A question about alignments of settlements and nations:
The Gamemastery Guide says the majority of a settlement's citizens ought to be within one step of the settlement's alignment. On the messageboards, however, I'm fairly certain I've seen it said several times that, just because a nation is, say, Lawful Evil, that doesn't mean that the people unfortunate enough to live in it are evil; rather, it's the alignment of the government. The argument is that everyday Chelaxians aren't evil, but oppressed by evil authorities. So which is it? Or do the alignment of a settlement and that of a whole kingdom follow different rules? What happens when the citizens of a settlement and/or kingdom and the rulers/authorities have opposed alignments? Which one "counts"?
I have a question about the feat Tiger Claw. I'm a bit confused with the wording.
When it mentions Power Attack, it says :
Benefit: While you are using the Tiger Style feat and have both hands free, you can use a full-round action to make a single unarmed strike with both hands. Use your highest base attack bonus, rolling unarmed strike damage for each hand separately and multiplying both if you score a critical hit. If you use Power Attack in conjunction with this attack, can add half your Strength bonus to one of the damage rolls. If you hit, you can attempt a bull rush maneuver with a +2 bonus on the combat maneuver check. This bull rush attempt provokes no attack of opportunity from your opponent, but you cannot move with that opponent if your bull rush is successful.
The Power Attack section confuses me a bit. Do I add the power attack bonus damage or the half strength bonus to my damage? Or, do I add both?
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Ugh... while we tried our best to make sure the Summon Monster lists were accurate, there is obviously some errors.
Errata is:
Change Giant Lizard to Monitor Lizard. (The lists don't support summoning a giant frilled lizard, but you could probably add them to summon monster V or summon nature's ally V.)
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Change Ant, soldier to Ant, giant.
The majority of these errors, I suspect, came from miscommunication between what was and wasn't changing with these animals in the switchover between the 3.5 Monster Manual and the Pathfinder Bestiary.
A few other notes:
The Giant Frilled Lizard is so much tougher than a bison or an ape because it's something that probably would HUNT bisons or apes. It'd be best to compare the giant frilled lizard ecologically wise to a tiger or bear; it's a top-tier predator.
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Hello James, I was preparing the sheets for for the creatures called by Summoning III and noticed that these two entries are still unchanged in the 5th edition. I have FAQed your old (2009) post, but maybe you could remember this to the appropriate person.
(I know it is not your job, but I am not sure FAQing a 2009 post will do much)|
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A poison question:
when you are affected by multiple doses of the same poison 8so the poison DC and duration are increased) and someone cast Neutralize poison on you, the DC of the caster level check is the cumulative, modified, DC of the poison?
I think so, but it can be hard to overcome even some relatively low strength poison if you rely on potions, scrolls and wands to cure them.
Creative Director
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Does a rakshasa-spawn tiefling with low-Wis, low-Int, stupidly-high Charisma, max ranks in Perform (Dance) and an entire bag of holding dedicated just to clothes sound like a good idea, or have I been watching too much Red Dwarf?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_CfNsK1Sro
I've never seen Red Dwarf, but I've learned enough about it that I know I'd probably not enjoy it all that much...
Sounds like that character could use a hurdy gurdy too, though.
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Creative Director
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A question about alignments of settlements and nations:
The Gamemastery Guide says the majority of a settlement's citizens ought to be within one step of the settlement's alignment. On the messageboards, however, I'm fairly certain I've seen it said several times that, just because a nation is, say, Lawful Evil, that doesn't mean that the people unfortunate enough to live in it are evil; rather, it's the alignment of the government. The argument is that everyday Chelaxians aren't evil, but oppressed by evil authorities. So which is it? Or do the alignment of a settlement and that of a whole kingdom follow different rules? What happens when the citizens of a settlement and/or kingdom and the rulers/authorities have opposed alignments? Which one "counts"?
The GameMastery Guide provides standard advice. It's fine to break the "rules" of that advice when you want, but don't do it too much... Cheliax is one of about 40 regions in the Inner Sea region... but that said, even IT doesn't break that advice that much, since the majority of Cheliax is lawful neutral.
When the citizens of a settlement or kingdom and the rulers are super opposed... the one that counts is the ruler's alignment. And that generally leads to countries in revolt or revolution...
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Creative Director
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A half orc with Toothy alternate racial feature and Razortusk feat gets two bite attacks.
Do they 'stack', can you use both on a Full-Attack action?
Unless you're a freaky mutant with two separate mouths... no, they don't stack. Take the better one and use the other racial feature/feat for something else.
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Creative Director
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I have a question about the feat Tiger Claw. I'm a bit confused with the wording.
When it mentions Power Attack, it says :
Benefit: While you are using the Tiger Style feat and have both hands free, you can use a full-round action to make a single unarmed strike with both hands. Use your highest base attack bonus, rolling unarmed strike damage for each hand separately and multiplying both if you score a critical hit. If you use Power Attack in conjunction with this attack, can add half your Strength bonus to one of the damage rolls. If you hit, you can attempt a bull rush maneuver with a +2 bonus on the combat maneuver check. This bull rush attempt provokes no attack of opportunity from your opponent, but you cannot move with that opponent if your bull rush is successful.
The Power Attack section confuses me a bit. Do I add the power attack bonus damage or the half strength bonus to my damage? Or, do I add both?
This feat allows you to sort of supercharge Power Attack, adding half your Str bonus on top of the normal damage you get from Power Attack for that one attack. At least, that's how I interpret the feat, which is indeed kinda awkwardly worded...
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Creative Director
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Ugh... while we tried our best to make sure the Summon Monster lists were accurate, there is obviously some errors.
Errata is:
Change Giant Lizard to Monitor Lizard. (The lists don't support summoning a giant frilled lizard, but you could probably add them to summon monster V or summon nature's ally V.)
...
Change Ant, soldier to Ant, giant.
The majority of these errors, I suspect, came from miscommunication between what was and wasn't changing with these animals in the switchover between the 3.5 Monster Manual and the Pathfinder Bestiary.
A few other notes:
The Giant Frilled Lizard is so much tougher than a bison or an ape because it's something that probably would HUNT bisons or apes. It'd be best to compare the giant frilled lizard ecologically wise to a tiger or bear; it's a top-tier predator.
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Hello James, I was preparing the sheets for for the creatures called by Summoning III and noticed that these two entries are still unchanged in the 5th edition. I have FAQed your old (2009) post, but maybe you could remember this to the appropriate person.
(I know it is not your job, but I am not sure FAQing a 2009 post will do much)
I would repost that to a new thread on the rules forum then and re-hit the FAQ button. I'm pretty sure that one slipped by multiple times. I'll try to re-send that bit of errata to the design team as well, but it absolutely can not hurt to have multiple fronts!
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Creative Director
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A poison question:
when you are affected by multiple doses of the same poison 8so the poison DC and duration are increased) and someone cast Neutralize poison on you, the DC of the caster level check is the cumulative, modified, DC of the poison?I think so, but it can be hard to overcome even some relatively low strength poison if you rely on potions, scrolls and wands to cure them.
Yes.
Poison is supposed to be scary.
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Creative Director
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How about In giants revisited?
Probably not.
Lini and Lem are hard to use in illustrations because of scale. It's REALLY easy for an artist to mess up the fact that they're half sized, and that tends to make the rest of an illustration look weirdly oversized if we don't put other things in to establish scale. Since the same goes for illustrating giants... well, that's like two strikes there.
But we'll see.
How about In giants revisited?Probably not.
Lini and Lem are hard to use in illustrations because of scale. It's REALLY easy for an artist to mess up the fact that they're half sized, and that tends to make the rest of an illustration look weirdly oversized if we don't put other things in to establish scale. Since the same goes for illustrating giants... well, that's like two strikes there.
But we'll see.
I can imagine Lini wouldn't be too bad since you could have her with her tiger to approximate a scale. And I suppose Lem would have to share the art spotlight with a medium iconic.
Any chance you could post your own house rules somewhere?
James,
How did it come to be that the hex map of the stolen lands is set 15 degrees clockwise to true north?
Any chance you could post your own house rules somewhere?
I believe PF is his house rules.
James,
How did it come to be that the hex map of the stolen lands is set 15 degrees clockwise to true north?
When you die in the game, you die in real life.
He keeps a loaded pistol on his lap for every game.
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There are fiddles. No guitars.So, I was looking through the Wondrous item lists for String Instruments and I noticed something, There's a Harp of charming, A lyre of building, there's even a Harp of Storms, but there's no Fiddle. So here's my question:
Are there Fiddles in Golarion? Relatedly, are there Guitars?
That strikes me as arbitrary. Is there a reason to keep guitars out of it? Golarion seems to have every other instrument invented before 1900, give or take. I know real-world chronology doesn't dictate what makes it into Golarion, but I'm curious to know if there is a particular reason you wouldn't want that one instrument to be present.
(It doesn't particularly bother me, and I had never really thought of it before; I'm really just curious about your take as a designer on that question.)
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Creative Director
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There are fiddles. No guitars.So, I was looking through the Wondrous item lists for String Instruments and I noticed something, There's a Harp of charming, A lyre of building, there's even a Harp of Storms, but there's no Fiddle. So here's my question:
Are there Fiddles in Golarion? Relatedly, are there Guitars?
That strikes me as arbitrary. Is there a reason to keep guitars out of it? Golarion seems to have every other instrument invented before 1900, give or take. I know real-world chronology doesn't dictate what makes it into Golarion, but I'm curious to know if there is a particular reason you wouldn't want that one instrument to be present.
(It doesn't particularly bother me, and I had never really thought of it before; I'm really just curious about your take as a designer on that question.)
To a certain extent it IS arbitrary. Part of my job is to make arbitrary decisions about the creative direction of Golarion, as a matter of fact.
But there's another reason. In modern society, guitars are very associated with modern music. Fiddles are more associated with more traditional music. As a result, guitars feel out of place in a fantasy setting.
One of the ways we've defined Golarion is by determining what ISN'T in the setting. For example, something like steampunk elements or commonplace airships or dragons that often mix with humanity in human form would fit in well into a fantasy setting like Golarion... but we've decided that those elements are NOT really in Golarion.
Choosing what isn't in a world helps define it as much as what is in the world. And to me, the guitar feels too modern, and thus it doesn't get a prominent place in the world—instead, there are lutes and violins and fiddles and samisens and other guitar-like instruments.
Does that mean you'll NEVER see a guitar in a Golarion product? No, absolutely not. Partially because some day someone might convince me otherwise with excellent writing... but also perhaps because a guitar might slip by in a product I don't a significant bit of direct input on.
We've also had airship elements and steampunk elements and dragons posing as humans in Golarion. In some cases, those are specific choices we made for story reasons to go against the norm in Golraion. In others, they snuck in under the radar.
Anyway... kind of a rambling response. Hope the answer you were looking for is in there somewhere! :)
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Hey James, I have a question that's caused quite a bit of contention at my local game store.
Does the Urban Barbarian's Controlled Rage replace the regular rage ability? There's one little word in the text that throws a wrinkle in the whole thing.
"When an urban barbarian rages, instead of making a normal rage she may apply a +4 morale bonus to her Strength, Dexterity, or Constitution."
Emphasis mine. Some players feel that the Urban Barb is allowed both rages, but I feel that the usage of the word, "may", is used to denote that you are allowed a choice of which physical stat you'd like to apply the rage bonus to.
As in, the word "may" is granting permission in that one ability, not granting access to two different ones. I hope that makes sense.
Dear Mr. Jacobs T-Rex Jesus...how goes dwarven courtship rituals? And how dwarves feel about interracial dating? And how female dwarves go about it.
Also--she-dwarves do NOT grow beards.They rock sideburns!
Since we're on the subject of steampunk and advancing technology....
Do you have any recommendations for a storyteller who wants to "age up" Golarion to a higher tech level? What nations, races, etc. would pick it up more swiftly, and which would be more resistant? What are the chances of Luddite-style resistance, on any scale, and from whom?
And perhaps, how would magic interact with such advanced technology? Is there potential for combining the two (a la Imperial Magitek) or would technology beyond a certain point be adversely affected by magic (a la Dresden Files)? The presence and mechanics of the Artificer class heavily suggest the former, but it is 3rd-party.
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They say they work like a cleric's channel, but they are a bit more limited. I like to be sure.Can pcs with the Aquatic or Swamp Domain, or any other channel granting domain, take the Channel Smite feat?Why shouldn't they?
Well, actually, a developer comment is sure to quiet my very vocal fellow player, who disagrees even after it was given the okay by my DM.
Does the advent of 5th edition DnD cause you any concerns about the future of Pathfinder?
Since we're on the subject of steampunk and advancing technology....
Do you have any recommendations for a storyteller who wants to "age up" Golarion to a higher tech level? What nations, races, etc. would pick it up more swiftly, and which would be more resistant? What are the chances of Luddite-style resistance, on any scale, and from whom?
I find that to be a fascinating question. It would say so much about the various nations. I imagine that Taldor would be heavily resistant, while Alkenstar would boom. Numeria also seems like they'd, oddly enough, be resistant to it, as it would weaken the grip of the Technic League if others had more advanced technology and magic. Get Sutter to write a What If please!
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nDo you allow druids to use other abilities animals get not listed in wild shape (hippo's sweat, giant toad's swallow whole, rhino's powerful charge)? Seems like a lot of cool animals will never see wildshape use because the cool abilities they dont get because of beast shape restrictions. Those animals cant compete with dire tiger cuz of it.
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Creative Director
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Hey James, I have a question that's caused quite a bit of contention at my local game store.
Does the Urban Barbarian's Controlled Rage replace the regular rage ability? There's one little word in the text that throws a wrinkle in the whole thing.
"When an urban barbarian rages, instead of making a normal rage she may apply a +4 morale bonus to her Strength, Dexterity, or Constitution."
Emphasis mine. Some players feel that the Urban Barb is allowed both rages, but I feel that the usage of the word, "may", is used to denote that you are allowed a choice of which physical stat you'd like to apply the rage bonus to.
As in, the word "may" is granting permission in that one ability, not granting access to two different ones. I hope that makes sense.
It does indeed replace normal rage. An urban barbarian doesn't get to apply a bonus to both Str and Con. He instead gets only one +4 bonus, but has the advantage of being able to choose Dex if he wants or of being able to split the bonus up how he wants.
If you're an urban barbarian, you can't rage like the normal barbarian. Because Controlled Rage IS your rage. It doesn't make sense that you'd be able to do a normal (uncontrolled) rage when you're playing an archetype that is all about controlling the rage.
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Creative Director
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| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
They say they work like a cleric's channel, but they are a bit more limited. I like to be sure.Can pcs with the Aquatic or Swamp Domain, or any other channel granting domain, take the Channel Smite feat?Why shouldn't they?
Then yes, you can take Channel Smite with them.
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Creative Director
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Since we're on the subject of steampunk and advancing technology....
Do you have any recommendations for a storyteller who wants to "age up" Golarion to a higher tech level? What nations, races, etc. would pick it up more swiftly, and which would be more resistant? What are the chances of Luddite-style resistance, on any scale, and from whom?
And perhaps, how would magic interact with such advanced technology? Is there potential for combining the two (a la Imperial Magitek) or would technology beyond a certain point be adversely affected by magic (a la Dresden Files)? The presence and mechanics of the Artificer class heavily suggest the former, but it is 3rd-party.
No suggestions, really. That's a wormhole I'm not quite prepared to even look into.
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Creative Director
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| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, actually, a developer comment is sure to quiet my very vocal fellow player, who disagrees even after it was given the okay by my DM.They say they work like a cleric's channel, but they are a bit more limited. I like to be sure.Can pcs with the Aquatic or Swamp Domain, or any other channel granting domain, take the Channel Smite feat?Why shouldn't they?
That kind of saddens me... that there are players out there who won't accept the GM's word as rule for their game.
In which case, I can offer this analogy:
If an adventure is a movie, then:
The rules are the cameras, lights, and sets.
The author is the screenplay writer.
The developer is the director.
The editor is (surprise) the editor.
The art director is the cinematographer.
The adventure's NPCs are actors.
The publisher is the producer.
Paizo is the Movie Studio.
The PCs are the stars.
The players are the audience.
But the GM is the one who choses what movie to show, and wether or not the Players get to watch it. He can turn the movie off whenever he wants. He can splice in new scenes or re-edit it to his heart's content. He's basically the movie theater owner, projectionist, manager, and staff of the theater. As such, he's 100% in control of what the players get to do or see or how they interact with the movie.