Berik's page

I think it doesn't really matter who the consultant they've used is, or who the individual lawyers are to be honest. I'm much more interested in any comments we end up getting from the union on how any negotiations end up going and then any visible changes we see at the end of the process. Any professional they'd hire is ultimately working for Paizo, so the real test comes down to what Paizo have actually tasked them with. And I think our best guide on that will be any comments we get from the Union on the process and then comments from the Union and hopefully Paizo staffers past and present on whatever changes actually happen.

But I think the forums are a much better place than they have been, not because of my polite discourse, but because those acting in bad faith were shown the door.

It's a sobering thought.

Hmm

I think your call for polite discourse is still super important for making the forums somewhere people want to actually be longer term Hmm. I think it's just that there were some other pieces that needing tidying up too. The forums hadn't been doing so well at enforcing consequences for people who purely wanted to stir the pot (at least in terms of their interactions with minority groups), and all the good will in the world isn't going to be able to moderate things where the discussion is essentially between 'I believe this' vs 'I don't really believe you should be allowed to exist'.

But there will always be plenty of areas where even posters properly respecting the rights of others are going to disagree with each other, and sometimes strongly. Being able to have friction in a community whether discussing politics or rpg rules is important, and your tips on navigating that are still useful for disagreement that will still be there even once bad actors as above have been moved on.

I'm delighted to hear this, I think removing some persistent negative voices will improve the community greatly. I really think stronger consequences for this kind of thing will make a nicer community and less mod work in the long run.

Oh, that's so sad to read that Steve has left. I hope that some people at least take what he was saying here to heart. This is my first post in over two years, but I've been checking the boards the last couple of weeks after I was dismayed to hear about the recent issues at Paizo and wanted to learn more. Honestly my first step to trying to get a handle on things was specifically looking at posts that Steve (and one or two others) had made since I've always found his opinions valuable.

Totally understand needing to step away from the forums, but Steve will be greatly missed here.

Fwiw, it matters to me.

I don’t think I’m getting any more minis and I don’t think I’m getting my money back. I have an ongoing relationship with Paizo and my confidence in them has been dented - this project has already impacted on my support for Paizo-licensed kickstarters. Without sounding too accusatory of him, I’d like to hear why ND were given such backing from Paizo since from my perspective there wasn’t any grounds for confidence in them.

“Sorry, my bad” might be all he can say (and that would disappoint me), but I’m hoping to hear a more thorough explanation of what went wrong.

Obviously I'm nothing to do with Paizo and this post is pretty old now, but as someone who was a big fan of Paizo at the time, and who had a number of positive projects fulfil with Soda Pop in the past, I did feel that there were grounds to have confidence in them and I'd like to share that perspective, though I certainly grant there were potential risks too.

With their first few projects (the original Super Dungeon Explore with CMON, the second they ran themselves, and the Ninja All-Stars project) the pattern of the company had been to release stunning miniatures, generally great board game components, and pretty darn uninspired rules. After the Super Dungeon Explore Legends project did so well, they seemed to realise poor rules had held them back and had pledged to make the rules better this time. But it seemed like they were struggling to succeed at that.

Their first Kickstarter had been pretty delayed anyway, but I still got all my things fine. So I wasn't all that dismayed that Legends was running slow. I was keen on better rules so I'd want to play the game as well as paint the figures and that seemed to be something worth waiting for.

When the Starfinder project was announced a few months later I was admittedly feeling a bit more concerned. They'd had three more projects since then, two of which were late as well (though one I think only just). I can certainly understand not backing then, but I still felt it was an acceptable risk. For all of their issues with game rules, they'd still been producing some excellent miniatures. This seemed like a sensible project for them. Get back to their core competency of making cool looking miniatures while working through the other issues the company was delayed with.

Obviously that didn't work out and we are where we are now. But Paizo also had all of the information that I had and surely a bunch more about Ninja Division's ability to fulfil at that point. I can't get too mad at them for concluding that it was still an acceptable risk. Unfortunately this just wasn't one that panned out. They should certainly look long and hard at why that was, but if it fulfilled all of their risk criteria (whatever metrics they may use for that) at the time and just went bad afterwards I wouldn't be shocked.

Speaking in general to the thread. If people want to be angry, then be angry, I can understand that reaction. But honestly for me this is much more of a sad story than one for me to be angry about. I'm certainly not happy that I'm out a lot of money with very little in return, but I think this was some people trying to make a cool product and making poor decisions along the way, not people who tried to rip me off.

I think people are overstating just how bad the track record of Ninja Division was at the time this Kickstarter was produced. It was bad, but it wasn't 'only a total fool would ever work with this company' bad. I mean, if somebody thought ND were that bad at the time then they really shouldn't have backed even with Paizo working on it.

Yes Super Dungeon Explore Legends was a few months late at that point, but that seemed to be related to working on the rules and dealing with just how much the project had swollen at the time of the Kickstarter. They had other projects which were just coming up late too, but that's not terribly uncommon on Kickstarter either.

Don't get me wrong, there were certainly red flags that I could understand people being wary of which kept them from backing. But I can also see how they convinced Paizo and a bunch of backers to support them one more time too. It's not like they didn't have a history of producing quality miniatures, whatever the apparent game design and management failings they also seemed to have.

Sure, hindsight has shown that it hasn't gone well. But plenty of companies have had some troubles coming out of extremely successful Kickstarter projects and come through fine. There was a time when CMON was getting quite a lot of bad press early in their Kickstarter days, and even Reaper got a lot of flak from some quarters over shipping issues in their Bones projects.

I'm certainly hopeful that Paizo may try to do something for backers of the project once they're satisfied that there is no chance of ND delivering. But as long as they're still working towards it at all I can see why Paizo want to see if there's any chance of actually getting the miniatures out.

I've got plenty of skin in this game too, but I don't think any of us gain anything by wanting to constantly re-litigate how Paizo decided to work with ND. I'm sure they've asked that question internally to try and mitigate it in future, but the decision was made long ago now. I'm much more interested in any future steps Paizo take on this rather than there initial decision to work with ND.

I believe Jessica and Robert from what I'm reading there. Jessica's story about Frank's comments on her facebook seems to have been corroborated on twitter by Crystal too. I don't know either of them well, but I liked both Crystal and Jessica from what I saw of them on the boards and can't see any obvious gain from making up the story. Doesn't mean that I suddenly hate Paizo and I'm certainly prepared to listen to their take on why they made whatever decisions that they did, but I'm glad for this kind of thing to come out into the open. Getting awareness over things like this is the best way to hopefully eventually see them stop happening.

For people saying 'innocent until proven guilty' I don't really see how that's relevant. I'm not a judge or a jury deciding on somebody to punish, and I'm not aware that anybody here is planning any legal action on these things anyway. What I am is an RPG fan who's aware of this apparent behaviour now. We all judge the companies and the people we deal with every day based on behaviour that we witness or hear about, all without meeting legal standards of proof. I'm not saying that everybody should make knee jerk reactions, but I don't think it's right to suggest that people shouldn't be reacting to this either.

Rysky wrote:

Speculative, but also explanatory, especially since upon further reading I found out Kenzer is a Lawyer with heavy knowledge of trademark law and thus knew the exact right thing to do and not do and to say and not say.

It's no less speculative, or more explanatory, than saying that WotC chose not to go after them because they knew that they (Kenzer) were completely right, and didn't want to fight a losing battle against a company that had their own resources to bring to bear.

Likewise, yeah, David S. Kenzer is indeed an IP attorney. Hence why he could so confidently say what he did...which is the same thing that I'm saying now.

But this line of discussion started with you disagreeing that the creator here needed to be very careful and conscious of her legal position. WotC chose not to go after a company run by a top lawyer who was quite ready to take things to court if they attempted to shoot him down. And Dave Kenzer went into publishing with full knowledge of the law, I presume he's already thought to be careful about any details which he needs to be careful about to keep this as a case he's expect to win.

Even Matt Finch in your quote said he thought that Kenzer would win, not that he was certain of it. That risk is one thing to take on if you're an established company with strong legal representation, it makes sense for an individual to be less keen on that fight.

in this case we're talking about a project that might bring in a few thousand dollars and already has some ambitious goals. Even if she'd win a case, fighting against a cease and desist order would still take time and money. Where does that money come from? It would certainly be better to just know what the courts will judge as legal or illegal use, but that's not how the law works right now. So if you're up against somebody with greater resources it makes sense to do everything you can to avoid getting entangled in court action in the first place.

I don't claim any legal knowledge myself, but I will say that the kenzerco situation isn't necessarily the best comparison to this. Chiefly because Dave Kenzer himself is an experienced lawyer with a background in intellectual property. I'm sure that he's dotted the i's and crossed the t's and knows his stuff to the extent that WotC would be pretty reluctant to send their legal department after his company.

I have no idea how likely WotC are to care about this project, but I think the creator would be sensible to have some legal advice on just where they stand in certain scenarios.

Right, and having the conversation beforehand is fine for you because you're getting what you want in certainty on the fudging question, but not fine for the person who doesn't want to know.

I never advocated assuring somebody that there will be no fudging if that isn't true. I said some people don't want to know either way.

I mean, we could go around and around on that, or just acknowledge that those two desires can't be accommodated at once. I mean, I'm not going to hold it against you for wanting to have a pre-game discussion of all this that puts me off because that's how you prefer to run your game. All I'm asking for is for you not to hold it against somebody else for running things in a way that works for their preferences and those of their group.

You can easily satisfy both. You discuss it up front, then, for groups who want the GM to fudge, you don't mention it again. The illusion, during the game, can be preserved for you that way.

Refusing to discuss it at the start of the campaign -- or, worse, promising not to fudge and then doing it -- means that the people who dislike fudging have no place in the hobby.

The illusion for some people in that group has already been broken by having the conversation. A game being run with the outright statement that fudging will happen draws a different reaction to unusual circumstances than a game where the topic hasn't been addressed. Not having that conversation before the game leaves me less able to guess whether surprising events happened by GM fiat or by chance, and that's what I prefer.

It's totally fair that a lot of people don't want to have that doubt and want to be definite that fudging will or will not happen. But that just means that not everybody fits in with everybody else with their gaming preferences. There isn't a conversation that will please everybody and that's fine.

(Having played with my group for years I certainly have a feel on who likes the dice to be fudged in their favour now and then and who doesn't. If I'm running I'd take account of that preference and I think our other GMs do too. But the newer group I've joined I've never had any discussion on fudging and haven't encountered any problems.)

I was perplexed that the Electoral College system didn't get scrapped after Bush / Gore, and I remain confused by the desire to keep it around without some changes. As it stands if you're a republican in California or New York then your vote for president is simply irrelevant. Equally if you're a democrat in Arkansas or Wyoming. Why would this be a desirable thing?

The areas dominated by a certain party dilute the vote of the supporters too. Once you already know a state is going to go a certain way then more votes for either candidate mean nothing.

Surely every individual vote should have as much ability to affect the race as every other individual vote does. It feels like that should be a key feature of a democracy and it isn't like it's something that would be very difficult to change in practice either. Make it a straight popular vote or allocate the seats for each state in the proportion of the votes received. Then each candidate would need to care about everywhere and not focus on 'paths to victory' which ignore large chunks of the country.

Look, when the electoral college was formed I'm sure it was a practical solution for the country as it was then. But the world has moved on, it isn't insulting the past to suggest we have the ability to institute a more fair system now.

And finding it hard to process this result really. With this and Brexit it's almost as if everybody just wants to destabilise the world. Hopefully we can all get through the next 4 years with a level of normalcy, but for a while at least the world feels like it is a more dangerous place than it was yesterday.

I pointed out the corrupted media and how the were connected to Clinton.

It was enough to make it so I totally could never support Clinton.

This strikes me as a pretty simplistic way to look at it. You think that the corrupted media supported Clinton, and as you say above you think the way they covered her actually pushed votes away from Clinton.

Apparently you're giving yourself credit for 'seeing through' them and not 'falling for it' to support Clinton. Given how people reacted, isn't it just as likely that the media could guess the reaction and presented the coverage in a way to get the result that they actually got? i'm not saying that has to be the case, but why are you ruling out that the media could have gotten exactly the result they wanted?

The point is that making decisions because it's what the media told you to do is dangerous, certainly. It's equally dangerous for people to make decisions because they want to go against what the media told them to do. Both options are just as easy to manipulate depending on what goal an organisation has.

Personally I have little interest in seeing the moderation policies on these forums become much more codified, and I certainly wouldn't want a more comprehensive set of rules to be put up. It's impossible to capture every nuance that makes interactions a problem or not, and I think forums that try feel very unfriendly places.

At the end of the day, if I don't trust the moderators then it doesn't matter what the policies are. I wouldn't much want to post here if I didn't trust the staff anyway, and the hypothetical untrustworthy moderators could make posting life hard for me whatever the written regulations. On the other hand if I trust the moderators then I'll trust them to use their judgement whatever regulations are written down.

In any system the 'wrong' moderation result will happen now and then. Bans have happened that seemed unfair to me, while some posters have been able to keep posting who I personally might have banned. But I still like the forums a great deal, the moderators still have my trust and I like the community.

To be honest, this situation actually shows how well moderated I think the Paizo forums are. The incident in question that sparked all this wasn't hidden and a multi-page thread was allowed with a lot of back and forth on the particular issue. Even as things got heated it appears that multiple opportunities were given for people to put in their two cents. I'm sure that some people will be unhappy whatever the final outcome, but people have certainly had the chance to put the case to Paizo on whatever they think should happen.

My first RPG was playing Champions with some friends at school while I was 13.

I'd been hooked on roleplaying games on my Amiga for a couple of years though, especially the Gold Box games, Eye of the Beholder and Dungeon Master. I have fond memories of staying on the phone for hours with a friend as we raced to see who could finish a play through of Champions of Krynn the fastest.

i think regardless of whoever set it up, that petition makes a lot of sense as a matter to debate in parliament. If voter turnout isn't that high and the margin of victory isn't that great, then it seems pretty important for parliament to have a good deep discussion about what to do in terms of enacting the result of a referendum. Certainly the Leave vote won, but at the end of the day less than 40% of possible voters held that position.

The government absolutely has to give consideration to the will of the 17 million people who voted to Leave. But they also have a responsibility to the 16 million people who voted Remain and to the ~10 million people who for whatever reason didn't vote. This is a complicated situation which has already divided the country and could divide it more. If more time needs to be taken to ensure a majority of people really understand and want what they're getting then I think (within reason) that time should be taken.

There's certainly going to be a challenge to keep the EU happy so there can't be too many delays, but at the moment there isn't even all that much clarity on what a Leave vote is meant to mean. No ties with Europe at all? The same kind of relationship that Switzerland and Norway have? Some kind of split regulation that enables London to continue as the financial hub of Europe? The government has a lot of major decisions to make that will completely change to tone of what a Brexit actually means, and if you're going to have people vote on the idea of leaving in the first place they really should have the chance to digest what that will actually mean.

Can't wait for August next year to check this out. The work Paizo has done touching on the 'spacey' parts of the world have been really interesting so far, so looking forward to a system that will explore that further.

No worries, happy to help!

Well, if you put the original formula in B2 then you could drag the formula down to cell B17 and then you'd get all of those cells populated at once. Looking something like the below.

1/3 [CR 1/3]
1/2 [CR 1/2]
1 [CR 1]
...
5 [CR 5]

(If you don't know what I mean by 'drag the formula down' it just means that if you click the bottom right of the cell with the formula in and drag down, you'll copy the formula to all of the cells you highlight.)

Getting an error trying to open that file sorry. Though what I posted will work if you have say one column with all the CR's and then want the column beside it to give the formatted version.

You mean say you have one cell with 1/3 and you want to format it as [CR 1/3] in another cell?

If 1/3 is in cell [A2] then you could have:
="[CR " & A2 & "]"

Thanks Diego, much appreciated.

I hate to do it, but saving up for a holiday at the moment and saving money where I can. If you can cancel my Adventure Path subscription I'd be much obliged.

Sad to stop my monthly shipment of Paizo goodness, but I'm sure I'll be back on board before too long anyway. :D

But once people pick a side they ignore any information that doesn't agree with their position. I prefer not to make that mistake and consider everything on a case by case basis.

While some people certainly act this way, this isn't in any way some inherent quality of picking a side. Believing that the evidence shows that global warming is happening doesn't mean I'll ignore anything that says it isn't. If the evidence changes I'll happily change my position, but I'll choose my position based on the evidence rather than just deciding I need to be in the 'middle'. I'm not even really sure what the middle ground logically is between 'we need to do something' and 'we don't need to do anything'.

I agree with the science of global warming, but fundamentally I'd like it if we found some other explanation that means the predictions are wrong. I'd be perfectly happy to see evidence that global warming isn't real because I'd rather like it to not be real, but I haven't seen any evidence to make me think that yet.

Good vibes to the IT team from here too! The friends I put onto the bundle are waiting patiently and excited to get their hands on the pdfs once things settle down.

Oh, I'm really sorry to hear that. I didn't know him that well, but thought he seemed like a good guy and we shared a little Aussie/Kiwi banter. I was just thinking about him the other day when I realised I hadn't seen any cricket talk on here for a while. Very sad to now know why that was.

My condolences to his friends and family, and thanks for letting us know.

Really enjoyed reading the notes from everybody on their adventures in the Spire so far. I'm having a blast running it and it's been the most 'intense' campaign we've played for a long time, with death lurking around every major encounter for the not-terribly-optimised party.

I've gone off script a little bit, and was wondering if anybody might have some ideas for fleshing things out. I can go into more details, but I'll keep things brief as there's a fair amount that's gone on.

tldr version: How do I solve the problem of Tarrin Dars? And if anyone has any other cool ideas I'd love to hear them! Cheers for anyone taking the time to look through this. :)

Sorry for the delay folks, things got a little crazy over the holidays but I've sent out the remaining gifts now!

Bellona - I'm happy to get the Gingerbread Kaiju as another gift if your friend's family ever got an account. :)

Happy holidays everyone! And thanks for your own giveaway taig, was neat to see another 12 days this year! :D

Kobold Cleaver wrote:

MeanDM wrote:

KC, I really wasn't aiming my analysis at anyone in particular, or you in specific, just making a general point.

Oh, the irony.

Irontruth wrote:

For me it's really the shepherding through the plot that happens via invisible forces. Characters who interact with her suddenly change their stated goals with no reason given.

Really? I don't remember that. Unless you're talking about Finn.

** spoiler omitted **...

Merry Christmas everyone, I've now sent everything that has been claimed so hopefully you'll have these in your downloads. Still a couple available for anyone keen!

Neat to note that after this year these giveaways have now gone out to 54 different forum members to try and spread Christmas cheer. :D

Still Available:

2) They're not turtle doves, but two for the price of one with the selection getting a Black Knight and seasonal Gingerbread Kaiju from Rogue Genius Games!

8) From small to big check out the Kaiju Codex from Rite Publishing!

Sent:
1) I've returned to GMing this year for the first time in years (well, started at the end of last year) and really been enjoying it. So hopefully somebody else will have as much fun running the Emerald Spire as I did! - Rynjin

3) Check into AA for the holidays with Advanced Androids and watch out for the Yuletide Beasts from Jon Brazer Enterprises. - xevious575 courtesy of Kalindlara

4) Take an intrepid expedition into the Northwest to the Island of Life! - 137ben

5) Not golden rings, but I've been hearing great things about Spheres of Power so hopefully this will be just as good. - Sedoriku

6) Get introduced to the Legendary Planet with the Assimilation Strain. - Haladir

7) I'm always a fan of Faerie Creatures and neat looking new publishers so hopefully you are too with this from the aptly named Menagerie Press. - Rennaivx

9) Visit Raging Swan's village of lizardfolk at Ossoko Draconsha and try to make your way through the Road of the Dead. - MoFiddy

10) So many Amazing Races that I couldn't decide which to give away! Pick any 4 of these from Abandoned Arts. - pulseoptional

11) Delve into the Akashic Mysteries with the Daevic! - N Jolly

12) Journey to the Western shores of Midgard and set out to make your fortune. - DungeonmasterCal

12a) Benefit from my inability to count to 12 and enter the Stoneheart Valley from Frog God Games! - Readerbreeder

New Year's Bonus: It isn't every day that you turn 100, so I'll finish up by giving out 2 copies of A Song of Silver, the 100th of these amazing adventure paths that introduced me to Paizo in the first place! mechaPoet & Wei Ji

No problem, I'll mark you both down.

1) I've returned to GMing this year for the first time in years (well, started at the end of last year) and really been enjoying it. So hopefully somebody else will have as much fun running the Emerald Spire as I did! - Rynjin

2) They're not turtle doves, but two for the price of one with the selection getting a Black Knight and seasonal Gingerbread Kaiju from Rogue Genius Games!

3) Check into AA for the holidays with Advanced Androids and watch out for the Yuletide Beasts from Jon Brazer Enterprises. - xevious575 courtesy of Kalindlara

4) Take an intrepid expedition into the Northwest to the Island of Life!

5) Not golden rings, but I've been hearing great things about Spheres of Power so hopefully this will be just as good. - Sedoriku

6) Get introduced to the Legendary Planet with the Assimilation Strain.

7) I'm always a fan of Faerie Creatures and neat looking new publishers so hopefully you are too with this from the aptly named Menagerie Press. - Rennaivx

8) From small to big check out the Kaiju Codex from Rite Publishing!

9) Visit Raging Swan's village of lizardfolk at Ossoko Draconsha and try to make your way through the Road of the Dead. - MoFiddy

10) So many Amazing Races that I couldn't decide which to give away! Pick any 4 of these from Abandoned Arts. - pulseoptional

11) Delve into the Akashic Mysteries with the Daevic! - N Jolly

12) Journey to the Western shores of Midgard and set out to make your fortune. - DungeonmasterCal

12a) Benefit from my inability to count to 12 and enter the Stoneheart Valley from Frog God Games! - Readerbreeder

New Year's Bonus: It isn't every day that you turn 100, so I'll finish up by giving out 2 copies of A Song of Silver, the 100th of these amazing adventure paths that introduced me to Paizo in the first place! mechaPoet & 1 still available.

Just a little bump to remind people that there are still plenty of gifts available for claiming. :)
I'll send out the gifts that have already been claimed in the next day or two so they're about for Christmas!

No problem at all! List now updated with selections from Readerbreeder, DungeonmasterCal and mechaPoet!

1) I've returned to GMing this year for the first time in years (well, started at the end of last year) and really been enjoying it. So hopefully somebody else will have as much fun running the Emerald Spire as I did! - Rynjin

2) They're not turtle doves, but two for the price of one with the selection getting a Black Knight and seasonal Gingerbread Kaiju from Rogue Genius Games!

3) Check into AA for the holidays with Advanced Androids and watch out for the Yuletide Beasts from Jon Brazer Enterprises. - xevious575 courtesy of Kalindlara

4) Take an intrepid expedition into the Northwest to the Island of Life!

5) Not golden rings, but I've been hearing great things about Spheres of Power so hopefully this will be just as good. - Sedoriku

6) Get introduced to the Legendary Planet with the Assimilation Strain.

7) I'm always a fan of Faerie Creatures and neat looking new publishers so hopefully you are too with this from the aptly named Menagerie Press. - Rennaivx

8) From small to big check out the Kaiju Codex from Rite Publishing!

9) Visit Raging Swan's village of lizardfolk at Ossoko Draconsha and try to make your way through the Road of the Dead. - MoFiddy

10) So many Amazing Races that I couldn't decide which to give away! Pick any 4 of these from Abandoned Arts.

11) Delve into the Akashic Mysteries with the Daevic!

12) Journey to the Western shores of Midgard and set out to make your fortune. - DungeonmasterCal

12a) Benefit from my inability to count to 12 and enter the Stoneheart Valley from Frog God Games! - Readerbreeder

New Year's Bonus: It isn't every day that you turn 100, so I'll finish up by giving out 2 copies of A Song of Silver, the 100th of these amazing adventure paths that introduced me to Paizo in the first place! mechaPoet & 1 still available.

Okay, I think I've got this correctly updated with what has been claimed so far. Still plenty of Christmas goodies to go around. :)

1) I've returned to GMing this year for the first time in years (well, started at the end of last year) and really been enjoying it. So hopefully somebody else will have as much fun running the Emerald Spire as I did! - Rynjin

2) They're not turtle doves, but two for the price of one with the selection getting a Black Knight and seasonal Gingerbread Kaiju from Rogue Genius Games!

3) Check into AA for the holidays with Advanced Androids and watch out for the Yuletide Beasts from Jon Brazer Enterprises. - xevious575 courtesy of Kalindlara

4) Take an intrepid expedition into the Northwest to the Island of Life!

5) Not golden rings, but I've been hearing great things about Spheres of Power so hopefully this will be just as good. - Sedoriku

6) Get introduced to the Legendary Planet with the Assimilation Strain.

7) I'm always a fan of Faerie Creatures and neat looking new publishers so hopefully you are too with this from the aptly named Menagerie Press. - Rennaivx

8) From small to big check out the Kaiju Codex from Rite Publishing!

9) Visit Raging Swan's village of lizardfolk at Ossoko Draconsha and try to make your way through the Road of the Dead. - MoFiddy

10) So many Amazing Races that I couldn't decide which to give away! Pick any 4 of these from Abandoned Arts.

11) Delve into the Akashic Mysteries with the Daevic!

12) Journey to the Western shores of Midgard and set out to make your fortune.

12a) Benefit from my inability to count to 12 and enter the Stoneheart Valley from Frog God Games!

New Year's Bonus: It isn't every day that you turn 100, so I'll finish up by giving out 2 copies of A Song of Silver, the 100th of these amazing adventure paths that introduced me to Paizo in the first place!

It's Christmas, so in the spirit of the season time for another round of PDF giveaways. Haven't managed to actually read as many of these as I usually try to, but everything on the list is something that I think looks cool at least!

First in first served for each item on the list and limit of one choice per person. There's only one of each to give away, apart from the New Year's bonus round. I'll try to get everything out once everything from the list has been selected. Happy holidays everyone!

1) I've returned to GMing this year for the first time in years (well, started at the end of last year) and really been enjoying it. So hopefully somebody else will have as much fun running the Emerald Spire as I did!

2) They're not turtle doves, but two for the price of one with the selection getting a Black Knight and seasonal Gingerbread Kaiju from Rogue Genius Games!

3) Check into AA for the holidays with Advanced Androids and watch out for the Yuletide Beasts from Jon Brazer Enterprises.

4) Take an intrepid expedition into the Northwest to the Island of Life!

5) Not golden rings, but I've been hearing great things about Spheres of Power so hopefully this will be just as good.

6) Get introduced to the Legendary Planet with the Assimilation Strain.

7) I'm always a fan of Faerie Creatures and neat looking new publishers so hopefully you are too with this from the aptly named Menagerie Press.

8) From small to big check out the Kaiju Codex from Rite Publishing!

9) Visit Raging Swan's village of lizardfolk at Ossoko Draconsha and try to make your way through the Road of the Dead.

10) So many Amazing Races that I couldn't decide which to give away! Pick any 4 of these from Abandoned Arts.

11) Delve into the Akashic Mysteries with the Daevic!

12) Journey to the Western shores of Midgard and set out to make your fortune.

12a) Benefit from my inability to count to 12 and enter the Stoneheart Valley from Frog God Games!

New Year's Bonus: It isn't every day that you turn 100, so I'll finish up by giving out 2 copies of A Song of Silver, the 100th of these amazing adventure paths that introduced me to Paizo in the first place!

The change that I'd most like to see and doesn't require the game to change too much is for 'mundane' characters to actually be better at mundane things than magical characters.

I really don't mind the idea that different classes play very differently, and I'm happy with the idea that some classes can change the world in some ways and others primarily react to it. But I really don't like that the wizard who spends so much time and energy studying magic usually ends up with a substantially broader range of skills than the fighter can get.

You seem to like to throw around a lot of comments about being connected to the field and apparently feeling that means we should be clinging to your every word. Do you actually know the backgrounds of everybody here, or have you just arbitrarily decided that we all don't really know what we're talking about? People aren't right or wrong because of their qualifications, they're right or wrong because of what they say (which will hopefully be informed by their qualifications and experience).

I myself have over a decade of experience as a statistical analyst working in the energy industry. I've regularly run and built specialised hydrology models, contributed to academic and industry think-tanks, produced carbon forecasts and the like, and devoted a decent chunk of my professional career to being able to understand and inform on this sort of thing. But none of that makes me right or wrong in debates here. Plenty of other people are clearly well-informed and I'm not going to go into a debate with people I don't personally know and just assume that because I know the topic I must be the most qualified here. (In fact, I very much doubt that I am.)

This debate about whether to use the acronym AGW or CC seems pretty pointless anyway. Both are terms that have been politicised, but that doesn't make them purely political terms. AGW simply means global warming caused by the actions of mankind. Quibbling over whether it's the 'best' term or not misses the point, it's something that many academics agree is happening whatever label you want to put on it.

An FAQ is a frequently asked question, I don't think separating out different types of answers or changing the name makes things any clearer.

I mean, if a question is asked frequently then broadly responses could be "it doesn't work like that, this is how it works". Or, "this is how it works, but we can see how the wording is ambiguous so maybe rewording it like this clarifies intent". Or, "gosh, sorry, that text doesn't match what we intended at all! This is how it should work and we'll add it to errata,"

I think it's far cleaner to put the response in the FAQ whichever flavour the answer takes, followed up by the issuing of errata when practical. Otherwise you'll have a situation where a question that has been asked will go to a totally different location based on how it ended up being answered.

The people who use statements from Al Gore to try and discredit Global Warming really do their own argument (such as it is) a disservice. I mean, he's a useful figure for having drawn attention to the debate, but he's never been an actual environmental scientist, so him mis-speaking when talking of actual science hardly invalidates the science. Let alone the amount of times people simply make up quotes from him that don't exist.

As thejeff says even the complaints about his quote on geothermal energy are pretty pointless. Yeah, he was confused about just how hot the earth is. But his actual point that geothermal energy is a viable solution is perfectly sensible. Certainly it will take time to better harness heat in places where it can't be accessed so easily, but it's already an important part of the energy mix in countries where it can be accessed more easily. Here in New Zealand development of more geothermal is one of the biggest reasons for forcing several coal stations out of the market.

There's been a lot of talk in here about how the complexity of privilege means that it isn't useful as an idea. But we talk about complex systems every day, as observed earlier it's the context that matters. For example the weather is an incredibly complex system, but it manages to be one of the most popular points of conversation around the world. People can comment on how the weather is today and on how awful it is, and then other people can observe the exact same conditions but enter into a discussion about how great the weather is. But that ambiguity doesn't render the weather useless as a concept.

To lurch back onto the topic of privilege it isn't some kind of scorecard where I determine I have 40 points of privilege, you have 50 points of privilege, therefore you're more privileged than me and therefore need to give me stuff. Everybody has privilege in some areas and does not have privilege in others.

And having privilege doesn't mean you can't engage in discussions where your privilege might apply, it just means that it's something worth keeping in the back of your mind. I can still talk to my girlfriend about female-only issues and she can still talk to me about male-only issues, but we also need to consider that our different backgrounds mean the male-only thing has never happened to her and the female-only thing has never happened to me.

All privilege really means is that our lives and our experiences are determined to some degree by who we are and what we look like. It's not even a matter of being harder or easier, but recognising that who I am means I've had different experiences from somebody else. My different experiences aren't better or worse than another's, but they mean that some people have direct experience of issues that I don't and vice versa. And that knowledge about different experiences should help to inform how I look at the world and how I view what others say.

I'm still not convinced that enough people will ever become vegan to render the meat industry defunct that way, seeing as that diet is simply not for everyone and not everyone has access to it for economic or health reasons even if it's what they want.

I think a more effective way to destroy the meat industry is to attack the structure of the industry itself and the structures that underlie it, but I am not educated in that matter, so don't ask me how that could be done.

Altering demand isn't the same as making the meat industry defunct. I haven't said anywhere that I think everybody is going to (or even should) move to a meat-free diet, I'm responding to Krensky's claims of hyposcrisy in vegetarians. And really, even if the meat industry is making the same amount of meat despite the people who reduce their meat intake, that increase can't be blamed on the people who are no longer eating meat.

I did say it was a minor effect, but as thejeff says there is an effect. If I personally halved the amount of meat I eat then that wouldn't change demand, but millions of people around the world doing so does.

Except not eating meat has no impact outside of your own self. that jibberish about normalising consumption of meat or whatever is just that, jibberish.

If you don not eat meat because of moral consideration that you can't say that dairy's ok or that it's ok to eat meat occasionally because eating less of it is better than eating a lot.

If you view eating meat as a moral wrong then "but I still eat it occasionally" is the same as 'killing people is wrong, so I only do it once a month'.

At least be consistent.

It's not the same thing at all. Believing that two things are both morally wrong does not mean you believe those two things to be the same level of 'wrong'. I view jumping a queue because you're in a hurry as morally wrong, and I also view killing people as morally wrong. I however feel that the punishment for killing people should be much greater than that for queue jumping.

Fundamentally, if somebody thinks that killing animals for food is morally wrong then they've improved the situation (albeit in a very minor way) by halving the amount of animals killed to feed them personally. Doing something to address a perceived problem is better than doing nothing, even if that falls short of doing everything possible.

Berik wrote:

I get some people not liking it, but D&D has fundamentally always dealt with Good and Evil as objectively true things. This means that anybody using those rule systems to create a game needs to at some point attempt to define what sort of action may be Good and what sort of action may be Evil. Since people are different these definitions will never be universally agreed with and that's okay.

This is confusing enough for companies to get across to people without also adding in substantial flaws into the deity. I mean, if Good is objective, but we can't assume that what a Good deity of family stands for in regards to family life is Good, then where does that leave things? If objective Good isn't meant to be judged from the teachings of a deity where is it meant to be judged?

Obviously everybody is going to draw a different line on where a particular action fits on a Good --> Evil scale. But if you're going to work with an objective alignment system then things do belong on that line somewhere. Nobody is going to come around to your house and slap you if you draw that line at a different place from Paizo. But Paizo need to at some point mention what they consider to be objectively Good for their own work to make sense.

That's the thing though.

The gods aren't 100% infallible. They're STILL people. To assume otherwise implies a terrifying level of personality-death. There's Gods who became gods after being mortals (Like Iomedae and Cayden) who are still portrayed as very human. Iomedae's a petty... person, and Cayden argues with his favoured-prostitute-turned-Herald and apparently made his dog immortal.

The gods are already shown to be sentient beings with their own wants and personality quirks, so they don't get to be 1-dimensional non-characters, existing only to show 'this is good' and 'this is bad'

In an objective alignment system, how is Paizo meant to portray that though? Say a deity has positions A, B & C. A is a clearly Good (capital 'G' meaning objectively good) policy. B is a little bit questionable but broadly Good. C isn't Good at all, and could in fact be Evil if people followed the idea through to an extent the deity wouldn't (but may think about). You'll make the teachings of each god broad enough to be effectively useless I think, and something that somebody of any alignment could rightly argue they're fitting into.

A deity can still be a multi-dimensional character and have consistent positions. There's also plenty of potential to suggest that there's a difference between what a good deity may believe and what he or she believes is right to teach followers. In the real world one of the most admirable traits (to my mind) is when people work around the flaws they have to avoid making life worse for other people.

And lets take a step back here. There will be people in the real world who believe that misogyny is a genuinely Good thing, just as there are people in the real world who do not believe that. Some people will honestly believe that purging misogyny from Erastil has actually made him more flawed. So when somebody asks for a deity to have more flaws what does that actually mean when individuals are trying to align their personal moral views into a world where morality has been objectively defined?

Except that canonically, orcs aren't always evil. They just have a major, possibly cultural predisposition towards malice. :P

Sure, and as I touched on I personally really don't like 'always evil' as a trope. But the point is that in Golarion orcs are genuinely and verifiably differently 'wired' from humans. We can't necessarily apply real world morals to the proper way to deal with a race that doesn't exist. I can tell you how I think that a human should treat another human in the real world. I can't tell you how I think a human should treat a kobold in the real world, since they don't exist. :p

I get some people not liking it, but D&D has fundamentally always dealt with Good and Evil as objectively true things. This means that anybody using those rule systems to create a game needs to at some point attempt to define what sort of action may be Good and what sort of action may be Evil. Since people are different these definitions will never be universally agreed with and that's okay.

This is confusing enough for companies to get across to people without also adding in substantial flaws into the deity. I mean, if Good is objective, but we can't assume that what a Good deity of family stands for in regards to family life is Good, then where does that leave things? If objective Good isn't meant to be judged from the teachings of a deity where is it meant to be judged?

Obviously everybody is going to draw a different line on where a particular action fits on a Good --> Evil scale. But if you're going to work with an objective alignment system then things do belong on that line somewhere. Nobody is going to come around to your house and slap you if you draw that line at a different place from Paizo. But Paizo need to at some point mention what they consider to be objectively Good for their own work to make sense.

Berik wrote:

I'm not a fan of some of the Torag bigotry myself and wouldn't have a paladin code like that. Having said that however, bigotry against fantasy races is pretty different from bigotry against something that really exists. I can feel more comfortable saying that a race that doesn't exist shouldn't exist, than I would be in saying that about something which is actually real. Maybe orcs are objectively things that deserve to die, I've never met one so couldn't say... (though in my Golarion they aren't automatically...)

And I think it's that need to ignore basic verisimilitude to keep Golarion "comfortable" that is leading to the complaints. It's the same deal with the claim that patriarchy just didn't develop in Golarion's cultures.

In what way does what I said break verisimilitude? I'm saying that wanting to persecute members of an objectively always evil group within the context of the game makes some sense for a 'good' person, while wanting to persecute a group that isn't objectively always evil is a different kettle of fish.

Lets look at two possible statements from an author:
1) "It's okay to kill orcs in my game world because they're always evil."
2) "It's okay to kill blacks in my game world because they're always evil."

My point is only that those two statements would not equally influence how I viewed that author.

I'm not a fan of some of the Torag bigotry myself and wouldn't have a paladin code like that. Having said that however, bigotry against fantasy races is pretty different from bigotry against something that really exists. I can feel more comfortable saying that a race that doesn't exist shouldn't exist, than I would be in saying that about something which is actually real. Maybe orcs are objectively things that deserve to die, I've never met one so couldn't say... (though in my Golarion they aren't automatically...)

James has said before that if he got to do things over he'd tone down the encounter with Iomedae and not have her punish the party. That's pretty consistent with the idea that they made changes to Erastil after deciding they didn't like that portrayal too. Shockingly enough they sometimes publish words that don't exactly get across the point they want, and sometimes need to provide later clarification.