jhilahd's page

Hey sorry for the late reply.
I did add the cairn in the Diamond Lake area. I drew out a map of the surrounding area, and included Everflowing, Whispering, Stirgenest, and a few other faux sites to the mix.

We finished the Tomb of Everflowing Blood(a days travel north of Diamond Lake), and have started the first part of the Whispering Cairn.

That's cool. That's what we ended up doing and it was a hoot.

We play about once a week for 3-4 hours in the evening.

It looks like it may take 3 sessions for this game based upon this.
But... that's because the group avoided all combat in the encounter with the Green Dagger gang. As I posted in another thread, they used "pfft" roleplaying... sigh(LOL) to get through the encounters. Bribed the first guard, and the second one near the stairs and coerced the leader.
It was nice. Took me by surprise, but it went really well.

So now they're on their way back to Diamond Lake(I'm running Age of Worms and this is my prelude adventure), where they'll restock, and then head out to the cairn.

I'm thinking of substituting the zombies with Fast Zombies to shake things up. We'll see. Keep us posted, Olaf.

So last night my grouped played our second session of Pathfinder. Yay us.
And our second session of the old Dungeon adventure the Mad God's Key.

The group had progressed in their investigation to find the Green Dagger Gang. I had anticipated, from my experiences with my players, a kick in the door, kill everyone and take everything attitude.
So I had my maps, my stats and my dice ready.

And what did they do? Bluff, intimidate, and bribed their way into seeing the gang's leader who was beside himself at how easily betrayed he was by his own gang. And in turn due to some just amazing rolls of the dice and great role playing, teamed up with the party to find the villain of the adventure and give them additional information regarding the "plot". Or as much as it was allowed.

To say I was unprepared was an understatement. I've gamed with many of my players at the table from over a decade, and I tend to know how they play their characters. This was a neat twist. It stymied me for a few minutes, but it went well enough.

But you know how you prepare for a certain portion of an adventure, even though you've read the whole adventure, you focus on what you think will happen that night. The plot moved ahead at a speed I wasn't ready for.

It was frustrating and cool all in the same breath.
I just had to share.
So now we're on our way to the final dungeon/encounter area and are one step closer to starting off our main story of the Age of Worms.
Players are cool.

Great timing.
I'm starting my AoW campaign's first game tomorrow and I too am running the Mad God's Key.
So this is awesome.
Question, Olaf, when doing the dock did you follow it per the adventure or did you incorporate the chase cards or any other chase rules?

I like the idea of players giving the GM some basic stuff to get a grip on, but I have never seen any correlation between long backstories and good role playing or good gaming.

I require just some basic character details, your 3x3x3 idea sounds pretty solid. If players want to write extensive back stories, the best way of rewarding them is by having their stories integrated into the campaign as best as I can.

Thanks, Ogre.

But I merely use the tool, I didn't create it. It was something I came across an old 7th Seas messageboard back in the day. I yoinked it and use it as often as I can.

jhilahd wrote:

And just a little background on how I run, I award not only session exp for encounters, but role playing as well, and when I remember(or did in the past) to do so I take a secret ballot vote for best player of the session. That can mean, made the game fun for everyone, contributed the most, played their character to the hilt - whatever and that's an additional xp reward as well.

I... I really like this. A lot.

Consider this stolen.

Thanks. Many moons ago when there was a 2nd edition.... I did it. Initially, it was out in the open... but that tanked... horribly.

So the secret ballot came up, and my players loved it. I've had ties with players, but that's ok by me. It shows me that my players are engaged enough to notice the others at the table and they want to reward them. Some people vote for themselves, what are you gonna? We're human. But for the most part it's a fun ending to a night of gaming. A couple of huzzah's, pats on their backs, and "well done" "good job" go a long way to encourage others to do the same.

I'm partial to traits. Some games my base is 0 traits, and they're all awarded for background info and in-game achievements.

For a wizard, additional spells are a nice perk to hand out for background writing, especially since you mentioned the player wrote about magical theory.

I'm not sure what level you're starting is, but my general guideline for awarding bonus XP is to use the experience point awards table and use the entry for individual XP at a CR of their level.

First level, and medium advancement.

20 point build, I'm allowing the optional 2 starting traits. To my surprise, no one has really said yes to them. They're not opposed to them, just not snagging them up like I would. :D

The extra spell idea is good. Thanks. I like that. I had even considered items as well, but exp is pretty sweet.

And just a little background on how I run, I award not only session exp for encounters, but role playing as well, and when I remember(or did in the past) to do so I take a secret ballot vote for best player of the session. That can mean, made the game fun for everyone, contributed the most, played their character to the hilt - whatever and that's an additional xp reward as well.

Ah sorry.... 3x3x3 is a method in which a player can add some background NPC's into the game. Ones they create, and gives me as a DM more opportunities for RP with said character via these NPC's.

3 Allies
3 Contacts
3 Rivals

With a format like this:
3x3x3
Friends/Allies/Contact/Rival/Enemies:
Name:
Quirk/Personality:
Ties / Background:
Notes:

Here's one from a Dresden game-
Contacts:
Name: Heather Baxley
Quirk/Personality: Huge eyes behind Coke bottle glasses. Reminiscent of an owl.
Ties/Background: Runs Baxley Books. Collectables and curios up front, magick shop and herbalist supply in back. Helps Marty out with all sorts of miscellaneous stuff.
Notes: In the know.

Noting super detailed but enough to get the player involved and allow me to use them as a foil, a source of info, what-not.

I have one player with heavy ties to Magnimar. He was/is a student at the magic academy there and has his family as allies(mom, dad and brother), 2 teachers and a shop keeper as contacts, and for rivals 3 students. 2 are LE and one is a CG gnome.

So in when in Magnimar if he needed help deciphering an ancient script or id'ing an item he was unfamiliar with he could turn to any of his contacts and they may or may help him. They're contacts - neutral, but can help if needed.
So if goes to the contact Larz Cavrindros, a Varisian scholar who he admires to get help with the ancient script he's found. One of his rivals over hears that he has returned to Magnimar and was seeking out the scholar. Now the npc might harass our hero, or stall the contact or even bribe the contact to keep the script so he(the rival) could see it or even steal it.

Just rattling now, sorry.

Basically in a group of 5 players it gives me 45 prebuilt NPC's to use as needed and inject into the story. Plus the players tend to have bigger buy-in's with the game if they're NPC in involved.

So I'm getting closer and closer to running my first Pathfinder game.

I stopped playing 3.X around the time 3.5 popped up, played a slew of other games until 4e, and have been running that since it's launch.

So I'm rusty at a couple of things(or at least feel like it).

I've encouraged my group to do character backgrounds, plus tie-in's to at least 1-2 players. And on top of that I'm asking for a 3x3x3 to incorporate into the game.

The backgrounds are purely optional, the 3x3x3 are not.

I can't for the life of me recall what a fair exp reward is for a character background/writeup.
Anyone have any suggestions on that?
I have one player who's done the background, the 3x3x3, and has written a mock-2 page paper on magical theory. Heck, he just texted me a couple of minutes ago letting me know he's doing a paper on how the magical mind interacts with psionics because he has down time at work.

I want to reward that kind of enthusiasm, but 50-100xp seems week sauce, but 500-1000 seems exuberant.

Now I told my group that I'd reward anyone who did both a background and the 3x3x3 with one of the following:
1) Pre-game Exp
2) a free trait
3) I'd purchase the Inner Sea Primer for them(or if they already had that, a player's companion guide of their choice)

But really, I'd rather reward exp to a creative group and can't find any guidelines on this. And my old brain cannot recall what I used to do for such things.

Help?

Just wanted to say "thank you" for this tool. It's cool and I am using it.

So Falcon's Hollow/Diamond Lake is pretty easy to merge or just switch out. The one I'm struggling with is the Free City.
Where and what.

I thought about dropping in Ptolus along the southern coastline of Andoran, and figuring out some wacky history like it was a planar shifted city during the powerful storms of 4606. Only because I like Ptolus, and think it'd be a good fit. The trick is that it's huge. But it would work, I think, in Andoran ok. It would be a free city state(no pun) and be allowed to operate in a more open friendly environment with the democratic ideals of Andoran(again, still learning the setting).
Plus putting it closer to Cheliax gives Andoran a reason to support Ptolus as an ally. Rambling now, but... I know that the Free City comes into play in the AP, but like I said I'm struggling with this one.

Bump?

Consider me late to the party and interested too!

Bump deux!

As a GM... I would say that the monster books would be a MUCH better second, third, and even fourth purchase than the Advanced Player's Guide, Ultimate Magic, or Ultimate Combat. Those last three have a lot of stuff in them—but they're mostly for players. Especially since monsters often get short stat blocks in adventures.

ALSO: Thanks for trying the game out! Hope you enjoy it!

Thanks!

And I have the Bestiary on my "next to buy list". While the AP stuff sounds/looks great, I agree more DM-y type books fall inline to what I need next.

And James, y'all had me at Rise of the Runelords way back when, I just resisted for too long. And now look at Paizo, consistently solid products. It's like a new game to me at this point.

So thanks again to all, I really appreciate the welcomes and advice. Because believe me, I will be posting alot of "how do I do X" and "I don't understand this" questions in the near future.

And my youngest, who's a freshman in HS and has played 4e with his sister and I, is interested in playing too thanks to Game Informer listing the beginner's box as a must buy Christmas item. He's now in league with one of my favorite players to run a 2-3 session 1 shot over the holidays next month. So to say it's a win-win so far is an understatement.

Ok, so I stayed away from Pathfinder for many reasons, none of them against Paizo or the game. I was at a point of burn out and didn't want any more d20 stuff, least of another 3.X game.

So in planning another game's 11-20 and beyond adventure ideas, I pulled out Age of Worms and thought "I'd love to run this. Maybe I can convert it to 4e and run it for my group."
In my searches, I found more Pathfinder conversions, and discussion which lead me to think about what I missed when playing 4e DnD.

Now don't get me wrong, I like 4e and as a DM it's easy as pie to run, but I missed some of the utility casting of wizards, some of the danger of battles, and more crunch than it offered. So I dug around some more, and the more I read the more I got intrigued, then excited about picking up Pathfinder.

I told my gaming group. Well... I hit up a couple of players whom I valued their opinions on gaming systems. I asked them if they thought I'd enjoy Pathfinder. They both played under me since 3.0 and one since 2nd ed. They both were soooo excited to even hear the possibilities of me running a Pathfinder game, it only fueled my enthusiasm.
So I ordered the core from Amazon on Thursday.
I wasn't expecting it til Wednesday.
I got it this afternoon.

It's the 4th printing. It's freaking huge. Has that wonderful new print smell and it just crisp, crisp all the way around(sorry graphic designer nigglets).

So I just had to share. I've got alot of reading and relearning to do.
I know the rules, but I need to unlearn them and start over. Which is going to be hard. But I'm excited. If I like it half as much as I suspect I will, the Bestiary and Inner Sea books are next on my "to get" list.

Great stuff!
Thanks for the replies.

And Astral, you're right, 9/10 is alittle over the top. Ok... alot.
They always felt more abundant to me and active than any other setting.

And thanks for the heads up about the omens/portents, will have to find other means of forboding information...

First off, hi.
Long time lurker, new Pathfinder convert.
My core book is enroute as I type this, hopefully arriving before the holiday weekend.

I don't have any additional PF material besides what is online, and the first Rise of the Runelords adventure.

But as I am planning on running my next campaign using the PF rules and Golarion as my setting... how involved are the Gods in the lives of mortals and the world in general?

Now, given it's a game and I can handwave how active or involved in my own campaign they are. I like my clerics to feel connected to their deity. They are special, so often many of my games have intervention, help, omens, dreams, long distance calls from their deity in their lives.
Quests, demands, expectations and the like. And often that spills over not only in that character's life, but their companions as well.

But I digress.
How involved are they say compared to other settings? I see the Forgotten Realms being the high end of things. On a scale of 1-10, it'd be 9. Pretty impactful in the world, but not always in your face. But some days is sure feels like it.

Do the setting rules support any kind of interaction or how to handle them?

Thanks.

Ok, a few questions.
First off, I'm new to Pathfinder. I stopped running 3.X right around the switch to 3.5 and haven't run a 3.X type of game since. I've done a myriad of others, and am now finishing up a 4e campaign and will be diving into Pathfinder after it. Which'll be about Summer 2012. A nice blockbuster movie type game. :D

So I've got time to plan out my game, and I will be using the Age of Worms AP as my game. Thrilled to death to do so, and thought instead of doing Greyhawk, which I'm the only old fart in my group who loves the setting; will be converting it to the Pathfinder/Golarion setting instead.

As I have not even purchased the core book yet, and don't have any of the actual setting material, I'm interested in a logical placement of Diamond Lake and the Free City of Greyhawk.

I've seen threads talking about placement in Taldor or the River Kingdoms.
Taldor is a wonderful sounding place for starting an adventure group, but Diamond Lake is a bit seedier than I would think you'd find in Taldor, correct me if I am wrong. And the River Kingdoms looks great too, but the geography might take more work than I'm inclined to do(yet).

Should I just drop in a "generic" Free City into one of these areas(even Cheliax(?)) and work around it? Has anyone found it difficult dropping in or converting these to Golarion?
I had initially considered just using Forgotten Realms(as I have run this more than any other setting in my gaming life), and the Boyd Conversion is pretty easy peasy. But Golarion actually would be fun as it seems to be a great new adventuring place for my group.

Also, starting off the group, I was thinking of running the Mad God's Key to get the group together give them a reason to adventure and care about one another. If not, then why or why would they be in Diamond Lake, and how would they find themselves trying to be heroes?
It seems less heroic and more Deadwood-esque. And to which, I plan on running it more like Deadwood when they are there, and incorporating many of the personalities from the show into NPC's there. Or at least the visage of the actors for many of the NPC's.

It's just through my initial reading of the adventure and the town, I can't think of how/why to really pull the party together. I guess, I've been running too many family/business partners/caravan guard games as of late that the openness seems ... hard. Suggestions or experiences anyone can share would be great.

I'm excited, my group is too. They've enjoyed 4e, but more core players lit up my inbox with excitement when I suggested the new game. So I'm working on my planning stages, learning the rules(from the SRD) and working on a game trailer to lure them in more.
I can't wait. This campaign hits alot of things I love. Undead, the Rod of 7 parts, undead, exploration and travel, undead, unique adventures and did I mention undead?

Thanks for reading my blathering, looking forward to your input/suggestions and rants. :D

jhilahd wrote:

So... I got my credit card statements and I didn't have a refund for this. Did I need to do something else with this , Cos?
Please let me know.

I apologize for having missed your previous post. I have refunded your order.

Thanks,
cos

No worries. Its not like you don't have other customers. I appreciate(no pun intended) good customer service. It says alot about your company.

Thanks again.

jhilahd wrote:

Ok, so I just picked up the pdf versions just for the electronic versions of the FR maps.

I already have hard copies, but wanted to be able to print out sections that I use for my campaigns without having to scan in the maps myself.

So as I complete my order and open up the pdf files, I find out these are full scans of the hard copies. Not the original files saved out to pdf, but scans.

I’m a little beside myself. I wouldn’t have purchased the files if I had known this was what I was getting. Is there any way we can get these? I don’t need layered files, but something that is clean and doesn’t have the wrinkles from the fold lines.

Did I just waste $20?

Thanks.

After searching through our PDF files, it appears that these physical scans are the only files we have for the maps. Unfortunately, this means that we will not have PDFs built from the original files.

I apologize and if you would like a refund, please let me know.

Thanks,
cos

So... I got my credit card statements and I didn't have a refund for this. Did I need to do something else with this , Cos?

Please let me know.

After searching through our PDF files, it appears that these physical scans are the only files we have for the maps. Unfortunately, this means that we will not have PDFs built from the original files.

I apologize and if you would like a refund, please let me know.

Thanks,
cos

Cos,

That's an incredibly generous offer.
I would like a refund. I'll delete the files from my harddrive(oddly enough work harddrive, ahem...) as I already have the original magazines, and if you'll also remove them from my account's download section. Sorry to be a bother about it, and thank you for the great response. Not what I expected at all. Thank you ever so much.

J

Ok, so I just picked up the pdf versions just for the electronic versions of the FR maps.
I already have hard copies, but wanted to be able to print out sections that I use for my campaigns without having to scan in the maps myself.

So as I complete my order and open up the pdf files, I find out these are full scans of the hard copies. Not the original files saved out to pdf, but scans.

I’m a little beside myself. I wouldn’t have purchased the files if I had known this was what I was getting. Is there any way we can gett these? I don’t need layered files, but something that is clean and doesn’t have the wrinkles from the fold lines.

Did I just waste $20?

Thanks.

I have the maps, but would love a pdf version of them.

How do I know which part of the map goes with which issue?

Yes. Aside from the free Player's Guide, Pathfinder #2 mentions that there will be alternate versions of the Magnimar map featured in that volume. The map's simply too big and too awesome to fit all the details in on one map. So yeah, even with near 100 pages every month, quite often there's going to be more than we can fit in.

Suh-weet!!!

And to answer the whole copyright/TM dealy-o...

I picked it up from other publishers, who are often asked "when!?", their response has always been soon. It got to the point that a couple of us used our mad-mac skillz and started adding the trademark symbol.

I figured the next progression would be a copyright symbol. But maybe a service mark would serve better here... hmmmm

That and I don't recall how to do the symbols on my windows based machine at home. :(

LOL

I'm not saying I need it NOW™, SOON© would be great.

I was just curious. It's not like your team hasn't already supplied an ample pdf file with loads of goodies to pilfer from.
I just like free stuff.

Like layered pdf files. Or PSD, I'll take PSD files too. :P

But in all seriousness, if it's on your calendar for a future date, that's cool. I understand not having free time. My team and I are ramping up for our busy season. If I have to reformat copy any more than I have this morning I may scream...

Thanks, fellas.

Just curious. One of the cool things Dungeon had was additional online content.

Will there be any further support for Pathfinder online from Paizo?

Thanks!

Jhilahd(absolutely loving his Pathfinder pdf)

BRAWK! After GenCon. BRAWK!

Yar! I figured as much.... cursed be those are able to go to the Paizo booth and get the release before us, argh. But Monday-Tuesday, tis not soooo bad. not much....

You, sir, wield unholy power.

Right, that part I saw. I just wanted to make sure that there wasn't a cut off date for starting #1.

Thanks, though.

So...
I just subscribed today... yes I waited to late to be a charter subscriber... <sniff>

But... my account shows the following below:
Ongoing Subscription
Volume #2 ships September 2007

Does that mean I will still get the First issue since it hasn't even shipped yet?

Soon trademarked in the RPG industry yet?

Soon™

:D

I can't wait either, I finally gave in and subscribed..

I'll chime in as well. I knew I wanted to look this over, as I am truly tempted by the Pathfinder series.
If the Pathfinder is half the quality of this little intro module, we'll be in for truly great gaming this year.

I want to also sing praises for the stat block layout. Love it. Abso-positively love it. Easy to find the stats I need, without fumbling for them.

Now if your player's guides are as good as Malhavoc's... I'll be a subscriber for life.

Ok... its April 11, 2005. Still no update or news.

We're one issue behind so far, does that mean we're gonna get credit to our subscriptions?

Or be able to cash out or transfer our remaining issues to another 'zine?

Jhilahd

I love the hi res pdf options that have been posted, but I was hoping that we would get a map(or maps) of Cauldron. We have the lo(72dpi) version, but how about a 200 or 300 dpi(clearer) version?

Tif, jpg or even a pdf are fine with me. PDF is nice as long as I can import it into Illustrator. :D

Jhilahd

Nicely done. Like it!

Hey DMFTodd,

Use my herbalist:

http://paizopublishing.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/Store.woa/4/wa/DirectAction/b rowse?path=paizo/messageboards/dungeon/adventurePath/aDetailedNPCHerbalist& amp;wosid=fJh7U5YYhWrJahctjXCk0g

Also let's see some more material!

I can't get this link to work... did I miss something?

Yeah? Whats next? Is it a campaign world specific? Or will it be more generic?
Can't wait!
Jhilahd

I hang on to them, oddly enough. I put most of them in a pocket folder. Especially the tiles, and the cool maps. The posters... while I hang on to them, I don't get as excited about them as the others.

Thanks Gary. I erred. I meant to post this in the Dungeon forum. D'oh!!!!

Servers me right. For not double checking myself. Oh well...

jhilahd wrote:

I like it too.

What I'm itching for are more maps to the Dungeon adventures. PDF, PSD, JPG - I don't care. But when they were on the old WotC website, I used to download them like mad. Take them into Photoshop and edit out the stuff the PC's could see. So PSD files would rock. I'd be willing to pay alittle extra too. Or maybe you could offer them to subscribers...

Thanks, I can't wait to see your DM resources fill up! Thanks for magazine and your hard work!

jhilahd

While it's...

I like it too.

What I'm itching for are more maps to the Dungeon adventures. PDF, PSD, JPG - I don't care. But when they were on the old WotC website, I used to download them like mad. Take them into Photoshop and edit out the stuff the PC's could see. So PSD files would rock. I'd be willing to pay alittle extra too. Or maybe you could offer them to subscribers...

Thanks, I can't wait to see your DM resources fill up! Thanks for magazine and your hard work!

jhilahd

Wow... I expected that these boards would be full. I guess everyone is over in the Dragon and Dungeon forums...

What I mean is, will we start seeing more than just Warmachine and Warhammer games? I play both of them, but I play other miniature games as well. CAV, Stargrunt, Wargods of Aegyptus(I know there was a recent article on them). I realize you only have so much space but maybe a 1 or 2 page filler with a run down of the games with a shot of painted mini or battle scene? That way you don't have to rag your text to flow longer than it needs to. Hmmmmmm? Anywho... just wondering.

I look forward to getting each and every issue. Keep up the good work.

jhilahd
Dallas, TX