AxeMurder0's page

I was wondering if anybody knew what time the local fireworks show is and if there are any good locations nearby to watch it from.

Thanks.

It was only a month ago when Venture Captain Drandle Drenge awoke you in the middle of the night and summoned you to his office.

*cue flashback music*

Drandle Drenge's office is a complete mess; unruly piles of paperwork lie everywhere, and it appears that somebody has ransacked his desk.

Drenge stares in your general direction, his eyes clouded by thick cataracts. He seems oblivious to the odd hour and lights a pipe and begins speaking in a slow southern drawl once you're all in his office.

"Well Pathfinders..." as he stops to take a puff from his pipe "fortune is with us today. I've got a mission fer ya that doesn't involve Varisia. Instead we'll be sendin' y'all to the River Kingdoms, to a little town called Thornkeep. Now you won't be spendin' much time in town for what we're really interested in is a scryin' pool in the 'Halls Under the Hill'."

Drenge stops speaking for a moment as he takes another puff from his pipe and pushes a stack of papers off his desk before picking one up, seemingly at random and continuing.

"Y'all are extra fortunate, as we have reliable intel on the danger's y'all gonna be facin'. The scryin pool is guarded by..."

Drenge takes a moment to review the sheet of paper in his hand.

"...a door. Not just any door, but a magic door. Now here's what I want y'all to do:"

*puff puff*

"Go to the Halls Under the Hill, secure the area between the entrance and the scryin' pool and figure how to get that door open. Y'all got it?"

Alright, welcome aboard everybody. This section is for OOC discussion etc. I'm going to be going over the characters in the next few days and at least briefly make sure they follow the rules.

Hopefully we can get the characters and their shopping sorted out by Monday or Tuesday and get started in earnest then.

As a note you'll have time to shop after being briefed in Absalom before traveling to Thornkeep, but poor Drandle Drenge doesn't have any useful intelligence for you, so relying on the information from the adventure blurb is pretty much all you'd get.

Also a brief into of yourself would be appreciated.

Ex.

Hi I'm Robert, I'm currently in Iowa and expecting to graduate in May but consider California my home. I play/judge way too much PFS for my own good and should reach my 3rd star by the end of the year. It makes a nice break between applying for jobs.

Greetings! My name is Robert and I'm a PFS addict.

I'm currently looking for 4-6 people with level 1-2 PFS characters to play the Accursed Halls. As a note we will only be running the Halls and not Thornkeep or the surrounding area.

While I would prefer players whom are unfamiliar with the details of the Accursed Halls, knowing such is not a deal breaker, just please make it clear how much you know.

Warning: There are some particularly lethal challenges for level 1 characters, so apply at your own risk.

Once I pick a team and check stats, I'll start the scenario within a week or so, with text here on the Paizo boards, and simple maps through Google Docs. I am hoping to be done before my trip to China on March 15th. To accomplish this, I'm expecting people to be able to post daily during the work week. (More frequently is welcome, of course.)

So, what am I asking you to do here?

1) Introduce your character -- if you have one -- or your intended concept. While I do not need a full stat block yet, I will need one before the start of the game.

2) Tell me how much you know about Thornkeep.

This recruitment is not first-come, first-serve. In few days, I'll draw straws, looking to build a well-balanced party. I'll let you know now that I'm likely to be capricious, and I'll apologize in advance to those who won't make the cut.

I am, of course, happy to answer any questions.

Presenting an interactive fiction of a day in the life of a new Venture Captain.

Venture Captain Simulator

I know this is a repeat for those of you who have been around long enough but I started working on it again so I thought I'd post the updated version. If you played it before, the page count has only increased by about 10% meaning there are not a lot of new choices.

If it's new to you: good luck and enjoy!

As before I'm happy to consider silly ideas from fellow Pathfinders regarding iconic situations etc.

"Additionally, a GM should have a physical copy of the Pathfinder RPG Bestiary"

I do not own a physical copy nor a pdf of the Bestiary.

(Some Straw Man / Some Serious Questions)

Should I stop GMing?

Should I ask if somebody has a copy of it when I sit down to run the table and refuse to continue until a copy arrives at the table?

Should I extort Todd Morgan and tell him I won't run any tables at his con unless he buy's me a Beastiary?

Should I just suck it up and buy a copy for $40?

Should I try and track down everybody at every slot I've run since that came into effect and ask if a physical Beastiary was at the table, and if the answer is no tell them to destroy their chronicle sheet as it was not a legal table?

Couple issues with Encounter C. THE UNDEAD CHARNEL HOUSE (CR 6 OR CR 9)

1) Ugh I hate being asked to apply a template myself.

2) High tier tactics for Marigana say "Use the tactics from Subtier 3–4." which have her casting Scare on the 3 most deadly PCs , Scare only targets characters below 6HD which is unlikely to be effective, although possible at subtier 6-7

3) Is the CR calculated right? 3x CR1 = 4 + a CR6 should be CR 7 right?
Although I guess once you have a CR 6 creature the CR1s aren't adding as much. (CR is calculated correctly at high tier)

4) There's a note that: "her spell-like abilities’ and poison’s save DCs are reduced by 2 as a result of the young simple template."

The poison is definitely correct, but do her SLAs really use CON and not CHA?

5) There seems to be significant differences in applying the quick vs rebuild rules including AC, CMB/CMD/Will Save/SLA+Poison DC* (Maybe, see question 4)/damage

Picture

Hey man, I'm lookin' to score some Pesh. Anybody around here know where I can get a good deal?

I, Farak, the Most Powerful Mage in All Absalom wish to remind my fellow compatriots of our role in the society. While I normally speak in boasts and grandure, I must be completely serious for a few minutes as I speak of our purpose.

It is not to undermine the Decemvirate, or complain of inequities. While many of these issues continue to plague us we have made great strides forward in these matters and it is time for us to shine as best we can.

Speak gloriously of our calling to all who can hear. Let everybody around you know that you will not allow a Pathfinder to suffer.

---

It is with great sadness that I must speak of my recent failures in this department. I let my drive for glory and fame blind me to the suffering of my companions.

First, when dealing with the Rats of Round Mountain I let my companion The Grey Reek step into a trap. As I held his lifeless body in my arms, mere seconds later, I unfurled a scroll and attempted to grasp hold if his soul and prevent it form leaving Golarion. Unfortunately my voice faltered and The Grey Reek was no more. I will carry this shame upon my soul until the say I am judged. For this was the first time I had let a Pathfinder die.

Secondly when the fate of the Society hang in the balance during the assault on the Grand Convocation. I saw my gnomish companion, a powerful sorcerer I had met only hours before, under assault by terrible foes. I chose to focus my efforts on destroying the infernal contraption that threatened the Society and merely watched as my companion fell to the darkness. I wanted the glory of saving the society and was worried about it's survival as a whole, but in doing so I lost track of what was most important and my companion paid the ultimate price. This is a second stain upon my soul.

I fear another may doom me to eternal damnation. So I will attempt to redeem myself by reminding us all to not let your fellow Pathfinders suffer.

Dedicate yourself to these tasks. Protect your companions with swords, spells, your own body if necessary. Show no mercy to those who threaten your allies and always give it your fullest. Hold nothing back.

Farak, the Most Powerful Mage in All Absalom

There are several items on the chronicle sheets that state they are only available to "12th level retired characters"

With the changes to how sanctioned modules work I presume these should be available to anybody who plays them, since nobobdy will be 12th level while playing Tomb of the Iron Medusa (lvl 14)

Relevant Text:

This rug is able to fly through the air as if affected by an overland flight spell of unlimited duration. The size, carrying capacity, and speed of the different carpets of flying are shown on the table below. Beautifully and intricately made, each carpet has its own command word to activate it—if the device is within voice range, the command word activates it, whether the speaker is on the rug or not. The carpet is then controlled by spoken directions.

So if you're riding around on a carpet does it basically just give you overland flight?

Or do you ride around on it using the mounted combat rules?

Or does it just move around however you like by talking to it. (In which case it probably couldn't doublemove/run etc)

Any thoughts?

I'm likely running this at Kublacon and am going to make it as awesome as possible. I've got a question, that perhaps somebody can help me with though.

Because of the specialness of this scenario I've gone with the double spoiler, to help keep people from accidentally spoiling their Eyes of the Ten experience.

I like contributing to my PFS groups. I judge as frequently as I want to (20-25% of the time) however it's still nice to contribute in other ways, especially when I'm not judging.

Things I sometimes do, and wish I did more often:

Bake cookies or buy snacks to bring to game.
Help a new player with their character.
Print things.
Show up early with a positive attitude.
Give somebody a ride to or from game.

I'd like to hear about ways others contribute in ways other than the obvious judging/organizing. (Mostly so I can steal them and become an even better gamer)

So I've never been to PaizoCon before and have a bunch of questions.

When on Friday do things start and when on Sunday do they end? This information will be useful in booking flights/hotel etc.

Speaking of booking Hotel how do I get the PaizoCon rate at the hotel?

Also where/when do I sign up for PFS events?

I'm going to be visiting Chicago March 12th through the 14th and was trying to figure out what PFS events, if any I might find in Chicago while I'm there. Hopefully somebody here can help point me in the right direction.

The recent discussion regarding a possible adventure where you get to be the Venture captain inspired me to write this little choose your own adventure.

It's very much in an alpha stage at the moment but hopefully it will provide some entertainment. Don't take it too seriously and let me know how your quest for coffee works out. Feel free to post any bugs you encounter, or email me axey@shadowsofcommand.com

So I was looking at the additional resources page, checking out items with fun names and came across:

Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Dungeons of Golarion
Equipment: deadflesh waraxe...

Obviously this cursed item should not be available, it has no price etc.

I've got two separate issues:

First: Does Tumor Familiar qualify for Improved Familiar?

Second: I'm also trying to figure out what kind of options Tentacle gives me.

Here SKR states that the extra limb can only be used in place of another attack, not as an extra attack.

Assuming he's correct, lets look at a tusked alchemist (orc trait that gives a natural bite attack).
I find the process confusing and somewhat nonsensical and feel like I'm missing something fundamental to understanding how it works.

I can wield a 2 handed weapon and take my bite but not my tentacle. I could however replace either attack with the tentacle. If I replace the bite with the tentacle everything is nice and simple. If I replace the sword attack with the tentacle then I'm no longer combining natural and manufactured attacks and the bite attack remains primary.

I'm wielding 2 1 handed weapons (or a weapon and shield). I can TWF and attack with both weapons (or weapon and shield), and the bite. I could replace any of these with the tentacle attack. If I replace the bite it's simple once again.

If I replace either weapon attack with the tentacle which of the following scenarios is correct:
Weapon attack with no penalties, bite and tentacle as secondary natural attacks.
Weapon attack with TWF penalties, tentacle with TWF penalty, bite as a secondary natural attack.
Weapon attack with TWF penalties, tentacle with TWF and secondary natural attack penalty, bite as secondary natural attack.

What if I'm wielding a two handed weapon and armor spikes. Is this any different than the above scenario?

Thanks in advance for any help in sorting these out.

I used to have a very good grip on what the current rules are, but ever since moving to Iowa I've been slipping.

I'm thinking of making my next character a pesh-addicted Tiefling alchemist (vivisectionist). (Yes I have the tiefling boon)

Can I craft mundane (alchemical) gear?

What poisons can I buy? (Is there anyway to buy Pesh? I don't think so, but it should be fun having the character complain that nobobdy will sell him pesh now that he joined the society)

Is Pesh prevalent in the land of Tian Xia or only in the Inner Sea region?

On a question that's more appropriate for the rules forum, does anybody have an opinion on Improved Familiar + tumor familiar?

Does the Separatist Cleric archetype allow you to take subdomains not normally available.

Including subdomains of domains normally available and subdomains of domains not normally available.

Specifically this is a PFS issue.

I'm personally of the opinion that Separatist doesn't say anything about subdomains so doesn't give access to any of them.

Does anybody have any thoughts on the matter?

The couple of threads floating around regarding the "best order" to play the scenarios in got me wondering what I had done with my various characters. I'm into accounting/stats so I thought I'd share the information with my characters.

Zapa - Human Siege Engineer - 11(Ranger 3/Rogue 1/Fighter 2/Shadowdancer 5)

Devin, the Mortician (Cleric 11)

Soryan, Osirian Sand Merchant (Druid 7)

Griff, Athlete (Barbarian 2, Ranger 2)

Mr. K, Aloof Taldan Wizard (Wizard 5)

Farak, the Most Powerful Mage in All Absalom (??? 7)

When I get some more time I'd like to do some analysis of this data, see how often I played up/down etc. Hopefully somebody else finds this interesting.

Some of the discussion of 7 player tables got me thinking about this subject again. Who has the power to do what in PFS.

Obviously people fill different slots at different times (frequently filling multiple rolls at once) but who exactly has what powers is sometimes a bit nebulous.

Lets start with Players:
They get to choose how to build and play their characters. Some restrictions apply such as no PvP and PFS legal material only but all in all the player has a lot of freedom here. No matter how much anybody else thinks their synthesist/gunslinger/magus is stupid they can still build and play it.

Thing they can't do: edit a character's previous choices, Be disruptive to a table, attack/kill another PC, use unapproved material, cheat, maybe re-skinning (currently in limbo)

GMs:
Roleplay the NPCs, run the mod with whatever style they want. Roll dice behind the screen for a more narrative experience or roll dice in the open for a more open experience. Fill out chronicle sheets.

"As a Pathfinder Society Game Master, you have the right and responsibility to make such calls as you feel are necessary at your table to ensure that everyone has a fair and fun experience."

Things they are not allowed to do: Change the number of foes, play the NPCs in a way inconsistent with their stated tactics, reward additional treasure/xp/prestige beyond what is available in the chronicle sheet.

This is one of the trickier areas as the quote from the OP guide conflicts with past rulings, I guess currently GMs can change the adventure however they like as long as you don't muck with rewards and ensure everybody has a fair and fun experience. (What do you do when you have a player who will only have fun if things are run as written and another player who will only have fun if you change things?)

Slight Tangent: Personally my biggest pet peeve with GMs making changes is seeing a GM make an encounter tougher and then realize he's made it too tough and softball the now tougher encounter. I think this happens because the GM doesn't feel it's right to kill somebody after toughening the encounter, and I think a player could reasonably be upset if a GM made an encounter tougher and then killed a PC.

Coordinators/Organizers:
Report Play! They also frequently fill the GM shoes, although not always. There's a lot of behind the scenes logistics such as choosing the venue, mustering, providing copies of the OP guide, wrangling GMs/players. Also removing cheating players from tables and reporting them to the "Pathfinder Society campaign staff".

Despite all this responsibility and work for a mostly thankless job other then removing cheating players they have no ability to muck with a table in progress. They frequently choose who plays where but cannot seat an 8 man table, or a lvl4 at a 5-9 or a 2 man table or allow a player to start at higher than level 0 or pretty much do anything at all.

Venture Captains:
"Regional Coordinators"
These are like coordinators but get access to free product, are expected to help other coordinators in their region and are required to attend and GM PaizoCon or GenCon. Additionally I think they are required to GM at least one session a month.

Much like the normal coordinators they have a lot of work to do and frequently choose things like what adventures are run and where they're run they have pretty much no say on how a GM runs a table or how a player plays or how the rules work.

Also apparently they have a super secret forum where they discuss PFS issues with the campaign staff and provide various types of feedback.

PFS Staff
They can make rulings on ambiguous issues although their rulings don't really matter until they show up an an official document. The big thing they do is edit the campaign documentation that we all follow.

----

Now some rules I'm sure are followed more than others, and I've probably gotten some details wrong.

What I would like is for the rules to match up with reality as much as possible. In some situations behavior should change but I imagine in most if there's a conflict the rules should be changed to match reality.

So where am I wrong and where does reality not match rules and where should they be changed

So I've finally found my way to Iowa and I've found Warhorn for IGA in Des Moines and Fellowship of the Blade in Iowa City and I'm signed up for the IGA yahoo group. Fellowship of the Blade seems to have a facebook page but there doesn't really seem to be any action there.

Anything else I bookmark/signup for?

Also currently I'm signed up to play at IGA on the 20th of August which should in theory be the same say Fellowship has their day. However I can't find any info about what Fellowship is running in August...

Looking forward to passing on hearts and bunnies from previous local yahoo Painlord to specified new local yahoos.

I'm happy to hear about any thing else others have found useful to spend their PA on.

Here I things I've spent 2PA on:

MW Composite Longbow (up to 3 Str)

1st level Wands:

Cure Light Wounds
Enlarge Person
Longstrider
Mage Armor
Comprehend Languages
Protection From Evil

3rd level Potions:

Cure Serious Wounds
Fly
Gaseous Form

4th level Scrolls:

Air Walk
Dimensional Anchor
Dimension Door
Freedom of Movement

I don't think I've ever bought an item with 1PA but I did once spend 1 PA to hire a lawyer for +4 to a diplomacy check to avoid being executed by the Quadiran government. (I've got Painlord to thank for that one)

When the Ape animal companion becomes large at 4th level, does its natural attacks gain reach?

Well today I decided I was tired of Treantmonk being the only game in town for Pathfinder optimization so I wrote up a guide for clerics.

Here is my first draft, it's done with the same color coding and general style of treantmonks. It's
Axe's Cleric Guide

Some things to note:

While I agree with most of what Treantmonk says there are some things I value differently quite differently. The items that immediately come to mind are damage over time effects and fogs. In my experience damage over time effects never get anywhere near to running their course, instead the fighter wanders by and slaughters your target. As for the fogs I find them generally to be limited utility spells that are not commonly useful.

Once again this is my first draft so it still needs some work but I thought I'd go ahead and share what I have so far. Feel free to comment, especially on judgments I've made that you disagree with, while in the end it's my guide I'm curious as to others opinions.

So I made a character with the Desert Shadow Trait from Qadira and intended him to be from Qadira and then played him a few times and took a GM credit on him. However somewhere along the process he seems to have ended up from Taldor instead of Qadira.

What do I do? I would prefer to be from Qadira but it's not the end of the world if I have to change my trait instead.