Seldriss's page

And this is another reason why i prefer spell points to vancian magic.
With spell points you don't have to worry about the level of your bonus spells, as you just have bonus spell points.

I got mine in the beginning of last week.

The screen is very solid, sturdy.

On the negative side, i regret that there is not more information on the screen.
It could be written in smaller size, to condense more stuff.

I would have liked also a little booklet of some sort coming with it, like some other RPGs offer sometimes, such as a digest of some rules, NPC stats and so on.
But Paizo never said they would do anything like that so i don't really complain.

All in all the screen is still good. Although pretty expensive, considering the shipping.

The archtypical Gish is an evoker. You may want to keep that in mind when designing the spell list and the class.

Many casting warriors are using their magic for two things :
- To improve their abilities, being stronger and faster. That falls into Transmutation.
- To increasing their defense and resistance. That falls into Abjuration.

Like it has been said, i also think the spell list should include buffs for the caster (enhancing his stats, his defense or efficiency), debuffs against the opponents (weakening or hindering them) and effects for the weapon (enchantments, magic effects).

I propose the name Seldriss

;)

Congratulations, Houstonderek.

Before you pick a name, please keep in mind that you are going to name an individual for her whole life.
A child is not a pet.
And your child might not share your geeky love of fantasy, sci-fi, movies, comics or games, so don't impose them on her.
Also, a name can be turned into a nickname or worse, into a pun. Kids can be cruel. So be careful to consider what could be the shortenings of the name.

Good luck.

If we are only talking about official classes, my favorite would be the Bladesinger.

By the way, why is there no option for Enemy/Demon or Enemy/Devil ?
It would certainly fit the niche of some fiend hunters, inquisitors, slayers and the like...

Now what house rules do you have Seldriss?

Some players pretend my houserules are somewhat the Pathfinder rules.
But that's not the case, although many of my houserules have similarities with Pathfinder.
In short :

Races : There are a lot of new races or variants. The core races are adjusted to fit the setting, and even humans have subraces (more than thirty).

Classes : All the core classes have been modified to fit the campaign setting and balance the additional ones. There are many additional classes and variants for the players to customize their characters.

Skills : Minimum 4 points per level, some merged skills, no class or non-class skills, alternative crafting rules.

Feats : Different progression, weapon groups, free feats, many modifications.

Combat : Initiative modifiers for weapon speeds and spellcasting, hit locations, critics & fumbles tables, damage reduction from armor...

Magic : Spell Points, advanced specialization and domains, alternative magic, runes, rituals, mana recovery and channeling, metamagic rules for spells alteration...

Psionics : Remix of 3.5 (mainly) and 3.0 (talents and combat modes), templates.

Other : Action Points.

This can also be useful, as a reference...
Ukrainian wooden church

Invisibility : Because of the multiple advantages you get. Especially the naughty ones.

Teleport : Because getting where you want with a snap of fingers is the ultimate coolness.

Because people like new things, and people like options, and because your game would not suffer if you were unaware that these extra books even existed.

No, that's not the Anumus.
Thanks though.

As a matter of fact, i think it was Thinking Races, Freeform Anthropomorphica.
But the book is not available anymore, due to some image copyrights issues.

Recently i saw a third party supplement for d20 or Pathfinder (don't remember) about anthropomorphic races.
Basically a book with animal races. If i recall correctly, it also had some rules to create your own anthropomorphic races.
I think it was quite recent. And no, it wasn't Savage Species.

Does anybody know which supplement it would be ?
Thanks in advance.

Is there going to be a PDF version of this ?

[broken] & [sucks] : Two terms, often empty of actual meaning that i cannot stand, in these messageboards or others.

I must add that i am also quite disappointed by Number 2. I like Ian McKellen, but his character is not given enough scope.
I won't even comment on Number 6. This actor has less charisma than Patrick McGoohan had in one of his tennis shoes.

American wine ?
That's a good joke.

I was also quite surprised and disappointed by the result.
I understand this is not really a remake, they tried to make something different.
But it lacks the humor and the surrealistic dementia of the original.
And the Village lacks the charming pittoresque of Portmarion.

I am running a 3.X campaign every third saturday of the month at The Compleat Strategist in NYC, if you are interested (or anybody else reading this).

The rules are 3.X, quite modified with some advanced houserules of mine.
The setting is my old campaign world, semi-historical setting, high/low magic.
The characters are currently 2nd and 3rd level.
I am only interested in dedicated players, who will commit to the campaign.
To complement the campaign i have some forums, destined to be a source of information, character development, roleplaying and PbP between game sessions.

We currently only have three players, and i am looking for a few more.
Let me know if you are interested.

Thank you for saving me 10 bucks :)

/Understood.

I loathe Claws as a special power for a Sorcerer. :)

Why not turning the Claws into a touch spell or spell-like ability ?

That was Green Lady's Sorrow, from a Dungeon Magazine.
I loved this adventure too.

Edit : Found the issue : Dungeon #35.

I am not here to defend the book - for which i also have some criticism, but that i still like.

There is some flavor text.
Not a lot, but still each creature gets his fluff.
Now i understand that all would have loved a bigger amount of flavor text and development. But this is a monster book, not a supplement.
We have been spoiled with Classic Monsters, which was the opposite, containing quite no crunch.
To save space and keep an easy reading, Paizo went for a one page per monster format. That obviously limits to the fluff, flavor text and all.
Consider also that the Bestiary is mainly destined to GMs, not really for players.

Good point from Frerezar, about the setting.

Bards and druids have a longer history, but even they weren't in the original incarnation of D&D.

A number of the classes in question were very rarely played in 3e (bards were terrible, monks were terrible)

Whatever the editions of D&D, there have been many players who liked or disliked some classes, like Bards or Monks.
If you don't like them don't play them. But it doesn't mean they are [terrible].
Maybe they are just not your style.

Argent is french for silver too.

Agreed, David.
And after all, that's your conversion, not an official one.

But then, as i said, i would suggest you to remove the radioactivity thing, and replace it with something equivalent, but more fitting in the setting.
Radioactivity is not very heroicfantasyesque (neologism) ;)
You could use some kind of a magic addiction, a debilitative effect or a mark from the shadows, a bit like the shadar-kai's affliction (that's what i used personally), an ancient curse, a banishment, whatever...

And as i mentioned before, don't forget the Light Sensitivity.

Im going to have to disagree with the choice to not give -2 Con as well. Even now in the PF Bestiary, Drow who live underground and deal with "radiation" still have the penalty to con. Also, if I remember correctly, the shadow elves had a fairly large occurance of malformation and even had a ritual where they would take malformed babies and leave them in the caves to fend for themselves. I just think this is personal preference with what you would like to see with the race (which I can understand) as opposed to what is already established. The description of the race in the Gaz. book even describes them as the typical elf stature and build, frail, not hearty like a jungle elf for example.

But i understand the point of David, he wants to make something different from the typical drow or elf, even if it differs from the original Shadow Elf from Mystara.
After all, these are destined to be from another world, Golarion i presume...
But then i would suggest to remove the radioactive thing and make up something original and new.

As a matter of fact, i happened to use Shadowelves in my own campaign world, but with a different story, something more in tune with the actual shadows, the shadow plane and shadow magic, similar in some points with the shadar-kai, but without the crazy aspect.

Technically, Shadow Elves were not from AD&D 2nd edition, they were from D&D, the basic game, from Mystara, even if the Gazetteer was published in the 2nd edition era.

They should have the -2 Con penalty, as they are frail as other elves.
Therefore their stats should be Dex +2, Con -2, Int +2, Cha -2.
They should also have Light Sensitivity, like many subterranean races.

Folks,
I can virtually assure you that we will get to a monsters as PCs book. Yes, these rules were available in the core system, but you either had to use the utterly broken LA system or the designed-before-its-time Savage Species rules, both of which sucked.

Hi!
I'm glad people are digging the Spell-less Ranger!
Hopefully you liked the remainder Seldriss :)
I kept favored enemy first so the class was closer to the Pathfinder and OGL/3.5 version. You could certainly reverse the order if you wanted.
There was actually some discussion about Nature's Healing in another thread:
link
Here is basically what I said in that thread:
"Nature's Healing is indeed intended to work primarily with Treat Deadly Wounds. I did leave it a bit vauge though, because I think it would not be out of the question for a DM to rule that it also works on long term care etc (as long as it occured within a Favored Terrain)"
I would very much be interested in what others think of the class and the animal companion / ranger tracking sheet!
Thanks!

By the way, what do you mean by "animal companion/ranger tracking sheet" ?

Fantasy Grounds stands apart from its competition by a beautiful interface and impressive tools, too many to list here.
I was considering using it with my group, for our online campaign, but two main factors made me reconsider :

The price : Although i don't mind, my players won't pay for a program. Greedy players :(

The technical aspect : Once again the interface is beautiful, and there are many useful tools, but all this makes the game experience too computerized in my own taste. Also i don't want to prepare everything on my computer, such as NPCs, maps and the rest.

Basically i want my game to stay true to the original table game experience, we just need the computer to connect through internet.
So we are just using Skype for the vocal chat, and for the maps, we are using OpenRPG, just for the option for me to draw maps live, instead of loading them from my hard drive.

But that's just me and it is not a criticism against Fantasy Grounds.
If you and your players don't mind relying on a program, go for it, Fantasy Grounds is a great product.

I'm not buying this. Enhancing the core races makes playing things like the previously +1 ECL races EASIER, since the core races are no longer that much less powerful than those races. And if you're trying to tell me that 3.5 had a workable and elegant system for playing any monstrous race... you've obviously never seen someone play a pixie sorcerer in a campaign of humanoids. It's sick.

But that's true.
As much low LA monsters are easy to play as characters, the ones with high LA can be a real headache, being too powerful as a race and too weak without a class at the same time.
So indeed, a small buff to core races cancels the discrepancy with LA+1 races, therefore making them LA+0, on par with the core ones.

To be totally mercenary... we WANT folks to buy our Adventure Paths. they're the backbone product that keeps Paizo afloat.
I see it as a necessity—we have a lot of eggs in the AP basket, and that's on purpose. We don't want folks to not buy six volumes because, say, they don't like a particular AP's plot. We want to fill EVERY AP volume with a nice mix of material so that even when we're doing an AP you don't want to use or won't ever run, those volumes will still have material you can use. It's a critical part of what makes the AP line successful, I suspect.

However, some of us don't buy adventure paths.
I don't, as i don't ever buy adventures or modules. The same way i was not buying Dungeon Magazine. It is not about the quality or anything, that's just that i prefer to make my own adventures.
And i am not going to buy a AP just because there are a few pages about some critters. I am sure i am not the only one.

Hmmm... To be honest, i actually bought some, because they had some stuff i was interested in, like the recent article about tieflings.
This perfectly illustrates James's point, and the efficiency of the product... (damn)

Anyway... Having these monsters from Adventure Paths compiled in one book would be something i would enjoy.

I'd like to see all the creatures from previous APs gathered together in a free PDF. Happy Birthday everybody!

But a Bestiary of Golarion could be an option, gathering the monsters specific to the setting in a specific book.
That could be a Pathfinder Chronicles book, to make susbscribers happy.

Apparently there's podcasters who love it as well, at Happy Jack's.

I'm surprised we haven't seen more discussion of the new Pathfinder ranger variant here, though. Worth doing those in future? Or would people rather have more Pathfinder articles like the Torture one by Hank Woon?

I know Tome of Secrets and some others have done classes, so.... Just wondering.

Some comments about the Kobold Spell-Less Ranger :
I would give terrain first, then enemy afterwards.
I am a bit confused about the Nature Healing, and i'd rather give him something else, like extend his stealth attack to mobile combat, in the same idea as the Scout's skirmish.

But by all means, yes, please, more class variants.
I love these, as they provide variety.

Sorry, but "space" if that is the reason, is a poor one frankly.

What we all want is a Bestiary containing all the critters. So it'll cost us an extra $10-20, that's fair enough. We're all going to pay for it eventually; I'd happily pay for it. I don't want Bestiary volume 1, 2, 3 etc. etc. [sounding familiar yet?]

So any new buyers of Pathfinder Adventure Path #13, for example, are still going to be directed to earlier editions of AP's instead of the Bestiary for creatures in that adventure [see page 22 & 79], which is crazy.

Will the existing pdf's be changed with Bestiary listing replacing the MM ones? Probably not, because not all the monsters that the current AP's have used have made it into the Bestiary!

The Core rulebook has 575 pages. Why can't the Bestiary be as large as that? I haven't seen a whole lot of complaints regarding the size of that book or it's price for that matter.

As a reminder, there are about 100 monsters in scenarii, and as the format is one page per monster, that would be 100 extra pages.

I understand you don't want to fall in the same chain of products than for D&D3, but there will be a Bestiary II, and probably III, IV...
The same way an Advanced Player's Handbook is coming, as well as a Advanced Dungeon Master's Guide (i'm not sure if these are the actual names but nevermind).

Don't see it as a vile commercial assault, but as extensions of the game, which must sell books to stay alive.
A game could just have one, two or three corebooks and that's all. But it wouldn't last very long, once all the players would have bought them.
This being said, nobody is forcing you to buy all the books.
You can run Pathfinder RPG for years with just the Core Rulebook and the Bestiary.

I appreciate new monsters are being released with each Adventure Path but why not include all the current [at time of printing] ones in the Bestiary? Surely not another deliberate choice to tempt yet more AP sales?

I can understand that you don't care for game balance, but the official rules cannot ignore it. That way lays the ninja class with d100 HD, double BAB, all strong saves, all spells, 20+ skill points, a feat at every level, and using 2 katanas at once (and, of course, the katanas do 100d100 damage, always crit for instant kill, and give you +20 charisma because you're so damn cool with those)

I mentioned i houseruled the scimitar damage to 1d8, as i prefer that as a DM.
I never said it should be officially changed (such a call would be ridiculous anyway).
And i know about game balance, even the points raised by James.
I still keep my change as a DM, and it still doesn't make the scimitar the number one weapon in my games, because my players just don't pick a weapon for its damage, crits or uberness...

I was wondering if you guys had some insight into Halfling Barbarians.
Should I focus on using a greatsword or two shortswords?
What feats would you guys suggest?

About the weapons, a question : Do you plan to invest on strength (penalty) or dexterity (bonus) ?
If Dex, then you could consider TWF, light weapons or even range weapons.

My point is not about the critical range of the weapon.
But a high critical range shouldn't be a factor lowering the overall damage of the weapon.
As i said if it was the case then the kukri should be 1d3, according to the same logic.

Scimitar = 1d8. High crit or not.

There you have your answer why it had the same damage as a longsword in 2e, but has a smaller damage die in 3e: In 2e, the weapons were pretty much the same in game terms, while 3e, with its introduction of other crit modifiers offered a way to differentiate the weapons: Either more base damage or better chance of critting.

Anyway, crit range or not, i don't agree its damage should be lower than a longsword's.
The two weapons have the same lethal potential, so they should do the same damage. 1d8.
I houseruled that years ago.

Besides, the argument that the scimitar should make less damage than the longsword because of its crit range doesn't make sense.
If it was the case, then the kukri should be 1d3, as it is the same size than a dagger, but with a better crit range.

There are bad things in Pathfinder :

Dwarves are still here.

NOT ALLOWED!
Must get Pathfinder #29 ready for layout on Monday!
TOIL!

While we are playing, the Paizo guys are working on the very same game we are playing.
Somewhat similar to cooks in a restaurant, preparing meals for hungry customers.

/Tip to Paizo

I won't comment about the edition guerilla.

But about the WotC cartoons, if some were very mediocre, like the troll and the beholder, some others were actually pretty good and funny.
The gnome especially.
And it became an instant classic.

I'm a monster ! Rawr !

Did it have a better crit range in older editions?

No, but it had a better speed factor (if my AD&D memory serves correctly).

"Tied to" does not mean "same as".
And honestly since we have an call from someone at Paizo that it could be seen either way. The debate about it is pretty much done unless someone else from Paizo countermands James' statements, which is unlikely. It can go either way. the rest is discussion about that.

In older editions, the scimitar was 1d8.
I always kept this damage in 3rd edition. Never used the d6.
And no, it didn't make all my players pick up scimitars ;)