Frustrated with Errors with the Bestiary / Core Rulebook


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion


I know people have been finding errors akimbo with the Bestiary, and I cant help but agree with almost everything thats been said.

I still know theyre going to do another run, hopefully with the fixes in it. Still...I shelled out good coin for advanced copies of both the Core Rulebook and the Bestiary, and I hope to god that the Advanced Players Guide and Gamesmastering Guide is going to be largely free from this problem of sorts.

Then theres contradictary rules (for instance,Spellike Abilities seem to be a condtradictory element, see what Pages 221 and 554 say, both say pretty different statements about how they work with regards to Counterspelling and thusly, can they be identified by Spellcraft?)

Then theres seemingly intentional changing of the wording of spells like Entangle which according to the RAW, only now affects opponents in the area and not anyone else - the spell doesnt grant the animated plants any kind of intelligence and the Druid cannot control the plants....then take into account how Black Tentacles sort of goes down this road as well, but throughout it, the terms "foe" and "creature" are interchangeable...that needs a huge clarification.

Now...I am a huge fan of Paizo and I largely love the system, having graduated from old school 2nd Edition Planescapes, to 3.0 and then in time 3.5. I tried my hand at 4E but it was designed for speed and combat heavy...more or less WoW on paper. And then Pathfinder came, I got the BETA playtest and began using it, and my players loved the changes.

While as the GM, I handle in game arguements that erupt, these 'misspelt' entries for spells and other abilities, etc are causing me fresh headaches however, and I find myself going back to the 3.5 wording for much of it.
I hope Paizo wont forget us customers who shelled out good coin to get the hardcovers, I'll be getting the new prints when they're finally released in dead tree form but I cant help but feel a little well...disgruntled.
But still I love the product, and I can work through whatever comes up...I know alot of people have nitpicked (rightly so) on areas of the system that are confusing (the whole trip weapon debate for example over what can and cant be used to trip), I hope the errata will be out soon, before the Gamesmastering Guide and/or Advanced Players Guide, as I feel these 'core foundation' books need to be rock solid before anything else is 'tacked on' afterward on shaky foundations.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

As frustrated as customers might be about errors in books... trust me, they frustrate us more. It's one thing to spend good money on a book that isn't perfect. It's another to produce books that aren't perfect, because if we make TOO many errors, we run the risk of being fired, after all!

So rest assured, we'll do our best to do better.


James Jacobs wrote:

As frustrated as customers might be about errors in books... trust me, they frustrate us more. It's one thing to spend good money on a book that isn't perfect. It's another to produce books that aren't perfect, because if we make TOO many errors, we run the risk of being fired, after all!

So rest assured, we'll do our best to do better.

I appreciate it James, the fact we have designers that listen to us gamers is what sets us miles apart from how things used to be with WoTC, I'm in with Paizo for the long haul, Pathfinder is the game we play when we game at all.

Keep up the good work guys, my faith in Paizo/Pathfinder is unshaken.

Liberty's Edge

Is there errata up yet for the book? I did find a thread with some corrections: ERRATA FOR PRINT BESTIARY. Also, is there an official errata for the Core Rulebook? I did find a thread LIST OF ERRATA IN PATHFINDER CORE RULEBOOK.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

William Ronald wrote:
Is there errata up yet for the book? I did find a thread with some corrections: ERRATA FOR PRINT BESTIARY. Also, is there an official errata for the Core Rulebook? I did find a thread LIST OF ERRATA IN PATHFINDER CORE RULEBOOK.

The first round of errata for the Core Rulebook is online; check your "My Downloads" page for the link. We haven't yet posted the second round of errata for the Core Rulebook or the first round of errata for the Bestiary. Hopefully soon, but I can't give an exact date.

Liberty's Edge

Thanks, James. It is great to get a quick response, which is one of the things I love about Paizo. Also, I appreciate the willingness to admit that there are errors and fix them.


Princess Of Canada wrote:


I know people have been finding errors akimbo with the Bestiary, and I cant help but agree with almost everything thats been said.

I still know theyre going to do another run, hopefully with the fixes in it. Still...I shelled out good coin for advanced copies of both the Core Rulebook and the Bestiary, and I hope to god that the Advanced Players Guide and Gamesmastering Guide is going to be largely free from this problem of sorts.

Then theres contradictary rules (for instance,Spellike Abilities seem to be a condtradictory element, see what Pages 221 and 554 say, both say pretty different statements about how they work with regards to Counterspelling and thusly, can they be identified by Spellcraft?)

Then theres seemingly intentional changing of the wording of spells like Entangle which according to the RAW, only now affects opponents in the area and not anyone else - the spell doesnt grant the animated plants any kind of intelligence and the Druid cannot control the plants....then take into account how Black Tentacles sort of goes down this road as well, but throughout it, the terms "foe" and "creature" are interchangeable...that needs a huge clarification.

Now...I am a huge fan of Paizo and I largely love the system, having graduated from old school 2nd Edition Planescapes, to 3.0 and then in time 3.5. I tried my hand at 4E but it was designed for speed and combat heavy...more or less WoW on paper. And then Pathfinder came, I got the BETA playtest and began using it, and my players loved the changes.

While as the GM, I handle in game arguements that erupt, these 'misspelt' entries for spells and other abilities, etc are causing me fresh headaches however, and I find myself going back to the 3.5 wording for much of it.
I hope Paizo wont forget us customers who shelled out good coin to get the hardcovers, I'll be getting the new prints when they're finally released in dead tree form but I cant help but feel a little well...disgruntled.
But...

Well.. Seeing this book was a lot of copy/paste work the editing should have been better. Yeah there was some original design which was enjoyable but overall ... pretty bad job for $50. Also, whats up with the cheesy peel off cover or whatever that is? Really? Stop printing stuff in China or get a better printer. I like the game but I will not support this if continued.

This must be some kind if ploy to get me to buy a new book because the first edition is of much lower quality than I expected and I personally told my players to wait until things improve before purchasing but use a PDF which sucks but I had a copy.


James Jacobs wrote:


The first round of errata for the Core Rulebook is online; check your "My Downloads" page for the link. We haven't yet posted the second round of errata for the Core Rulebook or the first round of errata for the Bestiary. Hopefully soon, but I can't give an exact date.

For those of us with PDF copies (Save the Treants!), is there a way to tell if our downloaded copies already include the errata? for example, there is a date on my personalized pdf, so what is the date after which the errata has been incorporated?


Easy enough to find out: Look at the Errata changes between 1st and 2nd printing here. If your PDF matches the newest text, you have the '2nd Printing PDF', if it's the old text, you have the '1st Printing PDF'.


Thanks, Q.

Now could someone explain why it takes 1.2 megs to create 2 pages?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Quandary wrote:
Easy enough to find out: Look at the Errata changes between 1st and 2nd printing here. If your PDF matches the newest text, you have the '2nd Printing PDF', if it's the old text, you have the '1st Printing PDF'.

We never released a PDF of the 1st printing, actually. All PDFs of the rules out there contain all of the 2nd printing errata.

The Exchange Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6

My 2 cents:

Errata is one of the few areas that doesn't reflect well on Paizo. I appreciate the aggressive publishing schedule and the frequent board postings quite a bit, but there's no central collection of errata for adventures and sourcebooks (and some of it is pretty meaningful), and the 2 page core rulebook document doesn't address as much as it needs to.

If this were a new-style report card, this is one of the few places I'd mark a "need improvement" rather than a meets or exceeds expectations

I'm hoping to see a turn-around on the errata before the end of the year. In an ideal world, we'll also get a central location for the more significant adventure- and sourcebook-related clarifications and corrections as well. Googling through the boards is a hassle, and also doesn't help when you're running things and realize a keyed location is missing from map or text, whereas a handy printout tucked in the adventure would do nicely.

Any way you slice it, the core rulebook and the Bestiary are great values for Pathfinder GMs. And definitely not unusable.

Thanks for listening if you got this far.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

I'm still listening. And just as frustrated, if not more so, than most on this board about the slow speed at which we're getting our errata out. We'll get there eventually, though.


Though this thread may not exactly reflect it, there are those of us who understand that errata doesn't pay the bills, and getting subscription products out in a timely fashion is what keeps the lights on.

James, thanks for taking the time to pop in and let us know that errata is being squeezed into the schedule somewhere. We all wish it wasn't necessary, but we are glad you are willing to make the effort deal with it instead of ignoring it.


James Jacobs wrote:
I'm still listening. And just as frustrated, if not more so, than most on this board about the slow speed at which we're getting our errata out. We'll get there eventually, though.

James, just in case you're still visiting this thread, here are two things that would make me love Paizo even more than I already do. Both pertain to PDFs.

1. Is there any way to publish PDFs with unlocked bookmarks? Being able to customize bookmarks (without making the PDF easier to pirate) would make me happy, happy, happy.

2. Low rez versions. For those of us without ready access to high bandwidth, being able to download a chapter at a time is great. It would be even greater if the background and images weren't quite so cpu and bandwidth intensive. I'm aware that some readers allow the user to simply turn off images, but doing so makes the pdf very hard to read.

Thanks, and again, Paizo Rocks!


James Jacobs wrote:
I'm still listening. And just as frustrated, if not more so, than most on this board about the slow speed at which we're getting our errata out. We'll get there eventually, though.

JJ, that you ARE listening and, even here, is a great improvement. I'm trying to get my 1040 from the US Govt. and its under 3 weeks till tax-me-to-death day.

Truthfully, no one can be perfect (Well, one was.) and striving to get there is a true mark of the search for excellence. 3.Pf IS the future of D&D. Pazio's dedication to self improvement and even frustration at the inevitable typos is heartening.

Now, a suggestion: A list of retailers that carry the books would be greatly appreciated. I have hit the local Barnes & Nobles without success. Twice. Frustrating. My last group was effectively recruited from people asking questions about what the difference was between 3.5 and 4.0, the others being their hangers on. Ultimately, our hobby boils down to groups of friends, or what pass for such, getting together to play 'pretend' and having local stores where we can bump into each other can only help.

And to quote Mynameisjake, "Paizo Rocks!"

Paizo Employee CEO

Bwang wrote:
Now, a suggestion: A list of retailers that carry the books would be greatly appreciated.

We are working on a retailer locator that will roll out this year. Stay tuned!

-Lisa


Lisa Stevens wrote:
Bwang wrote:
Now, a suggestion: A list of retailers that carry the books would be greatly appreciated.

We are working on a retailer locator that will roll out this year. Stay tuned!

-Lisa

Thank you Lisa, and to James and the Paizo staff, its so very much appreciated we have people who listen to us.

I do understand errata doesnt make money, but I am sure alot of people would trade in their old books at retailers and get the new ones without any arguements flat, or just buy them outright.

My gamers love the product, and IMO, it runs so much better than 3.5 ever did, and makes for more memorable characters and adventures.

Keep up the good work!


Lisa Stevens wrote:
Bwang wrote:
Now, a suggestion: A list of retailers that carry the books would be greatly appreciated.

We are working on a retailer locator that will roll out this year. Stay tuned!

-Lisa

Birmingham Al?

Owner - House of Books and Games LLC

Note that Paizo carries all the books :)

Now if only they carried art portfolios ...

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