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I hope nobody thought I was trying to criticize author (I didn't think I'd need to note it, but when I criticize stuff like genre immersion or etc, I'm addressing criticism to entire company because its never single author who makes executive decisions on how to present parts of settings.), but I do find it warming my heart that other writers popped up to note which parts they had come up with I want to also restate that I liked the story as a story as well.
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Yeah, they are ridiculous, but they also don't really break the genre immersion. Its weird that stone age and knights co-exist, but neither of those is familiar to me. For lot of people fantasy is escape from familiarity. Like its hard to tell where line is(to me its somewhere after tophats and early industrial factories, so trains and steamboats wouldn't necessarily be out of place to me as new inventions), but at some point Pathfinder might as well make their own version of d20 modern instead.
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keftiu wrote:
Alien spaceship crashing is different and much less familiar to real life experience, so don't misrepresent what I say, it hurts :( Its not fun when people dismiss your opinions like they are ridiculous or don't matter
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Isn't that kinda skipping aside that there aren't arcades or pop bands in eastern mythology either? Like main thing is that its kinda hard to have mythological feeling and modern feeling co-exist. Either way, I don't mind them playing magical game, its mostly how modern the whole setup with arcade for youngsters to socialize, play games and buy snackfood feels. Can't really comment on school life stuff since in nation where national education exists, of course its going to be different from era where it didn't. I imagine school life itself wasn't THAT different from 1940s and 2010s except regarding stuff you do in free time and what they teach. So I'm fine with that tbh. Pop bands themselves are kinda product of entertainment industry in my cynical view at least and hence why it stood out to me.
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Eeeh, its fun story, but I still I do kinda question having arcade and equivalent of pop music bands in fantasy setting? I mean, its one of those things that make setting feel like "modern setting with everything technological having magical equivalent instead" and not in the way like Final Fantasy where they have guns and wannabe super soldiers with buster swords co exist :'D I do know there is audience for starbucks coffee jokes in D&D, but at same time its one of those things that kinda conflicts with high fantasy? Sure pathfinder is more of pulp fantasy, but still yeah. (I do hate I'm being the grouch here this time x'D Story is fun and well written, but I'm conditioned by players to be cautious of humorous things breaking immersion)
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Either way, I think its kinda one of those "you kinda have to handle it with out of table talk" especially because the previous scenarios didn't let players know it was abduction and not rescue with certainty. Because I do agree with not having death be option this time, but it does result in that if pcs would do that, then it would default "voting" to "they got away, but pcs didn't willingly take package" I guess?
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John Mangrum wrote: I'm slightly concerned that this scenario is overlooking a distinct third possibility of what PCs will do about a certain NPC... I think they are doing that on purpose because they already had that choice in special plus let's face it cold blooded execution is always kinda no no socially :p (also let's face it, if that was option, it would just be repeat of "you didn't think I wouldn't have death man's switch?")
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PossibleCabbage wrote:
Cayden's story didn't have really greater implications on setting either. But yeah thing with Irori is that he is important in Jalmarey and Vudra, but I don't think we have lot on information on how exactly
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I mean, I think I've theorized that before, but tbh, that's exactly why he should have one of these stories. Like Irori isn't relatively boring as character trait, he is honestly vast majority of gods: they don't have that much mythology about their deeds or current activities, so they mostly stay as background figures that are easy to sum up. So having death story would be opportunity to give more characterization moments to him.
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I do kinda hope Prismatic Ray change isn't Nocticula joining it or something. That would kinda feel out of nowhere since Nocticula doesn't really have major thing with any of three. Arazni would similarly feel out of nowhere. Like if its god joining the pantheon, I hope its someone who both makes sense and has connection to them and not something that feels like a "I'd think it'd look good" ship.
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keftiu wrote:
Its weird yeah since Urgathoa breaks pattern, and everyone is afraid of death so that can't be it either
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This reminds me that one of my first character ideas(that I never played for being too edgy for my soft heart) was Zon-Kuthon cleric I called "Candle Wax Man". Concept name should say enough, but it was basically LN cleric with philosophy of enlightenment by numbing their anguish with constant physical pain, with idea that character could go LE (start doing his practice on others as well) or get redeemed (stop pouring wax all together) depending on story goes. Considering I can only play goody two shoes, yeah I obviously never would have played the idea, but it was fun theory crafting x'D
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Meanwhile, I recommend everyone to check out mythological Tiamat with her anime villain group of 11 monster children with silly gimmicks(four of them are just variants of serpents) and homebrew version of her for home game. (I honestly dislike D&D Tiamat at this point, because that version is just american pop culture stealing name from interesting mythological figure and watering it down to point of erasure)
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Sanityfaerie wrote:
In this scenario, Cayden's fear isn't that something is sipping his divinity, its imposter syndrome and fear that he doesn't actually deserve his godhood because he can't remember how he earned it Anyway I was thinking that the headcanon for ZK/Dou Bral was basically ZK being Dou Bral from previous reality reincarnating himself into this multiverse through cosmic time capsule more or less? iirc, I don't remember that paizo con segment Either way it wasn't 100% canon, it was developer headcanon iirc
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Tbh, if fourth fic continues the trend that these prophecies actually represent deity's worst fears, that really chances the paradigm. (it also would explain why all three stories so far have major red flag of "wait something is wrong". First one with psychopomps doing absolutely nothing without Pharasma, second with Ihys seeming rather comfy with using Rovagug as self destruct button if his gentle hand is threatened and third with the fact that belief making you into god isn't really pathfinder setting mechanic outside of like idols in 1e) Like... There is no reason to have story about how Rovagug's death leads to massive power vacuum because that wouldn't be what Rovagug fears. Maybe there could be surprising character reveal, but that kind of story would be more representative of collective fear of gods rather than teaching something new about Rovagug. Same way, unless short story would reveal something surprising about Gorum's insecurities, you'd think there wouldn't be much fo story to tell. Sure we didn't know about Cayden Cailean's possible impostor syndrome (except that in retrospect it makes 100% sense both in pathfinder and starfinder, starfinder iteration's relapse into further alcoholism post Gap seems kinda like redo of his alcohol binge memory loss so it likely was trauma trigger for him), but its reveal fits perfectly into place. Gorum so far is essentially spirit of battle without further personality, he is cool, but you'd think his fear would be rather simple topic to explore. Like you would think that story about Irori's death would be boring, but if you look it as character study of what Irori fears, then suddenly it has lot of potential to give more depth to Irori
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But yeah I don't believe ZK is the one to die, but here are three reasons I'd prefer to "because he is the torture god" 1) Nidal is kinda unassailable as bad guys, unlike Cheliax(both because nature of their pacts with evil gods differ and because Nidal is an isolationist country so they only have cameos rather than as main antagonists), so ZK being taken out of picture could open Nidal to more stories 2) it could be chance to explore what Dou-Bral discovered outside the multiverse in canon 3) It could be chance to explore what happens to Star Towers and have plotline of Rovagug's prison needing reinforcement or else risk of apocalypse happening I really think decision who dies should be made in terms of "what plots their death opens up for setting"
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Ya know, I think problem with Erastil or Torag dying is that besides it being example of paizo being biased towards lawful deities, it would come across as "eh, let's get rid of someone who was kinda problematic in past" kind of boring option. Plus both of them are deities with theme around traditions, so that opens another can of worms. Abadar being killed off would be annoying for similar reasons, but also for additional problem of "but we do kinda need non evil antagonist god who can be ally sometimes"
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Thing about ZK is that they aren't going to remove Velstracs, so removing him from core 20 just because he is dark would kinda sound like... Trying to sweep something under the rug that they are going to do anyway? (I believe whoever dies is chosen because their death makes for good story and not because developers wanted to get rid of them, it'd be troublesome for me if that was the case because it might really damage my trust in paizo, plus possible arguments caused by it ^^;)
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Friding is essentially killing an established character just for another character's pain and development more or less Anyhoo, I'm not fully convinced that they are going to kill of character just for being edgy, Pathfinder is more family friendly nowadays yes, but 1) there are multiple edgy gods in the evil list 2) they aren't really trying to sanitize the pathfinder (or at least company won't admit to doing so) and I think adventure content still shows that. I'd be surprised if Paizo really killed off any member of the polycule though because killing off example of positive representation seems unlikely to paizo (though by same token would feel off to kill any of good aligned gods?), though admittedly I think pathfinder follows design guideline of "everyone is bisexual unless stated otherwise, if you need to know for npc romance purposes" if I'm not mistaken?
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I think I have to open up about why I'm hoping it isn't Erastil, Torag or Abadar :'D One of my players is basically thinking that god who dies is 100% going to be LG or LN god that "Paizo doesn't like" and it would be really bad for me if they are proven to be right x'D
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I feel like the final 10 list has to be somewhat spicy (if it only involves gods like Erastil who would suck if they died, but are boring options, then it wouldn't be spicy) So I'd guess final list would be Cayden
Desna,
Zon-Kuthon(because at least one evil deity needs to be included) Nethys (I honestly think he will be one of deities going to be deconfirmed, but I'm less confident on remaining 10 after 7 first ones) Abadar
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Scarablob wrote:
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This is making me confident that my guesses of Sarenrae/Asmodeus/Pharasma are all wrong and all three Divine Mysteries stained glass gods survive :'D (btw, do we still get short stories for 9 gods that aren't part of 10 week countdown or are we left forever wondering what their prophecies would have been? x'D)
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PaperNinja wrote:
That was fast x'D I'd like to be able to do that fast (have lot of ideas, plus would be fun to do AP expansions x'D)
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I'm not used to reading texts where readers need to read between the lines, but its fun short story and I feel like it gets across feeling of that type of politeness where reading the room is norm and everyone avoids being too direct on purpose. Something about it does read bit stilted to me, but maybe that is just me having woken up after sleeping less than 6 hours due to needing to finish up stuff yesterday night x'D At least nobody else seems to be stating that, so its probably just my sleep deprivation brain
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