Yesterday, we announced a slate of new products set to release over the latter half of this year that are all tied to the War of Immortals event. While I’ll get to those below, I know the real reason you’re reading the blog, so without further ado, the identity of the member of the Core Twenty who is going to die as part of the War of Immortals is…

Gorum, God of War, is going to die in the War of Immortals event. Illustration by Ivan Koritarev.

Our Lord in Iron, Gorum! Now, the how, when, and why of this deific death are elements of War of Immortals we’re not quite ready to talk about yet, but we promise: Gorum is going to die “on screen” in an adventure in which your player characters play a role. We’ll have more details about that as the adventure’s release approaches. In the meantime, let’s take a brief look at the slate of products coming in the second half of 2024 in which Gorum’s death and the larger War of Immortals metaplot will play out!

First on the list are an adventure and adventure path that have already been announced. In July, we’re releasing Pathfinder Adventure: Prey for Death, a 128-page hardcover adventure for 14th-level characters, written by former Paizo Developer Vanessa Hoskins. In this adventure, you’ll play members of the Red Mantis, the notorious and mysterious assassins guild and cult of the mantis god, Achaekek, who must clear their names when treachery threatens to besmirch their honor. Not only is Prey for Death the first tie-in to the War of Immortals storyline, but it’s also the debut of the new ongoing format of the Pathfinder Adventure product line!

Also in July, we’ll kick off our 40th Pathfinder Adventure Path (!!!), entitled Curtain Call, with Pathfinder Adventure Path #204: Stage Fright by veteran designer Richard Pett. Stage Fright starts characters as 11th-level adventurers who, over the course of the AP, help to produce an opera based on their own prior adventures while simultaneously facing a new threat that only the most powerful of heroes can stop. The connections between a theater-based campaign and the death of one of Golarion’s most powerful deities may seem tenuous, but you’ll have to trust us on this: the ramifications of Gorum’s death and the ensuing Godsrain affect all aspects of the world. And players of the Curtain Call Adventure Path will have a front row seat!

In September, we’ll be releasing the first of a pair of e-book short fiction collections exploring the event, a compilation of Erin Roberts’s smash web fiction series, The Godsrain Prophecies, complete with additional material exploring the identity and motivations of the mysterious seer who first penned the prophecies.

In October, we’ll publish Before the Godsrain, an anthology of short and flash fiction featuring four Iconic characters: the barbarian Amiri, the wizard Ezren, the cleric Kyra, and elven rogue Merisiel. These stories—mostly previously published on the Paizo Blog—explore the characters’ origins, character, and prior adventures and set the stage for something we’ll chat about a little bit later.

Also in October, Paizo is proud to announce the tentpole release of the War of Immortals event, the aptly named Pathfinder War of Immortalshardcover rulebook. This 240-page hardcover (also available in special edition, retailer-exclusive sketch variant, and forthcoming pocket edition) will introduce mythic rules to Pathfinder Second Edition, as well as two brand new classes—the first original classes built on the remastered foundation of the Pathfinder Player Core—the animist and exemplar! In addition to loads of new character options, War of Immortals also explores Gorum’s death and the ramifications. Most notable among these is the Godsrain: a literal shower of the slain god’s blood, shattered armor, and divine essence that falls upon Golarion and every world on which he was worshiped, leaving war and mythic power in its wake. A book called War of Immortals would hardly be doing its job if it didn’t explain the selfsame conflict, an extended period of conflict in which gods struggle to survive a slew of divine deaths and mortals vie for the newly available god-sparks upsetting the balance of power.

October also brings our second War of Immortals tie-in adventure path, Triumph of the Tusk, beginning with Pathfinder Adventure Path #207: The Resurrection Flood, by Brian Duckwitz and John Compton, and adventure for 3rd-level characters. Triumph of the Tusk is a three-part monthly campaign in which an eclectic band of dignitaries become battle-hardened survivalists fighting for the orcs’ homeland and independence. “How does this tie into the larger War of Immortals?” you might ask. Well, let’s just say that Gorum isn’t the only god who’s going to die during this event, and some ancestral pantheons are going to get hit harder than others. For more info, you’ll just have to wait until October!

In November, we round out the products we’re announcing today (though the consequences of the Godsrain and War of Immortals will continue into 2025 and beyond) with two exciting new releases. The first, Lost Omens Divine Mysteries, explores, well, the divine mysteries of the setting and provides an overview of the gods and faiths common throughout the Age of Lost Omens, reflecting the changes to the setting brought about by the War of Immortals. You’ll notice that Arazni is featured prominently on the cover, and that’s because she’s graduating into the ranks of the Core Twenty to fill the vacancy left with Gorum’s death. While she won’t take on his mantle of war, she will nevertheless rise to more and more prominence within the setting as a new status quo materializes.

Finally, November also sees the return of long-format Pathfinder fiction to print with the much-anticipated Pathfinder Godsrain by fan-favorite author Liane Merciel. Unlike previous novels published under the Pathfinder Tales brand from 2010 to 2017, Godsrain will debut as a deluxe hardcover with wraparound dustjacket and will feature Pathfinder’s popular Iconic heroes as its protagonists. In this exciting tale, Amiri, Ezren, Kyra, and Merisiel will witness Gorum’s death, receive their own nascent god-sparks, and even meet one of their patron deities as they take on a desperate quest to prevent the greatest threat Golarion has ever known from escaping an ancient prison. Can they use their unique talents, newfound mythic power, and the blessings of the Dawnflower to maintain the seal on the Dead Vault? You’ll just have to read and find out!

The advent of the War of Immortals on Golarion will necessitate seasoned warriors, and we’re answering that call with the newly announced Battlecry! Class Playtest, launching on April 29, 2024. During this public playtest, players will have the chance to put two new war-themed classes through their paces before their release in an as-yet-unannounced product coming in 2025. The commander is a martial support class that can issue commands to her allies, granting them extra movement, actions, reactions, and more. The guardian is an armored tank, who can taunt opponents and maximize the effectiveness of heavy armor to be a bulwark against nearly any threat. Be sure to try these exciting new classes out in just a few weeks!

That’s all the announcements we have for now, but we’ll have a lot more to say about these releases and more in the coming months, beginning at PaizoCon in May. Until then, you can catch up on yesterday’s stream on Twitch or YouTube and join the conversation here, on the Paizo Forums, or any of the many social media communities where Pathfinder fans congregate.

Mark Moreland
Director of Brand Strategy

Despite my apprehension at reading about the deaths of so many of Golarion’s gods and my continuing belief that these Godsrain Prophecies cannot be taken at their word, I still feel a bit wistful about reaching the end of my analysis. While it is certainly possible that there are other prophecies in this vein, this is the last that I will read before delivering the collection to my Lady.

I am not sure why I feel so hesitant to put this work aside. Of course, there is something satisfying about feeling like you are a part of important research, even if the experience of it is less than pleasant. (I think here of those who have documented the beliefs of faiths that are somewhat more difficult to understand, as in To Scream Is Divine: My Year at a Nidalese Temple and its somewhat more uneven follow-up, Kuthite Lullabies.) Beyond that, though, I believe I will miss the gods themselves—or at least the insights into them that these texts have given me, even when I don’t believe a word that I am reading.

After reviewing the entirety of the Godsrain Prophecies, I am confident in one thing and one thing only: that the author has been made privy, whether through prophecy or otherwise, to the fact that one of Golarion’s gods will die. The preoccupation with the subject of a dead god, accuracy of some of the smaller details, and feeling of anticipation throughout are compelling evidence in favor of my theory. With all the contradictions and confusions in the text, though, I do not believe that the author knows which god, how they die, or why.

Unfortunately, this is where my certainty ends, as there are several different reasons why the author may have taken this information and used it to create the prophecies. It is possible that they feared what might happen and wrote these prophecies as a warning, attempting to prevent the dangers they dreamed up. It is also possible that they hope the death will be a destabilizing event, and that they intended for these prophecies to weaken faith and trust in the gods, making them easier to abandon in the aftermath of a catastrophe. There is no way to know, as I will admit to my Lady; I hope that in her wisdom, she can discern the truth.

If nothing else, as with all futures, only time will tell.

–Yivali

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The “Death” of Rovagug

The chant starts as a whisper—an idle piece of pillow talk on nights Sarenrae cannot sleep, her fingertips gone marching on the canvas that is Shelyn’s back, her hands casting surging shadows onto Desna’s resting arm. She weaves a tale of how to win the battle that she hungers for, imagining alliances that span across the Great Beyond and speaking life to victory until the passion of her dream becomes a shared ambition. All three lovers make mention of it, idly, to those who share their interests, pitched in a tone and timbre meant to echo in the listener’s chest. The message drums with nostalgia tinged with rage and thirst for justice long delayed, and it is passed along from ear to ear until it finally circles back, a call to action with the deadly urgency of war.

Imprisonment is not enough. Rovagug must die.

There are more gods now than there were when Rovagug was sealed away, and many sign up for the quest to kill the Great Destroyer, to stand alongside Abadar and Gozreh and Calistria. Some do so to show their mettle, some to gather bragging rights, and some to reassure themselves that if there is something to gain, they won’t leave empty-handed. Sarenrae worries, privately, that many do not understand the danger they’ve signed up for, but she takes the names and notes the skills and hands the roles out all the same—rear guard to those who fear but fight, support for those who dwell in hope, melee for those who want to feel the blood beneath their fingers.

At first, it seems too easy. Asmodeus unlocks the seal that leads into the Dead Vault and gods pour through in something like a line. Wrackworms turn from feasting on the Rough Beast’s flesh to face them, but fall to sword and spell and scythe as if they were an afterthought, slicking the ground around themselves with remnants of their dying. After the cheers and murmurs fade, a gnawing silence fills the air, thick and dank and hungry, and for a moment, no one moves, a huddled mass of godhood waiting for something to happen.

Then Rovagug is everywhere—suddenly, impossibly. Rending, clawing, tearing open, shoveling exalted flesh into his waiting mouths. Apsu’s wing is torn asunder. Hei Feng’s feathers fall like rain. Grandmother Spider holds her own, her arms a whirling blur of blades, but watches as Thamir falls still, body crushed beneath a claw, and Hanspur drowns a second time, awash in his own blood. But Rovagug, despite his power, cannot overcome them all, and soon the tide of battle changes, rattling the prison’s walls as gods press their advantages, slamming his body side to side—an endless, rhythmic dying.

With each impact on the Dead Vault’s walls, Golarion is shaken. Buildings tumble into streets. Rivers shift to find new banks. Old trees flatten forests. Volcanoes long thought dormant, from Taldor to the Five Kings Mountains, spit dense ash into the sky, blanketing the life around them and blocking out the sun. The Eye of Abendego expands twofold, turning the Mwangi Expanse into newly Sodden Lands. When Rovagug is finally still, Sarenrae standing by his head with her arms held high in victory, the gods emerge from the Dead Vault to find a world that thinks the end has come.

After all the dead are mourned, no one agrees on what comes next. The aftermath grows tense and bitter, victory turned vicious. With Rovagug no threat to them, godly alliances feel heavier, a burden to be shrugged off or set down and ignored. How to rebuild a ruined land becomes the stuff of smaller wars—Abadar feuds with Erastil, Irori shuns Iomedae, Sarenrae feels the weight of blame hurled at her from every corner, and Norgorber sides with anyone who might advance his cause. But while they bicker here and now, the gods may yet unite again, as deep in Avistani soil, disturbed by distant tremors, the worst of Rovagug’s spawn have felt their prison falter and ready for destruction that would make their sire proud.

While imprisoned, Rovagug maintains the peace between the gods, but in his absence, what prevents war between the immortals?

---

That is certainly one way to end things. If I am being honest, the idea of Rovagug trapped within the bowels of Golarion has always made me a bit nervous, but it seems it may be better than the alternative! Which gives me one final idea as to why these prophecies exist—perhaps they argue against change and tell those who read them that, even for those gods whom you might fear or hate, the status quo is better than anything new that you might long for—a desperate version of a wish that, no matter what they have seen coming, it would be best for things to continue as they are. Sadly for the author, change, I believe, is inevitable. I hope only that we are ready and that we meet it, heads held high and wings outstretched, however and whenever it comes.

Don’t miss our exciting livestream on Tuesday, April 16 at 4:00 PM Pacific at twitch.tv/officialpaizo, where members of the Pathfinder team will announce who among the remaining deities is the unfortunate victim presaged in these prophecies. In addition to revealing which major deity is going to die in the War of Immortals event, we’ll also lay out the entire slate of War of Immortals tie-in products coming in the second half of 2024. Make your final predictions and join us in just under a week.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Hey! It’s your fledgling and greenhorn Rulelord Pete here. If there’s three things to know about me, they’re that I am a consummate GM, I think the next iconic should be a shoony, and I want people to try new games! However, it’s not always that easy. Branching out in our collective hobby requires many people to commit time, money, and energy to sit at a table and engage with unfamiliar rules. There are many who might want to try something new but aren’t able to because they can’t find anyone to play with. If this sounds like you, then there’s hope.

The mods at r/Pathfinder2e saw a need to help bring Pathfinder to new players, and thus Beginner Box Days were born! This year, events will be running between April 13th and April 21st. Using the power of the internet, we have been able to connect new players hungry to try Pathfinder Second Edition with experienced GMs. So, how can you get involved?

RUN A GAME! GMs can register their game at RPGChronicles.net using event code 2716006. Once you set up events for both the Upper and Lower levels, players will be able to join your game starting TODAY! You can run games in your local time zone or even in a non-English language to help introduce the next generation of Pathfinder players to the game. Just make sure to get a Beginner Box module version for your VTT of choice or request a FREE PDF copy from Paizo through our form at BeginPF2.com.

PLAY A GAME! Starting TODAY players can register themselves for both levels of Paizo’s remastered Beginner Box adventure: Menace under Otari! Each level is designed to slowly introduce the player to important aspects of the game, from combat to skills to puzzles! The Upper Level is the starter level, where you’ll investigate Tamily Tanderveil’s basement to investigate who (or what) is stealing her fish. This level is best for people who are brand new to playing Pathfinder or any TTRPG. The Lower level introduces more challenges as you begin to uncover the menace under the logging town of Otari, putting your new skills to the ultimate test! Players can play one level, or both, by finding a slot that matches their availability and signing up on BeginPF2.com.

EARN SOCIETY CREDIT! Both GMs and players can earn society credit that you can use on your first official character. The Beginner Box is played in Adventure Mode so you can try any class or ancestry that your GM will allow, or play any of Paizo’s remastered pregenerated characters if you just want to get rolling! To earn society credit, simply add your Paizo Organized Play number on RPGChronicles when you create or sign up to a game. We will be reporting all sessions, but it is not necessary to join Pathfinder Society to participate in Beginner Box Days.

Paizo has also given us a stack of vouchers we’ll be raffling off to players and GMs, which we’ll distribute after all games are reported. Also, Rise of the Rulelords podcast and Team + Publishing are giving away 3 physical remastered Beginner Boxes, and Team + will be raffling away bundles of their best-selling class expansions! So don’t wait! Begin your next adventure, or help someone start their own at BeginPF2.com!

Guest Blog From:

Rulelord Pete
Beginner Box Days Organizer

As I near the end of my review of the Godsrain Prophecies, I’m reaching the part of any research project that’s the most daunting—the conclusion. While it will of course be up to my Lady to decide what, if anything, to do with these prophecies, I plan to present her with the two or three reasons for their existence that I believe are the most plausible (other than them all being true, which I maintain is nearly impossible).

Unfortunately, this need for clarity means that I must dismiss (or at least deemphasize) one of the more exciting ideas I have come up with thus far: that these are a collection of the gods’ fears. I have noted throughout these pages that there are responses to the gods’ deaths in each of the prophecies that seem out of character, either for the other gods or their followers, but I don’t believe this lack of consistency is due to these being reflections of what a god would worry over. In truth, I am not sure that gods fear anything at all. Is fear not driven by a sense of mortality, or at least, the potential for one’s role in the world to change or end at a moment’s notice? I wonder if, instead, the “prophecies” are intended to help the gods develop fear, to remind them that they are not beyond the reach of death and give them a small taste of mortal terror. Though to what end, I do not know. Who would want to give a god a nightmare?

–Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

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The “Death” of Irori

Irori is not one for dying. Death is common. Death is normal. Death is there for mortals who have not yet mastered how to reach new levels of perfection, who have not willed themselves into attaining the divine. Death might take some weaker god if given the right circumstances, starting with those cheaters who let the Starstone grant them power, grabbing godhood like some prize for drunks and thieves and zealots. But for a god like him, who’d worked and willed himself to godhood? Death is something of the past and he is moving forward.

Irori’s never rested long, no matter his successes. There’s always some new path to take at any well-earned milestone, some new technique to master, some new knowledge to find. Yes, it was good to be a god, if for no other reason than to share new possibilities with those who’d turn their will toward doing better with their lives. But he is one of many gods—some virtuous, some indolent—and so there must be something more, some way that he can still evolve. Some new route toward perfection.

Irori works with diligence, the way that he has always done, reaching beyond the world he’s known to better what he has become. Until one day, he grasps it all—the spaces in the sum of things, the power in the truth of everything that was or will be. And though total enlightenment is only for a moment, slipping between his fingers like a cloud of windblown sand, he still can feel the barrier between himself and something more, as pliable and thin as what once kept him from divinity. While he has it in his reach, he passes through the boundary, as bracing and as easy as a step through falling water. Irori, once a mortal, is now much more than deity.

Irori savors everything, if only for a moment. He takes a breath in every plane, his heartbeat now a multiverse, and feels the coursing power as it crashes through his veins. But he has departed our reality, has left a tear along the border of the way of things, and everything, on every plane, begins to shift toward him, as if he were a beacon for something within the Great Beyond—a single life, a single god, become a singularity. Gruhastha is the first to fall, the Keeper’s arms stretched uselessly, hands grasping at the emptiness he finds beside Irori’s feet. He’s swallowed by a void that somehow still contains a multitude, his body torn asunder in a bright and blissful darkness, his lips mouthing his gratitude, his throat choking on screams.

Irori is a magnet now, pulling those closest to him; Chaldira’s luck lost in a cry while Magrim’s runes go tumbling, some force dragging them both to places even he can’t follow. All he can do is close the gap before it sunders everything, using the power that he holds, still far beyond what it once was, to fix whatever he has done (or is doing or one day will, time half-unraveling in his hands). As he repairs the barrier, still dripping with the power that he touched from passing through it, Zon-Kuthon comes to stand beside him, image of the blinding void reflected in his longing eyes, and Nethys tries to touch the power nestled just beneath his skin, hands clawing unknown patterns of magic in the air. Both soon become his shadows, hounding every move he tries to make, Zon-Kuthon chasing memories and Nethys seeking answers, with Torag always close behind, holding his brother Magrim’s blade with vengeance on his mind. Some of Irori’s followers also trail behind him; those who were deep in prayer at the moment that he moved beyond, unable to unsee the void, dedicate themselves to its return, doing whatever they can to hasten the end of all things.

But Irori has a new path now, divinity left far behind as he masters the power that’s now deep within his bones. He sees things now—beneath the ground, between the breaths, inside the skin—and knows that they will take him where Gruhastha and the rest have gone, that what tore them apart will help him make himself anew. If there are prayers for him to hear, he is no longer listening. If rakshasas take his guise and use his faith to build their power? If Urgathoa’s clerics tell his followers that next time he will end the world and they should eat and drink and die with no thought for tomorrow? How can he care when there’s a new path for him to gain perfection? And if the world unmakes itself, if he had to unmake the world, if that brings him enlightenment, then that’s what it must be.

What lies beyond divinity, and who better than Irori to first achieve such exquisite perfection that he leaves even other gods behind?

---

Well, that was certainly involved. Multiverses? Singularities? Bright voids? And yet, in all of that, I almost see a pattern. I have tried not to reference other prophecies in my notes here; if my Lady chooses to read them out of the original order that I chose, I would hate for her to learn a piece of information in these notes that would be better divulged by the original text. Still, I am reminded of the prophecy regarding Desna, which also mentions a void. And there are similarities between this prophecy and the one for Nethys, not only in their reciprocal mentions but in their fascination with the fundamental properties of our universe. Perhaps instead of looking at the prophecies individually, I should be looking for these types of commonalities—could things that are repeated be elements of some underlying message, or a hint as to what among these “prophecies” might be true amidst the overstatements and suppositions? If there was ever a time to make a chart, that time is upon us.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Salutations! It’s me, Luis Loza! I am saddened to say that we are at the end of our draconic journey. Last week, we took a look at the mighty and benevolent empyreal dragons. This week, we close out our exploration of dragons by looking into the crystal ball and revealing the mysterious omen dragons. Let’s have a look!

Illustration by Kent Hamilton

Omen dragons are tied to the occult tradition, granting them strange powers. In the case of omen dragons, those powers are connected to prophecy and fortune-telling. Although proper prophecy no longer works in the world, short-term fortunes like those explored via augury still function. Beyond that, fortunes become less accurate, but might still have nuggets of truth within them. It’s these short- to medium-length fortunes in which an omen dragon dabbles.

Every omen dragon is constantly seeing glimpses of possible futures. These dragons’ occult nature compels them to share what they see with the relevant parties, regardless of the people involved or the nature of the future glimpsed. The dragon usually shares this future through their prophetic wings. An omen dragon’s wings have a reflective inner portion that is much like a mirror. The dragon can use their ability to allow another person to glimpse their future, sometimes months into the future, within the wings. Since an omen dragon has no other information beyond what it shares in the glimpse, they leave the task of deciphering the vision and dealing with the future to the people involved.

Omen dragons have a number of additional abilities tied to the fate and prophecy. Every omen dragon is unbound by the restrictions of fate, making them immune to fortune and misfortune effects except when the omen dragon chooses to be subject to them. They can also twist the immediate future to force misfortune on foes who attempt to attack the dragon. Even the breath weapon of an omen dragon is tied to fate and future. An omen dragon’s breath grants victims a small taste of an omen dragon’s power, inundating the victim with countless visions of possible futures that can overwhelm.

As they’re always seeing these future glimpses, omen dragons often collect items and treasures related to the future. Omen dragon hoards tend to be smaller than that of a typical dragon, but most omen dragons maintain several hoards at once. Most of these hoards hold items of some future importance, such as a weapon that will strike down a great power or a relic that can save an entire village. People who want or need these items can speak with the dragon in an attempt to claim the items, but doing so can be a difficult feat!

That’s the omen dragon, and with that we’ve finished our look at all the dragons in Monster Core! The book has been out for a few days now and I’m sure some of you reading this already had access to your PDFs or received your physical copies and learned about the omen dragon. In a way, you got to see the future before others, making you not unlike an omen dragon! I want to thank everyone who followed these draconic previews and I hope you’ve had a good time reading them. Also, special thanks to Kent Hamilton for his incredible work and being a great collaborator in helping create these dragons. These dragons wouldn’t be what they are without him!

As the author for the new dragons, I’ve been excited to talk about them, but I’m more excited to hear how everyone uses them in their games. I look forward to exciting stories in the months and years to come!

One of the theories that I intend to run by my Lady in my compilation of these so-called Godsrain Prophecies is that they may be warnings of some kind. This is a relatively new addition to my admittedly large list of potential reasons for their existence, which range from sensible hypotheses to outlandish theories, including one recent concern that this has all been a test by my Lady to discern whether I am trustworthy and analytical enough to handle some of her more complex research needs. I know she would never do such a thing, in truth, but after a particularly vivid dream (involving my being back in one of Lorminos’s classes and asked to deliver a talk about a research paper I had somehow forgotten to do), my anxiety briefly took hold.

The warning theory is of particular interest to me because it reflects an ongoing scholarly debate about the ability to prevent a true prophecy. As noted in Beyond Aroden (which I believe I have already mentioned in these pages), there are some who believe in the Fate’s Chain theory, which holds that any action taken to prevent a foretelling only hastens its speed and effects. Conversely, others believe that all prophecy presents the opportunity to exert free will. In the words of one notorious scholar, “those who lie down in front of the hooves of prophecy instead of taking the reins of their lives deserve to be trampled to dust, even if only metaphorically.” Fiery words, and ones I am not sure I believe, but given the gravity of this particular set of prophecies, I do like the idea that this might be an opportunity to shift the course of the future.

–Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

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The Death of Desna

The thing about journeys, especially the good ones, was how easy it was to lose track of the past. Hard to move forward while looking behind you. Desna had always believed that. Each new night, each new step, had something new to offer up—a bit of knowledge to excite her, a dark horizon to invite her, a way for love to keep her grounded as she wandered from place to place.

But something else was out there. A threat that she’d forgotten from the void between the stars, seeking only to expand its brutal, ceaseless silence. Not an enemy that could be caught or stopped forever, but something she’d held at bay as it consumed star after star, by making them anew as she had done since the beginning. Back then she’d set the stars like jewels, each a perfect piece of art, and now they were a chorus that only she could truly hear, gentle bells that softly chimed and brought new hope to dreamers.

Except with so much journeying, she’d let the task slide down her list, forgetting to replace the stars that steadily winked out. She hadn’t heard their quiet ringing slowly growing quieter, as something more than silence brought new fury to its form. And by the time it reached her ear, that music wasn’t quite as rich, and starlight twinkled that much less, and butterflies flapped weakly. Absence had turned to abscess turned to deep vulnerability, and what was of the past became the killer of the present. In one fell swoop of emptiness, no longer held back by her lights, something of the Dark Tapestry she thought she’d left behind took her and Cynosure as one, and with her all the stars that filled the skies above Golarion.

Desna was loved by many, and all stepped up to play a part and try to build a new world in the space left by her death. Cayden Cailean raised cups “to Desna and to freedom” (though he stayed still for many months, sometimes with Kurgess by his side, drinking to his memories and running up his tab). Shelyn offered welcome to those who sang in Desna’s name, collecting songs and poems so she would not be forgotten. (And when they sounded out of tune, as if something was missing, she called them Desnal melodies and blessed those who repeated them, ignoring art’s new promise for the haunting elegies). Sarenrae sought her vengeance but had no one to strike out against, and so she turned to healing in its place (by never letting hurt inside, and building walls around her heart she dared Shelyn to climb).

No one could prove the daytime light was any different than before, but even on the fairest day, there was something in the air—a stagnant sort of thickness that weighed upon the spine. Scouts moved slowly, and travelers lingered though they knew to hurry (to get themselves to safety long before the starless night). With no means by which to navigate, sailors called off voyages, reduced to tiny odysseys that kept the shore in sight. And while the feeling dissipated, slowly easing day by day, everything about the world felt dormant for a time.

Even as the pace picked up, no stars returned to fill the sky. At night, only the moon shone down, and paths forward could change in ways unlucky and impossible; more often did travelers disappear from the shadowed roads ahead. And while some blamed her ancient nemesis, Ghlaunder, who was emboldened by Desna’s demise, or Zon-Kuthon, who reveled in the new depth of the darkness, only Desna would have known that what killed her waited, determining its next advance, growing in the spaces left within a starless night.

Do the stars and their keeper, Desna, truly protect the Universe from some fell threat that hides in the darkness beyond them? May the stars shine forever, if so!

---

The Dark Tapestry? It has been some time since I thought about that void of space, which has long been reported to be the home of godlike beings far beyond my comprehension. Maybe this is why I am the most intrigued about Desna’s seeming knowledge of the place and its dangers. It is the first I am hearing of a potential connection, though that may simply be because I do not attend the right discussion groups. Whether or not this prophecy turns out to be true (or, again, maybe a warning that my Lady might be able to give to Desna to prevent this outcome), I will add a note about the possible link between Desna and the Dark Tapestry to my collected papers covering her works as a deity. I am not sure when or if I will have the time to publish any of the works I have begun to write, or if there will be room in my papers for all of the data I now have, but I am glad that I have at least begun collecting information. If these prophecies make nothing else completely clear, my own takeaway is this: it is important to understand what you know (and don’t) about the gods.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Something that I have been mulling over for some time (but have yet to mention in these annotations) is the naming of the Godsrain Prophecies. By the time I first heard of them, they had already been given that title, but nothing I have read so far has given me any indication as to how or why. Personally, I would never presume to name a collection of this potential impact and importance without a very clear reason, lest I end up in a repeat of the Fatal Four disaster. (To think that one scribe’s decision to include a bit of wordplay in their recounting of a minor historical prophecy would lead to not one but two assassinations is truly beyond the pale!) Issues like this are the reason that Lorminos insisted I read Notorious Names and Narrative Novelties: Navigating the Nuance of Nomenclature early on in my studies (a book that could easily have been 150 pages instead of over 700, in my personal opinion). While I must make reading these prophecies a priority, I will also endeavor to track down the origin of the word Godsrain. For one thing, it is possible there was a mistaken transcription somewhere along the line. Perhaps they should instead be known as the God’s Reign Prophecies, alluding to the end of a specific god’s reign? It is something to at least consider.

–Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

---

The “Death” of Zon-Kuthon

Shelyn has tried countless times to touch the heart of Zon-Kuthon, but in the end her music is what dooms the Midnight Lord. He’s long ignored his sister’s tears, no matter how they stream or pool, collecting any that he can and using them as salt to rub into followers’ wounds. Her pleading declarations he considers almost background noise, a counterpoint that makes the pain that echoes through the Netherworld sound that much more divine. But when she finds the beauty in the way his Kuthites scream and whimper, weaves together suffering into a string of rousing chords, builds melodies from dripping blood and rhythms from a clanging chain? Only she could find the art in all the suffering he wields, a dulcet murmuring that calls out from an orchestra of pain. Dou-bral, brother, I love you still. Dou-bral, come back to me.

With newfound strength, Dou-bral returns, soul breaking through its cage of bones and kicking out the usurper who’d lived beneath his skin. But even free he’s trapped inside a body built for cruelty, his face a mask of agony that tells a brutal story—scars and cries and sharpened blades, blood and tears and pain. The anguish he has known and caused, the torment Zon-Kuthon embraced—how can he reconcile himself with all he now remembers? He tries to flee back to his cell, to turn back into what he was, but Zon-Kuthon is memory now and only he remains.

Dou-bral can feel divinity like sparks beneath his fingertips, but with all that he’s done and been, he cannot now reward himself and let himself play god. He takes the power in his hands (so good now at destroying things) and rips it from his very being, leaving something more than man but less than deity. He stumbles from the Netherworld, his ears ringing with tortured screams (most of which are not his own), and makes his way to Pangolais, as if Zon-Kuthon’s capital will help him understand the things his other self has done. And when Shelyn walks next to him, her arm outstretched in kindness, the glaive she’d taken from him offered up with open hands, he turns his back and walks away, her music souring in his ears, reminding him of every chain he used to break their father.

Art and beauty pay a price for all that Shelyn’s sacrificed—the nightmares that disturbed her rest as she crafted a song of pain, the knowledge that Dou-bral is back but still wrapped up in suffering, the loss she feels from victory that’s nothing like she’d hoped. In theaters and galleries, on stage and page and instrument, creative minds start struggling—the colors dim, the music fades, the movements don’t flow smoothly—and lovers’ disillusions grow as nothing feels the way it was, until the disappointment drives some life-long pairs apart, an echo of a sadness that she cannot seem to shake.

Dou-bral’s other flesh and blood, the spirit-wolf turned Prince in Chains, roams the grounds of Xovaikain, trying to fill the absence that his son has left behind. But for all his vicious howling, what is left of Thron is not a god, and soon two new contenders come with plans to claim the Netherworld—Asmodeus who wants to bring new pain to the unworthy, adding a few new items to the tools he has for torment, and Iomedae, who seeks to free the souls still left within the realm, turning their search for pain into a sacrifice for glory. Neither willing to back down, they fortify positions, preparing for a battle that will change the Netherworld.

Far from the squabbling of the gods, Dou-bral travels through Nidal, hoping that he will find some path to redemption. Instead, he watches Cheliax, no longer held by ancient pact to stay within its borderlines, begin to take Nidalese lands, while members of the Umbral Court each claim to be Zon-Kuthon’s heir and stab each other in the back to claim his legacy.

Is the tainting of love and beauty worth Shelyn’s sacrifice if the shadow her brother’s replacement leaves behind remains to darken the world?

---

I will be completely honest here: Zon-Kuthon terrifies me! Always has. And yet this prophecy wasn’t scary at all. At least not to me. My Lady, I know, fears little, but I have been feeling the whole set of emotions during these annotations—terrified one minute and smiling the next. I truly thought I would be shivering after reading this, but I think I feel more sad than anything. Miss Shelyn trying so hard to free her brother and achieving her goal, only for him to reciprocate no love? It almost reminds me of my role in collecting these prophecies. I have wanted to be a part of something big to show my Lady how I can be of help to her for some time, and yet that means collecting a group of so-called prophecies that could be devastating in the wrong hands. It is odd to think of the gods having the same types of problems that the rest of us sometimes do. We revere them, and yet, especially as I read these prophecies, they seem more… mortal somehow? Or not. I hope that doesn’t sound too disrespectful. Best to leave this line of thought behind and move on to the next prophecy.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Greetings! Luis Loza, here! We’re just about done with our draconic tour of Pathfinder Monster Core. Last time, we took a look at the horned dragon, a remastered take on the green dragon of yore. This time around, we’re taking a peek at a brand-new design by checking out the empyreal dragon. Let’s have a look!

Divine Empyreal Dragon Design by Kent Hamilton

Around May of last year, we shared a preview for the diabolic dragon (the first dragon preview blog!). We are only just now getting around to their divine counterparts, the empyreal dragons. These dragons are connected to the plane of Heaven. They’re majestic beings with large, powerful frames and golden scales. Unsurprisingly, their divine nature grants them a breath that unleashes spirit damage with holy sanctification.

Their most noticeable feature is the golden halo that rests above their heads. This halo radiates an inspiring aura that grants allies benefits to saving throws and skills checks. Depending on the power of the empyreal dragon, the dragon can make use of additional abilities that originate from this halo. Some empyreal dragons can create a healing pulse that restores other creatures within the aura’s area. Others use their divine power to push creatures away. Particularly powerful empyreal dragons can even impose a mental burden on creatures in the area, causing them to become slowed. Thankfully, an empyreal dragon chooses who is or isn’t affected by these abilities so they can strategically help allies and hinder foes. The dragon can also deploy the halo, directing it to a nearby area and causing the aura to move with it. This allows an empyreal dragon to help or hinder from afar while focusing on a separate part of the battlefield.

All of these abilities complement empyreal dragons’ benevolent natures. They are compassionate beings who go out of their way to protect others. They even make their lairs particularly accessible, knowing that nearby innocents might someday make use of the treasures within. It’s not unlikely for an empyreal dragon’s lair to contain a multitude of magical armaments so that nearby innocents can stumble upon them in times of need.

That’s our look at the empyreal dragon! We’re just about finished with our look at the dragons from Monster Core, which releases in just a few weeks. We have one last dragon to preview for everyone. As has been foretold, we will take a look at the omen dragon in our final blog. See you then!

Luis Loza
Creative Director, Rules & Lore

We continue our look at the creatures filling the pages of Pathfinder Monster Core with this chilling encounter from Adam Daigle, featuring a first look at the remastered ghoul and Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Showtime Multi-Pack.

Massacre on the Hill — Severe 3

This encounter takes place in the small town of Navendale at the base of the Aspodell Mountains in Andoran not far from the Cheliax border. Your PCs could be passing through town or restocking and relaxing between adventures. Navendale is small, but it gets a fair number of travelers. One of the draws is the Red Rose Refuge, a popular lodge perched high on a rocky peak overlooking the town. The Refuge, as the locals call it, is known for having musicians play nearly every night, and tonight the famed Brastlewark Trio are performing.

The PCs are in the town square below when a stableboy comes running down the steep road to the Refuge shouting for any attention he can gather. He heads straight for the PCs and says, “Hey! You! You gotta help! It’s real bad up there!” If he’s calmed and asked what’s going on, he continues, “I was working in the stables brushing the horses when all of a sudden they got spooked, and then a real bad stink rose up. I nearly urped; smelled like when you stumble across a dead goat out on the mountainside. Then I heard all the yelling and screaming. A couple people stumbled out into the snow all bloody. You gotta get up there and do something!”

The PCs can run up the steep road and get to the Refuge in about two minutes. When the PCs arrive, the first thing they encounter is a stench of death carried on the cold spring wind. The Refuge’s door hangs open and the sounds of gruff voices, sobbing cries, and violence spill from the doorway. Inside, tables sit askew, and chairs are sprawled out on the floor amid broken pottery mugs and shattered glass. Over a dozen bodies lie slumped and bloody on the floor.

Map: This map showcases a portion of the upcoming Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Showtime Multi-Pack, out next month on Paizo.com or your local hobby store!

Creatures: Forced from their warrens, this group of ghouls has been wandering the countryside to find a new home. They’ve also grown hungry, and instead of hunting in town, they decided to target the remote Red Rose Refuge. They slinked out of the woods, passing by the stables before entering the Refuge.

They immediately attacked anyone they could reach, killing a dozen staff and patrons before cornering the frightened gnome singers on the stage. Three of the ghouls have the performers restrained while they whisper into their ears using Ghoul Whispers, while the other three are feeding on their fresh kills so they can use Grave Knowledge to help them find new warrens under an old boneyard. As the PCs enter the room, all six turn their attention to the door and bare their teeth.

---

Ghoul Stalkers (6) — Creature 1

Medium, Ghoul, Undead, Unholy

Perception +7; darkvision
Languages Common, Necril
Skills Acrobatics +7, Athletics +8, Stealth +7, Survival +5

Str +1, Dex +4, Con +1, Int +1, Wis +2, Cha +2
AC 17; Fort +4, Ref +9, Will +5
HP 16, void healing; Immunities bleed, death effects, disease, paralyzed, poison, unconscious

Stench (aura, olfactory) 10 feet; A creature entering the aura or starting its turn in the area must succeed at a DC 14 Fortitude save or become sickened 1 (plus slowed 1 as long as it’s sickened on a critical failure). A creature that succeeds at its save or recovers from being sickened is temporarily immune to all stench auras for 1 minute.

Speed 25 feet, burrow 5 feet

Melee [one-action] jaws +9 (finesse), Damage 1d8+1 piercing

Melee [one-action] claw +9 (agile, finesse), Damage 1d6+1 slashing plus Grab)

ConsumeFlesh [one-action] (manipulate); Requirements The ghoul is adjacent to the corpse of a creature that died within the last hour; Effect The ghoul devours a chunk of the corpse and regains 1d6 Hit Points. It can regain Hit Points from any given corpse only once.

ForbiddenCravings (curse) SavingThrow Will, using the high spell DC for the ghoul’s level (GM Core 121); Stage 1 carrier with no ill effects (1 day); Stage 2 2d6 void damage and the target is sickened 1 until it consumes raw meat (1 day); Stage 3 as stage 2; Stage 4 as stage 2 unless the target has consumed raw meat in the past 24 hours, then it takes 4d6 void damage and is sickened 2 until it consumes raw meat; Stage 5 if the creature has eaten raw meat in the past 24 hours, it dies and rises as a ghoul, if not, it returns to stage 4

GhoulWhispers [one-action] (auditory, linguistic, occult) Requirement A grabbed, paralyzed, restrained, or unconscious creature is within the ghoul’s reach; Effect The ghoul whispers dark thoughts and vile cravings into the creature’s ears. The creature must save (DC 17) against the forbidden cravings curse.

GraveKnowledge (occult) Frequency once per hour; Effect The ghoul calls upon knowledge it retains from one creature it has consumed in the past 7 days. The ghoul attempts a skill check using a skill in which the consumed creature was trained (if it’s unclear whether the creature was trained, the GM decides). The ghoul is treated as trained and uses a +7 skill modifier. This takes the same amount of actions or time as usual for the check.

The ghoul can instead automatically learn something specific known by a creature it consumed in the last 7 days, like the location of a hidden treasure or the name of a loved one. The ghoul can do this only once for a given creature, no matter how much of its flesh the ghoul consumed.

SwiftLeap [one-action] (move) The ghoul jumps up to half its Speed. This movement doesn’t trigger reactions.

As I continue reading through the Godsrain “prophecies,” I have begun to develop a troubling new theory about their origin. I will admit up front that this idea may seem more in line with one of those Another Absalom tales of spies and skullduggery than a scholarly review (though I have always believed that those tales should be studied for their ability to keep the reader’s attention, something we researchers often do not do as successfully as we would like!), but I’ve noticed that several of the prophecies seem to strike at the core of what many think about the divine. This is not to say that gods cannot die, or falter, or fail in some way, but the more I read these documents, the more I can imagine negative outcomes that I might once have dismissed as distant possibilities. What if this is deliberate?

Perhaps the author of these works is no prophet at all, but someone who seeks to weaken what we understand of divinity. I am not certain who or what would seek that as an outcome, but any entity that benefits from faltering faith is one that cannot have the best interests of Golarion at heart. Still, if I am being candid, the thought of some mysterious villain appeals to me more than it probably should. Perhaps I simply wish to find a reason for these prophecies outside of any potential truth I might find in their pages. Or perhaps I have stumbled onto a workable theory. I will note the thought, but only as one of many I might bring to my Lady. False comfort can too often be found within visions of conspiracy.

–Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

---

The Death of Nethys

Mind. Matter. Spirit. Life. Four essences. Four building blocks. Four cornerstones whose intersections shape the way that magic works. And in that four, two pairs that are too different to be joined together. Matter never blends with Spirit; Mind and Life remain apart. Nethys knows the truth of this, but never quite believes it fully. (Is he not the proof that there is power in duality?)

As the centuries progress, he keeps returning to this quandary, tells himself that he alone can meld the two opposing pairs. He can be the font of knowledge. He can give the world new magic. He can take the contradictions, put them through a transformation. He can start two new traditions. Mind and Body. Heart and Soul.

Does he succeed? Perhaps he does. Perhaps he stands awash with pride, his fingers trembling at the feeling, ready to share something of the magic he has wrought. But if he feels triumphant, it is only for a moment—a breath of jubilation as he soaks himself in magic, followed by a cry of horror as his body falls apart. Nethys, by sheer will and power, holds himself together briefly, fractures crawling down his arms, breaking him to pieces like a chunk of splintered glass. He remains alive just long enough to see the power of his folly, spreading from his fingers to the very building blocks of magic, tearing them asunder as his body turns to ash.

In an instant, magic changes—bends and rips and stretches thin, settling like a shredded cloth pulled tight across the world. Where it is torn, all magic ceases. Long-held items lose their power. Spells are nothing more than words. Spellcasters within these hollows lose all tether to their magic, even if they only cross the boundary in the aftermath. Some regain their skills with time, but others never quite recover, every magic word they utter turned to dust between their lips. Some don’t even make it that far, dying when the magic ends, falling from the skies above, losing shields that keep them safe, gulping down a healing potion turned to flavored water.

At first, the new uncertainty inspires mass devotion, but there is little solace from the other gods. Pharasma asks for a report. Irori swears to make it right. Their followers still cannot cast a single spell within the hollows. And those who lose the taste for magic, prayers dying in their mouth? They do not seem to gain a thing from all their dedication.

For those who never cared for magic, hollows are a place of refuge, leveling the playing field in favor of the fist and sword. Many flock who follow Nethys, loyal to his knowledge still, believing this to be some test that leads them to a new reward.

Many on Golarion relocate from their hollowed homes, fearing what it means to lose the magic in their lives. But travel is no easy thing, not even with the scout and map and herbal kits (now free of magical augmentations) that have become requirements for any trip outside. Rumors abound of hidden dangers scattered through the Great Beyond: places where the magic varies, strong one day and weak the next, turning one night’s cantrip to the morning’s deadly strike; villages consumed by all the magic stolen from the world, drowning in a power they have no way to unmake.

Magic is so fundamental to our reality that the thought of its absence or unreliability on a multiplanar scale is nearly as unfathomable as the concept of Nethys’s own ambition being magic’s undoing!

Magic has never been among my preferred subjects to study, but I now wish I’d learned more of it! It would help me to properly evaluate what, if anything, within this prophecy is truly feasible. Could one death (even the death of a god) create this level of chaos within such a fundamental part of life? This prophecy seems to indicate that magic is forever changed by Nethys’s actions, but even a disaster of the magnitude described seems unlikely to change fundamental principles of magic (a statement I would be much more convinced of were I sure that I fully understood them). While I doubt that this prophecy would come true, I am now curious if there are any projects that Nethys has undertaken that might lead to his attempting something on this scale. Perhaps I judged too quickly, and these are less dastardly plot than desperate warning? I need more information to be sure.

---

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

One interesting line of thought that I have yet to formally consider goes beyond the question of whether these “prophecies” should be considered equally as a whole to whether the whole of each of them should be equally considered. If, for example, I dismiss the effects of a particular god’s supposed death, does this mean that I am dismissing their prophesied death altogether? Does every part of a prophecy have to come true for it to be considered prophetic? If the vast majority proves true, what is wrong could be an error of translation, interpretation, or prophetic understanding. On the other hand, if most of a prophecy is false, what is accurate is likely a lucky guess. The Windsong Corollaries never reach this sort of sentence-level consideration (a gap that I might perhaps publish a small paper in when my Lady does not need me, so long as I keep things strictly theoretical). I expect a reading of Beyond Aroden: Failed Foretelling in the Age of Prophecy is in short order to establish a bit of a baseline, but it will be up to my Lady (with my assistance, I hope!) to determine what level of possibility and accuracy any of these must have to be fully considered a work of prophecy.

–Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

---

The Death of Erastil

Erastil runs. Gallops really. Hoof over hoof, his antlers gleaming, bounding over shallow stream and whirling under tree branch, his body flying forward in a streak of joyous motion. He cannot always be the stag, but there are times he needs to run and feel the wind across his legs, familiar as the dawn but as new as any sunrise. He runs until he’s just past tired and ready for a drink of water, shaking leaves from antlers in a spray of autumn colors and transforming back into the form his followers are used to—horned head and wiry body of an age-old master hunter.

But he is not the only age-old creature resting in this wood. Something emerges, slowly, from a refuge it has tired of, assorted sharp and fleshy parts dragging its pouch of hunger up from somewhere down below. Even Erastil’s well-trained eyes do not quite see it slowly crawling, clawing onto haunch and belly, drawing closer to the god and waiting for the perfect moment. Not until the instant that it rises up to strike.

Erastil runs. Scrambles really. Step after step, bow at the ready, preparing even as he flees, trampling through a clutch of bushes, plunging through the river’s cold, trying to stay ahead until he whirls around to face what hunts him, show it that he’s unafraid. But there are things that even Old Deadeye has no defense against. And when that something catches him, its jaw wide and devouring, it turns what once was hunting god to nothing more than helpless prey, only stopping its ravaging to marvel at the flavor. There’s something here it’s never savored, in between the crunch and squelch—divinely filling in a way that it has never known before and now can never be without. Once it has consumed its meal and all that’s left is bits of bone, it scents the air and twists its body, reveling in the aftertaste of something past mortality, and lurches through the undergrowth to find another morsel.

Followers of Erastil who felt his blessings fade track his remaining footprints to the place he fought and fell. (There’s luck in that, or Jaidi’s hand, steady despite a widow’s grief, putting firm hands against their backs until they find whatever place his hint of dust remains.) A hunt is called, a holy ride, in honor of the fallen god, to track and take whatever beast has left their altars bare. But all they find across their path are other grieving worshippers whose gods (most small in name and reach, their purpose only known by handfuls) now are merely carcasses, devoured by some wretched beast that no one ever glimpses. The Hunters offer shelter and a purpose to these wanderers, and some find comfort in the endless chase across the Great Beyond, even as they never seem to find the subject of their search. Whatever killed Erastil, whatever hunts the other gods, is always hidden from their view, is always one quick turn away, is always adding to the trail of carnage just ahead.

The gods take notice of the beast, each readying their own defense. Some draw together, forming pacts and promising to shield each other—the radiance of the Dawnflower reaches the realm of the Midnight Lord, Norgorber and Iomedae draw swords with Cayden Cailean, the half-abandoned Summerlands fill up with frightened deities—but others use the moment as the perfect time to strike. Gorum turns on the cowardly and sharpens blades against their backs, Asmodeus carves clauses into those he has a contract with, Calistria builds safety from the ashes of revenge. Pantheons rise and fall and splinter in the shadow of the beast, endlessly repositioning even when it has gone to ground, its hunger sated only briefly every new time that it feeds.

Among the mortals, fear takes root as one god or another falls, and those who live are sometimes absent, too caught up in safety to give followers their strength. Some flourish in these absences that gods might once have kept in check, selling hope or cruelty as counters to divinity, creating order from the chaos any way they can. And when the gods grow used to fear and venture back into the world (beast still lurking in the corners, drooling at the prey), some find their temples turned to rubble, dusty from years of disuse, or built over to some new purpose they can barely recognize, and must now find a new path in a half-godless Golarion, even as something in the shadows starts to hunt

When the god of the hunt falls prey to an unknown hunter, what chance do the beast’s other quarries have of avoiding a similar fate?

---

Much as I found it distasteful to read about, I wish this supposed prophecy had gone into greater detail about this “beast” with what I suppose is a taste for divine flesh (a prospect I can barely conceive of, let alone comment on!). While I did attempt to use my rudimentary artistic talents to create some sort of sketch, even my best guess at the appearance of this beast has fallen quite short, as it matches nothing I am currently aware of. Either my skills are not up to the task, the prophecy has purposefully been vague, or this beast has never been seen before. If the latter, this is yet another reason to doubt this prophecy in particular. Anything this powerful would surely be noted in someone’s annals. Beyond that, though, the breakdown of the gods noted here seems very unlikely. In both my studies and experiences of the gods, I have found them to be quite devoted to those who worship them (each in their own way, of course), even when to their own detriment. No matter how horrible the threat, I do not believe mortals would be abandoned in this way, nor that they would abandon their gods in return. Or, at least, I do not wish to believe it. Best, I think, to move on to some new, and hopefully less troubling, prophecy.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Hola! It’s me, Luis Loza! I’ve been taking you through a grand tour of all our new dragons, such as our look at the fortune dragon last time. This time things are a little different. You’ll see what I mean once I start to tell you about the horned dragon. Let’s have a look!

Illustration by Kent Hamilton

One of the challenges with the update to the Second Edition remastered rules was having to leave a lot of old favorites behind. In addition to classic spells, notable magic items, and other memorable mechanics, we also had to leave behind some monsters. Unfortunately, in some cases, a variety of reasons makes leaving behind strigiform-ursine hybrids or cuboid gels the best option for us. There are other cases where a bit of cleaning up and a makeover leads to something we can still use in the new remastered environment. That’s the approach we took with the horned dragon—a dragon who you might previously remember for its focus on the color green.

Horned dragons are our second primal dragon offering in Monster Core. Like other primal dragons, horned dragons are powerful and more bestial than other dragons. This manifests most notably in the form of their massive, paired horns. In addition to simply striking others with their horns, a horned dragon charges their prey and impales these unfortunate victims on the horn. Once impaled, the prey is stuck and goes wherever the dragon goes until the prey manages to escape impalement.

Beyond that, the horned dragon should feel relatively familiar. Their personalities are relatively the same, their other abilities such as their poison breath and twisting tail reaction are still around, and they still generally live in forested regions and swamps. When updating monsters for the remaster, we wanted to make these changes as unintrusive as possible and allow updated monsters to generally fill the same role they had prior to their update.

We also took these opportunities to update monsters in interesting ways where we could, thus the shift from the dragon’s color to their horn and the addition of their impaling charge. The change in focus allows us to make the dragon more of our own and even opens them for future possibilities. While the horned dragon in Monster Core is green and lives in forests, there’s a decent chance you could see a blue horned dragon that lives in a lake or a tan horned dragon that lives in a desert sometime in the future!

That’s our look at the horned dragon! Make sure to keep an eye out for this dragon and lots of other new dragons when Monster Core releases in March. Stay tuned for more draconic previews in the coming weeks. Next time, we’ll take a look at the majestic empyreal dragons. See you then!

Luis Loza
Creative Director, Rules & Lore

Continuing our series of encounters to challenge your players, featuring creatures debuting in the forthcoming Pathfinder Monster Core, Bill Fischer takes us to the dank grotto lair of a remastered sea hag, as depicted in Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Temples Multi-Pack.

Eye for an Eye — Moderate 1

Captain Blazo Orane’s career as a notorious pirate captain was cut short when a freak storm capsized his ship not far from the city of Riddleport. As stubborn as he was cutthroat, Blazo went down with the ship but awakened several hours later to find himself in the cave of a sea hag named Cyclona. The hag had spared Blazo’s life, but in return, she demanded the captain’s eye. Blazo balked, of course—like any good pirate, he only had one eye left to spare. Unfortunately, his captor was in no mood for mercy. Cyclona plucked Blazo’s remaining eye from its socket, leaving the now-blind man to bleed out while she transformed her grisly reward into a hag eye.

Miraculously, Captain Blazo managed to free himself from his shackles—striking Cyclona with his cold-iron scimitar in the struggle—and stumbled his way back to Riddleport. Now, still weakened from his ordeal, Blazo hires the PCs to retrieve his stolen eye. If the PCs express doubts Blazo will regain his sight even if his eye is recovered, the pirate seems unconcerned. “If I can’t have my eye,” he grumbles, “I’ll settle for revenge.” Blazo lends the PCs the only thing of value he has left, his cold-iron scimitar, with the promise they can keep the weapon if they return with his eye or proof that Cyclona is dead.

Map: This map showcases one of the maps included in Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Temples Multi-Pack, out this month on Paizo.com or at your local hobby store!

Approaching the Cave: Cyclona’s cave is a half-day’s walk from Riddleport. If Blazo’s understandably vague directions aren’t enough for the PCs, most anyone in the city can direct them to the place.

The remnants of an ancient sea wall stretch to Cyclona’s cave like a trail of stepping stones. Slick with algae, the wall is uneven ground. Once during the crossing, each PC must make a successful DC 13 Acrobatics check to Balance or fall into the surf. Any PC who fails this check alerts Cyclona to the party’s arrival, granting her a +2 circumstance bonus to initiative. Alternatively, the PCs can approach the hag’s cave along the weed-choked shore to the south. This approach doesn’t require skill checks, but the ground is difficult terrain, and the party’s noisy arrival automatically alerts Cyclona.

Creatures: When the PCs arrive, Cyclona lurks in the northern alcove, admiring an amulet set with a blue gemstone: Captain Blazo’s eye transformed into a hag eye. Loath to surrender her new treasure, Cyclona lunges at intruders, opening with her Dread Gaze before slashing with her claws. The hag remembers all too well the bite of Blazo’s scimitar, granting the PC holding the weapon a +1 circumstance bonus to Demoralize the hag. If reduced to 15 Hit Points or fewer, Cyclona dives into the sea, dropping the hag eye in her panic.

Treasure: The PCs might not recognize Captain Blazo’s eye in its current state, but anyone who interacts with the amulet feels its wet, sticky surface, allowing the character to attempt to disbelieve the illusion (DC 19). Like all hag eyes, the amulet produces no direct benefit for the wearer (and doesn’t restore Blazo’s sight if given to him), but it allows Cyclona to peer through the eye using the Seek action. Any damage dealt to the eye destroys it. If this happens while Cyclona is looking through it, the hag is blinded for 1 hour.

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Sea Hag — Creature 3

Medium, Amphibious, Hag, Humanoid
Perception +10; darkvision
Languages Aklo, Common, Fey, Jotun, Thalassic
Skills Acrobatics +8, Athletics +11, Deception +10, Occultism +8, Stealth +8
Str +4, Dex +3, Con +4, Int +1, Wis +3, Cha +3

Coven A sea hag adds humanoid form, mariner’s curse, and water walk to their coven’s spells. Their spell DC when leading a coven is 20.

AC 19; Fort +11, Ref +8, Will +10; +1 status to all saves vs. magic
HP 45; Immunities polymorph; Weaknesses cold iron 3
Speed 25 feet, swim 35 feet

Melee [one-action] claw +12 (agile, magical), Damage 1d10+4 slashing

Dread Gaze [two-actions] (curse, emotion, fear, mental, occult) The hag gazes upon a creature, afflicting it with a gnawing sense of impending doom, with a result depending on its Will save (DC 20). The target doesn’t need to be able to see the sea hag.

Critical Success The creature is unaffected.
Success The creature is frightened 1.
Failure The creature is frightened 1 and is slowed 1 for 1 round. If the target was dying, it remains unconscious for 1 day. At the end of the day, it must attempt a Fortitude save against the same DC; if it fails, it dies.
Critical Failure As failure, but the creature is frightened 2 and slowed 1 for 1 minute.

Sea Hag’s Bargain (concentrate, exploration, occult, polymorph) The sea hag can make a bargain with a willing creature who must be of sound mind. The creature gives away a special or cherished quality—such as its courage, its beauty, or its voice. In exchange, the sea hag spends 1 minute polymorphing the creature into a form the target desires.

This functions as Change Shape. It might be a total transformation or just changing one or more aspects of the target’s body, and it can’t make the creature more than one size smaller or larger. The creature changes its Speeds as appropriate for the new form. It doesn’t change the attack and damage bonuses with its Strikes, but it might change the damage type the Strikes deal. This has an unlimited duration, and as long as it’s transformed, the creature is sickened 2 and can’t reduce its sickened condition below 2. The creature can slowly and carefully eat and drink despite being sickened. The only way to restore the lost quality used as payment is to defeat the sea hag or make another bargain for its return. Ending the bargain in this way also removes the transformation.

It may seem odd that I have not made any notes within the margins of the prophecies themselves. It is certainly not for lack of opinions, but out of an abundance of caution; some of the most heated debates that I have ever witnessed during my studies dealt with the supposed impartiality of the researcher, with some believing that we should be as unbiased as my fellow psychopomps in their judgments of souls in the Boneyard and others noting that our beliefs influence everything we do, and should be acknowledged and even used within the way we work. The arguments grew heated more than once, and while it cannot be said for sure that they led to what some call “The Dueling Quills Incident,” they certainly caused plenty of frayed nerves.

This particular debate has taken on new meaning for me now, though, in reading of one supposed divine death after another. Maybe it is something I will grow out of one day, but it is hard not to be affected by these, whether I am mourning the potential loss of the Lady I serve or learning of the potential demise of a god I do not care for. I’m not sure I would ever want to view them and feel nothing but analysis. Passion drove me to this work and passion should be part of it—for all I know, that may even have been what brought me to my Lady’s attention. Still, I will present the prophecy with no further comment, and fear that once I have read it fully, even my small bit of glee will dissipate. As always, momentary gains bring unexpected consequences.

—Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

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The Death of Urgathoa

The feast is a sumptuous spread of delights if that’s the sort of thing you like. Piles of sweets and meats and cheeses, decadence on decadence, to celebrate a distant plague gone better than expected. Urgathoa is smiling as the undead shovel down the food, the flavors barely noticed in their urge to sate their hunger. It would all make Arazni sick, if that was still a thing she felt, and if she wasn’t steeled by something greater than revulsion. For all the gods Urgathoa hates, and all who hate her in return, she hasn’t even bothered to secure her own protection, relying on the undead to sniff out any intruder. Except they know Arazni’s scent. A tiny boon from all her years forced into undead servitude, now sharpened to a weapon to take down the god who dared to bring undeath to the unwilling.

Arazni moves in shadow, and if the diners notice, they barely pause their latest gulp to see her blade unsheathe. Urgathoa dies easily, falls lengthwise on the table, face-first into a centerpiece of something rich and juicy. As panic and dismay begin to spread throughout the Bloodrot, Arazni leaves the way she came, a vengeful shadow baring teeth in something like a smile. Divinity is still a thing she’s learning to inhabit, but this almost makes everything she’s suffered seem worthwhile.

Arazni waits, for…something—some rest for those trapped in undeath, some halt to necromantic work, some alteration in what had been a truly loathsome status quo. And there are places in the world where she can see the fruits of her handiwork—the Whispering Way is driven back, Geb’s Blood Lords struggle for control—until the undead start to rise from any perished soul. Not all, but some, begin to turn without a necromancer’s aid, and stagger from their resting places trying to fill their hunger. Without Urgathoa to lend some order to the chaos, some dead stay locked inside their graves, while others now reanimate with no real rhyme or reason, rising from their tombs and slowly crawling off battlefields, horrified and terrified and sometimes all too eager to see what unholy agenda their new bodies can pursue.

In places where undead have always been a threat to life and limb, the champions against them try their best to hold the line, not looking at the faces that are suddenly familiar, comrades-at-arms turned into bodies cut down by their blades. Some look to magic to protect the bodies of the newly-dead, but magic has its limits, and others fall to the horror they once tried to quell. At least they know how to respond, unlike those who are wrapped in grief, only to see a loved one rise as some new transformation. Do you love or do you fear? Do you watch or do you help? Do you wait or do you run and run and keep on running?

Some families go missing now. Some villages are overrun. Some cities bar their crypts and add guard shifts to every other street. Some call undeath a blessing, see the change as nectar from the gods. Some view it as a threat to something they once lived and died for. Others search for patterns, narrow in on who or what is to blame, let something they don’t understand consume their baser instincts, and rain fire down on those they think have brought this new world forth.

Arazni owns what she has done, seeks out the help of other gods, but they know just as little and have found themselves just as besieged, as undeath spreads like the diseases Urgathoa once held dear, refusing to contain itself to one singular plane. And as the numbers slowly rise, a flood that grows by sodden inches, one undead soul at a time from Axis to the Boneyard, some say the Pallid Princess watches from some place beyond undeath, relishing the moment like a feast to truly savor.

The severity of this prophecy ensures that even I, a loyal servant of the Lady of Graves, take no joy in the foretold destruction of the Pallid Princess. May that these prophecies prove untrue!

---

That was, to say the least, unexpected. While the horrors of undead potentially coming from every grave are one thing (and something that I know my Lady will not enjoy, no matter how untrue this prophecy may turn out to be), Arazni’s direct role in this cataclysm is not something I am quite sure how to parse. She has broken free from her centuries of servitude as Geb’s unwilling lich queen, and in so doing attained true divinity, a risen herald. With her newfound power, is she capable of slaying a fellow god? Is this merely one facet of the unreliability of these prophecies? Perhaps I should begin watching Arazni more closely, as some sort of harbinger, a sign that this alone among the prophecies is true? Does she have knowledge of this prophecy, and if not, is this something to warn her of? I will be dusting off my copy of What the Future Holds: The Ethics of Prophecy immediately. In the meantime, my Lady will know what to do with this. All I must do now is move forward.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

While it would require someone with far more expertise to confirm this absolutely, I am now convinced that this set of so-called prophecies are all authored by the same hand. Some of this is due to the handwriting on the documents that have been found in more pristine condition (it is perhaps fitting that a prophecy dedicated to the death of the Lucky Drunk was found on a scrap of parchment that looked like it had been dragged through the floor of more than one tavern), but the rest I attribute both to the places in which they were discovered and, I believe, the rhythm of the writing (though I would be a bit more sure of that if I had read The Peculiarities of Prophetic Speech more closely despite what I believe to be a truly excessive number of footnotes). I am sure that Lorminos knows someone who can confirm my beliefs if needed. That is if, of course, my Lady wants a set of writings so inflammatory to be so widely seen. I am far from convinced of the truth of any of them, and a single author could point as much to a singular troublemaker wishing to create strife as someone with a sudden gift of foresight.

—Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

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The Death of Cayden Cailean

Cayden Cailean had never thought himself a liar. A storyteller, sure, in the tradition of the tavern, where convincing someone of your worth might mean a refilled tankard. Who among his fellow patrons hadn’t added enemies to boost their tale of combat or invented some new twice-trapped room deep within the dungeon of a newly fallen foe? To claim that he’d become a god was more than normal boasting, but he couldn’t quite remember what had happened with the Starstone. Maybe he had passed its test and that was what kept him alive. Maybe he’d become a god and godhood felt no different than mortal existence. Maybe he would take another round of good ale on the house (a thank you from the barkeep for the honor of his presence). Maybe as he told his tale he could almost believe it. At least until the nightly dreams began.

They started off as flashes, tiny moments in the dark of night—a clanging sword that echoed down a long and shadowed hallway, the smell of new-cut marble turned impossibly acrid, the taste of blood and honey in the space behind his tongue. And still, no matter what they were, each vision woke him shuddering—skin drenched in sweat, heart racing wildly, cold breeze crawling up his spine, a voice he’d never heard before that whispered in his eardrums—liar, drunkard, cheater, thief. One day you will pay for this with everything you owe.

Cayden Cailean would never call himself a cheater. How could he know belief alone could make a deity? But every time the story spread that he had passed the Test of Starstone, something shifted in him, brought him that much closer to true divinity. By the time he heard his story chanted like a rowdy prayer, he was every inch the god that he had claimed to be. He did his best to share the gift, empower those who followed him, pass blessings out like cups of drink to those who strived for freedom. But no good deed had earned him pity from the voice that stalked his dreams, a whisper he now recognized as that of the Starstone itself, murmuring about the flask that he kept tight against his waist—forbidden, stolen, holy power. There will be a reckoning.

The flask was Cayden’s property from long before the Starstone, but now it held a draft he’d brought back from the Cathedral—a distillation of the power held within its core. And while he still could not remember what he’d done to make or bring it back, he knew that every sip gave him a taste of the divine. His followers’ convictions may have been the thing that made him a god, but all beliefs grow worn and frayed and faded over time. No matter who believed in him, he knew one thing down to his core: the liquid in his flask was what kept his lie alive.

But every tiny sip of nectar took his dreams on twisted paths, until he dreamt of death in the Cathedral every night. And after he had died each way the Test of Starstone could devise—some with the sound of steel on bone, some with the fall of flesh to floor, some with a bargain on his tongue that faded in a gasping breath—it left him with a final and unalterable verdict: time for you to pay your debt, return to mortal life.

Cayden Cailean had never minded being mortal, but as his story shifted, he mourned his legacy. Word spread, as words are wont to do, of his deceitful rise to grace, and those who’d raised his name in praise could barely muster pity. The innkeepers and brewers he’d counted as his worshipers now barred him from their premises, afraid they would be thought of as complicit in his lie, and soon the one-time god had faded out of public life, so far removed that no one knows quite how and where he died. Some say it happened in an alley, slumped over in the pouring rain, while others claim he died in battle fighting for a righteous cause, or braved the Starstone once again in one last fatal try.

Iomedae and Norgorber, as fellow gods Ascended, both moved to quell the rumors that they had also cheated to obtain divinity—Iomedae appearing on the front lines with her champions in tireless demonstrations of her prowess on the battlefield and Norgorber eliminating each one of his followers who dared to voice dissent or wonder who he used to be. But neither sees the true change that still lurks along the margins, as one after another shop begins to claim that, for a cost, you too can be transformed from mortal life to deity. If all it takes is stories and a liquor no one understands (as noted in a few reports of Cayden’s sad demise), then nothing stops a hundred shops from selling sugar water and a complement of town criers to those who feel that being god is next on their agenda—a warlord here, a despot there, the righteous and the vengeful—and what new revolution might they bring if they do rise?

---

A god created from belief alone? That is both deeply intriguing and somewhat baffling, as this is the first report I’ve read of such an occurrence. Surely if this were truly possible, I’d have encountered it before in my studies. This will require more research, though with what time I will pursue it I know not. It does make me wonder how many believers one might have to acquire to cross the boundary from mortal to god, and whether belief was nearly as important in this case as the Starstone nectar mentioned above. I have no doubt that if someone were able to distill a liquor from a source of pure divine power, it would be Cayden Cailean, but for those of us not blessed with that specific set of skills, I am struck by the idea that you could solve for number of believers and gain divinity simply by exceeding that threshold. Equations are not my strong suit, but I may see if I can find a collaborator and determine what that number might be. Though it might be difficult to do without revealing where the idea has come from. Perhaps it would be better to wait until I have all the prophecies properly analyzed and know what my Lady wishes to do with them before I begin making them a basis for a new research field, but it is hard not to get excited!

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Howdy! Luis Loza here! Last time, we peeked at the cover for Player Core 2 and took a look at look at the conspirator dragon that had earned a spot on the cover. This time I’ve decided to share the draconic wealth and showcase the new fortune dragon. Let’s have a look!

Illustration by Kent Hamilton

Fortune dragons are the other arcane dragon featured in Monster Core. Similar to the mirage dragon, the fortune dragon embodies direct control over magic. Unlike its cousin, the fortune dragon is less about a specific type of magic and more about raw magical power.

Magical energy and magical potential exist everywhere, and much like a person breathing in air, a fortune dragon constantly draws in magical energy from their surroundings. They use these energies to empower their magical abilities, or even heal their wounds. Though they are arcane dragons, their frames are noticeably bulkier than the typical frame of their other arcane cousins, and marked by one distinctive feature: their treasure. The constant drawing of magical energy creates a strange sort of magnetism that causes coins, gems, and magical items to cling to the body of a fortune dragon. This energy even flows through the items themselves, causing many of them to heat up and melt in the process.

Since fortune dragons are constantly drawing on magical energy, they have the capability of actively drawing from large surges of energy and using it for themselves. While they use spontaneous magic, a fortune dragon can recharge their magic by feeding upon other spells that affect them, turning a foe’s magic into fuel for their own spell. More powerful fortune dragons even have an aura of magical disruption, which makes consuming spells in this way an automatic process. Fortune dragons can unleash blasts of pure magical energy, manifesting as force damage, to hurt others. These blasts are disruptive as well, making others stupefied and leading to more disrupted spells that a fortune dragon can consume.

Of course, a fortune dragon has an enormous hoard of wealth in their lair. These hoards are typically larger than those of other dragons. A significant amount of a fortune dragon’s hoard is effectively worthless, however. Countless relics litter these hoards, each drained of their innate magic, with any inherent value left in the form of non-magical materials. A fortune dragon typically keeps their most valued treasures deep within their hoard or even directly attached to their bodies.

That’s our look at the fortune dragon! Make sure to keep an eye out for this dragon and lots of other new dragons when Monster Core releases in March. Stay tuned for more draconic previews in the coming weeks. Next time, we’ll take a look at the mighty horned dragons. See you then!

Luis Loza
Creative Director, Rules & Lore

Today, we debut a series of sample encounters previewing some of the creatures from the pages of Pathfinder Monster Core, the next release in the Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster Project. This encounter, from Josh Birdsong, features the first look at the quai dau to and makes use of Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Night Market & Shrine.

The Sound of Love — Moderate 11

This encounter takes place at a shrine for the Black Butterfly. Your PCs could have heard rumors of the shrine or have been invited to a heartbondritual taking place at the sanctuary. The shrine is a series of smaller altars and sanctuaries that were built to be traveled between in utter silence with respect to the Black Butterfly, allowing travelers to meditate on the silence between.

The PCs are given an opportunity to reflect on their previous adventures and meditate on their future choices. If they choose to travel in silence, they become more aware of the beautiful vista before them. They notice how green the trees are and how beautiful the nearby river sounds as it tumbles on its way, unconcerned with the happenings of the world around it. The air begins to smell fresher and cool against their skin. PCs who remain silent during their travels gain a +1 status bonus to Perception checks while traveling between the altars.

When the PCs arrive at the final altar, they are welcomed by a small gathering of nobles who decided this shrine was the perfect location for their heartbond ritual. When the ceremony begins, trumpets are sounded to announce the union to the world. Unbeknownst to the nobles, a quai dau to stealthily hunts nearby, and the sound of trumpets sends it on a rampage. It inflates and flies towards the ceremony with rage in its eyes.

Map: This map uses a portion of the Pathfinder Flip-Mat: Night Market & Shrine

Creatures: The local quai dau to normally hunts the river in peace, leaving the silent visitors of the shrine alone. However, they are very sensitive to loud noises and the trumpets, which caused the beast great distress. The quai dau to will attack the creature making the most noise. PCs can spend an action to calm the beast (DC 32 Nature check), provided they can get everyone else to become completely quiet. This DC is reduced by 5 if the quai dau to is reduced to 150 HP or lower. The beast will flee if reduced to 50 HP or lower.

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Illustration by Gunship Revolution

Quai Dau To Creature 13

Huge, Beast

Perception +25; darkvision, mist vision, scent (imprecise) 120 feet
Skills Athletics +27, Stealth +25, Survival +24
Str +8, Dex +4, Con +8, Int –3, Wis +5, Cha –1

Mist Vision The quai dau to ignores the concealed condition from mist and fog.

AC 32; Fort +26, Ref +19, Will +21
HP 300; Immunities blinded, dazzled; Weaknesses sonic 15

Frightful Sight (aura, emotion, fear, mental, visual) 60 feet. This aura functions as a DC 32 frightful presence aura (page 359), but a creature doesn’t attempt its save until it sees the quai dau to.

Reflective Scales [reaction] Trigger A creature within 30 feet casts a spell with the light trait or uses an ability with the light trait; EffectThe quai dau to adjusts its position to reflect the light off their scales in a blinding display. All creatures in a 30-foot emanation must succeed at a DC 33 Fortitude saving throw or become blinded for 1 round.

Speed 40 feet, swim 30 feet; Inflate

Melee jaws [one-action] +27 (reach 10 feet), Damage 3d12+14 piercing

Melee tail [one-action] +27 (reach 20 feet), Damage 3d8+14 bludgeoning

Melee foot [one-action] +27 (agile), Damage 3d8+14 bludgeoning

Drain Water [one-action] (manipulate) Requirements The quai dau to is within 10 feet of a body of water that’s at least 10 feet deep and their water sac is empty; Effect The quai dau to sucks water through their trunk to fill their water sac, lowering the level in the body of water by 10 feet. All creatures in the water within a 30-foot emanation are off-guard until the start of the quai dau to’s next turn.

Inflate [one-action] The quai dau to inflates their body. They become Gargantuan, gain a fly Speed of 30 feet until the end of their next turn, and then Fly. They deflate if they fall unconscious or Dismiss this effect.

Mist Breath [one-action] (primal, water) Requirements The quai dau to’s water sac is full; Effect The quai dau to empties their water sac to breathe out mist in a 10-foot emanation. All creatures within the mist become concealed, and all creatures outside the mist become concealed to creatures within it. The mist dissipates after 1 round.

Spout Water [two-actions] (primal, water) Requirements The quai dau to’s water sac is full; Effect The quai dau to empties its water sac to blast water from its trunk, dealing 9d10 bludgeoning damage to all creatures in a 90-foot line, with a DC 33 basic Reflex save. A creature that fails is pushed 10 feet (or 20 feet on a critical failure).

As I continue my reading of the Godsrain Prophecies’ dire predictions of the deaths of various gods, it should be noted (and will be, in the compiled report for my Lady), that their existence as a collection brings into question the validity of each one. I believe that a corollary of the Windsong Paradox explains this best (as unsettling as this discovery of “prophecy” has been, I relish the opportunity to apply one of my favorites!): each individual prophecy exists independent of the others, as if they each occur in their own solitary void (note, for example, the mention here of a living Pharasma).This means they cannot all be true and, per the corollary, the chance of any of them being true is lessened¹. A reassuring thought that I am happy to consider!

¹In all fairness, a counter-argument could be made that one of the Godsrain Prophecies is correct in full, with all others either invalidated by its truth or purposefully created to mislead, but I tend to believe my initial theory (perhaps, if nothing else, because it is a bit more comforting).

—Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

---

The wound that kills Asmodeus has ached for countless eons, and still he has no memory of how Ihys drew blood. He knows the war between them, can hear the ringing battle cries as he fought hard for order, and Ihys, sympathetic fool, set chaos in his sights. He sees his brother’s hand outstretched, can feel the arm against his back, remembers what it tasted like to plunge his sword into his kin, but never feels the moment that some blade or nail sliced at his leg, has only blood upon his hands to prove that he was hit.

Some days the cut is barely there, a scratch upon his surface, a moment’s irritation as he moves from place to place. But other days, it festers into leaking, pulsing wetness, a shooting pain that drips and strikes and stops him where he stands. He spends those days in agony, sealed deep within the Catafalque, encouraging the rumors of his secret chamber of delights, returning only when the wound has calmed itself again.

He’s known, somewhere inside himself, that this would be what felled him, but somehow, in his final steps, he still feels disbelief. How can one cut unravel everything that he has been and done, the worlds that he has built and wrecked, the Hell he has created? He stumbles through the empty hall, his body crashing to the ground, a rictus of shocked agony carved deep into his face. Perhaps it is a mercy that he cannot see what happens next, does not perceive the brother who emerges in his place. Ihys, summoned by the force that kept the gash forever open. Ihys, who, with sorrowed glance, replaces him upon his throne. Ihys, who believed in taking mercy on the mortals, giving them their freedom even when they broke and twisted things, seeing good inside their souls as something worth the sacrifice. Ihys, now the Prince of Darkness. Ihys, Lord of Hell.

Deep inside the Catafalque, the new god works deliberately, taking time to understand the Hell his brother wrought. He finds a few things to preserve—the contract of creation and its binding power on the gods, the prison that holds Rovagug, whose key he’s now charged with keeping—and vows he will uphold them in Asmodeus’s name. The rest he’s ready to unmake, but slowly, with the greatest care. This time he will not act in haste. This time Hell works his way.

He first visits the archdevils, his enemies of ages past, who greet him with their surface smiles and offer false obeisance—some dripping poison-syruped words, some sharpening their blades and fangs, some gathering a mass of shades to wait for new wartime demands. But Ihys understands their ways and flaunts his new divinity, his scepter Archstar swinging in a show of all his power, and while the peace he gains from them may be a prelude to a war, he makes each of Hell’s denizens sign contracts to a new decree—a kinder, gentler punishment for those whose souls have damned them there, a way for those to free themselves who want to choose another path, a safe route as they journey back up from the depths of Hell.

He's visited by deities—some curious, some threatening—who see the shifting way of things and wish to understand. And while Pharasma alters how her psychopomps send souls to him and Sarenrae applauds an ancient ally on his newfound life, the Four Horsemen of Abaddon begin to seek advantages, to plan some future action they may one day undertake.

With Hell remade to suit his likings, Ihys settles on his throne, turns the power of his gaze to fixing mortal things. He pores through every contract that he must now enforce, underlining loopholes that invalidate the cruelest clauses, marking for destruction those he cannot bend or change. With every small relinquishing, the power in some region shifts, as those who felt their contract as a prison or a heavy weight now have the chance to change the old direction of their lives. But none change more than Cheliax, where House Thrune used the power gifted by the Lord of Hell himself to make the many contracts that have kept them on the throne. Ihys rescinds this favor and refuses to grant any more, leaves the realm of Abrogail to manage on its own.

As Ihys rests then, satisfied. He does not hear the whispers, as close as Mephistopheles and far off as Egorian, of bitterness and revolution, hanging in the air. Or if he does, he honors them as choices made of mortal will—whatever comes, he lives and breathes, and he can always start anew. If devils come to challenge him, if Cheliax is torn to shreds, he’s happy to rend everything (with Rovagug set free to feed) and make the world again.

While one might assume an end of Asmodeus’s treachery would presage improvements in the multiverse, this prophecy presents a very different potentiality.

---

I felt such relief while reading this to know that the death of Asmodeus (at least according to this still unproven and unidentified source) might not mean the release of the Rough Beast, only for the prophecy to suggest that Rovagug might still be unleashed? Those who claim that research has no excitement are simply in the wrong field of study. I also must confess that this prophecy has piqued my interest in learning more of the fallen god Ihys—a topic I might not otherwise have considered! It will, though, have to wait. I must reach some conclusion, and still have much to read through, before I can present this to my Lady.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Lost Omens Firebrands, Lost Omens Highhelm, and Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Lore Masters is releasing a new question pack, aimed at broadening knowledge and proficiency in the spells featured in Player Core.

The pack contains 1,625 questions, comprehensively covering all 325 spells included in Player Core. Its distinct structure sets it apart from other question packs: each spell is accompanied by five questions, each reflecting a different level of difficulty. This design is beneficial for a wide range of players, from those just beginning their journey in wizardry to more seasoned spellcasters, providing challenges and engagement at various skill levels.

Another notable aspect of this question pack is the option to filter questions based on magical traditions—arcane, divine, occult, or primal. This feature allows players to customize their learning experience according to their specific area of interest or expertise in magic.

While the pack does not delve into every detail of each spell, it serves as a valuable resource for understanding key aspects of spellcasting, such as spell rank, casting time, range, and duration. The questions are carefully crafted to emphasize these essential elements, aiding players in grasping the fundamentals of magic and its use in the game.

This pack is highly recommended for those looking to deepen their knowledge of the magical arts.

Download Pathfinder: Lore Masters here:
App Store | Google Play

I begin my annotation holding death between my talons. An overly poetic beginning, that, and one I will certainly change when I report back to my Lady. Perhaps this a consequence of reading the Godsrain Prophecies, each with its dire tale of the death of a god and everything that comes after. I am reminded of the year I read What Comes Down: A Treatise on Mortal Falls and used the word defenestrate so often in my papers that Lorminos asked me to limit the word to once per page at most!

As my earlier field notes on these works detail, I learned of the Godsrain Prophecies not long ago, and have acted with great haste to locate as many as possible, despite my many doubts as to their accuracy. I must confess that I have also felt a certain unanticipated exhilaration in bringing rigor to a rumor, despite the grim contents of the documents once discovered. I believe that I may almost understand the impulse of adventurers (a mortal drive that remains an obscure field of study), though I likely took as much joy from detailing my methods as I did in undertaking them. Research rarely moves at such a rapid pace, but then rarely has any researcher been so motivated!

What to make of these “prophecies” is a wholly different matter, and one that I must settle before reporting to my Lady, lest I stir up visions of doom with no attempt at context or framing, no better than a doomsday caller singing in the streets! Any thought of these being accurate seems at first impossible, given the current failure of prophecy overall, and their author has yet to be identified. I immediately recall the many false omens in the years after Aroden’s death, many of which had Golarion perishing brutally a thousand times (and will one day, I assume, make for a fascinating set of studies).

Still, there is something about these pages that makes me ill at ease. The detail, perhaps, or the nature of the futures they forecast. This is heightened, of course, by the subject of the first of them, which I hoped never to find but must still document faithfully, as I have below. Perhaps the thing that troubles me lies in this simple question: how do you tell your Lady that she’s prophesied to die?

—Yivali, Apprentice Researcher for the Lady of Graves

---

The Death of Pharasma

When Pharasma dies, she dies by inches. She grasps for a prophecy beyond her reach and the skin on her fingertips blisters. She dreams the lost feeling of futures foretold and wakes with a tooth ground to ashes. She feels an uncertainty chilling the air, and her bones grow cold and brittle. What changed with Aroden’s death? Why has prophecy faltered? The questions race and turn and tumble, edges carving at her mind as she tries to judge the mortal souls whose futures she’s unsure of.

Is it any wonder that she shatters?

The god they called Survivor dies alone inside her palace—cold, exhausted, broken. No psychopomps to judge her works, no Atropos to take her reign. Most of her servants lose their power in the instant she dies, and no one comes to place her in a plane for all eternity. The fear of how she might be judged has kept her upright more than once, but in the end it’s simply this—she is and then she isn’t. Pharasma ceases to be.

Death does not pause for the Lady of Graves. Death does not stop for anyone. Mortals succumb to the usual things—some in the arms of those who loved them, some at the hands of those who did not. Some in a show of bravery, some in a haze of regret, some drenched hot with sweat or fear or love or loss or anger. All plunge into the River of Souls like jagged rocks sent tumbling, leaving eddies in their wake that shift and roil the current. The river churns with energy, a swirling froth of rapids, throwing souls from in its midst with no set rhyme or reason. The guardians who watch it pass are nothing more than onlookers, as this soul bound for Heaven is shunted off to Abaddon, and that one at the brink of Hell is flung into Nirvana. With souls no longer guided to the places where they’re most aligned, the outer planes turn turbulent, splintering to factions where they once found harmony. Fights break out, and rescue missions; pacts and trades and promises no sooner made than torn apart—a muddied bloodied mess of souls askew for all eternity.

Pharasma’s former psychopomps, distracted by the chaos or the torrents of the river or the sorrow of their grief, rarely see the predators who feast within the river’s wake—daemons and worse who grab souls up by the handful, taking them to sell or gift or simply disappear with.

Among the mortals, resurrections now begin to falter, as souls are often missing from the places where they’re sought. Even for those who never cared a moment for Pharasmin things, the new finality of death leaves many saying prayers for Pharasma, desperate for a sign that she might one day still reach out.

Her followers are hardest hit—the clerics and diviners, the midwives and morticians—their boons no longer functioning, their spells bereft of power. Those who battle the undead see their advantage dissipate, and some who cannot fight or flee fall easily to undead foes, their victories turned to slaughters in a hundred grim tableaus.

Urgathoa laughs, heartily, to see a foe defeated, declaring 50 days of feasts and manifesting blood-soaked wine in any empty cup. She calls upon her followers to press their new advantages, as those who fought her worshippers are left to face a reckoning—some turning to another god whose purpose fits their calling, some searching for a prophecy or ritual or sacrifice that might bring back Pharasma and the surety she gave them, some finding other pledges for their cause.

Above it all, a visage hangs and grins upon the chaos—Groetus watching eagerly from just above the Spire. Some say the crescent of his moon begins to wax in earnest, as we move ever closer to the end times he desires.

A prophecy foretelling the death of Pharasma specifically caused by the death of prophecy in the Age of Lost Omens certainly poses a paradox.

---

An unpleasant future, to say the least. I shudder to think of it! Thankfully, much of this prophecy remains questionable at best. Not only are there are many questions raised here, including the likeliness of my fellow psychopomps to simply cease their work and let souls be ravaged, whatever their grief, but this also appears to note the cause of my Lady’s death as indirectly caused by the end of prophecy. And yet if there is no prophecy, then how has this one come to be? A paradox, if I ever knew one, and one that I cannot yet untangle. Perhaps my next annotation will offer greater clarity.

About the Author

Erin Roberts has been thrilled to be able to contribute a few small threads to the fabric of Golarion in the pages of books like Pathfinder Lost Omens Firebrands, Pathfinder Lost Omens Highhelm, and Pathfinder Lost Omens Travel Guide. In addition to her work for Paizo, she freelances across the TTRPG world (and was selected as a Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program Winner in 2023), has had fiction published in magazines including Asimov’s Science Fiction, Clarkesworld, and The Dark, and talks about writing every week on the Writing Excuses podcast. Catch up with her latest at linktr.ee/erinroberts.

Hello, hello! Luis Loza here! Last time, we jumped into the Monster Core cover and took a look at the adamantine dragon. This time around, we’re going to be jumping into the Player Core 2 cover to look at the conspirator dragon. Let’s get to it!

Illustration by Kent Hamilton

The conspirator dragon is one of the new occult dragons featured in Monster Core. Occult dragons tap into more mysterious and strange magic, making use of supernatural abilities that sometimes seem alien or off-putting. Most occult dragons have slender bodies. They use their wings as supplementary appendages, somewhat like front legs to keep their proper forward limbs for grasping and other uses.

The conspirator dragon is named such due to their innate desire to see grand plans play out. Conspirator dragons are constantly scheming, either for personal gain or simply because watching a plan come together is exciting. These schemes vary, with some dragons looking toward more benevolent goals, some enacting wicked plans, and others simply scheming for scheming’s sake. Regardless of their goals, conspirator dragons tend to manipulate others, pulling strings from the shadows to get what they want.

A conspirator dragon has a variety of abilities to help them achieve their goals. In addition to using their magic to charm and influence others, these dragons make use of magical disguises. They conjure forth flesh-suit replicas of others and, through the help of magic, squeeze themselves into these suits. This bone-crunching and flesh rending process results in perfect disguises that allow a conspirator dragon to live among populations none the wiser to the dragon’s machinations. If they’re ever found out, the dragon can erupt from the suit in an explosive display that hopefully buys them enough time to flee. If not, they also use their choking breath to create a literal smokescreen for escape.

And that’s our look at the conspirator dragon! Make sure to keep an eye out for this dragon and lots of other new dragons when Monster Core releases in March. Stay tuned for more draconic previews in the coming weeks. Next time, we’ll take a look at greatest treasure hoarders of all, the fortune dragons. See you then!

Luis Loza
Creative Director, Rules & Lore

Logan Bonner here. Your Pathfinder Lead Designer is on the run from creatures ghastly and ravenous. That can only mean that Pathfinder Monster Core is drawing nearer! On March 27, prepare to get raided by everything from aeons to zombies! This is the third of the core books for the Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster Project. It compiles monsters from the Bestiary series along with some choice cuts from other books and some brand-new creatures.

Left to right: a Vordine Devil illustrated by Gunship Revolution, Smaranava Naga illustrated by Ivan Koritarev, redcap illustrated by Gunship Revolution, caldera oni illustrated by Gunship Revolution, and sedacthy marauder illustrated by Sammy Khalid

Design Goals

Overall, monsters were working well statistically and thematically, so there weren’t any changes to the basics of how monsters work. Instead, we focused on making the book gorgeous, expansive, and full of great monsters! We had several big goals for Monster Core.

Match the Remaster Rules: We adjusted monster rules that needed to match new terminology or rules. For instance, changing “negative healing” to “void healing,” using “Reactive Strike,” and swapping out spells that were in Core Rulebook, but not Player Core.

Collect the Greatest Hits: The most classic monsters mingle with new creations! This book is focused on creatures that you can use over and over in all sorts of games. Most creatures came over from the first Bestiary, with some updates. But we also graduated some monsters that appeared in Bestiary 2 and Bestiary 3 to the main monster book, including serpentfolk, herexens, marsh and shadow giants, phantoms, scarecrows, and more! Monster Core also brings several Pathfinder First Edition monsters into Second Edition, including bogwids and the sargassum heap (formerly sargassum fiend).

Replace Some OGL Monsters: We cut several creatures that we were using from the OGL as we move to the ORC license and a set of creatures more specific to Pathfinder and Golarion. Where possible, we put in creatures that fill a similar role in adventure-building. For example, the sargassum heap mentioned above replaces another lurking 6th-level plant creature! We’ve also created exciting new devils, dragons, and other new threats in classic categories.

Match the Mythology: For a great many creatures that originated in folklore, their abilities and look were based on sources like pulp novels and TV shows. Eleanor Ferron spearheaded an effort to take creatures like rakshasa, oni, dragon turtles, and coatls closer to their source material. Making them more authentic while ensuring they still match Golarion’s lore was a massive undertaking!

Pack it Full!: Lastly, we wanted to include as many monsters as we could reasonably fit. Variety makes for memorable campaigns, adventures, and encounters, so getting more monsters in the book was great. The book is longer than the first Bestiary, but beyond that, we fit more stat blocks into several sections—dinosaurs have the same number of pages, but 10 creatures instead of seven.

There were also some changes that weren’t primary goals. Low-level monsters had high AC too often, and Michael Sayre did a pass to make the low-level experience more even. There wasn’t a level –1 plant or fungus for summon plant or fungus, so Landon Winkler made the sprigjack, a weaker twigjack.

Wrap Battle

On streams and other previews, we’ve talked quite a bit about hags, devils, and other monsters that had pretty big revisions. Let’s take a moment to go over an example of a smaller change. Mummies, beyond being classic horror monsters, make for great undead to include in musty tombs and dungeons. But the Bestiary version was primarily based on causing despair and imposing a rotting curse. They can be pretty static, so we were looking for something new to put into our basic mummies to make them more interesting, much like we reassessed them when creating new mummies for Book of the Dead.

Since the mummy guardian and mummy pharaoh were originally created with sophisticated chemical processes, we landed on an alchemical theme. You can see the special actions the mummy guardian can now use in combat, and how they reinforce the creature’s theme in a unique way!

Illustrated by Jorge Fares

Mummy Guardian — Creature 6

Medium, Mummy, Undead, Unholy
Perception +16; darkvision
Languages Necril, plus any one language they knew while alive
Skills Athletics +15, Stealth +11
Str +4, Dex +0, Con +2, Int –2, Wis +4, Cha +2
AC 23; Fort +14, Ref +10, Will +16

HP 125, void healing (page 360); Immunities bleed, death effects, disease, paralyzed, poison, unconscious; Weaknesses alchemical 5 (see alchemical weakness), fire 5

Alchemical Weakness The guardian’s weakness to alchemical items not only applies to damage from alchemical items, but the guardian also takes 5 damage when splashed with non-damaging alchemical items or dosed with alchemical poisons, even if they’re immune to their other effects.

Blighted Consumption [reaction] (curse, divine, poison) Trigger A creature within 30 feet eats or drinks (including an alchemical item or potion); Effect The food or drink burns like the caustic substances fed to the mummy before its death. If the creature fails a DC 24 Fortitude save, they become sickened 2 after they finish the consumption and can’t reduce their sickened condition while within 30 feet of any mummy.

Speed 20 feet

Melee [one-action] fist +16 (agile), Damage 2d10+7 bludgeoning plus Choking Pain

Choking Pain [one-action] (divine, illusion, mental, void) Requirements The mummy’s last action was a successful fist Strike; EffectThe mummy shares the pain of its dying moments with the target of that Strike. That creature takes 3d8 void damage with a DC 24 basic Will save. If the creature critically fails the saving throw, it can’t speak for 1 round, including to Cast a Spell.

More Monsters!

If you’d like some extra looks into what we’re cooking up for this book, check these out!

• Blogs on the new dragons debuting in Monster Core: diabolic dragon, mirage dragon, adamantine dragon.
• Watch the Paizo LIVE stream in which Eleanor Ferron and I talk more about the book.

Hey everyone, Luis Loza here! A while back, I shared some previews for the diabolic dragon and mirage dragon, two of the new dragons premiering in Monster Core in March. I figured that I’ve kept the public waiting long enough for more dragon previews, so let’s take a look at another fun dragon!

Illustration by Kent Hamilton

Speaking of Monster Core, you might have seen the big dragon on the cover. This is an adamantine dragon, one of the new primal dragons in the book. Primal dragons draw on the magical energies of the natural world. These dragons tend to be the most bestial among dragons. As a result, they tend to be bulkier with more animalistic features like horns and spines. Some primal dragons even grow natural features on their bodies, like small plants.

The adamantine dragon—one of the skymetal dragons—got its name due to the adamantine that covers its body. The magic that flows through them draws adamantine to their bodies like a magnet, though some of these dragons naturally grow adamantine on their body, slowly replacing their hard scales with the skymetal as they age. Regardless of how the adamantine clings to their bodies, these dragons are tough. They’re so tough that they have a strong resistance against physical attacks. The claws and jaws of an adamantine dragon also allow them to burrow through dirt or even solid stone, sometimes emerging from beneath the ground to ambush their prey.

Adamantine dragons tend to use their shovel-like mouths to scoop up chunks of earth, consuming whatever rocks and unfortunate creatures are swept up in their bites. Instead of a typical dragon breath, adamantine dragons belch up all of these rocks, unleashing a veritable avalanche from within their bodies. While adamantine dragons typically don’t have the ability to cast spells, they make up for it with their hardy bodies and powerful blows.

So, that’s a little bit on the adamantine dragon! Don’t forget to check out this dragon and all of its draconic friends when Monster Core releases in March. Stay tuned for more draconic previews in the coming weeks. Next time, we’ll take a look at the mysterious and cunning conspirator dragon. See you then!

Luis Loza
Creative Director, Rules & Lore

“There’s more to life than fighting monsters and looting treasure. What happens when a PC wins a deed to a tavern in a game of cards, crafts a magical item, builds a home, or pursues a relationship? All these goals and more are resolved by running downtime. Downtime is the space between adventures, where your PCs take a step back before the next chapter starts. In downtime, you can sum up the important events of a whole day with just one roll. Use this mode when the characters return home or otherwise aren’t adventuring.” —Pathfinder GM Core

With the lowest stakes and longest time covered, downtime is a great way to start sessions, or take a break between major beats of a campaign. While most groups will do downtime activities in a few minutes, some downtime periods may last an entire session to suit the story beats. Just like exploration mode, downtime mode can be interspersed with encounters and roleplay beats to keep things moving.

There are a variety of tasks characters can take during downtime, such as taking long-term rests, earning income through a variety of avenues, going shopping, and retraining skills! Some of these tasks take longer than others—happening over a series of days or weeks, rather than hours in game. But take care not to linger too much in downtime at the table—15 minutes to half an hour is a good baseline for most downtime activities.

Downtime should always start with each player deciding what activity their character doing—or a group of characters deciding to collaborate on a downtime activity, like putting on a show to earn income. Some downtime tasks only require a simple roll and a little embellishment; for example, rolling a 22 to Earn Income via Crafting only requires the character stating what they’ve made and what it looks like. The GM might choose to roleplay a short scene of the buyer complimenting the work.

This is also a great time for daily preparations, such as choosing spells. Players should decide on a standard set of daily preparations, which will then be assumed to be the default unless the player states otherwise during a given downtime.

For longer periods of downtime that may take place over weeks, months, or even years, the GM and players should check in about long-term goals for the downtime. Then, rather than rolling for every single day and activity, the GM can lay out specific events that are bigger stepping stones to that end goal.

Using downtime is a great way to slow the game down after a stressful adventure or battle, as well as ease players into the session at the beginning of a new chapter! Pathfinder GM Core goes into detail about running downtime, to support GMs as they help characters achieve long-term and short-term goals. Pathfinder Player Core outlines some basic downtime activities for player characters, as well as suggestions for thinking outside the box!

Pathfinder Player Core and Pathfinder GM Core are available now on paizo.com and at your friendly local game store!

“So the shiny runes are… the reflection on the water?”

“Precisely! But there are many varieties and states of water, yes? How to maintain a reflection upon the frothing waves, or to split one across all the drops in a storm so that they fall in unison? What if one could calm and freeze the sea, carve off a piece of that reflection, and deposit it in another, still liquid sea—and have it continue reflecting that original sea? With a more expansive view of magic, one not held captive by axioms or collecting dust in a university library, one begins to see the hidden world truly unfold."

“Ez, I don’t wanna be in this chair all day.”

“Yes, yes.” Ezren scowled at his subject. “‘You can talk and tattoo at the same time,’ I believe were the exact words. Very well.”

Tak.

A precise blow, and Ezren’s needle once more pierced Valeros’s skin to deposit a drop of ink. Ezren placed the instrument on the work table, lifted another from a pot of sparking red liquid, muttered over it, and then the stuff turned just as black as any other ink. Valeros had asked about this about half an hour ago, which had earned him the lecture on magical theory.

Valeros wasn’t sure what hurt more, Ezren’s needle or the knowledge that he still had hours of pontification to sit through before the tattoo was done.
Illustration by Ian Perks

Tak.

Tak.

Tak.

Ezren lifted the striking rod, sighed brusquely, and set aside his tools. “Valeros, this patronage lasts for weeks. Can you at least try to be a good conversation partner?”

Valeros went to massage his temples, remembered he couldn’t move his right arm, and growled in frustration. “That’s rich. I tried with your big wet mirror analogy, you know! Hard to stay engaged when I can’t get a word in edgewise. Plus what do I know about magic theory? You want to have a proper conversation, you need to—"

The workshop’s southern face exploded inward in a storm of wood and dust. A ceiling joist smashed onto one end of Valeros’s chair, knocking it over and sending him rolling across the floor. Ezren hit the far wall, followed by several pots of ink—one of which hit the man square in the head. He folded like an anemic bird.

Valeros, dazed, opened an eye. No sign of sword: bad. Shield nearby: good. Shield slightly bent: standard.

Nothing broken, good. Lotta shallow stinging cuts, fair enough, not great.

Heavy, gurgling breathing, and what sounded like tightening rope.

Valeros rolled. A gnarled and glowing fist smashed through a fallen bookshelf and practically disintegrated the floor where his torso had been. He kneeled, lifted his shield, and turned to face his opponent.

Then swore. “Oh, give me a break.”

The person in front of him—he was almost certain it was a person—needed to crouch to fit in the cramped workshop. Which they were not doing, having instead used their neck and head as a battering ram. They had ploughed through roof and wreckage in their attempt to crush Valeros. Human-shaped, their body was covered in thick, obsidian scabs, viscous blood pouring from fissures like molten steel into a mold. They radiated heat like a furnace.

“Ez,” he called. “Ez!”

No sound but the hot roar of the giant’s breathing—and another tightening rope. He whipped his shield up, caught part of the blow, spun, and let the monstrosity stagger past him.

Fast not nimble. Probably too big to take out himself? Outmaneuver it, check on Ezren. Yeah.

Deep breath. Shield set. Knife out. Keep moving. In, sting. Out, shield up, make space. He was the horsefly, the heaving thing was the horse. Each bite of the blade loosed a cascade of blazing sludge that burned its way through the floor.

Sting, make space. Stay hard to see. Avoid the—

Valeros’s bones rattled inside his flesh and his vision exploded with hot, angry light.

“Back!”

Ezren’s voice rose over the assailant’s furnace rage. Valeros dipped in and out of consciousness, the ringing in his ears sometimes giving way to the whoosh of fire magic. He caught glimpses of Ezren wreathed in blue-white symbols, launching gouts of flame from one hand. His other held the snake-head staff, its eyes sapphire coals, surrounded in a blazing corona that flared every time the creature swung at Ezren. The fists seemed to hit an invisible barrier, and light erupted in a crackling flash.

It was pretty impressive, honestly. But Ezren was going to run out of steam soon.

The broken armor stand was leaning against the wall nearby, Valeros’s breastplate wrapped around it by the force of the giant’s initial entry. He lifted it, tested its weight. It was no sword, but it would do.

Valeros charged, makeshift weapon high, and brought it down on the thing’s spine. It screamed in a blast of sparks and spun toward him. Ezren continued raining flame into it. With each one, those internal fires grew hotter, and Valeros hoped that Ezren knew what the hell he was doing.

Then the tattoo started moving. Almost tickled, at first. It pulsed in time with Ezren’s magic, flared when those blue-white runes did. The tiger stripes slithered down his arm and up the erstwhile mace, and now each blow brought its own arcane heat. In, body blow, out. In, pull attention, out.

Then he raised the makeshift weapon high and brought it down on the creature’s leg. It stumbled forward and fell, now almost too bright to look at, its fissures incandescent, limbs churning on the splintered floor, little fires beginning to sprout around it.

It howled and launched its entire body at Valeros. At the same time, those tiger stripes leapt onto the shield Valeros was already raising. Monster met metal, and there was a deafening thunderclap.

---

Ezren said it was like a kettle with no lid. Too much steam, boom. Valeros didn’t know why you’d make a furnace-thing weak to fire, but hey, spell people were weird.

“So then what was the twisty tattoo thing?”

Valeros was mopping up ink, again. The last mop had melted after he’d tried to use it on the purple stuff.

Ezren looked up from the singed diagrams he was attempting to reconstruct. “I… honestly don’t know, which is very exciting! I think the tattoo was mimicking the ablative properties of my spellshaping. Which shouldn’t have been possible, given the crystallization matrix I established, but it was a tattoo, and blood, flesh, and hair are all traditionally puissant."



“Huh, I s’pose I could see that. So you moved the wet reflection to my big red mirror?”

“…so, my friend, you were paying attention!”

“I mean, kinda. Just… next time make it interesting, y’know? Say what the magic does, not just how it works in the fantastical and esoteric realms of the mind or whatever. You’re attaching it to my body, so tell me what it does, how I can use it. That’s the interesting stuff. Sorta like learning how someone fights.”

Ezren smiled and tapped the head of his staff on the pewter mug hanging from Valeros’s belt.

“Well, then. What say we talk the finer points of steel and ritual over a drink?”

Valeros held out a hand, offering to carry Ezren’s pack on the rough road into town.

“Maybe touch on who wants us dead so bad, too. Since we’ll be here for weeks and all. But, yeah,” he said, smiling, “that sounds good.”

About the Author

Andrew Mullen has been freelancing for Paizo and other publishers since 2017. He brings a keen interest in language and the interplay of geography and culture to his work, as seen in the Magaambya section of Lost Omens Character Guide, the xulgaths in the Extinction Curse Adventure Path, and numerous other monsters over the years. As a full-time parent, his daughter is his most important monster

About Iconic Encounters

Iconic Encounters is a series of web-based flash fiction set in the worlds of Pathfinder and Starfinder. Each short story provides a glimpse into the life and personality of one of the games’ iconic characters, showing the myriad stories of adventure and excitement players can tell with the Pathfinder and Starfinder roleplaying games.

“Exploration mode is the connective tissue of your adventure or quest—everything that happens as the characters move between encounters. It could be looking for a rare book in a library, trailblazing through a spooky forest, fortifying a castle before a monster attack, or canvassing the city for a missing person.” ­– Pathfinder GM Core

Illustration by Mary Jane Pajaron

Last month’s blog touched on encounter mode, the highest-stakes mode of play in Pathfinder Second Edition. Today, we’re slowing down a bit to talk about exploration mode, which is more free-form and presents unique challenges to player characters.

Exploration mode is a low-to-moderate-risk way to engage with the environment and encourages players to learn about and interact with their surroundings. Rather than measuring time in seconds and rounds, exploration mode uses 10-minute intervals as the smallest unit of measurement, with longer activities such as traveling between locations measured in hours or days.

Gameplay will often transition between exploration mode and encounter mode, with activities in exploration mode leading to encounters—such as stumbling across a den of giant rats while exploring underground tunnels. When transitioning back into exploration mode from an encounter or downtime, players can choose an exploration activity to be pursuing, such as avoiding notice, investigating, or sustaining a spell or effect. These are only examples, and players may also use any other actions or reactions they have that fit the situation.

Illustration by WIll O'Brien

Pathfinder GM Core provides the following list of guidelines for game masters to consider when running scenes in exploration mode:

• Evoke the setting with vivid sensory details.
• Shift the passage of time to emphasize tension and uncertainty, and speed past uneventful intervals.
• Get players to add details by asking for their reactions.
• Present small-scale mysteries to intrigue players and spur investigation.
• When rolls are needed, look for ways to move the action forward, or add interesting wrinkles on a failure.
• Plan effective transitions to encounters.

A key part of exploration mode is creating engaging environments and situations for characters to explore. Pathfinder GM Core includes a table of environmental details for a variety of different settings and biomes—with sight, sound, smell, texture, and weather details for each. If players are exploring an area with some amount of risk, changing hazards, traps, and potential encounters to match these areas’ themes and sensory descriptions increases immersion at the table.

All of the above and much more are possible in exploration mode—find more details on running exploration mode in Pathfinder GM Core, and more details of exploration activities for characters in Pathfinder Player Core, available now on paizo.com and at your friendly local game store.

It’s November 15^th, and that means that Player Core and GM Core are now officially out! These remastered products bring a lot of exciting changes to Pathfinder Second Edition, but that doesn’t mean you have to ditch your older books or stop using the classes that don’t appear in Player Core. To help you use classes and other options that are affected by the Remaster changes, we’re presenting a handful of compatibility errata for the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, Advanced Player’s Guide, Secrets of Magic, and Dark Archive on the Pathfinder FAQ!

Illustartion by Jessé Suursoo

Wide, sweeping changes to the game (such as the renaming of “flat-footed” to “off-guard” and the removal of spell schools) aren’t detailed in the compatibility errata pages, though you can find a summary of that info in our previous Remaster Core Preview PDF. Instead, the errata are meant to help you use options from those books in conjunction with remastered material from Player Core and GM Core.

For instance, the removal of alignment drove a lot of our changes to the cleric, but the champion is also highly tied to alignment. While a fully remastered champion is coming in Player Core 2, what’s a champion player to do until then? Don’t worry! The guidance presented in the Remaster compatibility errata provides some suggestions for how to play your redeemer or antipaladin until next August!

In addition, we’ve made some tweaks to the magus’s Arcane Cascade and Arcane Shroud actions to compensate for the removal of spell schools. Furthermore, since produce flame and ray of frost got replaced with other cantrips, and since dancing lights was subsumed into the new light cantrip, we’re also presenting ways for psychics of the oscillating wave and tangible dream conscious minds to use ignition, frostbite, and figment in those cantrips’ places!

Finally, in the process of getting Player Core and GM Core into everyone’s hands, we made a few errors here and there, so we also have some errata for those books. This isn’t comprehensive errata for everything in those two books, just a list of changes that we want to call out where it might impact gameplay. Here are two of the largest fixes.

• We added “slowed” to the list of conditions that can be counteracted with 4th-rank clear mind, sound body, and sure footing
• We revised the text to say that the wounded condition should increase your dying value only when you are knocked out.

That’s all for now! I hope that you’re all as excited for the future of Pathfinder Second Edition as we are!

Jason Keeley
Senior Developer

Check out the Errata Updates On The Pathfinder FAQ

As we cruise into the final days before the release, we’re getting to the end of these preview blogs, but we figured there’s probably still a few things we can talk about. How about orcs and the updated mixed ancestry rules?

Orcs are a common ancestry now, and appear among the Player Core options alongside dwarves, goblins, elves, humans, etc. This reflects not just a mechanical change, but also the ever-evolving state of our lore. With the undead hordes of the Whispering Tyrant seething outwards from the Gravelands, the orcs of Belkzen have seen their home transformed into one of the primary battlegrounds, raising their axes and torches high to fend off the encroaching darkness.

Illustration by Gabriel Scavariello

In becoming the vanguard of one of the greatest ongoing struggles threatening the Inner Sea, Belkzen’s orcs have also formed an ever-increasing number of alliances with their neighbors—something that is a source of contention for some of the less friendly holds…but that’s a story for later!

To help our new orcish allies with their battles, we’ve brushed up a few of their feats, as well. The old Hold Mark feat wasn’t great, especially in the context of some of the improvements we’ve made to ancestry feats; the Orc Weapon Familiarity feat now automatically gives you the benefits that used to require taking Orc Weapon Carnage as soon as you hit 5th level, without needing to spend any further feats. So, we reworked Hold Mark into a new 1st-level feat based on some of the orc holds of Belkzen that gives you training in a key skill and a constant bonus to saves against a specific type of magic—which does stack with the bonus from Orc Superstition, if you want to go that route, allowing orcs to be particularly resilient against certain types of magic!

As orcish heroes have spread across the Inner Sea, the opportunities for heroes of mixed orcish ancestry to carve out a place for themselves have also multiplied. Dromaars, as children of mixed orc and human ancestry are known in Belkzen, are one of the mixed ancestry examples provided in Player Core. The word dromaar is an orcish word, referring to those drummers whose music sends the hordes marching to war; many of the current generation of dromaar adventurers view themselves as heralds of a new age for orcs in the Inner Sea region.

While most dromaars from Belkzen have either one human parent and one orc parent or two dromaar parents, dromaars from other parts of Golarion might have some other ancestral mix; orcs and dwarves in Arcadia, for example, have a much more cooperative history together than the orc and dwarf nations of the Inner Sea, and it’s possible that the dromaars on that continent might have a significant population whose ancestry is of mixed dwarf and orc descent.

Illustration by Oleksii Chernik

Dromaars aren’t the only example of a mixed ancestry presented in Player Core; aiuvarins are people of mixed elven ancestry, typically having a human parent on one side and an elven parent on the other, though other mixes are entirely possible.

While introducing the aiuvarins, we took the opportunity to clean up some confusion around options like the Elf Atavism feat, which had some unclear interactions with things like the Ancient Elf heritage.

Previously we’d presented options like aiuvarin and dromaar as human heritages, specifically half-elves and half-orcs. By pulling them out of the human ancestry and making them the first two heritages of the new Mixed Ancestry option, we open up a whole new world of possible options to customize your characters and your worlds. Currently, if you want to make a new Mixed Ancestry that represents people of partial dwarven, gnome, goblin, or other descent, you’ll need to use the example set by the aiuvarin and dromaar heritages to create your own, but in days to come I wouldn’t be surprised to see more mixed ancestry options appearing as we push back the edges of the map and do deeper explorations of Golarion’s other continents.

Michael Sayre
Design Manager

 “Can you at least tell me what it does?”

Lem frowned down at the talisman. Feiya had just handed him a cord of braided sinew hung with scraps of fabric and a small yellowed fang.

“All in due time.” Feiya’s coyly reassuring smile almost achieved its goal. Her eyes betrayed her, preoccupied as they were with scanning the darkened corners of the shop. She was on the hunt, and even more terse than usual.

“Out of sight, fang near a vein, yes? Parallel. When the entity manifests, draw its attention. Then,” she growled through a predatory smile, “it’s mine.”

“So,” she chirped, malice evaporated, “the surprise is intentional!”

“Do consider how it might behoove you to be a bit more forthright?” Lem offered cheerfully, shirt pulled over one shoulder as he tied the charm around his bicep. “People appreciate directness! For instance, a witch might clearly label her concoctions in order to assure others that… hrm. Feiya?”

His willowy companion had drifted off around a rack of hats, their broad brims embroidered with scenes of local myths and histories. Lem sighed, dropped his shoulders slightly, and allowed a frown to darken his face. He sidestepped in front of a fitting mirror.

“She’s not listening, is she, Lem?” he asked his reflection morosely.

 “No, Lem, I don’t believe she is.” The mirrored image of Lem in the glass straightened, adopting a genteel tone. “Foregoing the pleasure of our company to go ask a spider for its gallbladder. Or some such.” Lem wrinkled his nose at himself. “Remember the rat?”

“How could I forget?” Mirror Lem mourned anew. “All that chittering, night after night. Daji said they preferred the ferns, but I think he just wanted an excuse to make noise when we were sleeping.”

They’d been tracing the Crushing Shadow for a few weeks, following a trail of property damage and strangulations across inland Ravounel. As best they could tell their quarry wasn’t a person, but some sort of magical force. Lem had picked up traces of hatred and want from the recent murder sites, not as acrid as one would expect from a mortal actor. They were attenuated—just not by time. With the most recent victim, they’d arrived right as her gaze became still and empty, yet even with violence so fresh, the emotions were wan and… dusty, was how he’d described it to Feiya. She had immediately agreed, then started down the path that had led to his strange new accessory.

An integral part of this was her nine-tailed fox’s repeated interviews with a rat. It was of utmost importance, Feiya had said, that the rat give the fang of its own free will. Mostly this had meant Lem got to practice the flute and forage for mushrooms for a few hours a day, and eventually Daji had returned triumphant from his protracted negotiations.

Feiya’s “other source” had revealed that, apart from the deceased’s, no flesh or blood were present at the killing. Lem had overheard Feiya mumbling in her sleep twice. The first time, she had mentioned “the lady’s dark and diaphanous wings,” and the second was something about traveling a path of stars. Then Lem shifted in his bedroll and saw Daji’s little red eyes peering at him over his pack. Since then, he’d done his best to ignore her troubled sleep.

Now, here they were in some packrat’s palace, searching hatboxes for traces of an invisible and apparently unliving force with a particular love for flattened tracheae.

 “Come now, Sad Lem, your tenebrous friend seems to have it all well in hand,” Mirror Lem reassured. “Just make sure that little—hey!”

A flash of white flitted behind a neat stack of bones. Muddy pawprints led from the ossuary and back to…

Real Lem looked down. “I just washed my feet! Do you know how long it takes to style my hair?” he groaned. “‘Back in a town,’ I thought, ‘do something nice for yourself after weeks of rainy roads.’ Should have known.”

A vulpine snicker sounded from the bones. A pair of red eyes glittered between them, then Daji strolled out into sight, nine tails swaying languidly.

“But Lem, practice makes perfect. Consternation builds character. That is my gift to you—the chance to grow as a performer and a person.” The fox knelt, wriggled as if to jump, then paused. “It was both, by the way. They liked ferns, and I liked needling you.”

Daji launched himself upward with a little yipping laugh, landing both atop a bookshelf and above the pincushion Lem had thrown at him. There was a dejected pah, pahf as the makeshift missile bounced off the shelf and fell to the floor.

---

Feiya snorted in amusement. Daji and the affable musician clearly enjoyed their verbal sparring. Truthfully, Lem was better company than she was used to. He didn’t ask uncomfortable questions, and if she shied away from a topic, he never brought attention to it; he just steered clear in future conversations. With him, the shadows of her past weren’t quite so deep, and it was easier to tend the cold and righteous fire at her core.

Never to gutter, never to rage, a still and safe anger to burn ‘til the day.

That was why they were here, really. She had been tracing a ley line when she stopped in a village for supplies. She’d entered the provisioner’s to find a red-jacketed halfling gentleman consoling a weeping shopkeeper. Townsfolk were hauling a body out the door and, being a curious sort, Feiya asked some questions. Seems the insightfulness of her queries impressed Red Jacket and suggested she might be able to help.

She was going to say no. Then she’d heard a child crying upstairs.

Certain things could stoke that cold fire until it blazed through her, and no fuel was greater than a child’s distress. Her face must have twisted, because Red Jacket paused, gave her a curious look, then handed her a torn scrap of the victim’s scarf.

“What do you make of this?” he’d said. “You know, magically. I’m guessing you’ll pick up some of the same things I did.”

Then he’d quickly closed and opened one eye at her? It was oddly endearing.

Now they were traveling companions, at least until this Crushing Shadow was found—assuming Lem didn’t strangle Daji first. She could hear her two companions locked in another of their philosophical debates, this one on the relative merits of mortal works.

Lem was lifting a gleaming sword from its velvet cradle. “…Yes, mortal work, and mortals perish. Yes, steel, and steel rusts. But the meaning we attach to the steel, to the sword and whatever violence it wreaks, that meaning grows tall and wide as wild rose, becomes a vast and tangled thing of beauty and danger both.”

Lem didn’t think Feiya was listening, but that never stopped him from talking all the same.
Illustration by Firat Solhan in Pathfinder Player Core.

“That is one of this great symphony’s mysterious movements!” Lem was winding himself up, gazing into the blade’s mirrored surface, talking as much to his reflection as to the witch’s familiar. “What may we mortals work that outlasts and out grows us? How privileged those few who see how the first stone they lay grows into a road, hear their song a continent and a lifetime away. Why, it reminds me of…”

Daji was weaving toward Feiya between the skulls and candlesticks of a high shelf.

“I walked away after the first sentence.”

He hopped down to sit in front of a black cloak with a vaguely sinister air, and cocked his head at it.

“Smells dangerous.” He nosed the dark fabric, which rippled in a disappointingly fabric-like manner. “Alas. Your new friend talks a lot, by the way.”

“Friend? But yes, he does. I think I like it? It’s comforting. And he makes me laugh in a way that feels good.” Feiya chewed on her lip. “You make me laugh like a cat who’s not done with their dinner. And that usually feels good, too. Mostly.”

She walked her finger under Daji’s chin and gave him a scratch. He made his I am pleased sound, though he’d never admit it. They sat a moment, just the two of them, in the quiet. It was almost like those first days, together in the snow.

“You’ve come far, little one, and she’ll lead you farther still,” purred the fox.

 “…Why is it quiet?”

Feiya turned to see the cloak strangling Lem.

It was wrapped around his neck, a sooty version of that eight-legged fish he’d been trying to explain to her the other day, and he was scrabbling at it to no avail.

She reached into herself for the cold anger that was always there. In her mind's eye it rose from the depths, trailing mist, and curled into long and wicked needles to jab into the minds of those who had wronged her. She snarled, and an invisible fang streaked toward the belligerent garment.

It ricocheted harmlessly off the utter void where the thing’s intent would have been, if it were a thinking, feeling creature.

“Daji!” She yelped, and her familiar responded with his own hungry growl.

---

Woe, woe, for the snuffing of a short-burned flame, the flower plucked before it blooms.

Red and black flames licked slowly at the edges of Lem’s darkening vision.

Enough, Sad Lem. Ideas?

Not a one! Oh, but I think he has some.

Daji was crouched on some taxidermized creature, his nine tails waving slowly back and forth, that bright red coloration crawling across his fur. His eyes glimmered bright as dying stars.

“A creature in sharp artifice will gnaw a limb to aid its flight,” said the fox, words smoldering and spreading. “A last gasp caught twixt death and life can tear as tender as a saw.”

One of Lem’s ragged breaths splintered, somehow, and then each splinter spread knife-like wings to launch itself at the cloak twisted about his neck. It writhed as the magic tore through stitch and seam. Fabric turned rotten and brittle, and the tightness around his neck eased.

The thin trickle of air into his lungs was all it took. The curiosity, the wonder, the desire to live and find out rose from his throat. He fumbled with numbing fingers, but his flute was unreachable. Still, he wasn’t without tools.

A single clear note sounded from his pursed lips. It shimmered against the ear, brittle, a raindrop brimming with the vast waters of mortal emotion and experience. Even standing as he was in death’s threshold, he marveled at how the smallest part of something could reflect the beauty of the whole—

echo of malice pale stitched heart wounds reflection of right that’s it—

“Feiya!” he rasped. “Not possessed, an echo! Recall the sound, remember your—” He stopped, unable to name the thing he had seen in her eyes that first day. He’d carried it himself, once.

But as the note faded, Lem saw the realization spread across her face. She stepped forward, lifted one cool, sharp claw—she had claws?—in front of his face, then sliced it downward. The tip bit into the writhing fabric of the cloak.

His bicep went cold, and that little yellow fang on the sinew thong ripped its way through his shirt. It, too, splintered, and suddenly he was surrounded by whizzing shards of bone, all tearing through gaps left by Daji’s spell. Between the talisman, the magic, and Feiya’s claws, the malicious thing was nothing more than gray tatters, some silver, and a few rapidly darkening red gems.

Lem slumped to the floor and took in a ragged breath.

“Maybe ‘all in due time’ could happen a bit sooner?” The gleam of candleflame across dully metallic nails caught his eye. “And since when did you get so pointy?”

“I’m not certain. It’s been a while.” Feiya lifted her hand to watch her nails lighten and retract. “Thank you for that final piece of the puzzle. I thought it was possession, but when you said to… you know.”

“Yes.” Lem’s bushy eyebrows scrunched together. “Feiya, I can only guess at what’s happened, and I truly don’t mean to pry, but with the strangling…”

A newly lengthened nail pressed against his lips, but Feiya’s expression was calm.

“It’s alright. Thank you,” she whispered, smiling slightly, “friend. Now, we should probably leave before—”

A shadow fell across the shop door’s stained-glass window. The key turned in the lock with the smoothness of an old habit, and a stout man stepped into the building. One look, and his face was rapidly darkening with anger.

“Mmm,” mused Lem, surrounded by shredded garments, bone fragments, and broken glass. “Bit late for that.”

About the Author

Andrew Mullen has been freelancing for Paizo and other publishers since 2017. He brings a keen interest in language and the interplay of geography and culture to his work, as seen in the Magaambya section of Lost Omens Character Guide, the xulgaths in the Extinction Curse Adventure Path, and numerous other monsters over the years. As a full-time parent, his daughter is his most important monster.

About Iconic Encounters

Iconic Encounters is a series of web-based flash fiction set in the worlds of Pathfinder and Starfinder. Each short story provides a glimpse into the life and personality of one of the games’ iconic characters, showing the myriad stories of adventure and excitement players can tell with the Pathfinder and Starfinder roleplaying games.

"Ready to keep going? Break time’s done.” Kyra straightened from her meditative stance in the darkened, deadened grass.

Merisiel had been pacing for the past few minutes already, eager to continue onward, muscles twitching in anticipation—chomping at the bit to keep going. Kyra had seen the elf’s posture like this many times and already knew the answer before it was voiced. Still, Merisiel turned an analytical eye toward her companion.

“That’s on you,” Merisiel said. “You used some magic back there. Are you ready to keep moving?”

“I’m ready,” Kyra confirmed, stretching away the stasis in her limbs, chuckling to herself as Merisiel practically leapt forward.

Kyra hung back a step, letting the elf take lead this time. The light was dim and muted here, and Merisiel was far better trained to step silently. Not that they particularly needed to, but it was generally good practice, especially here. This woodland commanded an almost reverent silence.

It wasn’t like other places Kyra had visited. She’d certainly seen her share of forest travel, but the Uskwood—and this particular part of it—was something different. Trees grew tall but held an innate roughness to them; branches twisted, splintered, or hunched as though in pain, yet still reached hopefully to the sky.

She couldn’t blame the trees for reaching toward the light. She would, too, if this was her home. Even the air felt heavier here than it did in sun-touched lands. Blue-gray fog wisped lazily at her feet and slithered away like a living creature. It made travel difficult for the two of them, obscuring the distance but offering a dim, hazy reflection of the light. Small comfort there.

There were stretches of Nidal and the Uskwood where the border between their universe and the shadowy realm of the Netherworld grew thin. While several of these rifts were already known and studied, the two adventurers knew there might be others that would randomly appear.

They’d just hoped to avoid them. Alas.

“It’s a nice place to visit, but I wouldn’t want to live here,” Merisiel said, smirking as she made her way forward step by careful step. In the unsettling silence, she didn’t have to speak loudly for her words to travel.

Kyra smiled despite herself. It was technically Merisiel’s fault they agreed to this mission in the first place; she wouldn’t have found herself in the Uskwood under normal circumstances. She responded quietly, “Definitely not.”

Silence descended on them again, smothering and cumbersome. Step by step, they proceeded alertly in this sinister quietude. The shadow-swept wood played with their senses; several times already during their trek, they’d both caught motion out of the corners of their eyes, only to find a disturbing lack of anything substantial. Whispers just on the edge of hearing teased them, only to result in nothing: no one there and little more than a persistent feeling of disquiet and of being toyed with by forces ever out of sight.

It was starting to grate on them both.

“Sooo,” sighed Merisiel quietly, “not to alarm you, but I’ve started to see things again.”

“Me too. Eyes watching in the trees,” Kyra answered. “More this time.”

Meri nodded agreement and both women moved their hands toward their respective weapons in preparation for a fight. During the last few hours, the appearance of the wispy illusions had all been false alarms, but to relax now would be foolish.

The Netherworld is no place for a casual forest stroll. Illustration by Emile Denis from Pathfinder GM Core.

As if guided by the hands of divinity, Kyra caught sight of strange, glowing eyes at the corner of her vision, then turned to look in the opposite direction—just in time to watch the nearby shadows spit out a giant, color-drained cat, its jaw extended and its long, misshapen claws stretching out for her, mid-pounce!

She met the strange creature with a startled cry. Her scimitar flashed in her hand, angled between them. It was an imperfect defense, she knew, even before her sword arm complained from the sharp sting of claw and tooth. At least the creature was wounded as well; its red blood turned gray and shadowy as it met the dark ground and melted into it.

If I’d hesitated but one second longer...

But then Merisiel was beside her, jumping from the fog-filled shadows behind the beast. Her face was contorted into a vicious snarl, and her daggers were lightning-fast, stabbing at the creature who attacked her wife before she retreated out of sight again.

Kyra’s mind whirled as quickly as her scimitar. They’d already encountered a small group of similar creatures, bleached of their color yet somehowharder to see in the dark mists of the forest, which commanded the shadows at their will and were, in turn, twisted by them. The previous attack had come from a sickly-looking stag who needed reminding that deer did not typically hunger for flesh. It was surely a mercy to put the crazed, blood-hungry creature to rest. They’d learned a lot from that battle.

It was the Netherworld’s influence on the real world, she knew. The animal inhabitants of the shadowy plane were bizarre, distorted beings that were a strange mirror to their own. When the planes bled into each other, as they did so strangely here… Well, it was no surprise there was some intermingling of worlds.

That didn’t make it any easier, though.

“It brought a friend!” Merisiel emerged from the shadows again, this time sending two daggers flying. One sank into the meaty, pale shank of the shadow-cat, and the other flew right past Kyra’s ear, hurtling toward the new enemy. “I think you’d be better handle that one, my love!”

With Meri commanding the feline’s attention, Kyra whipped around to follow the line of the elf’s weapon, though the crawling feeling along the back of her neck already told her the nature of the enemy behind her.

The creature was difficult to pick out at first, as it seemed to be merely the shadow of a nearby tree. Kyra’s eyes caught the strange, liquid movement of the being as it slithered from its base, all harsh angles and thorny, smoky darkness made manifest and given horrible life.

Horrible unlife, Kyra corrected herself, already feeling the burning heat of holy purpose filling her breast. Her right hand clenched around the golden idol of Sarenrae and thrust it up and outward. The Dawnflower’s magic answered, and the cleric focused it onto the shadow. A holy nimbus surrounded her clenched fist, and golden, magical fire lashed toward the creature, hungrily seeking to purge the corruption with its own radiant force. The undead reeled as divine magic lashed it, leaving it wounded and weakened.

Between the two of them, their enemies stood no chance. Merisiel’s seemingly endless supply of daggers, combined with her supreme agility, allowed her to easily get herself into advantageous positions. Kyra’s battle might shone as brightly as the angelic ankh idol in her hand, held aloft and glowing with sanctified cleansing magic.

It never failed to impress her how good of a team she and Merisiel made. In short time, their enemies were conquered, their weapons were cleaned, and their wounds were healed with a few, warming words and channeled magics.

Kyra sighed, worn down from a long day of exploration and battle. With a weary smile, she insisted, “Next time, love, I choose the mission.”

“How was I to know it was going to be this exciting?” Merisiel playfully retorted before dropping back into a more serious tone. “Look, we’re almost there. Just think: soon we’ll be at Volsazni Dezarr’s country home. We’ll enjoy a nice, long rest, a good meal, and we’ll be able to ask him more about the artifact we’re looking for. Easy!”

Kyra released a long breath. They could both use a good rest, she admitted to herself.

She had no idea how true that would become by journey’s end.

About the Author

Rachael Cruz is an award-winning writer / game designer whose TTRPG work can be found in Conan: Adventures in an Age Undreamed-Of, Dune: Adventures in the Imperium, Fantasy Age, RuneQuest, Star Trek Adventures, and more! She loves to help people of all ages play pretend and tell amazing stories together. For contact info, social addresses, and general writerly stuff, visit rachaelcruz.carrd.co.

About Iconic Encounters

Iconic Encounters is a series of web-based flash fiction set in the worlds of Pathfinder and Starfinder. Each short story provides a glimpse into the life and personality of one of the games’ iconic characters, showing the myriad stories of adventure and excitement players can tell with the Pathfinder and Starfinder roleplaying games.

Ever since we announced the Pathfinder Remaster project, my inbox has not known peace. Every day I get asked by the Pathfinders worldwide, “how will Pathfinder Society handle the Remaster?” Every day I must give the same answer, “I don’t know yet! Ask me in 1d4 months!”

It’s now 1d4 months later and I can finally start to answer this question! With the assistance of some incredibly dedicated Additional Resources volunteers and no less than six members of Paizo staff, we are here today to present the broad strokes of our plan to convert (or not convert) your Pathfinder Society characters to the brand-new Remastered rules. While we don’t intend for our scenarios to be written using the Remastered rules until Year 6 begins at Gen Con 2024, we know the characters will need to make the switch faster.

Before we get into it, I’d like to offer a couple of disclaimers. First, the rules we’re sharing today are the broad strokes. There will be more specifics to come on release date, but we’re still working our way through specific questions like “what happens to my staff of transmutation now that transmutation isn’t a school?” We’re sharing this today to get you ready for what’s to come.

Second, these rules are still in flux. We have a pile of questions yet to answer internally (we’re having weekly meetings to do nothing but answer them), and we expect more will come from the community as time goes on. We expect this to happen! Our intention is for these guidelines to live in a subpage of the Guide to Organized Play, to allow them to be a living document we’ll update as time goes on.

Finally, we will not be able to answer every single question that comes up. Rules discrepancies and questions come up all the time at tables, and the Remaster will increase the odds of that happening. The GM always has the power to make calls on rules questions at the table. While we strive for the Pathfinder Society experience to play out the same at every table worldwide, we need to accept as a community that there will be some variance, and be patient with each other as we figure things out. This is a game, we’re here to have fun, let’s all keep that in mind as we play!

With all that out of the way, here are the current planned guidelines for Pathfinder Society and the Remaster. If you have questions/comments/concerns, drop them in the comments of this blog and we’ll do our best to answer them. Once the Remaster drops, we’ll create a separate thread in the Pathfinder Society forum for those specific rules interactions that we won’t discover until they come up in play.

Alex Speidel
Organized Play Coordinator

---

Objectives

When considering the Pathfinder Remaster, our intent is as follows:

• To ensure that players are not forced to rebuild characters
• To ensure that as much previous material as feasible is still useable
• To incentivize adoption of the new, Remastered ruleset
• To provide an optional method to rebuild characters into Remaster rules

General Guidance

1. Game Rules
1. Players and GMs must use the remastered rules of the game immediately where possible.
1. Example: Recall Knowledge has been updated with additional guidelines. These take effect immediately at all PFS tables.
2. Example: The Refocus activity and the focus spell rules have been updated to be more intuitive. All characters immediately begin using these rules.
3. Example: Monster abilities such as Grab are no longer automatic, but allow a free skill check to attempt the action. GMs immediately begin using this new version of the rules.
2. Character Options
1. Beginning on November 15, 2023, no new characters may be created using the class chassis printed in the Core Rulebook if the class has been reprinted in the Player Core.
1. This affects the following classes: bard, cleric, druid, fighter, ranger, rogue, witch, wizard.
2. Characters with at least 1 game reported prior to November 15 may be built using the Core Rulebook chassis.
3. Previously-existing characters with at least 1 game reported may continue their progression using the Core Rulebook chassis. They may not use the chassis in the Player Core without rebuilding.
2. If a character option has been reprinted with the same name, use the new version as if it were errata. No additional retraining is necessary.
1. Example: divine lance has been reprinted with new Remaster-compatible rules. All PCs with divine lance must update the spell accordingly.
3. If a character option has not been reprinted, characters are free to use the option as previously printed, or to select it at any time.
1. Example: the brooch of shielding has not been reprinted. Characters may still purchase and use a brooch of shielding.
2. Example: the produce flame spell has not been reprinted, but ignition takes its place thematically. Characters may learn either spell anytime they would learn a new spell, and could learn both spells if they chose.
3. Example: the oracle class has not yet been remastered. Players may still build and play oracles using the rules in the Pathfinder Advanced Player’s Guide.

1. An oracle who learns divine lance must still use the remastered version of the spell.

Specific Rules

1. Alignment: Alignment has been removed from the game. PCs and NPCs no longer have alignment.
1. Edicts and Anathema: To replace certain aspects of alignment, edicts and anathema are being emphasized. These are voluntary and optional, though deities and classes may introduce specific edicts and anathema which are not optional.
2. Holy and Unholy: Many previously-aligned options now have either the holy, unholy, or sanctified traits. At a GM’s discretion, enemy abilities which previously had the good or evil traits may now have the holy or unholy trait.
1. Example: A quasit’s strikes previously had the evil trait. A GM may choose to give them the unholy trait, as quasits are demonic creatures. Similarly, a quasit’s weakness to good should now be considered a weakness to holy.
2. Wizards
1. Wizards built using the Core Rulebook chassis may continue to treat spells that had their spell school removed as part of the Remaster as if they have spell schools. They must otherwise fully update their remastered spells.
1. Example: An evocation wizard may still select electric arc as an evocation cantrip. They must use the new damage as printed in the Player Core.
2. Wizards built using the Core Rulebook chassis may learn new spells printed in remastered books, but they can never treat them as having a school spell if they did not previously have one.
3. Runelords
1. On November 15, 2023, the Runelord boon will be removed from the Achievement Points store. No new Runelords may be created after this date until/unless the archetype is reprinted.
3. Campaign-Specific Rules and Clarifications
1. Pathfinder Society characters may not be sanctified to unholy. This is the spiritual successor to the previous rule forbidding PCs of evil alignment.

Rebuilding

1. On November 15, 2023, all characters with at least one game reported are granted one free rebuild. This is a full rebuild; you may completely alter a character’s ancestry, class, background, and any options selected. You may not alter the adventures a character has participated in, nor may you alter a character’s Reputation earned.
2. Upon rebuilding, your character starts with gold equal to Table X.X[Alex note: this table will be published with the full rules, and is built on our baseline assumption of earning 8 TB per scenario].
1. Alternatively, a player character may sell any and all currently-held items at face value and purchase new items as normal.
3. If you use this rebuild, indicate “Remaster Rebuild” on your character’s most recent Chronicle Sheet.
4. If, in the course of this rebuild, you wish to refund any purchased boons, please email orgplayreportingerrors[at]paizo[dot]com with your character’s name, OP ID and character number, and the boon(s) you would like to refund.
5. This rebuild must be used before December 31, 2024. A second rebuild of this type will not be granted following the release of Player Core 2.

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One Final Change

While this isn’t a direct result of the Remaster, we’re taking the opportunity to make another change. Beginning on November 15, we will be removing the Pathfinder Training from the Guide to Organized Play. Your characters who are already Field Commissioned may still take bonus downtime, and we’re not going to take away the bonus Lores or feats your characters may have already gained. However, new characters may not use this system. Quite simply, it’s an extra layer of complexity that most players aren’t engaging with, and that doesn’t add much to the program.

However, we know everybody loves free items, so they will remain in the form of Pathfinder Provisions! We’ll have a pared-down list of consumables which all agents (including formerly Field Commissioned agents) may choose from at the start of a mission. By default agents will receive healing potions, though they may choose another item or items if they prefer. The Society wants to ensure its agents come home safe!

Hi, this is Landon! As Halloween and the Remaster approaches, one question burns in our minds: who’s going to torch all these undead while simultaneously healing the entire party? As you can probably guess, that’s still going to be the party’s cleric, but let’s dive into some changes.

The cleric remains defined by their god, so before we get into the cleric, we should talk about the Remaster’s changes to deities and the cosmos. While the Remaster sees the removal of the nine alignments, edicts and anathemas still provide descriptions of a god’s desires and prohibitions to guide their followers’ behavior at a much finer level than alignment. But there’s still an endless struggle over the souls of the planes. The new system of divine sanctification (whether holy or unholy) represents a dedication to join that fight. Some gods now allow for sanctification—even when serving a goddess like Sarenrae who rose through the angelic ranks, joining her in the fight is ultimately a personal choice—where some gods now require that their clerics swear allegiance actively, like Asmodeus and Iomedae.

Alignment damage used to be a major tool here, but it sometimes got in the way of the cleric’s story. A cleric of Lamashtu might have dealt evil damage to scatter those standing up against the Mother of Monsters, but that often didn’t reflect the god’s will. Some gods were neutral, and all gods had enemies who opposed to their beliefs but weren’t of an opposite alignment. The Remaster’s new spirit damage type lets gods’ wrath manifest much more broadly, harming anything with a spirit, down to oozes that need to be scoured away. Clerics who undergo divine sanctification can infuse many of their spiritual abilities with holy or unholy power, so a divine lance cast by a holy character will still damage almost anyone, but it will also trigger the weaknesses of demons and devils. On the flip side of the coin, divine wrath excludes the allies who are helping a cleric do their god’s work, even if the alliance is a little peculiar.

Beyond these changes, we also took the opportunity to smooth out some rough edges. All clerics will see their divine font simply give them a number of bonus heal (or harm) spells regardless of their Charisma score, giving clerics a little more flexibility in how they allocate their attributes. The warpriest got improved weapon proficiencies where it could, raising martial weapons to expert at 7th level and their deity’s favored weapon to master at 19th. Along with Focus Point recovery becoming a bit easier for everyone in the Remaster, quite a few domain spells were improved or replaced, like pulse of civilization now giving wide access to the lore of nearby cities rather than one public fact and ignite ambition working as a reaction that the target notices only on a critical success.

A lot of the remastered classes have gotten a few new feats to help tell their stories better. Even with its changes, the cleric didn’t get left out on this front. As a powerful cleric, your god might protect you so dearly that they punish those who harm you, or you might reinforce your shield with the strength of your divine font. But there are also smaller miracles, like blessing the area around you to heal your allies out of combat or presenting your religious symbol to protect against the world’s varied hardships.

Raise Symbol [one-action] — Feat 4

Cleric
Requirements You are wielding a religious symbol.

You present your religious symbol emphatically. You gain a +2 circumstance bonus to saving throws until the start of your next turn. While it’s raised, if you roll a success at a saving throw against a vitality or void effect, you get a critical success instead.

If the religious symbol you’re raising is a shield, such as with Emblazon Armaments, you gain the effects of Raise a Shield when you use this action and the effects of this action when you Raise a Shield.

Sacred Ground — Feat 4

Cleric, Consecration, Divine, Exploration
Prerequisites harmful font or healing font
Frequency once per 10 minutes

You pray continuously for 1 minute to call a subtle shadow of your deity’s realm over a 30-foot burst centered on you. It lasts for 10 minutes, and a creature that remains in the area for the entire 10 minutes regains Hit Points equal to your level.

If you have a healing font, this activity has the healing and vitality traits and heals living creatures. If you have a harmful font, this activity has the healing and void traits and heals undead creatures (or other creatures with void healing). Clerics with Versatile Font can choose either or both. It can’t damage creatures in any case.

Even my personal favorite cleric feat, Channeled Succor, spent some time in the fires of the Remaster to rise again as Restorative Channel, which interacts with the new, broader curative spells like cleanse affliction and clear mind. I’m stoked to have a new toolbox to channel all my new healing goodies. Especially with those spells all still helping when the counteract check doesn’t quite come through, it’s a good time to be freeing your friends from vexing conditions.

I hope you enjoy all these new options next month when Pathfinder Player Core is released. In the meantime, may your injured party be surrounded by a horde of low-level undead.

Cheers!

Landon Winkler (they/them)
Developer

When every individual action counts, you enter the encounter mode of play. In this mode, time is divided into rounds, each of which is 6 seconds of time in the game world. Every round, each participant takes a turn in an established order. During your turn, you can use actions, and depending on the details of the encounter, you might have the opportunity to use reactions and free actions on your own turn and on others’ turns. — Player Core

Illustration by Brian Valeza

Of Pathfinder’s three modes of play, encounter mode is the most highly structured and often used for combat or other stressful situations. Basic encounter rules assume that they are being used in combat, but for social scenarios or other situations, you might adjust the basic structure to use longer rounds or different actions.

Encounter mode follows this basic structure:

1. Roll initiative. When the GM calls for an initiative roll, make a roll to determine your place in the initiative order—the sequence in which all participants take their turns. Usually, this roll is Perception, but in some cases your GM might call for Stealth, Diplomacy, or other skills for initiative.
2. Play a round. Beginning with the highest initiative roll, all participants take a turn in order. Certain free actions and reactions might also let a character act outside of their turn.
3. Begin the next round. Once each participant has taken a turn, the round is over and the next begins, proceeding in the same order. Repeat this cycle until the encounter ends.
4. End the encounter. Encounters can end when the foe is defeated, a truce is reached, or some other event ends combat. At this point, the initiative order is dropped and participants can act in a more free-form manner. GMs will often award Experience Points or treasure to the party for successfully overcoming the encounter.

Turn Structure

When your turn comes around in the initiative order, you have three actions to use. These can be spent on single actions, or you might spend two or three actions at once for short activities. You also have a reaction, which you can use when a given trigger occurs (even if it’s not your turn), and free actions (which cost no actions to use).

1. Start your turn. Some things happen automatically at the start of your turn, such as reducing the number of turns remaining on an effect or making recovery checks. Do these “at the start of your turn” tasks in any order, then regain your 3 actions and 1 reaction.
2. You can use actions in any order, but you must complete one action or activity before beginning another. Once you have spent all three actions, your turn is over—or you can choose to end your turn early and lose your remaining actions. You cannot split a two- or three-action activity between turns.
3. End your turn. After your actions are completed, you can take the “end of your turn” steps in any order you choose. These steps could include ending spells that you chose not to sustain, taking persistent damage, and attempting saving throws for existing conditions.

Some combat encounters in unusual settings might require additional rules—Pathfinder Player Core also includes guidance for aerial combat, mounted combat, aquatic combat, and more.

Outside of encounter mode, a GM might transition the party into exploration mode or downtime—which we’re excited to cover in blogs to come!

Pre-order the remastered Pathfinder Player Core and Pathfinder GM Core today, or ask your FLGS about our hobby retailer exclusive Sketch Covers!

It's October, and you know what that means—the leaves are falling, pumpkin spice floats on the wind, and the scourge known as candy corn is appearing on store shelves, and so I, James, am here to put on my pointy hat and talk about all things witchy coming in the Remaster!

Feiya the iconic witch and her familiar Daji. Art by Wayne Reynolds.

As we've mentioned in some of our past material, the witch was a class we were excited to put into the first book of the remaster, the Player Core. The witch is a really iconic fantasy theme with a ton of historical and cultural grounding, and a popular player archetype for many characters. Unfortunately, we were also aware that the witch class has not quite always done the best at living up to this fantasy. The Remaster sees the witch as one of the most heavily changed classes, in ways that aim both to increase the class’s overall power budget as well as to express the witch’s unique flavor in an evocative way.

In Pathfinder, the witch’s defining feature is their relationship with their familiar and their patron—the witch does not get power from study, or from inherent gifts, but as part of a bargain made with a mysterious patron entity, with a magical familiar there to both provide power and make sure the witch is advancing the patron’s agenda. To highlight the fact that the witch is the premier familiar user in the game, we’ve increased the capabilities of their familiar from its original version. Now, the witch’s familiar gains even more abilities, one of which is wholly unique to the patron. These unique familiar abilities both help to express the patron’s theme, and they generate a passive effect every time the witch Casts or Sustains one of their hex cantrips. For example, a familiar granted by the Silence in Snow patron is forever cold to the touch—it might be the color of ice or its breath might crystallize in the air—and so every time you cast your sustain one of your hex spells, frost will form next to your familiar, creating difficult terrain. Many of these abilities are strong, but have very short ranges from your familiar, so be sure to keep your little shadow cat or curséd raven safe with spells like phase familiar or patron’s puppet, which can help to shield them from damage or let them dart quickly in and out of safety.

We’ve taken advantage of the Remaster to also do some general quality of life changes to the witch and make their abilities a little easier to use. Many hex cantrips now no longer make enemies temporarily immune to their effects once cast, as we felt that having to sustain them and having the limit of 1 hex cantrip per turn (it turns out, your patron doesn't like being pestered for supernatural favors three times in a six-second window) was already enough of a limit for most abilities. We also expanded some hex cantrips that were overly narrow, like wilding word, which used to function only against animals, fungi, or plants, but now function against any creature, with animals, fungi, and plants being especially vulnerable to its effects. Between loosening these restrictions and the unique abilities from familiars that happen when you Cast or Sustain a hex cantrip, the witch should be seeing a fair bit of hexing during their turns.

But of course, as your witch grows in power, so too can your familiar, which can gain various special abilities through higher-level feats. Some of these feats let your patron themself manifest through your familiar, to spooky effect. For instance, the new Patron’s Presence feat directs your patron's baleful attention to the battlefield, partially disrupting the magic of other spellcasters.

Patron’s Presence — Feat 14
Witch

Your patron can direct its attention through your familiar, and its mere presence becomes an ominous weight on the minds of other beings to distract them and blot out their magic. Your familiar gains the following activity.

Patron’s Presence [two-actions] (aura) Frequency once per hour; Effect A palpable weight extends from your familiar in a 15-foot emanation. Enemies who enter or start their turn within the aura must succeed at a Will save against your spell DC or become stupefied 2 as long as they remain within the aura, or stupefied 3 on a critical failure. The aura lasts until the end of your next turn, but the familiar can Sustain it up to 1 minute.

Beyond some of these feats that lean on the Pathfinder side of witch mythology, we also wanted to go back to the rich folklore of witches worldwide and draw on this when we were giving witches new feats—and they’re getting quite a fair number of them! It would be remiss of me not to call out my very witchy colleagues Simone D. Sallé and Shay Snow, who drew on their deep knowledge of folk magic to suggest the seeds that grew into abilities like Ceremonial Knife, which allows a knife or dagger to direct magical energies like a magic wand; the new iron teeth Witch’s Armaments (supplementing eldritch nails and living hair); or Witch’s Broom, which lets you anoint a broom with flying ointments to transform it into a flying broomstick that you can ride through the night sky (this also works with a staff, polearm, or other broom-like object—not saying there are vacuum cleaners in Golarion, but I am saying the book gives you what you need to live your best Mary Sanderson life).

And with that, I think it's time for me to get into my Witch’s Hut and use its new Leap option to spin thrice and cast a 10^th-rank teleport away! Be careful not to get cursed out there, and keep your eyes of newt on this space for more Remaster news!

The shadow remains cast,

James Case (he / him)
Senior Designer

"And then he walked face-first into a swarm of mosquitos, just like that!” Lini chuckled. “I remember the first time I did that, so many years ago! It nearly scared the life out of me. He’s fine, though; just rattled from the experience.”

The orange-haired dwarf grunted acknowledgement, pausing in his forward motion long enough to ask, “This was while I was scouting?”

“Right,” the lively gnome confirmed. “That’s why Valeros and Ezren stayed back at camp. Val wanted to sleep off the mosquitos…”

“…and Ezren wanted to avoid getting his shoes wet again,” her friend grumbled.

“You’re not wrong.” Lini grinned, hopping over an old, grounded vine. “But I can’t really blame him for wanting to stay behind, Harsk. He’s been seeing enemies everywhere. Every plant’s a flesh-eater and each low-hanging vine’s a snake to the poor guy.”

“He’s not like us,” Harsk summarized.

Straight to the point as usual, the little druid mused, but no less correct for it. The three of them—her beloved companion Droogami, the ranger Harsk, and she—had already fallen into a comfortable pattern. Each of them knew the best places to set one’s feet to keep their steps as unobtrusive as possible, and they had a general knowledge of what to watch out for in this environment. Each was more comfortable here, in the middle of the thick-grown jungle, than in the chaos of “civilized” settlements. Likewise, they each trusted the other to be competent in their own skills.

“Right. And it’s never good to be alone, so I didn’t really mind them hanging back at camp while we went ahead,” Lini finished. She saw the momentary flicker of a grin cross Harsk’s face and knew he’d been thinking much the same thing about their traveling companions.

Exploring the jungle had been a lot easier since letting Ezren and Valeros stay back, she had to admit.

A short, sharp hiss of sound from the dwarf interrupted the conversation. Lini crouched instinctively and then rolled her eyes at herself; she was the one holding the torch. Most obvious target, anyone?

Fortunately, the ranger’s quick warning was not immediately followed by an attack. It was just a signal for her to be cautious. Moving forward quietly, keeping low, the green-haired druid soon discovered what Harsk had seen: through the darkness ahead, a stone monolith reached up through the shadows, impeding their chosen path.

Lini’s curiosity tingled through her, the thrill of discovery barely held at bay until she received an all-clear signal from Harsk and saw Droogami return from circling in the opposite direction. She practically bounced as she approached, hopping atop a nearby root, a thick but sturdy remnant from a long-fallen tree. At this greater height, she raised her small hand and gently cleared away a curtain of overgrown moss, then rested it along the edge of the strange, sculpted rock.

“Another one in the distance,” Harsk said, pointing out a similar shape at the edge of their vision. “Wonder how far these go.”

“Droo, look at this,” she breathed, running her fingers along the rock. “How old do you think this thing is?”

As ever, the snow leopard refused to lend her appraisal to the situation. Lini chuckled. “I bet Ezren’s kicking himself now. He’d have wanted to see this.” Though, she had to admit to herself, he’d have certainly seen that vine over there as another snake, that plush leaf as a squirmy caterpillar, that hanging bit of moss as a bat…

“We’ll bring them tomorrow. More light then,” Harsk said.

Nodding, Lini’s hand brushed over a dip in the stone’s surface. Following a hunch, the gnome cleared away more of the moss. “Hang on a tic...! Hey, Harsk, there’s some sculpted stuff on the monolith! Kinda looks all swirly and serpentine. Come and look!”

“One moment,” answered the ranger. His own exploration had turned up something odd: dark, splotchy stains on an otherwise-green leaf. Blood...? He looked up, trying to locate the source of any drip, but found nothing of interest above. His stomach tensed, as it often did when he realized there was likely danger nearby.

You never know what you’ll find in the heart of the jungle. Illustration by WIll O'Brien from Pathfinder GM Core.

Meanwhile, Lini’s eyes shifted, focusing just beyond the edges of the monolith, past the normal spectrum of light, into the space that allowed her to detect the presence of magic. What she found drew a thoughtful sound from her. “Huh. There’s a faint magical aura on it, too...”

Harsk’s warning whistle came just in time. Lini dropped down and saw the emerald green blur of a reptilian tail jam into the stone right where her head had been. Instinctually, she pulled magic around her, drawing from the earth and tightening her skin to mimic the stony strength of the monolith. If not for Harsk’s well-timed warning, she’d have been mincemeat! The creature righted itself along the side of the stone and reared up over the top, its bright, leathery wings catching the torchlight.

“Drake!” the ranger called. As if in answer, a second serpentine hunter launched itself from the trees, angling towards him. That was a mistake; lightning quick, Harsk brought his axes to hand and left a long wound along the creature’s side as it flew by, hearing a satisfying shriek in reaction.

Meanwhile, Droogami launched herself towards the perched dragon threatening Lini, deftly avoiding the swing of the creature’s stinger and swiping at it with her mighty claws.

Despite the danger she was in, Lini had to admit that jungle drakes were simply gorgeous creatures. Sure, they were larger than she was by a notable amount, and sure, their stingers hurt like nobody’s business and had enough goopy venom in them to sicken even the hardiest body. But they were just trying to eat, after all, and a dwarf, a gnome, and a big cat sure seemed like an easy meal. Lini could totally understand how tempting a target she must make. Still, how majestic they looked when they—Oops, it’s diving again!

Rolling clear of claws and dodging the drake’s stinger, Lini gathered her magic and aimed it at Droogami. Focusing nature’s might, she used herself as a conduit, feeding power into the great snow leopard. The little druid felt her bond with the cat strengthen, their shared energy invigorating her friend. “Droo!” she called. “Like we practiced!”

Her stalwart companion and protector stood between Lini and the hungry drake. Fixing the creature with its most menacing gaze, Droogami let loose a long, primal growl, a burst of sound that shredded the air before her. You are not hunter, the magically enhanced noise insisted as it tore into the drake. You are prey.

Even Harsk had to glance over his shoulder at the great cat; he’d never heard Droo do that before. He was glad he wasn’t the target of her aimed, pain-inducing yowl.

The drake, however, wasn’t so fortunate: it reeled, knocked off balance and startled by the painful sound. Its eyes widened with fear, and for a moment, it seemed to reconsider its options. Jungle drakes typically didn’t prefer to stay and face down their prey, instead opting to fly by, letting their venom do the work for them. This one’s meal had just become more trouble than it was worth.

Noting the creature’s hesitation, Lini pressed the attack, pulling her sling and sending sharpened, stinging rocks hurtling towards it. “Harsk, watch for the stingers and the spit,” she called.

“D’ya think?” countered Harsk, diving out of the way of a flailing stinger. He rolled closer to the great creature, angling his axes with the movement, and was rewarded with a horrible screech—and a spray of hot blood as he severed the drake’s stinger from its tail. Using his momentum, he leapt from the ground, slicing his weapons upward and catching the creature’s wing. It was all but done for, and the ranger wasted no time finishing the job.

That left the one facing Lini and Droogami. By now, the gnome had moved into a flanking position, sending stinging stones at its back while Droo slashed and clawed at the creature’s front. It was going to lose.

This was too much for the creature. In perhaps the smartest choice of its entire life, the drake decided that the small, helpless meal was neither as small nor as helpless as originally thought. It displayed its wings broadly to buy itself some space and, hissing, leapt into the canopy above, beating a hasty retreat.

The victory didn’t make the druid or her friends feel much better. Taking only a moment to catch his breath, Harsk asked tersely, “You hurt?”

“No,” breathed Lini, turning her attention to Droogami. A few moments reassured her that her friend was in healthy condition. “We’re both good. You?”

Harsk nodded, voicing the thought in the same moment Lini had it: “Strange that it chose to retreat so suddenly. I don’t like it.”

“I mean, we were more than it bargained for,” Lini said. “But I don’t like it either. They love to fly-by and poison, but it’s very rare for those things to only fly in twos.”

“Then there might be more,” Harsk said. “It might be getting friends. Let’s get back to camp.”

“And quickly,” agreed Lini. “Ez and Val may be in danger!”

Wasting no more time, Harsk bounded away. Lini hopped onto Droogami’s back and the giant cat was quick to follow. Tomorrow, they could return, clean the carcass, and continue exploring the ruins. Tonight, Ezren and Valeros might need help, and neither Lini nor Harsk intended to let their teammates down.

About the Author

Rachael Cruz is an award-winning writer / game designer whose TTRPG work can be found in Conan: Adventures in an Age Undreamed-Of, Dune: Adventures in the Imperium, Fantasy Age, RuneQuest, Star Trek Adventures, and more! She loves to help people of all ages play pretend and tell amazing stories together. For contact info, social addresses, and general writerly stuff, visit rachaelcruz.carrd.co.

About Iconic Encounters

Hello all! Mike Sayre here to give you your next peek into the Remaster project with a look at the updated ranger, appearing in Pathfinder Player Core this November.

The ranger is a wilderness warrior, a character who’s good with weapons, good with animals, good in the wilds, and who can sprinkle just a little bit of magic into their repertoire if they feel like it. By and large, this is one of the classes that most people consider to be solid and effective, good at its role both thematically and mechanically. While we’re not inclined to fix things that aren’t broken, the ranger being a generally solid and effective class pre-Remaster didn’t mean we didn’t have some notable opportunities to go in and spruce a few things up, improving the general progression and experience. I’ll be talking about a few of those things here.

The magical element of the ranger is often one of its more understated aspects, but it’s one people really care about. Originally, ranger focus spells, called warden spells, were added to the class after the fact in the Advanced Player’s Guide, and one of the downsides to this was that since they weren’t built into the class originally, the class didn’t have mechanisms in place to ensure that the ranger’s spellcasting proficiency improved as the character leveled up. In the Remaster, we’ve baked the spellcasting progression directly into the ranger’s core chassis, ensuring that class features like Ranger Expertise and Masterful Hunter naturally progress the ranger’s spellcasting proficiency all the way up to master. We also streamlined the feats that the ranger uses to accrue their warden spells and recategorized the spells into easily referenced groups; the 1st-level Initiate Warden feat allows you to choose from any of the initial warden spells (which are all of the ranger’s focus spells that start at 1st rank), and there are regularly paced feats all the way up to the 10th-level Peerless Warden feat that gives you access to the strongest ranger focus spells available, which are focus spells that all start at 5th rank.

Along with the general improvements to spellcasting, we also added some new feats to help make certain builds pop and shine a bit more brightly. Precision rangers who like combining warden spells with big shots from crossbows will likely appreciate the Warden’s Reload feat shown below, which allows them to reload as a free action once per round when they cast a warden spell; this combines nicely with staple spells like gravity weapon to increase your weapon damage or spells like ranger’s bramble that damage and immobilize your foes, making them easy targets for you to pick off from a safe distance!

Ranger snares are going to be the one thing not appearing in Player Core that were originally available to the class; snares were kind of the least satisfying of the options available to the ranger and the least used options, so we’ve pulled those out of the class. They’ll be appearing in Player Core 2 alongside the Snarecrafter archetype, with a much-needed facelift.

There were also a few places where we had feats that many people saw as being taxes that you had to pay to accomplish a specific flavor. For example, the Crossbow Ace feat that originally appeared in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook was written under the assumption that all crossbows were simple weapons, and so it provided a damage bonus that essentially converted those simple weapons into martial weapons whenever you took certain actions like using Hunt Prey or reloading. This ended up having a couple issues. On the one hand, the damage bonus was big enough that the feat felt like a “must have” if you were going to be using a crossbow, crowding out build versatility and other options. On the other hand, the feat was actively fighting with the ranger’s play loop; if you were Tracking your prey before combat began and you had your crossbow in hand loaded and ready for the fight, you didn’t have any way to get your damage bonus! Playing the character the way that everything in the game was telling you to play your character was leading to situations where you couldn’t use the abilities you were supposed to be using in the situations you were supposed to be using them.

To address those issues, we added a martial crossbow, the arbalest, so that you could expect a more reasonable damage output without needing to pay a feat tax. While we had the patient open on crossbows, we also adjusted them to make them their own weapon group, with a damage-oriented critical specialization that deals 1d8 persistent bleed damage plus additional bleed damage equal to the weapon’s item bonus to attack rolls. If you preferred the bow critical specialization they had before, you can add that back onto your crossbow with the grievous rune, which makes it so that getting a critical hit with your crossbow when you have the critical specialization adds the bleed damage and also pins the target to an adjacent surface until they Interact to pull the bolt free.

With the basic damage outlay on crossbows addressed via the core weapon system, we were able to make reloading more fun and tactical with the feat space that was opened up. In addition to options like the Warden’s Reload feat I mentioned previously, we’ve also reworked Crossbow Ace and similar options to function more like the gunslinger’s various reload abilities, giving you additional things you can do to reinforce your playstyle with reload weapons while improving your ability to achieve the kind of cinematic tactical maneuvering that the class was always aiming to provide.

So that’s everything I’ve got for you on the ranger! Thanks for tuning in and stay tuned for upcoming looks at the rest of what we’ve got coming to you in the Pathfinder Remaster.

Your character’s ancestry determines which people they call their own, whether it’s diverse and ambitious humans, insular but vivacious elves, traditionalist and family-focused dwarves, or any of the other folk who call Golarion home. A character’s ancestry and their experiences prior to their life as an adventurer—represented by a background—might be key parts of their identity, shape how they see the world, and help them find their place in it.

Ancestries

Pathfinder Player Core introduces a variety of ancestries, each with their own heritage subgroups. These ancestries and heritages express a character’s culture and influence their attributes and abilities.

You can get special attribute boosts and flaws for your ancestry, such as a goblin getting better Dexterity and Charisma and worse Wisdom, or you can freely customize your attributes for any ancestry to play exactly the character you want.

The ancestries included in Pathfinder Player Core are: dwarf, elf, gnome, goblin, halfling, human, leshy, and orc.

Versatile Heritages

The peoples of Golarion are many, and they have a long history of intermingling or dabbling with forces capable of altering the very fabric of a mortal body or soul. The children born to such parents might have traits from each of their parents or physiological manifestations of the forces their ancestors were influenced by, manifesting as a specific heritage.

In order to reflect the great diversity of ancestries and cultures in Golarion, Pathfinder Player Core introduces versatile heritages—extra options including mixed ancestries and extraplanar origins. The most common among these are aiuvarins and dromaars, which represent a mix between human heritage and elven or orc heritage, respectively, in whatever way best fits the story of your character and their family.

Though a character can have only one heritage and one lineage feat, the possible permutations of a character’s background and family tree are virtually unlimited. An aiuvarin character might still have a changeling parent whose nature is visible in the coloration of their eyes even if they don’t have access to changeling ancestry feats, and a pitborn dwarf might very well have an ancestor with fey influences on their bloodline, reflected with a fey muse or patron gained through their class alongside their ancestral fiendishness.

Whether you’re looking to play a human fighter or a grimspawn leshy cleric, Pathfinder Player Core has a comprehensive guide to the ancestries and heritages of Golarion, opening new doors of possibility for your game!

Preorder Pathfinder Player Core on paizo.com or at your friendly local game store! Or, join the Pathfinder Rulebook Subscription and never miss a rulebook release!

Creating a compelling tale takes more than just heroes—it requires a complex cast of allies, adversaries, and villains! As the Game Master, your job is to narrate the story, working with the players to imagine an epic adventure. The GM Core is here to help you with every facet of the game, including guidelines on story structure, tips on creating thrilling combat, and amazing treasure to reward your heroes for saving the day! This book has everything you need to become a legendary Game Master.
—GM Core

Pathfinder GM Core releases this November 15 at your favorite local game store, bookstore, and the Paizo Store along with Pathfinder Player Core. As part of the Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster Project, it offers a fresh entry point to the Pathfinder Second Edition roleplaying game for Game Masters!

Customization and support are at the foundation of Pathfinder, and this book provides you with numerous ways to customize your game. Select whatever parts you need for the game you’re running with the toolbox nature of GM Core.

This blog will guide you in navigating the chapters of the GM Core, just like a trusty wayfinder! If you’re brand new to tabletop roleplaying games, read our summary on Archives of Nethys.

Introduction

The focus of every Pathfinder game is the player characters—they’re the stars of the show and appear in every scene that plays out in-game. But what about those scenes? What stories are being told? What old legends are being discovered, and what new ones are being forged? Who are the villains, the allies, the traitors, the lovers, the monsters, and the gods? Who runs the world? When you’re the Game Master, that’s all up to you!
— GM Core

Here you will find the basics of what it means to be a GM and guidance from the authors on how to use the book. They help you choose your tools whether you are a new GM, running a published adventure, making your own, or just need items.

Running the Game

As Game Master, you run each session of Pathfinder, providing the link between the players and the world of the game. It’s up to you to set the scene as the player characters battle monsters, interact with other people, and explore new locations.
— GM Core

This chapter provides tools to create a welcoming environment, prepare adventures, create characters, and plan and run sessions. You will find one of the best guides in the industry on special considerations, running encounters, exploration, downtime, difficulty classes, and rewards. You will also find sidebars on topics such as Tools for Responsible Play, Collaboration During Play, and more!

Building Games

Game Mastering can be an extremely creative endeavor, and this chapter gives you a suite of tools to make your own campaign or adventure. You can even create your own creatures, hazards, and items to populate your game, or even make your own game world!
— GM Core

This chapter covers everything you need to build an adventure of your own, from campaign structure to encounter design, world building, variant rules, and more. While you may need to make something from scratch, you can also adapt existing material using the guidance from this chapter. Build your own hazards, items, and creatures using GM Core’s in-depth developer advice and mathematical benchmarks. The Rewards section gives you all you need to distribute Experience Points, Hero Points, and treasure throughout your campaign.

Age of Lost Omens

Ten thousand years ago, the world of Golarion came close to ending. Earthfall, as this extinction-level event came to be known, saw the world pummeled by a shower of falling stars that sank continents, hollowed out new seas, and destroyed civilizations. It took centuries for the world to recover, and centuries more for society to rebuild, but recover it did.
— GM Core

Though the Building Games chapter includes everything you need to create your game world, the Age of Lost Omens is a fully developed setting that’s ready to use and has vast amounts of support across Paizo’s adventures and Lost Omens books. Explore the Inner Sea Region and beyond, learning about the rich cultures, religions, and factions therein. Use tools like nation and settlement stat blocks to understand our locations or flesh out your own realms. This chapter also covers extraplanar setting elements, taking your campaign into the Great Beyond.

Subsystems

When your game goes into uncharted territory or you want to emphasize an element of gameplay that usually gets overlooked or condensed into a single check, you can use a subsystem. As the name implies, subsystems are extensions of the main rules system that allow you to explore a particular topic or style of play at your table.
— GM Core

Part of Pathfinder’s robust game engine lies in its ability to explore elements of gameplay that are not always in the forefront. The Subsystems chapter gives Game Masters a diverse set of tools to tackle any in-game challenge and to track progress on tasks using Victory Points. Where some systems may leave you in the lurch wondering “what should my players roll for this?”, Pathfinder’s subsystems provide support for Game Masters and players alike. Subsystems covered in this chapter include Influence, Research, Infiltration, Dueling, and more.

Treasure Trove

Characters acquire treasure from the glittering hoards of their foes, as rewards for defending the innocent, and as favors from the grand personalities they treat with. As they progress through their adventures and improve their station in the world, characters collect ever more fabulous items, from enchanted armor and weapons to spell-infused wands and staves.
— GM Core

The Treasure Trove is a Game Master’s guide of alchemical and magical items and how to use them. Not only does this chapter cover a large range of treasure—ranging from potions and magical staves to apex items and more—but it’s also a comprehensive guide to reading item stat blocks and understanding how items work.

Finally, GM Core is complete with Treasure Table, Glossary, and Index sections as additional tools for you to use on the fly.

Inside GM Core you’ll find the guidance you need to build and run the fantastic stories you wish to tell!

—The Paizo Team

P.S.
After you’ve devoured GM Core, get started with the Pathfinder Society to find games and hone your skills. Don’t forget to subscribe or preorder today to get Pathfinder Monster Core in March 2024 and Pathfinder Player Core 2 in July 2024!

Hello, there! I’m Logan Bonner, Pathfinder Lead Designer, here to discuss some of the changes to spells and spellcasting in the remastered books, especially Pathfinder Player Core. James recently went over some details about the remastered wizard, and I’m going to cover the changes to spellcasting overall.

If you want to read some more on the subject, the Core Preview file goes into detail about the term “spell rank” replacing “spell level,” the removal of spell schools, the new spell format seen in the following examples, and some more information about focus spells and the remastered Refocus action.

Spellcasting

As we’ve mentioned in several places, we’ve removed spell components from spells for several reasons:

• They were highly tied to OGL content. We’re moving away from them.
• They were mostly redundant with traits. Though there were some shades of nuance here, most of the time, the player needed to remember that material, somatic, and focus components added the manipulate trait to a spell and verbal components added concentrate. The new system adds those traits directly and cuts out the middleman (the components).
• There were a ton of exceptions to make classes play as intended. You can see in the sidebar on page 303 of the Pathfinder Core Rulebookthat the bard, cleric, druid, and sorcerer all had exceptions for how their components work. This removal lets the classes work as intended without having to learn the system and then having to learn which parts of that system you could ignore.
• Classes wanted more freedom to define how they cast spells. As the game has grown, both over the course of 1st Edition and 2nd Edition, more class concepts came up that wanted to cast spells with different particulars and presentation. Ultimately, we decided we preferred to let the classes define how they cast and let the theme dictate their mechanics rather than to have a “consistent” system that must either restrict classes or be undermined by them.

Lini casts wall of thorns to impede charau-ka adversaries! Illustration by Firat Solhan

Spell Statistics

If you’ve looked at the War of Immortals playtest classes, you may have noticed that the animist is “Trained in spell attack modifier” and “Trained in spell DC.” Why doesn’t it say “divine?” This represents a change to spellcasting for all characters who get spells, whether it’s from a class, innate spells, an archetype, or any other source. You no longer need to track proficiency separately for each tradition; there’s just one proficiency now. To update an existing character, you’ll simply use the highest proficiency you already have for all your spells. Why has this changed?

• Reduce tracking. Having multiple proficiencies could be annoying to keep track of, especially for a complicated character.
• Enable interesting character concepts. Though you might think it would be fun to play a cleric with a bard archetype, the spell statistics could be so much worse that it wasn’t worth pursuing.
• Let the attributes do the work. We already have another way that the secondary spells you acquire can be worse—they likely use different attributes. In the above example, you’d still need Wisdom for cleric spells and Charisma for bard spells. That’s enough of a difference to account for without tossing in a gulf between proficiencies that pushes the stats further apart. It also allows you to eliminate the gap entirely if you choose options that use the same attribute.

Cantrips

We’ve made several revisions to damaging cantrips, with the broadest change being to use only damage dice rather than adding an attribute modifier. Like with most changes we made to the system, this was decided after examining multiple factors that were causing problems together.

• Consistency with how other spells work. Most spells deal just dice for damage, and cantrips were an outlier. Making spells look and function more consistently across the board helps in understanding the rules, especially for new players.
• Match their damage to our intended spell benchmarks. One-target cantrips were supposed to deal around 6 damage, with focus spells and spell slots dealing a bit more. Adding the spellcasting attribute modifier pushed all the damage numbers off their baseline.
• Avoid penalizing characters who have damage cantrips from innate spells or multiclassing twice. Characters who got damaging cantrips from multiclassing or as innate spells from ancestry feats or the like often have a lower attribute modifier than a dedicated spellcaster and were dealing with both a lower chance of success and lower damage if they hit. This is a smaller issue, but often led to players being unhappy with their character options.
• Cleaning up how cantrips work for monsters. This is another smaller issue, but a pain point for GMs. It was unclear how to apply the spellcasting attribute modifier for monsters with cantrips.

A good example of a cantrip built in a new manner is caustic blast, which now uses a burst and works a bit more like other spells rather than having a player need to learn how splash damage works for the purposes of a single spell the way acid splash did.

Caustic Blast [two-actions] Cantrip

Acid, Cantrip, Concentrate, Manipulate
Traditions arcane, primal
Range 30 feet; Area 5-foot burst
Defense basic Reflex
You fling a large glob of acid that immediately detonates, spraying nearby creatures. Creatures in the area take 1d8 acid damage with a basic Reflex save; on a critical failure, the creature also takes 1 persistent acid damage.
Heightened (+2) The initial damage increases by 1d8, and the persistent damage on a critical failure increases by 1.

We’ve also revamped many of the non-damaging cantrips. Here you can see both read aura, which needed adjustment due to the removal of spell schools and now speaks more directly to identifying the item, and light, which incorporates both parts of the original light spell and the removed spell dancing lights to provide players with an alternative that allows for more creativity and flexibility.

Read Aura Cantrip 1

Cantrip, Concentrate, Detection, Manipulate
Traditions arcane, divine, occult, primal
Cast 1 minute
Range 30 feet; Targets 1 object
You focus on the target object, opening your mind to perceive magical auras. When the casting is complete, you know whether that item is magical. You (or anyone you advise about the aura) gain a +2 circumstance bonus to Identify Magic on the item. If the object is illusory, you detect this only if the effect’s rank is lower than the rank of your read aura spell.
Heightened (3rd) You can target up to 10 objects.
Heightened (6th) You can target any number of objects.

Light [two-actions] Cantrip 1

Cantrip, Concentrate, Light, Manipulate
Traditions arcane, divine, occult, primal
Range 120 feet
Duration until your next daily preparations
You create an orb of light that sheds bright light in a 20-foot radius (and dim light for the next 20 feet) in a color you choose. If you create the light in the same space as a willing creature, you can attach the light to the creature, causing it to float near that creature as it moves. You can Sustain the spell to move the light up to 60 feet; you can attach or detach it from a creature as part of this movement.
You can Dismiss the spell. If you Cast the Spell while you already have four light spells active, you must choose one of the existing spells to end.
Heightened (4th) The orb sheds light in a 60-foot radius (and dim light for the next 60 feet).

Focus Spells

We’ve already mentioned and shown several changes to how Focus Points work in the Core Preview document. Mainly, the number of points for your focus pool is always equal to the number of focus spells you know, to a maximum of 3, and you can Refocus for 10 minutes to regain 1 Focus Point regardless of how many points you’ve already spent. If you want to see the new Refocus rules for yourself, take a look at the Core Preview document.

This alone should make focus spells more dependable and simpler to use and track. Additionally, we’ve taken a look at a few of the focus spells that didn’t function well as focus spells and tuned them up. Let’s look at waking nightmare, for example. It can now make a creature paralyzed instead of fleeing and can make the creature take extra mental damage.

Waking Nightmare [two-actions] Focus 1

Uncommon, Cleric, Concentrate, Emotion, Fear, Focus, Manipulate, Mental
Range 30 feet; Targets 1 creature
Saving Throw Will; Duration varies
You fill the creature’s mind with a terrifying vision. The target must attempt a Will save. A creature frightened by this spell takes 1 additional mental damage each time it’s hit by a Strike.
Critical Success The target is unaffected.
Success The target is frightened 1.
Failure The target is frightened 2. If it’s asleep, it wakes up and is paralyzed for 1 round.
Critical Failure As failure, but frightened 3.
Heightened (+1) The mental damage increases by 1.

Many focus spells with longer casting times, like read fate and safeguard secret, have had their casting times reduced, so you can use them in the middle of an encounter or scene.

What About Normal Spells?

So, you’ve heard about cantrips and focus spells, but what about all those other spells? For the most part, spells cast from slots work similarly to how they did before. Let’s look at a couple of those spells! First is thunderstrike, which replaces shocking grasp. It starts off with lower damage, but it becomes ranged instead of being a melee spell and heightened versions increase its damage output.

Thunderstrike [two-actions] Spell 1

Concentrate, Electricity, Manipulate, Sonic
Traditions arcane, primal
Range 120 feet; Targets 1 creature
Defense basic Reflex
You call down a tendril of lightning that cracks with thunder, dealing 1d12 electricity damage and 1d4 sonic damage to the target with a basic Reflex save. A target wearing metal armor or made of metal takes a –1 circumstance bonus to its save, and if damaged by the spell is clumsy 1 for 1 round.

Heightened (+1) The damage increases by 1d12 electricity and 1d4 sonic.

Second, we have tree of seasons, which we’ve previously mentioned in streams and such. It’s taking the “explosive seeds” spot formerly held by fire seeds, but with a bit more variety, higher damage, and the option to create the tree farther away from you.

Tree of Seasons [two-actions] Spell 6

Concentrate, Manipulate, Plant, Wood
Traditions primal
Range 60 feet
Duration 1 minute
You cause a Small tree to instantly sprout in an unoccupied space on the ground. Four seedpods grow from the tree, each filled with the magic of a different one of the four seasons. A creature can Interact to pluck one of the pods and can then either throw it up to 30 feet as part of the same action or do so with a separate Interact action later. When thrown, a pod explodes in a 5-foot burst, dealing 6d6 damage with a basic Reflex save against your spell DC. The damage type depends on the season of the pod: electricity for spring, fire for summer, poison for autumn, or cold for winter. When the spell ends, the tree withers away and any remaining pods rot, leaving behind non-magical seeds.
Heightened (+1) The burst’s damage increases by 1d6.

Logan Bonner)
Pathfinder Lead Designer

Hi everyone! James here to talk a little bit about the Remaster project. We're getting closer and closer to Pathfinder Player Core and GM Corereleasing in November. To shine a little more light on what's coming, the marketing team and us thought we would kick off a blog series going into some of our changes in a little more depth. We'll start things off with a class, the wizard!

The wizard is the classic arcane spellcaster who learns magic in the most academic way: institutions, tomes, tutors and the like, and we wanted this to come through in how the class feels to build and play, so expect to see some more references to training, incantations, runes, spell formulas, and the like in the feats and features.

Ezren, the iconic wizard. Art by Wayne Reynolds

While the wizard was generally already providing a satisfying play experience at the table, it was also a class that interacts very heavily with one of the larger changes we’re making in the Remaster, which is the removal of the eight schools of magic that were deeply tied to rules we were using via the OGL. Though this presented a big challenge in remastering the class, it also let us solve one of the biggest frustrations of the wizard, which is that there wasn't a whole lot of space left for them to expand. One of the most commonly requested expansions for any class is additional major paths to build your characters along, but because the wizard schools already had all eight schools of magic that could ever exist in the setting (plus universalist), we could never increase the number of wizard schools or explore more interesting options beyond those preset themes.

The new role for arcane schools is as just that: actual mages' curricula in Golarion. This allows us to make much more tightly focused schools that really let you sell the theme of your wizard, from the tactical spells of the School of Battle Magic (fireball, resist energy, weapon storm, true target and the like) to the infrastructure-focused spells of the School of Civic Wizardry (hydraulic push for firefighting, summon construct and wall of stone for construction, pinpoint and water walk for search and rescue, and earthquake and disintegrate for controlled demolitions). We've also rearranged the existing wizard focus spells and, in some places, changed them a little bit to fit their new locations—the School of Mentalism's charming push focus spell functions much like the original enchanter's charming words, but the new spell doesn't have the auditory or linguistic traits, since the School of Mentalism is much more about direct mind magic.

This also opens the door to create more schools in the future based on the specific schools of magic in the setting, and I know my colleagues in the Lost Omens line have already started thinking of what some of these might be (they have, as yet, sadly rejected my suggestion for a goblin-themed wizard school containing mostly fire and pickling spells).

We haven't just remastered the schools; we wanted to go through the feats as well and give the wizard a few fun toys to underscore how they're nerds their academic mastery of magic. Some of these are tools originally developed in other places that make perfect sense for a wizard to have, like the Knowledge Is Power magus feat (with a few wizard-specific adjustments). We also gave the wizards some new feats, like the following:

Secondary Detonation Array [one-action] Feat 14

Manipulate, Spellshape, Wizard

You divert some of your spell’s energy into an unstable runic array. If your next action is to Cast a Spell that deals damage, has no duration, and affects an area, a glowing magic circle appears in a 5-foot burst within that area. At the beginning of your next turn, the circle detonates, dealing 1d6 force damage per rank of the spell to all creatures within the circle, with a basic Reflex save against your spell DC. If the spell dealt a different type of damage, the circle deals this type of damage instead (or one type of your choice if the spell could deal multiple types of damage).

This feat ties into some of the flavor tweaks we've made to wizards to have them talk about their abilities a little more academically, and it's burst of damage is one that requires a little bit of forethought in strategy to get the most out of, something that a spellcaster whose key attribute is Intelligence might gravitate toward.

That's our look at the wizard! Of course, what would a wizard be without their spells? Check back in on Thursday, where we'll go over some of the updates to magic coming in the remaster, from new spells to some of the new rules for spellcasting!

James Case (he / him)
Senior Designer

Hello Pathfinders! As we announced during our Gen Con Keynote Presentation, we have a playtest of two new classes starting September 1! These classes are entirely new – not concepts brought forward from First Edition into Second Edition—and we can’t wait to share them with you!

To kickstart the playtest, we’re having a Paizo Special Livestream on Thursday, August 31 at 4 p.m. pacific daylight time (PDT). Join Design Manager Michael Sayre and Senior Designer James Case as they give an overview of the new classes and introduce the Iconics that represent them.

Tune in on the twitch.tv/officialpaizo to see the new iconics!

The Pathfinder Playtest launches on September 1. Check back here then for a blog with more details about the classes and how to participate!

See you on twitch.tv/officialpaizo!

From the Pathfinder Remaster Project to Starfinder Enhanced, the team at Paizo has a plethora of new content coming down the pipeline. This year’s PaizoCon Online featured speakers across Paizo’s creative team who teased at new products and projects.

Pathfinder Remaster

Lead Designer Logan Bonner revealed the final, painted covers for the Player Core and GM Core books during the presentation. These fully painted covers by Wayne Reynolds feature Pathfinder iconic heroes doing battle against and standing alongside new diabolic and mirage dragons, both of which will debut in Monster Core. These full-color covers will be available online and at retailers, while the Hobby Retailer Exclusive Sketch Covers, previously revealed on the Paizo Blog, will only be available through your FLGS.

Hardcover Rulebooks

Pathfinder has a variety of new rulebooks—some freshly released and some on their way. James Case, Senior Designer on Pathfinder, showcased some of the upcoming content.

Rage of Elements, Pathfinder’s latest rulebook, will be available in early August at Gen Con 2023, as well as online and at local retailers. This book adds wood and metal elemental planes to Golarion, taking players on a tour of the planes and introducing their elemental lords. Also included in Rage of Elements is a much-anticipated new class: the kineticist, an elemental adept martial class. Rage of Elements is the first Remaster compatible rulebook, giving a preview of the rule changes to come.

Coming in 2024 is the recently announced Howl of the Wild, a creature-filled book featuring an iruxi naturalist and his eccentric crew as they navigate the wilds on their airship, the Zoetrope. This book introduces six new wild-side ancestries, new creatures, regional variants of existing creatures, spells, archetypes, and more.

Lost Omens

Luis Loza, Creative Director of Pathfinder, gave a preview of Lost Omens Highhelm, an upcoming book that’s part gazetteer and part exploration of dwarven culture. This new Lost Omens entry releases in June and includes new skills, feats, ancestries, backgrounds, and mechanics to immerse yourself in dwarven culture and the city of Highhelm. Players can also expect to learn more about the dwarven pantheon, particularly eight gods not yet expanded on in Golarion.

Pathfinder Adventures

Syncing wonderfully with the release of Lost Omens Highhelm, Pathfinder’s next Adventure Path, Sky King’s Tomb, takes player characters on a quest for a major piece of dwarven history. The Adventure Path starts in August, and the three volumes will take players from levels 1–10.

Following that, our Adventure Paths take us to Tian Xia for Season of Ghosts. This ghostly, horror-flavored four-part Adventure Path for levels 1–12 takes place over a full calendar year in game—with each installment covering the length of one season in a cursed town in haunted Shenmen.

Standalone adventures return with Pathfinder Adventure: Rusthenge, a softcover book that places low-level characters in the world of runelords and their conflicts. Rusthenge will release late this year, bringing the western reaches to your table.

Partner Projects

Many of Paizo’s licensed partners are currently running crowdfunding drives or releasing new projects, such as the Dynamite Comics Kickstarter, BKOM Studios Abomination Vaults ARPG Kickstarter, Demiplane’s Pathfinder NEXUS, and more.

Breaking news! Steve Jackson Games announced that Pathfinder: Revolution, the Pathfinder expansion for hit board game Revolution, will release late this year. Pathfinder: Revolution puts players in the rebellion of Korvosa, facing off against tyrannical Queen Ileosa to save the city from her bloody path to immortality.

Starfinder

Looming big and bright on Starfinder’s horizon is Starfinder Enhanced, a book full of player options, items, spells, and rules for scaling up equipment. This book rolls out enhanced versions of four classes—the envoy, solarian, technomancer, and witchwarper—and presents new rules and changes that reflect feedback from the experiences of developers and community members alike.

Starfinder and mech fans alike can look forward to Mechageddon!, a high-level hardcover Adventure Path coming in 2024! Newly announced at PaizoCon 2023, this adventure starts on Daimalko—the planet of kaiju—and takes players through levels 3–18, letting their mechs level up with them through tier 17.

Organized Play

Pathfinder Society and Starfinder Society have plenty in store for this summer’s convention season! Debuted at PaizoCon Online 2023, Pathfinder Society Scenario #4-13: Within the Prairies and Pathfinder Society Scenario #4-14: Shattering Golden Chains continued this season’s path towards conflict with the night hag, Aslynn. Starfinder Society introduced its new season with Starfinder Society Scenario #6-01: Year of Fortune’sFall and Starfinder Society Scenario #6-02: Drift Scars. Starfinder Society players also participated in the group interactive special #5-99, Battle for Bulwark!

Look forward to election day in Starfinder Society! The First Seeker has stepped down, and four new candidates have been chosen from player-submitted characters to run for their place. In Starfinder Society Scenario #6-06, going live at GenCon 2023, Society players will get to meet the candidates and vote on who will step up as the next First Seeker.

Pathfinder Adventure Path #200

Pathfinder Adventure Path #200 is coming next year, and it’s a special double-sized standalone adventure available in hardcover and softcover. Seven Dooms for Sandpoint brings Pathfinder Adventure Path #1 author James Jacobs back to that adventure’s setting, the town of Sandpoint, for a level 4–12 adventure that adapts Pathfinder’s designer playtest campaign for the first time.

Watch the PaizoCon Online 2023 Twitch Panel Playlist on YouTube!

Your journey to adventure with the Pathfinder Remaster starts with the Player Core, a mighty tome containing all the rules you need as a player to create a character and take them on epic quests! Just as before, making a character is as simple as ABC: picking your Ancestry, Background, and Class!

This week, we wanted to focus on ancestries a bit to give you a sense of what you can expect from them in the Remaster. Little has changed in for basic ancestry features—you still get starting Hit Points, note your size and Speed, record your attribute boosts and flaws, list out your languages, and so on. The core identity of each ancestry hasn’t changed with the Remaster, so a lot of the descriptive text remains unaltered. But with alignment no longer a part of Pathfinder, we wanted to make sure that you still had a sense of what the ancestry was all about. So, we’ve created popular edicts and anathemas for each ancestry to give you a richer sense of what matters to them, beyond simple good or evil. You can use these as a basis for your character’s code and outlook, taking them as-is for a more traditional approach or tweaking them to spark your own unique ideas for your character. Take a look at the revised Beliefs section of the dwarf ancestry.

Beliefs

Dwarves tend to value honor and closely follow the traditions of their clans and kingdoms. They have a strong sense of friendship and justice, though they are often very particular about who they consider a friend. They work hard and play harder—especially when strong ale is involved. Torag, god of dwarvenkind, is dwarves’ primary deity, though worship of Torag’s family members is also common.

Popular Edicts create art with beauty and utility, hunt the enemies of your people, keep your clan dagger close

Popular Anathema leave an activity or promise uncompleted, forsake your family

As you can see, this gives you a more well-rounded and diverse picture of what members of the dwarven ancestry value as a people. We’re super excited about this change and have already started incorporating this format in our upcoming releases, such as the ardande and talos versatile heritages in Rage of Elements coming out in just a few months!

In addition to this, we’ve taken a hard look at the feats in each ancestry, making sure they’re living up to their design potential. You can expect to see upgrades to several feats to ensure they meet our current design philosophy (I'm looking at you, Stonecunning). Also, we’ve added feats from the Advanced Player’s Guide to the entries in the Player Core. For the dwarf alone, we’ve added Dwarven Doughtiness, Defy the Darkness, and more. Of course, we took this opportunity to create some new feats as well. Take a look at this all-new high-level dwarf feat!

Stonewall [reaction] — Feat 17

Dwarf, Earth, Polymorph
Frequency once per day
Trigger An enemy or hazard’s effect hits you or you fail a Fortitude save against one.

The strength of stone overcomes you so strongly that it replaces your stout body. You become petrified until the end of the current turn. You don’t take any damage from the triggering effect or any other ill effects that couldn’t affect stone.

This brings us to the end of our first round of previews, but you can expect to hear a lot more about the Remaster books in the coming months. If you want to learn more, don’t forget to watch our Pathfinder Remaster panel this weekend at PaizoCon Online! We’ll be going live on Friday from noon to 2 pm PST, right after the keynote address, over on the Paizo Twitch. We hope to see you there!

Jason Bulmahn
Director of Game Design

Over the past few weeks, we’ve given you a look at two new dragons from the Monster Core, due out early next year. And while I'm sure folks are eager to throw a diabolic dragon and a mirage dragon at their players, this week, we wanted to turn our attention to some of the new material you’ll find in the GM Core, a book packed cover to cover with everything a GM needs to run Pathfinder Second Edition!

While much of this tome will be familiar to those of you who have read the Core Rulebook and Gamemastery Guide, there are still plenty of new things tucked away here to delight and surprise your players! To give you just a taste, today I thought we’d look at two brand-new apex magic items set to appear in the GM Core! These items are the pinnacle of power for most characters, highly sought after for their ability to increase your attribute modifiers. We hope you enjoy this sneak peek at some of our exciting new items!

Bracers of Strength — Item 17

Apex, Invested, Magical
Price 15,000 gp
Usage worn bracers; Bulk L

Etchings of powerful bears decorate these brass bracers. You gain a +3 item bonus to Athletics checks and a +2 circumstance bonus to Athletics checks to lift a heavy object, Escape, and Force Open. When you invest the bracers, you either increase your Strength modifier by 1 or increase it to +4, whichever would give you a higher score.

Activate—Bear Hug [one-action] (manipulate) Effect Attempt to Grapple a creature. If you succeed, you crush the creature in your grasp, dealing bludgeoning damage to it equal to your Strength modifier. If you critically succeeded, the damage is equal to double your Strength modifier, and the creature suffocates as long as it remains grabbed or restrained by you.

Cloak of Swiftness — Item 17

Apex, Invested, Magical
Price 15,000 gp
Usage worn cloak; Bulk L

This thin cloak is surprisingly light, as if clouds or the very wind were woven together to make the garment. The cloak grants you a +3 item bonus to Acrobatics checks. When you invest the cloak, you either increase your Dexterity modifier by 1 or increase it to +4, whichever would give you a higher score.

Activate—Ride the Wind [one-action] (manipulate) Frequency once per day; Effect You tug on the cloak, wrapping yourself in the power of wind. You gain a fly Speed of 30 feet for 1 hour. While wrapped in the cloak, you become translucent, causing you to become concealed for the duration.

These items and more are set to premiere in the GM Core, coming out this November! Tune in next week as we take a look at some of the new elements you’ll find in the Player Core!

Jason Bulmahn
Director of Game Design

Hey everyone, Luis Loza here! I'm back to talk about another addition to the draconic ranks in Pathfinder Monster Core. If you haven’t seen our preview for the new diabolic dragon, be sure to check that out as well! Anyway, on to the latest preview!

Mirage Dragon Concept Art - by Kent Hamilton

The next dragon we’re showcasing is the mirage dragon, an arcane dragon with a mastery of illusion magic. Arcane dragons typically have a stronger connection to magic, represented by stronger spellcasting capabilities, direct influence over magical energies, and other supernatural abilities. Many arcane dragons sport lithe frames as they make use of their magic more directly and thus don’t require the powerful bodies that other dragons use for combat. That doesn’t make arcane dragons any less dangerous, however!

Take the mirage dragon, for example. Its scales are iridescent and capable of changing color for better camouflage, making mirage dragons surprisingly stealthy. The fins on the dragon’s head open up into a radiant display that can captivate foes, giving the dragon plenty of time to close in on prey. A mirage dragon’s hallucinatory breath can confound or overwhelm multiple enemies at once, which is helpful when dealing with parties of would-be dragon slayers. Add on a suite of illusion spells, and you have a dragon that’s just as dangerous, if not more so, than its larger cousins. Mirage dragons love to gaze upon their own reflections and hoard gold pieces polished to a mirror shine, as well as reflective metals, large mirrors, and other treasures to line their lairs.

I hope you enjoyed this peek at the mirage dragon. If you want a second look, make sure to check out our preview for the cover of Pathfinder GM Core. Stay tuned for more Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster previews—draconic and otherwise—in the coming weeks!

Luis Loza
Creative Director—Rules & Lore

Hey, everybody! Luis Loza here with the first in a series of previews of the upcoming Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster. If you aren’t fully up to date on what the Remaster is, make sure to check out our recent blog post announcing the project along with our video where Jason Bulmahn (Director of Game Design) and Logan Bonner (Pathfinder Lead Designer) discuss a few of the things to expect.

Among the most exciting new additions to Pathfinder are the new dragons that will appear in Pathfinder Monster Core. We’re updating the draconic connection to spellcasting traditions to give dragons a better fit within the Lost Omens setting. Every dragon will be arcane, divine, occult, or primal in nature and have their stories and abilities connected to their respective tradition. Creating this new dynamic—and the new dragons that come with it—has been incredibly fun. Not only do we get to imagine awesome and fearsome new dragons, thanks to the incredible talent of art director Kent Hamilton, we get to see them come to life.

Diabolical Dragon Concept Art by Kent Hamilton (Not final concept)

The first of the dragons we want to preview is the diabolic dragon, a divine dragon with ties to Hell. Divine dragons draw their power from various planes and sometimes even directly from a deity. Diabolic dragons are bound to the will of Hell, serving as guardians and leaders of Hell’s armies, with some even directly reporting to the archdevils. A diabolic dragon can unleash the fires of Hell itself, and no one is safe from their hellfire. This infernal and unholy fire is even capable of burning creatures made of flame, such as fire elementals. Should you somehow get lucky enough to triumph over a diabolic dragon, you may find their lair to be covered in piles of gems filled with trapped souls as well as countless contracts damning unfortunate mortals to an afterlife in Hell.

If you want another look at a diabolic dragon, take a peek at our preview for the cover of Pathfinder Player Core. While you’re there, you can also check out the mirage dragon on the cover of Pathfinder GM Core. Stay tuned for a future preview where we’ll give you a look at that new arcane dragon!

Luis Loza
Creative Director—Rules & Lore

Today, we are pleased to reveal the Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster Project, four new hardcover rulebooks that offer a fresh entry point to the Pathfinder Second Edition roleplaying game! The first two books, Pathfinder Player Core and Pathfinder GM Core, release this November, with Pathfinder Monster Core (March 2024) and Pathfinder Player Core 2 (July 2024) completing the remastered presentation of Pathfinder’s core rules. The new rulebooks are compatible with existing Pathfinder Second Edition products, incorporating comprehensive errata and rules updates as well as some of the best additions from later books into new, easy-to-access volumes with streamlined presentations inspired by years of player feedback.

This year saw a huge explosion of new Pathfinder players. Remastered books like Pathfinder Player Core and Pathfinder GM Core improve upon the presentation of our popular Pathfinder Second Edition rules, remixing four years of updates and refinements to make the game easier to learn and more fun to play.

In time, the Pathfinder Player Core, Pathfinder GM Core, Pathfinder Monster Core, and Pathfinder Player Core 2 will replace the Pathfinder Core Rulebook, Gamemastery Guide, Bestiary, and Advanced Player’s Guide, which Paizo will not reprint once their current print runs expire. Existing Pathfinder players should be assured that the core rules system remains the same, and the overwhelming majority of the rules themselves will not change. Your existing books are still valid. The newly formatted books consolidate key information in a unified place—for example, Pathfinder Player Core will collect all the important rules for each of its featured classes in one volume rather than spreading out key information between the Core Rulebook and the Advanced Player’s Guide.

The new core rulebooks will also serve as a new foundation for our publishing partners, transitioning the game away from the Open Game License that caused so much controversy earlier this year to the more stable and reliable Open RPG Creative (ORC) license, which is currently being finalized with the help of hundreds of independent RPG publishers. This transition will result in a few minor modifications to the Pathfinder Second Edition system, notably the removal of alignment and a small number of nostalgic creatures, spells, and magic items exclusive to the OGL. These elements remain a part of the corpus of Pathfinder Second Edition rules for those who still want them, and are fully compatible with the new remastered rules, but will not appear in future Pathfinder releases.

In the meantime, Pathfinder’s remaining projects and product schedule remain as-is and compatible with the newly remastered rules. This July’s Rage of Elements hardcover, along with the Lost Omens campaign setting books and our regular monthly Adventure Path volumes, continue as planned, as does the Pathfinder Society Organized Play campaign, which will incorporate the new rules as they become available.

Learn more with our FAQ here or read it below

Is this a new edition of Pathfinder?

No. The Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster Project does not change the fundamental core system design of Pathfinder. Small improvements and cosmetic changes appear throughout, but outside of a few minor changes in terminology, the changes are not anywhere substantive enough to be considered a new edition. We like Pathfinder Second Edition. You like Pathfinder Second Edition. This is a remastered version of the original, not a new version altogether.

Are my existing Pathfinder Second Edition books now obsolete?

No. With the exception of a few minor variations in terminology and a slightly different mix of monsters, spells, and magic items, the rules remain largely unchanged. A pre-Remaster stat block, spell, monster, or adventure should work with the remastered rules without any problems.

What does this mean for my digital content?

Paizo is working with its digital partners to integrate new system updates in the most seamless way possible. The new rules will be uploaded to Archives of Nethys as usual, and legacy content that does not appear in the remastered books will not disappear from online rules.

We will not be updating PDFs of legacy products with the updated rules.

Will the Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster books be part of my ongoing Pathfinder Rulebooks subscription?

Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster books will be included in ongoing Pathfinder Rulebooks subscriptions. We are currently working on a method whereby existing subscribers will have the opportunity to “opt out” of these volumes if they wish and will provide additional details as we get closer to the release of the first two volumes.

What impact will the Second Edition Remaster have on Pathfinder Society Organized Play?

We are working closely with our Organized Play team to seamlessly integrate new rules options in the upcoming books as those books are released, as normal. In the rare case of a conflict between a new book and legacy source, campaign management will provide clear advice with as little disruption as possible to player characters or the campaign itself.

Will there be more Remastered Core books to come? What about Monster Core 2 or Player Core 3?

It’s very likely that we will continue to update and remaster the Bestiaries in the future, but for now we’re focusing on the four announced books as well as Paizo’s regular schedule of Pathfinder releases. Publishing 100% new material remains Paizo’s primary focus, and we look forward to upcoming releases like Pathfinder Rage of Elements, the Lost Omens Tian Xia World Guide and Character Guide, our monthly Adventure Path installments, and other exciting projects we have yet to announce.

Will the new Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster books have Special Editions?

Yes. We are looking into various exciting print options for these books and will post more information soon.

Will the new Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster books have Pocket Editions?

Yes. Pocket editions of the new books will appear roughly three months following the hardcover releases.

Will these changes impact the Starfinder Roleplaying Game?

Not yet.

How can I learn more about the Pathfinder Second Edition Remaster books?

To learn more about the Remaster books, check out our live stream chat about the announcement happening later today on Twitch. Beyond that, we’ll be making a handful of additional announcements in the coming days and weeks to showcase more about this exciting project, culminating in your first full look at the project during PaizoCon (May 26th–29th)!