Balgin's page

Hello everybody,

as a long time GM I have known for quite some time that this AP was coming out. Initially I got excited. A war of succession has a lot of dramatic potential. Immediately I thought of the wars of king Steven and The Empress Maud who's war for the English crown raged from 1139 to 1147ad and forms a colourful background for the Brother Cadfael books (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empress_Matilda).

However, as time drew on I began to suspect that we'd be talking less Steven & Maude and more Oliver Cromwell's revolution. It became apparent that the adventure path might be geared less towards a struggle for the throne and more towards radically altering Taldor altogether.

Now this presents a problem. I rather like Taldor. I like it the way it is. It has class structure, honour, tradition - it is an unchanging stable rock in the mad crazy world that is Golarion. You always know where you are with Taldor and it's nice to have something reliable to come back to once in a while.

When you take all of that away you're basically left with something like Andoran. A bunch of jumped up revolutionaries with no idea how to run things who think that being independent makes them oh so important and brag and boast about their independence without actually putting much thought into how to run a country or get along with their neighbours.

If it doesn't end up as bad as Andoran then you might end up with something like Cheliax (equally unpleasant to my pro Taldan outlook - I did mention a certain fondness for Taldor earlier, right?).

The reason that this is a problem Is that many of my players are quite excited about this adventure path. I am less enthusiastic than they are and it has been suggested that someone else run it but, the only other player willing to do so (and one of the vocal enthusiasts fr this AP) isn't inspiring a lot of confidence among the group in his abilities to GM it well.

I'm a bit of a traditionalist. When I see phrases like "let's modernise Taldor" I don't exactly feel enthusiastic about it. Instead I feel my shackles rising and want to rise up and fight back against this radical newfangled notion. In one regard this could almost make me the perfect GM for this AP. I can run encounters where npc's espouse the virtue of traditional values possibly causing the pc's to consider the values of their cause. If a pc is sneaking down a corridor and hears to guards standing by a door around a corner holding a conversation about the current political state of affairs maybe he'll stop to ask himself if he really needs to upset the apple cart. A defeated noble knight could lament the social ramifications of his defeat. He will now be unable to protect and provide for those under his charge. By trying to overthrow the "natural order of things" the pc's will be setting off chain reactions that have horrible ramifications for people further down the social ladder. This should be adequately reflected - possibly shaming them into mending their ways.

However, in the end, my gut feeling is that for the authors of this adventure path, Taldor is less like the comfy old armchair that we all know and love but rather an abomination like Gormenghast (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gormenghast_(series)), even 'though Gormenghast actually has it's charms. They want the players to see it as an oudated mess that barely functions. Something to be washed away amidst a tide of "modernisation". Unfortunately when you do away with tradition & culture everything becomes rather bland and same-ish. The McDonaldisation effect. Nobody in their right mind wants that.

An interesting twist would be to play princess Eutropia as a villain and the pc's as her villanous henchmen (or unwitting dupes). That could actually be quite a fun campaign to play. Playing it ironically (and often reminding the players that "of course, you know that what you're doing is actually bad, right?")

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So my gut feeling is that perhaps I should simply refrain from running this adventure path because I personally strongly disagree with the underlying sentiment - the common cause, the theme of the campaign. It rankles me and I don't like it.

What do you people think? Do you think I could enjoy running this campaign? If so then please offer suggestions for ways in which I could find it enjoyable. I'd be most interested to read what people have to offer.

Does anyone know who that dwarven woman on the front cover of the player's guide is supposed to be? I've easily been able to identify the other two characters but she seems to be absent from the entire adventure path. While I've only read the first two books in preparation to run the AP I didn't notice that picture coming up again when skimming through the final four books. Usually the characters on the front of a player's guide all relate to the adventure path in question.

Perhaps she got lost in editing or something? I'll have to perform a more thorough search but hopefully one of you might know.

Thanks in advance.

This is probably the first time Paizo has been legally allowed to publicly write "mind flayer" or "beholder" on their website in a very long time :p.

Hello everyone. I have a question about the wording ot Bastion of Good and I haven't found an eratta, FAQ or post on the message boards that seems to answer it yet so here goes.

"This ability functions as smite evil, except that the paladin gains no benef it on attack or damage rolls against her target. Instead....."

Does the sacred shield still gain the Damage Reduction bypass that normal smite gains? The way it reads seems to imply that you get all the other parts of smite that aren't the bonus to hit and damage.

Further on the text states that "Attacks against the paladin deal full damage, but the paladin gains a def lection bonus to her AC equal to her Charisma bonus (if any) against attacks made by the target of the smite. "

This is the same as the normal smite bonuses. That gives the impression that maybe this completely replaces the full smite ability. The word "but" might be a reminder that you still get the defensive bonus.

Does anyone know if the ability to ignore damage reduction is included or not? Technicaly it's not a bonus to hit or damage but it could easily be considered part of the attack & damage portion of smiting.

Thanks in advance guys,
Balgin