Timitius's page

Actually three at the time of your post. My post has two games in addition to Daigle's one. ;-)

Just didn't want the second one to get lost in the clutter...

I stand corrected, sir!! ;-)

Howdy Folks! PaizoCon Dictator-Emeritus Timitius, here.

I am seeing several great games being proposed! This is GREAT. I want to play in all of these! However, what I am not seeing is these proposals taking that next step to becoming OFFICIAL. By my count right now...we have two. TWO.

We need more. LOTS more. Josh explained to me that each day is going to have upwards of 36 gaming slots. Of these, PFS scenario sessions will take up half. So....that's quite a lot of slots left open.

Sure, there will be Paizo staff run games in the mix, too, but not everyone can get into these. In fact, a lot won't. There are going to be 200+ gamers looking for a game each day. We just cannot have folks milling about, looking lost and bored. We need them to park their butts at YOUR table, playing YOUR game.

So, if you are a contributor, follow the examples of Adam and Greg, and submit a game or two to run at PaizoCon 2010. The fans know you, and they WANT the opportunity to play with you. I myself got to play some "Slumbering Tsar" preview action last year with Greg. It was so much fun! And, I also found myself sitting next to Lou Agresta and Sean Patrick Fannon as well! Bonus!

If you are a fan, PLEASE PLEASE submit your one-shot game here as well. You are needed! Convert an old D&D module to PFRPG...modify a module to run in 4-5 hours...heck, run some favorite, nostalgic game for your fellow nerds!

Bottom line here: Some of the most memorable times at the past two PaizoCons have been at the tables run by your fellow Paizo fans. You are playing with a pool of people that you just won't find anywhere else, during a weekend that is jam-packed with awesome.

So, heed the call of Cookie Mistress Lilith: fill up that lottery with more Paizo fan-run games!

+/- 100 isn't the problem. It's +/- 200 or more that is. The 750/1500 wasn't a range, but looking back on my original post, I should have made this a bit clearer.

Awwwwww, crud. Yeah, I read it like it was a range, too. (hangs head in shame)

Well....luckily, I can easily come up with another 240 words. Why, it's like there's a whole thread of inspiration to draw from...... ;-)

Kajehase wrote:

Sent in a Gods & Magic style write-up of Milani.

Excellent! I was hoping for a little more on Milani, as I have an inquisitor of Milani for my PFS character!

Oh, and just sent in an NPC entry for another of Ostog's party companions. ;-)

Ugh....take two. I wanted to share Howell at a level compatible with the rest of the party in the NPC Guide, so a bit of a rewrite was in order. Hard to do, when I haven't even SEEN the NPC Guide, yet.

DOH! Please forgive me, Mistress Lilith!

Sent in a Gods & Magic style write-up of Milani.

Excellent! I was hoping for a little more on Milani, as I have an inquisitor of Milani for my PFS character!

Oh, and just sent in an NPC entry for another of Ostog's party companions. ;-)

SO... it's 3/14, and the count shows:

45 coming, with 6 possibles.

Erik is definitely Valeros.

"The Line of Polity" by Neil Asher
"Guide to Pruning" by Cass Turnbull (hey, it's spring, and I now own a big yard!)

On the standby:

"Sea of Monsters" by Rick Riordan
"Snowcrash" by Neal Stephenson
"American Nerd" by Benjamin Nugent

So is everyone invited to these tours? If so I might show up wednesday night instead of thrusday afternoon.

Tam

Tam, everyone who wants to come is welcome! I'm not wrangling a tour bus or anything. Either we take a fleet of vehicles into the city, or we meet at a park and ride and take the bus in.

Hugo and I took the bus last year. I hate messin' with parking.

Norwescon gaming schedule is UP!

Why look at that.....Pathfinder Society scenarios abound!!!

Sajan - Faran Tahir. Captain Rabau of the USS Kelvin from the latest Star Trek.

Spot ON for Sajan. Excellent.

Wow. Looks like we will have ourselves a small force parading around Seattle! I think people need to start posting that they intend to come along on a Wednesday/Thursday tour!

I haven't put together an itinerary yet. The safe bet would be to hit the waterfront on Thursday morning, and do Pike Place Market, maybe the Seattle Aquarium and/or a Harbor Tour, and also try and hit Pioneer Square and the Underground Tour.

Hugo and I did this, and it was quite a task to cram all that in, AND make it back in time for the Meet and Eat. I'd say that doing the market all morning, and then walking down the waterfront to Pioneer Square and taking the Underground Tour would be enough for one day.

Now, Wednesday, we went Pacific Place, rode the monorail to the Seattle Center, and went up in the Space Needle, did the SciFi Museum/EMP, then hit a nice Thai restaurant for lunch, and returned to walk through the Pacific Science Center and take in an IMAX film. That's an option. OR we could hit up a Seattle neighborhood instead....maybe Capitol Hill, Ballard, Fremont? Or we could do the Locks, and the Zoo?

Possibilities are GREAT and NUMEROUS!

Hmm, relativity is a great thing.

What is this relativity thing?
Driving related?
Walking related?

Given that I will be flying in and taking a shuttle, I was wondering what the local attractions are. I understand there is a mall close, but you can goto a mall anywhere. The Seattle area is suppose to be know a little for its micro breweries.

Oh, definitely a drive. In Seattle, if it is not over 50 miles away, that's Relatively Close.

Exact distance from the hotel? 9.4 miles, if travelling up 405. So, that's about 15-20 minutes of driving. CLOSE.

The Seattle microbreweries you are thinking of are mostly IN Seattle.

The one that is right down the street from me is Black Raven Brewery.

Right around Bellevue and within walking distance? Yeah, you are looking at Bellevue Square for the mall. There's a Rock Bottom Brewery. And the Tap Room, but, geez, that's an upscale suit and tie place.

If you are here on Thursday night, be sure to join us at the Crab Pot. You should be able to catch a ride with someone!

Hey in looking over local attractions, the Redhook Brewery is listed as close by.

How close is this and do they have good brew?

Red Hook is up in Woodinville, relatively close by. Yes, it is good beer. You can even get a tour there.

I'd also recommend the Black Raven Brewery in Redmond. It's got a small taproom right now, but their beers are excellent.

Mac n Jacks is somewhere around here too, but it's just a place where you can go in and fill your growlers, or a keg.

Hmmm. I'm sensing a Wednesday night event here.....

Parminder Nagra as Kyra.

Jessica Biel as Amiri.

Pierce Brosnan as Ezren.

Hugh Jackman as Valeros.

Gina Torres as Seelah.

Gigi Edgley as Merisiel.

Hayden Panettiere as Seoni.

That's all I got right now.....

As someone who sat at the winning table (ROW LIKE YOU BELIEVE!), I can say that going in to the Banquet, I had no idea where I was sitting, and only a vague idea of who I was sitting with. I knew I would be sitting with Liz and Yoda because we wanted to eat together and chat. We picked a table up closer to the front, so we would have a good view of the RPG preview.

I may be mis-remembering this, but we didn't even KNOW that there was going to be a trivia contest until MCFrosty told us right then and there. I seem to recall that I realized after the first few questions that I was EXTREMELY lucky to have joined Mark and Liz for dinner. ;-)

But this year, we KNOW there will be a trivia contest, and that makes this year quite different, to me. Because people are talking about sitting together for tactical advantage, not for the camaraderie.

While I would love to reassemble the RFBU#107 to defend our title, I am hoping that we have new and different teams. Otherwise, it's like the NFL...same teams, same dynasties, same teams at the top.

Still, getting the right answers was cool (thanks Mark and Liz!!) but, really, the entertainment was from Josh and Erik and all the WRONG answers. And from each table coming up with their own shtick.

I posted this in another thread, but:

Just a little "heads-up" to all those who are bringing spouses and kids, and are wondering what they can do whilst you are gaming it up...

Being local, my wife has mentioned that she would be up for going to the zoo, aquarium, science center, or other such venue that is favorable to children on the weekend.

As we near the time, we can iron out the details for all those interested.

Also, while not into antiques, my wife is into crafts and scrapbooking. We have a Ben Franklin store in Redmond that is chocked full of that stuff. Me? I try to not set foot in there!

Joshua J. Frost wrote:

I am certainly not going to form a seating chart. And, let's be honest here, you were actually your team. They were just along for the ride. :-)

I refuse to comment without my attorney present.

Liz and one other guy helped out too! But, ya, Yoda...you rocked.

My only real contribution was the team name. And I think the wave.

But, man, it was fun!

Hey everyone!

This being the 3rd Annual PaizoCon, we need to have the 3rd Annual Meet and Eat, as well!

The Meet and Eat is a pre-PaizoCon gathering, where folks coming in from out of town, as well as us locals, all descend on an area restaurant, eat some dinner, and get to know each other. This way, when you show up for PaizoCon, you've already got some friends!

We have it on the Thursday evening before PaizoCon, starting around 6 pm or so. The present choice so far is The Crab Pot in Bellevue (it was GREAT last year!).

Every year so far, we've managed to get 20-25% of the Con attendees to show up for the Meet and Eat. And since this year we have a cap of 500, we could get...(ulp!) 100 people??? Yikes!

I don't want to depend on that as my sole estimate, though. SO!

If you are attending PaizoCon, and are planning to attend the Meet and Eat as well, please post here that you are coming, and how many of you are coming.

I'm trying to recall if anyone brought their friends or significant others to the meet and eat....it seems that all attending the meet and eat were attending PaizoCon as well. Of course, I'm not going to say that folks can't bring their families!

All I'm doing is setting up a reservation for x number of people, under the PaizoCon banner. However, last year we made a reservation for 40. We probably got 60. And those were pretty much all con-goers.

If we get much bigger, then I'm not sure how that will play with the restaurant. I'm not selling tickets to this, so there's nothing stopping them from eating in the same restaurant.

Perhaps we could set up a poll of sorts, so that I can start getting an idea of how big we will be this year...and then go to the Crab Pot early to let them know we MAY be taking over the place.

Tim

Protection from evil and dispel evil should both work to end a vrykolakas's possession power.

Yeah! I got one right! Oh, wait.....I said no. Damn.

Well, I am probably biased, wanting PCs to really think hard before tanglin' with the vrykolakas. ;-)

I noticed that the possession devils use basically the same mechanic, too.

In the bestiary, is there any way to break the Vryolakas Feral Possession power once it's possessed an animal other than killing the animal, such as remove curse, break enchantment, limited wish, etc? I would imagine a party druid would be pretty unhappy after beating a Vryolakas and having to kill their animal companion if it gets possessed.

Hey Joel,

As the contributor for this one, my intention was that you'd have to kill the animal. I had been researching the vrykolakas, and was delighted to see animal possession in the folklore. The image of the party chasing after a small squirrel is wonderful.

The adaptation of magic jar was a Paizo addition. I knew that Paizo was working on possession rules and such, so I put the ability in, hoping that it would serve as an example of possession for them to apply the new rules. However, magic jar seems to be a better fit for the ability.

I'd say that if the special ability is to be treated as the spell magic jar then a dispel magic would probably work. Dispel Evil maybe too. It is not a curse, and not an enchantment. And, of course, Protection from Evil would likely prevent the possession.

My concern with this, is
1) Does Dispel Magic even work on Supernatural Abilities? I mean, can you Dispel Magic on a vampire that becomes mist, forcing it to assume its original form? I view it in that way...so I'd say no.
2) But, if you could...in doing this, does it effectively neuter the ability, making the CR 10 creature less challenging/menacing? For 6th level characters, the earliest lvl to have access to Dispel Magic, the vrykolakas would be nearly out of their league, anyway. For 10th level characters, though...the use of dispel magic would probably take the teeth out of Feral Possession, thus eliminating the cool factor of this aspect of the vrykolakas.

Barring a magical solution, the only way to get the vrykolakas out of the animal without killing it would be to capture it, and prevent it from returning to the gravesite. If the vrykolakas doesn't reach its resting place in time, the magic jar effect would expire, and the vrykolakas would exit and die.

Just to let folks know...we've had two really fun sessions now, but the action has been pretty constant, so there has been no logical break where Howell can sit down and write a journal entry.

So, you'll have to wait to hear more about Chad the Hellknight, and our newest ally, Rummytumtugger.

Yeah!! PFS at Norwescon!

Thanks to Josh and thelesuit for making this a possibility.

Seriously, folks, think about running a scenario. Cuz when you are NOT running a scenario, you can come to the gaming panels (organized by yours truly). Jason, James, Erik, and Sean will be there. Chris Pramas. Mike Selinker. James Ernest. Mike Mearls. Rich Baker. Bruce Cordell. Wolfgang Baur. Jeff Grubb.

Just to name a few. ;-)

Check out the website for more info . It is a good time!

Actually it is not just my interpretation....I asked Mr. Bulmahn to confirm it when my paladin had gained the ability during a session of James Jacob's campaign of Sandpoint.

But, this IS the House Rules/Homebrew section...so that take is equally valid at another table.

Yes but not all paladins take divine bond with a weapon and not all weapons are under a divine bond.

This is true....some will take the mount.

Regarding "not all weapons are under a divine bond", the PRD states:

The first type of bond allows the paladin to enhance her weapon as a standard action by calling upon the aid of a celestial spirit for 1 minute per paladin level. When called, the spirit causes the weapon to shed light as a torch.

Note it does not state just one weapon. You are basically calling the celestial spirit down to imbue the weapon you are holding with enhancements. So, if I'd like to add the Holy Zing to my warhammer, good! If I would rather have it add to the +1 longsword, making it +2, fine! If I'd rather forego that +1, I could choose merciful.

But, that said.....I do like the spell. I just wanted to point out that the ability the OP was looking for is indeed there in some form.

What would be interesting is if it was not limited to "self", but could be cast on others, providing a save of some sort. Sort of a "Swords into Plowshares" thing.

Actually, Lokie is correct.

Merciful is an enhancement available at 5th level when you select Divine Bond.

So, while I like your paladin spell idea, it has sort of been factored in to the class.

Plus, merciful works in that you can turn it on and off with a command word...really making it "on the fly" as far as a last minute decision.

Just a little "heads-up" to all those who are bringing spouses and kids, and are wondering what they can do whilst you are gaming it up...

Being local, my wife has mentioned that she would be up for going to the zoo, aquarium, science center, or other such venue that is favorable to children on the weekend.

As we near the time, we can iron out the details for all those interested.

I am looking at booking Moorlucks and my airline tickets. Do you guys have any idea about what time the Meet and Greet will be on Thursday? I want to make sure teh flight gets us across country in time to make that. :D

Our last two Meet-and-Eat events started around 6 PM or so. Plan on 6-6:30 PM to be the start time this year.

I am planning on it being at the Crab Pot again....unless they flat-out refuse to reserve us this year. I am beginning to feel that we may exceed 100 people this time around! O_o

Try Run.com. Gives plausible routes around the suburb cities around here.

If you try Redmond, the Sammamish River Trail is a pretty nice way to go.

NORWESCON 33

SKR, Erik, James Jacobs, and Jason Bulmahn will all be there, as well as Wolfgang Baur, Chris Pramas, Jeff Grubb, Mike Mearls, Bruce Cordell, and Rich Baker. Mike Selinker and James Ernest. Eric Cagle. Hopefully, some Privateer Press folks, too.

Below are my thoughts on page 3.

Bumbershoot of the Mage

Review: a +4 shield bonus to armorclass alone is way more worth than this item , compare to the ring of force shield . In addition to this you have: levitate at will , gust of wind 1/day ( albeit always at first opening the umbrella) and magic missile absorption.

Aside from these effects you have nothing going on for this item, so it might be easily called a spell in a can. There simply is some mojo or spark missing her. Again a case of “nice, but not more”

First of all....Azmahel, you are a judging demon!! I thank you for all of the reviews, not just mine. Your comments are fostering a lot of discussion here, and that is simply a wondrous thing in itself. Thank you.

I suspect I got dinged for the spell in a can, or probably the Swiss Army knife effect...and then tossed out for the Mary Poppinsesque quality. Even likely it was the other way around.

I admit it did lack "mojo"...that was apparent immediately upon reading some of the top 32! I was actually quite concerned about the cost calculations. I was referencing wondrous items in the book, trying to get a feel for calculating various costs, and boots of levitation just threw me...it doesn't adhere to the formulas whatsoever! So, I took a stab at it, and relied on the "art" of item creation.

Again, many thanks for your review!

If you are attending Norwescon 33 this year (April 1-4)...I am trying to put a Miniatures Painting workshop on the schedule, with Sean and some other industry people giving the basics and pointers.

It's not finalized at all, but it is a strong goal to provide such a workshop this year.

Well, that encounter showed us that The Fungus Queen is not to be truffled with! She obviously had loose morels...all she had to do was pop a few of her button mushrooms, and Ostog was in deep shiitake!

Well, now I know why I didn't make the first round....you stole my TONGUE!!

;-)

Congrats, Joe! I'm looking forward to seeing your monster.

I will throw my entry into the hopper as well! I would appreciate everyone's thoughts!

Bumbershoot of the Mage
Aura faint abjuration and transmutation; CL 3rd
Slot -; Price 13,500 gp; Weight 3 lbs.

Description
This umbrella is constructed of wood, with an oiled canvas canopy measuring 4 feet in diameter. Painted upon each of the eight panels of the canopy is a different rune. In addition to the mundane task of protecting the wielder from sun or rain, the bumbershoot can also serve as a wizard’s bonded object. When opened and held aloft, the bumbershoot will allow the wielder to levitate upon command, as if he had cast levitate upon himself. The canopy of the bumbershoot has also been magically reinforced, as per the shield spell, granting a +4 shield bonus to AC when fully opened, as well as negating magic missile attacks . Wielding the bumbershoot in this manner incurs no armor check penalty, nor an arcane spell failure chance.

As an unforeseen consequence of crafting this particular item, whenever the bumbershoot is first opened for the day, it will release a gust of wind, as the spell. There is a 50% chance that instead of being released directly in front of the opening canopy, the gust will be released from within the canopy at the wielder.

Construction
Requirements Craft Wondrous Item, shield, levitate; Cost 6,750 gp

As for my thinking on developing this....yes, it's an umbrella. That alone is going to invoke all sorts of imagery (a reason I chose the umbrella in the first place). Yes, I know all of the possible comments this probably got regarding a certain movie character. But, note: this is not flying...it's levitating! And it's not featherfalling, so to avoid the comparisons to the multitude of cartoons.

But, I chose an umbrella because I wanted an item which was familiar to everyone, but that wasn't present in rulebooks. So, the reaction would be, "Ah! OK. Wait...I've never actually seen an umbrella in the game before. Wow! I can't believe this isn't already been an item before."

I also wanted an item that sort of lent itself to roleplaying, and I think certain types of wizards characters would thoroughly enjoy having an umbrella as part of their image!

Thoughts?

And I will counter with:

GO BIG RED!!!

So, I've bought tickets to both the event AND the banquet....I'm assuming I would pick them up AT the event? I know I'll probably be working during the day Friday and may not be able to go until Saturday, but it should be fine to pick them up then right?

(I've never been to a convention before)

Yep! Someone will be at the front table with your badge and tickets and stuff.

Oh, and I LOVE hearing people say, "I've never been to a convention before" and then come to find out they are making PaizoCon their first.

That...is a very cool thing. ;-)

Message dropped to SKR....

Yeah, I'm getting the sense that there are two kinds of gamers weighing in on this: casual console gamers and hardcore console gamers.

For the record, I'm a casual console gamer, and former hardcore PC gamer.

The Wii is great for the family. There are lots of games that are excellent to get those non-gaming persons in your family to actually sit down and PLAY. Play on the Wii, for the most part, is interactive and engaging. It makes you move. I myself will not buy a game if it involves sitting on my butt and mashing a bunch of buttons.

We have the Wii Fit Plus, Sports, Sports Resort. We have the Lego games (for my son) that he adores. My wife enjoys the Dance Dance Revolution games, and we just picked up Samba di Amigo, a DDR-like game, but with maracas. Hilarious. I myself enjoy Boom Blox, Big Brain Academy, Force Unleashed, and the Wii Fit games.

I bought the RE: Umbrella Chronicles. Hate it. HATE IT.

I must agree with the post above...rent a game first. About half the games we rent, we instantly hate. Another quarter, we sort of like, but quickly get tired of. That last quarter? Games that are great.

A big surprise for us was Monster Lab. Goes for about $20 now. Has minigames, monster building and upgrading, duels, and more. Great fun.

Bottom line is that the Wii isn't a typical console. It can't be. It's strength is being a console that EVERYONE can play...kids, parents, grandma and grandpa.

The best part? The fact that Ostog will likely be writing his OWN letter to the Pathfinder Forum after where the previous game ended, cliffhanger style, at an encounter yet to be summarized in Howell's excellent journals.

Yeah....he'll be tossing some salad reaaaaaaaaaal soon. Dressing. On the side.

F. Wesley Schneider wrote:

Dear Pathfinder Forum, I never thought it would happen to me, but...

??

v-p: Inside joke we made when it was revealed that Erika was serpentfolk....supposedly Velmarius beginning his letter to the Pathfinder Society's adult gentlemen's magazine. ;-)

But in all seriousness, I do hope no one takes any of my comments the wrong way.

And I hope you won't take it the wrong way if I happen to strand you in South Seattle during your tour in June. >:D

Yeah, it's called Sound Transit. ;-)

Seriously, when I took Hugo around last year, we caught the bus near my house and took it into the city. Pretty much walked around during the day....walking is good for you!

I suspect we will have lots of people joining us, so I will likely draw up an itinerary and have assembly points and times. Too hard to coordinate all those schedules.

Still...renting a van for the day.....hmmmm.

Tim, can I go on the super-fabulous-enchanting-mega-awesome-in-your-face-Seattle tour. I would really like that.

zuxius@pathfinderchronicler.net

Um....I'm not entirely sure it was THAT good, but...yes. I would be happy to show you the wondrous sites of Seattle.

That's more money that I could spend on beer, yoda....shut up!

;-)

One of the online games I am playing in also uses a wiki...pbworks.

You can take a look-see here
. Look under "Game History and Journals". The GM puts the session summaries there, and my character's journal is Xak's Boasting.

All in all, it works.

Another session last night! Much laughing, at Velmarius's expense!

I will post an update here soon. However, today I took the time to finally write up Howell's background (with some timely prodding from SKR -- thanks, Sean!). If you are interested, click on Howell's profile.

I've played a lot of characters, but Howell has to be my favorite to-date...and a lot of it is due to Jason, for making a paladin a lot of fun.

By the way ... what exactly is the Meet and Eat? That's not the same as the Dinner we purchased tickets for, right?

It's the only thing I get to organize for PaizoCon now! ;-)

Nah, it's all good. So! The Meet-and-Eat event takes place on Thursday evening. We reserve tables at a local restaurant, and then folks coming into town for the Con come, meet one another, have some drinks, eat some good food, and have a good chat. It is a great way to meet folks even before PaizoCon starts...that way, when you show up on Friday, you'll already know quite a few people there!

The first PaizoCon, we met at Todai!, a sushi-buffet place.
Last year, we met at The Crab Pot, and we will probably go there again this year as well.

Last year, we had over 50 people show up!

I am an aquatic ecologist.

I'm an aquatic ecologist, too. My focus is on freshwater benthic macroinvertebrates, specifically sampling them to see if the river or stream is healthy (biomonitoring). Right now, I'm doing that for a stream restoration project. I also do quite a bit of scientific support for fisheries and instream flow studies in our company....lots of Pacific salmon work.

Oh, and SAS is waaaay too expensive. Only universities can pay that kind of annual fee! I really like NCSS, but I'm using the statistics in SigmaPlot 11 right now (basically they folded Systat into SigmaPlot).