Niktorak, IronBear and I did our reading of the player's guide Bramble Bear's Prep Sessions, did some character building ideas, and were generally pleased by the player guide.
The only thing that stuck out was a minor editing error, and Jhuka the Goddess; as her description was a huge leap in logic for how she ascended. Usually people who die after a failure like that become undead with that much regret. Nice to see it goes both ways now. Become an undead or experience apotheosis.
While undeath might be the likely case for most ancestries, orcs were revealed in a PFS scenario to have a cultural tradition referred to as "Vow Marks", whereupon an orc shortly before their death can declare a vow and, upon death, enter a Crucible where they will challenge any one member of the orc pantheon, risking the annihilation of their soul and all hope of resurrection or afterlife if they lose the challenge, but standing to win the divinity of the god they challenged if they win. For example, Grask and Zagresh are mentioned in the Player's Guide. I would guess we will learn more about Vow Marks, the Crucible, and the new blood joining the orc pantheon and their Crucibles in Divine Mysteries.
If you're going for a more Swords & Sorcery feel, I'd recommend checking out the Xoth campaign setting by Morten Braten. Very strongly inspired by pulp and Conan. Even if you end up sticking to Golarion canon, some of it may serve as useful inspiration. The setting and rules for both PF1e and 5e are available for free at xoth.net.
None of his clerics still get spells. He's dead, and thus can't grant spells.
In Pathfinder you want a deity to grant you spells as a cleric or whatever, you have to worship them and they have to be alive in order to do so, and it's not possible for a different deity to sneak in and provide those spells to you while you think that you're worshiping someone else.
I'm not a fan of concepts like the Void Cleric, frankly. There are plenty of non-cleric options for folks who want to do a worshiper of a dead deity and cast divine spells in either edition.
I remember reading somewhere in a Pathfinder 1e book that time traveling clerics could still get their spells from their gods even if they time traveled to before their gods ascended. I know that's a little different from clerics not being able to get spells from a dead god, but I'm wondering if there's a reason for the distinction? Or am I just misremembering?
Hi again Mr. Stephens. Been following your RWW campaign notes on your blog with interest.
Question: If I want to know more about the Xa-Oroso/Blood Space setting for Starfinder, what would you say is the best place to begin? What would you say are the key books that give a good overall picture of the campaign setting?
Do you have a favorite combination of different monsters whose unique traits make them more deadly than the sum of their individual parts, either for 1e or 2e? For example, the classic red dragon/iron golem combo.
What was it about Shensen in particular that made her stand out from other PCs you played before her and has made her stand out from other PCs you've played since? (Basically, what makes her your favorite of all the PCs you've played.)
Salutations, Endzeitgeist. Big fan of your reviews.
There's one point that's a little confusing to me.
As far as I can tell, the Rajah's whole veil list consists of the Demiurge and the Titles. Therefore, it seems logical to me that you could only shape a number of veils up to the maximum on the table – which is to say, starting at 2 at first level up to 7 at 18th, but within the bounds of that, you can shape a title multiple times, the same way a wizard could prepare fireballs as many times as they have spell slots for. Of course, this hardly addresses the other issues you have with the class, but it does preclude level 1 ant empress shenanigans.
Hello, Mr. Stewart. I'm having a bit of trouble deciding on what to use for the ringmaster of an extraplanar traveling circus. Do you have any suggestions?
(Suggestions for circus members/acts outside the ringmaster also welcome, of course.)
Aha, I was under the misapprehension that in order for the shield bonus to function, it needed to be used for offense, much like weapons with the defending enhancement.
... Of course, it was less than 24 hours after I posted my observations about Sleipnir's fragility that I had the epiphany that a Nexus could always just take Noble Astrologist (or dip Zodiac) and use a constellation champion as a considerably more sturdy mount that comes online much sooner...
Thank you for your time, Mr. Sayre, and for the clarifications.
A fan of your work, Mr. Sayre. Very much enjoyed Akashic Realms and am looking forward to the next one. That said, I do have a question...
Michael Sayre wrote:
In the Asgardian Saga, Gungnir can be wielded in one hand while you're mounted (such as on Sleipnir or even Geri and Freki, depending on your size), and Gungnir grants a shield bonus that scales with essence, so the general idea was that you would basically be using Mjolnir as your primary weapon, but with the ability to guard yourself with Gungnir thanks to its greater reach and shield bonus. I think it works pretty neatly when you've got the various pieces of the set up and running, but YMMV.
While I can appreciate the intent, using Sleipnir to invoke a phantom steed only becomes an option for a Nexus (the only class with all of the Asgardian Saga on their class veil list) at level 16, at which you have a steed with an AC in the teens and a hit point total in the twenties. This feels quite late for the fighting style to be used to its full effect, especially since it requires not only Mounted Combat but Two Weapon Fighting to use fully, while suffering the penalties for using two weapon fighting without one of the weapons being a light weapon, meaning either the full style must wait until level 19 to have all the pieces and take the feats, or the feats must be taken ahead of time and will have at least one level where they're still waiting for the style to come online.
Of course, a small character can sidestep this, as you mentioned above, using Geri & Freki.
What's the best way to qualify for this prestige class? (i.e. anyone knows if a certain class or PrC or archetype gives you these for free: Exotic Weapon Proficiency (sawtooth sabre), Great Fortitude, Weapon Focus (sawtooth sabre) )
Inquisitor is probably your best bet, due to the high 3rd level spells requirement.
Warpriest with or without the Mantis Zealot archetype gets free proficiency and free Weapon Focus, but won’t get 3rd level spells until 7th level. Still nets more of the prereq feats than Inquisitors, though, and gets bonus combat feats to make up for taking Great Fortitude.
Aw, Modrons only get two arms... There goes the idea for a bolt ace homage to Nordom...
Delmoth, how would you feel about a variant orc inspired by Wicked Fantasy's orks? Feels like a good fit for the Athar, with the orks having rejected the control of their gods by devouring the orc pantheon after going to orc valhalla.
While unofficial, Adam Daigle has been kind enough to take a stab at what Fear-baby-blooded tieflings would look like, in case the book doesn't include them.
Hello Mr. Stevens. To what extent have you run adventures for players with your Really Wild West setting hack/microsetting? Would you kindly share a bit about any of those adventures with us?
Now don't take this as gospel, but if memory serves, while they do have an internal explanation, it's been said by one writer that the intention isn't for the readership to be able to piece together the Paizo's internal explanation.
Rather, they have an internal explanation so that, if it ever did get out what happened to Aroden, everything else that might have been published that's related to Aroden's death will fit. If someone is able to use what's known to extrapolate Paizo's internal explanation, that would be coincidental, and not intentional – at least on the part of the writer who spoke on the subject.
I hope I'm remembering right, and it may be that this is only the intention of the particular writer who spoke to the subject, rather than the Paizo-wide intent, but I haven't seen any Paizo writer say that they're doling out breadcrumbs with the intent of letting some clever segment of the audience to tease out Paizo's internal explanation.
I'll get back to you on this one later today or tomorrow.
In Golarion where they're native to the Ethereal Plane rather than one of the evil, outer sphere planes, no I don't consider them fiends. They're horribly evil but they're not formed of the substance of metaphysical evil itself. However if future material on the Night Hags provides a more convincing rationale as to why they should be considered actual fiends I'm open to changing my opinion. [For what it's worth I'd consider the night hags from D&D to be fiends since they're native to the Gray Waste as evolved hordelings]
The Maelstrom is infinite, so yes, there's room for more than one race of CN outsiders (just as there's room for multiple TN outsiders for instance, psychopomps and aeons, who both occupy entirely different metaphysical niches within that alignment). Of course different types of proteans could fill most any niche I think, and the more myriad the proteans the better.
Looking at her character sheet from when I played her in RotRL, and based on what I remember using, her favorite spells were: magic missile, fireball (acid substituted usually), confusion, black tentacles, a custom spell called protoplasmic burst (fireball but acid substituted and if you failed the save you're stuck to the ground as if by a tanglefoot bag), baleful polymorph, disintegrate, energy hammer, prismatic ray, and maze. She was an arcanist so by the end of the game at level 17 she hadn't gotten level 9 spells.
Thank you for the answers and the patience.
By your definition of fiends, then, do oni, rakshasa, and sahkil not qualify as fiends to your mind?
Alright, something a little less cruel. Do you have any thoughts you'd be willing to share on whether Fear Baby-blooded tieflings exist, and if they do, what they might be like?
Do you have any thoughts on Shadow Sandpoint (that is, the reflection of Sandpoint on the Plane of Shadow) that you'd be willing to share with us at this time?
I did mean all the non-big nine races, eheh. I suppose it's only fair to list the rest if I want an answer, though. So the ones I neglected to fully list were... Demodands, Div, Garuda, Kami, Kyton, Peri, Psychopomps (if you count Aeons as the 'big nine' representative for TN), Manasaputra, Qlippoth, and Rakshasa.
Do you count night hags as fiends?
Do you think there's room for more than one race of CN outsiders in Golarion's cosmology or do you feel Protean fills all/any potential needs?
What have been some of Il'setsya Wyrmtouched's favorite and/or signature spells?
How do the outsider races other than the big nine rank for you? You've said before that your top three are proteans, daemons, and demons, I believe, so do any of the rest break into your top five? top ten? If so, which ones, and where do they rank?
(So, Asuras, Coatls, Fear Babies Sahkil, Axiomites, Oni, and so on.)
To what extent do these races feature in your campaigns?
Of all the fiendish demigods in the hardcover BotD, who is your favorite of each fiendish race?
I find it rather surprising that Wrath of the Righteous was such a negative experience. The other day I tallied up all the averages of the reviews for the completed APs on the site, and Wrath came in 9th of 20, ahead of eleven other APs, more than half of the other APs released. I suppose, though, that review scores are only part of the story, and that sales are another part?
I, too, was rather hoping for an AP in 2018 dealing with the doomsday clock countdown hitting zero...
That's disappointing. I had been hoping for a Dominion of the Black AP, instead of another Runelords AP, given the clocks in Osirion are supposed to run out in AR 4718. Sigh.
If at least one Paizo-published AP, a ghost uses Vital Strike in conjunction with Corrupting Touch, so you can actually deal staggering single-target damage that way, especially if your BAB is high enough to support Improved or Greater Vital Strike.
Now if only we can get more generic PrC in the RPG line. I find many of the Pathfinder PrC too entrenched in Golarion material to properly adapt to other settings, especially established ones like the Forgotten Realms. Last time we had any was wayyyyy back in Advanced Player's Guide.
Not true. The Enchanting Courtesan PrC from Inner Sea Intrigue looks like it's quite serviceable in just about any campaign setting.
Appearance
Piercing grey eyes peer from out of a craggy, saturnine face, marking him as a Greyingot. He does not wear the look of a man who smiles often or easily. While many dwarves pride themselves on luxurious, extravagant beards, Hogun's salt and pepper beard is neatly trimmed, short and hewing close to his jawline, displaying the alchemist's marked pragmatism and lack of vanity. Some fond of more magnificent beards might consider it severe. His hair is not so different from his beard, salt and pepper, kept short and neat as a practical matter. He does, however, have a rich belt of chest hair. His form is as well compact as any dwarf, and he moves with the efficient, deliberate precision of a masterwork timepiece.
Personality
Hogun is a quiet and melancholy soul. He weighs actions and words carefully before acting. Patient, meticulous, fastidious, he dislikes being rushed, but he works hard, and will think nothing of long, grueling hours once he has committed to a course of action.
He is intensely devoted to his family, particularly his daughter, and it is for her sake and the sake of the dwarven people that he has answered the call for the best and brightest of their people. He keeps a journal, and regularly writes letters to his daughter, sending them back to her whenever possible, though he knows chances for that will be far and few between. When he speaks of his daughter or of his late wife, he softens, his air wistful and nostalgic. He has tried to put his broken heart back together, but like a teacup or a mirror that has been shattered, the time has not mended the cracks.
Background
In the days of Dammerhall's apex, the Greyingots were the finest alchemists in all of Dammerhall and served the Tharnhammers loyally as retainers. While most of Dammerhall knew them as the purveyors of fine brews and beers and top-shelf potions, there were also those among them who sought the secrets of transmuting lesser metals into gold. However, to the Tharnhammers, the Greyingots were prized as most as innovators in the field of alchemical warfare – the hated dark elves and many of the stranger things that stalked the Underdark had developed potent defenses against conventional spellcasting, and so the Greyingots turned their alchemical prowess to developing weapons that would bypass these defenses.
But it was not enough to stop whatever befell Dammerhall on that darkest of days.
Since then, the Greyingots have continued to serve the Tharnhammers with unwavering loyalty. While the Tharnhammers themselves did not have a great deal to offer the surface races, the Greyingots became merchants among the surface races, and their fine brews, their potions, their alchemical goods earning coin to provide for both the Tharnhammers and themselves.
It was into this family that Hogun was born. While no charmer, no merchant born, he was the finest alchemist of his generation, letting his aunts and uncles and cousins handle the mercantile aspects of the business while he devoted himself to alchemy.
Among the dwarves of his generation, only one mind matched – and, he would argue, surpassed – his own, the woman who became his wife. A truly dazzling intellect and possessed of sharp wit, she was a vivacious spirit, capturing Hogun's heart. In their years together, Hogun smiled more and more often, in spite of his natural gloomy disposition.
Those happy days seem more distant to Hogun now than the golden dream of Dammerhall itself. His wife was lost in childbirth, despite his most desperate efforts, despite having uttered prayers more fervent than any he'd uttered before in his life.
But for the sake of his daughter, he might have given up entirely, heart heavy and broken. He devoted himself to her, overseeing every aspect of her rigorous academic curriculum himself, seeing to it that her education would be second to none.
And it was his daughter he thought of, when his liege sent out the call for the best and brightest. Hogun sees the state of the dwarven people, and he wants better for their children, for his child, for his daughter. It is in the hope he can provide her a better future that he has left her in the care of her grandparents and answered the call.
Relationship to the Tharnhammer Family (ie. direct member, married into, friend of a family member, devoted thane, etc.)
Retainer
In the days of Dammerhall's apex, the Greyingots were the finest alchemists in all of Dammerhall and served the Tharnhammers loyally as retainers. While most of Dammerhall knew them as the purveyors of fine brews and beers and top-shelf potions, there were also those among them who sought the secrets of transmuting lesser metals into gold. However, to the Tharnhammers, the Greyingots were prized as most as innovators in the field of alchemical warfare – the hated dark elves and many of the stranger things that stalked the Underdark had developed potent defenses against conventional spellcasting, and so the Greyingots turned their alchemical prowess to developing weapons that would bypass these defenses.
But it was not enough to stop whatever befell Dammerhall on that darkest of days.
Since then, the Greyingots have continued to serve the Tharnhammers with unwavering loyalty. While the Tharnhammers themselves did not have a great deal to offer the surface races, the Greyingots became merchants among the surface races, and their fine brews, their potions, their alchemical goods earning coin to provide for both the Tharnhammers and themselves.
Patron Keys
Law and Tradition
Secrets beneath the Mountain
Statblock:
Hogun Greyingot
Male dwarven alchemist (gloom chymist) 1
LG Medium humanoid (dwarf)
Init +3; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +5 (+2 vs aberrations)
--------------------
Defense
--------------------
AC 16, touch 13, flat-footed 13 (+3 armor, +3 Dex); +2 dodge vs aberrations
hp 11 (1d8+3)
Fort +4, Ref +5, Will +0; +3 vs poison, spells, & spell-like abilities
--------------------
Offense
--------------------
Speed 20 ft.
Melee battleaxe +0 (1d8/x3)
Ranged gloom +4 (1d6+4 cold)
Special Attacks +1 on attack rolls against elven humanoids, gloom 5/day (1d6+4 cold, DC 14)
Alchemist Extracts Prepared (CL 1st; concentration +5)
1st – adhesive spittle (DC 15), open
--------------------
Statistics
--------------------
Str 11, Dex 16, Con 14, Int 18, Wis 12, Cha 10
Base Atk +0; CMB +0; CMD 14 (18 vs bull rush, 18 vs trip)
Feats Brew Potion, Point-Blank Shot, Throw Anything
Traits clever hands, glory of old, secrets of the dwarven brewers
Skills Appraise +8, Artistry (literature) +8, Craft (alchemy) +8 (+9 to create alchemical items), Craft (brewing) +10, Disable Device +4, Heal +5, Knowledge (arcana, nature) +8, Knowledge (dungeoneering) +7, Perception +5, Spellcraft +8, Survival +5; Armor Check Penalty -1; Racial Modifiers +2 Knowledge (history) pertaining to dwarves or their enemies (can be made untrained), +2 Perception vs aberrations
Languages Common, Dwarven, Gnome, Goblin, Terran, Undercommon
SQ alchemy (alchemy crafting +1, identify potions), mutagen (+4/-2, +2 natural armor, 10 minutes)
Gear alchemist's kit, battleaxe, bandoliers (2), formula book (contains all prepared extracts plus crafter's fortune, cure light wounds, polypurpose panacea, reduce person and shield), ink, ink pen, journal, sheets of paper (12), studded leather armor, 6 gp, 1 sp
I'm surprised no one's mentioned this yet, but I remember (fuzzily, so take this with a grain of salt) Crystal Fraiser noted that she wanted to give ancient Dwarven culture an injection of Meso American flavor, and that's reflected in the visual design of the iconic shaman, Shardra.
Lich isn't all that appropriate since that's something a wizard should WANT and should be intentional.
Juju zombie is what you're looking for I think.
How does this square with Geb forcing lichdom on Arazni? If you had your druthers, would Arazni instead be a juju zombie or some other type of undead? Or is she an exceptional circumstance?
Would you consider Kineticists that gain abilities from other planes of existence, such as Mechanus, The First World, or the Maelstrom? A Kineticist that channels the Eye of Abendago?
A think a Kineticist with ties to the Boneyard or First World would be quite interesting.
I'm pretty sure Phytokineticists from Occult Origins are pretty close to what you're looking for in terms of a kineticist with ties to First World.
Does your negative perception of how mythic and high level Pathfinder interact extend to your own personal experience adding mythic to Necropolis? Or is the problem a combination of high mythic and high level?
I ask as someone entertaining the possibility of running Necropolis if the module/adventure I'm currently GMing goes well.
I know you view Mengkare as evil, but would your vision of Mengkare be the sort to believe he's evil or to associate with the other great evils of Avistan?
Then again, I suppose that Arazni and Tar-Baphon wouldn't exactly get along swimmingly even if Mengkare wasn't on a Council of Avistan's Big Bads.
It could determine whether or not you're capable of wearing heavy-duty power armor, and tough/strong characters are hardly uncommon in sci-fi. Klingons and John Carter, for instance, or species from higher gravity worlds.
Come to think of it, it might be that there are high gravity planets that only characters with good Strength can explore. Then again, it wouldn't exactly be good design to have part of the party sit out because an ability score isn't high enough.
It still applies to skill checks (limited in utility, but to a class that needs neither Charisma nor Strength, it's still debatably more valuable than Charisma, because it affects both skill checks and encumbrance).
Finally, whether or not it's valuable to player characters, there will almost certainly be hostile indigenous lifeforms that favor melee combat.
You mentioned that part of your Karzoug tactics involved using undead anatomy IV to assume the form of an incoporeal undead. Which undead do you favor taking the form of when using undead anatomy IV?
I mean, hypothetically, I could see a Succubus wanting to keep alive a mortal whose life-force she considered especially toothsome, but the powerful temptation would always be there to drain them to the very last drop, and she'd probably give in sooner or later.
So, based on your feeling that the themes of what makes a darklord of Ravenloft should be present from the character's inception, do you feel Soth of Dragonlance was a poor choice to make into a darklord?
About Zeldin Tarr
RACE: Human
GENDER: Male
CLASSES/LEVELS: Sorcerer 1
ALIGNMENT: Chaotic Good
HEIGHT: 6"
WEIGHT: 165 lbs.
AGE: 29
EYES: Blue
HAIR: None
SKIN: Caucasian with numerous blue tattoos
TRAITS:
Reactionary (+2 to Initiative Checks)
Suspicious (+1 to Sense Motive which is treated as a class skill)
BLOODLINE: Draconic (Bronze)
REGION OF ORIGIN:
RELIGION: Irori (primarily), Nethys, Desna, and Cayden Cailean.
_______________________________________________________________________
Proficient with all simple weapons.
Cantrips
Eschew Materials
Dragon Claws for 6 Rounds/Day (3 +3 Cha)
Perception is considered a class skill.
_______________________________________________________________________
FEATS:
Alertness: +2 to Perception and Sense Motive checks.
Improved Initiative: +4 to Initiative checks.
Eschew Materials: Components costing less than 1gp are not needed.
Zeldin Tarr is a tall man with a swimmers athletic physique. His body is covered in tattoos and his head is completely shaved. The most striking thing about him is his eyes. He has an intense gaze that seems to miss nothing. Despite this, he is strikingly attractive.
In contrast to the great care he seems to take in decorating his body; his clothing seems to have function as its first directive. He tends toward things that allow easy movement. The spear is his weapon of choice.
He is intensely curious, and interested in the habits and attitudes of others. He can appear aloof, but once he has decided you are a friend he will stop at nothing to aid you.
BACKGROUND:
Zeldin does not know who his parents are/were. His early memories are of being raised in an orphanage. As he approached puberty he found that when he was in a state of emotion, either good or bad, unnatural things would happen near him. Often times electricity would discharge from his body. The staff was very understanding and even had someone try to help him understand what was going on, but Zeldin did not want to understand. He wanted to fit in, and have friends. This "episodes" grew in frequency and intensity and culminated in severely hurting another teen at the orphanage. (In fact, it was the occasion of his first kiss. He had a spontaneous discharge from his lips that badly burned the girl he was with.)
Ashamed at his lack of self control, and worried that he would be severely punished for what he had done, he got the girl help and then grabbed his limited belongings and fled.
Zeldin lived for nearly 10 years on the streets or edges of civilization, begging, and doing odd jobs. He tried at all times to avoid connections with others, because he did not want to harm anyone else. When people started getting close to him emotionally, he would simply move on.
His running eventually brought him to the town of Brindenford. He was about 25 and tired of running and hiding. He stopped trying to suppress the magic in his blood and decided to try to control it instead. To this end, he brought his meager savings to a retired wizard named Piven, and asked to be trained. Piven had foreseen the contact with Zeldin and accepted him as an apprentice despite being several years older than even the most senior of his apprentices. His first duties were menial and were used to teach obedience. Zeldin cooked and cleaned, and while he chaffed at being told what to do, he was also grateful for a chance to finally learn about his magic.
Something happened between those two. Piven, who generally had little patience for his young apprentices, and Zeldin who kept everyone at arms length found that they had made a sound friendship.
After several years of basic support tasks, Piven began trying to teach him from a spell book. Zeldin had already found short cuts to much of what his master was trying to teach him. Other things he could understand mechanically, but struggled to actually do. Piven watched the frustration of his student and determined that he would likely never be a wizard, and that while he had taught Zeldin self control and self respect, he would not be able to teach him about his gift.
Finally Piven came to Zeldin and told him about the Dragon's Delve, and suggested that he might best learn to use his power by the practical application the dungeon offered. It would be a chance for Zeldin to put his skills to use. To start him off correctly, Piven had saved Zeldin's "admission fee" from his apprenticeship, and added to it money that he would have paid to have the menial work done, and then some money further, simply in honor of their friendship. This purse was Zeldin's, to start him out right in his new life.
