I could write one heck of a self-indulgent retrospective. I'd start by going on about how I've been working at Paizo since November 2003 (I would have been 22) and how my first credit was as an assistant editor on Dragon Magazine #316. (I'd probably illustrate that section with that issue's cover.) Then I'd go on to talk about writing a ton of D&D stuff, starting to write adventures, and learning how magazine work is actually time travel. After that would be the scary but exciting times—starting Pathfinder Adventure Path, disguising a game as a textbook, long lines, yada yada. Things got wild after that.

Before Adam Smith from the Order of the Amber Die had the first adventure of Strange Aeons sent to him, Adam Daigle warned him that the Briarstone Asylum was pretty detailed and complicated. After seeing the maps for the previous Giantslayer marathon, we knew that he put a ton of work into his maps, and apologized ahead of time for how much time he'd spend with the asylum.

At PaizoCon's "Horror in RPGs" seminars, in products like Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Rule of Fear, and pretty much wherever else I'm given the chance, I've talked quite a bit about how to run unsettling Pathfinder games(—you're all coming to our Horror in Pathfinder event at Gen Con, right?). In writing Chapter 6 of Pathfinder RPG: Horror Adventures, Running Horror Adventures (and in the book's section on "Playing Horror a Hero"), I've compiled some of my creepiest techniques and gaming philosophies, sharing them to help all you GMs out there make your Pathfinder games truly frightening.

The most rules dense section of Path of the Hellknight comes at the very end. While there's certainly plenty of content in here for GMs planning to pit their PCs against Hellknight foes, in truth, this section is designed to give players a ton of new options for their Hellknight characters. A host of new traits, feats, spells, and equipment provide a spectrum of new ways to make your character feel more like a driven and entrenched Hellknight, while details on existing cavalier orders and inquisitor inquisitions recast existing options to further the Hellknights' agendas. You'll also find new options for those taking the Hellknight prestige class, the Order of the Ennead Star cavalier order, and more. There is a ton of super cool content in this chapter worth showing off...

Beyond the seven well-known orders of Hellknight—Chain, Gate, Godclaw, Nail, Pyre, Rack, and Scourge—there are several minor orders. Among these are the vicious Order of the Coil, revenge-obsessed Sargavan interlopers, the Order of the Pike, a band of renowned monster hunters, and the Order of the Glyph, who you might already know from the Hell's Rebels Adventure Path. Some of these fringe groups number among the most heroic and villainous of the Hellknight orders, but heretofore little has been said about them. The Lesser Orders section of Path of the Hellknight changes that. While these orders hold a great deal of interest and potential, especially with some of their niche focuses, they have less of a footprint in the Inner Sea Region, and, appropriately, in this book. But I didn't want to leave readers gravitating toward these orders adrift. As a result, each of these orders references which major Hellknight order it's most similar to. This guidepost points readers toward an analogous major order with options to crib from. It's a quick fix, but it opens the door to a variety of options for Hellknights of these minor orders. Beyond this, you'll find plenty of new details, histories, and options for these orders. To show off a bit of that, here's a few snippets from one, the Order of the Wall.

I've got a lot of favorite parts of the Pathfinder campaign setting—if you've been following along for the last few years, there's a good chance you already know a few of them. Since we created the Pathfinder world, I've had a chance to explore the pits of Hell in the Book of the Damned, some of Golarion's mightiest treasures in Artifacts & Legends, and the gothic nightmare of Ustalav in both Rule of Fear and Pathfinder Tales: Bloodbound. But in all that time there hasn't been a good opportunity to fully detail my favorite of Golarion's countless organizations. With the Hell's Rebels and Hell's Vengeance Adventure Paths, though, that's changed. This month, at long last, you'll learn more than has ever been revealed about the Pathfinder world's most infamous champions of law: the Hellknights.