Could point out to them that it's fresh enough for a raise dead spell.
I'd put it like this.
Lawful Good attempts to create a system that benefits everyone and protects those that need protecting, they put structures in place that help others and work within them to drive out misuse or abuse as well as destructive forces that might damage that system and attempt to change rather than destroy systems that harm others. Two decent examples off the top of my head;
2: Bandits are attacking trade caravans, turns out they're basically poor and impoverished farmer types who are being pushed to banditry by the heavy taxation of a particular lord, with some bad apples mixed in who are just cruel and doing it for kicks
LG tends to think more long term basically, because they're thinking in terms of the future as well as the now, its a slower, more difficult process than just rocking into town, kicking the evil lord in the teeth and wandering off again leaving a power vacuum.
When I ran the game, I kept the children from the Fish house around as a gang that the PCs had close contact with, the Lambs, they basically became a group of street children/cult led by the low level oracle 'The Lamb'
Best scene with the Lambs was them bringing back a dead horse killed in one of the riots and taking the entire thing apart for meat, the players thought something terrible had happened when they returned to their den and found a huge bloodstain on the floor only to end up getting dinner presented to them by a bunch of shy, desperate for approval children. That and one of the more benevolent players explaining to a little girl that they don't have to steal any more to avoid being hurt, that they'd look after them because they cared, after the girl presented them with a watch they'd stolen, having to actually convince the younger children was a great scene. Think Gavroche from Les Miserables.
Basically? Fighters lack options. Everything they could, logically, choose to do to spice up combat has its own feat, they lack skill points and skill boosting abilities and above all they lack a disposable resource that they can use to improve their base line abilities. Clerics and Druids can fighter better than a fighter because they can increase their power, Wizards have more options because they have a cornucopia of spells that can suit any situation depending on what they pick in the morning.
In my personal experience best way to improve the lot of the Fighter is to use Path of War for their combat and give a disposable out of combat resource that renews, stamina or mythic are good underlying mechanics, the surge ability of Mythic is a perfect example of the kind of 'Grit your teeth and use your last surge of strength to come to an epiphany about your investigation/swing across the chasm and save the Princess/uncover the secret door and escape' skill resource that Fighting men types need on hand.
Kingmaker: Protect your burgeoning Kingdom from the greatest threat to any land. Owlbears.
My GM has changed systems midway through a game from Pathfinder to 5E, the character I'm playing is fairly non-standard and I have never played 5E before. I have no idea how to create him, we're going to probably suffer a huge hit in ability meaning some of the things he'd done previously make no sense and a bunch of his equipment is now basically vestigial fluff. I can totally sympathize with him wanting to switch systems but I have no idea how to bring him across and I can't complain since the rest of the party are also pretty down with it and it might help a game that was going incredibly slowly speed up and smooth out. But, a character I really enjoyed playing and don't really want to retire might end up mechanically not viable, as in I literally cannot make him.
Simple. We already have a thing for curses. They're called curses.Corruptions are, by their name and nature, meant to be corrupting, they're meant to be game changers, to twist your character in new, interesting directions.
For example, imagine a corruption that lets you become a kind of Fisher King only to slowly turn you into a Dread Lord. There are perfectly good, in character reasons why even a good aligned king could be tempted by that sort of power, being able to guard his subjects better through accepting that from now on he's going to be just a touch closer with the land.
War comes and he's suddenly in a position where the land is being wracked and looted, so he accepts that the only option is to kill the invaders, bury them in the land, to feed it and grow strong again.
That's far, far more interesting than just 'so your character has been cursed to eat 1 HD of hearts a week in return for a +2 to cha checks with his subjects (Once a day)'
I'd sincerely say that the corruptions are the second most disappointing part of Horror Adventures in my eyes. The fluff is mildly interesting, I love the Hive one for example, but the mechanical side of it is basically uninteresting, gives niche powers for painful drawbacks, built for one specific 'story' (Oh no, you got dipped in alien goo/poked by a hag/fiddled by a golem, better do something about that before it consumes your soul) when Corruption should be more about the temptation of power and dangerous offerings for great strength, for example any horror sorcerer or dangerous cult leader in literature ever. And the 'become an NPC, do not pass go, do not collect £200' is just absurd, part of horror has always been terrible things happening and living with the consequences. As it stands the consequences are the GM taking away your character and you make a new one, you're effectively dead, move on. Meanwhile the current corruptions are more along the lines of 'meager power for huge drawbacks, oh and become an NPC if you're weak willed or play a character that becomes a lich/werewolf/shadow tainted'
Oh god the Domain Lord templates sounds like exactly what I need right now for my character that's turning into an Unseelie Fey King.
Wait until he inevitably slips up then kill him. Make sure to be stronger than him at all times, make sure to be careful never to be within the one hit death zone in terms of HP. And when he knackers it up, as he already has by letting you know OOC, destroy him. What else can you do really. He's made his bed, he can lie in it while he bleeds to death.
Dahak is basically a sadistic predator.
It would be like a cat working with an atomic bomb.
The First World. Because we really need more Fey content.
We had an arc in our kingmaker game involving the characters trying to matchmake for their far too serious sorcerer/Magister who claimed he was 'married to his work' which everyone assumed was just because he was too shy/awkward to talk to girls. Rom com shenanigans ensued as they tried to set up dates, arranged marriages, there were rumors he was a play boy after he danced with half the single young women of the upper class in one night due to all the PCs vouching for different partners.
Things eventually came to a head when it came to light that someone had seen him riding a unicorn, so everyone naturally assumed he was still a virgin. Turned out he was friends with the Unicorn and it was taking him off most nights to visit his Nymph lover, the Bard-Kings reaction was amazing.
So what you're saying is that in character your party betrayed someone who implicitly trusted them, to the point where they could ambush and subdue him despite him apparently having loads of minions and then handed him over for certain death by execution when there was a Runelord awakening and they needed all the help they could get. There's two sides to every story, if you flip the alignments you'd certainly think it was an unacceptable thing for the party to do and more than slightly unfair when the guy was by the sound of it playing fairly legit with them.
As someone playing a minion happy necromancer in a fairly heavy online game the main thing any minion-master needs to learn to do at a table is to know when to step back and have their character find a wall to prop up and have a smoke behind. Look up the term Godzilla Threshold on TVTropes, basically you only break out your minions when you've reached this point and before that you maybe goof about a bit and let others be more in the spotlight than you.
A Dragonmech campaign I was in had a LG Gun that was possessed by the soul of a Paladin who had utterly failed to save his homeland when the Moon came down.
My LE character ended up carrying it after buying it from a desperately nervous merchant. It was polite, it was charming, it was convinced she could be better than the amoral bountyhunter she was at the start of the game. And if she couldn't be better it fully intended to force an ego roll, jam itself into her mouth and pull the trigger. Straight up fire and brimstone Paladin who didn't take any prisoners and believed in hard justice, was happy to manipulate and bluff people into doing good deeds and basically worked with the forces of the divine to play events around the team to the benefit of all. In the end my character spent half the time keeping it in a lead lined holster (Upgraded later to a lead lined box in a bag of holding) to stop it reading her mind and intentions.
It was like carrying the LG version of Stormbringer, constantly manipulating and playing a game greater than the character could ever imagine, absurdly dangerous to its user and powerful enough that sometimes you didn't have a choice but to call on it.
All I ask as a player is that the GM is even handed, both mechanically and between players, and that he's open to ideas/suggestions, giving as much respect as I give him.
I couldn't stand playing under a GM who just expects the players to shut up and play 'their story' or by the raw AP, which I'm totally aware is a bit entitled, so I try to balance it out by carrying more than my fair share of the weight as a helper.
To play a massive devils advocate on the topic, the start of CotCT doesn't necessarily involve your characters knowing each other.
So its not too unreasonable that a group of murderous, revenge driven criminals brought together by the shared desire to punch the most punch-able face in Golarion (Gadren Lammb) might not want to share names since, well, anyone that knows your name is now a potential rat. So, treat it as such, give a psudonym, give them fake names and you can bond as time goes on over pints, your shared frothing hatred for a dead man wot probably killed at least one person you care about per PC (Or worse) and the fact the city is going to the dogs. Crimson Throne isn't a 'everyone is happy bunnies and already knows each other' situation, its the fantasy equivalent of you getting a call in the middle of the night, asking if you want some pay back on that beat your sister to death when he was dating her 'bout 2 years back, followed by you being ushered into a van, a bit of pipe thrust into your hands by a big bloke with a working class accent wearing a sack cloth hood and pointing you to a free seat in the back of the mini-bus full of other guys just like you.
The real question is.
Since you seem to have a good head of steam, by all means, go on tilting at that straw man if it suits you.If you honestly believe that then why don't you live out in the woods with no contact with society?Mengkare's subjects are volunteer subjects, however.Volunteering to enter a cage is still entering a cage. "Even if you volunteer and willingly enter into a contract with a person whereby that person can tell you what to do, they're still evil for offering such a contract." Your words, not mine, if its a Strawman then its one you built of yourself.As for the latter, imagine being a person that has lived a thousand years. Older than the concept of Britain as a country, or Germany, certainly older than America, you'd have seen nations rise and fall, the world change in ways people couldn't even comprehend from century to century, let alone across the one thousand years.
Would you know better than most people, having lived and experienced such things? I think its fair to say you would. I mean, we trust doctors after just 10 years (Minimum mind you) to tell us what to do and make it better, yes even life changing decisions.
Mengkare's subjects are volunteer subjects, however.Volunteering to enter a cage is still entering a cage. If you honestly believe that then why don't you live out in the woods with no contact with society? Social contracts and the rule of law is the foundation of civilization, from the laws the government sets (Which all curtail our choices, after all, stabbing your neighbor because he has a really sweet hat you want is a choice) right down to the code of conduct on this forum.If you honestly and truly believe that anyone that opts in on anyone else being allowed to influence their life with the best intentions is being taken advantage of, then I'm not sure what to say really.
Sometimes there are people who know better for a person, than the person themselves, be it through immaturity, not realizing the full consequences, or situations such as drug addicts.
Way I see if it Mengkare has made himself a parental figure to what in his eyes, is a race of children. He is not doing it for personal gain, at all, he doesn't get anything out of it and frankly, being a powerful Gold dragon there's far, far more important and self-serving things he could be doing.
Right, 6 book set up is a-go. Book 1: A Crown of Fire & Iron - Spoiler:
Background for the game is that for the last 6 months, Princess Eutropia has been leading the nation in her father's stead as Regent in Situ, after he was declared an Invalid and incapable of ruling actively due to illness. Rumors abound about his failing health.
Game begins not with a Coronation but with a traditional Taldane party, sort of a once a year summer fete situation where all the nobility are invited to come and be reminded that they do in fact, PCs could be guards, lesser members of the nobility, Knights or servants working within the Palace (Permanent or hired on temporarily to assist with crafting specific items for the party). A fair number of nobles haven’t arrived yet and some it seems aren’t planning to turn up at all in protest of a woman basically being on the throne. The main rumor being that the party is a cover for Princess Eutropia possibly finding a husband in order to avoid the upcoming succession crisis. 1st level involves dealing with social intrigue and the build up to the party, feasting, getting to know the movers and shakers, hunting Stags (And wolves) and being involved in Tournaments for small tokens, acting as catspaws in petty politics and so on, getting a feel for Taldane culture with some courtly work where a few peasants can bring in their grievances and the PCs have a chance to impress by appearing virtuous and helping with their troubles before the court, including a chance to deal with a few abuses by other lesser nobility to show that Taldor isn’t unnecessarily evil to the Unbearded (And to foreshadow a few of the villains) Eventually after a few days the party begins to get underway, with the peasants invited in during the day (Only the outer courtyards) and the gates locked at night so the plebs can be kept out and the nobility can get down to really partying hard. Various gifts are both given and accepted by the Royal household, ect, ect, including a troupe of clockwork musicians who can play the most beautiful music. On the night of the Summer Solstice the shorted night of the year the Castle basically has a Lock in, a true bacchanal and Masquerade, in the style of Masque of the Red Death. As things start to get out of hand and people disappear off into various shady corners to indulge in their personal vices, the party turns into a bloodbath, starting with the apparent assassination of the Princess herself by way of bunderbuss, the clockwork inventions turning on the crowd revealing their instruments double as weapons (Including muskets), leaving the PCs trapped with the wounded in the sealed castle as various other presents are revealed to be clockwork creatures, hounds for hunting the stragglers being the most important, cunningly made in parts to be put together on the grounds. Great chance to show the better side of the Taldorian nobility after the hedonism of the party, a knight who was bothering a serving girl (Or bullying a serving lad) fights and dies without hesitation to protect her and others, a pair of catty noblewomen who were causing each other as much trouble as possible put aside their differences to help carry the wounded, that sort of thing. The PCs end up leading a group of wounded, guards and servants to fight their way out past the creatures avoiding the main dance hall where the unit is being constructed, gathering other survivors and attempting to find an escape, culminating in a roof top battle with a pair of clockwork dancers/soldiers survivors of the night escape down the wall and down into the gardens. Once they are free of the castle limits one of the servant girls reveals herself to be the Princess, having opted to go to the ball as her handmaiden, while the handmaiden went as her in what was meant to be a clever joke. The PCs are then sent under the castle by the Princess with the remains of the Royal guard to knock out the supports under the main dance hall before the clockwork warriors can finish the rebuilding of a clockwork dragon. After doing so, the PCs are proclaimed bearded, as news comes to the Castle of clockwork leviathans dragging themselves onto the land in the harbour, creating a beach-head for an army coming down the other side of the river. Through hook or crook, or exposition (Good chance for a spymaster type ally), the PCs learn that one of the North East Vassals has rebelled, ruler of a holding just east of the World’s Edge Mountains, just in time for the Oppara Navy to be roused. Book 2: A Lion’s Pride - Spoiler:
Big punch up between the Taldor Navy and the Leviathans starts the proceedings, showing just how technologically backwards Taldor is as the Navy is decimated, but manages to block the harbour and upstream with their own shattered boats. PCs are called upon to kill the one remaining trapped Leviathan by dropping several of the broken boats onto its body, the rest having fled.
Princess sends the various nobles off by horse to quickly gather their knights from the nearest holdings so they can head North-East together and take battle to the rebelling Lord by pushing up the eastern front of the World’s Edge Mountains, through Porthmos Gap and the various valleys within. PCs are sent to the holdings of those Lords that died, with orders to gather any forces they can and quickly discover that it isn’t just a single Lord, but a conspiracy that stretches down the eastern edge of Taldor as far as the Border Wood, troops marching into villages, PCs having to put down petty Noblemen and would-be demagogues as they travel south, then up the north east to Sardis (And a chance to gain a penal unit), making difficult moral choices the entire way on if they stick to tradition and gain the support of the nobility, uplift the peasantry to gain more footsoldiers, or try to compromise between the two, coming to a head at Stavian’s Hold where they are expected to rally the local troops and meet up with the armies to the West, only to find that the current leader of the Phalanx is determined to remain neutral having been promised his own holding if he maintains it, while an ambassador from the ‘Buckshot Prince’ arms his troops with muskets as well as bows and spears as a sign of good faith. Armed with their new dragoons the PCs bring their army west to join the main forces, the Grand Marshal, a staunch traditionalist who believes in doing things by the book, they head up the Gap and into the valleys beyond, fighting patrols of Clockwork, mercenaries and fey as they go, discovering more about the enemy forces as they do, that they contain Forumite sell swords, Phalanx of Fey who mirror and mock the Taldorian style and the like, leading to a pitched battle with the Self-Proclaimed King of Taldors Army. Which, naturally is an ambush, as the knights charge down the hillside straight into cannonfire. Charge of the Light Brigade style. With the Grand Marshal dead at the head of the spear point the remaining troops (Including their own) fall back into the PCs hands as they fighting withdrawal over one hundred miles to Dalaston, or Stavian’s Hold, before holding out until relief comes to assist them, forcing a Stalemate near the headwater of the River Porthmos. Book 3: The Cold Iron Oath - Spoiler:
Now fully trusted by the Queen, the PCs are sent Westwards, to the Verduran Forest, an army needs supplies and with the muskets on the field the Taldorian army needs both strong shields and numberless arrows, the PCs are sent to renegotiate the number of trees that can be felled with the Wildwood Lodge and to find out if they can, why the fey are assisting the Prince.
What they find within is that the forces of Andoran (Or at least, the Lumber Consortium) have crossed the border and are taking advantage of their civil war, wolves circling the herd and that the Wildwood Lodge is locked in its own small, vicious war as the fey of the area begin to question if Taldor is a viable ally, if it can’t protect them. This attitude is of course being stoked by the minions of a Gunslinger Vilderavn, known as the Buckshot Prince, who has joined the would-be King for his own reasons (Those reasons being that Taldor will crumble under the force of civil war and he can laugh when it happens) Eventually the PCs discover the ‘Andoran’ forces are actually a group of sell swords working under the enemy, who are planning to rile up the local fey and push an attack against Andoran civilians to make the war even worse. Hiding under the guise of being Gorumites, the Szuriel cultist warriors are ravaging the forest and eventually hoping to provoke a glorious 3 way war if they can get Galt involved. Hints of the Origins of the Clockwork army come into play as the PCs find one of the masters of the terror force uses not just blackpowder weapons, but fiendish Clockwork constructs. After reassuring both the druids and a force of Eagle Knights that have come to see what on earth is going on, the PCs are joined by locals from the various towns/logging camps within the forest, a smattering of Fey (Blackwood Satyrs maybe?) and the Druid Cabal, before they receive a report from the east that the Taldoran army has seriously underestimated the capabilities of an army that’s immune to fatigue or cold and that a good chunk of them have crossed the World’s Edge Mountains and are flanking down towards Maheto, a core of Taldorian Industry. If the Clockwork Craftsmen of the Would-be King get their hands on the raw materials of Maheto and the nearby mines at Dalaston, then the Kingdom is lost. But, the PCs now have their hands on not just the plans for the Gunpowder weapons the enemy uses, but some of their simplest clockwork creatures, including clockwork knights, steeds and giants. Book 4: Stoking the Fires of War - Spoiler:
Run as a sort of reverse dungeon crawl, the PCs are forced to claim Marshal law over the city of Maheto, heaving with refugees from the north and overrun with fear, building up its defenses, making sure food goes around, refurbish the smithies of the city into powder factories and gun forges and then hold tight, as the local dwarven population works around the clock to perfect not just the defenses of the city, but also clockwork soldiers and other items that can counteract the enemy forces. Through their actions the PCs can define the new technology the Taldorian army has access to from here on and how it operates. Be it running a clockwork steed riding ‘flying platoon’ of dragoons to harry the enemy and whittle them down, heavy shielded Hussars with Blackwood Lances, tipped with explosives, Massed Musket Militia or drawing back into the mountain and creating an actual dungeon amongst the undercity the dwarves live in, for the enemy to throw their troops against, as well as some possible ‘dungeon crawling’ by doing raids on enemy supply wagons and finding bits and pieces to improve their army amongst the many and inventive weapons brought by the Szurielians.
Initial parlay with the Would-Be King, who is personally leading his forces reveals a striking similarity to the Princess and with some investigation and work, the PCs can discover that the Rebel Lord is in fact not planning to place himself on the throne if the Princess was to step back, instead he backs the claim of an Unbearded Watchmaker, the inventor of the Clockwork soldiers who claims to be the true King by right of blood. Who is revealed to be the Fitz/Bastard son of Stavian III, denied his birthright by his position as an Unbearded, backed by the Buckshot Prince as well as a cult of Szuriel (Lead by the Ero-daemon that first convinced the Clockwork Emperor to pursue his heritage) and funded by Qadira, with all its endless flow of gold, he’s convinced he can claim Taldor and then, when Qadira inevitably attacks, push them back with the army they funded. By this point it should be obvious to the PCs that such a ‘leader’ would be removed quickly enough, having no backing in politics and that as soon as he’s no longer useful, the Fey, Daemons and Qadira will turn on him, sending the empire sliding into oblivion. Maheto becomes the turning point of the war, as the Lords regain some faith in the Princess and her choice in putting the PCs in charge rather than a good, honest blue-blooded leader bred for war and in holding the line the PCs avoid the balkanization of Taldor as others make a grab for the throne. Attempts on the town range from salting the nearby earth, to week long sieges to assassination attempts on the PCs, until finally the invading army is forced back by the onset of winter, while Clockwork soldiers don’t need to eat, the rest of the army do and the efforts of the Wildwood Lodge using hit and run tactics have left their logistics lines devastated. Book 5: Last Stand of the Buckshot Prince - Spoiler:
With their new, technologically updated army the PCs are ready to start fighting back, unfortunately winter has set in and travel becomes more difficult as the PCs are called back to the Princess to be Knighted as heroes of the Empire, exemplars of battle and so on and so forth, bringing them back into the Sphere of intrigue for the first half of the book as they deal with the half-hearted threats of lesser nobles and broker supplies, weapons and men for their army.
Unfortunately this doesn’t last as long as it should, when the Buckshot Prince leads a daring raid upon the Forward base and kidnaps the Princess with his own unknown intentions for her. Forced to react without chance to gather their forces, the PCs can only take a small group westwards, brute-forcing their way through an ambush at Temple Canyon and onwards over the Tandak Plains to the Blackswamps of Cassomir, where the the Vildravn plans to trade the Princess to the Derro, who will break her as they broke her father and thus ruin the moral backbone of the loyalists. When the PCs ruin this plan, the Buckshot Prince pushes onwards, to the bombed out remains of Grayguard Castle, where his fey forces have overgrown the ruins in the image of the first world and where he makes his final stand. Chance of course comes at the end of the book, if any of the PCs have grown close to her (Or are convenient), for a marriage with the Princess, thus removing the succession problem. Book 6: The Watchmakers Empire - Spoiler:
With his Fey allies fleeing, his lesser lords defeated, the Taldorian army now on an even footing almost and spring approaching the Watchmaker turns to ever more desperate measures, razing villages one after another behind him in his retreat up the World’s Edge Mountain line. PCs get to face off against his greatest clockwork horrors as well as powerful Daemons of war and are forced to push through the Valley of Azlant to cut off his retreating army.
In his desperation he turns to his last remaining ally, the Szurielian cultists and they offer a solution. And so begins a ritual to call up the Dustbringer from Caina, for one last, horrific weapon, a Clockwork Goliath with a micro version of the Dustbringer as its main weapon, capable of grinding entire armies into dust. If he cannot be crowned master of Taldor, then let Taldor be lost to the ages. This information comes by way of the PCs once enemy, defected to join them now that his previous lord intends not to rule Taldor, but destroy it. Cue massive battle in the Thousand Relics Pass, followed by climax at Aroden’s Eye, which is both a thin point between the planes as well as now a magnificent clockwork workshop and fortress, filled with fiendish clockwork, lethal traps and eventually the Clockwork Augmented King-Pretender, backed by the forces of Abaddon’s Mistress of War and his half-finished golem. Taldor has survived and been given a wake up call, as through the war it wasn’t the nobility that led the charge, but the common man, armed with musket and Taldorian bravery rather than Horse and Bred-in Arrogance, it was innovation rather than tradition that saved them and it was their traditions that gave rise to the conquerors claim to begin with and almost being accepting of their new Queen. The PCs are now members of the Royal inner circle as the coronation finally gets underway and in their future lies the change of Qaria invading, or Szuriel’s cultists coming back for round two, or possibly even the Pale Stranger of the Buckshot Prince and the Queen of the Court of Ether, enraged by the death of her (One time) lover. But, at least the Empire now has a glorious future to earn, rather than the memory of glory. How's that?
It's actually not that hard to see Taldor (as a whole) as the good guys in many ways, but it also depends on just how long back you've read about Taldor and what parts in print you consider true. Presumably an AP about them would involve moving past their previous decadence. The thing is, Taldor is a withered appendix of an older, more savage age, when humanity was still reeling in the shadow of Earthfall and an aeon of enslavement by the orcs. In the south, Osirion is faltering and Nex and Geb are tearing reality apart, to the west humanity is getting a toe hold in the land of Linnorms. The only true contemporary of that time to compare them to? Nidal.Outside of Taldors walls? Basically anarchy and unconquered land on every side apart from the East. Taldor was the ancestor that founded most of the larger civilizations of the era, directly or indirectly. And to the east you have the Kelesh empire, which is just as bad, if not worse, with hungry eyes looking west, a warmongering attitude (They claimed Zimar for 500 years and are directly responsible for the rise of Cheliax, some would say), a constant stream of human suffering supporting a decadent noble class (Slavery being more than the norm) and equally backwards attitudes (Kelesh sends 300 women as concubines to Qadira a year.)
And for all their sins, many and varied, Taldor worked and dragged humanity painfully out of an age of exploitation and savagery, you can't do that just by being nice.
It isn't hard to see how people could want to see such a people rise again and do it properly this time, to finally push themselves beyond the confines of their culture so they can be proud of the present as well as the past, rather than falling to a nation that's just as arrogant, just as cruel and just as blinded to their evils by their own achievements. Sorry if that was a bit long, long story short, Taldor was and is a product of its time I guess, when there were greater evils than being a bit snobby and people having to put their dreams to one side in the face of not being consumed by Orcs every night and they have enough good points that it isn't unreasonable to imagine they could grow to be better than they are. Doubly so when compared to other empires in Golarion of equal size and power. Minor Edit: That and there aren't many-to-any APs about being intrigue-ish, it wouldn't be unreasonable to do an AP about being a bunch of nobles, trying to trim the fat of the nation before it crumbles from within as the King stubbornly refuses to budge an inch on matters of tradition, wolves at the borders, bringing justice to the common man from within the system, so on, so forth. With Ultimate Intrigue coming out soon, it'd be a riot.
God, that'd be a fantastic AP, he's intentionally organizing a Kingdom with its own incredible advancements and infrastructure, breeding heroes capable of defeating him, so on, so forth. In order to introduce the concept of the consent of the governed
You say perversion of the natural order isn't evil other people say it is. It can be argued they're not even a perversion of the natural order, as I mentioned above, the Siabrae keep their powers as druids. Considering you can lose your druidic powers for using metal armor, being too evil or too good, spreading disease (Pallid Plague), killing your animal companion or teaching non-druids your secret language, that's incredibly significant.And I remember asking a while back on a AMA on Reddit why undead were evil and the answer basically boiled down to 'We have a one line to describe the alignment of creatures and Paladins smiting undead is very traditional, so we put 'em as evil'
Man, I wish there was more on the Shadow Fey, they're a riot, still the rest of the book is fantastic, to the point where I've bought it even though I own half the advanced races options. Out of interest, is there any chance of us getting more shadow fey information in the future?
It's lawful. But not good. Because for me it comes way too creepy close to eugenics and the whole 'breeding a master race' thing for my comfort. Obviously some folks disagree, but I'm the one being paid by Paizo's management and owners to make creative... I think that's an entirely fair position to take, Mr Jacobs. I'd disagree and say it isn't intrinsically evil either but I guess that's just the point where our personal opinions diverge. Just out of interest, what's your position on designer babies, or artificial insemination and that whole branch of science coming up?
I'm disturbed at how many people think eugenics and elitism is Good aligned :D I breed a new type of dog that are hardy, loyal and perfect for sheep herding, in a world where sheep herders live incredibly dangerous lives. I also breed a new type of sheep that can survive in areas that no other sheep can and be saved twice as often, clothing thousands. Am I a bad person?I take my money from dog breeding and start a University, allowing the best and brightest of the Sheep herders sons to uplift themselves, become doctors, teachers for others, so on so forth, I don't have enough money to teach everyone
Would it be morally wrong to stop a Lamashtu cult who are breeding monsters in their wombs, because hey, that's their choice and that's, in its own way, Eugenics. That's life, that's the dreadful algebra of necessity, you take the numbers and at the end of the day a decision has to be made. It's cold, but its the only way to do any good in the long term. Golarion is a world of danger, death and destruction in which (And this is very important) eugenics works, as proven by the Aboleths managing to breed a super-breed of humanity who created a mega-empire that was aeons ahead of the now watered down people of the neo-dark-age. Elitism and Eugenics is Lawful, not evil, its organized, its community good orientated, so on. Eh, Mr. Jacobs has written up and/or developed numerous lawful good NPCs who are in fact still good. The various paladin allies from Wrath of the Righteous and Lictor Octavio Sabinus (the LG leader of a Hellknight Order) from Hell's Rebels come to mind. I will admit, Lictor Sabinus is an absurdly cool character, I was so happy when he popped up. I'm happily wrong on that one if Mr Jacobs designed him.
Well, no one knows what Norgy looks like, so who knows, maybe he's secretly attractive.
Negative energy is not evil because negative energy isn't intelligent it is a force like gravity or radiation. However it does represent entropy, ending and nullification. Drawing on these powers could be considered evil. And drawing on the opposite could be considered the same. Too much positive energy causes you to explode, cancer is caused by growth gone unchecked and nothing is as dangerous as something that cannot be stopped.A beginning nor an end are by their nature good or bad things.
Actually what's really funny is that by their logic, binding an angel is a totes good thing to do. Wunderbar, better start stocking up my dungeon with unwilling Angelic slaves. That'll cause chaos amongst the Paladins. Cue evil laughter.
Do death spells make you more dead? Most of them make other people deader, admittedly, but you're not going to suddenly have a heart attack due to your being 'contaminated' by death.And you can happily throw around fire spells until the cows come home without anyone arguing you should gain the fire subtype, or are you arguing that language-dependent spells change your alignment? Saying 'this interacts with alignment' isn't saying 'This changes your alignment' Protection from evil interacts with alignment by protecting you from evil, that's how it interacts, it doesn't turn you good suddenly because you cast it a few times. Unless you have a literal quotation that says 'Casting evil spells lowers your alignment' then its about as valid as me saying 'Casting fear spells makes you evil, because you're upsetting people you monster' Plus, you know, you didn't reply to the above [evil] creatures aren't always evil and by implication [evil] sources/spells aren't always Evil. If I cast Planar binding to summon a redeemed demon (Looking at you Wrath of the Righteous) am I suddenly on par with someone that just ate a baby.
'Stop trying to redeem Asmodeus, it takes 999 good aligned acts, have fun with that lads'.Well in the worlds where people play with rules that don't exist concerning casting spells with aligned subtypes that'd be pretty easy. Casting 999 protection from evil spells isn't even that hard. Hell, if you didn't mind snacking on a wand of mnemonic enhancer you could shave off 150 of them per day without even touching your actual daily spells. God that'd be a fun campaign. Playing a bunch of Mythic characters pulling a hit and run invasion of hell, plunging the very depths of damnation itself.Armed with the worlds largest stockpile of [Good] aligned spells, scrolls and wands alike, defeating and pinning down powerful Devils and forcing them to taste the g#$ d*!n rainbow son and convert to good, working your way up to eventually Care Bear'ing Asmodeus himself into redemption while the Empyreals themselves watch on and laugh at the sheer silliness of it all.
It's in Dragons Unleashed, but if I'm remembering correctly that was declared non-canon a while back, it was a vestigial left over from their work on 3.5 version of Pathfinder.
Not necessarily. Evil: Spells that draw upon evil powers or conjure creatures from evil-aligned planes or with the evil subtype should have the evil descriptor. Nothing in there mentions alignment, the same way casting Protection from Evil isn't a good aligned act, casting evil descriptor spells isn't an evil one. Or every Diabolist would have an aura of moral decency from trapping devils. The only source I can find that claims casting [evil] spells is an Evil act, is the redemption rules and those are very subjective, full of umming, ahhing, well-maybe's and fiddle-faddle, they're, to put it lightly, not very solid, with such stellar bits of mechanics as 'Redemption probably takes 2*HD good acts, or maybe 4*HD, or 8*HD, or you might throw your hands in the air and say 'Stop trying to redeem Asmodeus, it takes 999 good aligned acts, have fun with that lads'.And why should they be? Everyones path to redemption is different. And more importantly in this case, they claim its an act equal to worshiping an evil god or mind controlling a good aligned person into doing evil, which is insane. On the flip side it says casting a single good aligned spell is of the same caliber as going to confession, giving 50 GP to a church, preaching for an hour, not resorting to stabbing someone for their baked beans (Either before or after the fight) or not lying for a week. So, very, very weak and very, very general guidelines at best. Now I know what you're going to say, evil source, evil sources and evil aligned creatures are Evil, capital E, no questions, no ifs, no buts.
Evil Subtype - This subtype is usually applied to Outsiders native to the evil-aligned Outer Planes. Evil Outsiders are also called fiends. Most creatures that have this subtype also have evil alignments; however, if their alignments change, they still retain the subtype. Any effect that depends on alignment affects a creature with this subtype as if the creature has an evil alignment, no matter what its alignment actually is. The creature also suffers effects according to its actual alignment. A creature with the evil subtype overcomes damage reduction as if its natural weapons and any weapons it wields are evil-aligned. Most evil subtype creatures have an evil alignment, those that don't retain the evil subtype which proves you can be [evil] without being Alignment: Evil. In fact, it implies that only Most are, not almost all, not every last one bar exceptions. Most. An [evil] source doesn't mean an Evil source, its never been clearly defined as such and with the above we can see that [evil] doesn't always mean Evil.
I know its far too late in the day to do so, but it would be wonderful if Paizo put out a quick pdf, lining up the differences between Base and 'Golarion specific' information that made its way into the Core rules.
And I do not really see Necromancer-Paladin as a staple of the game, nor actually a desirable way to go. There are lots of things I find undesirable, for one I'm strongly against mix-matching Sci-fi and Fantasy (Less so than I used to be), but that doesn't mean for a second I'd demand no one ever play a game set in Numeria, even when our GM included a Numerian Mech in our Kingmaker game as part of the barbarian horde, I was down with it since that was how he enjoys his fantasy and if everyone was forced to kow-tow to my personal taste? They'd have far less fun with the game. Personal taste should never define what others get to enjoy and to be honest playing a Paladin-Necromancer sounds like it'd be a riot. I can easily imagine an order of Paladins who firmly believe duty goes beyond death and animate their own armor once they fall, in times of great need, to fight alongside the living. Training the next generation of Paladins.Or even a destroyed order, similar to the Hellknight Order of Crux, maybe an order who were annihilated during the battle with the Whispering Tyrant but survive in defiance of him, it'd certainly suit the gothic horror tone of Ustalav better, to have a Gothic Paladin Order with say, a Lantern theme, plate clad and tragic, than King Arthur-esq knights, rocking across the landscape.
Plus it makes sense, after all he's charming enough to build a Kingdom (Moment of Charisma) and markedly powerful, even for a gold dragon. Besides, everyone knows Mythic is one way to godhood.An entire AP based around the PCs having been convinced he's nefarious or a villain by his enemies and being manipulated into trying to bring down Promise could be a fantastic AP, a real twist on the usual stuff Paizo does.
Personally, I sincerely hope that Mengkare is legit, it's so refreshing to see new interesting takes on LG and Promise seems a perfectly valid one, with a focus on Lawful as well as good.
Go read the old Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser short stories, they're pretty much 'Fighter & Rogue go do things' the pulp series, I'd suggest giving the fighter more skill ranks, going fast and loose on handing out consumables and quite possibly allowing them both to gestalt for free into a second class (Non-casting or low casting), or just giving free gestalt levels when they earn them.
Fears, Nightmares & Phobias (esq): Vintage Terrors & Clockwork Delights A trio of Bogeymen run this entirely black and white tent, on its small patch of black grass, selling negative emotions of all kinds, from the slightest shudder caused by a house spider, to the terrors of one who dies from fright. Along one wall is a wine rack covered in bottles, each filled with a different terror and in fine writing the age, location of its original collection and age of the person it was collected from, but never the exact contents. Across from it the Bogeymen maintain a small but cleverly crafted back room of wonders, all limited to shades of grey and black ranging from simple clockwork toys to entire mechanical wind up circus acts set off with the simple winding of a key. The back room is quietly maintained by a pair of children, one boy and one girl but never the same two, the pair changes day to day. The trio of gregarious fear merchants never speak instead communing with their customers through hand gesture and legerdemain mixed with ever present hints of fears and half-remembered memories (Suggestion), eager to sell their vintage fears as a vintner might to the most discerning and rich of wine patrons, paid in turn in joy, hopes and happy memories, taken in either the solid form of items directly linked to them or directly tasted from the customers mind before being decanted into sparkling cordials that they then return to the rack. All three are also eager to sell their back room stock, though are much more discerning about what kind of person they're traded to, preferring to barter them with those who move around less frequently and who come into contact with children.
Their actual deal, spoilers :
Fears, Nightmares & Phobias are a trio of TN Bogeymen who over time have found themselves addicted to positive emotion, enjoying them in the same way an aristocratic and functional alcoholic might enjoy their vast wine collection. The constant sousing of positive emotions has raised the three of them to TN, bordering on NG and their friendly, if slightly disturbing, ways can be put down mostly to being more than slightly snozzled most the time on their private stock, their own awareness of how disturbing their voices are and knowing the true value of a touch of showmanship to truly bring out the emotions in others, what sale is complete without a touch of wonder?
Their back room is merely a hobby and the children found in it are the would-be victims of other, now dead Bogeyman that the trio have hunted and robbed of their own fear-stores, their finest wines being made from the fears of their own kind, with their little contraptions a mix of a hobby and a way to put the children at ease (And delight them, siphoning off a little of the joy to fortify down later into the emotional equivalent of the kind of moonshine that can dissolve spoons) and their slightly ominous request that the clockworks be kept around children is simply because they find a strange, inexplicable delight, in the idea of others being happy at their creations, even if they don't get a chance to sip it themselves. Their questions are fairly innocent as well, with the interest in more positive things coming down to the delight they take in hearing of the good fortune of others and the small talk being a result of Nightmare's secret dream, of disguising the three of them as mortals and becoming ringleaders of their own, mortal circus, traveling the world bringing delight to all and spending the entire time borderline paralytic on joy without having to trade in dark terrors for it. Fears and Joys of course could take the place of bonuses and penalties, a short, sharp shock of fear might be enough to give a fighter a reroll against an enchantment spell, or to give the rogue that extra edge of speed when he feels the wolf breath on the back of his neck, regardless of if the wolf is there, while Joy (if they can be convinced to bottle it for others) is a good cure for what ails you in general. Of course, turning them against enemies is equally useful and their clockwork creations could be a wonderful gift to the right people.
That and the building ownership rules can cause real trouble. I'll put my hands up and admit that it was me that bought a slaughterhouse in our current Kingmaker campaign and due to the fact kingdom building is month-by-month and that money can be used to buy more buildings (And thus more money) by character has money in the McDuck regions.It was honestly just a mistake to start with, ending up with both versatile crafting and lots of money. But my GM and I worked out a Gentlemans agreement on it when he pointed out that it was becoming a problem despite me just throwing most of it back into the vault, which is that most of it would be burnt on sidequests, hiring private spies to search for objects I wanted or information, ect, ect and thus give our spymaster a boost, or buildings that would give boosts to the economy rather than my personal funds and of course, healthy tithes to the poor, orphaned and so on. It's worked out really well actually, when things go poor on the important rolls my character has a pool of intrigue, goods and influence that I can spend with a nod to assist other players, there's very little in the way of suffering in the Kingdom since I run a private welfare program (And am loved for it) and the GM can throw any plot hooks he likes on to 'Your character has heard by proxy that...' So, all in all, my character has become Pork-Tycoon Wizard Bill Gates and everything worked out fine, it does require a lot of mutual trust though.
As someone playing in a Kingmaker campaign and assistant GMing, its not too unreasonable unless one of your players is interested in the Mythic crafting feat.
Downtime rules can be trouble as well if you're liberal with them.
And that's why I feel that it's so much more important to get flavor right the first time—because it's so much more open to interpretation, and I'd rather not create content that folks can interpret as a good-aligned deity being misogynistic, because that's not what I nor Paizo wants to do. If its any consolation Mr. Jacobs, as someone who basically acts as lore keeper for my group (to the point where my usual GM has threatened to throttle me if I ever again play a character with high knowledge Geography, History and Local in a Sandbox game, since my character basically knew where everything was at), we've never had any problem with any of the ret-cons (or corrections, your preference) made as Golarion goes along. If anything, conflicting information and a bit of wiggle room gives PCs and DMs more room to pick and choose how things work in their own Golarion.Every time something conflicting comes up (Or unknown/without an explanation), our group basically gets together and sound boards ideas until we come up with something that works with the canon and I honestly think our game is better for it. Be it the true daughter of Urgathoa being the reason for Bastardhall's curse, Dragonfall being the graveyard of choice for more traditionalist dragons not the be all and end all one (And one of several), or non-necromancy created undead being able to be non-evil since Urgathoa tainted Undead-creating necromantic spells with a flair of her own evil, when there are conflicts, there's just more room for interesting stories. Where there's ambiguity, you find the question why, and then you start thinking of cool answers. In other news, I believe that there was originally an afterlife for non-religious folk who weren't necessarily cruel or unpleasant in life, which Pharasma had set aside for them and which was all in all pretty pleasant. I believe it was mentioned in Great Beyond and since has been changed into a sort of Odd-sock drawer type situation where those souls that no one collects are forgotten and slowly fade and dissolve, abandoned to the aeons, which was in the River of Souls article.
IIRC, the specific examples of attic whisperers I have seen in Golarion setting materials all were examples of neglect to the point of abuse, not simply mom working two jobs or something. Eledia from undead unleashed died from being locked in a chest for 11 days by an evil caretaker for instance. IIRC, in another book there is a bugbear who specializes in tormenting children to death, who produces attic whispers that he talks to. Even if it's not spelled out in precise language, I think RAI attic whisperers are formed from some sort of abuse, and just being lonely and dying young is not sufficient to spawn one. Interestingly enough, Eledia isn't evil aligned despite driving Mother Comfort to suicide (Though she was already unstable). Meanwhile, Mother Comfort is firmly set as evil aligned.Neither chose to be undead, either way the orphanage is a pretty cool encounter, enjoyed using it.
Personally I'm happier with bloat, heck, I keep up as much as I can with 3rd party just to have more options. Some of the best character concepts and ideas I've ever had came from flicking through 3rd party books and looking at the fantastic ideas other people had come up with for little rule sets, or new ways of doing things.
The problem I find isn't keeping up with things, its when players know all the rules off by heart, when was the last time your GM really threw you for a twist using something mechanical, really?
To drag things away from the alignment debate and back towards the focus of the thread, there's actually a very good example of a non-evil undead in one of the more recent Pathfinder books. The Burning Child has both a fantastic backstory and interesting mechanics, on top of that he's CN.
And its got some interesting history with the Paladins of Lastwall, the most passionately Anti-Undead crusaders in the setting, it really works to underline how terrible the Hordes of Belkzen are and how compassionate the Crusaders are, that the sight of a single childs death can drive them to fight like lions.
Alignment > Pharasma.Pharasma would be inclined to disagree with you.No, it factually is not. Pharasma isn't good aligned. And my character spends money on himself to buy bread so he doesn't starve to death, instead of giving it to Tiny Tim the Orphan boy who really, really needs a new kidney.Is my character evil? No. You're defining the urge to not die as evil, if that's the case, everything is evil, no one is good, end of story. Or are you defining evil as not being willing to go along with the plan fate has for you, since if so, every character that's ever given bread to the starving, or put clothing on the backs of the cold is evil, because fate led that person there and you're defying it. As for denying the afterlife, maybe that's true in Golarion, but here and now, we are alive (or, well, undead) and there are things to be done. Maybe Paladins should just enact a mass suicide, give their souls over to the good and allow themselves to be remolded into Angels, as soldiers for the war against evil, they'd do more good that way. They're weak arguments. Becoming undead harms no one except yourself and even that's questionable compared to the alternatives.
Is every Attic Whisperer evil? Because they were tormented and abused and are now alone and terrified and lost and doomed for their nature when they were basically the victim of child abuse?
Except at that point they're no longer characters in most players eyes, they're monsters and anything they do or plan is seen through that lens. Ghost looking for her killer? Obviously attacking people, destroy it.Mother with alive baby? Kill Ghoul, gain orphan. Skeleton in Armour guarding something? No point asking questions, put it down with a mace. People aren't going to ask questions or take an interest in the background of a monster encounter and with all undead being evil, its just out and out less interesting and tragic that they exist. If Undead are special snowflakes, its because we all are, everyone who dies and rises are the undead has their own unique suffering that did it, because everyone dies alone (barring necromancer animated ones or massive disaster fuelled undead hordes, who also have their own shared situation), just waving it away as 'oh all non-evil undead are just trying to be special' is as lazy as me saying 'Oh anyone that wants to be an elf and have a longer life span and be of a non-human race? Special Snowflake' and you know it.
Undead are evil because the designer said so.
As someone who is currently playing a non-evil necromancer, I've got to say the draw of non-evil undead is very simple in my eyes.
If you make all undead always evil, you lose the subtle sympathy that there could be for them and reduce what are essentially, the tragic lost and hopeless dead to monsters one and all, after all, we all die one day and wouldn't we like to rest easy in our graves as well, or if we were murdered, to have our killers brought to justice? So, less special snowflake, more its an interesting angle that rarely gets used because undead are Always Evil.
For Groetus it'd probably be a sort of 'eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow cometh the end' type mentality, its all doomed but for the here and now, we're here and might as well revel in the glory of a doomed world, like mayflies in the dying sundown. Dark Tapestry? You know there are things in this world more powerful than any god, any demon, devil or daemon, that care nothing for morality or the Rules of the games that are played with mankind and their souls as pieces. Feed Abaddon to Bokrug, let Mhar rent the Abyss, crack it open like an egg and spoon out the insides, all of hells scheming and planning and lies will come to nothing in the face of Azathoth, in all his blind, mad, dumb glory, how can Azmodeus worm his way out of such a confrontation?
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