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 Recent posts by
F. Wesley Schneider:
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If you want a plot that will work. A dark future that is going to come about, be it this year, next decade, or a thousand years from now. A soul doomed to corruption, madness, or (at best) death. A force with the drive, the power, and arguably the right to bring ruin upon the world and resurrect it into a grim vision of inhuman majesty and endless potential: you want devils. They're immortal evil with memories, they've been at work manipulating the planes to suit them for eons upon eons. They're weakest servants might appear little more than brawlers and gestapo-like sadists but even they are embodiments of absolute active unholiness, and greater devils are masterminds with ages of plots and schemes few lone mortal minds will ever know, while their rulers are closer to gods than aggrandized monsters. They are the ship in Event Horizon, the corruption in Prince of Darkness, Barlowe from Salem's Lot, Pacino in Devil's Advocate, the machines from the Matrix, Damion from the Omen, the cultists from Conan, the ringwraiths from Lord of the Rings, the legions of Wayne Barlowe's <i>God's Demon</i> or Inferno illustrations - all wildly different, but all driven to conquests beyond themselves. They can be legion and unrelenting, they can be they can be subtle and scheming in ways mortals will never learn in a single life. But most deadly, they are unified, driven, merciless, and patient. Only the vastness of planes and worlds and the fearful reactionary reprisals of other gods keep them from taking that which their lords desire. And as open war among the planes and upon mortal worlds has proven untenable, their corruption comes in myriad ways - many cultivated and expected, but the most effective striking from undefended directions - and best when openly entreated by the same mortals who they would ruin. The lords of Hell have no reason to rush their inevitable domination: they have seen eons and will see eons more, and ever the ranks of Hell swell, ever their intention remains the same, and ever the archfiends spread their corruption - by corruption, by fanaticism, and by unrelenting force.
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F. Wesley Schneider wrote:
Oooooh, good call. I'll check that out when I get in.
Or maybe I can't wait.
So, the crepitus. It's a frustrating creature for scholars of the infernal to deal with and the source of significant debate. Included in some of the earliest treatises on the Pit, these imp-like fiends found their way into infernal bestiaries, tomes of dubious diablere, and even saw occasional summoning and interviewing by misinformed diabolist. Yet, crepitus are no more devils than hell hounds, cerberai, Hell gigas, asuras, kytons, or any other of the terrifying creatures that often make their lairs amid the flames of Hell. Certainly, the confusion has to do with the wings, red skin, natural maliciousness, and so many of the other traits that link these nasty fiends to imps, especially their interest in corrupting souls and serving mages, but such does not a true devil make. For all their similarities, they lack the powers and abilities inherent in those of true infernal pedigree - the immunities, traits, and ability to call on one another that typify actual devils. Their tendencies for pranks and wanton destruction also suggests a mind lacking the true discipline of a diabolical mind. Thus, while certainly similar, and seemingly interested in passing themselves off as devils, for all these fiends's submission and service they will always be mere suppliants in the face of true devilkind, ignored, manipulated, abused, or used as the lords of Hell see fit.
(Short version: Close but no cigar. Lawful, Evil, Extraplanar - yes, but no devil subtype. Also, lacking several of the immunities and abilities typical to devils. The description also doesn't really paint them as being in line with our plots for devils. Thus, despite the flavor text, the stats do not paint them as devils, so not devils. Doesn't mean Hell wouldn't use them, but it does mean they don't get invited to Dispater's birthday parties.)
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KaeYoss wrote:
Well, if you count äöüß, we have 30 as well. There's a lot of normal letters with some mutations, like aäáàâ etc..
Yeeeeeeah. :P You suggest thist to our art directors who would then need to find fonts with those glyphs (hard enough to find ones with dashes and ellipses), our editors who then have to distinguish between names like "Rhoatgast" and "Rhoatgäst", and - heck - us, who would need to track down those bloody squiggles every time we need to spell a name via keyboard combinations and drop down menus. I understand the uses in the language such symbols originate from, but in our stuff it largely just gums up the works without a significant gain or feels like a ham handed attempt to be more "FaaaaNtAsY!". It's also why you don't see ANY (or very, very, very, very few) names with apostrophes or dashes in Golarion: they don't add much of anything, just confuss things on the editorial and design side, and - really - are pretty played out in RPGs.
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KaeYoss wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
Valdermar, for example, is a name I made up
Did not. It has existed for a long, long time, in our real world. The Danes and Swedes had kings whose names were Valdemar. :P
If you don't know it it's new to you. I remember being very pleased with the name "Larsa" which I came up with in my early teens and used it numerous places in my early writing. At least, until I discovered some cagey Sumerians stole it back in the 2,000 BCs. But pretty much living proof of that infinite time, monkeys, type writers, Shakespeare, yada yada saying.
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KnightErrantJR wrote:
I'm sure the adventure, on its own, as fine, as Paizo didn't publish junk, and when I first started reading the adventure, I didn't put two and two together, but once I did, it ruined the entire adventure for me.
Obviously there are examples of taking an "easter egg" too far. Actually I don't even think the term applies here. It's one thing to find an easter egg - a subtle nod that a knowledgeable reader realizes references another work and both works gain from the connection - and things like veiled parodies and in-jokes. Easter eggs within our own continuity we like, and really appreciate authors who delve into our world, pick up logical loose ends or potential connections, and use them to thread their stories more into Golarion's greater weave. The others - the kind of stuff that makes us think we need to Google every character or location name just to avoid nonsequiter references and in-jokes (even the kind only a small percentage might get but nonetheless negatively impact the intended tone of a work) - we absolutely loathe and take pains to expunge. And when they slip by and we find out about them in print, well, that's just about the surest way to piss an editor(/former potential employer) off. So yeah, we're totally on the same page with you KinghtE, and don't expect references to Firefly, the 2008 elections, Golden Girls, or Thundercats in anything we do.
At the same time, we are partial to the occasional link between Golarion and folklore, mythology, and formative genre literature of the real world. That's implicit from page one of the PF Campaign Setting - and pretty much all fantasy RPGs. For example, hydras - just like mighty Hercules fought! You don't have to go to the Bestiary, or even an RPG book, to know what the monster is, but from first mention the name conjures ideas of snakes and heads and clubs and fire, swamps and fangs and maybe even regrowing heads, all bringing along with them the cache of Greek myth and epic struggles. Then again, there's references like Thuvia, both a country in our world and a princess from the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs. The difference here between a blatant literary reference and a reference to Ducktales (or any other out of genre nonsequiter) is two fold: First, it's an unobtrusive nod, and the connection goes no farther than a homophone even if you get the link - the country is not a running Burroughs gag after all, being much more then and very different from that. Second, it exists within the same realm, the same genre, the same tradition of fantastic adventure and a reader's mindset shouldn't be jarred by the connection. Although this isn't a perfect example as it's just a namedrop, such "easter eggs" (I keep quoting this because I actually hate he term) in their most elegant use should feel as natural as finding mention of Lovecraft's Necronomicon in an August Derleth story, a nod that works on its own but draws on additional information for an entrenched reader, making a story all the richer for the truly invested and rewarding one's attention to detail.
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Dogbert wrote:
Three APs I'm acquainted with so far (RotRL, CotCT, S.D), all three have members of the Vancaskerkin family (Orik, Verrik, and Saul), two of them bad apples.
Are there any more Vancaskerkins in other APs? Are they a tip of the hat to H.P Lovecraft's Carnby family who now and then either appear or get mentioned in his tales?
The Vancaskerkins are a family of dubious repute that lives in Varisia... that's about it. They only appear in those three APs and are about as likely to show up in any of our future products as any other characters (maybe less so actually as we've already visited with them on several occasions). No real metaplot or sinister underlying plans, though. Sometimes your barber is friends with your mechanic and cousin to a guy you went to high school with. That's all that's happening here for players. For readers, it's just cool to skim through and be like "Oh, that's the brother of the dude in that one adventure and the younger son of the guy in that other. Neat."
KaeYoss wrote:
Personally, I love those little hidden treasures.
And we're totally not fire-and-forget with our characters, so expect to see more links in the future! It's fun weaving ties like this and makes the whole world feel more connected.
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lastknightleft wrote:
Kevin Mack wrote:
Razz wrote:
One was done? Where is this published?
Rise of the runelords part 1 I believe.
I think he means "Where was this new Naga published?"
PF #27
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lastknightleft wrote:
You know that's pretty much what I'd figured, So when do we change the name of nagas to human snake?
The goblin snake should not be taken as a relation to nagas or suggest a monstrous trend common to all races. Nagas are their own distinct family with their own heritage and the goblin snake isn't meant to tread toward that, even if it has general similarities. New nagas, of which we have done at least one, are inspired by Indian myth and are meant to fit in with those existing breeds. Really, I'd liken the goblin/goblin snake relationship to that of drow and driders, a grotesquery brought about by a curse, magic, divine anger, or whatever have you that has breed true into the limited populations that survive today. As there's little published information on the creature, whether it's silly or not largely relies on how its presented and the capability of the GM.
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Just something to remember, while other companies do not own the names "Red Dragon," "Gold Dragon," "Mauve Dragon," etc, they do own the specific looks their company creates for said dragons. This is true not just of dragons, but every monster to some extent.
Its like if we wanted to do a cartoon about a crazy duck and decided to make him white, give him a lisp, and dress him up like a sailor: we might not call him Donald Duck, but we'd still get a letter from Disney's legal giant.
So, the Pathfinder look for dragons - which first appeared in Pathfinder #4 in 2007 - is not born of any distaste for past takes, but rather a need to separate our creatures from previous intrepreations owned by other companies.
And, at the same time, I personally think it's nice to be able to tell if you're looking at a Paizo product just by the look of its dragons. It's something most folks will never notice, but the die hards will be able to pick out in an instant.
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Danflor wrote:
You are entitled to your opinions about each AP, but personally, CoT is my group's favorite since RotRL...
Too true. It's hard not to take some opinions bandied about with about a 20 pound bag of salt (opposed to a mere grain). I know a lot of folks are SUPER passionate about their games and want everything exactly the way they want it now, but we're never going to be able to provide that to everyone. And thankfully we don't have to, as the game we offer is not just made to be customizable but encourages, even demands it.
It's been said a lot around here, but it's true, making a published requires work requires input and cooperation between writers, developers, editors, and GMs. Just as if the starting words don't satisfy the developer they get changed, and if the developed words don't work for the editor they get changed, if the printed product doesn't do something a GM really wants, they have the ability (and, I suspect from their own groups the expectation) to change it to entertain their players.
I can already hear the argument, "Well, I'm paying for an adventure, why should I have to do anything?" In short, because we're not coming to your house, interviewing your players to find out what they like and how they play, and then running a game for your group. At a lengthier pace, Pathfinder never claims to give you everything. It gives you a TON, but everything? No way - it's simply not possible in this medium. We're no telling you what voices to read text in, we're not telling you the weather or time of year, we're not pinpointing the starting position of every creature, stray smell, or texture in every dungeon. That's all left for the GM to add, develop, accentuate, customize, and roleplay out as they please. And really, so is every word that exists on the printed pages: it's your game, change whatever you want. You already need to make a thousand and one choices as GM, why not add one or two more. Think you shouldn't have to? Well that's kind of between you and your players, but I would hope GMs are interested first and foremost in providing their guests with entertainment and a reason to come back next week. And if tinkering with this here and that there leads you down a different path, or means that you're not using 100% of the published adventure, well having 99%, 95%, 80% (heck even 40%, 25&, or 2% depending on how creative you get) of the work done for you still ain't bad.
Really an Adventure Path is just a story. Everyone can't be expected to fall in love with EVERY story. Even uniformly great ones. Heck, I think everyone here would agree the three Lord of the Rings movies are all awesome, but damn if I don't doze off on than first one every time. Great stuff, but had I the keys to editing both, I might make some chops. If you wouldn't great, that's all you. But with Pathfinder, you do have the keys to the editing booth and can make all the tinkers you want.
And while I'm on my soap box here. I challenge all the armchair GMs and game designers to put their dice where their mouths are. If you want something changed in a published adventure, guess what: it's too late for us to do anything. That means it all up to you Robin! Want something different, change it however you want, run it, see what your players thought (heck, even tell them you tinkered with it and take the credit you deserve!), and THEN post on here telling us how your changes worked. I'm going to tell you right now, every person here (from employees to other readers) are going to be way more interested in and put way more credence on the opinion of a creative GM who saw something they thought wouldn't work for their group, came up with a cool solution and that played out in an exciting way, and then posted the epic tale. Folks learn from that - we as designers included - and get ideas to make future adventures even better. And it beats the heck out of the sophomoric brand of posts to the effect of "Carbuncles are dumb. No more carbuncle adventures!" Well thanks for that insight Zatoichi.
And if you don't have any ideas or need help (we all do sometimes) wandering on here and saying this, that, or the other thing doesn't meet with you or your specific group's approval is a little like wandering into the ice cream store and screaming that you hate vanilla. Turns out we have THOUSANDS of great GMs on here and this forum gives you a direct line to some of the best game designers in the world. Don't like something, ask for suggestions on how to change it, I promise you you'll get dozens - some likely from Paizo's owner, publisher, editor in chief, lead designer, bestselling authors, folks who have been in gaming since before there was tabletop roleplaying, and so on. So want a solution? Throw us the facts and I'm telling ya, you'll get something awesome back.
And a quick word on the business side of things. We truly do love you guys (especially you vagrant-poet) but really, come on, do you honestly think we're ever going to let the world at large in on every closed door decision, nuance of our publishing cycle, or business choice? No way! No. Way. We share a lot and we strive to keep our promises, but I guarantee you there's good reasons when we slip - usually something we can't talk about but is awesome and we'll let everyone else in on down the line. So on the implication that folks here aren't working hard or things at Paizo need to change because of X, Y, or Z, unless that's coming down from Lisa, Vic, Erik, or Jeff, one might not be fully in the know. Rest assured, though, all the developer gnomes and editor gnomes are busy, busy, busy, at work and you've got a TON of cool stuff headed your way.
And with that, I've now taken about a half hour I could have been working on the Bestiary writing this. Guess I'll get to that after my 4 hour brunch, 2:00 nap, foot massage, trip to the Paizo sauna and milkshake pool, and 5:00 nap. Busy busy.
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Glad you like the swords. Jesper takes all the credit for those. Our art orders were pretty much "Shaitan rogue girl" and "Badass efreeti general." Beyond that, we try to give all our artists the room to really express their vision and skill in their work.
It's funny, a lot of the times folks assume we give these huge multi-paragraph descriptions, working out every detail of our art. (We have tried that in the past actually - and it typically ends in disaster.) The truth of the matter is that regardless of how cool the vision a writer has in his head, it's never going to get translated perfectly into art. And, typically, trained professional artists simply have a better flair for making things look cool. So we try to keep our art orders very short. And when finals come in and they match what we need, awesome. And when they don't, well, it's typically MUCH cheaper to change the words of a story, monster, adventure, whatever, than to nitpick at the art.
At the end of the day, the only question is: Does it look like something from a cool fantasy adventure? And in both cases, I think the answer is an undeniable "Yes."
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KaeYoss wrote:
....of the second adventure.
Ha!
TruthRom wrote:
Doing a Adventure Path or Module for optimized characters?
Hum. What would this entail for you? I mean, we certainly could increased all the challenge ratings of a whole AP's encounters by say 2 or 3. But that takes us away from the core rules' assumptions about how experience is gained, level progression, and encounter design, which leads to a whole host of behind the scenes problems.
I'm also wary of making anything harder just for difficulty's sake. A more killer AP means - well - more kills, and TPKs just aren't very fun (not to mention that from our perspective, if you have a TPK in adventure four you probably don't play adventure five, which means no one reads our incredible prose :P ).
Fortunately, though, you don't have to wait on us or get stuck amid our hang ups to do this. The Core Rulebook presents all the rules you need for adjusting encounters (not to mention more traps, poisons, class levels to add, yada yada), and even if you don't want to just add more of the same enemies an adventure presents to increase difficulty, you've going a shiny new Bestiary headed your way in just a few short weeks.
So yeah! No one messes with a killer GM. Go claim that title!
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Gorbacz wrote:
I'm curious how much an inspiration for the Hellknights was drawn from the Planescape Mercykillers, especially Vhailor.
Maybe subconsciously, as I am a huge Planescape fan, but my direct influences were a little different. Largely, I always thought there should be paladins for every alignment, especially as that relates to the lawful neutral alignment, an alignment that might attract characters who look past the morality of an act to the necessity of a cause. The are definitely shades of fascism and about a dozen literary and fantasy judges and inspectors rolled into this group.
As for the Hell side of things, Hell in fantasy RPGs is a really interesting place. Drawing strongly from Dante, Hell is just as lawful as it is evil, and everything has a place and a time and reason, all of which is perpetual and from which there is no recourse. I think at some point everyone - even against their better judgment - has wished the law would be omnipresent and merciless. Whether its wishing a cop would appear to ticket the guy on the motorcycle blows by you on the curb, or wishing a swift execution upon the obviously guilty dancing amid the red tape of the judicial system. The appeal is there, though the underlying morality is highly suspect. The Hellknights are what happen if that twinge of guilt and morality is ripped away. Like Hell, they care not for the apologies and prostrations of the would-be innocent, the law is the law and for every infraction a punishment must be meted out decisively. If such "justice" proves heartless, such is the cost of an ordered society, and if one occasionally (and accidentally) faces unrightful pain or hardship in the pursuit of an ordered, peaceful existence, such is acceptable for the greater good.
That's my favorite thing about these guys. These warriors are a total foil to your typical, devil may care adventuring group, but try to smite evil on 9 out of 10 of them and it's simply not going to work. It's all about shades of gray, and these guys are the grayest. (Actually, this just made me realize that I dipped my toe into this water already with the Gray Guard in Complete Scoundrel. Huh.)
That's the awesome, misunderstood thing, the Hellknights, as an organization, are not evil. Sure, there are evil members, and as you get into the final, teen levels of the prestige class certain powers granted along the Path of the Hellion even tempt one toward evil acts (simulating the subversive nature of Hell), but your rank and file Hellknight is typically LN, and just as likely to be LG as LE. Yes, there can and are lawful good Hellknights, though they might find themselves just as at odds with the strictures and requisites of the order as lawful evil knights, with both likely facing confession and reckoning more often than a typical lawful neutral member.
Ayunken-vanzan wrote:
The forces of good really should do something against this hellknight problem ...
I'd actually expect Iomedae to - while not endorse the Hellknights - see them as a misguided but ultimately useful human venture. There are Iomedae worshipers among the Hellknights. In fact, among the pantheistic Order of the Godclaw, Iomedae is actively revered and, perhaps even supports the signifers of that devout order.
So it's not that easy. Sure, there could be a crusade that wipes the various separate Hellknight orders out, but in so doing, many goodly souls would be lost, several regions (like Varisia) patrolled by Hellknight guardians would face encroachment by dangerous creatures, and criminal ventures in numerous orderly cities would explode. Hellknights aren't a necessary evil, by and large they're not evil at all, but they don't care about you, your family, or your fruit stand, they're here to make sure the trains run on time, that lawlessness is stomped out, and that humanity adopts the discipline to survive itself.
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Frostflame wrote:
One thing I want to ask were the daemons originally Lovecraft inspired? They have always had this very alien mentality to me.
Maybe subconsciously, but not so much. We have our own ideas and places for Lovecraft monsters (they typically take the form of, well, Lovecraft monsters). Our daemons really come from trying to define a place for them in our cosmology. The thinking is that is devils corrupt the mind, and demons defile the body, daemons attack the soul. This draws upon ideas of daemons being soul takers and bargainers from the game's history but gives them a reason to do so - they hate them and want to eat/destroy them. (The idea of daemonic soul concentration camps just came to mind. Probably too literal and inefficient, but hum.)
This also arises from the fact that daemons sever the Four Horsemen, classical destroyers of mortal life, which we knew we wanted from the get go. Overall, the daemons are going to get a treatment as thorough as demons and devils in Bestiary II, so look out for everything you need - from CR 20-ish boss daemons to CR 2-ish familiar daemons and everything in between - coming up early next year!
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yoda8myhead wrote:
Thanks, Wes. I for one appreciate your willingness to make these changes for us needy fans. We'll be addressing the canon status of blog posts on the wiki so that we don't have similar issues arise in the future. Sorry if I was a pain.
Elorebaen wrote:
I concur. Thank you Wes and James for giving this some extra agony. In the end, I think it is for the best.
See. Look James. They are nice people and they didn't mean to increase the size of your ulcer over the weekend. It all worked out for the best in the end and we learned a valuable lesson about the development cycle of content posts as it relates to these jackals-urk, I mean, dedicated and attentive readers.
On the other side of things, be nice to your editors - especially "experienced"(/aged), grumpy editors - for their efforts bring you many awesome things, yet their duties often put them one sideways comment away from running off to live with bigfoots (bigfeet?) on Orcas Island.
And now your moment of zen.
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vagrant-poet wrote:
New summon lists! Booyah!
Yeah, James and I just finished populating and paginating this book last week and there's some really awesome stuff. A lot of stuff that feels very old school while at the same time being obviously new, even to fantasy RPGs in general. Expect some very cool surprises.
And as far "new" monsters, don't expect any gut-torn lava-lickers or jotojangos (totally made up stuff). Everything has a source, a reference, a history and a story to it.
As for the back matter, Bestiary I has a huge amount of content besides its more than 350 monsters, largely just to get all the rules for monsters into the game. Bestiary II will have a comparable amount, and likely more monsters, while expanding on #1's rules. Two of my big goals with this is to make this book NOT a monster ghetto. Just because a monster's in Bestiary II is no reason you cant use summon monster to summon it, create undead to create it, or animal companion rules to have it tag along. The list for the Improved Familiar feat should also see some massive growth in here.
But I've probably said too much - especially since the first one isn't even out! So far, I've got 4 big sheets with what's scheduled to be on every page and a lot of awesome authors banging away. But I've probably said too much already. We'll have more details and new awesome art as we get into November and early next year!
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Let me predicate this on the fact that this might all be a fever dream. I seem to remember at some point in the past months stumbling upon some bit of trivia or a stray Wikipedia reference or a note in one of my folklore books mentioning the much hated athach, suggesting a pedigree beyond the 1980s, Mystara, and the Rules Cyclopedia. The problem with obscure monsters and D&D, though, is that as soon as something like this hits a Monster Manual internet research on it is fubar, as all that comes up are like "Sexy Ogre's Athach Fan/Hate Site" and "My All Athach Campaign."
So, anyone know/remember anything in this vein? The validation of an entire race - that, honestly, might not be worth validating - hangs in the balance.
(P.S. - Erik, we all know what you think about the athach. Shhh!)
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F. Wesley Schneider
(Managing Editor),
