The "too much books and bloat" argument.


Pathfinder First Edition General Discussion

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Scarab Sages

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captain yesterday wrote:
Ethel is always fun to tip.

Ethel's welcome at my table any time. But no summoners or gunslingers.


I dunno, Ethel is kind of a snowflake, maybe Myrtle is a better fit for your table, tho she might eat someone.


You're right. Again, it's a two way street.

I believe a GM is entertaining four to six people and should be more flexible to the group needs.

But then, yes, something is to be said for "dude, I made a world and you only are making a character - kwitcherb*&%%in and change concepts!"

My initial point was yes, bloat can be ignored, but many players will scorn you the more you do ignore...so yeah, bloat IS an issue.


It's true, I will eat someone.


Party animals, amiright.

Scarab Sages

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The players are fair game, but she shouldn't eat my stack of Paizo books, I hear that might make her bloated.


It clearly says man eating cow.

Just don't invitation a goat, they'll eat everything! Even for me, they're pretty.. dark.


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If you don't like the thread, cap, click hide. What you're doing is rude. Derailing as a conversation goes off is one thing - nonsequitors because you don't like the current tone is entirely another. No one is forcing you to read it. You know I have no problem with you, but come on man. It hit a spike I didn't like earlier. I left. I came back. Not that big a deal.

Scarab Sages

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You should be able to reflavor his comments to fitting into the thread. Banning them is just a blatant lack of creativity.


That's just what I do.


That's funny. Entirely unrelated, but funny. I made a request from one adult to another that I respect. There is a difference. As well, I have the power to leave, which I may choose, similarly to players who don't enter games with rule sets they don't like...As I initially mentioned.


Is.. is he saying my serial cow tipping Ranger isn't allowed.


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Point being while, no, you shouldn't be shooting things down left and right and laughing maniacally, you should still have a right to say 'no. As is, that will not fit.'


Agreed.

Sadly I have encountered the Core Only No Matter What type enough to where I am a little disgusted by that behavior, and my initial untempered reaction was vitriolic. Same with the GM who thinks he's the multimillion dollar director of a cinematic masterpiece and not some dude telling a story that will probably unwind in under a year and doesn't want his vision even remotely altered.


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Where I've encountered the type of player that when looking for an idea for a character, makes a beeline for the 'sir not appearing in this film' list and instantly goes for something from that. Thankfully not for a long while now as I have a stable group with an occasional rotation out.


Well sorry, but it's cold as shit out, there's nothing to do but dishes and cleaning, and this is the time of year when I get hit by seasonal depression, joking around, and trying to find a lighter side is one of the many ways I combat it without medicating it.

So you can either ignore it, or flag it, but I'm not going to stop cracking jokes, for my own sake. :-)


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Repost.

I usually excuse specific things or, more rarely, specific categories of things. I don't tend to go "only this". But have a three phase; red light, yellow light, green light.

Red light is "this is excluded from the campaign. It just plain doesn't exist to be played. This category is usually small and carefully targeted. The dwarf example. A world with a different planar structure that doesn't include outsiders in the way the book does and thus is not including Asimar or Tieflings. Etcetera.

Yellow light is "I didn't think to include it or I am inclined not to, and i havent made a place for it, but if you can weave me a good yarn and make it sing or fit, you are good to go.

Green light is .... Everything that was specifically included. You pick one of these, you are likely good to go without extra commentary from me. You want an 'easy' character creation process? Stay here. You dip into yellow, there is going to be extra work involved, and red just isn't going to happen.


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Redbeard the Scruffy wrote:

Agreed.

Sadly I have encountered the Core Only No Matter What type enough to where I am a little disgusted by that behavior, and my initial untempered reaction was vitriolic. Same with the GM who thinks he's the multimillion dollar director of a cinematic masterpiece and not some dude telling a story that will probably unwind in under a year and doesn't want his vision even remotely altered.

Honestly, I doubt the "Core Only No Matter What" type is doing it for flavor reasons. Maybe he gets overwhelmed by too many choices. I kind of have a preference for a simpler set of options, though I'd usually go beyond Core only. PF has gotten past the point where I even know what the scope really is, not just with classes, but new feats or items that open up things that just didn't use to work.

There's a big difference between that and actually aiming for a certain thing for a particular campaign. If I was looking for players and only told them "Pathfinder", then I'd be pretty much open for any options at least mechanically. Then we could start with those characters and go pretty much anywhere, developing from that starting point, but most likely, since there was no initial direction, it's going to be a fairly straightforward "f@%$ it, let's go adventuring" game, at least to start with.
OTOH, if I've got something else in mind, I'll give a more focused and possibly more restricted pitch. If my prospective players don't like the idea, that's fine. We'll move on to something else. If they, or enough of them, do like the idea we'll go ahead with it, but at that point, you've agreed to the basic pitch. If you then make a character that doesn't fit, that's when we have to see what went wrong.
Did I explain things badly?
Did you really not want to play in what I'd suggested, but just wanted to play something?
Do I not see how your character really fits, even though it doesn't seem to at first?

None of this falls into "Is it possible to bend the things so your build technically doesn't violate the rules I laid down?" Cause that's not the point. It's about "Are we aiming for the same goal?"


Fair enough, Jeff...but if you (again, not you specifically, but second person phrasing) want simplicity, you probably shouldn't be playing Pathfinder in the first place.


Redbeard the Scruffy wrote:
Fair enough, Jeff...but if you (again, not you specifically, but second person phrasing) want simplicity, you probably shouldn't be playing Pathfinder in the first place.

In some ways, I agree. I generally do prefer more rules-light systems.

OTOH, I've got a nostalgic fondness for a lot of the D&D tropes and I'm fairly happy with the basic PF system. I can work with Core and the first couple of layers of expansion without too much trouble. I just have no interest in chasing the constant increase in material.


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens Subscriber
RDM42 wrote:
And I don't see why published campaign settings should for some reason get more respect or reverence than long established home settings.

They shouldn't. I'd rather have the rule of fun trump obscure lore, whether it be in a book or locked in the GM's head.


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deinol wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
And I don't see why published campaign settings should for some reason get more respect or reverence than long established home settings.
They shouldn't. I'd rather have the rule of fun trump obscure lore, whether it be in a book or locked in the GM's head.

What if I find the obscure lore fun?


You're not the only one playing. What everyone finds fun matters, not just the GM. If people cannot appreciate that fact, they should not GM.


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Redbeard the Scruffy wrote:
You're not the only one playing. What everyone finds fun matters, not just the GM. If people cannot appreciate that fact, they should not GM.

And if I find it fun as a player, should that always be trumped by any other player who wants to ignore it?


I didn't say that.

All should be considerate. If you're inconsiderate, it's not as big of a deal, as you don't make the decisions for anyone but yourself.

If you're inconsiderate, they probably shouldn't let you in the group, but if you're inconsiderate, you most certainly should not be the one running it.

The fun of all matters - including the GM, but not limited to him. As I said, a president and his cabinet, not a dictatorship, and not a Senate either.

The statement implication was one GM enjoying it when players don't. If it's one player who has a problem, tough booties son.


Redbeard the Scruffy wrote:

I didn't say that.

All should be considerate. If you're inconsiderate, it's not as big of a deal, as you don't make the decisions for anyone but yourself.

If you're inconsiderate, they probably shouldn't let you in the group, but if you're inconsiderate, you most certainly should not be the one running it.

The fun of all matters - including the GM, but not limited to him. As I said, a president and his cabinet, not a dictatorship, and not a Senate either.

The statement implication was one GM enjoying it when players don't. If it's one player who has a problem, tough booties son.

That I'd agree with.

It's also only a default implication in all of these discussions that all the players are at best tolerant of the restrictions, even when we're speaking specifically of one player who's having a conflict over his build.
Which in my experience isn't true. The few times I've actually seen this come up in a group, it's been one player with an odd character and everyone else happy with something that doesn't cause conflict and is just waiting to play.
If most people aren't into what the GM suggested, complete with the restrictions, we play something else. Maybe with a different GM. Maybe with the same GM, but a less quirky concept.


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My take on this is rather simple: I lay out what I am willing to GM on X world in the player documentation. If the mood strikes us and I'm feeling really masochistic, I'll run an anything goes game in Generica, the land of I Don't Care and people can run what they want.

If a player and I are just deadlocked because they want something and it's one of the few things that I don't allow for whatever reason, then we come down to the following choices:

1) You save it for next time.
2) You stand by your principles and don't play.
3) You GM or find someone else in the group who wants to GM for X thing.

It IS a matter of fun, as you've said Redbeard. If one person is just dead set on holding out because the game isn't allowing them to play StarBright the rainbow pony mage, then it is up to that person to decide what they want to do. Everyone else already made their choices.

This, incidentally, is why I give the players world documentation far in advance. That way I'm not dealing with an argument the day of the game.


Knight, this is an honest question, not snark*: is Generica, the Land of I Don't Care synonymous with Golarion, or does it also include 3pp?

I'm just curious because RDM42 mentioned published settings being treated as sacrosanct as compared to homebrew settings, but I think that sort of gets it wrong, no insult to RDM. Published settings are required to include all of said publisher's material, so I see them as a lot less sacrosanct, actually. Just using Paizo material, you can play a Clint Eastwood Man with No Name type from Alkenstar who ends up adventuring alongside an Inuyasha type party in Tian Xia, but no GM should be required to do that in a homebrew setting.

*I suppose the snark would have been directed at Paizo, not you, in any case. ;)


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Hitdice wrote:

Knight, this is an honest question, not snark*: is Generica, the Land of I Don't Care synonymous with Golarion, or does it also include 3pp?

I'm just curious because RDM42 mentioned published settings being treated as sacrosanct as compared to homebrew settings, but I think that sort of gets it wrong, no insult to RDM. Published settings are required to include all of said publisher's material, so I see them as a lot less sacrosanct, actually. Just using Paizo material, you can play a Clint Eastwood Man with No Name type from Alkenstar who ends up adventuring alongside an Inuyasha type party in Tian Xia, but no GM should be required to do that in a homebrew setting.

*I suppose the snark would have been directed at Paizo, not you, in any case. ;)

Ah, no, not at all. Generica -- it doesn't actually have a name -- is basically a world that I don't care about, that I've invested little if any time creating backstory for and so on.

In contrast, some of my homebrew worlds have existed for going on thirty years, with ongoing stories and plots and the like, fleshed out NPCs and family trees and all that jazz.

Generica, for lack of a better name, includes none of that. I might use Greyhawk, or Golarion, or another created and published system but more often than not it would be a very generic fantasy setting world with little work put into it. The sort where the map might be drawn on a napkin with a scale that varies depending on the day.

I don't use Generica much because most of my players are looking to continue the threads they've started or heard about in the other worlds. I use Generica when people just want to bash things without worrying overly much about story, cannot agree what they want to do (half want pirates, two others want noble intrigue, and another wants to punt goblins), or for one or two off sessions where people want to create characters they don't have to care about, or introduce new people to the mechanics and general idea of the game without endangering ongoing quests or interfering in "the real world" of the game.


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Hitdice wrote:

Knight, this is an honest question, not snark*: is Generica, the Land of I Don't Care synonymous with Golarion, or does it also include 3pp?

I'm just curious because RDM42 mentioned published settings being treated as sacrosanct as compared to homebrew settings, but I think that sort of gets it wrong, no insult to RDM. Published settings are required to include all of said publisher's material, so I see them as a lot less sacrosanct, actually. Just using Paizo material, you can play a Clint Eastwood Man with No Name type from Alkenstar who ends up adventuring alongside an Inuyasha type party in Tian Xia, but no GM should be required to do that in a homebrew setting.

*I suppose the snark would have been directed at Paizo, not you, in any case. ;)

Well, Golarion is, since it's Paizo's only setting. And Forgotten Realms is, since it's the generic D&D setting, but D&D also has some much less generic settings. Eberron & Dark Sun don't have all the same races or have seriously altered versions of them.

I'd also say that even in Golarion, while you can play a Clint Eastwood Man with No Name type from Alkenstar who ends up adventuring alongside an Inuyasha type party in Tian Xia, individual GMs don't have to support that, even if they're running a Golarion game. That's why guns are linked to Alkenstar and not widespread. That's why Tian Xia is on the other side of the world, without close contact with the Inner Sea. Golarion was deliberately designed to have everything available, but segregated enough it would be easy to exclude the bits you don't want.

That's all sort of tangential to your actual question, I freely admit. :)


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Hitdice wrote:

Knight, this is an honest question, not snark*: is Generica, the Land of I Don't Care synonymous with Golarion, or does it also include 3pp?

I'm just curious because RDM42 mentioned published settings being treated as sacrosanct as compared to homebrew settings, but I think that sort of gets it wrong, no insult to RDM. Published settings are required to include all of said publisher's material, so I see them as a lot less sacrosanct, actually. Just using Paizo material, you can play a Clint Eastwood Man with No Name type from Alkenstar who ends up adventuring alongside an Inuyasha type party in Tian Xia, but no GM should be required to do that in a homebrew setting.

*I suppose the snark would have been directed at Paizo, not you, in any case. ;)

I mentioned that because people say, quite often in these discussions, that those types of things and restrictions shouldn't be hard restrictions 'Unless its in an published campaign setting like 'X' .."

And I really don't see the reasoning that should respect their setting integrity more.

Shadow Lodge

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I personally find every campaign setting is innately morphic simply due to the nature of the game. My own 'Generica' uses Greyhawk as the template, and changes from there to suit the whim of the group. (Naturally, the fact that you CAN change the setting does not equate to you MUST change the setting.) But if I decide to use Golarion (as we do for APs) there is no reason not to change it as I see fit.


I have a generica, that I choose not to put effort into any significant background depth of, so it can act as the 'Everything must go, no idea can ever be disallowed' paradise.

Its the least favorite and least requested of the worlds I run games in, by a long shot.


Anyone who quotes my text get a free like, but TOZ is special for not quoting it. :P

I have Generica sessions vs plot driven campaigns too, I just don't feel the need to invent a new world for each.


Hitdice wrote:

Anyone who quotes my text get a free like, but TOZ is special for not quoting it. :P

I have Generica sessions vs plot driven campaigns too, I just don't feel the need to invent a new world for each.

Its not a new word for each. A new world only pops up if the campaign couldn't fit well in one of the old worlds. That is, at this point, rare.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

I suppose it would be nice to have a fleshed out world for once in my life, let alone multiple times. Unfortunately, none of the groups I have been a part of have had the time to explore them beyond the immediate area.


TriOmegaZero wrote:
I suppose it would be nice to have a fleshed out world for once in my life, let alone multiple times. Unfortunately, none of the groups I have been a part of have had the time to explore them beyond the immediate area.

By the time I had actually fleshed out my world, it had become obvious that "Titus Andronicus starring the Muppet Babies Players" was too sophisticated a production for both my table and my campaign milieu.

Coping with disappointment as I usually do, I just kept playing D&D. :)


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As a player, I much prefer playing with extreme limitations - it's part of what defines individual campaigns for me. As a DM, I think it's best to tailor one's limitations to what the players are happy with - it doesn't really bother me to run an 'anything goes' game, even though I don't enjoy playing in them.

Perhaps it comes from always playing in the same group, but I don't quite get the idea that a DM is building their campaign ahead of time and then inviting players to come and visit (that's how these discussions sometimes seem to be framed). In our games the DM does a lot of the work, but it's still a pretty collaborative process - we're not going to prepare a "martial characters only" campaign if the players haven't expressed an interest in playing one.


RDM42 wrote:
Hitdice wrote:

Anyone who quotes my text get a free like, but TOZ is special for not quoting it. :P

I have Generica sessions vs plot driven campaigns too, I just don't feel the need to invent a new world for each.

Its not a new word for each. A new world only pops up if the campaign couldn't fit well in one of the old worlds. That is, at this point, rare.

Whereas we tend to play with one campaign per world. The world being designed for the game in question. Usually some of its unique features playing directly into the main plot arc - whether that's actually mechanical limitations like which races or even classes are available or just the political setup.

We've been doing this essentially, with various GMs and different groups since AD&D in the late 80s. Games before that were a lot sillier. The same basically holds for non-D&D games, even when the game assumes a defined world, like Shadowrun or World of Darkness or Amber, we rarely linked back to any previous continuity. A couple of times in Call of Cthulhu, there were cameos by previous characters.


thejeff wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Hitdice wrote:

Anyone who quotes my text get a free like, but TOZ is special for not quoting it. :P

I have Generica sessions vs plot driven campaigns too, I just don't feel the need to invent a new world for each.

Its not a new word for each. A new world only pops up if the campaign couldn't fit well in one of the old worlds. That is, at this point, rare.

Whereas we tend to play with one campaign per world. The world being designed for the game in question. Usually some of its unique features playing directly into the main plot arc - whether that's actually mechanical limitations like which races or even classes are available or just the political setup.

We've been doing this essentially, with various GMs and different groups since AD&D in the late 80s. Games before that were a lot sillier. The same basically holds for non-D&D games, even when the game assumes a defined world, like Shadowrun or World of Darkness or Amber, we rarely linked back to any previous continuity. A couple of times in Call of Cthulhu, there were cameos by previous characters.

Yeah, this is our approach too.

Nowadays, I run all my games (regardless of system) in Golarion. Nonetheless, I've run low-magic games, high powered games, games where arcane magic doesn't exist, games with Dragonborn, etcetera... In our way of playing, each visit to Golarion is essentially a 'fresh start' with a lot of common features but with various twists or adaptations. Paizo's practise of not progressing the timeline is really well suited to our way of using a campaign setting.


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Personally, I don't believe there can be too many books. I love reading them, and I also love playing character concepts that are weird/different. I find everything in the core book to be exceptionally boring and refuse to play anything from that book. So, I guess I'm the target audience for all these books Paizo keeps creating.

I don't get the "too much" argument at all, nobody is forcing anyone to buy the books so if they don't want to. But don't crap all over those of us who enjoy reading and exploring new character possibilities.

Shadow Lodge

Steve Geddes wrote:
thejeff wrote:
RDM42 wrote:
Hitdice wrote:

Anyone who quotes my text get a free like, but TOZ is special for not quoting it. :P

I have Generica sessions vs plot driven campaigns too, I just don't feel the need to invent a new world for each.

Its not a new word for each. A new world only pops up if the campaign couldn't fit well in one of the old worlds. That is, at this point, rare.

Whereas we tend to play with one campaign per world. The world being designed for the game in question. Usually some of its unique features playing directly into the main plot arc - whether that's actually mechanical limitations like which races or even classes are available or just the political setup.

We've been doing this essentially, with various GMs and different groups since AD&D in the late 80s. Games before that were a lot sillier. The same basically holds for non-D&D games, even when the game assumes a defined world, like Shadowrun or World of Darkness or Amber, we rarely linked back to any previous continuity. A couple of times in Call of Cthulhu, there were cameos by previous characters.

Yeah, this is our approach too.

Nowadays, I run all my games (regardless of system) in Golarion. Nonetheless, I've run low-magic games, high powered games, games where arcane magic doesn't exist, games with Dragonborn, etcetera... In our way of playing, each visit to Golarion is essentially a 'fresh start' with a lot of common features but with various twists or adaptations. Paizo's practise of not progressing the timeline is really well suited to our way of using a campaign setting.

Hmm. The Long Golarion


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HeHateMe wrote:

Personally, I don't believe there can be too many books. I love reading them, and I also love playing character concepts that are weird/different. I find everything in the core book to be exceptionally boring and refuse to play anything from that book. So, I guess I'm the target audience for all these books Paizo keeps creating.

I don't get the "too much" argument at all, nobody is forcing anyone to buy the books so if they don't want to. But don't crap all over those of us who enjoy reading and exploring new character possibilities.

Don't worry. You're in good company.

For the last several pages it's been more about lashing out at those not willing to use each and every option in every book and some of us trying to argue that you're not actually a bad GM if you impose some limits.


thejeff wrote:
HeHateMe wrote:

Personally, I don't believe there can be too many books. I love reading them, and I also love playing character concepts that are weird/different. I find everything in the core book to be exceptionally boring and refuse to play anything from that book. So, I guess I'm the target audience for all these books Paizo keeps creating.

I don't get the "too much" argument at all, nobody is forcing anyone to buy the books so if they don't want to. But don't crap all over those of us who enjoy reading and exploring new character possibilities.

Don't worry. You're in good company.

For the last several pages it's been more about lashing out at those not willing to use each and every option in every book and some of us trying to argue that you're not actually a bad GM if you impose some limits.

Yeah I definitely wouldn't agree with the "You're a bad GM if you ban anything" argument either. Personally I would never play in a Core only campaign, but I wouldn't say someone is a bad GM/player if they want to play in/run one. To me, it's all about personal preference.


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To me, banning is fine even in giant quantities.... as long as there is justification that all at the table agree with.

... I do often find that "Core Only" generally doesn't have any justification that isn't based on flawed premisses or "This is our first game ever".


I don't equate banning (or some might call it "fixing") anything to make you a good or bad GM. It's something GMs and players do; that in and of itself doesn't make you good or bad, it makes you a gamer.

To swing back by what I said earlier, I will note that while I have some older campaigns, not all of them are old enough to vote. But I'd been asked by players in the past for a world where they didn't have to concern themselves with accidentally burning down a town and having that impact things on their other characters, which is where Generica was born from.

The Exchange

knightnday wrote:
To swing back by what I said earlier, I will note that while I have some older campaigns, not all of them are old enough to vote.

Man, you don't know how envious that makes me. Wish I could say the same about me, but as I seem to be the very personification of procrastination, all those world building ideas fly around in my head without ever havin been expanded on (apart from my own version of Generica which basically was created by simply stealing from various sources)


I didn't read the entire thread, but I read most of it. I think people are missing one of the biggest definitions/problem areas regarding "bloat".

Development.

At the end of the year after the Core Rule book, there were 12 Player's Companions, a few more rules hard backs and maybe a couple of Campaign books with some crunch. At the end of year two double that. At the end of year three, it went up by the same amount, etc, etc.

All of that crunch has to at least be considered when new products are developed. It may all be "optional" for play, but for development, everything has to play well together. There are a few areas where new rules end up walled up in their own environment and don't have to worry about interaction. But the vast majority of it... it has to keep all of the previous work in mind. This has to make development an increasing headache, particularly for the Player's Companions given how quickly they come out.

And where do most rules problems come from? Yeah, that new thing combined with this old, obscure thing is totally abuse-able. Or that new thing ramps up the power of something that was already "good". Or that archetype makes dipping a level of X really nice. Or that feat, taken with this race that can get it with this trait and then add in this class feature... The interactions are numerous and getting worse with each release. I don't think Paizo has enough time or man power to vet new material against old material to any great degree of detail any more. I'm sure they hope play tests find a lot of this for bigger supplements. But at some point, the sheer amount of material increases the probability of something being broken toward higher and higher frequency.

When the stack of books on the desk falls over on the developer when he sits down to draft a new book, the developers themselves probably start to think "you know, version 2.0 might not be a bad idea any more". Once they're rescued from the rubble of the desk and books that is. :)


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens Subscriber

I always run games in the same setting too. It's called Planescape. And it has room not only for every published campaign setting, but multiple game systems as well.

When my 1-20 Pathfinder game ended, the characters ascended. They are now gods being worshiped in my Kingmaker campaign.

Of course, I've moved states since then, so it is unlikely new players will be as interested in those gods as my old group, who these days I only get to game with once or twice a month via Roll20.

Silver Crusade Contributor

@Darkbridger: One correction... it would have been six Player Companions. They were put out every other month until far more recently.

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