Definitely sounds like the Spire of Nex is the winner, with the Pinnacle of Avarice as a runner up. The Spire seems like a nice place to adventure in.
Magic is fine. I figure outsider-made stuff would count, I probably wouldn't count Deific made.
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Using the term man-made loosely, monsters and other player race-made stuff are fine but at least something entirely artificially constructed, so not stuff like the Sky Citadels, which seem to be carved out of mountains (correct me if I'm wrong). Dungeons are probably out, too, providing they're dug in. I'd also want to avoid statues or obelisks or whatever, just buildings people can live and walk around in. So far all I can think of are the Starstone Cathedral and the Emerald Spire (which is mostly underground dungeon but has a big part sticking above the ground). I appreciate for a lot of these the exact height of buildings probably isn't mentioned but if you know any, please share buildings with a surprising amount of floors or levels.
I wonder if a vorpal dragon can have a hoard of severed heads, alive and able to communicate. Maybe in a cave above a valley full of wandering headless bodies frantically trying to find their heads. I like the vorpal dragon but I'm surprised they were spawned from the vorpal sword vs Jabberwocky fight. Seems like dragon species would be cool to predate weapons, and maybe the sword was granted from it. Eh either way like I said I like it. And the young ones seem like they could be interesting foils. The coral dragon is definitely beautiful. NPR had a science Friday on coral a couple weeks ago and the way it reproduces is so weird. Really looking forward to seeing their write-up.
Thanks a lot. Never thought about Nidal
None of the nations are really a 1:1 take on real world nations or cultures but some things in the setting are clearly inspired by real life. I'm basically looking for a really repressive atmosphere, where it's due to the people and not any separate supernatural thing like the threat of the Worldwound or Tar-Baphon. A domineering government with a vast spy network of secret police dedicated more towards surveilling its own populace than outside threats. Razmiran seems is a little like this but is there anything with a party-based leadership and not a god-king? If not, is there any place that seems like it could turn that way? There's been a lot of turnover since the setting popped up. Maybe Molthune or Ravounel?
This is great to hear, thank you so much, everyone. I really appreciate the quick and clear responses.
Hi, long time fan of the game. I still don't have much experience in remastered or 2ebut I'm trying and I'm enjoying it. My son is growing to like it too, to the point that he has started wanting to whip up some homebrew monsters. The Gamemastery Guide had a really nice section on Building Creatures. Is it still relevant? I ended up kind of skipping over 2e so I'm not quite sure on what the differences are between 2e and remaster. If the suggestions from the Building Creatures section aren't going to help in remastered, were they converted over in any other book?
I have the book. I enjoy it. I particularly like the bunch of non-humans section in the back. That said. The cover has an elf in a blue uniform, with a magic shield and a (I'm guessing) sword cane. Does anyone know who he is? A lot of the characters on the cover appear elsewhere in the book (the darkly armored figure next to blue elf is the Knight, from p16. Can't find this guy, though. He makes me think of a more disciplined version of Damiel, the iconic alchemist.
I haven't seen any singles on the Paizo shop but miniaturemarket is selling some. The bases are clear.
I haven't been getting Battles for a while but I think this is the first time they've had single-content booster boxes. If they keep it up like this I wouldn't expect any large or huge figures. But it looks like the next one, Armies of the Dead, is either going to have a release similar to the old way, or somehow deal with putting any of the four large figures in these small boxes.
But the next one, Wrath of the Wild, seems like it fits the Fearsome Forces release method:
I only got the Legendary Adventures one a while back, and I splurged and got a whole Case. I have enough elves and goblins and orcs and gnomes to build warbands out of them, which is great. But I've also got 4 dragon turtles. So I'm hesitant to get a case again. With Fearsome Forces (there was a price change at the last couple weeks I ducked) I only got a Brick, which was a small box like the size of a small pizza box, with 24 smaller boxes in it. I managed to get at least one of each of the figures. I have to admit I was wondering if it was sort of planned, like will every brick have one of everything? It got close because the standout of the crew, the Omox, didn't seem there and was hiding in my last box. Anyways the final tally was:
Which is pretty good. I have some kholo minis so these can now be the "elites" of their warband, the orc brutes don't look much different than the same orc brutes in Legendary Adventures. But the Lifeleecher brawler will round him out. I've never done Serpentfolk/Iruxi/Nagaji stuff but have always wanted to. And I have a ton of skeletons so the champion and mage will round them out nicely, with the harpy skeleton acting perhaps as a scout. The quality seems a bit better than Legendary. The bases are clear (the type of mini is engraved on the bottom). Some are bent and some of the paintjobs are dull (orcs and skeletons and xhola don't have much style) but there isn't a lot of the overlap in painting I saw in Legendary, mostly in the faces. A while back I got the Battles Goblins Legendary Cuts, and I am kind of hoping for more like that. Like right now if I wanted to have my players come across an iruxi, serpentfolk, or nagaji encounter, I wouldn't have minis enough to represent a challenge. Parties, warbands, packs, whatever, a lot the folks my players PCs kill are usually found in groups of some sort. So it's nice to be able to get support for showing that off. Hopefully we'll be able to get a big group of something next.
It's out this month. Fearsome Forces. It seems more of a random bunch, but sort of common "leaders" of groups of minions, with some minions in there. You can see the list here:
Gnoll Cultist
They had a sudden cost change a few days ago and I decided not to get the case. Instead I ordered a brick from a different retailer and got it yesterday. The last Pathfinder Battles I was part of was the Legendary Adventures one, but this is drastically different. In Legendary Adventures, each booster was a box with 4 miniatures in it: 1 huge or large, 3 medium or small. In Fearsome Forces, each booster has 1 miniature in it. All the possible miniatures are medium, at least according to this:
So I got the brick, and it's 24 miniatures. I only opened one so far, it's the Nagaji soldier, the spear is a little bent, it's the same quality as from Legendary Adventures. The bases are clear, with the name engraved on the bottom.
Ah there it is! Thanks. And I didn't remember about the centaurs until I saw your post, didn't know about the strix.
I've got a campaign going there and it's going pretty well. I have some outsider monsters (a cynosphinx and a pack of gnolls) that, I think are very uncommon to the area. But I'm not sure exactly what is common in term of monsters there. Specifically we're playing in the northeastern part of it, where the Heartlands meets the Menador. Menador is supposed to have a few orc tribes, some shadow giants, and a few unique places like Ganderhal's Lair (he's a big bad shadow wizard), and the Scar Thicket and Pillar of Palamia. But as far as I can tell (I got one of the Cheliax sourcebooks) there's no general "List of monsters for this region." I even grabbed the Hell's Vengeance books (which helped fill up the Whisperwood) but it depicts a very specific area (the Whisperwood) time during the Glorious Reclamation, so there are angels and Glorious Reclamation Patrols everywhere. Am I just overthinking it? Should I just look at the terrain, find monsters that fit in the terrain and that I want the players to maybe encounter and be done with it?
I searched for something about this before and found nothing, but also made a post in the Licensed Products/Miniatures subforum only to realize a few days later that it seems sparsely visited at best. But I was hoping for a clarification about two upcoming Pathfinder Battles (Namely: Armies of the Dead and Fearsome Forces). WizKids website and other online stores (MiniatureMarket) have listings for Pathfinder Battles: Armies of the Dead. With an estimated release date as April 2024 (on MiniatureMarket) and Q3 2024 (on WizKids site). But it's not in line on the Pathfinder Battles Ongoing Case subscription, which offers PB: Mwangi Expanse and the upcoming PB: Fearsome Forces case, supposed to release on 18 September 2024. Wizkids website and other online stores (MiniatureMarket) also have listings for Fearsome Forces. WizKids also says Q3 2024, MiniatureMarket says September 2024. Basically I'm asking "what's the deal?" It looks like Armies of the Dead be releasing soon, but if that's the case, it looks like it's not part of Paizo's Battles subscription (so it might be worth pre-ordering on another site). Is it possible the dates are wrong, and Armies of the Dead should be out in April 2025, so subscribers will have it after Fearsome Forces is released? Just trying to clarify things so I know how to plan what to buy.
I apologize if this question has a widely known answer, I did search for the subject in the forums but nothing came up. WizKids website and other online stores (MiniatureMarket) have listings for Pathfinder Battles: Armies of the Dead. With an estimated release date as April 2024 (on MiniatureMarket) and Q3 2024 (on WizKids site). But it's not in line on the Pathfinder Battles Ongoing Case subscription, which offers PB: Mwangi Expanse and the upcoming PB: Fearsome Forces case, supposed to release on 18 September 2024. Wizkids website and other online stores (MiniatureMarket) also have listings for Fearsome Forces. WizKids also says Q3 2024, MiniatureMarket says September 2024. Basically I'm asking "what's the deal?" It looks like Armies of the Dead be releasing soon, but if that's the case, it looks like it's not part of Paizo's Battles subscription (so it might be worth pre-ordering on another site). Is it possible the dates are wrong, and Armies of the Dead should be out in April 2025, so subscribers will have it after Fearsome Forces is released? Just trying to clarify things so I know how to plan what to buy.
Sorry if this is necro'ing.
Now we're doing full campaign (in Cheliax, good and neutral PCs) and I'm coming up with questions like, "Where are all the elves?" (all the city populations seem to be: x humans, x/10 halflings, x/100 tieflings. Except for one town just bustling with gnomes. And given the localized dwarven areas whether or not the hyrngar would seek them (or Cheliax itself) out as an overworld ally, or escape-route from their overbearing religion. Given the whole setup with the King of Hell himself, I'd fully expect there to be a number of Houses who are trying to curry favor with other archdevils to try and get an edge, and demon cults popping up to try and influence other Houses that have fallen by the wayside and may want a "boost." I know the Blood War isn't a thing but Asmodeus seems like the prime target for everyone who wants power in the "lower planes." Some way that happens (like Fex in Hell's Vengeance). Also some explanation of what "random monster encounters" are like. Most of the lists I've seen have fiendish animals, cool, some human threats, but then a bunch of devils. Would the average citizen of Cheliax have some way of fending off a lemure or peacefully bypassing an erinyes with her two bearded devils? Maybe the Church sells talismans to show you're supposed to be good with them? I appreciate these are more intelligent devils and not just ganking every human they see but does a wagoner bringing grain to town just give these things a polite nod and keep going? I really dig the place, for adventuring. They are a bad guy like the Zhentarim, but the cities seem far more orderly (which I guess is the point), while Zhenthil Keep was more of a "hive of wretched scum and villany," where every alley had monsters (literal and mundane) eager to turn a mugging into a murder. But I don't see it happening for a long while, it looks like some of the more long-wondered about places are getting books. Still, if anyone makes a thorough homebrewed take on Cheliax I'd probably buy it.
I like it, everyone's bringing up good points. Always liked Lamashtu but felt weird about it, I like this take more.
When I ran this, the wizard in the party was affected by dysentery quite often. It made some of the fights a bit tougher, but they managed well enough (until the final fight in the Fortress of Sorrow, that is). Thanks, for some reason I kept thinking it would be more debilitating to martial classes but forgot those with weaker constitutions might be even more harder (and repetitively) hit. I'll save them for later in the game when levels are higher.
I'm looking at examples of exploration through the books and found the possibility for diseases an interesting one. I know the levels for the book are supposed to be 5-8 so the penalties might be pretty negligible but I was planning on something at lower levels and figure it might be more impactful then (and less avoidable given the survival checks needed). Anyways I was wondering if anyone noticed any impact from the diseases in their game, or if they altered them (cut them out, made them stronger) somehow. Or if anyone had any noteworthy encounters or events that came about from players suffering from dysentery or malaria.
Interesting, thank you! I thought they were relegated to niche groups but wasn't aware how much, given the little reference material I've seen. Still it is does seem something that can easily be adjusted by the GM or impacted by the PCs like yours did. Your document is really helpful, too. Good luck on the update!
The anathema of Pharasma against robbing a tomb makes taking loot from undead enemies in a tomb-like dungeon awkward. Anubis also has "rob a tomb" as Anathema.
Thanks for the assist! It's really interesting the lack of a sort of external enemy monster. Though I suppose it pushes the adventure focus on rooting out cults of Rovagug and such and tomb raiding. I saw another post of yours where you said you were really into Osirion so I'm glad you responded, cause I had another question. Looking into it, I saw Osirion Pantheon and figured that that would be the dominant one in the area but it looks like they are more of a "vestige of the past" with even the Ruby Prince being a cleric of Abadar. Does the Osirion Pantheon have enough of an impact there that champions and clerics of their gods wouldn't be seen as some sort of throwback? Do they have organized religion and temples?
This sounds sweet. I like the embrace of the nerd. One of my favorite parts of playing a wizard and, since then, running them, was finding obscure spells on scrolls and enemy spellbooks and scribing them into their own books. Lets me dig into third party stuff and pull out real surprises to both arm the enemy and reward the victor. Also I think goblin school might want an antidog field.
I think it's going to be Asmodeus. I've heard (secondhand, maybe it's in a post idunno) that designers said it wasn't going to be due to licensing issues and I'm sure it isn't, but he's like, almost the exact same guy across the street in D&D's settings. Many of the other archdevils could take his prominence in the setting without necessarily becoming gods and expanding deviltry to focus on the other archdevils would have some upsides. I certainly think it would spice up Cheliax. But there's a few of gods that (to me) seem like they haven't really...done much, like not appearing in adventure paths or having a following that pushes things along in the setting. Gozreh seems like you could knock out and just replace with a "nature" force.
I'm working on something for Osirion and am waiting for some of the first edition stuff to arrive to help me figure out more about the place, but one thing I want to get a jumpstart on is what the most common baddies are. Like some nations have big problems with goblins or orcs or hobgoblins (until they became nations) and I know Katapesh has a lot of gnolls, and I think neighboring Thuvia has issues with divs, but the wiki isn't helping with Osirion. I know the sphinx are really important to the lore but they're not exactly common. Instinct makes my mind jump to mummies and sand zombies but I figured there might be more, is there?
Love the idea. Really hope they manage to take the slot of the drow. I really dug the PF take on intellect devourers, too. Superintelligent creatures that aren't humanoid are always a plus.
There's not an ecology article, but a large portion of the adventure takes place in a major hryngar city, and that city gets a detailed write-up. Sounds really good, thanks! I heard a little about the changes so am looking forward to reading the rest.
I've never liked dwarves but for whatever reason last year I fell in love with duergar. It's been a hard relationship since they're usually overshadowed by other Underdark or Darklands contemporaries like the drow or illithid or serpentfolk. I heard that during the remaster the PF duergar were getting a refit and in a review for Cult of the Cave Worm saw that the hryngar make an appearance there. Is it a good start for information regarding what they're like now? Is there an "Ecology/Society of" section or something for them? It's been a while with adventure paths for me but I know they used to have guides like that.
Hi, this is such a minor thing but it's driving me crazy not remembering and all my stuff is packed away in a FROG, coincidentally. I remember an adventure from what I -think- was Paizo's era publishing Dungeon Magazines. The story was about a toad familiar that used to belong to Vecna (maybe another famous evil wizard like Acererak?). The idea was that it had been left behind in this area a long time ago, but because of its link to its powerful godlike master, still managed to survive, thrive, and grow in power and size. So the adventure ended up being about a gargantuan fiendish or dire toad that effectively ruled a town through the magical powers it developed. Does anyone remember what issue this is from, if it exists at all?
Hello, I appreciate with weather and holidays everyone's busy and this isn't an emergency or anything. But either I have never dealt with a sidecart or when I did it was years ago, and am not quite sure if I have to do anything more for it. I seem to have a bunch of items in my sidecart (I thought I purchased them) but they don't seem to be being sent. Is this part of the slowdown because of the holidays (we were given a heads up about that) or is there another step I need to take to get those products sent to me? Thanks!
As a new subscriber was hoping to get word of 2020's upcoming battles (if any?), didn't know there was Starfinder stuff coming that's cool.
I got some Crayola Gel markers that write on black that I used to mark some of my miniature bases (they have pegs that only fit certain miniatures).
Are numbers available anywhere? Traditionally the RPG industry has been shy about publishing specific sales numbers. The closest I always found was ICv2, which just had a ranking of 1-5 for sales for a quarter and is often erroneously held up as an example of what's the greatest game at the moment. Like the Star Wars RPG pops up there whenever there's a Star Wars movie on the horizon. However well it's doing, Paizo does seem like it could do more of a social media push, sponsor some/more live play of games and stuff. Those seem to be incredibly popular right now.
I haven't heard much about it but all the fandoms are pretty busy right now. I imagine once they pull out a Kingmaker-like Adventure Path for 2e (or Starfinder, for that matter) you'll get more talk about 2e. Big old interesting things to draw attention for a bit of time, and Kingmaker's popular enough to do it. Some of the people who come to look will stay, others will find something else. Keep doing it and you've got a fandom. Numbers don't matter, people will believe what they want, and online you'll always hear more people complaining than saying they like it. Give it some time to stretch and grow.
Could probably just have a feat allowing it with certain weapons. One of my players was gung ho about playing a rogue in 1e and disappointed at knife throwing.
Thanks all. I suppose I leaned really hard on the materialistic aspect of their play but as a whole it's probably better described as self-motivated. Didn't know about Shattered Star I'll check it out.
Villains and villainous organizations. I was kind of disappointed in 1e with how they were pretty isolated in their own spot and weren't big on expanding. Looks like I need to catch up on 2e's setting changes, sounds like Tar-Baphon is mostly out, so that's a good step. Basically it all stems from wanting motivations for why to have Character A outside of their homeland. Widespread, international plots are fantastic for it. Religions work really well, especially with the gods more prone to encouraging action upon the world.
I suppose this is a good example of why 'She teaches temperance and patience in all things.' Because when you act out of haste or anger, bad things can happen.
Pretty much like the title says. Most of our experience with APs tends to be 'you are a good person, bad things are happening, you're getting pulled along by destiny to be the one who stops things from happening, so that the status quo can remain.' That's a cynical look at it but I'm sure you get the gist, it's standard adventuring fare. However my players like loot. So their PCs like loot. And they are not a fan of morals. So while some are likely to want to play neutral, others are fine being flat evil. I see there's only one real 'you are evil' AP, Hell's Vengeance, but Skulls & Shackles seems like it might fit in with the moral-free looting. And it's not just gold they want (though that's a big part of it), they want treasure. Magic items and artifacts. Which APs have increasingly enticing 'That legendary object is somewhere in those hills, and soon you're going to go out there and find it' feels to it, able to lure characters on with promises of power? If an entire AP doesn't really jibe with the idea, perhaps there's just some that might fit in? A heist or attempt to loot a castle before the enemies break the siege? Anyways I really appreciate any help directing me towards a satisfying AP (or module, really) for this. Third party ones are fine if they fit.
It's because vampires have something called a blood bond. While traditionally transmitted orally (someone drinks a vampire's blood), it can be transmitted other ways (injecting like heroin, or sexually). There's no rules for stealthing off a condom, but there certainly are for convincing someone to do something they wouldn't normally want to do, and the sexuality of vampire has been something tied in with the game and the mythos of the creature since their origin, and people being uncomfortable about it is why they have things like X Cards. D&D introduced similar concepts in their 5th edition, as some people are known to take the violence inherent in the game to extreme levels. Though people taking things past the limit of their players consent is something that can appear in all games (notably someone got banned from the UK Expo for doing it with Things from the Flood, sort of a post-apocalyptic Stranger Things). While you are obviously more than free to not play these games, most of them don't really delve into sexuality the way Vampire does, and that game is influenced by the fears of puritans from the time of Bram Stoker as much as they are Anne Rice and Laurell Hamilton.
That's...reassuring, I guess? Well, it means Matt McFarland he has nothing to do with the vast majority of books. Isn't there a rule in the new Vampire the Masquerade called the "rubber hat" rule or something else relating to condoms? I heard the writing really leaned a lot more heavily into the "vampires as rape allegory" than previous iterations of the game, and part of that was due to his influence. I just worry that if I started getting invested in this stuff I'd metaphorically be stabbing his victims in the back by purchasing something he contributed to... You might be the victim of misinformation here. While I'm not much of a fan of Masquerade, there is no 'rubber hat' rule. There's an appendix in the back that deals with Considerate play, including a variety of approaches to it, from the 'Lines and Veils' system where you state out what you're willing to and not willing to deal with in the game, or the 'X Card' where there's a piece of paper with an X on the table and if someone feels uncomfortable they can tap it and things will stop, no questions asked, as well as others to avoid people getting into uncomfortable situations. They attributed the creators of them, too, apparently. I understand that because of this they've taken a lot of flak about making the game 'too safe' or whatever from people angry about games trying to make themselves more considerate to their players, which might have been where a comment on 'rubber hat' rules came from. Also, as an artist who worked on completely different projects (they're on steam, though I forget their names) and hasn't been hired by White Wolf since you wouldn't be supporting him by getting an unrelated game like VtM 5. But Zak S is a pretty vile person so I can appreciate wanting to avoid an association. I got into this thread because we've had a lot of 'edition warring' over the different games, so the prospect of older editions getting updated has been pretty tense, especially with some things gathering more steam on the social-media front. It would be like if Paizo started publishing 3.5 stuff and Dungeon and Dragon and opening a section of the forum. Entirely different issues than the metaplot issue, but the only solutions I have for that (that don't involve breaking the bank and reading profusely) are reading up on 'canon' stuff in synopses like I mentioned. Though, really, if people are talking down to others because they don't know that that the ruler of one city is elected and not based on open succession they're gatekeeping, and probably best avoided.
While McFarland worked on a lot of stuff it was pretty much all Demon the Descent, Beast the Primordial, and Promethean the Created (2e, which is a shame because 1e was received so well). Though people seemed to like Demon a lot, most of the complaints being that the demons don't resemble media depictions of demons (its technognostic robot demons, rather than sin and batwings). Games like Vampire the Requiem and Werewolf the Forsaken were developed by different people (Rose Bailey and Stew Wilson, respectively) with nice groups of freelance writers from all over. And seem to like the stuff that's come out since he left, like Changeling 2e (I preferred 1e) and Geist 2e (massive improvements over 1e). Also Zak S was hired by White Wolf to make some visual-novel type games for old World of Darkness stuff, and didn't actually work on books like Vampire the Masquerade. All that said, regarding the 'metaplot' you could always find a thread with people who are focused on that stuff (pathfinder society and adventure paths seem to be the things with changes) and ask for a synopsis. It's how people have managed to get back into oWoD stuff, though I'm sure the companies would be pleased if you just bought pdfs of every first edition book there was.
Where are all the books printed? Iirc the 1st edition ones were printed in China. Is that the case for the 2E books as well? These (core and Bestiary) were printed in China.
I just got mine today. Between this and Shunned by the Moon it's probably the best month for new RPG releases I've been interested in in years.
Gah! Thank you so much, War for the Crown sounds exactly like what I'm looking for, if only I thought of this in seven months. Is Jade Regent really hands on with the helping the heir?
I'm probably being too specific with this but I've only been off and on with Adventure Paths in the past few years. From what I know Kingmaker is about building a Kingdom, and I know Curse of the Crimson Throne is basically about taking down a ruler. I have the first Jade Regent but from what little I've heard the rest is more of a babysitting mission than acting as champions for an up-and-coming noble. Are there any adventure paths that revolve around helping a ruler, like of a downtrodden place, build the place up, or at least get their enemies off their back and reassert their rule?
I always thought using Sunder on the spell components pouch would be a nice step, but I don't believe it's rogue doable. This is a huge thread and I've been out of the game for a while but it'll be interesting to read.
Sad to hear it go. I remember being so bummed when Dungeon and Dragon were being cancelled, especially after the awesomeness of the Age of Worms and Savage Tide. When Paizo went on their own, I thought it would go the way of all the OGL spinoffs. Instead they made something great and it kept getting better. I've never been so pleased to have been wrong.
1. Yes, because it balances out the extremely varied power of their class abilities. 2. Traditionally, wizards have been involved with long years of study and Discworld's Sourcery (and the other discworld books), as well as the various depictions of magic in Glen Cook's universes and even the Vancian books make it somewhat clear that magic is a part of the universe, it requires training to use or abuse (somewhat like science) and thus you need guides and blueprints to do so, which are what spellbooks are. There are other tales (Merlin, for instance) that involve learning magic through a patron, but I imagine the game would become unfair if Sabrina was able to bring her demon lord patron down to a fight whenever she needed help, so having it brought through a pet is probably more fair. Also in various mythologies, where people have learned wisdom from animals or gods or gods wrapped in animal-bodies. 3. I'd be pretty disappointed in the system that did it, and probably wouldn't play it. I know there's a lot said about crunch and fluff, but in the end it's a game of storytelling. If you want to just put your coins in, buy your upgrades and have an ever-increasing power creep, there are games for that. And RPGs aren't one of them. 4. Yeah. 3.5, made it so wizards had to find spellbooks or scrolls to get new spells, rather than being gifted a couple upon level-up.
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