The Golarion Gazette

Weeks of tense negotiations between the Golarion Adventurers Union, or GAU, and the Pathfinder Society have failed to result in a new contract, with issues including unsafe working conditions, vacation days, and looting privileges remaining major sticking points. Adventurers have long complained about long stretches of near-constant battles with no letting up, with some reporting that they are forced to engage in more than half a dozen battles in a single day. The situation is at an impasse, with Pathfinder Society management stating that the increased workload is unavoidable due to spikes in villain activity. The GAU has announced that they will go on strike if their demands are not met.“The people who protect Golarion from monsters and villains every day deserve reasonable hours, safe working conditions, and regular breaks, not broken promises,” said union representative Paragal Wavehaven.

One of these alleged “broken promises” relates to vacation time. While the existing contract stipulates that adventurers must be provided at least eight days of vacation time after each adventure, union representatives claim that management has circumvented the rule by calling multiple disparate missions part of the same adventure. “In the past few months, I’ve had to beat up some Aspis Consortium agents in Absalom, sail over to Osirion to dig up ancient mummy curses, and go all the way to Katapesh to infiltrate a slaver’s operation,” said half-elf rogue Kirani Oakshire. “And I haven’t got a single vacation day because they said I haven’t finished the adventure yet. What do I have to do to finish the adventure? Stumble into godhood on a drunk bet?”

Other GAU demands include mandatory breaks of at least 30 minutes between combats, time-and-a-half pay for all encounters after the third in one day, and comprehensive health benefits including full resurrection coverage. “In our training, they constantly tell us about the Golarion Medical Association recommendations that adventurers not engage in a battle until they are healed to full health,” said Wavehaven, “but it’s impossible for us to follow when they’re forcing us into back-to-back battles without giving us time to heal.” Wavehaven also says that many adventurers would like to retrain their skills or craft new items, but they don’t have any time to do so because they are constantly forced into new adventures. “If you add up everything they want us to do, we would have to ascend to near-omnipotence within a few months of starting our careers.”

The Pathfinder Society is seeking a legal injunction preventing the GAU from striking on the grounds that adventurers perform an “essential public safety function” and any strike would present an “undue risk” of allowing villains to conquer Golarion. However, the GAU says such rhetoric is just “fearmongering” and “if it were really that easy for villains to conquer Golarion, it would have been conquered many times over by now.” If the GAU prevails in their fight, they next plan to focus on mandating clearer guidelines for recalling knowledge on monsters in combat and requiring that all traps be outfitted with warning markers and safety padding. “We won’t stop until all adventurers are in as good a shape as the nobles that hire them,” said Wavehaven.