Golarion Day: Return of the Sable Company

Thursday, January 6, 2010

Howdy, everyone! So, hot on the heels of the announcement of "Design Tuesdays," I'm here to unveil the first installment of "Golarion Day!" Every Thursday, we'll try to do a post that expands the world of Golarion in some small way. Sometimes, this might be a tiny new rules element. Other times, it might be a bit of lore. It could be a brief look into an upcoming product or an interview with someone who's worked on the world of Golarion. Or, as in today's case, it could be a quick update of older rules to the current Pathfinder RPG system. Let me know what you think, and if you have any special requests for future Golarion Days, let me know that as well!

So, back in the day in the Guide to Korvosa, we told you about a group of rangers called the Sable Company. Exported from my homebrew game (where they were known as Skyriders), these highly trained city guards patrol the skies above Korvosa on hippogriffs that they've bonded with. In Guide to Korvosa, we handled this bit of fun flavor by simply introducing a new feat: "Sable Company Marine," which let rangers select hippogriffs as an animal companion. And for a few years, all was well and good.

Then we went and did something unthinkable. We changed games. And in the Pathfinder RPG Bestiary, we didn't even bother to keep the poor hippogriff around. The griffin was there, sure, but no sign of his less cultured kin.

I'll be honest. I was a bit surprised to see the hippogriff become the most-missed monster from the Bestiary. I would have assumed something bigger and badder, like missing titans or nightwalkers or inevitables would get folks riled up, but I was wrong. So when it came time to do Bestiary 2, it was obvious what monsters we needed to include—chief among them was the hippogriff.

But the job still wasn't finished, because we'd also changed the way rangers get animal companions, and we'd even changed the way animal companions work.

So, until we actually get around to revisiting Korvosa's Sable Company in print (which, I bet, we'll do some day in the future), check out the following rules for allowing rangers to gain hippogriffs as animal companions. Note that we've changed the way you gain a hippogriff from a mere feat to a ranger archetype—this is because hippogriffs are pretty powerful creatures as far as animal companions go, and not all rangers have the right stuff to serve in the Sable Company. It requires the sacrifice of some traditional ranger training in order to master a bond with a hippogriff, in addition to being a member of the Sable Company itself. It's up to your GM whether the Sable Company is hiring. (Basically, you need your GM's permission to select this archetype, and your GM may require your character to perform certain duties as befits your responsibilities in the Sable Company.) In fact, if your GM's cool with it, you can adjust the adjustments and flavor of the archetype so that other classes can get access to hippogriffs as riding companions—you can even use these rules as a sort of template to open up "animal companions" for similarly powered magical beasts. Because who wouldn't want to play a halfling ankheg rider?

Anyway, here you go: Pathfinder-compatible updates for the Sable Company of Korvosa!

Ranger Archetype: Sable Company Marine

Illustration by Florian Stitz

You graduated from the elite hippogriff-riding school of the Endrin Military Academy. Not only can you ride a hippogriff with great skill, you have also formed a close bond with a particular mount. A Sable Company Marine has the following class features:

Hippogriff Companion: You can gain a hippogriff as a companion. This ability works identically to hunter's bond when used to gain an animal companion, but can only be used to gain a hippogriff (see below for rules for hippogriff companions). You gain a +2 bonus on Ride checks made when riding your hippogriff companion, and whenever you are within 20 feet of your hippogriff, it gains a +2 morale bonus on all saving throws made against fear effects. This ability replaces favored terrain and hunter's bond.

Hippogriff Companions

Starting Statistics: Size Large; Speed 40 ft., fly 50 ft. (average); AC +2 natural armor; Attack bite 1d6; Ability Scores Str 15, Dex 15, Con 14, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 9; Special Qualities darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision, scent.

4th-Level Advancement: Speed fly 100 ft. (average); Attack bite 1d6, 2 claws 1d4; Ability Scores Dex +2, Con +2.

James Jacobs
Creative Director

The Korvosan Cards

Thursday, May 22, 2008

One of the highlights of working in a gaming company with product lines as closely related as Paizo's is to see an idea you presented in one product show up in another. In fact, even though James Jacobs is systematically destroying the city I lovingly and painstakingly crafted in Guide to Korvosa, it is immensely satisfying to see features of Korvosa I created presented in our flagship product. Along those same lines, two of the excellent cards in the Curse of the Crimson Throne Item Card set come directly from Guide to Korvosa.

First up is the coin card. This card presents a gold sail as minted in the Golden Vaults of Abadar. Of course, the coin is generic enough that you can use it for coinage from any governmental entity that produces its own numismatics.

The other card shown here is a badge of the Korvosan Guard, the main branch of Korvosa's armed forces. Like the coin card, though, the symbol is sufficiently generic enough to allow you to use it for whatever you want.

Check out these and 52 other awesome pieces of art in the upcoming Curse of the Crimson Throne Item Card set, set to release on June 11th!

Mike McArtor
Editor

Quarantine!

Friday, April 11, 2008

Queen Ileosa quarantines Old Korvosa! Bridges destroyed! People separated from their families! The shipments of supplies grind to a halt! Chaos ensues! Check out the great art that tracks the quarantine of Old Korvosa, from Pathfinder #9.

Mike McArtor
Editor

Who's up for a game of BLOOD PIG?

Monday, April 7, 2008

We've introduced several Varisian pastimes in the pages of Pathfinder, ranging from the goblin favorite of Killgull to the dockside fun of Knivesies. Well, in Pathfinder #9 we've got a new game for your characters to play: Blood Pig!

The basic idea of Blood Pig is pretty simple. Two teams face off against each other. Each team controls a goal and a pig. The object of the game is to get the other team's pig, then run it back across the field to place the pig in your goal. Of course, things are a bit more complicated than that, especially when the other team consists of a gang of crazed maniacs, the pig's a panicked squirming menace, and there are starving wolverines lurking in the pits that serve each team as a goal. And since the game itself was designed by one of Korvosa's more unstable and insane new crimelords, well, let's just say that a game that passes without a fair amount of bloodshed is something of a fluke. The rules, such as they are, certainly encourage violent tactics...

But don't let that scare you! After all, by this time your PCs will have faced riots and undead and all manner of peril, right? How much trouble could a pig really cause?

James Jacobs
Pathfinder Editor-in-Chief

Imps and Pseudodragons

Monday, March 24, 2008

While Mike was working on the Guide to Korvosa, he and I brainstormed ideas for what kind of perils might be dwelling in the Shingles. We'd both seen plenty of monster-infested city undergrounds, but we wanted something more with Korvosa; we wanted a monster-infested rooftop. Sort of. We didn't want things like dire bats or manticores stomping around up there—whatever ended up in the Shingles had to be relatively small and agile. Nick Logue's adventure already had a pseudodragon in it, and I liked the idea that these little dragons were perhaps native to the region and adapted to the rooftops as the city took over the landscape. And Mike had all these rogue, castaway imps flapping around. From there, the image of periodic imp-on-pseudodragon sky clashes popped into my head—it was too awesome an image to resist, and so the imp and pseudodragon battles became a part of the city's flavor.

This wasn't really meant to be much more than flavor; just something that makes Korvosa unique. But we got a little carried away, and suddenly two huge pictures in the book were of this supposedly rare event. With the extra weight lent by the illustrations, the imp and dragon clashes became THE iconic Korvosan event. Problem is, of course, that the game rules get in the way of this flavor. Pseudodragons can't actually hurt imps, so logically speaking, such huge battles should only ever happen once and after that, it's all imps all the time, right?

Not really. If you want more rules to back up how these battles work out, it's a relatively simple thing to come up with variants and additions for both sides to even things up a bit. Of course, you can just fake it, saying that with enough pseudodragons piled onto you, no amount of damage reduction will really help. Alternately, you can rule that Korvosa's imps have lived on the Material Plane so long that they're now considered native outsiders and have lost their fast healing and damage reduction as a result.

My preference? The Impslayer feat! Give it to all your Korvosan pseudodragons as a bonus feat, and watch the imp ichor fly!

New Feat: Impslayer

Many of Korvosa's nobles decorate their roofs with tiny amounts of precious metals, among them silver-lined weather vanes, shingles, and gutters designed to catch the sunlight to give their homes a distinctive sparkle in the sunlight. By spending years sharpening stings and teeth against these silver-enhanced decorations, or sneaking drinks of holy water from outdoor fonts at various temples, some pseudodragons have effectively transformed themselves into deadly weapons against the city's imps.

Prerequisites: Pseudodragon

Benefit:Your natural weapons bypass an imp's damage reduction. In addition, your great skill at fighting imps allows you to apply your Dexterity modifier to damage done with natural weapons rather than your Strength modifier, as your blows are delivered with great precision rather than force.

Special: Pseudodragons born and raised in Korvosa's Shingles gain this feat as a bonus feat.

James Jacobs
Pathfinder Editor-in-Chief

Sneak Peek: Escape from Old Korvosa

Friday, March 7, 2008

Enjoy this art sneak peek of a NPC in Pathfinder #9 — "Escape from Old Korvosa". That's one lucky kitty.

Carolyn Mull
Paizo Sales & Marketing Assistant

The Sable Company

Thursday, January 31, 2008

The Guide to Korvosa details Varisia's unofficial capital, a militaristic city tolerant of fiends but ever strict in its applications of law and punishment (especially the punishment). Three military branches protect the city from external and internal threats: the peacekeeping Korvosan Guard, the hard-hearted Hellknights of the Order of the Nail, and the elite hippogriff riders of the Sable Company. Here is just a taste of what the beloved marines of the Sable Company are all about.

Sable Company
First by tradition, and later by an addendum to the city's charter, the Sable Company does not answer to the leader of Korvosa, regardless of the leader's title. Instead, the commandant of the Sable Company reports directly to the Seneschal of Castle Korvosa.
Commandant Marcus Thalassinus Endrin leads his hippogriff-mounted marines in defense of the skies and waters of Korvosa. Shipboard raids and airborne threats fall under the jurisdiction of the black-clad Sable Company, and its members offer aerial and amphibious support to Korvosan Guard operations. The Sable Company works closely with the Korvosan Guard and relies on its ties with that group to coordinate efforts with the Hellknights and Acadamae (neither of which the Sable Company gets along with).

Mike McArtor
GameMastery Associate Editor

Sneak Peek: Guide to Korvosa

Friday, January 11, 2008

Pathfinder Chronicles: Guide to Korvosa gives an up-close view of the city-state of Korvosa. Enjoy this sneak peek of interior art of this civilized and very cultured city.

Carolyn Mull
Paizo Sales & Marketing Assistant

Long Live the Queen!

Friday, December 28, 2007

Queen Ileosa Arabasti, the beautiful young wife of Korvosa's current monarch, isn't very popular among the nobles and citizens of her city. Not that she cares all that much about what those lesser fools think of her. Keeping the rabble happy is her husband's job, after all—Ileosa's got more important things on her mind. But what could those things be?

Stay tuned in to Pathfinder, for as we begin our second Adventure Path, Curse of the Crimson Throne, Queen Ileosa's plans for the city should quickly become obvious.

HINT: Now's not a good time to move to Korvosa.

James Jacobs
Pathfinder Editor-in-Chief