Gabrielle's page

I believe that there was also an issue with the placement of B3 during that conversion. The description of the entrance to B3 is in a different area than the map shows the entrance.

Yes. I've tried running the published scenario with both maps and I think both ships work fine. Really, B3 can be on whichever deck you want it on as long as the physical description in the encounter text is moved to the right place.

shaxberd wrote:

A fun adventure, but yet another scenario that punishes you for not just being a murder hobo. Is there even a scenario out there below the 7-11 tier that has a Scroll of Teleport on the Chronicle sheet? Meh.

THIS!

One of the only times my group decided NOT to be murder hobos and we were penalized for it? WTF?!?!?

You're not punished for not killing it, you're punished for swearing fealty to it, above your vows to your gods and the pathfinder society. You can not-kill it all you want. You just can't bend the knee to it without consequences.

As I mentioned in the GM thread for the scenario, I laughed really hard when I saw that "boon"...after I picked my jaw up off the floor. It's so harsh, but loyalty matters.

I haven't GM'd this scenario, but I did just play it the other day.

One other note I want to mention I find funny. Reading the "boon" by the time the brine dragon would come to cause issues for you, I feel the PC's would be strong enough to possibly even go slay the bigger dragon it is pretending to be by themselves if it was causing problems...

Oh, wow... That would be so awesome.

HEY PAIZO, PLEASE LET ME WRITE THIS!

What stats should be used for the Cultists in C3 if the PCs attack?

I'm not expecting many players in my lodge to go from hearing "What was your business in there?" to attacking without some roleplay, but it's not beyond the realm of possibility that an annoyed group of PCs (especially if they are combat-heavy and have so far only had 1 fight during the scenario) might want to shoot first and ask questions later.

Give them the stats of basic NPC unarmed civilians. They're upset on a religious/spiritual level that people are coming out of their sacred cave, but they're not prepared to do anything about it. Your party of dragon-subduers would wipe the floor with them, especially after they're demoralized about their "god in the cave" just being an arrogant little dragon.

James Anderson wrote:

My players were not happy that doing the right thing and not-fighting the dragon got them a negative boon.

In effect, what they think as the right thing might end up being the wrong thing. Their logic isn't bad, but not always adapted to that specific case. It is not inherently bad/evil to fight it, not being needed for the balance of the area nor I would miss a delusional individual, but that depends of the mood of the group. If only viewed on the lens of the Society's goals, it even might be better if the dragon is removed, incapacitated or pidgeonholed to surrender.

But I would take pains to help Nalu to get out.

Fighting the dragon isn't the wrong thing. It may be cute, young, small, whatever, but brine dragons are arrogant little sh*ts, singularly focused on gathering a following of "lesser beings" (including your party). The dragon isn't going to negotiate or be pigeonholed into surrendering. It wants servants, and as intended, the slightest disrespect will set it off and make it roll initiative. There is no reasoning with it. You can bow or die.

Removing or incapacitating it are, in my book, methods of success. There's even a provision in the scenario for knocking it unconscious and bringing it back to the Grinning Pixie alive.

The only "wrong thing" a party can do is to swear fealty to it.

In my original script, I made it pretty much impossible to swear the oath to the dragon. Just because it's what the boss wants, doesn't mean the boss should get it! Originally, the dragon would ask for a test of loyalty that would be distasteful and essentially impossible for the PCs to fulfill, requiring an evil act, which would railroad PCs back to combat when they hesitated.

Paizo made the bold decision to take that choice out of the narrative and put it back in the players' hands, essentially saying, "No, if they choose to do this, let them. They'll see what it gets them." On one hand, wow, that "boon" is harsh. On the other hand, it made me laugh out loud. I think it's daring and brilliant on Paizo's part. I've NEVER seen a chronicle sheet with such bold consequences before. And yeah, you're Pathfinders, you made an oath above your oaths to the PFS and to your own gods. Maybe next time, Paizo seems to say, don't do that.

(It's still harsh. I still love it.)

And, thank you for saving Nalu and Kelp. :)

25. Use whispering wind to order a pizza.
26. Cast silence when that song you hate comes on, instead of skipping ahead.
27. Wind walk: Best way to get around at the chili cookoff.
28. Prismatic Wall: Put on some Pink Floyd; charge admission.

The missing audio books for the final Tor books are something that MacMillan Audio has the sole right to produce at this time. If folks want those, they need to convince Tor that they're worth producing. At some point in the future, these books may be available for someone else to produce audiobook versions of, but until then, the ball is in Tor's court.

PLEASE clamor, friends!

And, closer to home, is there any chance of a PFS chronicle sheet for the final Tor books?

Lord Fyre wrote:

So these goblins have basic BASIC literacy. ;)

{pushes imaginary glasses up} Ahem:

Sir Attenwampi's Guide to the Galaxy wrote:

...Space goblins begin play knowing GUI and BASIC. Space goblins with high Intelligence scores can choose from the following: COBOL, INTERCAL, Logo, MagicSmoke++, Pascal, and VisualPickle; with GM approval, they may instead choose any one language they want (except secret languages, such as Ruby on Rails or Dogcow). See the Linguistics skill page for more information about these languages.

10 Burn all the things

Here's a question for my fellow PFTales authors: If you're allowed to say, what are you working on now?

I'm currently doing revising/rewriting on a young adult contemporary novel (my first NON SF/F work). There's an interested agent who gave me good feedback and sent me off to make it better. (A revise/resubmit request, which I'm excited about... when I'm not busy worrying that this book will never be done.)

You?

I'm so excited to play Celeste!

I'm blessed with a significant number of scientist friends (I'd say I'm probably in the bottom third of my social group, education-wise), which is always handy—I've certainly tapped them to help me figure out things like orbits and planetary mass, since even after attending the amazing Launchpad Astronomy Workshop I'm still the rankest of amateurs in all hard sciences.

Hi, James. :)

I'm curious: when you attended Launchpad, I know Distant Worlds was already out... but did you already know Starfinder was going to be a thing? Or did Launchpad help inspire it, or a little bit of both?

So, GEARS OF FAITH is finally here! Not to blatantly self-promote, but to alert those of you who've been waiting for this novel and those of you who have come along since the short story "Inheritance" appeared in the Pathfinder Tales web fiction here (in *cough*2013*cough*)... the novel continues the adventures of Keren and Zae, a F/F couple, and their dog.

It also includes a trans main supporting character and a sprinkling of conspicuous non-binary folks as well. And sex-positivity. And epiphanies about respecting boundaries. And feels.

People in this book are queer and trans and non-binary and it's not a big deal to the plot or to anyone around them.

I wrote this for us; I wrote it to help to normalize us. This thread's positive and welcoming response to the short story years ago has never been far from my mind. I know the book is advertised on the site elsewhere, etc etc, but I wanted to personally thank the contributors of this thread. I hope I've done you proud.

Big thanks to Bookwyrm for a great weekend!

In Kingmaker, we're far enough along that we're running the kingdom, but we also still get wanderlust and venture out to have adventures from time to time.

We come across an NPC who, of course, needs our help with something.

Me: "Can we tell him we'll help him if he brings us a troll for the troll blood quest? I mean, there's no reason why we can't send THEM on quests too, right??"

--

GM: Your reward is 400xp each for accomplishing the objective, plus your kingdom gets +2 loyalty.
Player 1: "They're not giving us any gold as reward?"
Player 2: "When they give us gold, it's called taxes."

So are the PF Tales authors excited about StarFinder and a chance to write sci-fantasy?

The more I see of Starfinder the more excited I am about it. I'm sure the moment I start to play it, I'll be full of ideas of stories I want to tell. :)

That said, they've got to get the game out there before they start worrying about the fiction!

Instead of "rolling a perception check" we say "I'm percepting." I think that started as an attempt to needle the two fiction writers in our group, but we adopted it right along with them.

When a roll plus its modifiers adds up to 20, I usually announce it as an "unnatural 20" just to save the GM the follow-up question.

Gorbacz wrote:

Antiheroes are much more interesting than holier-than-thou LG crusaders, sorry.

That doesn't mean it can't be done (as demonstrated by the upcoming Gears of Faith novel).

Keren appreciates your faith in her, Berselius. Sadly, she doesn't have much to give you beyond a well-chewed dire apple! (Though I can say that Gears of Faith has a healer as main protagonist, and the LG crusader is not a generic do-gooder. No one who lived strictly by the book would ever be able to make it work with Zae.)

To get back on topic, I've worked with Sam Sykes for about five years, I have copyedited one of his novels and I've stood at a publisher's table selling books with him for many hours. I've shared meals and had drinks with him. And I didn't know until last weekend who his mother was. Writing-wise, he may have grown up with the publishing industry, but he does his own legwork and I think he does it well.

His first series, while wordy, is really a very thoughtful look at what an adventuring party is, and brings a fun, self-aware take to all the roles therein. The healer who says "What's the point of healing you so you can get yourself banged up again tomorrow," the rogue who's sneaky because he really doesn't want to fight, the mage who deals with physical consequences every time he casts a spell... They all analyze their roles in the great game, and deal with some interesting dilemmas about whether they accept those roles or not. It's meta in a way that I, as a life-long fan of quest fantasy, really appreciated.

It's not perfect, but I'd say give it a chance. I see what James Sutter sees in him. I haven't read the book, but I have faith that Sam's take on fantasy will be a fun addition to the Pathfinder universe.

Do you hear that sound? That's the sound of an author squealing and doing a happy-dance. :D

...There's now a button for that!

Specifically, the "want to read" shelf button on Goodreads. The book won't be out for a while yet, but if you're looking forward to it, you can add it to your "want to read" shelf now.

Added bonus: the Goodreads listing features a reveal of the official title. clicky here :)

Currently reading: The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater. But slowly, because it's the last book in the series and I don't want it to end.

She does incredible things with words. It's inspiring to my own writing.

I saw someone refer to their significant other as their "theyfriend" the other day and I thought that was pretty awesome.

Beautiful story Gabrielle.

I would love to read a novel or two of Keren and Zae's adventures together.
The art by Kelly Perry was perfect.

Thank you! Your wish will be granted. More info on the novel as I'm allowed to share. :)

132. Randomly, in an enclosed room: "How tall is your character? I see. And do you have any ranks in swim?"

Background: Our home-group's GM was feeling some cat-herder fatigue and asked me if I'd like to try my hand at the helm. I was a little nervous but willing, but it turned out that we were all so attached to our current campaign's characters that nobody actually wanted to do anything else.

To address that but still give our hard-working cat-herder a break, I ran We Be Goblins, figuring that a one-shot with pregen characters wouldn't feel like a betrayal of our Kingmaker party.

It was stunning how quick the "negotiate with everything, even the turtles" party was to turn around and be goblins set on eating or setting aflame everything in their path. So much so, that I decided that my next move would be to do some other, ongoing module with an all-goblin party.

A bit of forum-browsing led me to Skull & Shackles, especially a combination of posts suggesting that the pirate officers could be hobgoblins and the characters could wake up in the hold after the post-"We Be Goblins" celebratory feast.

I offered the players the opportunity to switch goblins, or make their own, or customize the pregens however they liked. To my surprise, everyone wanted to stick with their same goblins. They upgraded the pregens a little and bought better weapons/supplies, but otherwise played them as-is.

So. We have:

* Chuffy, goblin rogue.

* Moggy (Mogmurch), goblin alchemist.

* Buggy Bugeye, goblin witch (alternate pregen)

* Reta, goblin warrior

* Miss Gojangles, goblin sorcerer (alternate pregen)

I set the captain, first mate, and bosun as hobgoblins; most of the other NPCs have remained of ambiguous race. To keep disrespect for humans from ruining the adventure, unless the race of the character is particularly striking (like the half-orc NPC), I gloss over it. If the party asks, I just say that the character isn't a goblin, so does it really matter? Turns out, everyone is happy to assign an NPC's race as "food" and leave it at that.

It's going well. In the first session they developed a healthy respect for the pirates; after watching their first keelhauling, they're agreed that nobody wants to be "keyholed."

The party goes to the Mud Bowl in the Greenbelt to get black rattlecaps for the Old Beldame.

Druid: I'll summon a turtle to go into the mud and pick mushrooms for us.

Wizard: What self-respecting turtle would go wading into toxic mud?

Druid: Good thing the spell doesn't say "summon *self-respecting* turtle."

----

My party is big on including animals in our adventures. We have a druid's mountain lion and a ranger's wolf as regular companions, and the druid will frequently speak to the animals or turn into one herself.

Both the bard and the druid have gotten a little obsessed with summoning animals in combat, too.

The druid's player was looking through the summoned animal list, trying to pick a good one for our fight, when she said:

"At no level can you summon a goat? That seems unrealistic."

(Because shooting fire from your hands or turning into a bird? TOTALLY realistic.)

Then we found the wondrous figurines and that mollified her a little. In the meantime, she discovered she could summon a rhino. AND that she could specify the alignment of said rhino, so that it could do a charge AND smite against an evil enemy.

"I summon...a CELESTIAL RHINO!"

Someone commented, through laughter, "That is seriously metal." ...Which led to our wizard summoning Europe's "The Final Countdown."

"Celestial Rhino...We're smiting together, whoa-oh, Celestial Rhino!"

It was several minutes before play could resume.

I got a couple great ideas from players and other writers at GenCon. Please help brainstorm and keep the wackiness coming!

The more aesthetic embellishments, the better. These are for the most dedicated of tinkers, after all.

Hey, all!

So, at PaizoCon, I got permission from James Sutter to crowdsource some tinkered healing devices for [Title Forthcoming], my upcoming Pathfinder Tales novel.

For this novel, I'm looking for zany and clever devices that a tinker could create, preferably with a focus on healing and other medical (including preventive) applications, and I'd love it if they came from your brains as well as from my own!

These items are not all going to be Zae's creations or property, so while they need to rely on spells, they do not need to rely on cleric/healing spells. Any spell that can be utilized creatively for a healing purpose is fair game.

I'm looking for two kinds of items:

* devices that will work. (Name them. describe them. tell me how they operate, which spells they run off of, and how those spells are incorporated into the technology).

example:

-- Bedroll of Gentle Repose: a standard inexpensive bedroll infused with the Gentle Repose spell, so that any corpse that is carried in it gains the effect of the Gentle Repose spell and does not decay. Activates upon unrolling.

* devices that fail spectacularly or amusingly.

example:

-- Sphere of Detect Magic: This sphere is a magical object which, when activated, displays a blue glow if magic is near. However, being a magical object, it ALWAYS DETECTS ITSELF. Give this to a very drunk character, or a very young character, for maximum entertainment value. "Whoa...magic is everywhere!"

The Small Print:

I will not use all items suggested, and I reserve the right to modify suggested items and use them as inspiration only. Even if I love your idea, the final decision is Paizo's. But, by suggesting an item you do run the chance that I may use it in a Pathfinder Tales novel. If this does happen, you will receive no compensation except for a mention in the novel's acknowledgments and my personal gratitude. Your idea will become property of Paizo, and you will not be able to earn money for it.

If you don't feel comfortable posting here, feel free to PM me your ideas.

I may have already whispered my cover artist requests into James Sutter's ear. :)

I'm sure whoever does it will do a fantastic job!

Relatedly, I just spent a week with family, and several conversations went like this:

Dad: I thought you were supposed to be doing work while you're here.
Me: I am! Playing with the dog is totally research!

Bard: These three soldiers traveling with our party...are they wearing red shirts?
GM: Well, red cloaks, yes.
Bard: Then I won't get too attached.

--

GM: You know that he was exiled for having an affair with a weaver's daughter.
Wizard (9 Charisma): Hey, weaver-f**ker, how's it going?

--

GM: You come upon a dead horse... on closer inspection, it's a dead unicorn.
Oracle (Me): Can I read its entrails?
GM: It appears remarkably whole, actually.
Oracle: That can be remedied.

Druid: I can speak with animals. Can I speak with dead animals?
Oracle: Even if you can, I bet it can only answer yea or neigh.

You know how in Pathfinder Society, you can pick a profession/craft/perform skill and assign it as your day job, and how it doesn't really impact play, but at the end of the session you get bonus gold for having done your day job?

Okay, so last night, The Bastard, our bad-ass magus who wanted to kill everything first and ask questions later, says yes, he has a day job, and rolls for his bonus gold. Someone says, "What's your day job?"

He says, "Midwife."

Three cheers for the sick and twisted. :)

I'm proud of Appleslayer, Zae's trusty riding dog. He named himself by his great deeds.

Otherwise, I usually go for the cute names for the vicious things, and the vicious names for the cute things. Fluffy is my fallback -- in MMOs I name all my pets Fluffy (including ravagers, spiders, rock elementals, etc) so that my characters never call one by the wrong name in battle.

I'm also partial to Peaches, Nibbler, and the ever-classic Bitey.

Our dwarf paladin is unconscious, on fire, and dying. It's just not his day. My Oracle is trying to reach him to put him out and heal him.

"I'm approaching the flaming dwarf...which, by the way, is also a really excellent pub..."

I heal him with a crit success.

GM: That was well done!

Me: Really? I think he was medium rare, at most.

He retained the name "the Flaming Dwarf" for the rest of the session, and possibly will for the rest of the campaign.

In my next work of Pathfinder fiction, I'm hoping to use the Flaming Dwarf pub - its sign would have to be a ginger dwarf with stylized flames for his hair and beard.

SUPERDUNGEON is now stuck in my head, and all I can envision is a giant emerald crystal jutting out of the ground, adorned with a fluttering red cape.

Hopefully the real cover will push that image out of my brain.

Any GM can cannibalize a logical series of events from the environment, both (or all) characters' stats and description (body type, flexibility, lining up properly, etc.), and feeling towards one another (whether it's an empty act tantamount to object-assisted masturbation or full of love and passion and blah blah blah).

What T.B. said, except that perhaps I wouldn't have used the word "cannibalize." :)

In addition to rolling on dexterity/constitution etc, or a perception check to realize you've been propositioned, it can be fun to give characters' existing feats and abilities a more adult context. (Mage hand, ghost sound, anything that alters perception, temperature, appearance, or reaction time (all used on consenting participants, of course.)) Applying outside rules to sex just feels contrived to me, whereas appropriating and perverting the characters' existing abilities feels more innate and clever.

I really enjoyed the Inheritance web fiction, as it delves into a few elements I'd like to see more of:

1. Female adventuring pair, huzzah!
2. Non-human narrators. It really helps give a perspective as to what humans are like compared with other races, rather essential for properly portraying a human-centric world like Golarion.
3. Non-heroic narrator. It's not that Zae isn't a capable cleric of Brigh, but she's not a demon-slaying, holy sword-wielding champion of justice and badassery. It takes the average to emphasise the exceptional.

Thank you so much!

I love writing all those elements, so... :)

-Gabrielle

Thanks, all!

Yes, I deliberately chose to make Zae's level too low for raising the dead. Also, to go along with being lower-leveled, she mentions in the narrative that she's never healed in combat before. It's all just happening too quickly for her to do anything about it.

The emotional fallout from failing is a new experience, too. Yay, gnomes love new experiences, right? Maybe not all experiences are equal.

I like to make emotional growth happen on the page. This experience won't 'humanize' her, but it'll definitely have an impact on her in future adventures.

@Set - when I saw the teeth on the random weather effects table, I knew I had to use them!

Thanks!

I came to writing via online text-based roleplay, and I really enjoy having other people's unpredictability to play off of when I write. It's a lot of fun to write Zae and Keren together because they create that unpredictability by viewing the world in such different ways.

I'm writing more about the writing process aspect on my blog. Only the first chapter is covered so far, but eventually there'll be a peek at all four chapters: http://gabrielle-edits.com/2013/10/11/inheritance-one/

Trying to illustrate halflings and gnomes without making them look like children or dwarves is probably one of the hardest art challenges in fantasy, especially when they're solo shots with no background to give scale. Its one of the reasons why Lini (or iconic druid) is often illustrated with her snow leopard.

Then it's a good thing Zae has a faithful steed! :D

I like this depiction of a gnome. the others seem to show more of a lucky troll doll look.

Reasons for like,
1.eyes are still big-like but seem to fit the face well.(the other images have the eyes taking up almost half of the face.)
2.The eyebrows while probably still longer then norm (good) don't look like a set of antennae coming off her brow.
3.the head to body proportions look alot nicer as the other depictions still make them look like children.

All good points. I haven't gotten to peek at any of the art before it goes live, and I've been waiting for this one impatiently.

I have to say, it's grown on me more and more all day--probably for many of the the reasons you point out. I did expect body proportions to "show" more shortness, but you're right. Body proportions should be proportional; scale with other people should be what shows shortness.

Perfect, perfect art! Thanks again to Kelly Perry. :)

Alas, poor gorbel. I knew him, Horatio...

Huzzah! Thank you. :)

Second rule of mitten club: if this is your first pair of mittens, you must thread them through your jacket sleeves on a string!

Gorgeous art! And a great first installment. Chris, no one writes pirates like you do. :)