Hey Lancers, wanted to hop in and provide some communication. We are going through a transition period at work and I have had to work extra days, including alternating hours, which has been something of a struggle, and left me without the time and energy to devote to gaming. But the GM has been on an interview frenzy and it seems we will have some new folks in the next couple weeks, at which point my schedule will return to stability and normality. Consider this in a bit of hibernation at the moment. When the time comes for things to kick off in earnest, I will start a brand new thread for the campaign. Until then, discussion can continue and I will be happy to answer any questions or give thoughts on ideas. Est Solarus oth Mithas
Terevalis Unctio of House Mysti wrote:
I am aware, they are outcasts, Dalamar of course being the most famous dark elf. I was using the example to explain ultravision as it existed in AD&D. And yes, 3.5 Dragonlance elves have "Elvensight" which encompasses both low-light vision and 30 feet of darkvision. Nonetheless I was speaking specifically of dwarves with the changeover in vision post 3E. Standard elves didn't get darkvision until 5E, when they removed the 3E/4E concept of "low-light vision" (good riddance if you ask me).
Zahir ibn Mahmoud ibn Jothan wrote:
I have read nearly all of the Weis/Hickman material, and some of the side novels. I have not read the Dwarven Nations trilogy, but I have a feeling that the author may have played a bit fast and loose with the lore. There are many canonical examples of dwarven clerics in the setting, Jasper Fireforge, a cleric of Reorx who later becomes a mystic of the Citadel of Light, is a rather big one. Thiewar dwarf wizards are absolutely canonical as well, they belong to an order called the Obsidian Circle. Also, in both 1st and 2nd Edition AD&D, it specifically lists clerics/priests of the Holy Orders of the Stars (usually Reorx) as a playable option for dwarves. In AD&D (the timeframe in which the Dwarven Nations trilogy was written) dwarves and elves and the like had an ability called infravision, but dark elves and dark dwarves and other such deep dwelling races often had what is called ultravision, which is a superior form of vision in the dark, as opposed to the more limited nature of infravision. When the 3E switch happened and ever since, dwarves just have normal darkvision (in both game and fiction), and dark dwarves have and extended range of said darkvision. I've never used it, but I remember hearing about something called 5E Tools, that might be something worth looking into.
Zahir ibn Mahmoud ibn Jothan wrote:
1. Depends on what you mean by magic-less, dwarven clerics are very common (especially of the Daewar clan). And while rare, its not unheard of for a Klar clan dwarf to become a druid, usually focused upon mountains and the "living earth". If you are specifically referring to dwarves becoming wizards, there are virtually no dwarven wizards as a societal rule. A dwarf can technically pursue wizardry, but faces being shunned for doing so. Only the evil dark dwarf clan of Theiwar does not follow this philosophy, wizards of the black robes are pretty common for them. 2. No multiclassing. 3. Mechanically, all of the 4 playable dwarf clans (Hylar, Daewar, Klar, and Neidar) will use the extra hit points of the Dwarven Toughness feature found under Hill Dwarf (and every character uses the +2/+1 rule from Tashas). For elves, Qualinesti and Silvanesti use the High Elf subrace, and Kagonesti use the Wood Elf subrace. No gully dwarves. 4. In every edition of D&D that has featured Dragonlance (1E, 2E, 3E, 5E) dwarves are played with their abilities straight out of the Players Handbook, in 1E/2E they had infravision, in 3E/5E they have darkvision. All dwarves have darkvision. 5. No centaur. 6. Becoming a Knight of Solamnia will require special roleplaying, upon gaining new status, whether officially becoming a Knight of Solamnia, or hypothetically one down the road rising to the rank of Lord Knight of their order, I will offer the character a boon of some sort, this might be a special magic item that is bequeathed and rewarded to the knight, or could come in the form of an extraordinary or supernatural capability.
Sargon Starbright wrote:
Elf lore or elf stats? For stats you would just use the Elf race from the PHB with the High Elf subrace. There was a whole line of Dragonlance sourcebooks from the 3.5 era, including one called Races of Ansalon that delved into all the inhabitants of the setting. Dorian 'Grey' wrote:
I'm glad you enjoyed the timeline and discussion, a shame you wont potentially be joining us. As far as wizards go, Dragonlance is about as iconic as you can get.
Humans also get the +2/+1, so fret not brotherguiness. Lol, 25 years old sounds perfect critzible. The one thing I did not see amongst the stat block was Ralphs alignment. So I have to wonder, upon reading the following from your background: "You are in frequent contact with people in the segment of society that your chosen quarries move through. These people might be associated with the criminal underworld, the rough-and-tumble folk of the streets, or members of high society. This connection comes in the form of a contact in any city you visit, a person who provides information about the people and places of the local area." I wonder if perhaps Ralph might be in league with, or an aspiring member of, the Legion of Steel. The Legion was the first thing I thought of when I read that.
Hello folks, work has been pretty crazy of late. I'm glad to see the interest in this forges on. When the time comes I get my ducks in a row, I will make a new thread for official recruitment. Ok, lets take stock of what we have. Human Bard of Branchala
@critzible sounds like a solid concept there, I imagine he is underestimated by his potential prey a good amount of the time. @Sargon you are saying one of the extended royal family had a dalliance with a known and avowed dark elf? *gasp* @brother_guiness I love it, a proper Knight of Solamnia in the making! What patron deity would your paladin follow, are you more a Paladine man or a Kiri-Jolith one?
Albion, The Eye wrote:
Man, everyone is on a minotaur kick, lol. This is a great character background, I do not require novels for backstories, just that you know who the character is and where they came from, and perhaps an idea on where they want to go. This character concept could possibly pursue being a paladin of Kiri-Jolith, he has taken an interest in sponsoring honorable noble-hearted minotaurs in order to be an alternative to Sargas. I will say though that the Knights of Solamnia still follow the bylaws that a member must be human or half-human. But the Legion of Steel very possibly could be interested. I like how you tied the story to the timeline event of the attempted minotaur conquering of Flotsam. If this became something viable and there are enough folks interested, my thought was to run a combination of modules, probably some of the D&D starter set and/or essentials box, mixed with some others, and go from there. For placement I was thinking Abanasinia, I am of two minds on the exact location, one being the classic Solace, but Solace is so detailed, defined, and built up nowadays, the Legion of Steel is headquartered there, the Knights of Solamnia have a regiment stationed there and stand as honor guard of the Tomb of the Last Heroes, an archmage makes his home there and is at the Inn almost every night, it is very safe. The other would be the town of Digfel, which I feel would be a good equivalent to Phandalin, a small settlement with a connection to mining. Although it could be fun to start in Solace and then travel to Digfel on the business of a couple of hill dwarf brothers looking for a long lost mine.
Codanous wrote:
I keep it traditional with the moon gods, they do not sponsor divine spellcasting followers, their province is solely in the realm of wizardry. Also depending on what you mean by "sorcerers" (meaning spontaneous casters who do not use a spellbook, rather than shorthand for the "Wizards of High Sorcery") they do not exist in this timeline. Wizards are the only arcane casters. I will post the gods list from the Age of Dragons link in the thread for full clarity. Deities of Kyrnn Gods of Good Paladine: (Head of the Pantheon of Light) LG God of Protection, Leadership, Nobility, Light, Redemption, Hope, Good Dragons
Gods of Neutrality Gilean: (Head of the Pantheon of Balance) LN God of Knowledge, Time, Prophecy, Wisdom, Balance, Enlightenment, Watchfulness
Gods of Evil Takhisis: (Head of the Pantheon of Darkness) LE Goddess of Tyranny, Dominion, Subjugation, Hatred, Night, Evil Dragons
Gods of Magic (No Clerics) Solonari: LG Moon God of Good Magic and the Order of White Robe Wizards
Since someone mentioned they were considering playing a kender, here are the kender racial statistics. Kender Age. A kender reaches adulthood around the age of 20. They can live for over a century. Alignment. Most kender are chaotic good. As a rule, they are good-hearted and kind, hate to see others in pain, and have no tolerance for oppression. Size. Kender stand between 3 1/2 and 4 feet tall and average about 60-70 pounds. Your size is Small. Speed. Your base walking speed is 25 feet. Curious. Kender have an innate curiosity and extreme difficulty resisting picking locks, be they on chests, doors, jail cells, or chambers filled with monsters, as well as searching pouches, seeking interesting trinkets, curios, and knickknacks. You have proficiency with thieves' tools and the Sleight of Hand skill. Fearless. Kender are immune to fear, be it from dragon, undead, magic, or otherwise. The rare times they actually feel something akin to fear it is described as an odd sensation in their stomach (which was probably just something they ate), that is usually only felt if their friends or family are in very perilous situations. You cant be frightened. Kender Pouches. As an action, you can make a roll on the Kender Pouches Table to see what’s in your pouches. You may use this ability a number of times equal to your dexterity modifier. You regain all expended uses upon completing a long rest. Also when you initially create your character, roll 1d6, you may roll this many times on the Trinkets table, gaining each item rolled, rerolling any duplicates. Lack of Focus. Kender are easily distracted and have a general lack of focus that plagues their species. You have disadvantage on Constitution saving throws to maintain concentration on a spell. Nimbleness. You can move through the space of any creature that is of a size larger than yours. Taunt. You have an uncanny insight into the motivations and sentiments of other races, and you can use this insight to infuriate them. As a bonus action, you can force a target to make a Charisma saving throw against a DC equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Charisma modifier. On a failed save, the target becomes enraged with you. Until the start of your next turn, all attacks targeting anyone other than you are made with disadvantage. This anger also causes the target to move recklessly. If the target must move in order to attack you they may not take the disengage action until the start of your next turn. At the end of each of its turns, the target can make another Charisma saving throw. On a success, the taunt effect ends on the target. You may use this feature a number of times equal to your Charisma modifier (minimum 1). You regain all expended uses of this feature upon completing a long rest. Languages. You can speak, read, and write Common and Kenderspeak. For the other races, Qualinesti and Silvanesti use the high elf statistics, Kagonesti use the wood elf statistics. All 4 of the dwarven clans (Hylar, Daewar, Klar, and Neidar) gain the dwarven toughness feature from the hill dwarf. As previously mentioned humans use variant human. And remember race/subrace does not determine your starting stat bonuses, everyone gains a +2 and a +1 of their choosing. Tinker gnomes use the "rock gnome" subrace and add the following features: Guild Affiliation. You are affiliated with a guild of your choice. While there are hundreds or even thousands of guilds, they all fall under one of three major guild categories. Choose one of the following guild categories. You may add your proficiency bonus when working with any of the tool sets in that category. Furthermore, based on the guild category you choose, you may double your proficiency bonus when working with one set of artisan’s tools of your choice. Craft Guild: Weaver’s tools, Painter’s supplies, Potter’s tools, Leatherworker’s tools, Smith’s tools, Woodcarver’s tools Technical Guild: Carpenter’s tools, Glassblower’s tools, Mason’s tools, Tinker’s tools, Cobbler’s tools Sage Guild: Alchemist’s supplies, Brewer’s supplies, Calligrapher’s supplies, Cartographer’s tools, Cook’s utensils, Jeweler’s tools Life Quest. You have a life quest that has been handed down to you from previous generations. This life quest informs every major (and even some minor) decisions that you make. As a result of the all consuming nature of your life quest, it’s very difficult to dissuade you from whatever course of action you have decided upon. Therefore, you add your proficiency bonus on all saving throws made to resist attempts to change your mind, whether magical (as in the charm spell) or mundane (such as Charisma checks (Intimidation or Persuasion)).
For those who haven't taken the 30-40 mins to read the entire timeline, I should probably give a general overview of what it entails. The world has known relative peace for 40 years now since the end of the Chaos War, Solamnia is a united whole as a kingdom under its new king for the last 15 years, Drakas Solamnus, paladin of Paladine and Knight of Solamnia. Its dark counterpart, the nation of Neraka, has also grown strong in the intervening years, under the arm of the Dark Knights of Neraka, in its national capital of Sanction. Also having seen a great resurgence is the Empire of Ergoth, which has grown to a strength and prosperity not seen since prior to the Cataclysm. There is a tenuous peace between the 3 great powers, or perhaps one might say the stalemate of a cold war. (As national entities, Solamnia is LG, Ergoth is LN, and Neraka is LE) The elves have also taken back the reigns of their destiny, Qualinesti is thriving under Speaker of the Sun Gilthanas Kanan and his consort Silvara, and has full fledged alliances with the humans of Solamnia and the dwarves of Kayolin, as well as being on good terms with the Legion of Steel in Abanasinia. Silvanesti too has solidified, although now finds itself surrounded by enemies near its borders (the ogres and dark dwarves to the north, and the tarmak brutes to the southwest) and traditionally brooks no allies with the other nations of Ansalon, preferring to keep to themselves. The mountain dwarves have had a tumultuous time, having lost the realm of Thorbardin in an attack by the great wyrm red dragon Cinder leading a host of goblinoids, draconians, and other red dragons to invade the mountain. The surviving light-loving mountain dwarves of Thorbardin all relocated to the prosperous mountain dwarf realm of Kayolin which borders Solamnia, whilst the evil dark dwarves have consolidated in the reconstituted realm of Thoradin in the east. The kender have a new home, the island of Cristyne, nestled right in between the islands of Sancrist and Southern Ergoth. A treaty brokered by Solamnia made this possible after the Empire of Ergoth decided it wanted to claim its entire island of Northern Ergoth as their own. The gnomes are the gnomes, happily tinkering away under Mt Nevermind for their entire lives and pursuing their Life Quests.
The races list was chosen as it was to convey an old school D&D feel, and also for the fact that I place a high value on the verisimilitude of a setting. Most peoples experiences with minotaurs have been not good ones, either being raided or pirated from them, ergo a minotaur walking up to a human town is likely going to be barred from entry. Think of what Drizzt experienced for his first 20 years on the surface. Just out of curiosity, what are your character concepts for the minotaur and the irda? Dazzle me with creativity and we'll see. I will say, for people mulling over possible characters, I am most drawn to heroic natures and to classical archetypes. If one considers what that entails for Dragonlance, therein lies the sweet spot.
Hello folks, for the better part of a decade I have worked on a project, an idea for an alternate timeline originally presented in one of the 3.5 Dragonlance sourcebooks. The concept for said timeline is that at the end of the Chaos War, Takhisis doesn't steal the world. The gods aren't missing, magic doesn't disappear, there are no bloated alien dragon overlords, instead the world progresses naturally from the culmination of the Chaos War forward. I have taken this timeline, sculpted it, expanded it, honed it, and put an inordinate about of time, research, and effort into it. I give to you... Which brings me to here, I have been pondering on possibly running a game utilizing my work, and I wanted to gauge on whether there would be interest in such or not. Right now this is merely a hypothetical, but its good to see what potential there may be. The campaign would start in 423 AC, 40 years after the Chaos War. The game would be 5th Edition D&D. Available Races: Human (civilized or nomadic), Elf (Qualinesti, Silvanesti, or Kagonesti), Dwarf (Hylar, Daewar, Klar, or Neidar), Gnome, Kender, Half-Elf Available Classes:
Available Alignments: Any non-evil, good (preferred), neutral (permitted) Spells Available sources are Players Handbook, Xanathars Guide, and Tashas Cauldron Stats Everyone would use the set of 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, as well as the Tashas rule of choose a +2 and a +1 to a stat of your choice Optional Rules Feats: yes, multiclassing: no. All humans use the "variant human" statistics. I am also open to letting someone be a nomadic human of the barbarian tribes who uses the goliath racial abilities instead of the human ones. Some notes: Bards function essentially as specialty priests of art, music, and creativity in the way druids are specialty priests of nature. Bards tap into the primordial Song of Creation first sung by Branchala at the dawn of time. And no one can ever mistake a bard for any other kind of spellcaster as a bard must be singing or performing musically in some manner as a component to cast their spells. While any god can sponsor a bard, the 3 deities who are most apt to utilize bard followers are Branchala (for good bards), Sirrion (for neutral bards), and Hiddukel (for evil bards), although Gilean has a number of bards who specialize in being loremasters as venerators, and Kiri-Jolith has some College of Valor bards that serve him. As noted, Artificers are gnome only, and wholly technological, which would require some creativity on the players part to properly roleplay that (coming up with the gadgets, contraptions, widgets, etc that produce the "magical" effects). Factions one may with to join or pursue, Knights of Solamnia, Legion of Steel, Wizards of High Sorcery, Holy Orders of the Stars, Brass Tigers Mercenary Company If you are needing a refresher on Krynnish geography, here is a good map of Ansalon for you to peruse.
David Schwartz wrote:
Well said David, you have expertly surmised how I view fantasy settings. I think the core of the discussion falls to the age old nature vs nurture debate, and I would say for D&D its generally about 25% nature, 75% nurture.
Firstly, I just want to say really awesome blog piece, it hearkens to a lovely classic feel, a quality that made RotR as popular and everlasting as it has been. Into the other matter, the culture of a given race is really what the determining factor is. The vast majority of orcs are CE because their culture celebrates and demands that. Now, in the case of an orc baby whos found in the woods and raised at a monastery, well his alignment could be just about anything, because he has been allowed to grow without the demands placed upon him by his racial culture. Thats really what it all boils down to, demons are always THIS alignment because they are outsiders with an intrinsic creation that specifies such, humanoids aren't bound by such rules, but generally follow the culture of their racial norms. Its also why if you totally deconstruct the monolith, then everything just becomes "Humans with funny X", and thats doing a disservice to good worldbuilding.
Rysky wrote: Don’t get cheaper than “unavailable”. I'm well aware of its status on the Paizo site. I'm speaking of its accessibility through other avenues. It's usually priced for well over $200. PFRPGrognard wrote: Yeah, the secondary market prices are outrageous. I just shamelessly sold my collector's edition hardcover for over $300. No doubt the prices will drop once the pocket editions hit the shelves. Indeed, that is the hope my friend, we shall see.
Upon further contemplation, I have decided that if Paizo addresses the situation, and the feedback therein, and puts together an action plan for a solution to the matter, I will eagerly purchase this book in order to support good positive business practices. If they choose to stay silent on the matter, or offer only conciliatory regards with no plan of resolution or redevelopment, that will likely draw to a close my 8 year relationship with Paizo and Pathfinder. I have always celebrated this company for its openness and willingness to converse with its playerbase (especially via forum interactions), but if they ultimately prove unwilling to address things of this nature, it might constitute a shift in company practices to a direction that would deem my future support unwarranted. I hope the opposite will prove true. This ultimately may mean very little, as I stated in my last post I haven't played Pathfinder in a while, and the last Pathfinder product I purchased was a roughly a year ago. Perhaps the resolution to this and my subsequent purchase of the book would reinvigorate my Pathfinder spirit, after all blazing infernos start from the smallest kindling. But I figured it best to proverbially put my money where my mouth is. Good day all.
Rysky wrote:
Heh, negative, but I would have loved the symbolism of such an occurrence. I only mentioned it because something random brought me to the site today (I googled something regarding the Card Game), clicked on this thread, read a bit of the feedback, saw someone say something to the effect of "if you dont voice your opinion, you are irrelevant", not a viewpoint I agree with, but figured I would share my experience on the matter nonetheless.
I have been delving into the vast realm of other RPGs of late, trying out more obscure titles like Mythras and The One Ring, as well as playing in a 5E campaign, thus I haven't played Pathfinder in quite a while (nor have I been on these forums in a while either), but I had heard of this warrior shapeshifter class through the grapevine a little while back and the prospect of it made me a bit excited, I thought to myself "that sounds fun, it might be time to fire back up some Pathfinder again". The book comes out and I happen to be at my FLGS one day, so I pull it off the shelf to peruse (as I always do before a purchase), and flip straight to the Shifter, excited to delve into this new class, this new possibility. And then I read it, and the excitement leaves me, replaced by a sense of apathy, apathy not just for the class, but for any thought of reigniting Pathfinder in my RPG life. I put the book back on the shelf and leave the store with it unpurchased.
Reposting my previous message. I backed this Kickstarter at the $100 level and added another $85 in add ons (which I never specified, so Im guessing they could be used for whatever you want), but never played as I lost interest in the game direction (I kind of excitedly jumped in at "Pathfinder Video Game" at the time of the KS without really considering that FFA PVP is a game mechanic I just dont enjoy). So anyway I have a fresh account up for sale for any interested parties. Send me an offer, we'll work something out.
Thanks TOZ. Kind of a shame actually, I've really gotten into the DCC RPG lately, we had a blast with the character funnel especially, I would definitely have picked this up had it been for their system (plus I am a sucker for box sets, as my 2E AD&D collection attests). Perhaps they will do a Kickstarter to update this at some point.
Ciaran Barnes wrote:
I addressed smithing above good sir, but as for performance, I think you are looking at it just from the perspective of a content creator, and I dont disagree that charisma plays an important aspect in such, but I believe merely playing is based more on those motor skills. And many bards are singing and playing songs that have been around forever, ancient elven ballads, historical dwarven war chants, grand lyrical masterpieces of the old human empire, etc, i.e. stuff they havent created themselves. This is not me trying to disparage musical creativity in the slightest, just provide alternate perspective.
Cyrad wrote: Wait a minute. Smithing is a Strength-based skill? Have you ever seen the Man at Arms: Reforged series? A smithy isn't a muscle-head that whacks a lump of metal until it shaped the way he wants. Smithing is a mixture of art, science, and engineering. A smith has to know metallurgy, the physics of metal, and other technical knowledge. I was looking at it as the act of attributing skill points into the skill was learning the training/skill aspect of smithing, and being stronger just generally makes the work go more smoothly.
I've been going about reworking the Pathfinder skill list, expanding and consolidating some here and there, while keeping things grounded in verisimilitude and internal consistency, and I wanted to share and get some outside opinions on it. I will go over my thoughts on each skill removed and added. First the list: Acrobatics (Dex) (Armor Check Penalty)
Now I'll go into each skill that got removed or changed and my thoughts behind the process. Appraise: Folded into a new skill called Mercantile so as to widen its value, Mercantile covers appraising as well as all aspects of running a business and the practices therein.
Other notes: Crafting, Profession, and Performance are all list as "Var" which means it Varies on which is its governing stat. Each one will be based on the individual chosen subskill. For example smithing will be Str based, painting and other forms of artistry will be Dex based, alchemy will be Int based, etc. Same goes for profession, sage will be Int based, farmer will be Wis based, courtesan will be Cha based, etc. As for Performance, singing, acting, comedy, and oratory will all be Cha based, whereas the instrument ones will be Dex based.
Hit me with any feedback or suggestions you may have.
oyzar wrote: Hmm, I wonder if I should turn my kender into an umbral blade or a dragon fury eventually or if I should just stick with straight rogue. There aren't many advanced rogue talents that excite me, but I would be giving up sneak attack... Anyone got any thoughts or suggestions either way? The flavor of umbral blade speaks about the dark side of the moon, would that mean the dark evil moon for dragonlance? You should totally go with Kender Handler. :P
Terevalis Unctio of House Mysti wrote:
Hello shalafi my old friend, fancy seeing you here. ;)
Here is a good map of Ansalon before the Cataclysm, the timeframe we are playing in, although this one is from much later, just before the Cataclysm, as I dont believe Istar was around back in the time of the Third Dragon War. You can click on it to zoom in further. For contrast here is the post Cataclysm map circa the War of the Lance era.
I am so down, I want to play Drake Steelwind, a Human Knight of Solamnia, a Warder with the Ordained Defender archetype who multiclasses into Cleric of Paladine or Kiri-Jolith, and later on takes the Battle Templar prestige class. Would doing Quests of Virtue to progress from Crown Knight to Sword Knight to Rose Knight be a component in the game, or would we not delve into personal sidequests to keep the game flowing? Est Sularus oth Mithas
I backed this Kickstarter at the $100 level and added another $85 in add ons (which I never specified, so Im guessing they could be used for whatever you want), but never played as I lost interest in the game direction (I kind of excitedly jumped in at "Pathfinder Video Game" at the time of the KS without really considering that FFA PVP is a game mechanic I just dont enjoy). So anyway I have a fresh account up for sale for any interested parties.
Cylerist wrote: Human Warblade (adapted to PF as best we could) Do you guys know about Path of War? Its the Pathfinder update to the Tome of Battle.
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