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 Recent Posts
2) As far as I know, Superstition doesn't specifically state that you hate magic and those who use it. But that's the common attitude of the board it seems (and I agree with that view). Sure, occasional party conflict is fun. But constantly hating party members is just no good in my book. How do you deal with the role play challenges? One way to view it is that the barbarian's deeply held spiritual/religious beliefs may be a bit out of step with the norm everyone else follows, and either these beliefs are strong enough to shield him from conventional magic or whatever he believes is actively running interference on any incoming magic. The barbarian could believe: And maybe there could be a little truth to it. He could actually share the same general beliefs of the party's divine types and appreciate arcane magic, but the finer points of his beliefs are just a bit off.
And thanks for the post, Jason. I'm glad it's being looked at, and hopefully reconsidered. I share Davick's sentiment though: But I'm glad it's being looked into and not pushed under the rug like Brass Knuckles. I think monk fans are understandably annoyed considering the rollercoaster they've been on the past couple of years. Personally, the frustration over the drawn out brass knuckles thing, post-errata Cockatrice Strike still being practically unusable, the VoP, the monk reevaluation we haven't heard any updates on if it happened or not, evil qinggong powers but no good ones, and MIA errata for Blood Crow Strike haven't made for a pleasant time for someone trying to make the monk he really wants. And then this comes along, when it could have been mentioned in any number of threads where most of us were clearly working off the one-weapon-flurry paradigm. Monk fans need to catch any break they can.
i jus tied this wif headbus again wall and manjed to do lots, feeleng veri sleepi now tho
Despite the name and implications, also hoping Paladin of Irori is something single-classed monks can go into.Given James' statement that it specifically supports multiclassing of paladin and monk (and, as you say, the fact that the name is the Paladin of Irori, not the Monk of Irori), I wouldn't count on it. I figured that was probably the case. I'm still looking forward to seeing it, though I do hope holy/celestial-flavored options for monks(and other non-divine classes) come out eventually.
Oh man I forgot about size coming into play. That has me thinking about some sort of large intelligent carnivorous plant that preys on fairies. Basic idea is solid, right? If the plant lures in its prey with magic, like a sympathy effect, it's neat and makes sense. If the plant uses intoxicating and euphoric pheromones to lure its prey, it's neat and makes sense. If the plant uses threats and its prey just goes nuts and suicidal of their own free will, it gets goofy pretty quick.
Always interpreted it as using the numbers/formula for TWF but using the flavor for the monk, thus making flurry distinct from TWF, because that's honestly how it came across to me. So a 1st-level monk could kick and then punch with their flurry. But that same monk could also do a high spinning kick, full rotation, and a low spinning kick with the same foot. The ability to keep that latter visual possible is important. Personally, I think this swerve is going to make a lot of PFS monks unhappy. As well as Zen Archers. And monks that liked to flurry with shurikens. There are too many things affected by this. When I GM, I'm ignoring this development. I have no desire to make things more complicated for monk players that they already are. I don't like it. It's the brass knuckles situation all over again, both in terms of bad communication happening and the monk once more getting the shaft.
Another vote here for "I like to see under-represented real world cultures and ethnicities getting some play". I like to see completely fantastic and alien cultures as well, so it doesn't have to be one or the other. Now to just get that Osirion or Vudra/Jalmeray AP.
Where is that happening? The idea of a corrupt government/court was only brought up as a possibility to play with, not an assumption of fact.
"Hey dead person! I smell you're going to Elysium! You sure you want to be another you forever? Taste what I have to sing for a moment. Wouldn't you like to be other things? You could be a tree. Or a song. Or a question. You could be all of those instead of just one thing. Final states are boring-death. Why be only one pattern when you can be lessmoreother? Go on if you wish. But if you grow weary, do come to the edge. We will be waiting to welcome you to ouryour wonders."
I try not to think about that night. We were hired to defend this small village on the border from this warlord that had been tearing across human and orc territory alike. We were expecting trouble, eventually, but we had handled petty orc warlords before. The villagers were as ready as they could be as well. They had lived their entire lives near the border, they knew the risks. And they did everything we suggested to bolster their defenses. But then they actually came. Everything went to hell. These hulking brutes just stomped forth out of the night, shouting vile insults and horrific threats. They made no attempt to hide themselves. They practically announced their presense. We might have actually been able to halt their advance, but the villagers...gods. They started to run towards the buildings we had prepared as shelter. But as they ran, as they heard the calls of those orcs....I swear most of them were half-orcs...they stopped in their tracks. Men. Women. Children. The old. They all just turned around and charged towards their own deaths. Most of them didn't have any weapons. Those that did were hardly of any real quality. But still they turned and charged right into the midst of the enemy to be cut down. There was an old woman...I never even learned her name....she always seemed to be bringing us food and thanking us for our work. So sweet natured and I never learned her name. I remember calling out to her to run towards safety. She just turned and ran into some orc's axe. Faris, our mage....he couldn't do anything. Everything he had planned fell apart in an instant when the villagers ran into the orcs' midst. Almost everything he could have done would have killed the people were were there to protect. So he ran. He didn't get very far. An orc stepped out from behind a house, holding a struggling child in one arm. The brute shouted that he would use Faris' skull as a bowl. Faris seemed as if he was about to torch the orc right then and there. I saw him glance at the child. He just charged. Faris was a good man...he deserved better. It all happened so fast...we began to pull back. It wasn't a fight to protect the village anymore. We were all just running, to save as many lives as we could. I was carrying a man I had to knock unconcious to keep him from running towards his own death. He had been weeping, screaming for the wife and children cut down before his own eyes. I ran past Phaera. She was kneeling over Revik, trying to stop his bleeding. The man was dying, but she had never been one to leave behind those in need. A more loving soul I had never known. She was practically her goddess made flesh by my account. She was just about to whisper her prayers when one of the bastards called out to her, laughing at her attempts and promising as painful a death as those we had witnessed in the dozens already that hour. I screamed at her to cover her ears. To run with me. I don't know if it was fear or rage in her eyes as she stood and ran to her death. I try not to think about it. I hear the war's getting closer still. I really thought things would turn around once we started making those muffling helmets for our soldiers. That brought new problems all on its own, but then the bastards learned how to use body and sign language. Wizards're saying that whatever is happening, it isn't magic. People are just going crazy whenever that horde shows up. My advice? Keep moving west. Don't look back. Don't listen. Just keep running. Me? I'm going to stay right here and drink myself blind and deaf. At least then...I might be able to die as myself.
presumably before it came to blows, there would be a 'wait a moment, we are both paladins... what the deuce?!' type moment. Yep, that's the moment I'd most be looking forward to as a paladin player. Two genuinely good people trying to convince each other of what they know to be the truth and stopping something terrible before it starts. Like Solid Snake and Paragon Commander Shepard debating at each other over a battlefield. If both parties learn something that shocks them, bonus.
I'd try to avoid presenting the pursuing paladin as an Inspector Javert type. Have him be a genuinely good man. Just misled. Or maybe the player paladin is misled. Maybe both.Problem is, there's nothing like opinionated alignment in Pathfinder. A paladin that thinks he acts LG but does not, is not. For all it's worth, I would favor an inquisitor over a paladin for that role. The line on which two paladins could reasonably battle one another is just too thin for my tastes. You can have such a character be genuinely LG. He just doesn't know the government/people he's serving aren't legit. If it's a case of the paladin serving people that are openly committing atrocities, he doesn't have an excuse. But if those in charge are keeping their misdeeds hidden, that paladin is really doing the best he can with what he knows. Such a paladin is both a valuable asset and a danger to those in charge, because they likely need to keep him at a distance* and in the dark about what they're really about. Said pursuing paladin could be the genuinely good sort of person that discovers a horrible consipiracy amongst those in charge, if the story was about him. Here, he hasn't found out yet. Perhaps the player paladin can change that, perhaps not. It's not a sort of situation I'd like to force though. *Especially considering what paladins are known for being able to detect! That makes them even more valuable as misleading PR and even more of a potential threat. It's basically the bad guys playing with fire.
I'm not sure what it is about paladins that makes some people so spiteful, but I've noticed the same people usually turn out to be sadistic and cruel when they play paladins themselves. "Idealism is for kids! Cynicism is for mature adults who know who the real world actually works! What do you mean it's evil to wipe out the entire race?! The book says they're evil! It's a game!" Sadly I've run into that guy. Even more sadly, he wasn't twelve years old at the time.
Strictly adhering to the Code: Paladin could go to bat for the wizard at court when the trial happens, speaking on his behalf and vouching for him if he feels it's the right thing to do. However, the paladin must also concede to the rule of law. If the wizard is sentenced to death, the best the paladin can do is offer spiritual support and comfort to the wizard before his execution. Unless... If the court turns out to be illegitimate, he need not be bound by it. THIS is a possibility that shouldn't be discounted, but it needs to be presented pretty well by the GM. It still presents the possibility of paladin vs. paladin, with all the potential good and bad that can bring to the table. I'd try to avoid presenting the pursuing paladin as an Inspector Javert type. Have him be a genuinely good man. Just misled. Or maybe the player paladin is misled. Maybe both.
Yeah, I figure it'd be possible. But the why's and how's and how they change with the direction one's moving between castes has me wondering. There's also the matter of how it would affect any mechanical representation of Vercites. For a brief moment I was thinking of giving all Vercites a floating +2 and a slightly different set of skill modifiers depending on their caste, but having three different races to represent the same actual race is really wonky(especially since none of them are born into those castes). Traits feel like the way to go right now, at least to represent their starting point in their caste if movement between castes(even if extremely rare) is possible. Also wondering how hard the lines between the castes are defined. If a paladin loses her legs and has to get mechanical replacements, is she seen as a God-Vessel, Augmented, or something that overlaps caste boundries? Or could this be something that various Vercite cultures view differently, with a different set of taboos? There's one nation there where God-Vessels seem to be all about augmentation for everyone along with the Augmented there, societal norms be damned. Maybe elsewhere God-Vessels are expected to avoid augmentation as much as the Pure Ones?
As said before, we're all different people. I'd be fine with a chest-slot item as long as it fit a monk's flavor, though I'm not convinced pricing it cheaper than the AoMF while adding some other drawback is necessarily a bad thing. Like DeathQuaker said, power creep is less of a worry when there's something wrong with the core to begin with. That's the frustrating thing about building around the top-optimal choices, especially with a class as MAD as the monk. Those of us that would like to play monks with non-negative INT and CHA tend to get shafted.
I hoped we could get something like that in Ultimate Combat. And since they technically aren't items, didn't seem like they'd have a chance here...Yea, it is kind of unfortunate. The only way I can think of that we could get something like this in Ultimate Equipment is if the 'ritual' came in book form, kind of like the Manuals that give Inherent bonuses to stats. That still keeps it in the monk's court as far as him doing the enhancing himself. Learning the wisdom of those that came before and mastering it yourself and such. Maybe it could come with some sort of test/check the monk needs to overcome before he masters whatever is in the book? You could get some really flavorful tomes out of that...
On the Monk handwrap issue: Personally, I think a more flavorful solution would be some sort of ritual that permanently enhances unarmed strikes and 'enchants' them as if they were weapons.Yup. Like the feats Monte Cook put in Arcana Evolved and the Book of Experimental Might. Direct enhancement rituals, especially if the monk does it himself, are actually the approach I'd prefer. I hoped we could get something like that in Ultimate Combat. And since they technically aren't items, didn't seem like they'd have a chance here... But yeah, that's pretty much the monk holy grail, short of a workable VoP for them.
Can't stop thinking about the Paladin of Irori. Hoping it's adaptable for monks that revere Korada or some of the other good gods/Empyreals. Been wanting options for holy monks since forever.
Post above nails it. Neither does Antagonize. It's incredibly specific in what action you must take (in fact, too specific, according to SKR). Must attack you. That's it. Nor does Command for that matter: you get a choice of one of five words. Neither is carte blanche to wave you around like a marionette. :| No. Non-casters could get those results through other methods. Like hypnotism and mind-altering drugs.* Purely mundane means. And they're still outside forces acting on the target. They may force the target to do something they wouldn't normally do, but at least it doesn't steal the player's character by making them do it of their own free will. That is the distinction. Also, HD is not personality and Wisdom is by no means enough of a facet of one's personality to sum them up entirely. Low WIS-guy could easily be a complete pacifist as he could a complete berserker. And Antagonize would affect both possibilities equally. As it's been said a hundred times already in the thread: Make it a meaningful penalty that the target will have to decide to bear or shake off by doing exactly what the Antagonizer wants, and that violation of roleplaying disappears. *Now there's a possibility, some sort of bloodrage poison.
Dear God. I can't believe Bioware managed to do this. Spoiler:
Shepard's dancing seems to have actually gotten worse. Remember some of those potentially heart-wrenching conversations you could overhear from background NPCs in ME2? Like that salarian taking his asari step-daughter shopping? ME3 seems like it's going to enjoy twisting that knife as far as it can possibly go. Spoiler:
That asari lady at the counter dealing with the old lady is actually getting to me on a personal level. It's actually hard to walk by that place now. One quick actual possible minor spoiler question for those early in the game. Probably two/three hours in. Spoiler:
Did anyone ever actually authorize that PTSD-suffering asari commando's gun request? There is absolutely nothing about that situation that remotely says "Hey, this could work out!"
When I first saw the request all I could think was, "Haha! Oh really game?"
We know that Vercites choose to join one of their three castes when they come of age, but is this choice set in stone for the rest of their lives? If so, that could explain part of the taboo against coercing someone towards a particular choice that may not be right for them. But augmentation or possible discovery of divine connections later in life could still happen to people from all three castes, right? That kind of blurs the lines a bit. How does Verces society deal with this if it does happen? And how does it affect the social norm of not marrying within your own caste, when you might sport the features of more than one?
Neither does Antagonize. It's incredibly specific in what action you must take (in fact, too specific, according to SKR). Must attack you. That's it. Nor does Command for that matter: you get a choice of one of five words. Neither is carte blanche to wave you around like a marionette. As has been repeated repeatedly: Dominate and Charm Person take into account the personality of the target, give them saves, and are outside forces forcing the target to behave unusually.Antagonize forces targets to act OOC of their own free will, with no outside force being to blame. Post below nails it.
What the desire for handwraps boiled down to is "I want to be able to use something that can be enchanted like a weapon but uses my unarmed strike damage." I don't remember anyone asking about NOT being limited to punches.Ah, so you want your cake and to be able to eat it, too. :/ Personally, what I'd like out of it is not something that just enhances punches. What I was visualizing were wraps that go about the wrists and ankles, possibly part of the torso, that infuses the entire body and thus unarmed strike. None of that splitting-up-unarmed-strike stuff. If it has to eat up wrist, feet, and body slots, so be it. And it would be priced at a friendly midrange between the current AoMF and standard enhanced equipment. But the most important thing: It fits the monk's flavor. It feels right. It's not a piece of bling that's making him a better monk. He's still fighting with his entire body. Bonus points if the monk himself has a hand in making those wraps through cost-appropriate rituals. It's all about helping the monk feel more like a monk. The earlier remarks on Improved Natural Attack already making a distinction between unarmed strike and natural attacks and all the other metagamey decisions that have been made to nerf the monk already in the game are spot on. Splitting up unarmed strike would be overcomplicating an already complicated class.
Flintyreach in Lands of the Linnorm Kings (Ironbound Islands). I had high hopes, but that place is half-orcs only. At least half-orcs finally got something nice, though it still doesn't give them their own distinct non-always-horrible culture to pull from, which is the really frustrating thing when you're told "if you want heroic orcs, that's what half-orcs are for".
Are orcs really that popular of a PC race? Personally, they're my favorite fantasy race. The "proud warrior race guy" type at least, that have as much capacity for good or evil as the other player races and are more than just xp fodder. Not the old cut-and-dry Always Chaotic Evil ones. That's why I'm hoping Advanced Race Guide actually has some support for that flavor of orc, for those that want it. This kind of feels like the last chance to get any of that out of Pathfinder since Orcs of Golarion has come and gone and didn't have anything for them. Really, really hoping this one comes through.
Even then, in-universe dominate person would at least be the villain's fault. With Antagonize, the fault for leaving that NPC to die is squarely on the PC acting of his own free will, if not the actual player's. But yeah, 4E fighter marks would be a lot more fitting.
Handwraps. Or body wraps. Or anything else that would actually fit the flavor of a monk that could fill the role brass knuckles did for a while. Something that can enhance a monk's entire unarmed strike. And only their unarmed strike. No natural attacks baggage. No restricting the monk to just punch-punch-punch. It should be something that lets the monk live up to their flavor. To let them really be a flurry of fists, feet, headbutts, elbows, knees, all of it.
Mikaze, my brother was raging about that same issue all day. Any chance you're playing on a 360 with a Shepard imported from 1 into 2 and then imported from 2 into 3? Yep. Maybe it's a thing. Thankfully my Shepard's face is pretty easy to rebuild. Still it's a bit of an annoying speedbump for those hoping for a seamless transition across the trilogy. That aside, enjoying the hell out of it thus far.
Yep. All balance issues aside, that is my beef with that particular feat. Perfectly balancing Antagonize won't deal with the core wrongness of it. The whole concept has to be rebuilt from the ground up in a way that doesn't break a table's social contract. Right now, it's a feat that lets someone steal another person's character from them and do things they would never do. Another classic example: PC's love interest is dying. All she needs is a Heal check to keep him/her from dying. The PC that has spent the entire campaign developing a tight bond with that character is right there, ready to save him/her. Then the GM has a villain use Antagonize on him. That is not a good game.
NO SPOILERS Did anyone else have trouble importing their Shepard's face? All of my key plot points made it over correctly according to the summary bit, but for some reason it could not transfer my Shepard's appearance. Was able to remake it, but still... SLIGHT SPOILER Spoiler:
Man, you know things have gotten bad when Udina and the Turian Councillor both make nice with you. In the same room.
Sadly the original VoP was a trap for virtually everyone but druids, and its rule text in how to maintain your Vow essentially forces you to fall from grace; especially when you refuse to have potions on you that you could use to heal your dying allies. That puts yourself and your vows before others, causing you to fall and specifically never, ever, again, receive the benefits of the Vows. Yep, those were some of the serious problems mentined above. That's also why I got excited when I first heard about UM having a Vow of Poverty in it. I really expected that it would be a fixed and cleaned up VoP, with tightened language both to prevent abuse and nonsensical situations. Didn't pan out. A few of the other UM vows had similar problems actually, though a reasonable GM could easily adjust them. Stuff like the Vow of Celibacy preventing you from catching someone as they fall, dragging people to safety, or even offering a comforting hand on the shoulder of the mother whose children you stood by and let fall to their deaths or burn in that barn. Also, sorry Odraude. Missed the PM note as I immediately saw red. :(
Dare I ask? You can PM it so it won't hijack the thread Spoiler:
The original Vow of Poverty from Book of Exalted Deeds had some serious problems, but the basic idea did something very right for monks: It made gearless monks reasonably possible. It helpe those monks actually feel like legitimate msytically ascetic warriors, who were held up by their own enlightenment rather than a ton of expensive magical gear likely made by casters. It put forth an interesting inherent bonus-boost mechanic that could have been the backbone of a whole set of mechanics to support characters held up by their own skills rather than being overly gear dependant.
It helped people make monks that felt like monks that could keep up with the rest of hte party and contribute without being a burden to them. It helped make those monks live up to their own flavor. UM VoP doesn't. Everything the original VoP gave is gone, with a small ki-point increase in its place. It isn't even a real Vow of Poverty when one considers the "one expensive piece of gear" caveat. A 15-point buy UM VoP monk is not going to make it very far in a standard Pathfinder AP. A proper VoP should have made such a character possible, but that's not what we got. What was really frustrating is that many of UM VoP's defenders claimed that those upset by it were just a bunch of min-maxing powergamers. Then when it came time to show that the UM VoP could work, the example was one of the most ungodly min-maxed abominations of a monk I've ever seen. I don't know, maybe I'm crazy, but I think it should be possible to build a reasonable ascetic monk without having to play a horribly dumpstatted dwarf. There are so many things the Pathfinder Vow of Poverty could have been. It could have been a cool alternate system of inherent bonus options or supernatural powers, offering the monk inherent power at the cost of the flexibility magical gear brings. We didn't get that. What we got was something that mechanically would not carry a monk through an AP and failed ot live up to its own flavor. This was especially frustrating as at that time the monk was the most ailing class in the game. Thankfully, Ultimate Combat actually came through for it. Still no viable options for gearless monks though within PF itself.
I am quite fascinated by the Vercites. Their mix of future tech and arcane magic makes me think of a non-dystopian Warhammer 40K. Their relative similarity to humans should make it pretty easy to whip up homebrew stats for them, too (I'm thinking a floating +2 ability bonus, +2 to Disable Device and/or Engineering, low-light or darkvision, some other stuff...). I could probably also dredge 3.5 or d20 Future for ideas for grafts or techno-implants. A huge part of Verces' appeal to me is that it's a technologically advanced planet(with magic!) that isn't a horrible dystopia. It still seems to have serious problems, both obvious and lurking between the lines in a lot of the text, but those issues feel like they'd actually be fun rather than resulting in overwhelming grimdark. It felt to me like one of the nicer/cooler Star Wars/Mass Effect planets had popped into Golarion's solar system, which works fine for me. Voting for Vercites getting a floating +2 as well, and also for a lot of the human-likes on the other planets. I'd almost suggest that there should be three variants for skill bonuses, depending on what caste they belong to, but I'm not sure how set-in-stone one's caste is there.
Yup, the Inquisitor is a female half-orc. Granted it's not a "Core" class like fighter or cleric but it is a iconic. Plus, I think she is one of the better looking characters as well. She has that Old West outlaw look. Yeah, she's a really cool, heroic looking character. But for some reason she just can't make it into the APs.
I say go for it! Draw it out perhaps for maximum drama, but go for it if you have a group that would enjoy it(and it sounds like you do!). She also doesn't have to abandon the reasons why the party loves her. In fact, her having to reconcile that with the possible abandonment of her old god(and especially if she embraces a certain other god who has a follower interested in saving her) could be a good source of drama and fun for the group. You can have her still come across as evil, but genuinely trying to be better and gradually getting there, with bumps along the way.
I'm hoping. The duergar's text leaned pretty hard in the "these are all horrible people" direction. I'm hoping the races with more pages(orcs, goblins, etc) get more range and flavor to back that up.Given what we saw in "Orcs of Golarion" I am not holding my breath on that. :( Well, that's me. Eternally and foolishly hopeful. I'm hoping being divorced from Golarion canon means that they actually put some flavor their for non-Always Chaotic Evil orcs.
Mikaze: Pardon me, but did I ever claim that negative energy was evil? I certainly do not recall doing so. Perhaps you are the one making some assumptions here?
Where are you getting that a vampire retains it's soul? Either from in game fluff or otherwise? Original conciousness, I'll grant you (albeit "borked up"). But soul? No. You've pretty much stated one proof already: To bring that friend back to life, you're going to have to destroy her vampiric form first. Until then, her soul is stuck in an undead body. You can't bring her back with raising magic. You won't find her in her appropriate afterlife plane. D&D/PF vampires aren't Buffy vampires. Most intelligent undead have repeatedly been shown in both D&D and PF material to retain their original souls. That's the hell of it for most undead: these souls are stuck and trapped in that state. This has been the regular state of things in the game, to the point that actual exceptions are called out when they happen(liches with their put-away souls, Dragon Ecology devourers with their notably missing souls). Also, non-evil undead have long been a part of the game, no evil required. That doesn't mean vampire girl here wouldn't fall towards evil, but that's left for that group and their setting's rules to explore. Or not, if it plays out that way. Really the core of the issue here seems to be incompatible play styles. Or a lack of OOC concern for group integrity, going both ways honestly.
It was probably mentioned upthread, but the latest Wayfinder has an ad featuring the likely final cover art.
So, I heard about a necromancer from Kobold quarterly that lets you cast necromancy spells as good spells, not evil. It's a neat concept, but I'm trying to wrap my head around the fluff...you're still unearthing graves and using corpses/upsetting the balance of life. Can someone help me? Actually, White Necromancers(and evil necromancers) don't need to go digging up graves to do what they do. That and understanding the balance of life and death are a big part of what they are. After all, potions of immortality and the like upset the balance of life too, and those aren't evil. They just honk off certain inevitables. The easiest way to look at it is this: Typically evil necromancy is evil because it's about enslaving, defiling, or otherwise harming the soul. Necromancy that does nothing to the soul is, in a vacuum, neutral. White necromancers are about working with the dead. You help the dead, they help you, sometimes it's one-way and both ways, but it's always with willing souls. White necromancers are unique in that their necromancy hinges upon Diplomacy. They don't enslave the dead. They actually have to show them proper respect to get their aid. And considering the number of restless spirits and souls with so much unfinished work left behind in a typical fantasy world, that's a lot of folks that need a white necromancer's help. As mentioned by Beckett, Juju Oracles operate with similar mechanics, though the spirits that inhabit their undead are actually (loosely defined) wendo spirits. Like the White Necromancer though, their mindless undead are neutral and their intelligent undead match their alignment. White Necromancers and Juju Oracles both operate with mechanics that strip the [evil] descriptor from their undead creating spells. What this means is that the creation of undead, in and of itself, doesn't have to be evil. There's just something about those spells in their current vanilla form that is evil. That's left in the flavor of those spells for groups to explore on their own. Whether it's profane rituals or if it brands the targetted soul with evil, something makes those spells and often the resulting undead evil. Whatever the White Necromancers and Juju Oracles do, they cast those spells differently. Their rituals are different, and thus the resulting undead are different. No damage to the soul is done.
I banned it also when I first read it. Same'd. Our entire group outright banned it as soon as we all saw it. Looking at it from both a GM and player perspective, having your characters hijacked by someone else's mechanics that technically force you to do something stupid and quite possibly grossly out of character without the justification of mind control is too much. It's essentially taking other folks' characters away from them with the explanation that they really are derping that hard of their own free will. Even if it's Pacifict Pete, whose entire schtick is to never do harm. Hell, he might even have a Vow of Peace. So much for that, he got Antagonized in front of the city guard. And then there's Paladin Pauline or Noble Ned getting Antagonized in the throne room, in front of their liege. And they don't even get the comfort that it was magic that forced that upon them. The way Antagonize works, it's all their fault. That's bad pool. GMs don't dictate to players what their characters do. Yes, dominate and such can come into play, but those are supernatural forces messing with the characters. With Antagonize, it's the characters themselves that are to blame. Hence banning Antagonize as written. If a fighty type really wants something like Antagonize(and they should have a reasonable "aggro" option) in any game I'm running, I'm just going to rewrite it into a variation of the Come And Get Me rage power. The target would be given an incentive to go after the antagonizer: he's slapped with a morale penalty unless he attacks the guy taunting him. He can still do what he would normally do, but he's going to be operating with penalties until he goes after the Antagonist or the encounter ends. Personally, that is a much more reasonable approach to "aggro" mechanics, and it doesn't violate a player/GM's control of their characters. It's less, Fighter: Wizard: GRARARRHARARARARAER and more, Fighter: Wizard: Gods damn it I hate that jacka- GRARARRAARARARRR Replace Wizard with any other class as needed.
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