James Jacobs's page

Still. Please do a full on Lovecraft, Call of Cthulhu RPG inspired Adventure Path sometime. The most optimistic part of me is hoping Bestiary 4 is groundwork for one next year.

I would LOVE to. But I have to build up my skin a bit thicker to deal with the folks who would get all angry about the decision first. As well as convince management it's a good idea. And since when we DO do Lovecraftian stuff, those products tend to sell quite well... shouldn't be a tough sell.

The only minor problem I have with this is that I know you folks have a real lovefest for the Mythos. I just really don't think it's that good an idea to tie Earth up with Golarion, even if it's Victorian Earth. A one off visit in an AP is fine, but it really shouldn't become a regular feature of the campaign world.

It hasn't. We've had connections to Earth via the mythos for over 5 years, and Golarion's been fine. It will continue to be fine after Bestiary 4, which doesn't mention Earth at all.

And while you call it a "real lovefest," believe it or not we've been pretty sparing with mythos elements. If we weren't, and if we HAD incorporated as much mythos stuff as I personally would have liked, there would be a LOT more in Golarion. I understand that not everyone's into Lovecraft, but more are than aren't as this thread's another example. So... it's in the game, but it's not the FOCUS of everything in the game. Which is, overall, the best way to do it.

If prestidigitation doesn't remove hair, how does Seoni stay silky smooth?

I've asked her that myself. Got slapped. Figure I got off lightly.

I'm not seeing the word "ugly" anywhere on the daughter of Urgathoa entry on page 309 of the Inner Sea World Guide.

I'd like to see that too. I'm running Rise of the Runelords at the moment (the adventurers are just about to fight Nualia) and the amount of errata identified here is a bit overwhelming.

Turns out, a missing +1 here and there isn't going to ruin your game. If you feel the errata is overwhelming... just run it as is. Your players won't notice, and if your game is anything at all like the games I run, the errors you and your players introduce accidentally in the game will be on par with playing with the "errata" ignored anyway. And while the thread is big, there's also a fair amount of errors in the supposed errata as well.

Don't let the possibility of errors get in the way of having fun, in other words!

James Jacobs wrote:

Thomas LeBlanc wrote:

On the list at the bottom under Demiplanes and other dimensions, which of them are planes? Demiplanes? Are any on that list no longer existent?

They're all still out there somewhere. Of them all, the First World is an actual plane. I could see a few others like Leng and the Dimension of Dream being qualified as planes as well.

And where´s Ravenloft?

Hidden beyond the mists. Those mists being the fumes of Intellectual Property and Copyright Law. We can't see through them, but your GM probably can.

If a PC takes the Leadership feat, who gets to design the cohort - the player or the GM?

For that matter, should the GM present via roleplay a number of possibilities (at the right character level for the Leadership score), and let the player/PC choose a cohort from among them (and only then let the player see the nitty-gritty information like stats)?

That's entirely up to the GM.

My preference is to let the player design the cohort. It's the player's feat, after all, and I as the GM have plenty of work already. Likewise, I require the player to come up with an in-game reason why the cohort is a cohort and wants to follow the PC.

An exception would be if the player wanted to make an established NPC ally into a cohort—in this case, I've got the stats done already and just hand them over to the player who gets to make all the level-up decisions.

I am NOT a fan of the school of GMing where the GM hides lots of information from the players, including things like not letting the player see the stats for a cohort before accepting the cohort, as well as other things like rolling their perception checks for traps.

... a llama ... Patrick Renie.

If you send Patrick anything llama related (or anything pug related for that matter)... the resulting display of shock and delight would be able to power the city of Redmond for a year.

Interesting, while reading the lines "megalithic construction the size of a city" and the information concerning the fate of one of the explorers who found the Star Titan's Grave(quite similar to extreme radiation exposure poisoning) in the pages dedicated to the Valashmai Jungle (excellent book "Dragon Empires Gazetteer" I must add, if you don't have it please acquire it as soon as possible), I thought it was a gigantic robot.

Yup; that was kinda my intent to give that impression, actually. There's more going on there. We'll have more to say relatively soon!

It's actually not all that complicated. Lovecraft was pretty specific about where R'lyeh was located... down to exact latitude and longitude coordinates for it.

A location that puts it pretty close to the oceanic pole of inaccessibility, as it turns out, which is another way of saying "It's at the most inaccessible part of the planet for us land-dwellers." Which is pretty cool, I think!

Anyway... R'lyeh is on Earth, and we're not really using any of Derleth's additions to the mythos anyway, since that content's not in the public domain. Among other reasons.

I'm also worried that this module will "wussify" dragons. Of course, there's more than one way to defeat a foe than fight them, but if that's how the dragon is defeated...

If you bring a 20th level character into the adventure, the dragon will be a chump, yes.

If you play the adventure as written, for a starting group of 1st level characters, the dragon will not feel like a pushover. Trust me.

So, I find myself more and more drawn to hobgoblins as of late. Yeah, I know, I'm a super minority, but you guys did a good job of making them interesting. The whole goblin Warband lifestyle and their technical aptitude above other similar races just make them interesting to me.

So, might we get some more Hob love in the future? Any good places to look for hobgoblin stuff?

The latest places we've done much with hobgoblins was Fangwood Keep and part four of Jade Regent. Nothing else hobgoblin related of not in the near future.

Am I the only person hoping for an update on Falcon's Hollow in this book?

Annd I can honestly say, this is something that I'd never have asked for in a million years (because I figured the response would have been a resounding "No!") -- but now that it's coming I'm really looking forward to it.

Well... if we were going to update Falcon's Hollow, you'd think we'd go hire one of the folks who helped define that region in the first place.

Oh. Wait.

I think we've all had that happen. Best we can do is try to keep the criticism constructive.

Yup.

Being able to interpret helpful and constricting criticism can be difficult, especially when reading internet criticism where anonymity, passion, and the lack of body language/tenor can obscure valid criticism with the perception of hostility.

James, if I may ask a question. What would be an appropriate good aligned deity for a monastary that raised grapes for wine making, that wasn't Cayden?

Shelyn or Desna or Erastil.

Has Paizo been satisfied with the sales of the RotRL hardcover? Satisfied enough that you'd consider giving the same treatment to other hard-to-get APs in the future? What about an occasional (as in when you can allocate resources) AP that only appears in hardcover, such as the Emerald Spire book from the Kickstarter?

We are very satisfied with the sales.

That's not what decides whether or not we do something like that again, though. The primary point of the RotR Anniversary Edition wasn't to make money, but was to celebrate our anniversary. We might do something like this again in the future for another anniversary or event, but at the same time we are VERY concerned about the perception that folks can stop buying APs as they're published so they can wait for the compiled edition. If that happens, no one gets any APs because we'd stop being able to publish them.

Why is that? Costs.

Look at it from the customer viewpoint first. What's easier on your wallet? Spending 22 bucks a month for 6 months for an AP? Or spending 132 bucks all at once for the same product?

The same goes for us, but it scales up dramatically, since we not only have to pay for every piece of art and every single word all at once if we were forced to switch over to doing full AP products because folks stopped buying the serialized ones... but we'd also lose 5 months of cash flow every six months. That's a good way to go out of business.

I can certainly understand the interest in having more planetouched races... but the design space for such entities is pretty narrow. In the beginning, aasimars and tieflings were just made-up words; now that they've been around for so many years they have their own gravitas and feel like they've been around forever, and the problem there is that anything new we introduce will feel just that—new. They won't have the same weight to them, and as a result, they'll feel like last-minute additions to the Great Beyond, which isn't what they should feel like since, in theory, they're as old as aasiimars and tieflings.

Furthermore, the aasimar and tiefling already pretty much cover a significant portion of "planetouched" race options (and you'll note we actually never use the word "planetouched" in print... at least, I don't THINK we do...). Aasimars cover good, be it lawful, neutral, or chaotic. Tieflings cover evil, be it lawful, neutral, or chaotic. All that's left is neutral, be it lawful, true neutral, or chaotic.

The problem THERE is that whereas there's a specific theme that covers all the types of good (celestials) and one that coves all evil (fiends), there's not one for neutrality. Between inevitables, proteans, aeons, and psychopomps, we actually have a VERY diverse selection of outsiders, and I've never really seen how they could all be lumped under one umbrella like "celestial" or "fiend." Which suggests 3 "planetouched" races, which seems wrong as well. Furthermore, I'd really not want overlap between the planetouched races—I wouldn't want the lawful one to, say, cover good, neutral, and evil, because then it's encroaching on the territory of aasimars and tieflings.

And on top of that... there's just not a lot of mythology about humans and non-celestials or non-fiends interbreeding. Part of that's because so many of the neutral outsiders aren't really based for the most part on real-world myth but are wholly invented for the game (the psychopomps being the one exception), but part of that is their natures—they aren't really into mixing with mortals for the most part. While that could certainly explain why the neutral "planetouched" race is so much rarer than aasimars or tieflings, in my mind it just as easily explains why there are NO neutral planetouched races.

Furthermore, I am not a fan of "forced symmetry." That is... if we invent a neutral evil and a chaotic evil race of fire-based flying bat people, that doesn't mean that there has to be a lawful evil one. In fact, without a LE one, the other two, in my opinion, become MORE interesting, because asymmetry is more interesting than symmetry to me. This is why there's not a fiendish equivalent to angels, or why the Empyreal Lords are one category while the fiends have several categories of demigods. And it's a big part of the reason why there's no neutral planetouched race in the game.

And finally, there is such a thing as overdesign. Some types of monsters have nearly infinite design space—devils, demons, angels, true dragons, psychopomps, oni, kami, azatas, archons, daemons, and agathaions all feel like there could be dozens or even hundreds of variants. That's not the same with other races, like proteans, dark folk, rakshasas, linnorms, sphinxes, and so on. We've certainly done a lot with some of those by exapnding them, but I'm of the opinion that these races have a soft ceiling beyond which more variants is less interesting.

Obviously which races have soft ceilings and which ones don't will change from person to person, and I'm not looking to get into a debate online about which ones do or don't or which ones do or don't deserve to have ceilings... the point is that myself and the others here at Paizo feel that way about some monster categories, and as a result you'll probably never see a huge proliferation of these creatures as you do with demons and devils and azatas and dragons and the like. Because if we aren't passionate about something, it's a disservice to the concept to do half-assed job with it.

And to be frank, no one here at Paizo is all that passionate about new planetouched races.

That may change in the future, but that's the way it is for the moment. Which makes it an excellent place for other designers or other companies to come in and fill the void, I suppose.

Sorry for the somewhat rambling and long-winded response; hope that makes more clear some of the philosophies we have at Paizo about monster design though!

Daethor wrote:

4) You've mentioned before that in a hypothetical 2nd Edition, you think iterative attacks should be replaced by everyone getting the Vital Strike chain automatically. Do you think that, unlike the Vital Strike chain, bonus damage would get multiplied if this were implemented?

Actually, a question related to this... would it be that you get a choice to make one attack with more damage dice or a series of separate attacks, or would it be vital strike only base, with maybe a series of iterative attack feats?

Also, in pathfinder as it is, thoughts on houseruling vital strike to be one scaling feat instead of a series?

No choice. Iterative attacks slow the game down and trick/force fighters and other martial characters into bad tactics and/or make combat boring AND overly complex.

Why not do one big 12 volume year long AP that goes from level 1-20?

More than enough time to get there and more than enough room to expand on anything you want to.

- Torger

Because having 2 Adventure Paths a year has many advantages that outweigh having only 1 a year.

The biggest being if you don't like any one AP, you only have to wait 6 months for the next one rather than a year.

James Jacobs wrote:

The Silver Mount did not crash during Earthfall. The "rain of stars" was people noticing bits and pieces of the ship that had broken up in the atmosphere raining down and burning up or glowing in re-entry; that's why there's lots of different little tech dungeons scattered throughout Numeria in hidden places—it's not only the Star Mount. That's just the biggest one.

So when you say "re-entry" is that meant to imply that it originated on Golarion before it went in to space, or are you just using that as another way of saying atmospheric entry?

No. When I say "re=entry" I mean "atmospheric entry." As in when something falling through the atmosphere gets all hot and bright and smoky.

James, will there be special rules for fighting kaiju?

There are special rules for kaiju in Bestiary 4. Not a lot. Not a lot at all. But they're there.

At least, they were there in the text I turned over to the developer! ;-P

James Jacobs wrote:

Jose Suarez 916 wrote:

Scrap Bomb (Su): When the alchemist creates a bomb, he can choose to have it explode into shards of shrapnel that deal piercing damage. A creature that takes a direct hit from a scrap bomb takes 1 point of bleed damage per die of bomb damage unless it succeeds at a Reflex save.

Is it just a single bleed damage that I can do multiple times in a turn?

or does work with the normal rules of bleeding, which multiple hits wont stack the bleed damage in a single turn?

It's a single point of bleed damage. It doesn't stack with itself. 1 bleed is actually not insignificant.

OK so let me get this straight, lets say I hit my target with 5 bomb attacks which will do 6d6+int of damage each, this means that Scrap bomb will do an extra 6 points of bleed damage(1 point of bleed damage per bomb dice) in a single round because it wont stack from multiple attacks and then it will apply the ''bleed'' condition rules on the target normally right?

So the bleed rules will make him take 6 points of bleed damage INITIALLY the same round that I hit him with my bomb and then 6 points of bleed damage later at the beginning of his turn?

or will he take just 6 points of bleed damage ONLY at the beginning of his turn with no initial bleed damage?

Sounds like it's a FAQ candidate for the rules forum now.

Bleed damage, though, never applies in the round it's caused. It only ever happens at the start of a bleeding character's turn on the round AFTER the wound that caused it is delivered.

What does Terrasque taste like?

Victory.

James Jacobs,

Regarding the feat Leadership, what really does the "Special power" modifier mean?

Yes, it can be defined by the GM but any kind of guidance you can give would be helpful because, as near as I can tell, just about every PC class qualifies.

Note: I am not asking for a ruling, just an opinion. :)

- Gauss

It's specifically set up so that it can be defined by the GM. In my opinion, it should be a special power that helps to codify the character as being a great leader. Spellcasting wouldn't necessarilly count, but a character who up to that point has displayed an affinity toward casting spells that bolster allies or manipulate people would. A monk's immunities or a cleric's channel energy ability wouldn't count, but a bard's bardic performance or a cleric with the Nobility domain would count.

Would it be possible to milk a venomous familiar/animal companion for poison? For instance, if you want to coat a weapon with, oh, I dunno, giant wasp venom.

Milking ANY animal for its poison isn't something the rules let you do, unless you use the Craft skill rules to make the poison. Which as we all know is a can of worms.

My house rule:

If you want to milk venom from an animal or harvest its poison from a freshly killed animal, make a skill check—Handle Animal for milking or Survival for harvesting. DC = 15 + the animal's CR. On a success, you extract one dose of poison. For each 5 points by which you exceed the target DC you get a 2nd dose. Regardless, you have the standard 5% chance of poisoning yourself unless you have poison use. Poison harvested in this manner remains viable for 24 hours before it spoils—making preserved poison that lasts longer requires Craft checks.

James Jacobs wrote:

judas 147 wrote:

Can you spoiler if you are making new base classes, a hint or something?

I can't spoiler that at all.

i would take that answer as an spoiler itself!!

:3

Of course, you could do that with any answer I provided for that question, including NOT answering the question.

Personally, I dont think there's anything wrong with just granting the capstone ability at whatever you think is likely to be the final level of the campaign.

This.

Oh my god how I wish we'd put this in print in the core rules. "Your capstone ability can be gained at the final level planned for your campaign."

Of course, I also wish we'd given a capstone ability to clerics... but that's a different story.

Do dwarves have throat-singers?

What would a typical dwarvish song sound like? Would the lyrics be about beer and gold, or only most of them?

They might have throat-singers.

But as for how a dwarf song sounds? See Peter Jackson's "The Hobbit" for the answer there.

Questions:

1. Does Mind Fog allow the caster to know who failed their save against it. If it doesn't Mind Fog sounds like a blind dip, as it doesn't tell the caster or the caster can't see who is vulnerable.

2. Distant Worlds says Golarion casters will find "numerous differences" between their magic and that of their Triaxan Counterparts. How is this covered, if at all, in the next issue of Pathfinder. Different spell effects? Different Schools? Different systems as opposed to Vancian (and spontenaeous?

3. Where can I find the 3.5 statblock to Graz'zt that you wrote for Dungeon 360? I want to convert him.

1) A caster always knows if a target of a spell makes or fails its save unless rules specifically say otherwise.

2) I'm not sure that's really covered at all—with limited space to cover an entire planet's worth of differences, we had to pick and choose what we focused on. That said, I wasn't involved in the writing, development, or editing of that volume, so I can't say for sure; that's a Rob and Adam question.

3) The Graz'zt volume of the Demonomicon was one I wrote for an early online Dragon, a few months or so after the magazines stopped being in print. I'm not sure how to get to it these days, but it would be on WotC's site. I suspect you'll need a D&D Insider sub to see it.

Could I ask you your opinion on some specific cases, though?

Richard

Sure, as long as you promise not to use my replies as crowbars to leverage out advantages for your character from your GM! ;-)

James Jacobs wrote:

We aren't planning to significantly involve mythic rules in the next two APs after Wrath of the Righteous. If they're really popular, we'll do another mythic AP at some point in the future. And we certainly could well throw in a mythic foe now and then in a normal AP. None of that will really help non-mythic APs hit 20th level though.

A shame - I was sort of hoping that the Mythic rules would be at least partly integrated into future APs, rather than limited to specific all-Mythic adventures. Will there be some standalone Mythic adventure modules, at least?

In the Golarion-specific mythic bestiary, will we see examples of mythic characters as well? As in, NPCs (such as the Runelords or similar) who progressed up the mythic tiers to a certain point, and who will be statted up in that fashion? Or should we expect to see the standard Mythic template applied to those NPCs instead to signify their mythic abilities?

We won't really know how much folks dig how the mythic rules work in an AP until a few months after the last Wrath of the Righteous volume is out in January of 2014. By that point, the adventures for the 2014 AP will allready be in writing, at which point it's too late to pull back and make the AP a mythic one. It's just the way it is. Furthermore, we've got the modules more or less planned out until 2015, and none of them are mythic.

If folks REALLY love the mythic rules, we'll see if we can't take evasive action to give them more, but my suspicion is that they won't eclipse the popularity of the Core Rules. If they do, I'll be pleasantly surprised.

NOTE: They don't have to eclipse the popularity of the Core Rules to be successful. No other book we've done yet has, I would say, eclipsed the popularity of the core rules in toto.

As for seeing mythic creatures and characters statted up... stay tuned!

Oh! I'd probably put them out in front of my window at work or in my back yard. Neither of which are entirely mine to decorate, but when a T-rex is involved, you don't need to ask permission because everyone wants one, as far as I can tell.

Hey James, hope you're doing well!

1) I know that it's a long shot, but working at Paizo is still a dream for me. I have heard that most Paizo staff members have English degrees. For someone who is already almost done with a degree other than English, what can I do to make myself an attractive job candidate?

2) I am curious as to why most adventure writing is done as freelance work. Is there not really a position for "adventure writer" in the publishing business? Or is it something else?

Thanks for any answers/advice you can provide!

1) Keep an eye on our site for job announcements, first of all. If you're looking to join the design/development/editorial team, start building up your credits and begin writing and designing for the game; take part in RPG Superstar and the open call for PFS scenarios; come to Gen Con and/or PaizoCon if you can and attend the various seminars where we talk about how to write for Paizo, and do lots of work if you can for other publishers.

2) There isn't a position for "adventure writer" at Paizo, no. The closest position to that at Paizo would be "developer," which often requires rewriting (sometimes extensively so) of projects to fit with the company's needs. We don't publish enough adventures to justify an "adventure writer" full-time position, basically.

1) For mage's disjunction, are spells automatically unraveled with no caster level check required?

2) If a caster is protected by prismatic sphere, does the mage's disjunction destroys both the sphere and the spells contained within...

1) Automatic. No caster level check needed.

2) Yes; it takes down the whole sphere and anything within.

I had the idea of a Changeling Winter Witch who may be closely (or distantly) related to the Jadwiga of Irrisen.

This might seem like an odd thing to ask, but what personality traits would shine through in such a person, even if she weren't evil?

And what motivation would any person related to the Jadwiga have to leave Irrisen, considering the kind of status they enjoy there? I imagined this character starting off as a bit of a spoiled brat of a noble, but being Lawful Neutral in alignment and possibly going up to Good from there.

That's more of a Rob question at this point. Were I designing such an NPC, it'd be an open book with any possibility. The NPC would have the traits that were most appropriate for her personality and role in the campaign.

As for a motivation to leave Irrisen if you were a Jadwiga... being good aligned is the best motivation I can think of.

For Unspeakable Futures, how compatable with Pathfinder would you want it to be? Would you want to, for example, be able to drop a Pathfinder class in there with relative ease and little conversion?

Just something I've been thinking about, with Rasputin Must Die coming out next month, about having the d20 Modern Classes meet with the Pathfinder classes.

It's entirely compatible with Pathfinder. It uses the Pathfinder rules. You can take elements from Unspeakable Futures and put them right into Pathfinder and they'll work fine. I've already done this, in fact, with androids and robots. You can absolutely do the same thing with anything else from Unspeakable Futures, such as deep one hybrid PC races, sniper and scavenger classes, Hacking and Piloting skills, etc.

The rules for firearms and other WW1 era tech in Rasputin Must Die is NOT the same rules as the tech rules from Unspeakable Futures, though. Nor do these rules draw upon d20 Modern much at all either.

OK, but can you reveal this:

do they dream of electric sheep?

Nope. They do dream of unicorns, though.

Dear James-

Have we/ Will we see creatures for Pathfinder that have certain game mechanics based on individual characters experiences?

One example of this is the Thestrals in Harry Potter who can only be seen by those who have witnessed death, seen here. I know I would love to see more creatures like this for Pathfinder.

That's an interesting idea. And a kind of tricky one, since unlike a novel, where the author has complete control and doesn't have to worry if one of her characters is "left out" of a scene... with Pathfinder, you have a whole party of characters and it's tricky building elements like that into the game.

Does that mean they have artificial/synthetic souls?

That would open a certain can of worms.

It means they have actual souls. The implications of which are complicated and not something I am ready to reveal now. Have patience!

James, since you have a fancy globe of Golarion, which Inner Sea and Tian Xia countries does the equator run through?

The cactus on Katapesh's symbol is the source of pesh? And why does Katapesh capital put off a strong desert vibe even though the Inner Sea Region map shows the land around it dark green, situated on a river, and on the shore of the Obari Ocean? What is the name of the bay the capital is situated in?

If by "fancy" you mean a 3 dollar blue beachball with rough continent outlines drawn in ink that smudges if you mis-handle it...

The Equator runs more or less right through Nagajor in Tian Xia. It doesn't touch the Inner Sea region at all... it's a few hundred miles south of the bottom edge of the Inner Sea region map. (The Inner Sea region is about 1/5 the size of Tian Xia.)

Pesh is indeed a type of cactus. Katapesh itself is part desert, part savannah. I don't recall off the top of my head what the capital's bay is called, but if we HAVE mentioned it... it's either in Pathfinder #21 or Dark Markets.

What are the odds of seeing an AP focusing on a outer plane as it's main local?

For example, in the "Jade Regent" campaign, the first half is about getting to Tian Xia, and the second is all about that place. So could a resembling plot structure using an outer plan be used anywhere in the near future (say, next 5 or 6 APs)? I know "Wrath of the Righteous" will have large parts set in the Abyss, but I was hoping for a less explored plane.

If so, what are the chances of getting an elemental plane campaign?

The odds are 100%.

Beyond Wrath of the Righteous, we'll certainly be looking at doing planar stuff as well.

I know that. But, OTOH, if you fear change that much, I think that this will negatively impact on the costumer base, too, if not now, then in a few years when people want something new. I just think that you are underestimating the adaptability of your costumers on this issue.

I've been watching reactions to changes to campaign settings/timeline advances for a long time... both as a customer and as an industry professional. And my observations of how such changes have gone have informed my decisions about timeline advances—it's not something I just decided on a lark. And the same goes for the publisher and owners of Paizo. Timeline advances/drastic campaign setting changes are very risky, and making them when the setting is still gaining popularity is not the best move. When you're doing something right, as evidenced by Pathfinder's continued growth, changing things drastically is a fundamental risk.

I'm certainly watching reviews, feedback, and post counts for Shattered Star, since that's one of the biggest timeline advancement things we've done. And while the AP has been pretty well received... it's not looking like it's a game-changer as far as our existing policy on timeline advancing so far.

Are all androids on Golarion male-shaped or are there gynoids as well?

Androids are male and female. In fact... the only illustration we've done yet is of a female android.

Which is, as I now see, what Adam just said.

JJ, for Bards, why is Oratory a Visual Performance, usable for Distraction- rather than a Audible, usable for Countersong?

Isn't Oratory much more auditory?

I think oratory is auditory too. Maybe Jason got confused? It's an easy enough fix to house rule if ya want.

But if you rename Pathfinder as post-apocalypse instead of "medieval" fantasy (with guns) it fits much better.

That said, it's still a bad idea to introduce nanites to the setting. Not so much as what they do as the implications that nanotech is available/doable will lead to a chain of logic/rolls that lets PCs begin building genocidal disassembler swarms.

We've actually kinda had nanites in the game since the 3rd module we published about 6 years ago... "Seven Swords of Sin." James Sutter's a big fan of mixing sci-fi with fantasy. The point is... the nanites are already hear and the game survived... ;P

Merisiel Sillvari wrote:

Steelfiredragon wrote:

I bet she'd leave AND take her friends with her......

And you'd lose your shirt on that bet.

hardly, I'd only bet a single copper piece

You should probably buy nicer shirts then...

And I still think you overestimate that danger. ;) Every consumer of other serial media manages to live with things not staying static. Gamers are no more conservative than comic fans in my estimation.

I know you do. But since dozens of people's salaries rely upon Pathfinder's and Golarion's continued popularity and success... Well, I'd rather overestimate the dangers.

If you ever did advance the timeline.

What would you see as the advantages for me, a long-time Pathfinder Superscriber?

I'm honestly not sure there's any advantage for advancing the timeline for a long-time subscriber. In fact, I'd think most such folks would consider a timeline advance as a turn-off.

James Jacobs wrote:

10) Intrigued, but in different ways than James Sutter. I'm intrigued by the idea of what is essentially a eugenics experiment run by a dragon on humans would be like—reminds me of several science fiction stories about genetics and also Hitler's attempt to breed the perfect German soldier. Which to me says that Mengkare is probably lawful evil. At BEST he's lawful neutral. He's NOT lawful good, because he's a type of slaver. The idea of a non-lawful good gold dragon in such a position of power is VERY interesting. Sutter, on the other hand, thinks he IS lawful good, but the way he's written him doesn't make any sense to me as that alignment. Alignment is not relative—it's not something you can trick with semantics. Alignment is a reflection of your deeds, and changes to match your deeds. If among your deeds you regularly force intelligent creatures to live a lifestyle of your design and force them to breed with people you select and aren't afraid of breaking up and mixing up families so you can produce a "perfect race," then there's no way that I'll ever let you get published with ANY good alignment.

I know you wrote that a month ago but wait, wait, wait. Seriously? Don't all those people in Promise volunteer to go and know what they are getting into? If you tell me to punch you and I punch I'm not evil. Not even violent. Just helpful.

I don't think you can say, "Mengkare is evil" because he's doing something that would only be evil if he wasn't doing it with their permission. Has Sutter even gone into enough detail about Hermea to know that they have traditional family structures? I kind of imagined all the kids being given over to experts in early child development so that their parents could focus on whatever is was that made them worthy of going to Hermea in the first place.

Maybe I'm just remembering a lot more the stuff from the Campaign Setting than the ISWG but I don't see Hermea or Mengkare as evil at all. Maybe slightly crazy but not evil.

As I said, at BEST he's lawful neutral. If we make him lawful evil, he's really sneaky about it, and something like a great wyrm gold dragon has PLENTY of tricks and methods and resources to trick folks into thinking he's got the best of intentions toward him.

Bard master! Did you intend for multiple bardic performances to be able to be started and stopped in the same round? Say stopping inspire courage, starting dirge of doom as a move action, casting a spell and then canceling dirge to start inspire courage as a swift action? Or were you not involved with that aspect of the bard?

Do you think if there was PF2, you guys would focus even less in the musical aspect of bards and more on manipulation?

With the design team starting to publish their own 3pp, do you plan on doing so too?

As long as you have the actions to do so, yes, you can start and stop new performances as often as you want. Each time you activate one, though, it uses up a daily use of the ability, remember, so make sure not to run out before you want!

Bards are about performance, and music is a huge part of that. We'd likely try to make it a bit more clear that just as not every cleric has to be a healer and not every wizard needs to cast fireballs and not every fighter needs to use longswords that not every bard needs to be a musician... but we'd absolutely keep music as a big part of the bard's themes.

I've been working on my own apocalyptic game, Unspeakable Futures, for over a decade. I'd LOVE to get it out there. At the same time, though... essentially going into competition with my employer unsettles and disturbs me a little bit, so I'd be much more likely to polish up Unspeakable Futures and then try to get Paizo to produce it. We'll see.