Pathfinder 2.0 Crazy Gaming Group Idea

[Raf_Cian]

I created a journal in FA advertising interest in... well the topic says it all. Link to the FA journal here.

But, since this is a forum and not a chat room, I can post the text of the journal directly.

I picked up Starfinder thinking that it would be my gateway back into playing RPGs again, instead of just gorging on the source books and never playing a single session. As of yet, no Starfinder games... so I'm starting up early for Pathfinder 2.0. Playtest isn't even out till August, so let's set up a gaming group now.

Trick is, I want to be a player, but I also want to world build... and somewhere in the middle of contemplating those contradictions, I came up with an idea that would all both me and everyone else at the gaming table to be both. I know round table GMing isn't a unique idea, but normally you play in one world. But, what if, all the player characters came from different worlds? And all those worlds are connected by a hub, let's say on the astral plane for the sake of conversation. And at least at the beginning time will be spent exploring the hub and those worlds to make sense of it all, with each player stepping in to introduce their creation. From there, decisions have to be made... but I think it could be a lot of fun.

Of course, ground rules need to be set. I personally think the GM can control their character during exploration and downtime, but they should probably hand it over to another player during combat encounters; everyone's a GM in this situation, so riding two characters at once shouldn't be too much of a hassle. Also while some stuff needs to be kept hidden, certain mechanical elements of the homebrewing should be shared upfront. Not just for balance issues but also meshing the worlds together; if one person has a Science Fantasy world while another has an Urban Fantasy world, they'll both need to agree somewhat on how the homebrewd Computer skill would work.

...and yeah. Until I have someone to bounce ideas off of, that is the extent of my pitch. This would, of course, mean a level of dedication to actually pick up the Pathfinder 2.0 Playtest in August, and possibly the full setting whenever it is finalized. But if you're interested there is no reason not to start planning out the fluff now. I'll pass links to this journal around and see who I can get to bite, but eventually those who do bite will need more flexible venue to talk in... once again, though, something to discuss once people are interested.

I'm a little hesitant to post this here, mostly because I've been gone for so long that I probably won't know the majority of the people who might respond with interest. But I know know so few people anywhere so that is a hesitation I'm going to have to put aside.

Also, aside from basic premise, little has been decided. So once we actually have a group of people, stuff like table rules will need to be discussed. There's so far there has been only one maybe interested party. I have one stream I might drop a link into with the streamer's permission... and after that, maybe a second discord. If I can't get three to five interested people out of that I'm not sure what I'd do.

[Selden]

Well, I guess I could join in.  I'm in a D&D group that meets Wednesdays, but I'm sure I could handle a second session on some other day.

[EisenManfred]

I can join in

[Raf_Cian]

First thing, thank you both for your response.

Second thing, the person responding on Discord said they were mostly voicing words of encouragement and believe that we're both in different timezone... so that's a bust. So as of yet the only respondents are you two.

Speaking of which, I'm Eastern Standard Timezone. This is about the time we should double check such levels of compatibility before moving forward. And considering the ruleset we're going to be using isn't in playtest until August there isn't any rush, just a reminder to keep on moving towards the goal. Speaking of, second thing to do would be to decide on a method of communication; I favor Discord now-a-days, and it does hold the advantage of creating one subchannel per to world facilitate design talk, but I know some have trouble using it for voice chat.

I guess there is also a question of how much further recruitment should be done. I've tapped those communities I feel comfortable doing so with... and where I didn't find silence I instead found concerns about availability. So as of yet it's just the three of us; three isn't an impossible gaming group but I'd feel more comfortable with just a little more... unless you both think that would make things unmanageable for such a creative endeavor like joined world building.

[Selden]

I'm in Mountain time.  That's a two hour difference, but that's no different from the other group I'm in - if we play during the week I'll try to get home from work ASAP, figure 4:30 mountain, 6:30 eastern.  The good news is that I should be able to stay up as late as people in more easterly zones want to.  As I said before, my Wednesdays are booked but any other day should be okay.

I use Discord, and haven't had trouble with voice chat.  As to the number of players, four or five would probably be a good idea... and of course a GM.

[EisenManfred]

I'm on mountain time as well but I don't get off work till 5 or sometimes later

[Raf_Cian]

OK, so we're talking 7pm Eastern, 5pm Moutain, as a the earliest start time. Weekdays preferred by Selden, but not Wednesday.
I will note that the Pathfinder 2.0 playtest won't even be out till August and it will take time to slap together the house rules, so circumstances will change for many of us before then.

I do have a worry, and it mostly comes from the line "four or five would probably be a good idea... and of course a GM". That is the basis for a standard gaming group... but that wasn't what I was proposing.
My original idea was a group of four to five people, with each character from a different world, and working on a round robin system of GM responsibility. If you guys read and digested all that, that's great. If all you saw was "Looking for a Pathfinder 2.0 game"... then we might need to sit down and talk some more.

Given the lackluster response gained from the initial proposal, I'm all for changing the direction. I could slap together four to five worlds, and just let the players choose from them. This would loose the round robin approach while maintaining the original vision proposed. Alternatively, I could just do one world, though if I do that I would prefer to just do a furry conversion of Eberron rather than create anew for various reasons.

If you guys want to stick to the original idea, we need to expand our feelers and search in other communities (I'm rather introverted, my original soap box stand only covered three plus one stand alone friend). This does mean we might be working with some nonfurries.
If you guys want to go with the idea of must me being the GM, than I would like you two to decide which of the two approaches you would prefer me to do since so far you would be the only players and I would hate to loose you.

[EisenManfred]

I'm just new to role playing games so I have no idea how to be GM or DM?

[Selden]

I could give it a shot.  I probably wouldn't do a great job, though.

[Raf_Cian]

Right. Apologies for taking so long to respond again, but with those two one sentence responses I think we need to move this discussion to someplace more... dynamic.

Since we got one no to GMing, and one maybe if you look at it from the right angle, I can just be the GM. And since you both answered the first question but not the second I'm making the executive decision just to go with Eberron.

As for more dynamic discussion, the entire point of the delay was for me to pull up my pants and create a Discord server. Channels and roles have been set up, though you'll need to join the server for me to assign you roles. I'm generating a one use link for both of you, and sending it via Private Message. I'm hoping the discord server will allow things to pick up the pace a little bit. You'll need to wait for me to assign you a role before you can comment on anything, but aside from the existence of the channels there is nothing much to comment on yet.