Is Pathfinder a Renaissance Game?


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


AD&D was very much a game based in the middle ages. The most common weapons & armor where chain mail, longsword (with the occasional bastard sword) and shield. Yes heavier armor's where in the game, but full or field plate was a rarity.

It seems Pathfinder tends more towards Breatplates (+1 AC on armors), no shield and lots of crossbows (though lots of crossbows was also a 3.x thing). There's also more folks running around in plate (though that could have more to do with failure to enforce encumbrance rules among 3.x GMs or take them into account when posting on forums). I wonder if the common vision of Pathfinder (and 3.5) hasn't become more renaissance the medieval.


The thing is, the common vision people have of the middle ages is people in plate armor. Granted that was coming around at the end of the period but that's how most view it. (as were crossbows, common in the 13-1400's)

And concerning encumbrance, have you read the strength encumbrance rules? I can't speak for second edition, but in 3rd and Pathfinder the characters apt to use plate armor are going to have so much encumbrance capacity that a suit of armor's 40ish pounds (speaking from a realistic knowledge rather than looking up the table, fullplate may way more in game) isn't going to be that big a deal to them.


I've been using it for a Steampunk esk game. I think it works well in almost any setting.


The Forgotten wrote:

AD&D was very much a game based in the middle ages. The most common weapons & armor where chain mail, longsword (with the occasional bastard sword) and shield. Yes heavier armor's where in the game, but full or field plate was a rarity.

It seems Pathfinder tends more towards Breatplates (+1 AC on armors), no shield and lots of crossbows (though lots of crossbows was also a 3.x thing). There's also more folks running around in plate (though that could have more to do with failure to enforce encumbrance rules among 3.x GMs or take them into account when posting on forums). I wonder if the common vision of Pathfinder (and 3.5) hasn't become more renaissance the medieval.

Its a fantasy game. Its somewhere in between...like alot of fantasy books. Some of the armor and weapons are very much renaissance era, but the general tech level and living conditions and general attitude are very much medival, with some exceptions. I would suppose you can chalk it up to the fact that just because history went one way on earth, doesn't mena we can apply the same logic to another world...who know...one day we may meet some aliens who never developed black-powder weapons because they figured out the tech to make energy weapons when bows and crossbows were the hi-tech ranged weapons of the time.


If you get a chance to see the timeline in the campaign setting, it goes back thousands of years, starting from the Starstone's impact on Golarion. There are also civilizations that existed for centuries or millenia, prior to the Starstone's arrival. In short, what I am trying to say is that civilization has existed on Golarion for a long time and I think that a lot of different technologies can fit into a campaign.

I don't know precisely what the Paizo staff had in mind, but my own interpretation of Golarion, is that it is a present day alternate earth, where science never developed the way it did for the earth we know, becase magic is easier.


Gunpowder was introduced into the Inner Sea before Irori became a god, thousands of years ago, but nobody really uses it (wizards are better artillery). The timeline is wonky.

But it's diverse enough that you can make it any kind of game you want. I'm planning on running Absalom as a Conanesque Lankhmar-like city on the way to Osirion. Everyone will use short swords, not rapiers, and shipping is in dhows, not galleons.

It's your game.


It's an Age of Lost Omens game.

As others have said, you cannot really look too closely at a game whose game world(s) usually have humanoids that are older than many civilisations on Earth, a world where magic is very real, as are fantastic monsters like dragons.

And it gets better: It's a fact that few people know or care what the different ages of earth's past really were like. So actually there were no valorous knights in full plates and crossbows fighting pirates who shot them with cannons?

In the end, it's all about fun and letting your imagination run wild. Historical accuracy is an extra at best.

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