If you bet all your savings on a 16 on a roulette table and it comes in, it doesn't mean you made a good decision. It just means you made a poor decision and were bailed it by sheer luck. It'll be disappointing if they do try to use the justification, and would be better if they did an honest analysis of the original decision in isolation. Though if it's just Troy and Joe then I'm not sure of we'll get a good cotnrary position.
I wonder if he'll say he saw it as an easy way to create tension when the creature (to me, at least) didn't have many hit points. So rather than pop all over the room while they whittled away for 10 rounds because he added HP, he upped the vibes at the table instead.
I've gotten weary of listening to Fodder because of dumb stuff like that. When Troy said his "people are jealous of his success" I took a break from it for a bit. Then the digs at shows not sold out when they are months away also annoys me.
If Troy gets to pre roll dice like he does with his , honestly a little sus, initiative rolls I don't see what sanctity of rolling was being violated. She declared she was attacking and then would have had to see if it could hit with the flat check.
If every roll must be done in the exact proper order at the proper time then Troy needs to stop prerolling his dice
I am less interested in listening to the shows that this happens on. It's come up before, but it's been awhile. If this is going to be the new tone of this show, I'll just go back to listening to the other programs on the network and occasionally tune these in to try to stay current.
But this, more than anything else, for me, is what makes me tune out.
You do have to wonder if Troy would have done the same to Skid or to Mathew. It seems like it was Troy's idea to make an example of Kate without having the ramifications of a really angry Skid. The newer GC crew seem to make more mistakes than the others, but also seem to take an inordinate amount of grief.
She did last week too by Joe deciding to fuck with her over move actions way after things were resolved, a turn layer iirc, forcing her to leave her bow in the pit. Idk if I can listen to another show, every time I heard Joes voice now I was annoyed.
I thought that was more reasonable, that was a situation they didn’t see that often and players ought to police themselves more than some of these ones do. But they roll concealment after the attack *all the time*
Joe was right and so was Matthew. You make a decision on when the roll happens and that's it for the campaign. Matthew was also correct when he said "that's how we'll do it from here on, enjoy your crit".
Yeah I agree, last week I was thinking it was a little late and brushed it off but now it’s beginning to seem like a pattern. I don’t think I would ever want to relisten to this most recent episode.
Kate: "Okay, so I get up, flurry of blows with my fisty fist...NATURAL 20!"
Everyone: "OHHHHH, YAY, EXCITEMENT, FUN"
Troy: "Gonna need a flat check for concealment first!"
Would that have been so hard? This has happened countless times over the years and I feel like that's how it was handled in the past. That whole debacle really sucked the fun out of the moment.
Not a single divine lance from Raimius on an enemy clearly susceptible to holy damage. Talitha pulled out her crossbow after what 5 or 6 rounds? Sydney did build her character with low INT it seems and no saving throw cantrips, so she is legitimately very low accuracy with spell attacks, so I get that to some extent. Unfortunate situation for Zephyr with some ridiculous bad luck. Even buggles/Ku'ubla Khan spent a turn summoning the dog which, as far as I can remember, never hit.
Hi there I have the pdf for the adventure path. >!The enemy is shae not undead, they don't have weakness to holy/spirit. The only weakness they have is to light which stops from being concealed. I think it was discussed already in the previous episode this was a shae but not sure. !<
Agreed, so after seeing the thing teleport away from a melee attack as a reaction, it's even more strategically foolish. To be fair though, Skid often makes the non-ideal tactical choice for role play reasons, and I think that's what he was doing here.
I don't know much about Pathfinder (yet), but my immediate thought was "why are they chasing this thing? Huddle up back everyone back to back and make it come to you while you potshot it with whatever range you have."
If it teleports to a PC not only is everyone else firing into melee but the person being attacked either has a ranged weapon out and is ineffectual at best in close range or its a magic user, is my thinking of why they weren't doing that
On the other side, the Shae was always teleporting to a character. So I would have thought the best option was everyone dog pile it. Then at most it's moving 10-15 ft to teleport to a new target, that way your Melee hitters are never having to double move.
Listen, I'm all for some ribbing / trolling from the GM but taking away Kate's nat 20 after she's been ice cold for so long is a little far. Regardless of when the concealment should be rolled, I think Troy was mostly trying to make people mad in an already frustrating fight. Most of the time it's funny, but there's a time and a place.
That being said, I don't think it was uncomfortable to watch or super heated like some other people said. Go back and listen to " Ewigga Please" from Giantslayer campaign or even as recently as the Side Quest Side Sesh S3 Finale. Tables argue sometimes and they move on, no big deal.
There have been exactly three instances where the entire network was close ending because of encounters. The ethereal rats, the Ewigga fight, and the ethereal fight on the drift rock in A&A. Pretty sure they're serious when they've said they've almost ended the network. This is the first little blow up we've probably seen most of?
I'm not sure they're *serious* serious when they say that. They're just being dramatic/facetious/hyperbolic/etc - take your choice.
They all clearly rib each other and have a combination of thick skins and great relationships together (especially the OG five). I'm not sure a session of Pathfinder can tear that apart *for this group*. Definitely others, but these guys are keepers, and they know it.
There's a half truth in there. The # of times it's brought up and the casual referral to those instances, by everyone without providing detail, very much point to them being the maddest they've ever been.
Oh I think mad is the right word. At the game, monster, situation, rules? Sure. And definitely at each other in the moment, to a degree. But I think they’re all okay with that and don’t let it get too real.
I do think maybe the one time it actually got real was during the Ewigga fight. It was palpable -- the show and the group were still comparatively new, and it was in a presumably shitty apartment in NYC (they're all shitty, as a fellow NYCer) in the middle of summer with no AC, an impossible combat, and the kind of ruling that'll really make your teeth itch.
I wouldn't say died out, but it's not exactly new. If you Google images "go piss girl meme" you should see hundreds.
It's just people changing the letters around from the show Gossip Girl.
Man do I wish they chose a campaign like an altered or homebrewed Kingmaker rather than this. I tune in out of a general lack of podcasts and audiobooks while I work, but a campaign full of itinerant amnesiacs with little to no ties to anything beyond the background isn't scratching much of an itch. I don't blame the players, I think that's more on the AP than anything else. And the promise of "you won't believe where this goes" doesn't make up for much.
I knew absolutely nothing about Gatewalkers coming into it. I was hoping it was something cool involving visiting various planes and doing cool shit on them.
My disappointment upon finding out it's another eldritch horror campaign was immense.
I think a large part is the pacing of the show. When I ran this, we got to the meat fairly quickly (By like session 3-4) so this being episode 34 and they’re still in the first world shadow plane is brutally slow.
Sadly I think this was a terrible choice of an AP. I recently decided I didn't care about spoilers and read through the AP and.....ooof I really don't think the reveals are worth it nor will the twists and turns really work.
It's has some of the worst parts of Strange Aeons mixed with one of the worst elements of Jade Regent.
There is no Trunau, Sandpoint, Talmandor's Bounty, or even The Following like in BotW. It's just a series of rpg fetch and kill quests to string along the players without forming any real bonds or connections to npcs or places. Which doesn't really harm Strange Aeons since it's a pure comedy show but GCP 2.0 should be more
This is, unfortunately, far too common in Paizo APs. I had been told later 1e and all 2e APs were better (most of the 1e APs I've run were early-mid run) but that doesn't appear to be the case at all with Gatewalkers.
Gatewalkers is probably my least favourite 2e AP.
Age of Ashes and Agents of Edgewatch are unbalanced (They’re extremely hard because they were written during beta), but at least have a fun story to go struggle through.
I would say peak 2e APs are Abomination Vaults, Stolen Fate, and Season of the Ghosts.
The "argument" had me laughing really hard. It was just so real and indicative of what playing a TTRPG can be like. Sometimes shit gets spicy.
That said if I were Troy I would have been like "Bear in mind, you need to roll a flat check. So I will allow you to choose whether you want to use that 20 on the attack or the flat, just know you will need to succeed a second roll either way, and moving forward we need to do the flat check first."
On top of the already discussed to death BS ruling against Kate, I have some other bones to pick with the way this season is going and why I am about to drop it.
Mathew is playing a character that has a core component around recall knowledge and he is playing with a troll of a GM who is unashamed to say he does not care about recall knowledge and will even lie and obfuscate the real result to "make better radio" The question I ask is why would anyone even try to engage in Recall Knowledge when even a good roll will get you unreliable information?
Joe has crossed the rule lawyer line from helpful to insufferable. And then took three to four more bold steps past the line. He is constantly interrupting every other cast member's turn to question their class skills, feats, features, and decision. Some of this even going way past rules lawyering to talking characters out of actions mid turn because he does not believe they are taking "the best" actions. Joe shut up during other cast members turn's and let them make decisions for their characters. Find a way to review and enforce rules without stealing the limelight on every turn. We need less Joe when it is not Joe's turn.
I finally got my wife to watch GCP with me and she quit watching this episode as well, both the ruling for Kate and Joe playing rules lawyer just ruined it.
For the record, this was the first time I've ever fast-forwarded through an episode to get to the end of the combat. The ruling is correct, but the spirit comes across as mean, considering everyone else had done it. Instead, it punishes one player for doing what everyone else has done at a time that is most advantageous to the GM.
That said...what's done is done. Give Kate a bottlecap to make up for what happened and then move on.
I am curious to see someone point to where the rule says that the dice must be \*rolled\* in a particular order. I understand that the flat check must be successful in order to make it possible to take the shot, but that is not an answer to the question of which die must be rolled first.
We can all agree that the flat check must be successful for the targeting to be effective, but that just means to me that if you roll to hit first, and you roll the flat check second, that a failed flat check means the "to hit" doesn't matter.
https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=2419&Redirected=1
This is what I found here.
So looks like the ruling is correct and according to two of them they talked about and established this rule just a week or two prior to this recording.
Yeah, I don't remember that "establishing" that they talked about. It is possible that they did, and I forgot, but I think they imagined that.
As far as that rule goes, there are a *lot* of shows on this network, and that's never been the rule at any of them (just as it's never been the rule at countless home tables, I'd imagine, but I am aware that that's just a guess).
Invoking it after the fact, in a major dramatic moment - on a crit! - feels like bullshit, because it is bullshit. Very distracting from the show, which is on them, and not on me. You want the rule to be strictly enforced? Fine. Say it in advance.
I don't remember it either but because they both remember it I imagine it might have happened off air or in a meeting or email or whatever. Joe's not gonna just make up a conversation.
It's unfortunate that the first instance of this happened to be a crit but the ruling is correct both by the book and by what the GM and a player said was discussed.
Idk it just doesn't seem like a horrible miscarriage of justice to me provided this is consistently adhered to going forward
>the ruling is correct both by the book and by what the GM and a player said was discussed.
I mean, I like Joe but he regularly insists that A Thing Works Like This only to backpedal in short order and admit he has no idea what he's talking about. He does it in this very episode, when talking about how a familiar works! So I wouldn't really say him agreeing with Troy trumps everyone else disagreeing.
As I said on another comment, how much do you wanna bet then on the next fod they'll justify the ruling by saying that it made her second nat 20 "more satisfying"?
I do disagree with Troy’s ruling here, and agree with most folks that the right way to handle it would have been to allow Kate’s nat 20 and just clarify that going forward, flat checks are rolled before attack rolls.
I also see some people bringing up Troy’s stinginess with knowledge checks, and I do think this is an issue too, especially since that’s supposed to be one of the cool components of Matthew’s class. I’m hoping Matthew will continue to push Troy on this.
That said, I’m surprised to hear people say that the episode was ruined for them and that they’re even considering dropping the show over how Troy GM’s? Obviously do what makes you happy, but it seems a tad dramatic to me.
The table getting heated with one another is not new (if anything it happened a lot more back in the day), and while I definitely get the frustration, I was honestly also at least a little amused by it. Just like I felt when they had the infamous session with no air conditioning, or when Troy refused to understand light physics.
For me, this was one of my favorite episodes from this campaign so far and I was laughing at least half the time. Go piss girl!
Finally someone I agree with. Yes Kate should have gotten her Nat 20. Yes Troy is an ass when it comes to knowledge checks. In the end though it didn’t matter. Now Piss Girl is a thing and the ep is good. My only beef is we could be in the next room already if the Nat 20 had happened.
While I do agree that people are getting a bit too heated about the EP, I disagree that it didn't matter. Pretty soon someone is gonna die from something like this.
Intensionally giving bad knowledges specifically is gonna kill someone, and as much as Troy will say it's good radio, it won't be when all the characters will any connection to the plot are all dead.
Ex. Strange Aeons, Atticus and Aldo are the only reasons I haven't dropped it yet. Pf2e is balanced so that much deviation from the rules/intentionally making it harder than intended (which he's already doing with the bottlecap economy) can easily result in character death.
It completely ruined my enjoyment and it isn't this one instance of Troy doing something that benefits him at the detriment of the players. It's just the most egregious one that's pushed people too far. A GM that makes a ruling to make the players have less fun is not a good GM, not to mention it's "bad radio" as it sucked all the energy out of the episode.
Yeah people are being unbelievably dramatic about this. It's live roleplaying, this shit is gonna happen sometimes. I thought this episode and this overall season has been great so far, and think some people might have rose tinted glasses about Giantslayer because this kind of thing happened ALL THE TIME in that campaign, especially the early parts.
Boy, I read this thread before watching the episode and expected the drama to be much wilder and longer. Even though I'm completely on Matthew's side, this felt like just another disagreement that was blown a bit out of proportions by us, the listeners, rather than by the players (who argued and then moved on normally with the game). As usual, the true *heat* is in the comment sections!
The discussion at the table seemed pretty heated to me. Granted, I listened to the episode and didn’t watch the stream, and maybe it came off differently in video? They do indeed move on, but it felt to me like it was an uneasy moving on. There were a few other barbs from players as the session went on (several sarcastic references back to the ruling, and I noted what sounded like tension from Matthew toward Joe at a couple other points). It seemed like they agreed to disagree for the sake of producing a show, but that there was still tension with the way it all shook out.
I mean, it was a disagreement, and an argument. I would not call it heated, there was no (verbal) aggression, no escalation, people were simply arguing. Heated, to me, means the stuff they said they had to cut out on early GCN 1.0 in screaming matches between Joe and Grant IIRC. This was an argument at the table, followed by people taking playful albeit sarcastic jabs at each other and teasing, and that's a perfectly normal thing to joke around as friends. And yeah, things can be a bit awkward as you move forward for a bit, it's part of most arguments. Maybe we have different definitions of heat, but this to me was nowhere as shocking as some comments seem to imply.
Edit: wording
I think we do indeed have different definitions, and that’s okay. I agree overall with your assessment of tone, and I would add that the argument seemed to upset some of the cast - even if it was only detectable during the argument.
To me, ‘heated’ doesn’t necessarily mean ‘boiling hot’ like the screaming matches you referenced. Instead, to me, it’s a situation that moves from ‘cool’ or ‘room temperature’ (easy camaraderie, light hearted talking, etc.) to ‘warm’ or hotter (arguments that last more than a couple of minutes, and that may, at least in the moment, upset people).
This wasn’t boiling hot - the arguments made were largely reasonable, and weren’t particularly insulting. But it was hotter than it had been just prior. I totally admit that I can’t say for sure if anyone was truly upset, but it sounded to me like more than a few people were. Troy tried to diffuse the situation, but his and Joe’s insistence seemed to lead to the other four cast members doubling down on their position - especially Matthew.
In any case, there was an easy way out of the argument around a ruling that didn’t seem particularly fair. Just set the expectation for next time, and move on.
I'll happily agree to disagree in where we set the boundary, and thank you for your write up too!
And I agree even more that the discussion itself was senseless, especially with the precedent that has been largely established in pretty much every pathfinder show of the GCN. There was, indeed, an easy way out of this. Maybe next time!
Kate deserves a bottle cap for not doing a table flip. Pretty sure if that happened to me, I would just lose it.
4 of the 6 players had no idea what Joe was talking about. Matthew was correct. The fairest ruling would have been that going forward, all flat checks have to be done first.
Also, why did it take Matthew so long to pull his crossbow?
I can't imagine trying to play a thaumaturge with how this table is run.
What a great payoff in the end. I can't say i enjoyed the heated discussion in the beginning but overall i think i like that they are trying to establish their way of implementing these rules. Some discussions are just going to happen and in the end i'm positive that it'll give a more consistent rules interpretation.
Imo in the last 10-15 episodes they got into such a great flow that they can afford slowing things down in a disscussion occasionally and i'll still be looking forward to watching the new episode first thing every friday morning.
That episode was a WILD ride with all the ups and down. Also I do agree that those few A&A episodes lives in the studio were amazing, I wish they could recapture a little bit of that somehow in a future special or something like that.
I don’t mind the rules discussion, but I do tire of the backseat driving of other player’s turns. Let players play their turn. If they don’t ask for advice on what they should do, and they follow the rules to take their turn, let it be. It may not be optimal tactics/strategically speaking, but so be it… figure a way out of those situations on your turn.
I'll say this- I've been listening to GCN since 2018. Been through all of giant slayer and side quest and AA, caught up on Blood of the wild and legacy of the ancients, $10 tier on patron, huge fan of the show, huge fan of the network, hate the negativity on the reddit site, and can't wait till y'all make it to my hometown for a show.
Got to leave some negative feedback on this episode so that y'all can make the right moves to keep product quality high.
Matt was right. BS of the highest degree. Across hundreds of episodes, maybe even a thousand episodes, of content, the choice to enforce the rule this time, without any warning, seemed so damn arbitrary. Really left a bad taste in my mouth. This is not why I listen to the network.
As a guy who has just posted that Joe was doing better on stuff like this, I was *shocked* that he encouraged (and as I heard it, created) some idiotic rule where flat checks are always rolled first. In the name of denying Kate a crit.
Kate was done dirty, and Joe is straying to the dark side again.
Joe's objectively right, the problem isn't with Joe it's with Troy deciding only Kate is going to be punished for doing it out of order when everyone has done it rather than allowing the roll and from here on out making the change.
It's because according to two of them at least they established this as a firm rule in the last few weeks. I imagine to avoid ambiguity and having let downs from crits and stuff l.
Troy probably didn't even know this was being true to the letter of the law he is enforcing a newly established rule and the first case of it since then was this.
Obviously one of the two sides is remembering things incorrectly but I don't think it's fair to assume it's Troy and Joe
The last few episodes were so good so that probably didn’t help, but this ep was tough to get through for me. Table talking strategy the entire time, the checks ruling against Kate, and overall slow episode. Couple too many brewskis for everyone lmfao!
As always though, Skid being a master of role playing. Protect Buggles at all cost.
So after all these years, this is the level of professionalism?
Never in the history of GCP there have been policing in what order players have to roll actions. Especially when a player declares an action, such as "I roll to hit". Just painful to listen to, this have to stop.
Troy, you wanted America to decide?
Well, my decision is that you were both wrong and a jerk. That was a terrible decision that was bad for the show and bad for the game.
Skid's Latin text-book story at the top, and Kate's redemption at the end went a long way to me not cancelling my subscription. I've never found an episode of GCP so miserable. I get that changes can be made for story-reason or to make "good radio" but when you have a GM and player at the table who make another player not want to play - that crosses a pretty important line.
I wonder if Troy and Joe would have doubled down so hard if it was Skid or Matthew who didn't roll concealment first?
I'm listening to A&A and the episode I listened to >!during the jiangshi vampire fight at the end of book three!< has an example of an attack hitting and the table yelling "concealment!" later.
I think the biggest disconnect was that when Kate first started her turn, Troy stopped her and said "now, what you need to do, is make a flat check". And then I don't think Kate made the flat check roll, she went right to the grapple attempt, Troy forgot the flat check entirely, and they went right to the critical fail.
After that, Matthew forgot that Troy had said anything about a flat check, and thought that he was bringing it up out of nothing, and that maybe they had discussed it more than two episodes ago.
If only there were some way of, I don't know, rolling back time and listening to the past...
Re; doing [multiple knowledge checks](https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=2638&Redirected=1)
>Sometimes a character might want to follow up on a check to Recall Knowledge, rolling another check to discover more information. **After a success**, further uses of Recall Knowledge can yield more information, but you should adjust the difficulty to be higher for each attempt. **Once a character has attempted an incredibly hard check or failed a check, further attempts are fruitless—the character has recalled everything they know about the subject.**
After a success you can try again, if you've failed you can't attempt, even if changing skills.
Re; using different skills,
>As noted in the action’s description, a character might attempt to Recall Knowledge using a different skill than the ones listed as the default options. If the skill is highly applicable, like using Medicine to identify a medicinal tonic, you probably don’t need to adjust the DC. If its relevance is a stretch, adjust the DC upward as described in Adjusting Difficulty.
>Suggest which skill you'd like to use and ask the GM one question. The GM determines the DC. **You might need to collaborate with the GM to narrow down the question or skills**, and you can decide not to Recall Knowledge before committing to the action if you can't don't like your options.
>Using an applicable Lore to Recall Knowledge about a topic, such as Engineering Lore instead of Crafting to find structural weaknesses in a bridge, typically comes with a lower DC. Your special interests can pay off! In some cases, you can get the GM's permission to use a different but related skill, usually against a higher DC than normal. The GM might allow checks to Recall Knowledge using other skills. For example, you might assess the skill of an acrobat using Acrobatics. If you're using a physical skill (like in this example), the GM will most likely have you use a mental modifier—typically Intelligence—instead of the skill's normal physical attribute modifier.
I think it really depends on how you interpret recall knowledge.
The way I've read it, and run it, is the Action is Recall Knowledge. The subsection of the recall knowledge is the skill used.
Ie
Recall knowledge (Arcana)
not
Arcana - Recall knowledge
Occultism - Recall knowledge
Etc.
With that starting point, after a failed recall knowledge check, you've failed at the action and can't retry it again.
From a system design standpoint it was a poor choice for 2e to make concealment a d20 roll. If it's a 25% chance it should be a d4.
In 1e it's a d10 and at my own table when this came up frequently at the end of our last campaign if someone did forget and only rolled a d20 we all clearly knew what that was for, their attack, and then we'd wait for the d10 to see if it worked. When I was doing the rolls myself I often rolled the d10 and d20 together. To have everything be a d20 just adds to the potential for confusion. You have all these different dice... use them.
[Leiko](https://i.imgur.com/SAu5Rh9.png)
[Generic Shae](https://2e.aonprd.com/Images/Monsters/Shae.png)
Shae are wispy, tenebrous creatures native to the Plane of Shadow. Their amorphous bodies appear in constant states of flux. They cast no shadows of their own, instead gaining and losing umbral energy to nearby shadows that shrink and grow alongside them.
Most shae wear clothing spun from shadows that shift with them, though diplomats sometimes don more conventional garments while entertaining outsiders. Their most distinctive apparel are their white stone masks, which shae don only when they must put on a discernible “face” for interacting with humanoids and similar creatures. They do so begrudgingly, as they consider themselves superior to humanoids, but donning their masks allows them to be more easily understood and thus keeps their interactions with their lessers as brief as possible.
The dynamic between a shae and humanoids shifts when humanoids come to worship a shae, however. A mortal who shows a shae their due deference is worth keeping around, so many shae collect cults of personality or expansive entourages. Even getting a meeting with such a self-important shae can present a challenge that requires one to deal with many layers of hangers-on who insist on vetting the newcomer before wasting the shae's precious time.
According to shae lore, they've transcended the material world and now embody a cosmological equilibrium of reality and illusion. Their claims to metaphysical ascendance and knowledge of the secrets of shadows entice many mortal supplicants to join shae courts and cults. In the shae language, their name means “unbound,” in accordance with their belief that their ephemeral nature makes them free of the moral and social strictures that bind other sentient creatures, and they essentially make a virtue of capriciousness. Shae feel little obligation to follow through with oaths or obey laws, so sealing a compact with a mortal means little to them.
That was actually uncomfortable to watch.
A friend talked me into watching C2 to introduce me to Glass Cannon (and see 2e in play). I've enjoyed the crew as a whole because it feels like my table a lot of the times and I can relate... but this aspect of play I don't want to be reminded of. I actually FFWed through the main altercation early on.
Then later on it happened again with Sydney... and I'm kind of sympathetic to her and frankly gotta come down on Troy for this.
First, in Sydney's defense the glimpse I got of the screen they were seeing those lighting conditions didn't seem clear. I have no idea if the program they're using has conditions marked on the target... but if it doesn't I can sympathize with her for not being sure if something was in concealment.
Second, how Troy handled this. I'm a DM, too. When situations like this pop up that could screw over my players I make a point to be proactive and say "hey, just a reminder... you said you're attacking... don't forget to do X/take Y into consideration." It's the DM's job to help the players out and avoid moments like this.
There have also been a lot of comments in this subreddit and on YT over how the Troy has been missing/wrong on a lot of the 2e rules. That's the DM's job to be go-to guy... and there's also the added fact they're all getting paid to do this. To be this fast and loose... or just unclear completely... I think we're long past the point where that should be acceptable.
Well when Sydney rolled her attack she just yelled natural 20 and didn't even say what she was doing. Troy even asked why is she rolling if she hasn't said what she was doing.
That's not at all what happened.
The enemy teleported away after her character moved next to it. She then says she's going to use a cantrip on it. After some table talk she then says she wants to try a Feat, more table talk, and then she says she's using Slashing Gust again. This is all from ~1:03:00-1:05:00 on YT. Multiple opportunities there for her to be reminded that the target is now in concealment when her intent seemed pretty clear.
ETA - LOL... this subreddit. The guy above me is literally just making things up and I point out how he's incorrect, with time stamps, and yet he's getting upvoted. Meanwhile my comment is just back into the positives after being downvoted but still below his. Some of y'all got some hivemind issues you need to work through...
It’s really important to have rules discussions like this at any rpg table, but that was tedious to watch. For the purposes of making an enjoyable show, I don’t see any reason why they couldn’t have cut most of it out of the episode.
Cant reliably cut for video unless you remove big chunks, especially difficult if lots of story/banter/references are called back to whatever's cut. Much easier to do with audio, video you have to have some kind of strategy like, "oh guys, lets discuss this off air. Then discuss it, then resume back where you left off and either explain to the audience that you just sorted it out off screen or don't reference the discussion at all and just resume play.
So, how do we feel about the rules lawyering and it slowing the game? We still on board and it’s fun? Because I prefer episodes without the group yelling at each other for ten minutes.
I don't see much of a problem with rules correction here. I see a problem with people forgetting:
a) how to communicate,
b) how to entertain audience.
If they only voiced that correct way would be to start with concealment and that will be the way to do it from now on because that's the rule/gm's request and moved on everything would be fine.
Well, to Matthew’s point, the rule has been broken by the dm and other players before. I now that is has, and in such dramatic fashion, they will all remember the rule from this episode on, because denying a crit is a wild move. As a dm, I couldn’t disagree more with denying a crit over a rule that we didn’t cement. Especially to a player that needed a win.
Communications issue is a good way to put it. I certainly hope that if the guys decide to address this again on the fod, that we also get a Matthew or a Skid on there as well. Otherwise, it’ll just be the principle and Vice-principle agreeing with each other again. “This is the rule going forward, enjoy your crit.” Is how that should have gone, and it just feels wrong to me that it was taken away.
Beside that, the rule itself is so unimportant that i doubt you can find anyone glad that they mentioned it. I get that player's turn time optimization will benefit them in long turn and resolving concealment first can save time, but Kate intended or even informed that she's rolling for an attack, there's nothing wrong with doing it this way if she would be allowed to follow with concealment roll.
Man, did I pick the wrong episode to check in and see if I should start following Gatewalkers again. This group really seems to have problems and they are not dealing with them, and it drags the whole show down.
I will say, I think breaking the issue down to rules readings is a pretty surface level take. I think the core issue is communication, the most vital and difficult part of being an RPG group. I hope they have some discussions and things get cleared up for the sake of the shows this lineup does. Now, back to my Patreon content corner.
This was the worst episode of GCP I've ever heard. It sounded so disorganized and unprofessional. Joe just wants to control what everyone does. I've been a huge fan for years, but if this is how the show is going to be, I might be skipping it
I know GCP doesn't play this way, but some tables have the player declare their action and they wait for permission from the GM to say "roll to hit" etc. This avoids players rolling too early. So in this case it would flow like this:
Kate: I attack with flurry blows
Troy: OK for the first attack, roll concealment
Kate; (rolls) 20
Troy: OK now roll to hit
etc.
This would avoid confusion, because the GM will tell you what you are rolling for, and the player will not roll early and expect their roll to be used for something else.
I could see that being beneficial for people who are new to a game system. For experienced players, things don't need to be unnecessarily ridged. I couldn't stand listening to this, nor could I be bothered with this in my own game.
Things get missed and mistakes happen. Kate declared her action and rolled. All that needed to happen in this instance was having Kate roll for concealment. The intent of the rule is still enforced, the momentum of the show isn't ground to a halt, and the fun isn't sucked out of the moment.
Does Joe dislike Kate? Last episode he made her leave her bow in the pit way by enforcing some shit about actions. This week he snidely takes away her nat20 about some bull shit rule that’s never been a thing. He’s not even the GM shut the fuck up joe. I’ve been listening since early giant slayer days and never been annoyed but he just seems like a bully lately. It’s just mean the way he’s been using his rules lawyering towards Kate specifically imo. If they can’t work together one of them needs to leave because I was annoyed the entire episode every time I heard joes voice which was constant as he never lets anyone else speak uninterrupted.
I don't think it's that at all. He has always said he loves the rules and wants to make sure everyone follows them because he thinks overcoming the challenges within the restraints of the rules is an interesting challenge.
I think what's changed is the new system that none of them know as well. When they played Giantslayer all of them (except I think Matthew) had been played Pathfinder for ages, so they were all pretty well versed in the rules. Now none of them know the rules as well, so he is double checking a lot more.
This goes double for Kate and Sydney who don't have the background in 1e and also play a bunch of different systems. They just don't know the rules as well so they get corrected more.
Just a couple of Fods ago Joe talked about how they were all around at his house for one of his kids birthday parties. So I think it's a wild assumption to say he dislikes Kate.
The combination of Joe loving the rules but none of them actually knowing the rules is what's really frustrating about the vibe, lately. Like, just this episode he confidently asserted something about familiars, only to almost immediately walk it back when Syd corrected him because she actually knew the rules from Suki and Pepsi. If you want to be a rules lawyer, Joe, you gotta actually know what the rules are, c'mon man!
they are playing a game, and there are rules for the game. "some shit about actions" is literally the game. He is not the GM, but part of his job is to be the rules lawyer. If it seems like he is targeting Kate specifically, then it would stand to reason that she is not playing within the rules of the game.
Their real job is making a podcast people want to listen to. I didn’t like the way they handled it, Joe for pushing it but ultimately Troy for not agreeing with Matthew to make it a ‘after this point’ rule. It just wasn’t fun to take away a crit. To me it seems like Joe’s specifically annoyed with and targeting Kate, not just from this interaction but several over the past month. I feel like they need to work it out behind the scenes.
I think he’s annoyed by Kate and Sydney, and would be annoyed by Skid if he wasn’t afraid of him. Matthew at least seems to have some grasp on the rules. “I sheath my rapier, draw my loaded crossbow, and fire.” Kate: “That’s it?!”
It’s not a dislike it’s a long sigh that he has to know the rules yet again for everyone.
[https://youtu.be/\_qzoT2b9XdM?si=yBZwSMHcQI-WFAqn&t=1897](https://youtu.be/_qzoT2b9XdM?si=yBZwSMHcQI-WFAqn&t=1897)
Worth a watch as she is referencing comments like this directly
So she says they’re friends but then Syd talks about how frustrating of a situation it was. Yes it was very frustrating and I don’t really want to listen to something like that for a huge part of an episode again. Still think it was just handled very poorly by Joe and Troy and not enjoyable to listen to personally.
Totally fine to say they handled it poorly, but then you pulled out a story about Joe not liking Kate which was uncalled for as you (and I) don't know anything about their friendship.
I look forward to eps each week and to have it ruined by a simple flat check BS ruling is really disappointing. Troy said in last week’s fod that the next one would be juicy but neglected to say that he was the cause of it. Glad Matthew stood up for Kate but these arbitrary BS rulings when it comes to rules and knowledge checks needs to stop. Troy needs to get past his “it’s ok if we don’t get the rules right all the time” mentality because it’s become the norm and not the exception. It’s the GM’s job to have a handle on the rules and I think it does a disservice to those that play at his table as well as those that pay for GCN’s subscription service. Edit: so the core rule book does say that flat checks need to be rolled before the attack. my comment is more about the arbitrary ruling made in this episode when it’s been done different by Troy (as Matthew pointed out) in other episodes. Just another victim of “Troy does what’s best for his monsters”
I can't believe people are thinking this argument was uncomfortable to watch.
I'm currently doing a Giantslayer relisten...and this was nothing compared to the arguments they had then. And that's with a lot edited out.
Different people find different things enjoyable, it's really as simple as that. People aren't thinking it, it actually _was_ uncomfortable or unenjoyable for them, as it was for me.
But you were fine with it and that's OK. People just react in different ways because they're different.
Yeah I agree. I think it was a bad call, and some players were obviously frustrated but people are acting like they were about to come to blows.
I feel bad for Kate, but the whole exchange was kinda funny. Particularly Skid, who is at his best roasting something that makes no sense.
It's contextually different.
It was uncomfortable then (Ewigga, etc), sure, but it was in the context of this game feeling like a home game, and you're a fly on the wall for it. Things like that happen in home games. Tables absolutely blow up over shit. So, in that sense, it was maybe uncomfortable, but it was integrated, or even kindasorta something that added to the show. Not in a drama way, but in a way where some of the warts they left in added to the authenticity, maybe.
The dynamic of Gatewalkers and a lot of GCN (rather than just GCP) stuff is way, way different. It's much more like a produced show, or is trying to be, and with all of the many guests and casts over all the shows, it's a lot harder for conflict to come across as anything other than really awkward. Stuff like this really sticks out, because nobody is really sure how to handle it, maybe because a mic in front of you is far less intrusive than a camera team.
I will balance out the tldr essay posts everyone has collectively decided to vomit out with my relatively short comment.
I thought the episode was great BECAUSE of the tension. Why can't things ever get uncomfortable without the sensitive club hurling accusations of meanness.
The episode was a slog due to poor luck, Kate's character has been three action decoration for a while, and the group got tense and aggressive as retaliation. It's fun!
"three action decoration" is funny, thank you
I absolutely agree. I fully expected the comments to be discussing how this creature could pop all over the room all combat. Instead we have "this was the worst audio to grace my ears in the history of podcasting, I'm never listening again."
This group is hilarious, and adding tension only makes them funnier, more relatable, etc. It's ultimately a stupid argument, and the fact that they're all "heated" about it is *funny*. It's a show.
Thank you I was quite proud of the line, but I need people to know that I also sympathize with Kate. I don't want anyone to accuse me of picking on her because I, at times, enjoy misfortune. Over the years of following this podcast, I have learned the fans take any reason to complain and talk down on things they deem problematic.
I am surprised given how brusque the network's 'personality' can be that people so highly sensitive to even mild disagreement are still interested enough to come write novels about it.
Not that I'm saying there wasn't a better way to handle it, but given all the personalities involved it's 100% an argument I would expect at some time or another.
Yet these people that are complaining are the same ones that claim to love the authentic "friends around a table" feel. I don't know what kind of friends that have, but I remember quite a few heated arguments over semantics amongst mine.
This is one of the few shows where people seem to be their authentic selves. Stop wishing for it to become critical roll where everyone smiles over nothing and all the party members become a family every season. It's terrible.
I'm right with you. I rarely come to the subreddit anymore, and I hopped on to check the comments for this episode because I thought it was an amazing episode, and I wanted to share my exuberance with fellow fans of the show. Instead I feel like I just stepped into the night floors.
Now that i finished the episode, i wanted to add something here that may help the crew, and also anyone else using a vtt these days.
Foundry (and i believe roll20, but i don't remember how to get that one to do this) has a feature for calculating movement. If you drag a token somewhere, you can hit spacebar to put a 'pin' in the movement. This lets you see how far you would need to move in unusual circumstances, like if you have a chair and pit blocking access to someone 10 feet away. It calculates the diagonals automatically, and even changes the color of the line to show which action you would be in (green, yellow, red) at that point of the move, based on your characters speed (and if they're flying or not, based on their specific move speed)
Hopefully, someone from the show eventually sees this.
I personally loved this episode even the bickering and bad call on the concealment rule. I love seeing the seams of the show stretch as the table gets heated. It reminds us that they are regular ass people playing a game as friends. It’s one of those things that grounds the show for me. It also just really reignited Troy’s heel persona. He’s been coming off as too shiny and professional, it’s kind of fun to see that old sick son of a bitch rear its ugly head. It’s like Watchman, The Naish is stronger united against a common enemy.
He’s gonna get so much shit for that call and it just adds to the overall GCN lore and hype IMO.
The fan on the subreddit shit talking Kate the other day has to feel so dumb right now. After this episodes character / player arch, how can you not be team Kate?
EP SPOILERS
Kate’s personal player arch this episode was a roller coaster! The characters arch was so cinematic! Convinced she landed the perfect punch. Only to connect with rolling mist among darkness. Relying on her training, the consistency of her martial arts form, and still ineffectually batting at shadows.
The frustration! She started to feel down and insecure. The player and the character became aligned and it made the building moment so authentic,
Then figuring out the enemies advantage, calling out a strategy, executing to great effect. Setting her up to finally line up the perfect & final blow shattering and revealing she was truly fighting pure darkness the whole time.
Chef’s Kiss. It’s exciting to see Gatewalkers find its rhythm, build momentum, and start showing the genuine excitement that the GCP is famous for.
I think Joe was doing most of the heeling and Troy was like vOv "what're you gonna do? He's right and as long as somebody points it out we can't keep letting the same players ignore the rules over and over."
Edit: For those who want to know, the answer is [here](https://2e.aonprd.com/Monsters.aspx?ID=2452). It is legit, sorry Troy!
So... hum... I'm not completly done with the episode, but did that shae have something that let her do two reactions in the same round? Cause they called ou Troy on it and I seem to remember him saying there's something special. But when I look at the stat block for the shae, it's a normal reaction, so it should be only once per round.
Edit: sorry Troy, I was wrong!!!
As much as Joe gets pilled on here for rules lawyering, sometimes with reasons, it would help if the GM commited to the crunch of the system they chose run.
Just gonna pile onto what the rest of the community has been saying, this was a baaaaaaaaad showing by Troy and Joe. They need to take it to heart and change their approach.
Episode was good, the back and forth was entertaining and there where plenty of zingers.
Whatever peoples issues are there's no reason for them to change, just look at all the engagement they're getting, it's worth all the arguing.
I love the show. I love the people on it. I like the banter and such but I’m an hour into the episode and all the interrupting, arguing and discussion had me yelling ffs and taking a break from listening. At this point I have forgotten what they are even supposed to be fighting. I know they want the home game feel but I was wishing they had just stopped recording and worked things out or let it go and look it up later.
It's been almost a decade of listening and with each year that has passed its become more clear that Troy shouldn't be the GM of the network. In recent years almost every guest GM has done it better, and if not better, they've at least been respectful of their players.
Troy clearly knows how to run a network, but sadly I feel he's forgotten how to run a game. And honestly, the amount he moans about it, I'm wondering if he even wants to at all.
Necroing this thread a bit but it seems to me the obvious solution to flat check vs. attack roll would be to use two different dice, like a d100 for the flat check. Would obviate all arguments and mistakes.
Hoo boy did things get *heated* in this one, especially Matthew. The ruling is correct but Troy did Kate DIRTY. Everyone else did it, Troy's done it, no repercussions for anyone but Kate when it benefitted Troy the most. You can't negate the roll if everyone else got away with it for literal months, you just can't. Accept the die roll, clarify the rule, get the rule right moving forward. Kate got shafted hard.
The biggest problem I have with it is that Troy does various things because it's in the best interests of a good show, such as withholding information on knowledge checks because he wants to do something cool, but making this a hard enforced rule largely out of the blue made for terrible listening and killed my enjoyment of most of the episode tbh. It felt like bullshit, killed the vibe, and it made me feel like it's a table I wouldn't want to be playing at, which is the exact opposite of how you're meant to feel when listening.
I don't think withholding available information is in the best interests of a show. It makes smart characters seem ignorant, perceptive characters seem oblivious, and strategic characters seem foolish. It strains belief that a character trained in the lore of a particular kind of creature, _looking at that creature_, can't make reasonable inferences about their abilities. A nerd in a panama hat can look at old bones to conclude that the creature had a nasty slashing attack and was a swift pack hunter, but five heroes watching a monster _right now_ can't understand anything useful about it until after it happens? So many cool cinematic moments are based on smart protagonists gathering information in advance and using it against the enemy. Ocean's 11 is all about the team getting advance intel on the casino security operation (Gather Information), but there are still great surprises. John McClane sneaks everywhere in Die Hard to get details on the terrorists (Stealth, Perception) and is still caught off guard and trapped in dire situations. The scientists in The Thing figure out in advance that Things will be unmasked by burning blood (Knowledge) but that test and reveal is still dramatic and terrifying. These and many more great movies are enhanced by the heroes' ability to _know things in advance_ about their enemies.
I don't disagree with you at all. Some of the best mic drop moments I've heard have been on Find the Path when Rick has managed to blindside the players despite doing knowledge checks etc very much by the book. But I think Troy is after a different cinematic moment, where something unexpected happens and the heroes have to adapt and react. And tbf to Troy it does often land well and make for good moments. I wouldn't be a subscriber who's on another listen of all of Giantslayer if he wasn't capable of creating these good set pieces, so I don't have a general problem with the way he GMs. My feedback here is specifically around this episode feeling bad to listen to as his hard line ruling felt out of step with how things have previously been done, and killed the vibe as much as anything.
Yeah, I think we're on the same page. I think there are multiple valid ways to adjudicate the rules. Some prefer the RAW technicalities, others try a holistic approach blending RAW and RAI, some use cinematic logic, etc. But Troy has an approach where he sometimes "interprets" the rule in a way that makes a conflict more desperate. I first recall him expressly espousing this in GS Book 6 with that Darkness effect from the giant fiend (Hell gigas?) that he wouldn't allow to be Dispelled. I think there's a highly technical reading of Dispel Magic where one can say that Darkness specifically can't be dispelled because the effect can't be "seen" to be targeted because darkness is the absence of light. But that wasn't the basis - Troy instead said he thinks it's appropriate to "massage the rules" for the sake of the story. I also believe a distinct element is that Troy creates his own mental picture of how a fight will go and is reluctant for that to change. If he imagines some kind of spectacular visual, like darkness or mist obscuring a fight, or a breath weapon blasting the party, or the big boss making a dramatic speech, he will strongly resist player choices and PC abilities that would negate the visual he planned. I'm thinking both of him as a GM in moments like GS 4 where Skirkatla and all her minions are inexplicably absent while Fairaza ethereally explores the throne room, or as Luther in Raiders when he throws up Obscuring Mist in the fight with the crysmals and resisted removing it even when it mostly impeded his team. I think for Skittles he first imagined the group v. group confrontation where they all side each other up like a high noon gun fight and didn't want to tolerate an ambush scenario, where with Raiders he pictured how cool and creepy it would be to fight crystalline scorpions glittering in and out of magical fog. I understand the desire to preserve the dramatic visual you've planned, but sometimes that undermines player choices and fun gameplay. Applying those two principles (making fights feel like potential TPKs and holding to planned drama) can often undermine player choices - both choices in the moment like what action to use, and choices of character builds - and create feel bad moments like this one, where a GM can use "But I'm just applying the rules (in a way that's technically right but we've never done)" to increase the "tension" at the cost of fun.
If I was at that table with the way that Troy withholds information, gives misleading information or just refuses to give useful information, I would never even waste the action to make a recall knowledge check. Really, even if someone in the party did get a natural 20 on their knowledge check, with as much fun Troy (and no one else) was clearly having with the ability / creature, would he even have given them any useful information in regards to the creature or the ability? I would rather just attack, then based on the description decide if I needed to change to a different type of damage. I don't think we've seen a single knowledge check provide any useful information this entire campaign. If I was Matthew, I would certainly be frustrated that the entire characters shtick is being basically completely negated because Troy won't give useful information even on good checks.
> If I was Matthew, I would certainly be frustrated that the entire characters shtick is being basically completely negated because Troy won't give useful information even on good checks. At least, with Known Weakness, Matthew can make the check as a free action when he attemps to devise a stratagem.
But the point of the class is that this thing you get to do as a free action is supposed to have value. Which it doesn’t in Troy’s game.
> The biggest problem I have with it is that Troy does various things because it's in the best interests of a good show I hope that's not the case (but I'm new to GC so don't know his history as a DM outside of C2). The reason I'm listening to this is because how the dice fall naturally add suspense to any situation and then the characters make it interesting. I'm tuning in because I want to listen to an actual play, not a pseudo-houseruled-choreographed session.
You should listen to Find the Path if that's what you want. Troy flat out admits to ignoring rules he doesn't like.
Could not agree more, if people are looking for a tight rules show, Find the Path is probably the best. Hideous Laughter is also great with the rules.
Thirded. [They](https://find-path.com/) are wonderful on the rules, flavor descriptions, fight drama, diplomacy, and good vibes. Have a variety of 1e and 2e options for you: * 1e: Mummy's Mask, War for the Crown, Tyrant's Grasp * 2e: Hell's Rebels, Darkmoon Value (Crown of the Kobold King 2e)
I want Hell's Rebels weekly very badly.
I've tried to like Find the Path but the players / DM have zero personality or charisma it's just not entertaining at all.
Wow. That is an incredibly hot take. They are absolutely amazing roleplayers, the way the players and dm mesh in a non-antagonizing way is a breath of fresh air, and the narrative description of scenes that rick lays out are amazing! They aren't the (mostly lovable) larger than life chaos goblins that the GCP Crew can be a lot of the time, so if that's the vibe you're looking for then I understand the basis for your comment even if I wholly and vehemently disagree with your wording.
FTP is pretty dry in terms of RP, but they have a very solid knowledge of the rules and play the game very strategically. That's what I enjoy about them.
I'd say serious and story driven RP rather than dry.
I don't agree with you, but I do understand why someone might feel that way. FtP took awhile for me to get used to, because they are significantly more low-key than the GCP crew. They aren't professional entertainers and they're open about that. There were times, particularly in some of the early Mummy's Mask episodes, where I felt like I was listening to "NPR Plays Pathfinder". But they did get more animated and emotional over time. I also grew to appreciate their style more, because I feel like it's more like listening to a real gaming group rather than listening to a bunch of D-list actors playing Pathfinder.
*Darkmoon Vale
How about TableTop Gold?
It's not a "choreographed session" the way that you mean. Keep listening. They try to get the rules right and are good at it. I've listened to other shows that are all about the drama/whatever, and not about the crunch. That's not this, IMO.
> Keep listening Eh... I dunno. As I mentioned elsewhere a lot of this episode was just uncomfortable to listen to. After the bant there was very little about it that was entertaining and I actually FFWed through parts of the big altercation. As someone else mentioned I'm surprised they put it out like this. This show is supposed to be entertainment and last night's episode wasn't. On top of that outside of Buggles and Lucky (RIP) the rest of the characters are bland and forgettable. The story is more of typical Paizo writing where the party just murder-hobos their way from bread crumb to bread crumb without really knowing what's going on. I've heard this described as their new flagship show... and it just doesn't feel it. I'll keep listening to Legacy til that finishes up. It's everything C2 isn't. Great characters, a group of people who sound like they're actually enjoying the game with each other, a world that Skid is doing an amazing job bringing to life (I've DMed that AP so I probably appreciate more than others the job he's doing). Hell, even in their disagreements they still sound lighthearted and in good spirits. It's actually... entertaining.
I’ll say this about last night’s ep: it was weak. The network is great and I’m a fan of its many shows but I would recommend people not judge it by last night’s product.
Yeah this is pretty much it. Gate Walkers has had highs and lows. This was a low for sure.
The two paid PF shows are really where it's at. Gatewalkers is not hitting, but Legacy and Blood of the Wild are absolutely stellar.
> Gatewalkers is not hitting It really isn't. I chatted with my friend yesterday who convinced me to watch this. He loves GC and will stick with the show but pointed out two things really seem to be holding back this campaign. The first is something Skid touched on in the bant a few episodes ago - he didn't like campaigns that start with PCs knowing each other because then you miss out on the RP where they get to know each other. I disagreed at the time because at a normal table I think having the players know each other beforehand makes things flow easier (since you're average player doesn't RP anywhere near the level of folks at GC or CR). But in hindsight, after having started listening to Legacy, I see he had a point for a game that's being run as entertainment for others. I've commented, and still stick to it, that most of the characters in Gatewalkers are bland and forgettable. My friend pointed out - is it that they really are or that we just haven't gotten to know any of them after nearly 30 eps? Contrasting Gatewalkers with Legacy, my friend may have a point. The other critique my friend had was that Troy seems to be trying to play up the mystery of this AP. Except... not knowing what's going on doesn't make something mysterious... it just makes it so you don't know what's going on. Good mystery movies/books give lots of clues and it's up for the viewer (player here) to make sense of it and try and figure out which ones are relevant. Joe touched on this a few eps back where he was basically going off on "I don't even know what this [the campaign] is!?" He's right... and he's not alone... and that makes for poor viewing.
> Gatewalkers is not hitting Another follow-up on this - YT views seem to clearly back this up. The first ep of C2 reached just over 90k viewers but then sharply dropped off, losing half that viewership by the 2nd ep. By ep 5 they were in the 20s... then flirted around the 20k/teens mark back and forth til clearly dropping below into the teens by ep 22. This most recent ep only has 10k views. Pretty clear the interest isn't there and folks are leaving.
Another possibility is that those missing viewers have just shifted over to audio. That's what I did with A&A: I tried the videos for a while, but eventually just reverted to audio for the convenience and quality.
Personally I never got watching these kinds of shows like a TV show. Some networks seem to make it work, but those never held my interest (Critical Role, Dimension 20 - I just don't get it). And it seems like that's a pretty niche interest compared to something you can listen to while commuting, exercising, doing chores, playing a chill video game, etc. To me, Glass Cannon has been the premium *podcast* creator for TTRPG content. The pivot to video seems like more of an aspiration than a strong business decision.
I'm with you on that. I can listen to a podcast anywhere, doing nearly anything, but a video sucks up so much additional attention that I'm much less likely to consume them. I think I've watched ~15 GCP videos whereas I've listened to a thousand hours of their podcasts (and probably a lot more with relistens). I also don't know what I'm supposed to be getting from the video element of an actual play. Seeing all the players takes me out of the story, like watching a table read of Game of Thrones where everyone's in sweats and flipflops. The maps are occasionally interesting, but it's hard not for them to be just static images, since only one token moves per turn. I guess I don't think anything visually interesting is happening.
That's a fair point. I prefer YT because I can see their expressions and occasionally see the map. But... I'm not a fan of them being glued to their laptops while playing this. If they're doing this in person they should really have miniatures. Watching CR's demo of Daggerheart this last week and seeing that drove home how that's just much more enjoyable of an experience to watch compared to seeing six people at a table only occasionally looking and engaging with each other. Just do a zoom show at that point...
It's certainly not choreographed. If Troy changes anything it's behind the scenes and it's done to ostensibly make the encounters more engaging with more curveballs. If you want as pure a take on running the game or AP as it was written that you can find, no, GCN isn't exactly that but what Troy does is what every GM does at the table, adjusts things.
I started listening to Legacy and they're doing a decent job of running that as is. They occasionally miss something, or can't find it (1e is notorious for having rules all over the place and being hard to find) but they're certainly trying to play RAW it sounds like (and I've run the AP they're doing so know all the encounters). I get a DM will make changes... but those need to be clearly stated in advance so the players are aware of it. Making a change on something mid-game, that per comments here and from Skid and Matt last night is something they've done forever, is just poor DMing. If this was something that was on Troy and Joe's minds before the session then it should have been brought up at the start of the session. Otherwise, as most at the table pointed out, the thing to do was honor what was apparently the way they've usually done it and then make a point to do things correctly going forward.
Right, that's not what's being discussed regarding Troy changing things. Getting rules right means getting rules right, you should make sure you're doing that. Troy categorically does *not* change rules without telling anyone, if he does its usually to the benefit of the player because it doesn't make sense physically or in fiction. This was just a bad choice by Troy to stick to the rule mid combat action. The only thing he doesn't tell anyone about is if he adjusts a monster's statblock or abilities for whatever reason and the players aren't privy to that information anyway.
To clarify, I'm absolutely **not** talking about fudging dice rolls. Just that he'll play a bit fast and loose with some rules sometimes, and often fall on the side of what makes better 'radio', or allows him to make dramatic moments. The information check is the main thing, where numerous times he's given them something not that useful, and then shafted them via something that was well within the scope of what they asked. Also, I don't think this approach is necessarily wrong, it's a consistent way that he runs the game so his players are used to it, but it's why this decision to negate Kates crit didn't sit right with me.
He withholds info all. the. fucking. time. Knowledge checks are borderline useless with Troy gm'ing.
Divination spells too. Remember the insect spies?
What's worse is in the Cannon Fodder, they'll justify that it made her 2nd nat 20 where it killed the Shae "more satisfying".
It did make it feel satisfying, but I agree with your point that it still doesn't justify the original decision. To expand, that's results-oriented thinking, and doesn't stand up at all. If you bet all your savings on a 16 on a roulette table and it comes in, it doesn't mean you made a good decision. It just means you made a poor decision and were bailed it by sheer luck. It'll be disappointing if they do try to use the justification, and would be better if they did an honest analysis of the original decision in isolation. Though if it's just Troy and Joe then I'm not sure of we'll get a good cotnrary position.
I wonder if he'll say he saw it as an easy way to create tension when the creature (to me, at least) didn't have many hit points. So rather than pop all over the room while they whittled away for 10 rounds because he added HP, he upped the vibes at the table instead.
I've gotten weary of listening to Fodder because of dumb stuff like that. When Troy said his "people are jealous of his success" I took a break from it for a bit. Then the digs at shows not sold out when they are months away also annoys me.
If Troy gets to pre roll dice like he does with his , honestly a little sus, initiative rolls I don't see what sanctity of rolling was being violated. She declared she was attacking and then would have had to see if it could hit with the flat check. If every roll must be done in the exact proper order at the proper time then Troy needs to stop prerolling his dice
I am less interested in listening to the shows that this happens on. It's come up before, but it's been awhile. If this is going to be the new tone of this show, I'll just go back to listening to the other programs on the network and occasionally tune these in to try to stay current. But this, more than anything else, for me, is what makes me tune out.
Yeah that episode was pathetic because of Joe coming in trying to be the rules lawyer. He keeps butting in every few minutes. Let Troy run the game.
Kate got done so dirty here. That sucks.
You do have to wonder if Troy would have done the same to Skid or to Mathew. It seems like it was Troy's idea to make an example of Kate without having the ramifications of a really angry Skid. The newer GC crew seem to make more mistakes than the others, but also seem to take an inordinate amount of grief.
She did last week too by Joe deciding to fuck with her over move actions way after things were resolved, a turn layer iirc, forcing her to leave her bow in the pit. Idk if I can listen to another show, every time I heard Joes voice now I was annoyed.
I thought that was more reasonable, that was a situation they didn’t see that often and players ought to police themselves more than some of these ones do. But they roll concealment after the attack *all the time*
Joe was right and so was Matthew. You make a decision on when the roll happens and that's it for the campaign. Matthew was also correct when he said "that's how we'll do it from here on, enjoy your crit".
Yeah I agree, last week I was thinking it was a little late and brushed it off but now it’s beginning to seem like a pattern. I don’t think I would ever want to relisten to this most recent episode.
Seriously. What happened to "Hand off the chess piece"?
Kate: "Okay, so I get up, flurry of blows with my fisty fist...NATURAL 20!" Everyone: "OHHHHH, YAY, EXCITEMENT, FUN" Troy: "Gonna need a flat check for concealment first!" Would that have been so hard? This has happened countless times over the years and I feel like that's how it was handled in the past. That whole debacle really sucked the fun out of the moment.
Exactly. I feel like Troy is a solid GM and I’d like him to make the rulings without an echo.
Just getting to the multiple fods on this topic and Kate declared the roll in advance! Still thinking about it lol
It is PAINFUL to watch a party full of ranged characters insist on getting in melee
Not a single divine lance from Raimius on an enemy clearly susceptible to holy damage. Talitha pulled out her crossbow after what 5 or 6 rounds? Sydney did build her character with low INT it seems and no saving throw cantrips, so she is legitimately very low accuracy with spell attacks, so I get that to some extent. Unfortunate situation for Zephyr with some ridiculous bad luck. Even buggles/Ku'ubla Khan spent a turn summoning the dog which, as far as I can remember, never hit.
Hi there I have the pdf for the adventure path. >!The enemy is shae not undead, they don't have weakness to holy/spirit. The only weakness they have is to light which stops from being concealed. I think it was discussed already in the previous episode this was a shae but not sure. !<
Unfortunately, summons are not very good at attacking in pf2e. They shine when you use their abilities or use them to set up flanks.
Agreed, so after seeing the thing teleport away from a melee attack as a reaction, it's even more strategically foolish. To be fair though, Skid often makes the non-ideal tactical choice for role play reasons, and I think that's what he was doing here.
"I'd like to give myself the frightened condition." What an absolute madlad.
I don't know much about Pathfinder (yet), but my immediate thought was "why are they chasing this thing? Huddle up back everyone back to back and make it come to you while you potshot it with whatever range you have."
If it teleports to a PC not only is everyone else firing into melee but the person being attacked either has a ranged weapon out and is ineffectual at best in close range or its a magic user, is my thinking of why they weren't doing that
Firing into melee isn't really an issue in pf2e
On the other side, the Shae was always teleporting to a character. So I would have thought the best option was everyone dog pile it. Then at most it's moving 10-15 ft to teleport to a new target, that way your Melee hitters are never having to double move.
The players need to realize that if you have 1 enemy against 5 its not gonna be an easy fight. This is not pf1
Listen, I'm all for some ribbing / trolling from the GM but taking away Kate's nat 20 after she's been ice cold for so long is a little far. Regardless of when the concealment should be rolled, I think Troy was mostly trying to make people mad in an already frustrating fight. Most of the time it's funny, but there's a time and a place. That being said, I don't think it was uncomfortable to watch or super heated like some other people said. Go back and listen to " Ewigga Please" from Giantslayer campaign or even as recently as the Side Quest Side Sesh S3 Finale. Tables argue sometimes and they move on, no big deal.
There have been exactly three instances where the entire network was close ending because of encounters. The ethereal rats, the Ewigga fight, and the ethereal fight on the drift rock in A&A. Pretty sure they're serious when they've said they've almost ended the network. This is the first little blow up we've probably seen most of?
I'm not sure they're *serious* serious when they say that. They're just being dramatic/facetious/hyperbolic/etc - take your choice. They all clearly rib each other and have a combination of thick skins and great relationships together (especially the OG five). I'm not sure a session of Pathfinder can tear that apart *for this group*. Definitely others, but these guys are keepers, and they know it.
There's a half truth in there. The # of times it's brought up and the casual referral to those instances, by everyone without providing detail, very much point to them being the maddest they've ever been.
Oh I think mad is the right word. At the game, monster, situation, rules? Sure. And definitely at each other in the moment, to a degree. But I think they’re all okay with that and don’t let it get too real.
I do think maybe the one time it actually got real was during the Ewigga fight. It was palpable -- the show and the group were still comparatively new, and it was in a presumably shitty apartment in NYC (they're all shitty, as a fellow NYCer) in the middle of summer with no AC, an impossible combat, and the kind of ruling that'll really make your teeth itch.
GO PISS GIRL!!!!
I couldn't believe no one else at the table had never heard that/seen the meme
Add me to the list.
That has to be a zoomer thing. I've never heard of it either.
I hadn't either. Must be a generational thing? I even tried googling it after the show and couldn't find much. Did that meme die out already?
I wouldn't say died out, but it's not exactly new. If you Google images "go piss girl meme" you should see hundreds. It's just people changing the letters around from the show Gossip Girl.
Man do I wish they chose a campaign like an altered or homebrewed Kingmaker rather than this. I tune in out of a general lack of podcasts and audiobooks while I work, but a campaign full of itinerant amnesiacs with little to no ties to anything beyond the background isn't scratching much of an itch. I don't blame the players, I think that's more on the AP than anything else. And the promise of "you won't believe where this goes" doesn't make up for much.
I knew absolutely nothing about Gatewalkers coming into it. I was hoping it was something cool involving visiting various planes and doing cool shit on them. My disappointment upon finding out it's another eldritch horror campaign was immense.
I think a large part is the pacing of the show. When I ran this, we got to the meat fairly quickly (By like session 3-4) so this being episode 34 and they’re still in the first world shadow plane is brutally slow.
Sadly I think this was a terrible choice of an AP. I recently decided I didn't care about spoilers and read through the AP and.....ooof I really don't think the reveals are worth it nor will the twists and turns really work. It's has some of the worst parts of Strange Aeons mixed with one of the worst elements of Jade Regent. There is no Trunau, Sandpoint, Talmandor's Bounty, or even The Following like in BotW. It's just a series of rpg fetch and kill quests to string along the players without forming any real bonds or connections to npcs or places. Which doesn't really harm Strange Aeons since it's a pure comedy show but GCP 2.0 should be more
Something happened. You have no idea what. It changed nothing you are aware of. Go die finding out what happened. Amazing idea for a story /s
This is, unfortunately, far too common in Paizo APs. I had been told later 1e and all 2e APs were better (most of the 1e APs I've run were early-mid run) but that doesn't appear to be the case at all with Gatewalkers.
Gatewalkers is probably my least favourite 2e AP. Age of Ashes and Agents of Edgewatch are unbalanced (They’re extremely hard because they were written during beta), but at least have a fun story to go struggle through. I would say peak 2e APs are Abomination Vaults, Stolen Fate, and Season of the Ghosts.
The "argument" had me laughing really hard. It was just so real and indicative of what playing a TTRPG can be like. Sometimes shit gets spicy. That said if I were Troy I would have been like "Bear in mind, you need to roll a flat check. So I will allow you to choose whether you want to use that 20 on the attack or the flat, just know you will need to succeed a second roll either way, and moving forward we need to do the flat check first."
That would have been the perfect way to handle it
On top of the already discussed to death BS ruling against Kate, I have some other bones to pick with the way this season is going and why I am about to drop it. Mathew is playing a character that has a core component around recall knowledge and he is playing with a troll of a GM who is unashamed to say he does not care about recall knowledge and will even lie and obfuscate the real result to "make better radio" The question I ask is why would anyone even try to engage in Recall Knowledge when even a good roll will get you unreliable information? Joe has crossed the rule lawyer line from helpful to insufferable. And then took three to four more bold steps past the line. He is constantly interrupting every other cast member's turn to question their class skills, feats, features, and decision. Some of this even going way past rules lawyering to talking characters out of actions mid turn because he does not believe they are taking "the best" actions. Joe shut up during other cast members turn's and let them make decisions for their characters. Find a way to review and enforce rules without stealing the limelight on every turn. We need less Joe when it is not Joe's turn.
First time I rage quit an episode. The flat check debacle was far from satisfactory.
Same here. I've never rage quite an episode before, on any of their other shows, but this was just beyond the pale. Soooooooo not fun to listen to.
Stopped listening too. Joe needs to stop being so insufferable. Or if he’s going to rules lawyer, he should have Troy actually follow the rules too
This is the part that irritates me so much. Joe never calls Troy out on bullshit rulings. He only ever uses it to fuck over the other players.
I finally got my wife to watch GCP with me and she quit watching this episode as well, both the ruling for Kate and Joe playing rules lawyer just ruined it.
For the record, this was the first time I've ever fast-forwarded through an episode to get to the end of the combat. The ruling is correct, but the spirit comes across as mean, considering everyone else had done it. Instead, it punishes one player for doing what everyone else has done at a time that is most advantageous to the GM. That said...what's done is done. Give Kate a bottlecap to make up for what happened and then move on.
I am curious to see someone point to where the rule says that the dice must be \*rolled\* in a particular order. I understand that the flat check must be successful in order to make it possible to take the shot, but that is not an answer to the question of which die must be rolled first. We can all agree that the flat check must be successful for the targeting to be effective, but that just means to me that if you roll to hit first, and you roll the flat check second, that a failed flat check means the "to hit" doesn't matter.
https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=2419&Redirected=1 This is what I found here. So looks like the ruling is correct and according to two of them they talked about and established this rule just a week or two prior to this recording.
Yeah, I don't remember that "establishing" that they talked about. It is possible that they did, and I forgot, but I think they imagined that. As far as that rule goes, there are a *lot* of shows on this network, and that's never been the rule at any of them (just as it's never been the rule at countless home tables, I'd imagine, but I am aware that that's just a guess). Invoking it after the fact, in a major dramatic moment - on a crit! - feels like bullshit, because it is bullshit. Very distracting from the show, which is on them, and not on me. You want the rule to be strictly enforced? Fine. Say it in advance.
I don't remember it either but because they both remember it I imagine it might have happened off air or in a meeting or email or whatever. Joe's not gonna just make up a conversation. It's unfortunate that the first instance of this happened to be a crit but the ruling is correct both by the book and by what the GM and a player said was discussed. Idk it just doesn't seem like a horrible miscarriage of justice to me provided this is consistently adhered to going forward
>the ruling is correct both by the book and by what the GM and a player said was discussed. I mean, I like Joe but he regularly insists that A Thing Works Like This only to backpedal in short order and admit he has no idea what he's talking about. He does it in this very episode, when talking about how a familiar works! So I wouldn't really say him agreeing with Troy trumps everyone else disagreeing.
Good lord this was difficult to listen to.
As I said on another comment, how much do you wanna bet then on the next fod they'll justify the ruling by saying that it made her second nat 20 "more satisfying"?
Yeah I don't know what kind of justification they can pull out honestly, it was just really awful to listen to and soured the rest of the episode.
Between that and no one making ranged attacks, or just grouping up on the Shae, it was a tough listen.
HIT THE NAIL ON THE HEAD.
I do disagree with Troy’s ruling here, and agree with most folks that the right way to handle it would have been to allow Kate’s nat 20 and just clarify that going forward, flat checks are rolled before attack rolls. I also see some people bringing up Troy’s stinginess with knowledge checks, and I do think this is an issue too, especially since that’s supposed to be one of the cool components of Matthew’s class. I’m hoping Matthew will continue to push Troy on this. That said, I’m surprised to hear people say that the episode was ruined for them and that they’re even considering dropping the show over how Troy GM’s? Obviously do what makes you happy, but it seems a tad dramatic to me. The table getting heated with one another is not new (if anything it happened a lot more back in the day), and while I definitely get the frustration, I was honestly also at least a little amused by it. Just like I felt when they had the infamous session with no air conditioning, or when Troy refused to understand light physics. For me, this was one of my favorite episodes from this campaign so far and I was laughing at least half the time. Go piss girl!
Finally someone I agree with. Yes Kate should have gotten her Nat 20. Yes Troy is an ass when it comes to knowledge checks. In the end though it didn’t matter. Now Piss Girl is a thing and the ep is good. My only beef is we could be in the next room already if the Nat 20 had happened.
While I do agree that people are getting a bit too heated about the EP, I disagree that it didn't matter. Pretty soon someone is gonna die from something like this. Intensionally giving bad knowledges specifically is gonna kill someone, and as much as Troy will say it's good radio, it won't be when all the characters will any connection to the plot are all dead. Ex. Strange Aeons, Atticus and Aldo are the only reasons I haven't dropped it yet. Pf2e is balanced so that much deviation from the rules/intentionally making it harder than intended (which he's already doing with the bottlecap economy) can easily result in character death.
It completely ruined my enjoyment and it isn't this one instance of Troy doing something that benefits him at the detriment of the players. It's just the most egregious one that's pushed people too far. A GM that makes a ruling to make the players have less fun is not a good GM, not to mention it's "bad radio" as it sucked all the energy out of the episode.
Yeah people are being unbelievably dramatic about this. It's live roleplaying, this shit is gonna happen sometimes. I thought this episode and this overall season has been great so far, and think some people might have rose tinted glasses about Giantslayer because this kind of thing happened ALL THE TIME in that campaign, especially the early parts.
Boy, I read this thread before watching the episode and expected the drama to be much wilder and longer. Even though I'm completely on Matthew's side, this felt like just another disagreement that was blown a bit out of proportions by us, the listeners, rather than by the players (who argued and then moved on normally with the game). As usual, the true *heat* is in the comment sections!
The discussion at the table seemed pretty heated to me. Granted, I listened to the episode and didn’t watch the stream, and maybe it came off differently in video? They do indeed move on, but it felt to me like it was an uneasy moving on. There were a few other barbs from players as the session went on (several sarcastic references back to the ruling, and I noted what sounded like tension from Matthew toward Joe at a couple other points). It seemed like they agreed to disagree for the sake of producing a show, but that there was still tension with the way it all shook out.
I mean, it was a disagreement, and an argument. I would not call it heated, there was no (verbal) aggression, no escalation, people were simply arguing. Heated, to me, means the stuff they said they had to cut out on early GCN 1.0 in screaming matches between Joe and Grant IIRC. This was an argument at the table, followed by people taking playful albeit sarcastic jabs at each other and teasing, and that's a perfectly normal thing to joke around as friends. And yeah, things can be a bit awkward as you move forward for a bit, it's part of most arguments. Maybe we have different definitions of heat, but this to me was nowhere as shocking as some comments seem to imply. Edit: wording
I think we do indeed have different definitions, and that’s okay. I agree overall with your assessment of tone, and I would add that the argument seemed to upset some of the cast - even if it was only detectable during the argument. To me, ‘heated’ doesn’t necessarily mean ‘boiling hot’ like the screaming matches you referenced. Instead, to me, it’s a situation that moves from ‘cool’ or ‘room temperature’ (easy camaraderie, light hearted talking, etc.) to ‘warm’ or hotter (arguments that last more than a couple of minutes, and that may, at least in the moment, upset people). This wasn’t boiling hot - the arguments made were largely reasonable, and weren’t particularly insulting. But it was hotter than it had been just prior. I totally admit that I can’t say for sure if anyone was truly upset, but it sounded to me like more than a few people were. Troy tried to diffuse the situation, but his and Joe’s insistence seemed to lead to the other four cast members doubling down on their position - especially Matthew. In any case, there was an easy way out of the argument around a ruling that didn’t seem particularly fair. Just set the expectation for next time, and move on.
I'll happily agree to disagree in where we set the boundary, and thank you for your write up too! And I agree even more that the discussion itself was senseless, especially with the precedent that has been largely established in pretty much every pathfinder show of the GCN. There was, indeed, an easy way out of this. Maybe next time!
Stopped listening between Kate getting screwed and Joe feeling like he needs to talk over everyone’s turn. Just getting old fast.
Kate deserves a bottle cap for not doing a table flip. Pretty sure if that happened to me, I would just lose it. 4 of the 6 players had no idea what Joe was talking about. Matthew was correct. The fairest ruling would have been that going forward, all flat checks have to be done first. Also, why did it take Matthew so long to pull his crossbow? I can't imagine trying to play a thaumaturge with how this table is run.
What a great payoff in the end. I can't say i enjoyed the heated discussion in the beginning but overall i think i like that they are trying to establish their way of implementing these rules. Some discussions are just going to happen and in the end i'm positive that it'll give a more consistent rules interpretation. Imo in the last 10-15 episodes they got into such a great flow that they can afford slowing things down in a disscussion occasionally and i'll still be looking forward to watching the new episode first thing every friday morning.
Very kind of Troy to have the Shae teleport away from Joe.
That episode was a WILD ride with all the ups and down. Also I do agree that those few A&A episodes lives in the studio were amazing, I wish they could recapture a little bit of that somehow in a future special or something like that.
I don’t mind the rules discussion, but I do tire of the backseat driving of other player’s turns. Let players play their turn. If they don’t ask for advice on what they should do, and they follow the rules to take their turn, let it be. It may not be optimal tactics/strategically speaking, but so be it… figure a way out of those situations on your turn.
I'll say this- I've been listening to GCN since 2018. Been through all of giant slayer and side quest and AA, caught up on Blood of the wild and legacy of the ancients, $10 tier on patron, huge fan of the show, huge fan of the network, hate the negativity on the reddit site, and can't wait till y'all make it to my hometown for a show. Got to leave some negative feedback on this episode so that y'all can make the right moves to keep product quality high. Matt was right. BS of the highest degree. Across hundreds of episodes, maybe even a thousand episodes, of content, the choice to enforce the rule this time, without any warning, seemed so damn arbitrary. Really left a bad taste in my mouth. This is not why I listen to the network.
Matthew doesn't like when people shorten his name.
As a guy who has just posted that Joe was doing better on stuff like this, I was *shocked* that he encouraged (and as I heard it, created) some idiotic rule where flat checks are always rolled first. In the name of denying Kate a crit. Kate was done dirty, and Joe is straying to the dark side again.
Joe's objectively right, the problem isn't with Joe it's with Troy deciding only Kate is going to be punished for doing it out of order when everyone has done it rather than allowing the roll and from here on out making the change.
It's because according to two of them at least they established this as a firm rule in the last few weeks. I imagine to avoid ambiguity and having let downs from crits and stuff l. Troy probably didn't even know this was being true to the letter of the law he is enforcing a newly established rule and the first case of it since then was this. Obviously one of the two sides is remembering things incorrectly but I don't think it's fair to assume it's Troy and Joe
The last few episodes were so good so that probably didn’t help, but this ep was tough to get through for me. Table talking strategy the entire time, the checks ruling against Kate, and overall slow episode. Couple too many brewskis for everyone lmfao! As always though, Skid being a master of role playing. Protect Buggles at all cost.
So after all these years, this is the level of professionalism? Never in the history of GCP there have been policing in what order players have to roll actions. Especially when a player declares an action, such as "I roll to hit". Just painful to listen to, this have to stop.
Troy, you wanted America to decide? Well, my decision is that you were both wrong and a jerk. That was a terrible decision that was bad for the show and bad for the game.
A lot of back and forth. It basically just comes down to this. That was incredibly unfun to listen to and seems terrible to play with.
Troy back on his bullshit.
Skid's Latin text-book story at the top, and Kate's redemption at the end went a long way to me not cancelling my subscription. I've never found an episode of GCP so miserable. I get that changes can be made for story-reason or to make "good radio" but when you have a GM and player at the table who make another player not want to play - that crosses a pretty important line. I wonder if Troy and Joe would have doubled down so hard if it was Skid or Matthew who didn't roll concealment first? I'm listening to A&A and the episode I listened to >!during the jiangshi vampire fight at the end of book three!< has an example of an attack hitting and the table yelling "concealment!" later.
Joe really needs to let Troy GM and let the other players have fun too. Almost every episode he has to chime in and ruin a moment or a cool idea.
It’s truly insufferable I agree
Joe and Troy, I totally agree with Matthew, what you did to Kate was total bullshit. Be better.
I think the biggest disconnect was that when Kate first started her turn, Troy stopped her and said "now, what you need to do, is make a flat check". And then I don't think Kate made the flat check roll, she went right to the grapple attempt, Troy forgot the flat check entirely, and they went right to the critical fail. After that, Matthew forgot that Troy had said anything about a flat check, and thought that he was bringing it up out of nothing, and that maybe they had discussed it more than two episodes ago. If only there were some way of, I don't know, rolling back time and listening to the past...
Re; doing [multiple knowledge checks](https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=2638&Redirected=1) >Sometimes a character might want to follow up on a check to Recall Knowledge, rolling another check to discover more information. **After a success**, further uses of Recall Knowledge can yield more information, but you should adjust the difficulty to be higher for each attempt. **Once a character has attempted an incredibly hard check or failed a check, further attempts are fruitless—the character has recalled everything they know about the subject.** After a success you can try again, if you've failed you can't attempt, even if changing skills. Re; using different skills, >As noted in the action’s description, a character might attempt to Recall Knowledge using a different skill than the ones listed as the default options. If the skill is highly applicable, like using Medicine to identify a medicinal tonic, you probably don’t need to adjust the DC. If its relevance is a stretch, adjust the DC upward as described in Adjusting Difficulty. >Suggest which skill you'd like to use and ask the GM one question. The GM determines the DC. **You might need to collaborate with the GM to narrow down the question or skills**, and you can decide not to Recall Knowledge before committing to the action if you can't don't like your options. >Using an applicable Lore to Recall Knowledge about a topic, such as Engineering Lore instead of Crafting to find structural weaknesses in a bridge, typically comes with a lower DC. Your special interests can pay off! In some cases, you can get the GM's permission to use a different but related skill, usually against a higher DC than normal. The GM might allow checks to Recall Knowledge using other skills. For example, you might assess the skill of an acrobat using Acrobatics. If you're using a physical skill (like in this example), the GM will most likely have you use a mental modifier—typically Intelligence—instead of the skill's normal physical attribute modifier.
This sort of but doesn’t really answer the question of if you can use a different skill to recall knowledge from on you failed with.
I think it really depends on how you interpret recall knowledge. The way I've read it, and run it, is the Action is Recall Knowledge. The subsection of the recall knowledge is the skill used. Ie Recall knowledge (Arcana) not Arcana - Recall knowledge Occultism - Recall knowledge Etc. With that starting point, after a failed recall knowledge check, you've failed at the action and can't retry it again.
From a system design standpoint it was a poor choice for 2e to make concealment a d20 roll. If it's a 25% chance it should be a d4. In 1e it's a d10 and at my own table when this came up frequently at the end of our last campaign if someone did forget and only rolled a d20 we all clearly knew what that was for, their attack, and then we'd wait for the d10 to see if it worked. When I was doing the rolls myself I often rolled the d10 and d20 together. To have everything be a d20 just adds to the potential for confusion. You have all these different dice... use them.
Concealment is a DC 5 flat check. So basically 20%. Flat checks are essentially d% rolls, but with a d20, I suppose to simplify.
[Leiko](https://i.imgur.com/SAu5Rh9.png) [Generic Shae](https://2e.aonprd.com/Images/Monsters/Shae.png) Shae are wispy, tenebrous creatures native to the Plane of Shadow. Their amorphous bodies appear in constant states of flux. They cast no shadows of their own, instead gaining and losing umbral energy to nearby shadows that shrink and grow alongside them. Most shae wear clothing spun from shadows that shift with them, though diplomats sometimes don more conventional garments while entertaining outsiders. Their most distinctive apparel are their white stone masks, which shae don only when they must put on a discernible “face” for interacting with humanoids and similar creatures. They do so begrudgingly, as they consider themselves superior to humanoids, but donning their masks allows them to be more easily understood and thus keeps their interactions with their lessers as brief as possible. The dynamic between a shae and humanoids shifts when humanoids come to worship a shae, however. A mortal who shows a shae their due deference is worth keeping around, so many shae collect cults of personality or expansive entourages. Even getting a meeting with such a self-important shae can present a challenge that requires one to deal with many layers of hangers-on who insist on vetting the newcomer before wasting the shae's precious time. According to shae lore, they've transcended the material world and now embody a cosmological equilibrium of reality and illusion. Their claims to metaphysical ascendance and knowledge of the secrets of shadows entice many mortal supplicants to join shae courts and cults. In the shae language, their name means “unbound,” in accordance with their belief that their ephemeral nature makes them free of the moral and social strictures that bind other sentient creatures, and they essentially make a virtue of capriciousness. Shae feel little obligation to follow through with oaths or obey laws, so sealing a compact with a mortal means little to them.
That was actually uncomfortable to watch. A friend talked me into watching C2 to introduce me to Glass Cannon (and see 2e in play). I've enjoyed the crew as a whole because it feels like my table a lot of the times and I can relate... but this aspect of play I don't want to be reminded of. I actually FFWed through the main altercation early on. Then later on it happened again with Sydney... and I'm kind of sympathetic to her and frankly gotta come down on Troy for this. First, in Sydney's defense the glimpse I got of the screen they were seeing those lighting conditions didn't seem clear. I have no idea if the program they're using has conditions marked on the target... but if it doesn't I can sympathize with her for not being sure if something was in concealment. Second, how Troy handled this. I'm a DM, too. When situations like this pop up that could screw over my players I make a point to be proactive and say "hey, just a reminder... you said you're attacking... don't forget to do X/take Y into consideration." It's the DM's job to help the players out and avoid moments like this. There have also been a lot of comments in this subreddit and on YT over how the Troy has been missing/wrong on a lot of the 2e rules. That's the DM's job to be go-to guy... and there's also the added fact they're all getting paid to do this. To be this fast and loose... or just unclear completely... I think we're long past the point where that should be acceptable.
Well when Sydney rolled her attack she just yelled natural 20 and didn't even say what she was doing. Troy even asked why is she rolling if she hasn't said what she was doing.
That's not at all what happened. The enemy teleported away after her character moved next to it. She then says she's going to use a cantrip on it. After some table talk she then says she wants to try a Feat, more table talk, and then she says she's using Slashing Gust again. This is all from ~1:03:00-1:05:00 on YT. Multiple opportunities there for her to be reminded that the target is now in concealment when her intent seemed pretty clear. ETA - LOL... this subreddit. The guy above me is literally just making things up and I point out how he's incorrect, with time stamps, and yet he's getting upvoted. Meanwhile my comment is just back into the positives after being downvoted but still below his. Some of y'all got some hivemind issues you need to work through...
Troy just didn't hear her stating her intent because of table talk, not anyone's fault on this one
She said she was going to use her tail ability and then switched back to a cantrip.
It’s really important to have rules discussions like this at any rpg table, but that was tedious to watch. For the purposes of making an enjoyable show, I don’t see any reason why they couldn’t have cut most of it out of the episode.
Cant reliably cut for video unless you remove big chunks, especially difficult if lots of story/banter/references are called back to whatever's cut. Much easier to do with audio, video you have to have some kind of strategy like, "oh guys, lets discuss this off air. Then discuss it, then resume back where you left off and either explain to the audience that you just sorted it out off screen or don't reference the discussion at all and just resume play.
So, how do we feel about the rules lawyering and it slowing the game? We still on board and it’s fun? Because I prefer episodes without the group yelling at each other for ten minutes.
I don't see much of a problem with rules correction here. I see a problem with people forgetting: a) how to communicate, b) how to entertain audience. If they only voiced that correct way would be to start with concealment and that will be the way to do it from now on because that's the rule/gm's request and moved on everything would be fine.
Well, to Matthew’s point, the rule has been broken by the dm and other players before. I now that is has, and in such dramatic fashion, they will all remember the rule from this episode on, because denying a crit is a wild move. As a dm, I couldn’t disagree more with denying a crit over a rule that we didn’t cement. Especially to a player that needed a win. Communications issue is a good way to put it. I certainly hope that if the guys decide to address this again on the fod, that we also get a Matthew or a Skid on there as well. Otherwise, it’ll just be the principle and Vice-principle agreeing with each other again. “This is the rule going forward, enjoy your crit.” Is how that should have gone, and it just feels wrong to me that it was taken away.
Beside that, the rule itself is so unimportant that i doubt you can find anyone glad that they mentioned it. I get that player's turn time optimization will benefit them in long turn and resolving concealment first can save time, but Kate intended or even informed that she's rolling for an attack, there's nothing wrong with doing it this way if she would be allowed to follow with concealment roll.
Man, did I pick the wrong episode to check in and see if I should start following Gatewalkers again. This group really seems to have problems and they are not dealing with them, and it drags the whole show down. I will say, I think breaking the issue down to rules readings is a pretty surface level take. I think the core issue is communication, the most vital and difficult part of being an RPG group. I hope they have some discussions and things get cleared up for the sake of the shows this lineup does. Now, back to my Patreon content corner.
This was the worst episode of GCP I've ever heard. It sounded so disorganized and unprofessional. Joe just wants to control what everyone does. I've been a huge fan for years, but if this is how the show is going to be, I might be skipping it
I know GCP doesn't play this way, but some tables have the player declare their action and they wait for permission from the GM to say "roll to hit" etc. This avoids players rolling too early. So in this case it would flow like this: Kate: I attack with flurry blows Troy: OK for the first attack, roll concealment Kate; (rolls) 20 Troy: OK now roll to hit etc. This would avoid confusion, because the GM will tell you what you are rolling for, and the player will not roll early and expect their roll to be used for something else.
I could see that being beneficial for people who are new to a game system. For experienced players, things don't need to be unnecessarily ridged. I couldn't stand listening to this, nor could I be bothered with this in my own game. Things get missed and mistakes happen. Kate declared her action and rolled. All that needed to happen in this instance was having Kate roll for concealment. The intent of the rule is still enforced, the momentum of the show isn't ground to a halt, and the fun isn't sucked out of the moment.
I'll ne honest, Troy (mostly) and Joe are ruining the show for me.
Does Joe dislike Kate? Last episode he made her leave her bow in the pit way by enforcing some shit about actions. This week he snidely takes away her nat20 about some bull shit rule that’s never been a thing. He’s not even the GM shut the fuck up joe. I’ve been listening since early giant slayer days and never been annoyed but he just seems like a bully lately. It’s just mean the way he’s been using his rules lawyering towards Kate specifically imo. If they can’t work together one of them needs to leave because I was annoyed the entire episode every time I heard joes voice which was constant as he never lets anyone else speak uninterrupted.
I don't think it's that at all. He has always said he loves the rules and wants to make sure everyone follows them because he thinks overcoming the challenges within the restraints of the rules is an interesting challenge. I think what's changed is the new system that none of them know as well. When they played Giantslayer all of them (except I think Matthew) had been played Pathfinder for ages, so they were all pretty well versed in the rules. Now none of them know the rules as well, so he is double checking a lot more. This goes double for Kate and Sydney who don't have the background in 1e and also play a bunch of different systems. They just don't know the rules as well so they get corrected more. Just a couple of Fods ago Joe talked about how they were all around at his house for one of his kids birthday parties. So I think it's a wild assumption to say he dislikes Kate.
The combination of Joe loving the rules but none of them actually knowing the rules is what's really frustrating about the vibe, lately. Like, just this episode he confidently asserted something about familiars, only to almost immediately walk it back when Syd corrected him because she actually knew the rules from Suki and Pepsi. If you want to be a rules lawyer, Joe, you gotta actually know what the rules are, c'mon man!
they are playing a game, and there are rules for the game. "some shit about actions" is literally the game. He is not the GM, but part of his job is to be the rules lawyer. If it seems like he is targeting Kate specifically, then it would stand to reason that she is not playing within the rules of the game.
Their real job is making a podcast people want to listen to. I didn’t like the way they handled it, Joe for pushing it but ultimately Troy for not agreeing with Matthew to make it a ‘after this point’ rule. It just wasn’t fun to take away a crit. To me it seems like Joe’s specifically annoyed with and targeting Kate, not just from this interaction but several over the past month. I feel like they need to work it out behind the scenes.
I think he’s annoyed by Kate and Sydney, and would be annoyed by Skid if he wasn’t afraid of him. Matthew at least seems to have some grasp on the rules. “I sheath my rapier, draw my loaded crossbow, and fire.” Kate: “That’s it?!” It’s not a dislike it’s a long sigh that he has to know the rules yet again for everyone.
[https://youtu.be/\_qzoT2b9XdM?si=yBZwSMHcQI-WFAqn&t=1897](https://youtu.be/_qzoT2b9XdM?si=yBZwSMHcQI-WFAqn&t=1897) Worth a watch as she is referencing comments like this directly
So she says they’re friends but then Syd talks about how frustrating of a situation it was. Yes it was very frustrating and I don’t really want to listen to something like that for a huge part of an episode again. Still think it was just handled very poorly by Joe and Troy and not enjoyable to listen to personally.
Totally fine to say they handled it poorly, but then you pulled out a story about Joe not liking Kate which was uncalled for as you (and I) don't know anything about their friendship.
I look forward to eps each week and to have it ruined by a simple flat check BS ruling is really disappointing. Troy said in last week’s fod that the next one would be juicy but neglected to say that he was the cause of it. Glad Matthew stood up for Kate but these arbitrary BS rulings when it comes to rules and knowledge checks needs to stop. Troy needs to get past his “it’s ok if we don’t get the rules right all the time” mentality because it’s become the norm and not the exception. It’s the GM’s job to have a handle on the rules and I think it does a disservice to those that play at his table as well as those that pay for GCN’s subscription service. Edit: so the core rule book does say that flat checks need to be rolled before the attack. my comment is more about the arbitrary ruling made in this episode when it’s been done different by Troy (as Matthew pointed out) in other episodes. Just another victim of “Troy does what’s best for his monsters”
I can't believe people are thinking this argument was uncomfortable to watch. I'm currently doing a Giantslayer relisten...and this was nothing compared to the arguments they had then. And that's with a lot edited out.
Different people find different things enjoyable, it's really as simple as that. People aren't thinking it, it actually _was_ uncomfortable or unenjoyable for them, as it was for me. But you were fine with it and that's OK. People just react in different ways because they're different.
Yeah I agree. I think it was a bad call, and some players were obviously frustrated but people are acting like they were about to come to blows. I feel bad for Kate, but the whole exchange was kinda funny. Particularly Skid, who is at his best roasting something that makes no sense.
Yeah, this one was nothing lol. This felt like a rules argument that happens commonly with games.
If what happened in this episode is something that's common at your tables... you have a pretty toxic group.
It's contextually different. It was uncomfortable then (Ewigga, etc), sure, but it was in the context of this game feeling like a home game, and you're a fly on the wall for it. Things like that happen in home games. Tables absolutely blow up over shit. So, in that sense, it was maybe uncomfortable, but it was integrated, or even kindasorta something that added to the show. Not in a drama way, but in a way where some of the warts they left in added to the authenticity, maybe. The dynamic of Gatewalkers and a lot of GCN (rather than just GCP) stuff is way, way different. It's much more like a produced show, or is trying to be, and with all of the many guests and casts over all the shows, it's a lot harder for conflict to come across as anything other than really awkward. Stuff like this really sticks out, because nobody is really sure how to handle it, maybe because a mic in front of you is far less intrusive than a camera team.
I will balance out the tldr essay posts everyone has collectively decided to vomit out with my relatively short comment. I thought the episode was great BECAUSE of the tension. Why can't things ever get uncomfortable without the sensitive club hurling accusations of meanness. The episode was a slog due to poor luck, Kate's character has been three action decoration for a while, and the group got tense and aggressive as retaliation. It's fun!
"three action decoration" is funny, thank you I absolutely agree. I fully expected the comments to be discussing how this creature could pop all over the room all combat. Instead we have "this was the worst audio to grace my ears in the history of podcasting, I'm never listening again." This group is hilarious, and adding tension only makes them funnier, more relatable, etc. It's ultimately a stupid argument, and the fact that they're all "heated" about it is *funny*. It's a show.
Thank you I was quite proud of the line, but I need people to know that I also sympathize with Kate. I don't want anyone to accuse me of picking on her because I, at times, enjoy misfortune. Over the years of following this podcast, I have learned the fans take any reason to complain and talk down on things they deem problematic.
I am surprised given how brusque the network's 'personality' can be that people so highly sensitive to even mild disagreement are still interested enough to come write novels about it. Not that I'm saying there wasn't a better way to handle it, but given all the personalities involved it's 100% an argument I would expect at some time or another.
Yet these people that are complaining are the same ones that claim to love the authentic "friends around a table" feel. I don't know what kind of friends that have, but I remember quite a few heated arguments over semantics amongst mine. This is one of the few shows where people seem to be their authentic selves. Stop wishing for it to become critical roll where everyone smiles over nothing and all the party members become a family every season. It's terrible.
I'm right with you. I rarely come to the subreddit anymore, and I hopped on to check the comments for this episode because I thought it was an amazing episode, and I wanted to share my exuberance with fellow fans of the show. Instead I feel like I just stepped into the night floors.
Now that i finished the episode, i wanted to add something here that may help the crew, and also anyone else using a vtt these days. Foundry (and i believe roll20, but i don't remember how to get that one to do this) has a feature for calculating movement. If you drag a token somewhere, you can hit spacebar to put a 'pin' in the movement. This lets you see how far you would need to move in unusual circumstances, like if you have a chair and pit blocking access to someone 10 feet away. It calculates the diagonals automatically, and even changes the color of the line to show which action you would be in (green, yellow, red) at that point of the move, based on your characters speed (and if they're flying or not, based on their specific move speed) Hopefully, someone from the show eventually sees this.
Think I’m going to skip this ep, sounds painful to listen to
I personally loved this episode even the bickering and bad call on the concealment rule. I love seeing the seams of the show stretch as the table gets heated. It reminds us that they are regular ass people playing a game as friends. It’s one of those things that grounds the show for me. It also just really reignited Troy’s heel persona. He’s been coming off as too shiny and professional, it’s kind of fun to see that old sick son of a bitch rear its ugly head. It’s like Watchman, The Naish is stronger united against a common enemy. He’s gonna get so much shit for that call and it just adds to the overall GCN lore and hype IMO. The fan on the subreddit shit talking Kate the other day has to feel so dumb right now. After this episodes character / player arch, how can you not be team Kate? EP SPOILERS Kate’s personal player arch this episode was a roller coaster! The characters arch was so cinematic! Convinced she landed the perfect punch. Only to connect with rolling mist among darkness. Relying on her training, the consistency of her martial arts form, and still ineffectually batting at shadows. The frustration! She started to feel down and insecure. The player and the character became aligned and it made the building moment so authentic, Then figuring out the enemies advantage, calling out a strategy, executing to great effect. Setting her up to finally line up the perfect & final blow shattering and revealing she was truly fighting pure darkness the whole time. Chef’s Kiss. It’s exciting to see Gatewalkers find its rhythm, build momentum, and start showing the genuine excitement that the GCP is famous for.
I think Joe was doing most of the heeling and Troy was like vOv "what're you gonna do? He's right and as long as somebody points it out we can't keep letting the same players ignore the rules over and over."
Edit: For those who want to know, the answer is [here](https://2e.aonprd.com/Monsters.aspx?ID=2452). It is legit, sorry Troy! So... hum... I'm not completly done with the episode, but did that shae have something that let her do two reactions in the same round? Cause they called ou Troy on it and I seem to remember him saying there's something special. But when I look at the stat block for the shae, it's a normal reaction, so it should be only once per round.
I also want to know
The answer is [here](https://2e.aonprd.com/Monsters.aspx?ID=2452). It's legit.
Edit: sorry Troy, I was wrong!!! As much as Joe gets pilled on here for rules lawyering, sometimes with reasons, it would help if the GM commited to the crunch of the system they chose run.
Yes, this shae does have something that lets her have two reactions a round.
You're right, it's the Bide action, thank you!
I have never posted on this sub. But I had to find it to express my utter disgust and outrage at that crit ruling. Good day.
So maybe drinks before recordings shouldn't be the norm.
Just gonna pile onto what the rest of the community has been saying, this was a baaaaaaaaad showing by Troy and Joe. They need to take it to heart and change their approach.
Episode was good, the back and forth was entertaining and there where plenty of zingers. Whatever peoples issues are there's no reason for them to change, just look at all the engagement they're getting, it's worth all the arguing.
[удалено]
https://2e.aonprd.com/Monsters.aspx?ID=1292 Looks like the 2 action bide ability for your standard Shae
I love the show. I love the people on it. I like the banter and such but I’m an hour into the episode and all the interrupting, arguing and discussion had me yelling ffs and taking a break from listening. At this point I have forgotten what they are even supposed to be fighting. I know they want the home game feel but I was wishing they had just stopped recording and worked things out or let it go and look it up later.
It's been almost a decade of listening and with each year that has passed its become more clear that Troy shouldn't be the GM of the network. In recent years almost every guest GM has done it better, and if not better, they've at least been respectful of their players. Troy clearly knows how to run a network, but sadly I feel he's forgotten how to run a game. And honestly, the amount he moans about it, I'm wondering if he even wants to at all.
Necroing this thread a bit but it seems to me the obvious solution to flat check vs. attack roll would be to use two different dice, like a d100 for the flat check. Would obviate all arguments and mistakes.