roguerouge's page

The Arms and Equipment Guide has rules on dragons as mounts/property. Eggs start at 10,000g, minimum, and training is 5,000g, minimum. Unless they're trained from the moment they hatch, dragons are too smart and too willful to be trained as ordinary mounts regardless of your Handle Animal skill; you're into negotiations with another intelligent creature, and in general you're expected to provide your dragon with a horde of at least 1,000g/HD, minimum (even if they're trained from birth, depending on reading). And the DC to train the buggers is crazy-high, to boot; 25+HD, so you're talking an absolute minimum of... like... 28.

OOH! Good stats. Does the Paizo Dragons Revisited have similar stats for this?

Hm. Those figures seem about right. We have a range of 1,500 to 5,000 GP for wyrmlings here, with wild cards being for morality reducing # of buyers, rarity, expense of upbringing, escalating long-term risk and other factors.

Also, I'm not sure how rare white dragon wyrmlings are, as I remember from one source that parents simply leave wyrmlings after birth in the wild to fend for themselves. And it's canonical that Frost Giants use them as pets, rides and guard beasts.

OT: As for campaign-specific factors, it's a single PC game with a precedent of arresting those humanoids she can and reforming a few as well. The PC is 14th level, with the skills necessary to seek out interested buyers. And it's an out for the PC rather than having to laboriously raise/reform a dragon in the campaign's end game or slaughter a baby (dragon).

We're talking 900 GP each if it's by the wyrmlings' CR, and she's already gotten a huge amount of treasure from the parent. But, if it's by the parent, that would be another 5,800 gp, or 1,450 GP/wyrmling.

It's generally not done...mainly because mortal lifetimes are not long enough to raise dragons... raising one is a project on the order of centuries.

Elves and Dwarves have lives that span 2-3 centuries.

Answer as much as the PC's can get for it.

As the DM, it's my job to set the cap for how much they can get for that.

The morality stuff is important, but I've already got the difficult moral questions side of this equation worked out for my campaign. I just need the base value of the dragon.

Exactly.

I'm on record as having said that the magic item shop is among the top ten dumbest ideas in the game. I think all the major reasons have already been presented by other people in this thread.

And this is a -good- thing, in my opinion. I hate it when magic items become just a financial exchange away. Magic items should be rare and noteworthy.

Then you must prefer the 3.5 system of item crafting, where magic item shops didn't make sense on an industrial scale, due to XP costs.

In Paizo's system, it's no different from changing trees into lumber or stone into decorative art works. Stone + time + skill = profit is no different than Gold + time + symbolic stick = magic staff for sale.

Magic item crafting in the Pathfinder system is simply an artisanal system in which the crafter uses gold to make something that may have a higher demand than the amount of gold required to make it.

Owlbear chicks went for 3,000 gp in 3.5e, with a 2,000 gp cost just to have a professional trainer raise them. How much would it be for a white dragon wyrmling?

Note: for these purposes, morality is only important to the precise extent it affects the GP value.

If there are jewelers or a high-end art market, then there's magic shops. The only relevant question is whether there's a luxury item market. If there's enough surplus exploited from labor to warrant demand for luxuries, then there's going to be a place to buy magic items. And if there are jewelers, then the security problems facing magic shop owners have been successfully solved.

Have you read the Belgaraid? There's a wonderful scene where a character makes a persuasive speech about how badly low-level soldiers get screwed by their low wages, then starts dropping money on the field. The soldiers broke ranks and started collecting the gold, then joined the persuasive speaker's army.

So. You should use the money to buy the unstoppable invading army. Then you go loot some other jerk's kingdom.

E6 as a rules system is pretty great for this.

Put me down as someone who LIKES prestige classes and wants to see more of them. I'm not a fan of having a choice between vanilla and chocolate ice cream in a cone. Sometimes, I want sprinkles on cookie dough ice cream in a cup with a waffle cone on the side. If you don't like prestige classes, rule 0 is there for you.

I've never really understood the "Less Choices=More Fun" camp.

This is something I try and cover often -- why did you show up when I managed to one hit the boss? Everything else we did on the way in. I couldn't have handled those giants, the three traps, the horde of orcs, the long climb up pass the wyverns on my own and still have been in any shape to take out the boss with that spell -- the team effort to get here allowed me to provide the team with an easy go this one time.

Their contributions is what made the chance of that spell even being cast happen --

I'm sorry, but for players of non-casters, this is like the Academy awards, where the famous person thanks all their mooks and family members for their efforts in making them famous. Indeed, without their contributions, their famousness would never happen.

There's a reason why QBs get their offensive lineman extremely expensive XMas gifts. The wizard that doesn't follow up their use of the most powerful spells in the game with Haste on the Fighter is just asking for a power-hug from the other side's monk.

The other thing with planar binding is that minted coins are basically worthless to devils and celestials. The only thing of value to them are magic items, favors and souls. If you wrote that in the spell description, its (ab)use would shoot WAY down.

Even though we're regularly fighting enemies who are blind, stunned, or have just slipped to the floor the vast majority of the party is regularly grumbling about my lack of blast spells, and look at me like I'm nuts when I say I'm not taking fireball first when I hit 6th (I think stinking cloud but maybe slow - can't decide).

Slow's a great one, although Haste will have your fellow players seeing the wisdom of your ways.

The bad thing about soccer is that most americans (and I know I'm guilty of this) will only find games between two sub-par teams exciting. We like to see results and dont really care as much about the subtleties that are football.

Tons of Americans play soccer in private leagues or on school teams when they're young. Certainly more Americans have played soccer than have played on a hockey or football team. There's a big problem when you can't interest people who actually have played your sport to watch the sport. And while the ratings for the US-ENG game were great, we still don't watch MLS and I shudder to think what will happen if they don't advance due to this thing.

The draw against world-power England (clearly having a poor Cup) got many Americans paying casual attention.
This, followed by the bad judging at the Slovenia game is making many, many many Americans talking -- vehemently -- about football.

I've heard that argument. I don't think that finding a new reason to hate soccer is good for the sport's future here, though.

roguerouge wrote:

And this is one way our football is better than theirs.

But the thought that one can say our (US) football is "better" than original football -- the biggest thing, let alone sport, on the planet, is ridiculous.

Especially for something like a badly blown call after a game with a handful of questionable calls.

As if we don't have that in our sports.

You're misreading me. I said "one way" American football is better than football, not that it IS better than football. Any sport can have superior aspects to another sport. The idea of refs explaining calls as being superior to soccer policy was something I got from a UK paper around the time of the annual London NFL game.

And it's not the blown call, although that's pretty bad. It's that they don't ever need to explain it. NFL refs call back plays for inadvertent whistles. But they do have to announce that that's what the call was, or if this was one of the random plays they call holding on, etc.

GULGA CENCH.

• It steals income from the artists who create, thus impeding their ability to create more. Why bother spending months of your time creating a game accessory if scumbag jerks are going to rip it off immediately because they're too cheap to pay a nominal fee for legal access?

Actually several independent studies of music downloading haven't found that to be proven.

Researchers at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina tracked music downloads over 17 weeks in 2002, matching data on file transfers with actual market performance of the songs and albums being downloaded. Harvard professor Felix Oberholzer-Gee’s results showed that it took 5,000 downloads for the sale of an album to be reduced by one copy. In addition to this startling discovery came an even bigger one: when it came to popular artists, record sales actually improved from downloading music – sales increased by one copy for every 150 downloads. Even high levels of file-swapping seemed to translate into an effect on album sales that was "statistically indistinguishable from zero," they wrote. (Borland, John. “Music sharing doesn't kill CD sales, study says.” Cnet News. 29 March 2004)

I'll also note that the record industry was making the same dire predictions they made about file sharing as they did in the 1980s about the nefarious evil known as... cassette tapes.

Also, as a teacher of underground media, these file sharing services are often the only place to readily find art based on samples, collage or genuinely subversive media content. Whatever else they do, they're also archives.

This was an awesome post. Paizo really didn't do their homework on this one.

Yeah, didn´t go well today, even if it were only four yellow, not 8. The referee was very stern in his rulings in the beginning, but became more lenient in the 2nd half. I guess he noticed that he went over the top with the yellow/red against Klose. But in the end, the players win or lose a game. The German team did not find its rhythm today.

Five yellows (or 4 + a red). But the basic requirement of umpiring is consistency so that the players know the rules of the game. Call it loose or call it tight, but call it consistently. When you call it tight, then stop giving cards once the Serbs' defenders all have yellows, that's unfair to Germany. And I don't agree about not finding their rhythm: they pressed the Serbs pretty well for playing a man down and with an inconsistent ref.

And this FIFA policy of not explaining calls? Ridiculous. I have so much respect for MLB, NBA and NFL refs right now. At least they explain their calls to the players, managers, and/or fans. Blowing the call is one thing; not manning up and standing behind your call is quite another.

Now American soccer fans know how the Irish feel, I guess.

I don't know, Germany probably has the same complaint after 8 yellow cards were handed to them, which not only made them play a man down and lose, but also affects them during the next game and possibly in the knockout rounds as well, if someone gets a yellow next game.

And then there's this gem, from Donovan on "The Call": “I’m a little gutted to be honest. I don’t know how they stole that last goal from us. I’m not sure what the call was. He (the referee) wouldn’t tell us what the call was.”

US robbed of the winning goal by a horrible offsides call AND the ref not calling multiple fouls. That was just s#&*ty reffing.

And this is one way our football is better than theirs. In the NFL, the refs have to announce what the call actually was. The announcers still didn't know at the end of the game and neither did the coach. I have no idea what they actually called other than no goal.

A beautiful game for both halves, ruined by awful refereeing.

What effect would it have to make wizard spellbooks useable as scrolls?

So... the SCOUT and the RANGER are not guiding the party through the wilderness, but are lagging behind the party by 100'+? There's several problems with that. First, who's guiding them? Someone needs to be making survival checks to make sure that they don't get lost or wander in circles. Second, the two PCs with kick-ass perception scores are ... 100' away? The front group should be getting ambushed on a regular basis then.

Freeport has a great deal of supporting material for a setting, with a fully-detailed city complete with adventure hooks and book of NPCs that's definitely worthwhile. A great short cut is always getting detailed settings established. Just add an airstrip and it's a hive of scum and villainy ready for your campaign. Their modules are a bit limited, but that's okay.

267 gp PER BOLT.

As for your choice, I'd go with the boots, as you can always use speed, with the bonus as gravy.

Don't underestimate the classics: ability boosters, save boosters, AC boosters and wands.

But what's your character's role in the party? Are you the Skill Monkey, and so really need to have top-notch skills? Are you the Face with the charisma necessary for the bard and sorcerer levels?

Off-Topic: And what's with the triple caster multi-class? Are you going for that extremely difficult druid Prestige Class or a Mystic Theurge?

One add for your list:

1. Death Ward. It basically does what Mind Blank does, only 4 levels earlier. It negates a major avenue of attacks and it's a must have as soon as you have access to it.

A few observations on your list.

1. Dominate Person: There's some caveats to note here: casting time 1 round, language dependent, easily detected by a skill check, "and any subject forced to take actions against its nature receives a new saving throw with a +2 bonus." And let's not forget that one of the most common buffs in the game gives the subject a new save as well.

3. I sort of agree with you here. I'd say that there could be an improved version of the spell one level higher that is the current spell, with the new 1st level version gives the bonuses.

5. Feeblemind would fit on the sixth level spell list for that school. The penalty negates some of the fact that it's only useful against those with good Will saves, although the INT penalty might destroy fighters who depend on complex tactics or sneaky rogues. Fifth or fourth level might be right if this was a touch spell, maybe.

6. Nope. Haste is well-slotted as it gets a discount for encouraging teamworks.

7. I could see switching Greater Invisibility with Nightmare, which has seriously limited utility and generally related spells are not on the same level (e.g. Shadow Evocation and Conjuration).

11. Charm Person. This one's huge. it affects encounter design for the DM from the very get-go, at least for me, with my campaign featuring a bard.

12. Color spray is first level, and I think you could drop Magic Mouth or Phantom Trap down to first level to replace it. Of course, if you did, it would mean that there's little of appeal for first level illusionists. {Perhaps that might be solved with moving Blur down to first level, which is a little better than Entropic Shield, but not by that much.]

Adjust your tactics to fit what you have, rather than some theoretical ideal. Thats why its not useful to talk about what role the alchemist fills so much as what useful things he brings to the table.

Lest this develop into a full-fledged thread-jack, we're clearly going to have to agree to disagree on this one. Now, are you going to talk about the Alchemist like the OP asked?

I've been rping for about 5-6 years now. I enjoy it immensely. My girlfriend of several years, who happens to be the most patient and compassionate person I know, recently started attending these sessions with me. I believe she initially just wanted to try to get involved in some of the things I'm passionate about, just as I do for her

I love this girl. I love Pathfinder. If one has to go it's obviously not gonna be my future wife, but I really would like to find a way to get her as passionate about gaming as I am. I realize that some people just don't take to it as well as others, but I believe there's a middle ground here.

Sorry for the long-winded post, I just felt the need to clarify that I'm not looking for tips on how to score some Pathfinder nookie :)

You, sir, are missing a huge opportunity. Do what I do and DM a game JUST FOR YOUR GIRL. She's the only PC. It's together time. You can go at her pace and she can't be a wall flower. You can gear the game exactly to her interests and skill level. And you would not believe the fringe benefits of immersive role play. (In short: you should want to score some Pathfinder nookie! It's your girlfriend!)

If you want help on how to run a 1 PC campaign, start a separate thread and I can share my experiences, as will others.

I believe her point was treat women like any other new gamer and make her feel welcome. That is the most important issue and that shouldn't be a gender issue.

The only true gender issue I can think of is. Don't make it feel like a boys only club. But that goes along with making the new player feel welcome, regardless of gender.

I have to disagree. Gender is an issue.

For those thinking that MMOs are making it easier to attract women to gaming, you might consider how much sexual harassment occurs in MMOs and online communities. After exposure to the "t!t$ or GTFO" meme, would you be eager to sit down in a game store with a bunch of strangers? Basically, that kind of thing makes it hard for the tabletop game to add people outside of word of mouth and knowing the people at the table.

I agree that treating people like intelligent human beings is the solution, but I'm afraid that sexism is the reason why that's not a given at all tables.

Roles do matter, in my experience. And it doesn't harm you for other people to discuss them.

When you're in a Paizo module or AP, it DEFINITELY helps if you have your 4 bases covered. They design them that way. I've played Age of Worms where we somehow ended up with a party with three skill monkeys, a tank, two blasters and a cloistered cleric who didn't turn very well. Basically, all we could do was deal damage. When we did get info about upcoming combats, we didn't have very much that we could do to adjust to that information, especially once we lost the player of the cloistered cleric to a job travel situation.

Home brew is very different, as the DM can tailor the campaign to the particular strengths of the party. But, even in those situations, a party where the four major roles are covered allows for a broader diet of monsters.

The Alchemist definitely strikes me as a 5th wheel type, like the bard, only without the ability to dominate the face part of the game.

I've mostly played in groups with an equal number of both sexes. Professions include: VP, social worker, tech writer, librarian, web/video editor, homemaker, and a couple more who's profession ranks weren't yet allocated. Their game interests have run from plot to RP to combat to keeping an eye on the SO to being an utter cypher. Fan service illustrations have rarely been a motivation or garner much more than an eye-roll, although one's suggested that Valeros is a hottie. Irritation with the lack of mini-options outside the scantily-clad/full plate binary have been mentioned more than once.

Hope that helps.

I recommend dressing your Imp in diapers and giving him a stogie whenever he gives you bad advice.

Spell descriptors do nothing to your PCs alignment. Your characters actions and intentions are what affects it. Alignment has more to do with how you view the world and your attitude than what spells you cast or even what actions you take. Alignment does not directly affect your actions. A lawful paladin could murder an innocent housewife and be in full rights to do so if he has reason to believe it is the "good" or right thing to do. Weather or not they use Detect Evil is another story.

TL:DR He can cast any spell he wishes to, but cause and effect build up over time.

Perhaps in your campaign, but that is a house rule.

Enworld has a wiki for this as well. It's one of the biggest nonaffiliated gamer sites.

Basically, you have two options. 1. Tell your player that supply and demand works in your world and that, with a lot of effort and dealing with competition, he can sell his work at a profit. 2. Tell your player that there is no supply and demand in the Paizo system, essentially because it's too complicated. In short, it depends on how immersive your world is.

Many of your spells are conjuration spells. Furthermore, they work or not based on the saving throw DC.

So, I'd grab spell focus conjuration right away. I'd follow it with a +1 for Imp. Initiative, since that will help you place battlefield control spells, and not have to worry about hitting your guys.

Are you allowed 3.5 feats? If so, Sculpt spell is a no-brainer.

I'm not allowed 3.5 feats, but I do have improved initiative.

The spell focus feat is tempting, but I'd have to take a conjuration spell which allows a save above 2nd level. That would either be cloudkill or stinking cloud. That might be worthwhile.

Harry Potter, modern fantasy, but fantasy no less.

** spoiler omitted **

Of course, I'm trying to block out that section of the book from my memory. Nothing's better than reading about the heroes bickering far from the action, while off-screen amazing events are occurring. For me, your example is a mark against the use of alarm-like spells.

Hm. Cloudkill's much more useful now, isn't it?

Basically, the character's for a one shot module for 11th level characters. I don't plan to use it again after that.

The party's got: Rogue 11, Monk 11, Barbarian 11, Wizard (evoker) 11, Paladin 11, Cleric 11 with sun and glory domains.

I don't anticipate that the party's going to have trouble doing damage. My damage-dealing spells are purely backup spells.

Thus far the advice has been to drop Still spell, Extend Spell, and Silent Spell, with suggestions of Greater Fortitude, Heighten Spell, and Extend Spell. I'm concerned about Extend Spell, as I have so many 1st level spell slots (14, due to splurging on a ring of wizardry 1).

Other items include: boots of elvenkind, belt of dex +2, Headband of charisma +4, cloak of resistance +3, ring of counterspells, efficient quiver, handy haversack, eyes of eagle, boots of elvenkind, hat of disguise, and lots of wands (fully charged: magic missile CL 9, Cure light wounds; half charged: endure elements, unseen servant, enlarge person, darkvision, blindness.)

If you're talking about rods instead of feats, I'd love suggestions on what to drop in my items list.

It's core-only, so I cannot have any 3PP or fan-created feats.

Most importantly: which spell is it?

Also, if you can fly and cast greater invisibility, and they can't, don't worry about anything but an ambush from them.

Possible solutions:

Get bodyguards. These can either be a group of hired mercs or you could take the leadership feat. Charm Monster lasts for one day/level, meaning you can have eight monstrous allies. Planar Allies deter no one, but it might buy you the round you need to prove them right. You've got CHA. Make use of it, dude.

Pick the least hostile PLAYER and get him on your side. Aid him first in combat. Make sure that you craft an item just for him. Help him achieve a goal. Voila. Odds evened. You have CHA, dude: use it.

Figure out a way such that you are invaluable to their plans. You're smarter, wiser, and more charismatic than them.

Pick a good role player in the group. Charm/Dominate and diplomacy his character. Make sure to be a benevolent master that permits the player to get some fun out of this arrangement.

The Keyser Soze Solution. Work with the DM privately through down time to kidnap someone near and dear to these blackguards. Everyone has someone. Now we can all play nice, or else.

Blackmail. You have a great deal of information on these jerks. Set up a plan such that if you die, underlings bring incriminating information to the worst possible people. They now have a strong incentive to protect you, until such time as they break your plan. You should be setting up a network anyways as an evil CHA based character. You have CHA dude: use it.

Perhaps they're right. Wait until they're damaged badly and take over in a surprise round. Make them curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!

Firstly AND lastly, tell the DM that if he doesn't solve this problem, these plans will be put into action. If he's down with that, then go ahead. If not, he's got fair warning that the campaign's just about to implode if he doesn't do something.

I've got a brass draconic bloodline sorcerer 11 that I'm building to play in a core-only module. I'm having trouble with the feats, though. There don't seem to be many for this class.

I'm not happy with what I've taken, which are:

Princess (trait)

Combat Casting (human bonus feat)
Defensive Combat Training
Empower Spell
Eschew Materials (class bonus feat)
Improved Initiative
Silent Spell
Spell Penetration
Still Spell
Toughness (bloodline feat)

Got any suggestions? Anything helps.

If it helps, these are my spells:

LEVEL 1 –Charm Person, Grease, Mage Armor, Magic Missile, Protection vs. Alignment, Shield.

LEVEL 2 – False Life, Glitterdust, Invisibility, Resist Energy, Scorching Ray, Web.

LEVEL 3 – Dispel Magic, Fireball, Fly, Haste, Major Image.

LEVEL 4 – Black Tentacles, Dimension Door, Enervation, Fear.

LEVEL 5 – Spell Resistance, Summon Monster V, Wall of Force.

Does this work provide info on the Test of the Starstone?

It's possible the player didn't recognize what you were doing, thinking that "pull the scrag out" meant that you would do a combat maneuver.

Me too. And congratulations, by the way.

I don't have time to look at it right now, but what about movie Buffy?

It's not a focus, but there is a picture, yes.

I thought people might find interest in this article's analysis comparing various illustrators' representation of Buffy. It's written by a former student of mine, so I'm bursting with pride.

What do you think of it?

[It's a fair cop: I'm the editor.]