Review: Pathfinder Adventures

[Pitta]

Wow great convo!!!

First thing I'll try tonight will be keeping the party together!!!

Anyway, despite some gameplay concessions to thematic inconsistency, the game is really great.

[currymutton2016]

I normally don't care about stars/ratings as such. But I think this does not really deserve 5-star rating.

Bugs, inconsistent UX and omission of information vital to user

The game is fun, although a little divergent from the D&D-sic RPG we know (and love?), but there are a lot of missing pieces, hiccups forbidding me from enjoying more...

I wish I could list them all but I think I just leave it for another time.

[Snarvid]

One way to think about my reaction to that quote is that it seems to hold the storytelling chops of their cards in rather higher esteem than is merited to claim that these are the stories the cards are telling. I'd probably have reacted better to that if it didn't seem like complimenting themselves, but you (and they) are right--it is possible to think about this more generously than I was giving it credit for. I think the cards themselves tend to cause the problems as much as they solve them, but that's the joy of a complicated, sometimes apparently conflicting set of texts which require substantial interpretation--you have the flexibility to make them mean a variety of different things, and can focus on what seems most salient in the current situation.

sidebar/ I am vaguely gob-smacked by the civility of this conversation, taken as a deviation from Internet norms. /sidebar

Some of the other rules tips (which can be found in the app under Rules->Tips and include such as "Cards don't do what they don't say" and "If it isn't called a thing, it isn't a thing") seem to focus on making sure players don't use their storytelling imaginations to make cards do more than the rules say they do. In that context, "Allow For Abstractions", along with "Cards do what they say", try to prevent players from using their storytelling imaginations to make cards say less than the rules say they do.

I agree that from a storytelling perspective the cards frequently demand improv-level "Yes, and-ing" and a strict refusal to negate their premises. As such "letting the cards tell you their stories" requires a particularly active form of listening - which to me, is one of the joys of the game when played around the tabletop. You can just play along mechanically following the rules, or you can construct a story to make it make sense, in an inevitably goofy and contorted way that would never pass muster in, say, Atlas Game's Once Upon a Time.

Also, @Pitta - assuming this does well, I think we can count on a lot more material for the app. There are currently 3 boxed sets of Pathfinder Adventure Card game out in print, with a fourth coming in October, and each set with all expansions has IIRC 33-35 scenarios total, so you're looking at something like 140 scenarios if they release everything. I like to imagine that much of the difficult work is already done before Obsidian comes along - art assets, scenario design, character balance, etc - and that as they remove the bugs from their chassis with Rise of the Runelords there should be a relatively low time cost for them to convert additional material. But then, I don't code...

[geigerm]

sidebar/ I am vaguely gob-smacked by the civility of this conversation, taken as a deviation from Internet norms. /sidebar

That's Pocket Tactics for you!

I haven't coded a game, but I've done a fair amount of coding, and I'd assume the amount of time required to integrate new content would largely depend on the variety of rules added with each set. If there's something the current code base doesn't account for, adding that in without breaking anything else might be tricky.

[zot23]

Is it just me or does $25 feel a bit steep at launch? Considering they've only released 33% of the content so far, seems like an "early bird" $15 might be a little easier. Ease that price up to $20-25 by the time installment 5-6 comes out. I don't know, I like it but $25 is a lot for iOS

[Snarvid]

It's a frequent complaint when looking at board game to app conversions, which frequently cause sticker shock in the IOS store. If you bought the tabletop game, you'd be spending roughly $40 for base box + $15x5 expansions + $15 for extra character deck. So... Once they squash the bugs, I'd argue it's a real bargain, and still much less than many people spend on Hearthstone or MTG.

Also, of course, you can grind to unlock stuff, but I don't know how much gold it costs because I did unlock it all in the single purchase. Still, I've played the tabletop game quite a bit, and doing so never unlocked anything additional for me.

[pfail]

Pitta asked basically the same question to the devs on Twitter ("Any timeframe for the iOS version going universal?") and their response was, "Not yet, but we'll keep you all posted."

https://twitter.com/Obsidian/status/728986205296041984

Ah, thank you for that. I guess I should just go straight to developers for deman-- I mean, questions like this.

[rinelk]

I've been going back and forth between quest mode and story mode on harder levels, and I'm wondering if anyone has discovered a way to tell which characters have completed each scenario? I expect to have time to fully level everyone as far as they can be leveled before the next content drop, but I played around with my party kind of a lot in my first playthrough, so I don't recall who did what.

[halfvoid]

I believe there's a tab on each character's "sheet" which is titled Completion. Should show you exactly which missions have been completed already by that character.

[rinelk]

I believe there's a tab on each character's "sheet" which is titled Completion. Should show you exactly which missions have been completed already by that character.

Brilliant! I feel foolish for missing it, but yes, that's exactly what I'm looking for.