Burnt Offerings Clarifications (GM Reference)


Rise of the Runelords

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First question: The players guide has a side note about giant lizards, but unlike the other possible animal companions it does not say what its stats could be. Any clarification?

Second question: One of my players wants to be from riddleport, but pathfinder offers no information about this city, and the players guide only refers to it as a scurvy city full of pirates and cutthroats, also harboring puzzle masters and a "great ring". Can you discuss at all what this "great ring" is and what a puzzle master is?

My player was thinking they are all some sort of puzzling and riddling half-mad pirates!

Paizo Employee Creative Director

NotJeff wrote:

First question: The players guide has a side note about giant lizards, but unlike the other possible animal companions it does not say what its stats could be. Any clarification?

Second question: One of my players wants to be from riddleport, but pathfinder offers no information about this city, and the players guide only refers to it as a scurvy city full of pirates and cutthroats, also harboring puzzle masters and a "great ring". Can you discuss at all what this "great ring" is and what a puzzle master is?

My player was thinking they are all some sort of puzzling and riddling half-mad pirates!

There are giant geckos detailed in Pathfinder 1. These or the monitor lizard from the SRD both work as giant lizard animal companions.

Riddleport gets a little more detail in Pathfinder 3, and may get even more several months down the road. The "great ring" is actually a rune-covered arch that looms over the city harbor entrance.

As for Riddleport itself, there'll probably be less pirates there in the final version we'll eventually get around to printing. Riddles, puzzles, ciphers, and codes are certainly one of the big themes of the city, though, but as for how those themes manifest, we're not really sure quite yet.

Again... we'll eventually get around to detailing a lot more about Riddleport, but that'll be many, many months at the minimum.

Grand Lodge

James Jacobs wrote:
The "great ring" is actually a rune-covered arch that looms over the city harbor entrance.

Whoa, a Stargate! I knew it! :-)

The Exchange RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

rpotor wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
The "great ring" is actually a rune-covered arch that looms over the city harbor entrance.
Whoa, a Stargate! I knew it! :-)

For ships, no less. "Take off! For great justice!"

Hm... perhaps Riddleport was once a "port" used by the Thassilons or whoever to transport people to one of the moons...


Being in Canada, I just received my copy, love it! Good job. Anyway,I was flipping through and found a scale that confused me. On page 33 of Burnt Offerings there is a map showing the Sandpoint Hinterlands. The scale is set in miles and the full length on the page is about 3.5 centimetres (an inch and a three eights). Seemed a bit small so I looked at the amazing players guide, specifically, the map on the inside back cover. This scale is also set in miles but is much larger, making perfect sense. Is the scale on page 33 in Burnt Offerings correct or a minor error, if it is incorrect, can you post the correct scale? Thank you TJ

Paizo Employee Creative Director

rpotor wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
The "great ring" is actually a rune-covered arch that looms over the city harbor entrance.
Whoa, a Stargate! I knew it! :-)

The ring actually does look a fair bit like a stargate. Which pretty much guarentees you that it's not actually a stargate.

I know what it does, in any event. So yeah... not a stargate.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

The scale shown on the hinterlands map is correct, as is the scale on the mpa of Varisia. The region around Sandpoint detailed on page 33 is a VERY small portion of Varisia. You can pretty much walk to any of the locations on the Hinterlands map in a day or less. The width of one of single scale bar on the big Varisia map is 15 miles, about twice as many miles across as the width of the Sandpoint Hinterlands map.

In other words, the black dot that locates Sandpoint on the Player's Guide map of Varisia would pretty much cover the entire map of the hinterlands presented on page 33 of Pathfinder 1 if it were scaled to the same size.


James Jacobs wrote:
I know what it does, in any event. So yeah... not a stargate.

Or . . . it [u]is[/u] a stargate and you're just trying to throw us off . . .

The Exchange RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

William Pall wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
I know what it does, in any event. So yeah... not a stargate.
Or . . . it [u]is[/u] a stargate and you're just trying to throw us off . . .

... Nope, it's not a Stargate.

Spoiler:
It's a [b]Quasar[b]gate.

Scarab Sages RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

According to ATHF - it's a Fargate.

The Exchange RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

Wait a second... we've been going about this the wrong way... we're thinking that it's a gate, but what if it's the gate? Perhaps... The Penultigate?

... G@! d%$n, that one's just been beaten like a dead Light Warhorse.

Silver Crusade

My characters think Aldern Foxglove had something to do with the goblin attack on Sandpoint. Silly players. If they do a gather info what will they find out. Does he visit Sandpoint often? What do the locals think of him?


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brent norton wrote:
My characters think Aldern Foxglove had something to do with the goblin attack on Sandpoint. Silly players. If they do a gather info what will they find out. Does he visit Sandpoint often? What do the locals think of him?

I believe people would say he's just a rich noble from magnimar that comes out to the country to hunt boar and fowl. In my game, they'd say he's an eccentric, silly, and foppish young man from magniamar that has been coming to Sandpoint for many years. Despite his strange demeanor, he loosely tosses money around in an effort to make friends, and his 3 manservants never leave his side. Maybe a higher check would reveal his noble house and where their money comes from? Course, that doesn'y clarify anything for you I guess, I'm just tossing oyu some ideas. The book does say hes a noble from magniamar though. pg 13 says he is a noble. pg 16 says he is going back to his home in magniamar.

Sovereign Court

I was wondering what the exact date of the Sandpoint fire was? All I could gather from Pathfinder #1 was that it happened in winter one month after Chopper's killing spree.

The Exchange

Being asked by one of my players, I'd like to know if barbarian chew (RotRLPG pg.10) is intended to be a one-use item? If it is, aren't 15 gp per portion a bit too much? And if not, what would be a reasonable amount of applications to be contained in such a little box?

As you might guess from this question, I have absolutely no experience with chewing tobacco. :)

edit: hm, now I'm wondering myself why I asked this question in this thread?


Is the Goblin Dog's jump modifier really +14? Do they have a racial bonus of +8 that was omitted from the skill section?


Nualia's Artwork

Paizo Employee Creative Director

WormysQueue wrote:

Being asked by one of my players, I'd like to know if barbarian chew (RotRLPG pg.10) is intended to be a one-use item? If it is, aren't 15 gp per portion a bit too much? And if not, what would be a reasonable amount of applications to be contained in such a little box?

As you might guess from this question, I have absolutely no experience with chewing tobacco. :)

edit: hm, now I'm wondering myself why I asked this question in this thread?

It is indeed a one-use item. It's an expensive habit, and not one 1st level barbarians should pick up. For tough-guy high level barbarians, thoguh, have at it!

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Syzygy wrote:

Is the Goblin Dog's jump modifier really +14? Do they have a racial bonus of +8 that was omitted from the skill section?

Yup; it really is +14. It breaks down like this:

Ranks: 4
Strength Mod: +2
Speed of 50: +8

TOTAL: +14

It's the speed modifier that sneaks in there. You get a +4 bonus on Jump checks for every 10 feet faster than 30 your speed is. For every 10 feet slower than 30, you get a –6 penalty.

Dark Archive

Another foolish question, The spells Lyrie has under Spells Known, are these her prepared spells? Are they also in the spellbook? The two lists are different so I presume that they are prepared and also in the spellbook.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

PandaGaki wrote:
Another foolish question, The spells Lyrie has under Spells Known, are these her prepared spells? Are they also in the spellbook? The two lists are different so I presume that they are prepared and also in the spellbook.

Those spells SHOULD be listed as "spells prepared." When an NPC has a spellbook, we don't repeat spells she has prepared in the list of spells in the spellbook; that's just a waste of space. So yeah, the spells she has to cast on PCs are indeed also in her spellbook.

Dark Archive

Ah, then I think you need to talk to the ones doing the layouts, all casters (even Barl Breakbones) list spells known in their offense section instead of spells prepared.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Sect wrote:

Wait a second... we've been going about this the wrong way... we're thinking that it's a gate, but what if it's the gate? Perhaps... The Penultigate?

... g@~ d@~n, that one's just been beaten like a dead Light Warhorse.

It's in a harbor, I think it's quite obvious that it's a Watergate...

[Not to animate the warhorse...]

Paizo Employee Creative Director

PandaGaki wrote:
Ah, then I think you need to talk to the ones doing the layouts, all casters (even Barl Breakbones) list spells known in their offense section instead of spells prepared.

That's not a layout issue, alas. That's an editing error. Not one that'll really impact game play, at least, but an editing error anyway.


I may just be missing it, but in Erylium's chamber with the Runewell, there are two side doors marked "A" and "B" but I don't see any reference in the description to what's in them. Any idea? My players have now spent a lot of time in this room :)

Scarab Sages

1) Empty : Everything in them has either crumbled to dust after many many years or was taken away long ago.

2) Very old, unusable and weird mundane religious/magical supplies.

3) Same as 2 but mundane religious/magical ceremonial vestments.

4) Old and weird sacrifical remains. (See B8 A/B/C.)

5) Remains of ancient important people for a very distant past.

6) Monster(s) (As in, one of the usual monsters of the complex could be hiding to later jump on the PCs and surprise them. Especialy good if you need to boost CR for extra PCs over the usual 4.)

7) Treasure (especialy if you have more than 4 players, this could be a very good place to give them extra treasure.)

8) Your favorite idea!


Questions/fishing for suggestions about 2 things:

1)Nualia - for some reason I am unhappy with her recieving a vision about Malfeshnekor for 2 reasons: 1- Seems like Lamashtu would have bigger fish to fry than to worry about Nualia/Mal. 2- Since Malfeshnekor is so insane with rage & hunger, and has been imprisoned thousands of years, it seems like, again, Lamashtu has no need for him. This begs the question why the vision.

I know this is mostly just minor backstory stuff for the DM, but I can be a wee bit overhyped about this stuff I guess. Long story short -- I was thinking about putting a library in the Catacombs of Wrath that hints at Malfeshnekor and his allegiance to Lamashtu; Nualia believes he is the key to gaining her favor and goes off to do so. Anyone else add any extra rooms to the Catacombs, or something similar?

2)Darn it, I forgot!

Hope this is the best place for this. Thanks

Dark Archive

James Jacobs wrote:
Russ Taylor wrote:
I'm unclear on why the sinspawn would have left blood on the rim of the pool in area B4. Any guidance? It doesn't seem like they've been preying on anything, and they don't seem to ooze blood.
Erylium's been doing that to create sinspawn, actually. The blood spatters are left over from her last batch she cooked up.

OK I am having an issue with this part. If someone posted the answer please point me in the right direction!!!

How does she do enough damage to herself to cause her own blood spill if she has DR 5/cold iron OR good?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

DmRrostarr wrote:
How does she do enough damage to herself to cause her own blood spill if she has DR 5/cold iron OR good?

By aiming real hard.

Dark Archive

James Jacobs wrote:
DmRrostarr wrote:
How does she do enough damage to herself to cause her own blood spill if she has DR 5/cold iron OR good?
By aiming real hard.

Uh huh thanks James...not buying it. :)

Never seen anyone coup de grace themselves, but if its allowed only her bite would have a possible chance of doing it (d4-1 x2 for a possible 6 points of damage minus 5 for DR equals 1 dmg.)

Dark Archive

Because maybe, DR works the same as SR, the creature itself can lower it if it wants.

Though I'd give money to have the ability not hurt myself by mistake :)


DmRrostarr wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
DmRrostarr wrote:
How does she do enough damage to herself to cause her own blood spill if she has DR 5/cold iron OR good?
By aiming real hard.

Uh huh thanks James...not buying it. :)

Never seen anyone coup de grace themselves, but if its allowed only her bite would have a possible chance of doing it (d4-1 x2 for a possible 6 points of damage minus 5 for DR equals 1 dmg.)

Lol. Her grand scheme to conquer the world has been undone by an inability to hurt herself. Thats classic.

Verdant Wheel

She can bite herself, if she has a damage resistence, her natural attacks can hit the same type.


The Last Rogue wrote:
This begs the question why the vision.

This is totally my thought but perhaps Lamashtu was waiting for the chess pieces to move into place. Set up, runewell activates, payoff.

Sovereign Court RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8

My party's still digesting the journal this week. Though I did print some of Lilith's work on Save vs. DM's journal. Didn't have time to staple it together though. At least one player failed his save vs boobies and didn't read the journal so much.

Greg, your letters were a big hit. Our puzzle person dove into the kanji, but everyone else was relieved when I handed out the translation. Having your handouts in one font while having the journal in another added to the 'feel' of it.


Draco Bahamut wrote:
She can bite herself, if she has a damage resistence, her natural attacks can hit the same type.

This is true only for DR/magic or DR/epic, not DR/alignment or DR/material.

I will make Erylium's tiny dagger cold iron.

I had a question about Erylium.

How is the party going to be able to make a Sense Motive check at Erylium's worry when the pool's glow dims? Unless it is a stealthy party, Erylium will probably be invisible when she spills her blood into the pool because that is her first action.

Dark Archive

PJSlavner wrote:
Draco Bahamut wrote:
She can bite herself, if she has a damage resistence, her natural attacks can hit the same type.

This is true only for DR/magic or DR/epic, not DR/alignment or DR/material.

I will make Erylium's tiny dagger cold iron.

I had a question about Erylium.

How is the party going to be able to make a Sense Motive check at Erylium's worry when the pool's glow dims? Unless it is a stealthy party, Erylium will probably be invisible when she spills her blood into the pool because that is her first action.

Because if she attacks herself, does she become visible??? LOL :)


LOL :)

On second thought, I will not make Erylium's dagger cold iron. Damage Reduction can be interpreted as a wound that heals instantly, so Erylium could cut herself, bleed a few drops into the pool, and not be harmed.


I like the tiny cold iron dagger idea quite a bit. I'm not sure about the idea of instant heal DR. That starts sounding like the DM is abusing the rules to get the desired outcome.

Scarab Sages

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Well, everybody bleeds a couple drops all the time (small cuts, etc), and you wouldn't consider that -1 HP, would you? I mean, don't tell me that wizards get a long beard because shaving (and getting one or 2 small cuts in the process) is too much of a risk because it could render them unconcious and they could bleed to death if no one is nearby to stabilizes them?

I like to see DR as a requirement to permanently break the link between cells of the body of a creature (something like in real life physics, where you need some energy to break the link between particles, just replace energy with a given special material or magic). Much like you could strike at water with any weapon, but the water would close in as soon as the weapon is off the water. Weapons don't bounce off the creature. They apparently do the damage for a split second, but it's back to normal right after the weapon gets off the wound, as cells of flesh, muscle, blood vessels and bone would link back together instantly, as if nothing split them. As for blood, I could easily see that some would still coat the weapon that was used to do the strike, just too little to make that an important blood loss for the creature. The few drops of blood on the blade can then be droped in the runewell...

Verdant Wheel

Djoc wrote:


I like to see DR as a requirement to permanently break the link between cells of the body of a creature (something like in real life physics, where you need some energy to break the link between particles, just replace energy with a given special material or magic). Much like you could strike at water with any weapon, but the water would close in as soon as the weapon is off the water. Weapons don't bounce off the creature. They apparently do the damage for a split second, but it's back to normal right after the weapon gets off the wound, as cells of flesh, muscle, blood vessels and bone would link back together instantly, as if nothing split them. As for blood, I could easily see that some would still coat the weapon that was used to do the strike, just too little to make that an important blood loss for the creature. The few drops of blood on the blade can then be droped in the runewell...

If you hit the water strong enough, it don´t get permanent little bits of damage. But if you hurl water into other person, she won´t get hurt, but if you hurl water really strong (water cannon kind of strong) she ´ll get hurt (but not as hurt as a ... sugar golem would be hurt by the same attack).

Scarab Sages

Draco Bahamut wrote:
If you hit the water strong enough, it don´t get permanent little bits of damage. But if you hurl water into other person, she won´t get hurt, but if you hurl water really strong (water cannon kind of strong) she ´ll get hurt (but not as hurt as a ... sugar golem would be hurt by the same attack).

I'm not sure what your point is. I took water as an exemple of how the flesh of the monster would react after a sword/spear would be slashed in a big enough pool of water. The water lets the sword in (and maybe a few drops of water are scatered as well on the initial blow), but immediatly closes around the weapon, and when the weapon is taken away, no hole is left in the water, but a few drops of water would still fall off the weapon.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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I guess my problem here is that the rules are getting in the way of the story. In any event, the runewell only requires a few drops of blood to activate... it doesn't require the donated blood to be from a damaging wound. A pinprick would suffice. I've got no problems that Erylium can damage herself enough to shed a few drops of blood... it wouldn't do any damage (any more than a PC doing the same to himself would).

If that's still not good enough, just give her a cold iron dagger. Or maybe add a few rats into the room for her to squeeze into the pool.


I agree, I don't think that DR should make it impossible to get a few drops of blood without getting past the DR. That's kind of silly, it implies that to just break the skin of something with low hp you have to come close to killing it.

I know there are various examples in the game that imply 1 hp is the minimum to draw any blood. If you look at the Blood Magus in Complete Arcane, they can scratch themselves and draw blood to power spells. It does 1 hp of damage, but it also says that DR doesn't apply.

However, if you insist on being silly, you could always require her to continue biting herself unitl she gets a critical and rolls enough damage to get past her own DR.

It would make for a strange scene for the PCs to watch.

Round 1: Chomp - Visible - "damn, a 17"
Round 2: Go Invisible
Round 3: Rinse, repeat until you get a 20

Could take a Loooong time. Kind of spoils the mood...

Verdant Wheel

Maybe she has a cold iron needle tucked in her dress.

(My point was, hitting water couldnt be like hitting damage resistence, because damage resistence has a limit when a strong enought strike can damage it, but there aren´t a swordstrike stronge enought to damage water.)


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LOL! Hit points are an abstraction--I've seen them described as fatigue, luck, narrow misses as well as actual wounds. She can definitely give herself a good scratch that has no effect on her ability to fight.

I've often thought that hit points are poorly named. A "hit" can be anything from a near miss, a blocked blow that wears down the character, a glancing blow, a solid bruise--all the way up to being run-through with a sword!

Next time you're watching boxing or ultimate fighting, keep in mind that all those blocked kicks and punches that don't rock the fighter are sucking up his hit points... right up until the one that takes him to zero and knocks him out!

p.s. You can't attack yourself! Otherwise we get into even weirder territory like "can you be flat-footed when you attack yourself?" Gah!


I am reading over the first episode again (not running until I convert to 4e).

I too wondered about how Erylium could harm herself, but like you have done above I came up with ways around it.

What I could NOT explain is how in the hells (all nine of them)did those ragged goblins of Thistletop get a heavy warhorse through their lair of 4ft briar tunnels and over a rickety bridge (that cannot accept more than the large creature that the horse is at one time). I had trouble believing the 'they tied its feet together and put it in the merchant's wagon' part (I am sure it would take a LOT of goblins to do this and still cannot picture the logistics of the whole movement), but then became totally lost with the idea of it being on the island...

Where is the wagon now? (I assume burnt or pulle to bits for timber...that part was easier).

My idea was immediately to change the merchants to halflings with minature ponies. ;) Only way I can see it unless the goblins used magic to get a hostile 'monster' into their midst...???

Ideas (real ones ;)) welcome. Mr James jacobs if you will :)

Cheers, C


Connors wrote:
What I could NOT explain is how in the hells (all nine of them)did those ragged goblins of Thistletop get a heavy warhorse through their lair of 4ft briar tunnels and over a rickety bridge (that cannot accept more than the large creature that the horse is at one time). I had trouble believing the 'they tied its feet together and put it in the merchant's wagon' part (I am sure it would take a LOT of goblins to do this and still cannot picture the logistics of the whole movement), but then became totally lost with the idea of it being on the island...

I can adequatly explain the part about the rope bridge. In the text about the rope bridge, it states that there is a series of knotted ropes that can be tied so that the bridge can support four times the weight.

As far as the tunnels, maybe the goblins took the horse along the cliff edge, avoiding the tunnels altogether. Looking at the map, it appears that the brambles do not grow up to the edge of the cliff.


Thanks for that...but I am sure from descriptions that bushes do go to the edge.

I am still having trouble with the whole incident, starting with goblins lifting it onto the wagon? I still cannot see them carrying it across the bridge. I assume they 'herded' it over.

Sovereign Court

If the horse is used to humans, it could have been led over by one of the longshanks currently residing at Thistletop. Also, the druid could have made a major contribution to calming it down.

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