Pathfinder Society in the Netherlands (or Join the Crew of the Flying Dutchman)

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Illustration by
Christopher Burdett

Last month, we highlighted Croatia, Bosnia, and Slovenia, and Venture-Captain Zrinka Znidarcic's efforts to grow Pathfinder Society there. We now shift our focus back to the northwest and the land of the Dutch. I present to you, Venture-Captain Auke Teeninga's report on Pathfinder Society in the Netherlands.

The Netherlands is a small country in northwest Europe. It borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders with the United Kingdom. The country's capital is Amsterdam and the seat of government is The Hague. The Netherlands, in its entirety, is often referred to as Holland, although North and South Holland are actually only two of its twelve provinces. The Netherlands is a geographically low-lying country, with about 25% of its area and 21% of its population located below sea level, and its name literally means "Low Country."

In 1602 the Dutch East India Company was established. This chartered company is often considered to have been the first multinational corporation in the world and was the first company to issue stock. Its mercantile fleets challenged the best in the world for supremacy, and due to the companies success the Netherlands, enjoyed a so-called "Golden Age" of prosperity. Rembrandt van Rijn, Frans Hals, and Johannes Vermeer perfected their crafts. Christian Huygens and Anton van Leeuwenhoek made amazing discoveries in science. Cities like Amsterdam, Leiden, Utrecht, and Delft started to grow, and their distinctive canals were dug to provide both infrastructure and defensive capabilities.

Nowadays, these same cities are still used as a home base for expeditions. Multiple times each month, teams of explorers from the Pathfinder Society are sent to Golarion to search ancient ruins, collect art and artifacts, and gather knowledge to bring back to the Grand Lodge of Absalom.

I started playing Pathfinder Society at GenCon UK in 2008, and continued to do so at various conventions in the United Kingdom. I wanted to share my enjoyment (and cut back on flight costs to the UK), so I started organizing regular games in the Netherlands in 2010. The Dutch Pathfinder Society has been growing ever since, and currently we've got more than two dozen active players, half of which GM regularly. I've got big plans for 2013, which includes a multi-day, multi-table, Pathfinder Society-only convention like PaizoCon UK, and get players from across Europe to join and share their Pathfinder experience, while at the same time helping us to grow our player base.

Although we have a few stores in the Netherlands willing to host Pathfinder Society games, most of games are run from private homes. The games, however, are open to everyone (as long as they RSVP) and no one has been turned down yet!

In the Netherlands there are also quite a few roleplaying conventions, and the Pathfinder Society presence at these conventions is increasing slowly but steadily. Some of these conventions include:

Ei-Con, Leiden
V-Con, Vleuten
K-Con, Delft
Meetup, Utrecht & Amsterdam

If you live in the Netherlands and are interested in trying out Pathfinder Society Organized Play, join the Pathfinder Society NL forum on Google Groups or send an email to dutchpathfinder@gmail.com for more information. Convention organizers and store owners interested in hosting Pathfinder Society events should send an email to pathfinderbenelux@gmail.com.

If you are in another country and do not have a Venture-Captain, but think you can do as good a job as Auke did above, please do not hesitate to send me a write-up about Pathfinder Society play in your area of the world and include some photos.

Mike Brock
Pathfinder Society Campaign Coordinator

Illustration by Christopher Burdett

Golarion Day: Death to the Iconics!

Thursday, February 24, 2010

So we have this book coming out soon called Undead Revisited. A 64-page book that's sort of a spiritual sequel to Classic Horrors Revisited, I suppose, in that it's got ten six-page articles that explore all sorts of scary monsters. But whereas Classic Horrors Revisited focused on frights that come from myth and legend, Undead Revisited focuses more on undead who were mostly created whole cloth for the game. A few in here, like the wight, are certainly from mythology, but most of the undead in this book are things like bodaks, devourers, graveknights, nightshades, and raveners—creatures made up for the game and only very loosely (if at all) inspired by overall stories featuring undead and threats from beyond the grave.

Anyway, when I was ordering art for the book, I decided to have a little fun. Each chapter opens with a half-page illustration, so why not show these horrible undead doing what they were born to do—kill player characters? So for each chapter opener, you get to see some violent undead monster killing off one of our iconics—pictured here, the iconic alchemist Damiel meets his end at the shadowy hands of a shadow.

Of course, there's only ten chapters, and when you count the three most recent additions to the party (the samurai, the ninja, and the gunslinger), we've got over double that in iconics. That DOES mean that only ten of the iconics get offed in this book. So make sure to check out Undead Revisited when it comes out to discover if YOUR favorite iconic bit the dust!

James Jacobs
Creative Director

The Shipping of the City

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Heads up, everybody! As of last week (turns out the blog can get a little packed during the summer), City of Strangers has officially left the building, shipping out to subscribers and anyone else who wants to pick up a copy. This'll probably be my last post about the book for some time, but I wanted to reiterate how excited I am (and how cool it is to see folks commenting on the product page!). We put out a lot of awesome books, but this one has been in the back of my head—or on the desktop of my computer, glaring accusatorily at me, demanding to be finished—for about four years at this point. To finally get it out there and see people's reactions, well... it's a lot of fun.

Illustration by Christopher Burdett

And you know, I still haven't gotten over the book itself yet, either. Normally by the time we finish developing a book and drag it, bruised and bloody, across the finish line (also known as "shipping it to the printer"), there's some angst mixed in with the love—not because it isn't great, but because all we can see when we look at it is sweat and tears, and maybe some weekends spent in the office. Yet when it comes back from the printer, all shiny and new, we all get that new-baby glow I keep hearing about. In this case, though the book had a whole lot of midwives, I really feel like the father, and the fact that Jared Blando's maps perfectly captured my hopes, and the artists (and art staff!) outdid themselves to bring the words to life... well, I've probably waxed maudlin long enough. Here's an example instead:

When I first wrote about the city in Seven Swords of Sin, there were quite a few details I threw in at random, which folks then picked up on and asked about. What, for instance, were the wormfolk? I certainly didn't know. It wasn't until Eando Kline came up against one in Pathfinder Adventure Path #3 that I realized they were nagas. And though I had a pretty good mental image of what they looked like, that was nothing compared to Christopher Burdett's fabulous illustration.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is one of the wormfolk. (Though don't let her hear you calling her that.)

In any case, it's been a fabulous ride thus far, and I hope that those of you who check out the book enjoy your time in the city as much as I have!

James L. Sutter
Fiction Editor

Illustration by Alex Aparin

GameMastery Guide Preview: More Art!

Friday, June 4, 2010

To celebrate the return of our globetrotting senior art directorix, this week's preview takes another look between the words of the GameMastery Guide at more awesome art! Welcome back, Sarah!

Illustration by Christopher Burdett	Illustration by Eva Widermann

Next week, the wait's almost over, so it's time for the penultimate GameMastery Guide preview!

Wes Schneider
Managing Editor

The GameMastery Countdown Begins!

Friday, April 30, 2009

In just about a month (give or take a week or so), the thousands of pages we set free into the wild promise to return to us in shiny blue binding as the complete GameMastery Guide. In the weeks leading up to the GMG's release we'll be previewing some of that tome's coolest and most innovative aspects right here on the blog. What to kick things off with ended up being a real tricky decision, though. So rather than focus on any one element, I've gone through the book and snipped a handful of shots to give you an idea of what to expect merely from the text of this behemoth. Look closely and you'll likely notice that some snippets tease more than just a chart here or a new rules concept there. Also, since—aside from Christopher Burdett's thematically relevant compass rose—I've gone totally art-light here, tune in next week for a look at some of the GameMastery Guide's incredible illustrations, including its official mascot!

		Illustration by Christopher Burdett

F. Wesley Schneider
Managing Editor

Planes: Anything but Plain

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Having finished hacking away at the random encounter tables for the GameMastery Guide some time ago, I was recently set to work doing the same kind of thing for the Bestiary II. This time, however, instead of providing GMs with random encounters based on a plane's alignment, I got to make a separate table for each individual plane in the Great Beyond, Golarion's cosmos.

This is pretty exciting, because not only do these new tables utilize all the new monsters in the Bestiary II, but they also provide GMs with a plethora of inspiration, whether your PCs be traveling through the ever-shifting realm of the Maelstrom or ascending the soaring Great Spire in the Boneyard.

As if having stores of creatures to fill entire planes with isn't sweet enough, the GameMastery Guide includes an entire section dedicated to the planes, detailing the specific traits and characteristics of each plane, as well as the dangers that may await adventurers. As an example for what kind of cool details you can find in the GMG, below is art for Ymeri, the Queen of the Inferno.

Illustration by Christopher Burdett

At any rate, I've been staring at these books and their tables and creatures and stuff for weeks now, and I'm still excited about them; that means all y'all on the outside have no idea what kind of awesomeness you're in for.

Patrick Renie
Editorial Intern

Illustration by Christopher Burdett

The Game Is Afoot

Friday, December 8, 2009

I know it's been a while—whole months in fact—since we dropped a huge hardback tome on you all, but rest assured, we've got more in the works! Right now, on top of all the usual Pathfinder swag you've come to expect from month to month, we're also working away on our third huge tome, the GameMastery Guide. Meant to be the go-to source for Game Masters of all stripes and skill levels, the GameMastery Guide is in invaluable resource and toolbox offering hundreds of pages of new subsystems, common stats, advice, tables, and tons more, all from some of the biggest names in gaming. We're already elbow deep in the book's construction and over the course of the coming weeks will have plenty more of the content and awesome art to show off. For now, though, check out the cover on the GameMastery product page and one of this book's mascots, every tricky GM's favorite beastie, the mimic.

F. Wesley Schneider
Managing Editor