Skulls & Shackles especially since it's been promised to customers for a while. If the plans have changed and errata cards aren't happening anymore, customers should be informed. Nothing official was ever said about Mummy's Mask to my knowledge, so I don't ask about those cards.
Based on what I can remember from past posts, October - December is the time of year when Vic Wertz might have time to work on the revised cards. Any new developments for Skull & Shackles or Wrath of the Righteous? Have updated cards through DriveThruRPG been cancelled?
A class deck based on the Pathfinder Tales characters is a neat idea. Tales Readers who play PACG gain extra insight into the boons accompanying their hero along with a deeper understanding of their hero's backstory and personality. On the flip side, the buy-in for PACG players who haven't read the novels and want to learn more is relatively low, a library check-out or a $10 book purchase.
I also like your Frogatar. It stands out compared to some of the other Paizo staffers who picked people to represent themselves online; although admittedly, I can't look at pictures of Abadar without thinking "Why is Vic Wertz in that illustration" so maybe that was the point. :)
I'd like to pay my respects as well, James. Your novel "Death's Heretic" was my first introduction to Golarian and the Pathfinder setting; your portrayal of Salim and the Rahadoumi really got my attention. The idea of a whole society purposefully rejecting gods in a world where miracles happen every day was a interesting idea for a high-fantasy setting. It also helped that Death's Heretic had an interesting mystery with some good plot twists.
By that logic, the PACG mobile app and the upcoming Kingmaker PC game shouldn't exist either because "others play more" and they already know the story. I worked on the guides, and it's not just Jan Englund asking for more story. Paizo and Lone Shark wouldn't invest the time and money if it was just a few people asking for it. Customers needs aren't identical, nor do they buy everything a company offers.
I'm still holding out for those Skull & Shackles Errata cards. I've got a reminder set to ask about them again in November. :)
This is the easiest way to find officially sanctioned artwork, including artist attributions: http://www.pathfinderwiki.com/wiki/Category:Artwork_by_artist Trust me, I've looked at *every* blog post on Paizo.com using the Older entries link while working on the Rise of the Runelords guide, and PathfinderWiki's artist page is much easier. The only quibble I've found is that on very rare occasions the wiki includes images that only appeared on the Pathfinder Society page (which doesn't have blog in the URL path) and they're marked "Community Use", but this only an outlier for about 5 images of the thousands they link too. My suggestion for avoiding any potential CUP problem is to check out the attribution link to the original Paizo.com web page and only download the image from Paizo.com if the link complies with the policy (eg. a blog post or an official product cover from the list).
I love the horse shot too. It would work well when paired with Craig J. Spearing's Dust Digger for a Community Use project. That Ringleader Bard would be a fun Community Use illustration for the section in Skull & Shackles where the players clear out the Chelish opera house for Arronax Endymion.
Thank you for all the rules question answers in the BGG and Paizo forums. I learn something by reading your replies (sadly, I've spent more time writing guides than playing the games).
Did you know there are fan-made story guides that serve as a companion for the card game? They flesh out what's happening on all the scenario cards as you play along. You can find them in the Community Use Registry here on Paizo.com; the files are hosted on BoardgameGeek. There are text-only versions and versions with artwork for each set in the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game. I've been busy improving prior editions of the guides because I've seen translations pop up online as PACG is made available in other languages. I reformatted Skull & Shackles and Rise of the Runelords so the presentation matches later editions of the Adventure Guides. Deck 6 of Skull & Shackles got a significant artwork update. Rise of the Runelords looks better than ever because I snagged almost every piece of Community Use artwork available for Runelords and put it in the guide. I'll look into reworking Wrath of the Righteous at a later date since some aspects like the cohort banishment section didn't work out as well as I would have liked. It was still a good project for something I did in the equivalent of 3 weeks worth of "crunch time".
Draft 4 featuring everything through Adventure Deck 5 is now live!
Hmmm... I think the headline I would have used is "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Fight Them." You can always use it for Beastiary 7. :-)
For those of you following along here on paizo.com, Draft 3 of the guide featuring everything through Adventure Deck 4 went live on Boardgamegeek.
Ouch, I'm sad to hear that the adventures which are made better by having a story are that much less popular. That's where Byron "Kittenhoarder" Campbell and I step in. There are Adventure (story) Guides for all three base sets - RotR, S&S, WotR. The fourth guide for MM is already underway! Curious if people go the effort of making their own versions of the OP cards on DriveThru (or if it's even permitted to do so)? I've made the same observation from the standpoint of "people could do this, so why aren't they available?" It's good to read some comments on this thread about "the cards might change", so at least there's some conscious thought going into the decision vs. organizational inertia and indifference. If you're a bit more industrious, and like using sleeves, you can instead print out the new cards from the PDF, sleeve them up, and skip all the proxying—so instead of adding Gogmurt as a proxy for Wortus, you just add Wortus. There's also the option of using an Internet printing service like PrinterStudio.com, provided you aren't creating galleries to share the cards out to others so they can print their own cards too. I'm not a lawyer and I don't hold this out as legal advice, but I think this falls under "fair use" for U.S. copyright laws, otherwise you couldn't legally do the home printer option either. PACG is available internationally, so the laws may be different in your country of residence. On a practical level, provided you aren't distributing your cards to other people, you'll likely be safe from an enforcement perspective.
SPHINX! (Go Team Venture!)
The information in the blog post and the desert-themed images might come in useful for the Mummy's Mask Adventure Guide. Thanks Paizo!
I purchased the Dark Tapestry story Vic mentioned earlier. It was a good tale with an interesting take on druids; Chianna Ti definitely maintains a tit-for-tat balance with those who insult or betray her, and as any good role-player knows, druids are all about balance. I'm glad the Dark Tapestry takes place in some locations used in the Mummy's Mask set. I try to learn what I can about the Pathfinder setting when working on the card game guides so players can get a better sense of the purpose behind each scenario. It's a fine line imposing my own structure on the proceedings while leaving room for players to develop their narrative based on the cards revealed while playing the game. Byron Campbell did the bulk of the writing for Rise of the Runelords and Skull & Shackles; but I wrote the guide for Wrath of the Righteous. Byron will be tackling the upcoming Mummy's Mask, while I serve in the role of editor/publisher. I'll see what I can work up for Chiann Ti's biography. I'm having some computer troubles at the moment that will take me a few days or weeks to work through, the RMA process for defective hardware can be slow.
The +1 hand size problem could be addressed by reducing the hero's total number of cards by one. If it's a mandatory card for the character, it's already part of the build, which should be taken into account when designing the hero in the first place. Page 23 of the Mummy's Mask rulebook says "Loot cards do not have a check to acquire; instead, you earn them as a reward for completing a scenario." Honaire is definitely not "loot" since he wasn't a scenario reward. I'm indifferent whether the definition of "Cohort" or "Loot" is changed, or if an entirely new keyword is invented that incorporates most of the qualities of "Loot"; but right now, neither Cohort or Loot's current definition fits the card. What is the point of updating the rulebook every release if problems like this aren't being addressed correctly?
Yes, but the problem is Paizo/Lone Shark is already committed to this mechanic thanks to the tight coupling of the Class Decks with every possible base set for the Adventure Card game. Does this mean every class deck needs to be updated to call cohort-like cards "Loot"? What happens to the cards included in the Iconic Hero sets like Lini's pet? Alterations like this aren't as simple as it first seems. It might be better to assign an updated definition to Cohort in the rulebook and/or FAQ. You certainly can't blame me as the customer because the word "Cohort" is used in Wrath of the Righteous.
I submitted my stories for Simoun, Ahmotep, and Tup for version 1.5 of the guide. I changed the document's title from "Meet the Iconics" to "Meet the Heroes", because Mummy's Mask is the first set to break with the pattern of only using iconic heroes in the card game. I wanted to link up Simoun's and Ahmotep's story, but it felt contrived, so I skipped it. I hope everyone enjoys my additions to the Adventure Card Game canon. You can find the link to the PDF file in the Paizo CUP registry. It will be live on Boardgame Geek once the admins approve it.
Ahmotep was a quiet and observant child. Her parents ran an antiquities business identifying the treasures removed from Osirion's tombs - and sometimes - removing the dangerous curses from them. Ahmotep's father excelled at business; he was an expert negotiator and skilled at arranging transport for dangerous items across the desert. Her mother researched the items her father acquired. Ahmotep's mother would spend long hours pouring over the artifacts, poking and prodding them with her spells and consulting obscure tomes. Ahmotep noticed when her mother was exhausted, she would continue working thanks to the golden scarab ring she wore. A quick twist of the ring and her mother found the spell she needed when other mages would have retired for the day. Her parents were far too busy to pay attention to Ahmotep. Since there wasn't much to do, Ahmotep read the books and scrolls her parents had finished examining. Over time, Ahmotep learned the rudiments of spellcraft - much to her parent's consternation. Her mother scolded Ahmotep for bringing home a jackal as a pet. "It's only tame because you've charmed it," her mother reprimanded. "As soon as the spell wears off, it will drag you into the desert and eat you." Her father punished Ahmotep for conjuring a scorpion to attack a boy who teased her. Eventually, her parents tired of the distractions and conscripted Ahmotep to work with her mother researching artifacts. The work was slow and tedious; but it was all Ahmotep had ever known, so she enjoyed it. When Ahmotep was old enough, her parents sent her off for formal arcane training. It was a fortunate event - not only did Ahmotep acquire her vocation - but it also saved her from a terrible fate. A group of adventurers left a tome in her parent's care without revealing the terrible circumstances surrounding its acquisition. When her father opened the book, a swarm of scarabs burst forth from its pages, descending upon him to consume his flesh. Ahmotep's mother slammed the book shut and did her best to drive the insects away; but it was too late, her husband was dead. A day later Ahmotep's mother was beset with an incurable wasting disease. She barely managed to get her husband prepared for burial before she succumbed to the illness. The Ruby Prince's agents arrived, confiscated the tome, and summoned Ahmotep to deal with her parent's affairs. Ahmotep made the necessary arrangements to have her mother's organs stored in canopic jars, wrap the frail body in fine linens, and adorn it with finery to ease her mother's journey into the afterlife. When the tasks were completed, Ahmotep accompanied the acolytes into the necropolis, where they would lay her parents to rest for all eternity. As she gazed upon her parents for the last time, Ahmotep noticed the golden scarab ring on her mother's finger. It was wrong to steal from the dead, but the ring would be useful to her. Surely her mother would want her to have it? Quietly, Ahmotep removed the ring from her mother's bandaged finger and slipped it on to her own finger. Ahmotep froze as a great moan rose from her mother's corpse. Its bandaged fist shot upwards, connecting with Ahmotep's jaw. The world went black as she crumpled to the cold, stone floor. Ahmotep awoke later in her own bed. A priest of Pharasma gazed down at her, his concerned gaze softening to one of relief. "I'm glad you're awake. The prayers I said on your behalf removed all signs of sickness and corruption." The priest pulled himself upright, interlocking his hands in front of him. "I regret to inform you that your mother's spirit was restless and awoke as a mummy. The acolytes were barely able to fend her off as they pulled you from the crypt. They sealed the mummy within; but in their haste, the acolytes didn't record where she was buried. I'm afraid we're unable to return and put your mother's spirit to rest." The priest swiftly departed, leaving Ahmotep alone to her thoughts. She stared at the golden scarab ring adorning her finger as grief and shame welled up inside her. Did her theft awaken her mother's spirit, or was it some other force in play? The answer would have to wait, because her tears burst forth and swept Ahmotep away in a tidal wave of pain. Later, when her sobbing fit was over, Ahmotep pledged to search the necropolis and set things right. She would need help to do it; but it was never a problem finding adventurers in Osirion.
I've had some difficulty researching the back stories online for some of the new Mummy's Mask heroes. I maintain a Community Use document with the backstories for the heroes featured in the PACG base sets and character decks, and right now it's incomplete for Mummy's Mask. There's a segment of PACG players who only play the card game (myself included), so I try to pick up the slack for the things that are missing from the card game - lore on the Blessing deities, story guides, and the backstories of the heroes.
Isn't the Pirate's Code more like a set of guidelines? :)
Cameltrops - love the name.
PS - I purchased digital copies of the Adventure Path for WotR and "King of Chaos". You can totally see it on my download page. ;-)
I wasn't planning on buying these cards either until the Skull & Shackles Errata cards are available for purchase. There's no point in paying for shipping twice. I'm even holding off on playing Skull & Shackles until I get the errata cards, which isn't terribly difficult given how often my friends and I meet to play PACG. I'm only poised to start Adventure Deck 3 in Rise of the Runelords despite all the up-front work I've done on Adventure Guides.
Also, the Puppy Monkey Baby card has already been sent off to the printers, so here's the FAQ item for it:
No. You must consume Mountain Dew prior to making the die roll. The text "if you consume a 16oz or larger Mountain Dew product before making the check" should be changed to "if you consume a 16oz or larger Mountain Dew product immediately prior to making the check."
Thanks elcoderdude for having my back here and on BoardgameGeek. Enjoy the game Ed and Think3Yerslf!
If you check the community use registry here on Paizo.com you'll find links to Adventure Guides for Rise of the Runelords, Skull & Shackles, and Wrath of the Righteous. Each guide has an introduction and conclusion for every scenario in the PACG games and provides the complete Adventure Path story. Enjoy!
Soooo many ways I can abuse that :3 "Tag! You're it!" the gnome cleric shouts (runs to the backside of the boulder). First player to fail the stamina check gets tired and loses. :-D
Latest update from Liz Courts: The Iron Gods items should have been in the sale, but I think they had cloaking fields activated. We've detected them and put tracker bugs on them—sale prices should be active in a few hours. If you've already made your purchases for these items, please contact Customer Service for making sure you get the correct prices.
Hmmm... I notice most adventure path PDFs are on sale, but some aren't. There doesn't seem to be a discount on Mummy's Mask, and Giantslayer is on sale but Iron Gods isn't. Was that intentional or is it an error?
WizKids sent my replacement. This is issue is resolved. Thank you for the help everyone!
Eldritch Wizardry - nice! The best I can do is a 1st edition AD&D Dungeon Masters guide and Deities & Demigods (the ones with Melnibonean and Cthulhu Mythos.)
Eberron is new-fangled in my book. I've got the old Greyhawk folio edition (the one before the 1983 box set). Now that's putting the Grey in "Greyhawk."
I'll second the cheers for Reiko. Now we need some illustrations with Enora, Kess, and Andowyn. All we have is "Nocticula's Attention" where Kyra is the focus of the illustration and you can see Enora's cloak to the right.
I submitted the artwork PDF this morning. I tweaked the ending of the text-only PDFs so they remained synchronized with the artwork version; I wanted to leave room for the official Mummy's Mask cover when it's posted to the blog. I hope you've enjoyed my telling of Wrath of the Righteous.
Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with the end product. I wish Paizo had a Community Use image for Baphomet along with a better shot of Iomedae, but those wants are relatively minor compared to the 2-3 images I wish I had for Rise of the Runelords and Skull & Shackles. Arushalae will likely be available at some point if Ekkie and Ranzak are good indicators. I would definitely update the document to add her. I might also make room for Mummy's Mask official image when it becomes available, although I'd have to use a caption if I wanted to avoid updating the text documents.
I just finished up the artwork document. Total time for the Adventure Guide project was a little over 110 hours. I'll give the document a quick once over tomorrow morning before submitting it to BGG.
The BGG file page is now live. I updated the Community Use Registry to point to the BGG download page.
I think I have a better idea. How about we take up a collection to reward Byron Campbell (BGG user Kittenhoarder) for his fine work writing the first two adventure guides? We could give Byron a complete copy of Wrath of the Righteous or subscribe him here on Paizo.com for the next game in the PACG series. It seems like a very Chaotic Good thing to do, and it would please me even more than getting something for myself. If you check in on the my guide, you'll see work is progressing well. I've got the first 6 Adventure Decks covered. I should be done editing them soon, so I can get to work on Adventure Deck 6 and close the guide (and the Worldwound) for good.
Also, please don't pester me while I'm working on it unless you have an offer to help or you're doing something nice for me. I don't need the distractions.
The Venn diagram for people who read BGG and people who read Paizo's forums isn't a full overlap, so I thought I'd share the news that work has begun on a new guide. http://www.boardgamegeek.com/article/20978779
You might want to check out the Adventure Guide for this game if you feel it requires more story. There are also guides explaining who the deities are in the Blessings Deck and the full hero backstories. This bounty is made possible by Paizo's Community Use Policy
It's possible my explanation might be lost on a few people because of the technical implementation details. Let me try another approach. I notice the Pathfinder RPG line has a set of detailed errata documents that provide information about changes for each printing of the source book in question. Pathfinder Adventure Card Game Rise of the Runelords has 2 print editions, and to be honest, 3 print editions if you include the DriveThruRPG errata cards. Why can't we have an errata document for Rise of the Runelords so it's easy to tell which FAQ items apply to a specific printing of the game? You can do this with CSS styling on the web page or you can take some other approach: PDF files, separate web pages, etc. The nice part about this is once you've categorized the data for everything released prior to the DriveThruRPG cards, all FAQ questions released after that point becomes "new" for every customer and doesn't need categorization beyond the red "new for the month" CSS style Paizo.com already uses. It's not a data issue because it's already been provided. It's not a manpower issue, because you have people in the community who can help out. This request may seem unimportant or trivial compared to the other work or problems Paizo has to deal with internally (for example, other product releases, problems with manufacturing, supporting freelancers contributing to Paizo's products). The problem is that customers don't see your progress on those issues, so if you're writing blog posts explaining how you deal with product errors, and you've had some bad product launches (Rise of the Runelords first printing comes to mind), ignoring customer requests like this one that seem useful and easy to accomplish to an external observer makes you look out-of-touch, especially if it's work you're already doing for another set of customers.
Great post. I enjoyed reading it. Hopefully, it will cut down on the number of complaints when mistakes happen because people will understand how/why they happen (also some of them might not be mistakes at all.) The Horsechopper hyperlink in the post is wrong. I's going to the WOTR Object/Item entry. There's also a big issue with the FAQ you're missing. It'd be helpful if there was a distinction between Errata that's been corrected on DriveThru Cards vs. errata that isn't available. It's no fun at all reading the RotR FAQ purposefully ignoring 3/4 of the content to find the few things that changed if you bought the cards (a practice which you're trying to encourage with your business partner DriveThruCards.) The red CSS styling link is only good for the most current FAQ update, then it goes away when a new update is made. I'd suggest different colors for pre/post DriveThru cards via a CSS style, but there are other ways of conveying the information. It just seems easier to me to use CSS instead of cutting and pasting stuff around an HTML file or script. I'm not sure what continual changes means for DriveThruCards. If RotR cards are still getting updated, I'd like to purchase new cards as it's much easier to just rely on the cards (the way the game is supposed to be played) than trying to remember everything on a FAQ that might apply. I'm not sure what business process would work best, perhaps an annual update cycle - ROTR 2016 Update, ROTR 2017 Update?
I'd also like to thank Chris Lambertz and Tanis O' Connor. They both posted responses shortly after I made my initial post with offers to help. Based on what I've gathered here, Deck List != Card List and there's apparently no problem with the Character Sheet downloads. I updated the comments section for the Community Use Package PACG Character Sheets with my findings.
Before everyone goes nuts trying to fan mod existing Paizo Adventure Paths, I should point out that it's not allowed under the current Community Use guidelines (I have no insight into whether the policies are going to change):
The topic has also been addressed in this thread started by ace PACG fan Hawkmoon269 with a comment by Vic Wertz I will note that while the CUP lets you use characters and locations from most of our products, it only allows people doing campaign journals or play-by-posts to use storylines from those products. This means that you're not allowed to adapt a storyline that we've published (so you can't do, say, the Carrion Crown adventure path), but you are allowed to make up your own stories (so you *could* come up with a parallel storyline using characters and locations from Skull & Shackles, or you could come up with new adventures extending the story of Rise of the Runelords). One of the easiest tells that someone isn't complying with Community Use Policy is that they forgot this part of the policy: You agree to create an account on paizo.com and add an entry describing your material on our Community Use Registry at paizo.com/communityuse/registry, with links where appropriate. You agree to endeavor to keep this information up-to-date. Every time I've looked a product that wasn't registered (which admittedly isn't a large sample size), I've usually seen it accompanied by other violations like usage of unapproved artwork, modification of approved artwork, or usage of Paizo story lines. It's almost as if the author feels that copying the required Community Use disclaimer is sufficient for meeting Community Use guidelines, which it's not, and it's about as effective as making a cross with your index fingers to hold off Dracula.
It's really great that there are enthusiastic purchasers and players like Junon and Troymk1, but it sounds like there aren't enough of you to support the current release schedule all the way through the entire sales channel. It might not be a problem with Paizo's pre-order customers, but it could be an issue for brick-and-mortar stores and online retailers. Inventory takes up money and space (that can be devoted to other products that are selling), so they have the same concerns that Paizo has. There's significant cost savings on bigger print runs (or bulk purchases), but the savings are lost if you have to warehouse the inventory for too long, heavily discount it to sell it, or worse never sell it at all. Aliases
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