Pathfinder Confessional


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I don't care for the point buy system. I find it limiting for development of character attributes. I'm not saying this to invite debate. I don't like it, and never will. :-P


Randarak wrote:
I don't care for the point buy system. I find it limiting for development of character attributes. I'm not saying this to invite debate. I don't like it, and never will. :-P

i agree, but it aids in a couple things: Being able to pre-design a PC well in advance, and also not having two PC's widely disparate.


I don't have anything against the point buy system, I just don't mix well with it due to being incredibly indecisive. rolling for my stats helps narrow things down a bit.


I would prefer to roll but I got hang ups with all the failsafes you need to enact to make rolling work in 3.5/pf you might as well point buy anyways.


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roll 4d6, reroll 1's, drop lowest that's what we do and you get to throw out your stats and reroll as many times as you so desire


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I enjoy both systems. As far as attributes go, if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid so I don't find point buy so much constraining as easily exploited. My happy compromise is to use stat arrays and give roughly equal amounts exp for RP and combat.


On a not unrelated note: I have an unhealthy love of mini-games, and often incorporate them into dungeons in place of or as part of puzzles or major fights. As such my *current* favorite method of stat generation is tic-tac-toe (dots and crosses for our friends across the pond). It's roll for stats (9 times, place answers in a grid) and then you pick two lines of three. Makes the optimization a bit more random and imo fun.

Shadow Lodge

DrDeth wrote:
Randarak wrote:
I don't care for the point buy system. I find it limiting for development of character attributes. I'm not saying this to invite debate. I don't like it, and never will. :-P

i agree, but it aids in a couple things: Being able to pre-design a PC well in advance, and also not having two PC's widely disparate.

That would be true if all classes were SAD or MAD to the same degree. But they are not.

Shadow Lodge

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Trekkie90909 wrote:
if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid

8 really shouldn't be incredibly stupid. A bit slow, yes, but not incredibly so.


Kthulhu wrote:
Trekkie90909 wrote:
if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid
8 really shouldn't be incredibly stupid. A bit slow, yes, but not incredibly so.

Admittedly there is some finesse to it; it depends on the scale of the point buy/rolls/array. Lets use the heroic stat array as an example (equivalent to a 15 point buy). Your stats are 15/14/13/12/10/8. Most NPCs will have stats like this. Ignoring racials for a moment someone with 15 int is in the upper 17% of the population (really smaller if we adjust for non-heroic NPCs), 14 is close but top 34%, etc down to 8 (bottom 20%, really slightly higher since this is also where the standard stat array bottoms out). After factoring in racials we get 17 as highest (say around top 2-8% of the population dependent on race), and 6 as generally the lowest (only a factor for a few specific races). So yes, for the vast majority of characters/species an 8 intelligence means you are amongst the dumbest people alive (lets say generously somewhere around the bottom 40% of the population for most species). Remember too that at this point there are entire species who are more intelligent than you; even their weakest most heavily damaged (at birth) members.

This varies depending on your stat generation method. I chose arrays A) because I like using them, B) they're often used for NPCs regardless of PC generation methods, and C) because they lend themselves nicely to examples.


Trekkie90909 wrote:
Kthulhu wrote:
Trekkie90909 wrote:
if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid
8 really shouldn't be incredibly stupid. A bit slow, yes, but not incredibly so.

Admittedly there is some finesse to it; it depends on the scale of the point buy/rolls/array. Lets use the heroic stat array as an example (equivalent to a 15 point buy). Your stats are 15/14/13/12/10/8. Most NPCs will have stats like this. Ignoring racials for a moment someone with 15 int is in the upper 17% of the population (really smaller if we adjust for non-heroic NPCs), 14 is close but top 34%, etc down to 8 (bottom 20%, really slightly higher since this is also where the standard stat array bottoms out). After factoring in racials we get 17 as highest (say around top 2-8% of the population dependent on race), and 6 as generally the lowest (only a factor for a few specific races). So yes, for the vast majority of characters/species an 8 intelligence means you are amongst the dumbest people alive (lets say generously somewhere around the bottom 40% of the population for most species). Remember too that at this point there are entire species who are more intelligent than you; even their weakest most heavily damaged (at birth) members.

This varies depending on your stat generation method. I chose arrays A) because I like using them, B) they're often used for NPCs regardless of PC generation methods, and C) because they lend themselves nicely to examples.

Note that using that logic means that a little under 1/6th of NPCs are(with their 8 int) among the dumbest people alive in their race. That...doesn't seem very reasonable. Probably best to not base population statistics based off the elite array if numbers end up like that.


I see no reason NPCs can't have obstacles to overcome. What makes them NPCs as opposed to mooks is that they, like the PCs are capable of overcoming their own shortcomings and limitations. What makes them NPCs as opposed to PCs is they're looking for help. I find it reasonable for 17% of my NPCs to be in the bottom 17-34% IQ.


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Confession (by way of helping me to not do something I know I will regret) _ I have this *great* idea for a new campaign, called

"Has Anybody Seen My Construct"

- the premise will be that five powerful wizards who all belong to the same guild were all rushing to complete a sophisticated construct to win the Annual "Rusty pelican trophy for the best practical construct design of 1380" but unfortunately a Solar flair and confluence of planetary alignments (with Jangle in Retrograde) caused all five constructs to escape. Now it would be embarrassing for the guild if the wizards went out and captured the runaway constructs themselves so each of the five wizards sends there best, most qualified (most expendable) apprentice to capture the constructs, as a team effort

But here is the twist - each player in the game must create a third level character (the apprentice) AND, a construct as if it were created by a 17th level wizard (with no more than nine months creation time available to the wizard). The party of apprentices will hunt down each construct one at a time, and each player must control their own construct, doing their best to keep it on the lose in the city. The player whose construct is the last to be captured, wins the game.

I so want to start this game - and I know it will not go well...


We roll our stats because its cliche, it also helps cover up poor build choices and the fact that the next spell that boosts stats will be the first, that's right 4 years now and Bear's Endurance has yet to be learned or cast :-)


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I had a table top game a couple of years ago, and the group was sitting around the table trying to decide what was the best way to get into a castle/temple/prison, through the flooded sewers when the cleric in the party suddenly, while flipping through the spell list shouted "Bears Endurance"

I got what she was talking about, but the players all looked blank, then she said, "You know, so we can hold our breath longer"

There were laughs all around

RPG Superstar 2013 Top 32

I have yet to play through a full AP.

Shadow Lodge

Kthulhu wrote:
Trekkie90909 wrote:
if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid
8 really shouldn't be incredibly stupid. A bit slow, yes, but not incredibly so.

If 8 is incredibly stupid, then 12 is incredibly brilliant.

Silver Crusade

I confess I think of Alchemists as an NPC class along the same lines as a Sage.


Alchemists are one of my favorite classes :-)


Trekkie90909 wrote:
I enjoy both systems. As far as attributes go, if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid so I don't find point buy so much constraining as easily exploited.t.

The stat array and IQ spread on Golarion is very oddly spread. About one person in seven has a 8 in IQ (the Std array has one 8, but a few people are elite array and a very, very few have stats outside that).

That would make a 8 Int= IQ 83, quite a bit higher than Forrest Gump's 76.

But altho that's fairly close to the standard deviation of Int8= IQ80, only about one person in a 100,000 or even less has a IQ lower than that. Again due to the standard array (which over 90% of the population of Golarion has) having no number under 8.

So, 8, in Golarion is just below average. 15's are very high.

7's or even 6's are exceptionally rare. You could play those as "incredibly stupid" if you wanted too.


Kthulhu wrote:
Kthulhu wrote:
Trekkie90909 wrote:
if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid
8 really shouldn't be incredibly stupid. A bit slow, yes, but not incredibly so.
If 8 is incredibly stupid, then 12 is incredibly brilliant.

For your average peasant, yup. For an adventurer or important NPC it's still slightly below average (again depending on species).


DrDeth wrote:
Trekkie90909 wrote:
I enjoy both systems. As far as attributes go, if I play a character with 8 int, I play them as incredibly stupid so I don't find point buy so much constraining as easily exploited.t.

The stat array and IQ spread on Golarion is very oddly spread. About one person in seven has a 8 in IQ (the Std array has one 8, but a few people are elite array and a very, very few have stats outside that).

That would make a 8 Int= IQ 83, quite a bit higher than Forrest Gump's 76.

But altho that's fairly close to the standard deviation of Int8= IQ80, only about one person in a 100,000 or even less has a IQ lower than that. Again due to the standard array (which over 90% of the population of Golarion has) having no number under 8.

So, 8, in Golarion is just below average. 15's are very high.

7's or even 6's are exceptionally rare. You could play those as "incredibly stupid" if you wanted too.

Well really it would be 8 int = IQ 86 and lower i.e. IQ 0-86 (avg 77) again assuming that approximately 17% of the population has an int of 8 (On a related note Shippensburg University has a nifty IQ graphic).

Also to reiterate the correlations are fluid; they vary considerably by race, so a 15 int elf is of average to high intelligence whereas a 15 int orc would be a god amongst orcs, the single smartest one to ever live. Assuming we're using the stat arrays (Basic/Heroic) previously mentioned.


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I dont worry too much about what stats mean. I keep them under the hood and they serve only mechanical purposes. I let my players roleplay however they see fit without forcing my idea of pretty/ugly or smart/stupid on them. Obviously, I would call foul if somebody tried play a genius with low Int and expected actual genius results in gameplay. Fortunately for me, my players have never tried such shenanigans so it has never come up.


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Terquem wrote:

Confession (by way of helping me to not do something I know I will regret) _ I have this *great* idea for a new campaign, called

"Has Anybody Seen My Construct"

- the premise will be that five powerful wizards who all belong to the same guild were all rushing to complete a sophisticated construct to win the Annual "Rusty pelican trophy for the best practical construct design of 1380" but unfortunately a Solar flair and confluence of planetary alignments (with Jangle in Retrograde) caused all five constructs to escape. Now it would be embarrassing for the guild if the wizards went out and captured the runaway constructs themselves so each of the five wizards sends there best, most qualified (most expendable) apprentice to capture the constructs, as a team effort

But here is the twist - each player in the game must create a third level character (the apprentice) AND, a construct as if it were created by a 17th level wizard (with no more than nine months creation time available to the wizard). The party of apprentices will hunt down each construct one at a time, and each player must control their own construct, doing their best to keep it on the lose in the city. The player whose construct is the last to be captured, wins the game.

I so want to start this game - and I know it will not go well...

Do this!!


captain yesterday wrote:
Terquem wrote:

Confession (by way of helping me to not do something I know I will regret) _ I have this *great* idea for a new campaign, called

"Has Anybody Seen My Construct"

- the premise will be that five powerful wizards who all belong to the same guild were all rushing to complete a sophisticated construct to win the Annual "Rusty pelican trophy for the best practical construct design of 1380" but unfortunately a Solar flair and confluence of planetary alignments (with Jangle in Retrograde) caused all five constructs to escape. Now it would be embarrassing for the guild if the wizards went out and captured the runaway constructs themselves so each of the five wizards sends there best, most qualified (most expendable) apprentice to capture the constructs, as a team effort

But here is the twist - each player in the game must create a third level character (the apprentice) AND, a construct as if it were created by a 17th level wizard (with no more than nine months creation time available to the wizard). The party of apprentices will hunt down each construct one at a time, and each player must control their own construct, doing their best to keep it on the lose in the city. The player whose construct is the last to be captured, wins the game.

I so want to start this game - and I know it will not go well...

Do this!!

Gahhh! Don't tempt me - do you know what kind of crazies we have on

these threads...

edit - HAH! besides, you have created 139 aliases, made over 6000 posts, and still are not in any campaigns on these boards, so what's that all about

But if I did do it, and I'm saying I will, but if I did, I was thinking of making it a part of the deal that the apprentice character's will each be granted a wish, if and only if, all five constructs are captured, or do you think I would need a bigger reward to get them to cooperate?


I've had a cold, so I've been unable to come up with more aliases :-)

I don't do PbP for personal reasons I won't get into :-)


Set wrote:
captain yesterday wrote:
I confess, I love their are no Mind Flayers or Beholders in Pathfinder :-)

Love mind flayers. Never liked beholders or those gith races. Good riddance to those modrons! Giant space hamsters were less silly!

The only loss from 3.X monster IP I still mourn is the displacer beast. I have a weird love for those guys.

I agree with you except on the Modrons. For some reason I find them more endearing and interesting than the current LN outsider races.

Oddly enough I think Mind Flayers fit Golarion (what with all the space elements) than they do Faerun.

Shadow Lodge

Set wrote:

Love mind flayers. Never liked beholders or those gith races. Good riddance to those modrons! Giant space hamsters were less silly!

The only loss from 3.X monster IP I still mourn is the displacer beast. I have a weird love for those guys.

Between The Illithiad and Unveiled Masters: The Essential Guide to Mind Flayers, illithid has some of the best flavor material of any of the monsters in D&D.

I also like the displacer beass.

Silver Crusade

I confess to not liking aasimars and tieflings at all


I want to make an Undine Pyrokineticist :-)


Also Undine are hands down my favorite elemental race :-)


When I was in the eleventh grade a friend told me that the Sylph artwork in the MM was naked.

I confess that I had never noticed it until it was pointed out - to concerned with the data of the MM and not the artwork, *sheesh* was I a regular dweeb then. These days, if the artwork is sexy, I usually never get around to reading the text at all, and just buy the book.

Silver Crusade

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I confess that I have never required the use of spell components.


Tin Foil Yamakah wrote:
I confess that I have never required the use of spell components.

Not even 5000 gps diamonds?

Once in a great while we have a game where the Wizard loses his pouch and has to scramble, but it very rare.

Oh, and for me, you just need 5000gps. In pretty much anything.

Grand Lodge

Kalindlara wrote:
EntrerisShadow wrote:
MMCJawa wrote:
I have to confess being extraordinarly interested in threads that get modded, which half the time increases with Chris Lamberts description of why the thread got modded.

That. Especially when she mentions deleting posts.

WHAT DID THEY SAY?!

Minor correction. ^_^

(I made the same mistake for a couple of months.)

Other than that, 100% agree. I'm drawn to forum drama...

Whoops, that's a tad embarrassing.

Silver Crusade

DrDeth wrote:
Tin Foil Yamakah wrote:
I confess that I have never required the use of spell components.

Not even 5000 gps diamonds?

Once in a great while we have a game where the Wizard loses his pouch and has to scramble, but it very rare.

Oh, and for me, you just need 5000gps. In pretty much anything.

Nope, We have never played with them


it annoys me when people confuse the differences between what the intelligence and wisdom stats mean.

Intelligence represents your capacity to learn, and wisdom represents your common sense/gut feelings/intuition.

I've seen them explained as "book smarts" and "street smarts" respectively.


I must confess: The telekineticist is opening me up to the idea of liking the occult classes.

Frankly, I just love telekinesis of all stripes. I'm not even playing Pathfinder right now, but I'm thinking about how I'd build one for if I do again anytime soon.

Um...aren't kineticists even more SAD than other casters, though? All you need is CON, which everyone needs... (Forgive me if that's already been discussed to death. I've been off the boards a few weeks.)

I also confess I hate spelling telekineticist out.


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Aniuś the Talewise wrote:

it annoys me when people confuse the differences between what the intelligence and wisdom stats mean.

Intelligence represents your capacity to learn, and wisdom represents your common sense/gut feelings/intuition.

I've seen them explained as "book smarts" and "street smarts" respectively.

Intelligence is knowing the habitat, diet, lifespan, and markings of a grizzly bear.

Wisdom is knowing not to pick up a cub while its mother is nearby.


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I've liked "Intelligence is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing a tomato doesn't go in a fruit salad. Charisma is putting a tomato in a fruit salad and convincing people to buy it."

Other random internet guy wrote:
Some random internet guy wrote:
A tomato fruit salad is just salsa.
GUYS, I FOUND THE BARD!

As for my confession?

I confess that I think Murderhobo is taken way too seriously, and that I am quite certain that most groups are practically murderhobos anyways.


Scythia wrote:
Aniuś the Talewise wrote:

it annoys me when people confuse the differences between what the intelligence and wisdom stats mean.

Intelligence represents your capacity to learn, and wisdom represents your common sense/gut feelings/intuition.

I've seen them explained as "book smarts" and "street smarts" respectively.

Intelligence is knowing the habitat, diet, lifespan, and markings of a grizzly bear.

Wisdom is knowing not to pick up a cub while its mother is nearby.

And Charisma is being able to make friends with a grizzly bear without becoming prey.

(some people in real life have managed. I can understand it with cats, but not with those ruthless, omnivorous killing machines. wait is that a description of bears or of us?)


Trigger Loaded wrote:
I confess that I think Murderhobo is taken way too seriously, and that I am quite certain that most groups are practically murderhobos anyways.

I think the 'murderhobo' way of playing is rather repetitive, unsatisfying (for me, from a roleplaying/story angle) and would like to get away from it in my games, both as GM and as player.


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There's an art to Murderhobo, it's not all stab! Stab! First you gotta fabricate the Ogre attack, then you gotta salt the fields, ravage the cattle and release the women (wait! Did I do those in the right order?) Then you gotta find an Ogre patsy, get rid of the hunting party looking for the Ogres and get paid and leave town before it all comes down around you.

It is hard work I tell you!


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Trigger Loaded wrote:

I confess that I think Murderhobo is taken way too seriously, and that I am quite certain that most groups are practically murderhobos anyways.

Not in my experience.


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Aniuś the Talewise wrote:
(some people in real life have managed. I can understand it with cats, but not with those ruthless, omnivorous killing machines. wait is that a description of bears or of us?)

Yes.


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Aniuś the Talewise wrote:
Scythia wrote:
Aniuś the Talewise wrote:

it annoys me when people confuse the differences between what the intelligence and wisdom stats mean.

Intelligence represents your capacity to learn, and wisdom represents your common sense/gut feelings/intuition.

I've seen them explained as "book smarts" and "street smarts" respectively.

Intelligence is knowing the habitat, diet, lifespan, and markings of a grizzly bear.

Wisdom is knowing not to pick up a cub while its mother is nearby.

And Charisma is being able to make friends with a grizzly bear without becoming prey.

(some people in real life have managed. I can understand it with cats, but not with those ruthless, omnivorous killing machines. wait is that a description of bears or of us?)

Don't besmirch bears, they don't kill for pleasure.

Humans and cats both do though. :P


Cats are hardwired hunters. They'll chase down and bite anything that moves. Even their play with each other is not unlike hunting.

Humans, on the other hand, are just friggin weird.


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Aniuś the Talewise wrote:
Scythia wrote:
Aniuś the Talewise wrote:

it annoys me when people confuse the differences between what the intelligence and wisdom stats mean.

Intelligence represents your capacity to learn, and wisdom represents your common sense/gut feelings/intuition.

I've seen them explained as "book smarts" and "street smarts" respectively.

Intelligence is knowing the habitat, diet, lifespan, and markings of a grizzly bear.

Wisdom is knowing not to pick up a cub while its mother is nearby.

And Charisma is being able to make friends with a grizzly bear without becoming prey.

(some people in real life have managed. I can understand it with cats, but not with those ruthless, omnivorous killing machines. wait is that a description of bears or of us?)

[hippie]Not all humans are omnivores, at least by action if not biology. [/hippie]

People who feed their cats (or dogs for that matter) an herbivorous diet need to be slapped, however.


thegreenteagamer wrote:
Aniuś the Talewise wrote:
Scythia wrote:
Aniuś the Talewise wrote:

it annoys me when people confuse the differences between what the intelligence and wisdom stats mean.

Intelligence represents your capacity to learn, and wisdom represents your common sense/gut feelings/intuition.

I've seen them explained as "book smarts" and "street smarts" respectively.

Intelligence is knowing the habitat, diet, lifespan, and markings of a grizzly bear.

Wisdom is knowing not to pick up a cub while its mother is nearby.

And Charisma is being able to make friends with a grizzly bear without becoming prey.

(some people in real life have managed. I can understand it with cats, but not with those ruthless, omnivorous killing machines. wait is that a description of bears or of us?)

[hippie]Not all humans are omnivores, at least by action if not biology. [/hippie]

People who feed their cats (or dogs for that matter) an herbivorous diet need to be slapped, however.

Very hard!!!!!

Also people who guilt trip others into not eating meat or animal products or treat people like they're horrible for eating them

Liberty's Edge

Speaking as an on-again off-again vegetarian (no ethical issues, it's a healthy living thing), I second the slap. Those guys are jerks.

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