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 Recent Posts
You might find that www.consupport.com is unblocked. Worth a try, and it's the site where you can sign up for GenCon UK, buy accommodation on campus, find out about off-site accommodation and what-not. Discussion on the forums is very quiet; can I recommend the site www.ukroleplayers.com which has a more active discussion of things GenCon (and not all complimentary, to be honest!)
I'm pretty sure I'll be at GenCon UK and I'd also be happy to run a module or two. Paul 'Kithran' James is in charge of all organised play rpgs at GenCon UK, I believe; if I see him in the near future I'll talk to him about it!
There's plenty of discussion in the forums. The news item appears to have been added by a normal user due to a glitch in the software - it was not written by site staff the way that those news announcements are. It was removed when the user realised that he shouldn't have had the ability to do that! Since when I saw it it was posted under the heading 'Latest 4E updates' it was clearly out of place: this is a 3.5E update, and not 4E news. I expect that the site knows that a lot of people are looking to it for regular and uncluttered 4E news, and this announcement was not part of that. I'm sure that there will be ongoing discussion on the Pathfinder RPG on the ENWorld forums, as there is ongoing discussion on OSRIC, older versions of D&D etc, but that discussion doesn't belong in the 4E news parts of the site - while Paizo not directly producing product for 4E is news, it doesn't tell us anything about what 4E will be like, nor about what will be available for 4E so belongs elsewhere. Hopefully between this site and ENWorld there is plenty of room for constructive discussion of both games - and partitioning discussion (both on ENWorld and here) is sensible to avoid cluttered forums where it isn't clear what game is being discussed or why. Edit: Also, note that the second news item down on www.enworld.org is the Paizo press release and a link to this website.
From what I've read, I get the impression that in fact, skill challenges are a radical departure for the d20 system. It appears that, at their heart, they are a conflict resolution system, rather than a task resolution system. What I think this means is that the GM and player determine what is at stake as a whole (either: "do I escape from the city?" or "do I get closer to my goal of escaping from the city?") and then roll dice. Based on the dice-roll, they narrate the events which happened to show the escape/increased chance of escape/drawbacks/capture. This is markedly different from a task resolution system where the GM explains in clear detail how far away the guards are, points out the ladder, crates, bickering couple, seedy bar, and sewer grate the PCs can see and says: "what do you do", followed by a hide check or a intimidate check or a climb check or whatever, then figures out whether being on the roof is good enough to help the player avoid being noticed, or whether the intimidate check was enough to rile the couple to violence against each other. Actually this isn't a complete departure: doing one of the RPGA GM tests directed me to a hidden rule about chases (basically, opposed con check if over a long distance, opposed dex check if in close quarters/city/whatever) but it's a considerably more fun system than that one! Now, whether this is a good development or not is a matter of opinion. It goes hand-in-hand with the move away from pretending that D&D is a simulationist system, which is the primary basis of the classic d20 skills system. It seems as if both will go hand-in-hand. Do you want the PCs to have an easier time of things if they can climb down the rope and not have to fight through three rooms of monsters to get to the stairs? A classic skill check from each PC is perfectly sensible, with allowances made for clever planning to help those who can't climb well get down safely. Do you want an obstacle in your battlefield which the PCs can exploit? Jump checks etc are the perfect mechanism. But if you want a scene where the PCs are trying to convince the King that marrying his daughter off to the crown prince of somewhereland is a very bad idea, anything which beats a bare opposed diplomacy check or (worse) the D&D 3.5 diplomacy skill as written, is likely to be more fun, and back that fun up with better mechanical support.
1) I am undoubtedly going to play 4E. Whether I continue to play 3.5 as well is unclear, though perhaps unlikely. Most of my current D&D is RPGA-related, and I'm looking forward to Living Forgotten Realms. 2) I am far, far more likely to maintain my Pathfinder subscription if you publish it in the 4E rules-set 3) I am already considering dropping my subscription for Curse of the Crimson Throne as - although I really like urban adventures - I do not know when I would get to play/run it, given that I have not yet managed to start my Runelords campaign :( and that will be, at most, fortnightly, so I expect to be playing it for a long time to come! Conversion documents, even if imperfect and even if there had to be a marginal charge, would be very welcome indeed.
Which leads to another question: 'map folio'... book? Or toy/game? It's important!Well, for customs purposes, we can call it a book. But unfortunately, for shipping purposes, it doesn't qualify as Bound Printed Matter. (Packages need to contain 50% BPM by weight to qualify for that shipping rate, so as long as it's shipping with a Pathfinder or another book, it'll qualify.) That makes things easier then. Perhaps I'll subscribe to Pathfinder Chronicles, starting with the map folio, then try to remember to turn off my subscription before any cards get sent, and turn it on in time to pick up subsequent books. Do you think that'll be possible? Or is the release schedule not clear enough/will there be months where you'd be sending PC book plus PC cards at the same time? Darn this stupid insistence on borders :( Could we be the 51st State and part of the EU at the same time, please?
I'm not an import/exports lawyer, but my understanding is that if you import anything upon which VAT is chargeable into the UK via the mail from somewhere outside the EU, you are required to pay the VAT and import duty on it. There's probably also a processing charge on top of that. Books are 0% rated for VAT so you don't pay any duty or a charge for books, but card-sets and other such things are liable for VAT, so it has to be paid. In short, this is liable to happen to every package that isn't marked 'books' (well, unless it's marked 'children's clothes' or something else which is 0% rated!) I don't know whether it is likely to happen - I don't know what proportion of mail is checked like this - but I wouldn't order anything VAT chargeable from outside the EU without expecting the price to go up substantially due to VAT/duty/fees. More's the pity. Which leads to another question: 'map folio'... book? Or toy/game? It's important!
Thanks. I tried a few other things and even if I choose for the subscriptions to both start with things which can't be shipped immediately, i.e. the Map Folio and the December Planet Stories module it still wants to charge me $20 for the stuff plus $13 for S&H. What I think I'd like is for whatever's available from Planet Stories and Pathfinder Chronicles to come along with my next Pathfinder (I'm not a GMM subscriber and am skipping that one for now). If you could let me know if that's possible, and what products I'd get, I'll add a subscription. The 'confirm your order' screen makes it look as if my card would be charged $33 odd even if nothing was being sent until the next Pathfinder [I've lost track of which 'month' we're in for Pathfinder, incidentally!] Thanks for the reply, though!
I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding something, but is the shipping price for international customers a per-item price? I'm considering adding a Planet Stories and Pathfinder Chronicles subscription to my Pathfinder AP subscription, and when I do, even if I choose 'Hold for monthly shipment' it's showing a S&H price of $13.72 which is twice the $6.86 listed in the drop-down box for USPS Package service. If I could get all three products delivered once a month for $6.86 I would add the extra subscriptions. If it's going to be 2 or 3 times that for postage etc then I think I'll have to pass. Could you let me know if I'm overlooking something?
I am about to start a Rise of the Runelords campaign, but I'm convinced we won't be anywhere near finished by the time Curse of the Crimson Throne is released and I'm wondering: if I convince someone who is playing my Runelords campaign to GM Curse of the Crimson Throne, would preparing for and running the second AP diminish his enjoyment of the second half of the first one? Or are the two APs sufficiently separate that you can run the second one without learning secrets or reading references to events which happened late in the first?
My credit card expires at the end of September. I have a new one, which is valid from the 1st of October, with a new expiry date. If it's certain that my card won't be charged - or pre-authorised - before 1st October, I'll go ahead and put in the new details. But if there is a chance that it'll happen slightly before the start of October I don't want to do that as then the transaction won't go through as you'll have the wrong expiry date. Do you have a suggestion? Or should I just wait to see what happens and remember to change the details on the 1st?
[Pedant] If you're going to by hyper-correct, shouldn't it actually be alumna in this instance? [/Pedant] (As, as far as I know, Lisa Stevens is a woman) :D What's the internet law which says that any post correcting another's spelling or grammar will itself contain at least one such error?
I really think there ought to be a better place to put this, but what the heck :) Is there any way we can bribe, beg or borrow anyone associated with Paizo to attend GenCon UK? It's August 30th to Sep 2nd, it's back after a hiatus of a year and returning to the location where large-scale RPG/games conventions started in the UK: the campus of Reading University, a mere hour from London. Now, I wasn't a Paizo fanatic until recently, but reading about Pathfinder and Game Mastery modules have made a convert of me... would I be right in thinking that at least one of your most fabulous authors resides in this green and pleasant land? Any chance? At all? :)
Well, if humans in our world eat Bird's Nest Soup then I wouldn't be surprised to find a recipe making use of Slurk slime. The nests are composed of interwoven strands of salivary laminae cement. In English: solidified bird spit :D It's a delicacy, apparently, and food only fit for an Emperor and his most favoured dinner guests.
What a pity. Paying book + shipping makes the subscription very expensive for Europe. It's only a dollar more than for US customers. Given the weakness of the dollar (at least against the pound, not sure how it is against the euro) it's actually good value - and probably better than you'd get from a store.
This verse was creepy. Wonderful transition from a general sense of house-breaking and raiding to the very specific image of a particular goblin under a particular baby's crib. Brrrrrr <shiver!>
I don't even do desktop wallpaper art, and as soon as I saw the ghouls I knew it had to be there. I even put all the cluttery icons of install files and random things I'd downloaded to my desktop into a 'clutter' folder so I could see it all in its dark and sinister glory. Tidiest my desktop's been since I bought the PC!
Swift and immediate actions are in the 'Psionic Powers Overview' document in the SRD (available here http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=d20/article/srd35). I'm not an IP or contract lawyer, but I don't see any reason why use couldn't be made of them in a non-psionic context, if the authors chose.
Now, Vic. Does this mean we goet cookies too? I love cookies! I adore cookies! I will join the Dark Side for cookies!I wanted to include cookies (chocolate chip or snickerdoodles) with every Pathfinder shipped, but the goblins ate them. Goblins really love cookies, you know. Grabby little jerks that they are... Normal, run of the mill, WotC goblins? Nah. Front-cover of "Burnt Offerings" round-mouthed hundred-toothed red-eyed marauding goblins? I can believe that!
Paizo didn't 'junk' the magazines. From what we know, Wizards of the Coast decided to no longer permit Paizo to publish them. Their names, reputations and everything else belong to Wizards, not to Paizo - and I imagine that the license deal was such that it was actually Paizo which got to keep any profits (and which risked any losses). Wizards has its own strategy and it clearly doesn't include print magazines. Therefore, Paizo has to stop producing the magazines. Paizo won't openly blame Wizards - they want to keep opportunities for collaboration in the future - but that's where any vitriol ought to be directed. I imagine Paizo wholeheartedly wanted to carry on producing the magazines, but it's not an option.
I am looking to take advantage of the Pathfinder full subscription. Is it possible to pay for the subscription up front and not month by month? I have to say that given the current weakness of the dollar, this might be something to have a little reconsider over. I'm not sure if I'd want to put down a year's worth, but 6 months might work well, and might give a level of certainty to the thing!
I've not had anything shipped by Paizo to the UK before, but I've decided to subscribe to Pathfinder - it seems as if it'll be a very cool product and I'd like to get in at the start! Could anyone tell me what the practical difference is between the three postage options - particularly as they all cost the same! Are there advantages of Air Mail over Global, or Parcel over Envelope? Thanks - and good luck with this new product - I'm looking forward to it!
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