A few beginner questions.


Rules Questions and Gameplay Discussion


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Just picked up S&S this weekend and other than lamenting I waited this long to try PACG I have a few questions.

1. We also picked up the Ranger Class deck, Does this provide enough extra cards to increase the players past 4 or do I need to get the char-addon pack. (will be doing so anyways but may have a group of 6 by this weekend.)

2. One of my buddies loves caltrops but we weren't sure if he could re-add to his deck at the end of scenarios if all caltrops got banished and there were still enough items to rebuild his deck.

3. WE cant seem to understand moving the ship and encountering new ships if anyone could explain it easily.


Welcome to PACG.

1. You can do four player with just the base set. For 5 or 6 you need the character add on, mostly because it also gives you a few henchmen you will need.

2. You can not. Unless the group as a whole doesn't have enough items, you can't go to the box for one.

3. Don't move the ship. Your ship (or at least the card that is your ship) never moves.

If your ship is docked, put the ship at the location specified by the scenario card. If you are at that location, you are on the ship. If you are at that location and it is your turn, you are commanding the ship.

If your ship is not docked, place it by the scenario card. When it is your turn, you are commanding the ship. Anyone at the same location as you is on the ship. Whenever the commander moves, anyone at the commander's location can move with them. This means that when I end my turn at location A and you start your turn at location B, me and everyone else at location A don't get a free move to location B to join you.

You can only encounter another ship when you are in a ship. In docked scenarios that means you must be at the docked location to encounter the ship. In undocked scenarios that means you must be the commander or at the commander's location to encounter a ship.

In minute I will post some helpful links. In the meantime, good luck on your adventure.


Thanks only bit of clarification I still need is one point one. In addition to the core we did get the Ranger class deck pack based on your post I do still need to get the Char-addon pack correct?


Talonhawke wrote:
Thanks only bit of clarification I still need is one point one. In addition to the core we did get the Ranger class deck pack based on your post I do still need to get the Char-addon pack correct?

Correct


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

The class decks, even if you shuffle them in with the game box, do not include banes (monsters, barriers, and henchmen). These extra banes, especially the henchmen, are needed if you are playing with more than 4 players in order to properly set up the location decks (for a 4-player game you will have 6 locations usually, versus 8 for a 6-player game. This means each scenario requires 2 extra henchmen -- one per each new location you add. The base game only includes enough henchmen to run up to 4 players, hence why the character add on deck is required).


Thank you all now off to get a class pack. One other question comes to mind. I know that ill be wanting the S&S pack for the Alchemist but can the rune lords classes work with S&S?


The Runelords characters can play in Skull and Shackles. Though note that they might not be up for the unique challenges of Skull and Shackles.

S&S has a strong emphasis on Wisdom and Survival. While not every character in S&S has great Wisdom or Survival, they usually have ways to compensate for it.

I'd say some of the Runelords characters would be awesome in S&S (Amiri the barbarian, Sajan the monk) while others might struggle a bit. But you can certainly try them all. There is nothing about the characters themselves that prevent them from being compatible.


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Ok. Here are the links I mentioned.

Accessories This contains a ship card that explains some of the unique things about ships that can be hard to remember.

This is a guide for new players. It is directed at Rise of the Runelords, but should be pretty compatible with Skull and Shackles.

I also recommend this adventure guide to give some more story to the game for you.

Enjoy!


Wow those are nice need to get card stock and a color printer.


Okay 2 more questions came up last night.

1. Shark reef (or whatever its called not at home.) Could someone explain closing it and how it interacts with the summoned shark at the start of turn. We weren't sure if beating that shark let you close it of if you had to fight another shark when you closed it.

2 Jinx Eater If you use its second ability do you still take damage?


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

1. The summoned sharks do not allow you to close. Henchmen let you close the location they came from, however summoned cards come from the box and not a location deck, therefore there is not any location for them to close. Summoned cards are always banished back to the box after the encounter, so losing against it or evading it would not shuffle it into your location either. So, the start of turn effect does not allow you to close, and when you empty the deck or beat a henchman in the deck that allows you to close, you then need to fight an additional shark to actually close it (if you defeat the villain there it is automatically closed without needing to succeed the close check, so no sharks for you in that case).

Grand Lodge

Talonhawke wrote:

Okay 2 more questions came up last night.

1. Shark reef (or whatever its called not at home.) Could someone explain closing it and how it interacts with the summoned shark at the start of turn. We weren't sure if beating that shark let you close it of if you had to fight another shark when you closed it.

2 Jinx Eater If you use its second ability do you still take damage?

1) At this location, at the start of your turn you summon a Hammerhead Shark. This is a summoned creature and does not have all the powers as the actual Henchman.

So summoned Henchmen (and you'll encounter more as you keep playing) do not have the power to allow you to attempt closing a location. Only when you encounter the physical card of said Henchmen can you attempt after you defeat him.

2) If you read the second power, "If you would fail a combat check by 1, you may bury this card to succeed.", it is saying that if you missed the combat check by 1, instead of failing the check and taking damage, you can bury the Jinx Eater and succeed.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

I have a beginner question. Can I use an ally (or other card) to explore my location during someone else's turn?

I'm a bit unclear on exactly when I can use card effects.


No, you can't use an ally or anything else to explore during someone another players turn.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

I didn't think so, but I could not find anything in the rulebook which would stop it.


Preston Poulter wrote:
I didn't think so, but I could not find anything in the rulebook which would stop it.
S&S Rules v1 wrote:

PLAYING A SCENARIO

...
YOUR TURN
...
Explore: You may explore your location once each turn without
playing a card that allows you to explore; this must be your first
exploration for the turn.
You may never explore on another player’s
turn.
When you explore, flip over the top card of your current location
deck. If it’s a boon, you may attempt to acquire it; if you don’t, banish
it. If it’s a bane, you must try to defeat it (see Encountering a Card on
page 10). Many effects allow you to explore again on your turn, and
there is no limit to the number of times you can explore.

...


And to build on Firedale's point, exploring is actually restricted to your Explore step, as stated in the S&S FAQ.


elcoderdude wrote:

And to build on Firedale's point, exploring is actually restricted to your Explore step, as stated in the S&S FAQ.

Also note that some encounters look like exploring but they're not and those can occur outside the explore step.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

So I could case detect evil on another player's turn and encounter a monster?


No, but only because detect evil says you have to play it on your turn.

But you could play detect evil before your move step, since it doesn't count as exploring.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Could I explore before moving using a blessing or ally?


No, because all exploring has to occur in your explore step.

Detect Evil isn't exploring. It is examining and encountering, which feels a lot like exploring, but isn't.


No, as Firedale posted a bit above the rulebook say this about exploration:

Quote:

PLAYING A SCENARIO

...
YOUR TURN
...
Explore: You may explore your location once each turn without
playing a card that allows you to explore; this must be your first
exploration for the turn.
You may never explore on another player’s
turn. When you explore, flip over the top card of your current location
deck. If it’s a boon, you may attempt to acquire it; if you don’t, banish
it. If it’s a bane, you must try to defeat it (see Encountering a Card on
page 10). Many effects allow you to explore again on your turn, and
there is no limit to the number of times you can explore.

So you can only Explore during your own turn and during Explore step.

You can use stuff like "Detect Evil", "Detect Magic", Alahazra's Stargazer ability and like to encounter cards outside of Explore step [and in some cases, even outside your own turn!] because, as Hawkmoon said, those effects don't count as exploring.


The moving shark seems like a bugger, but consider this.
Lets say Location A and B have one Shark Henchman. You spend an average of 5 turns to hit the henchman in Location A. But then defeating the Shark Henchman into the bottom of location B. Here it doesn't help your odds. The average time to get to the Henchman/Villain in Location B is still 5 cards. But say your first encounter is a monster and you evade or lose to it. It gets shuffled into the location. SHUFFLE!!!

Now you have 2 out of 11 cards that can close the location meaning you'll hit one on average in 2-3 turns.


So just Have another question Just finished the 3rd scenario of the base set last night. What is a 0 class ship feat?


Talonhawke wrote:
So just Have another question Just finished the 3rd scenario of the base set last night. What is a 0 class ship feat?

If I'm correct, you have a Fleet-Card, which has 2 sides. One side tells you what Plunder you get on what Roll (1- Weapon, 2- Spell, 3-Armor, 4-Item, 5-Ally, 6-Your Choice). If you turn the card around. You'll see a lot of checkboxes with a lot of names but they're categorized under Class 0-7.

What this means is that you can get an Extra ship to your Fleet. Meaning you can cross of not only Merchantman (which is your starting ship) but another Class 0 ship.

Here is how ship works real fast:
1. You start every scenario with 1 of the ships you have crossed of (so Merchantman for starters).
2. If you defeat a ship and a card told you that you were allowed to seize it. You can seize. Replacing your ship. (Also: Defeating a ship means more Plunder).
3. At the end of the scenario, if you are under control of a ship that is crossed off on your Fleet Card, congrats, you may take it to your next scenario. If you haven't crossed it off. Too bad. You have to replace it with one of your fleets.

You do know how Plunder works, right?

So, in short: Ship Feat give you more ships to choose from at the start of every scenario. The Class is like a level. (Although my favorite ship is a Class 4 ship...)


You should have a Fleet Card (it has the Plunder Table on the other side of it). It lists ships, broken up by Class. You can check off any ship under Class 0. That means you now have more options when you set up the scenario and choose which ship will be your ship for the scenario.

See this FAQ.


OK I was too long to answer, anyway since it's a long answer, I leave it here...

Talonhawke wrote:
So just Have another question Just finished the 3rd scenario of the base set last night. What is a 0 class ship feat?

This means you can add one new ship of "class 0" in your fleet (you can add a checkmark on your fleet card). The fleet is the selection of ship from which you select one at the beginning of each scenario.

When you win a "X Class ship feat", select one of the ships of "class X" that you don't already have in your fleet and add it to your fleet.

E. g., you start S&S with only the "Merchantman" ship checked on your fleet card. This means in any scenario you start (*), you can only use the "Merchantman" ship as your ship until you have win one or more "X Class ship feats". When you win "A 0 class ship feat", you can check any ship of class "up to" 0. This mean you can check for example the "Shackles Pirate Ship" and from now one you can select between the "Merchantman" and the "Shackles Pirate Ship" any time you start a scenario.

(*) Note that DURING a scenario you can seize a ship (if you defeat it and the rules let you seize it). A seized ship can be used during the rest of the scenario (or swapped to another one during the scenario if you defeat another one), but is not kept between scenarios. For the next scenario you are back to selecting within your checked ships on your fleet card.

Clear?


Thanks

Sovereign Court

Also, note that promo ships (if you have any) are not on the fleet card. They are considered checked off as long as you have at least one ship checked on the fleet card that matches the promo card's class number


Finished Sunken treasure last night and a few more questions have since arisen, mostly because it was our first extremely close game. (we ended on with one blessing left.)
1. Is the blessing deck always 30 cards even if playing with more than 4 players?

2. Are the players allowed to check to see how many blessings are left. We choose not to last night but were wondering.

Can cards that reduce combat damage be used to negate the Brine Dragon's before combat acid damage or not.


1. There are always 30 Cards in the Blessings Deck, be it with 1 or 6 characters.

2. I guess you are allowed to check the number, yes, we do it a lot to count out how many blessings we can discard to use for bonuses on ships. Same goes for Location Decks, your own Decks and stuff like that. I don't think there is a rule that prohibits you from doing some math.

3. Brinebones deals Electricity damage for starters. And no. Electricity damage is not Combat Damage. If it were it would have said "Electricity Combat damage". You can, however, bury most armors to negate any damage, which is thus also Electricity damage.
So, you can only reduce damage with cards that specify for which kind of damage they are meant to reduce.


Thanks again.


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, PF Special Edition, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

To expand on #2, that goes for any deck, feel free to also count how many cards are remaining in your character decks or location decks if that helps you make decisions -- just don't look at or rearrange the cards when doing so.


skizzerz wrote:
To expand on #2, that goes for any deck, feel free to also count how many cards are remaining in your character decks or location decks if that helps you make decisions -- just don't look at or rearrange the cards when doing so.

+1 to encouraging players to check how many cards they have left in their character deck. You don't want to get a nasty shock when you reset your hand and find yourself one card short.


Back again hope you all aren't tired of me yet. When are you allowed to play spells? We may have missed it in the rule book and i'm not with my rule book. Can i for instance play cure on someone else's turn to heal them before they explore.


S&S Rulebook p10 wrote:

Playing Cards

Anyone can play a card whenever the card allows it....
A specific card’s power may only be used once per check or step....
If a card in your hand does not specify when it can be played, you can generally play it anytime you can play cards, with the exception that during an encounter you may only perform specific actions at specific times.

Couple that with this FAQ that says you can play as many cards as you want between steps.

So yes, you can play a Cure on someone else's turn. On anyone's turn, you can't play it during an encounter. You can play 1 Cure on anyone's "Advance the blessings deck" step. As many Cures as you want/have between anyone's "Advance the blessings deck" step and their "Give a card" step. 1 Cure during their "Give a card" step. As many as you want between their "Give a card" and "Move" step. And so on.

You just can't play it during an encounter, during the "End Your Turn" step, or between explorations if the second exploration is triggered by an "immediate" effect.


Talonhawke wrote:
Back again hope you all aren't tired of me yet. When are you allowed to play spells? We may have missed it in the rule book and i'm not with my rule book. Can i for instance play cure on someone else's turn to heal them before they explore.

You can play spells, like Cure, most any time, with a few exceptions. You can't play a spell during an encounter that's not directly related. You can't play spells for no effect (no "I cast Force Missile against the darkness"). You can't play cards after you reset your hand, not until the next person's turn. So you can play Cure on another person's turn, just not during an encounter.

edit- and again ninja'ed by Hawkmoon


Hawkmoon269 wrote:
S&S Rulebook p10 wrote:

Playing Cards

Anyone can play a card whenever the card allows it....
A specific card’s power may only be used once per check or step....
If a card in your hand does not specify when it can be played, you can generally play it anytime you can play cards, with the exception that during an encounter you may only perform specific actions at specific times.

Couple that with this FAQ that says you can play as many cards as you want between steps.

So yes, you can play a Cure on someone else's turn. On anyone's turn, you can't play it during an encounter. You can play 1 Cure on anyone's "Advance the blessings deck" step. As many Cures as you want/have between anyone's "Advance the blessings deck" step and their "Give a card" step. 1 Cure during their "Give a card" step. As many as you want between their "Give a card" and "Move" step. And so on.

You just can't play it during an encounter, during the "End Your Turn" step, or between explorations if the second exploration is triggered by an "immediate" effect.

So you can play a Cure between explorations if the second one is from something like a blessing or ally?


Yes, exactly. But not between Ezren aquiring a boon with the magic trait and exploring again with his power.And not between defeating Ambush and exploring again as the reward for defeating it.


Elezar wrote:
So you can play a Cure between explorations if the second one is from something like a blessing or ally?

Only before you play the card that gives you the next explore. It works like this.

-Once you play a card / use a power that gives you an explore, you are in the "during an encounter" sequence.

-If you get an explore during your encounter, then the moment your encounter ends, you must choose to use or forfeit the earned explore. If you use it, you're in "during an encounter" again, with no chance to do "between" stuff.

(ETA: if you get an explore during your encounter, and it doesn't say you "may" do it - most such explores do specify that you may, however - then you must choose to use it as above.)


Hawkmoon269 wrote:
Yes, exactly. But not between Ezren aquiring a boon with the magic trait and exploring again with his power.And not between defeating Ambush and exploring again as the reward for defeating it.

Just to expand on this, when some cards say "you may immediately ..." then you can't play cards or use powers before you take that option. So you can't defeat a Henchman then use a card like Toad to get a card before you try to close.

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