How I run it: Respecs

One awesome thing about playing in newer systems is that you always have new stuff to try out! This is also one of the terrible things.

When Pathfinder 2e only had one book, I co-ran a West Marches. It felt like every other month, we had a new supplement that added so many cool classes and ancestries and heritages. At first, allowing players to have more than one PC let people play around, but even that became an issue as players ran out of slots or didn’t want to manage yet another character sheet.

The GMs hesitated to let players retire characters left and right, because part of what makes game dynamics work is shared history. We didn’t want to lose half the town every time a new book came out. Sure, retraining exists, but it only goes so far and takes time. What could we do to make everyone happy?

Enter the Respec

What if there was a way to keep PC history and let people play something new? We didn’t want players changing things willy-nilly (so no swapping out every feat right before a game because you heard there’d be a red dragon), but surely once every few months wouldn’t be too unmanageable.

We started brainstorming. Here were some things we considered that were rejected:

• Only allowing changes from the new book. This leads to too much accounting.
• Only allowing a certain number of changes. Again, accounting. We would have to audit character sheets.
• Only allowing one per player. When we came to our final system, this felt unnecessary.
• Reset on gold and gear. PCs had a wide range of wealth, so this felt like it would punish our most active players.

I’m not saying that these were wrong decisions, only that they were wrong for us and our set-up.

Finally, we came up with what respecs would look like for us:

• Your history stays the same. All your old experiences and relationships are a part of your character.
• Your gear doesn’t change. If you need to buy new stuff, sell what you have and use your existing cash reserves.
• You can change anything else on your sheet. Ancestry. Heritage. Background. Class. Feats. Spells. ANYTHING.
• It’s up to the player to come up with the story. GMs can help but aren’t responsible for coming up with the idea themselves.
• No downtime is necessary. It just happens. If you want to roleplay it taking a while, that’s perfectly fine, but the timeline is up to you.
• Every PC gets one respec per book that includes significant changes. So, a Lost Omens book without a new class or ancestry might not count, but a book like Rage of Elements does.
• You can’t stockpile respec points. It’s one or none.
• You also don’t have to spend it right away. Feel free to hold onto it until the time is right.

The reaction was almost unanimously positive. Players got to try out new stuff, GMs weren’t overwhelmed, and town history stayed intact.

Metaplot

The biggest sticking point was explaining why these changes were happening. Some of the options we ended up using:

A Big Event. We put together a big event a few times that helped explain the sudden changes. Fey BS was a popular reason, but we also used disasters or other major events to explain the sudden shifts.

Reincarnate. The Reincarnate ritual was another option open for players, though with no rolling or money spent. They ‘die’ and are brought back in a weird new body with new ideas in their head.

A Clever Retcon. A few players opted for a clever retcon of their own story, like an Elf who realized he was an Android with implanted memories.

Fallout

Whenever I tell other GMs about this policy, they’re skeptical. It sounds like it would utterly wreck games and the immersion, so I must have dealt with a ton of fallout each time a new book came out. Except… I didn’t.

I won’t say it was a non-event, but players were game to accept the new reality around their fellow PCs and even enjoyed playing it up. Also, since major books aren’t realized too often, players were careful about spending that respec point. They would be stuck with it if they didn’t like what they ended up with.

What I did notice

Re-engagement. In a West Marches game, big releases meant more people logging on and joining games so they could play with new toys.

Growing pains. Right after a new release, if players used respecs, you have to GM with a lighter hand. Players are getting used to new feats and abilities, so the first game might have a lot of long turns.

Changed tactics. If respecs are done to a dedicated group, they might take a session to readjust their tactics to new play styles.

Happy players. Not to sound too dorky, but a GM is always happy to see happy players, and players with new toys are generally happy.

Investment in personal arcs. This was an interesting one, but some players didn’t respec for the new books, but to update their story.

So, all around a win, and worth a little chaos!