Gastogh's page

There's a looot of this stuff. I'll post a few from our selection. We keep a record of our own on a wiki, though it's in Finnish so merely linking it wouldn't help much. Sorry if some have been posted before, I don't want to Ctrl+f my way through 400+ posts.

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An elven rogue of mine was forced to return to the site of a past failed mission. Given his

GM's hidden disguise rolls over three days (revealed later OOC): 3, 1, 4. The resulting disguise itself.

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Orpo (Finnish for 'orphan') is a Qinggong monk with many unusual powers, all of which are fluffed out to be the result of Special Training from Marcos Farabellus himself, who took Orpo under his wing for handpicked instruction. Marcos Farabellus is the light of Orpo's life, and for a brief point in Orpo's initially GM-blobby existence he considered himself a Cleric of Farabellus. Here's one of the Secret Techniques passed on to Orpo by his master.

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NPC bard: "Show them what Pathfinders are made of!"
Player 1: "Blood and guts. And shards of bone."
Player 2: "Sugar and spice?"
Player 3: "Cheese, of course!"

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Keenan, a very young half-orc sorcerer and freshly initiated agent of The Revolutionary Conspiracy, has a tenuous grasp on what his job entails:

Innkeeper: "Right, breakfast. What'll ya have?"
Keenan: "Are your eggs free range?!

As for what I want to see in PFS:

1. More proactively making things happen rather than preventing bad stuff from happening. Closing wounds in the world or stopping the Runelord is well and good and all, and someone should do it if no one else except some zany adventurers are up to it, but restoring status quo is a recurring motif I could do with seeing less often. What I really like to see is events that can be followed up on. Acquiring the Hao Jin tapestry was a wellspring of future plot developments, even above and beyond the whole Season already built around it. Forging relations with Magnimar and other cities/states/regions/organizations are likewise promising. Stopping the bad guys before anything happens feels... bland, in the long run and with enough repetitions.

2. I heartily approve of the increased amount of scenario-specific boons lately. XP and money are nice and all, but boons unique to what you've actually done are like a good old sticker on the side of your suitcase. You didn't just have an adventure related to who in the what-now, you talked to/fought gnolls in western Katapesh. I like that. Keep it coming!

3. More morally ambivalent choices that don't involve explicit bad guys. Even if this runs the risk of the characters having no clear reason to prefer one above the other, such as what happened to my group in

Regarding the Grand Lodge talk earlier:

3 of my 19 characters are GL. Two of them lived around the Mendev/Worldwound region and as such had front row seats to the high and mighty of Avistan ignoring the problem facing them all while the Society was one of the few players in the political field willing to go out of their way to fix things. Given that maintaining their operations there meant facing armies of demons, the whole "explore Jormurdun" thing felt rather a lot like a pretext rather than the real reason. It's pretty much my Top 1 piece of evidence that there's at least someone with half a conscience throwing their weight around within the Decemvirate. That and the fact that the Society was apparently the only bunch on Golarion with the spine and wherewithal to pull together a strike team to attack a Runelord.

Anyway, even those two characters of mine don't subscribe to the "Loyalty to the Decemvirate above all else" line, and that has seemed seriously dumb to me since the faction first came about. The Ten are, simply put, not the kind of figures that would inspire or command loyalty. Individual Venture Captains who have proven their worth and shown themselves getting their hands dirty? Maybe, on a case by case basis, though there's still some way to go until 'Loyalty to me above all else'. Torch in his workers'-rights aspect? Sure, I'll dig that. The Decemvirate? A bunch of anonymous shadow puppeteers, unaccountable and unavailable to anyone aside from a minuscule inside clique? Really?

On that thought, could one even create a character who's *justifiably* loyal specifically to the Ten without some serious Venture Captain-grade inside knowledge of what the Ten are up to? The more dealings my higher-level characters have had with the leadership of the Society, the more estranged they've grown from it. I didn't walk into those developments with a set course in mind, either.

Also, Grand Lodge totally is a default faction for folks that don't fit anywhere else. I don't remember how such things worked before the number of factions was bumped up from 5 to 10, but these days, you go register a character and it's opt-out from Grand Lodge. You want anything else, you'll have to manually affirm your preference.

The GL tagline just seems woefully detached from any basis in reality. A number of my characters, especially the experienced ones, have very real loyalties to their fellow Pathfinders - some even to the organization at large (cough Worldwound crusade cough). Given all the things agents go through on their missions, having some kind of in-group centered on Pathfinder solidarity is sensible enough. If solidarity sounds too sugary, there's careerism too - Captain titles, power, access to more resources, information...

As said before, though, the Decemvirate can go jump in a lake.

With gracelessly disguised discomfort caused by a twisted, otherworldly body build a touch or two too large for the chair he is seated in, a tiefling wizard clears his throat. He has come to the debriefing alone, but with his mismatched horns, matted patches of tangly hair spattered irregularly all over his body, rat's tail and stunted and twitching wings tucked between his robes and an already hunched back, Medeilysis is easy to remember and hard to mistake.

The curse breaker is still wearing full field gear, impractical mage's robes, bandoliers, endure elements and all. Aside from weariness and his chronically strained posture, he appears little worse for the wear, courtesy of copious castings of prestidigitation upon entering the lodge. Only the persistent smells of magic components and the desert still cling to him.

His voice is the same hoarse whisper as before, and his words still enunciated with the same meticulous care of a spellcaster who has had to work hard to make his throat create any coherent sounds at all. Skipping the pleasantries as is his wont, he begins,

"I should say first that the other agents all survived. Since they all received more wounds than I did or had other matters to attend to, it was determined I would deliver the report alone. I made notes along the way in case I were to forget some crucial detail later. You will find the more detailed report here." Medeilysis digs out a neat sheaf of papers from his Handy Haversack and places it on the Venture Captain's table without so much as disturbing the dust ubiquitous to every level surface inside the desert city.

"As for the abridged version, the main narrative runs as follows: some portion of the Jeweled Sages' power abides in the five gemstones from which they get their title. The ruby was broken and its shards temporarily invested some of its abilities on our group. Its remnants were left with the Diamond and Sapphire Sages, along with the topaz. The emerald is in the possession of Grandmaster Torch. The two remaining Jeweled Sages are working to restore their order.

"Regarding the last, the course of the Sages' future came to a vote, in which I, Pêlakouél Malcha-Betharsism-hed-Beruah-Schehalim, Dien Weefiresoul, Kirimomi, Raket Willow and Ta-weret of the River Junira were included on account of the Ruby Sage's spirit residing in us. Because the two Sages did not agree, we held the deciding vote. The matter had boiled down to which of the two Sages would take a preeminent role in the new order, and with four against one with one abstaining, we voted in favor of Amenopheus. While this may work to the Society's favor in the near or far future, the more immediate concern is still Grandmaster Torch and his possession of the emerald."

After delivering his report and answering any questions the Venture Captain deems important enough pose then and there, Medeilysis shuffles out of the room to pursue his studies.

I played the warpriest of Iomedae. What follows is not a systematic run-through of all its abilities, but should get my feelings across clearly enough.

I see the class as a decent addition to the pool. It occupies another slot in the continuum between fighter and cleric (Ftr-Pal-Warpriest-Cle), but distinguishes itself from the others enough to be a legitimate option. The typical warpriest will probably fill the niche the used to be occupied by more combat-oriented clerics - meaning you'll get exactly what it says on the tin, I guess.

The minor blessings mean that you have something to do in (and occasionally out of) combat that's not just wielding run-of-the-mill spells or weapons. This means you're not just occupying a strip of middle ground between two Core classes, but actually have something unique to bring to the table. Only being able to use your two blessings a grand total of three times at level one is a bit of a drag, but the fixed one-minute duration patches that up somewhat. And of course, you don't have to hang on to your daily blessings quite as religiously as 1st-level paladins have to do with their Smite.

Second, because of the weapon and armor proficiencies you get, you have an easier time contributing to fights in a meaningful way than ye olde combat cleric-types. The free Weapon Focus you get at level 1 compensates a bit for that BAB +0, and you don't have to use up a feat if you want to wear heavy armor.

Because you get both a free-choice Combat Feat and a free Weapon Focus at level one, the class might become a popular multiclass dip for all manner of combat-oriented classes, despite having to sacrifice one point of BAB in the process. You can also stick with a single-class warpriest and not have to mourn the decision, since the class isn't particularly front-loaded and you don't have to wait until level X to get your candy.

The end result is that you can go all kinds of ways with this class: buffer, healer, tank, or damage-dealer. Being able to do this without cobbling your build together from a bunch of archetypes and half a dozen different Ultimate Whatever-books is great. The class has versatility from level 1 onwards, and I think players will be quite happy with their warpriests.

8th-level Tetoris' Graceful Grappler gives them the Grab special ability. Creatures with grab receive a +4 bonus on combat maneuver checks made to start and maintain a grapple. However, a Tetori has to use ki in order to use their Grab.

The question: is the +4 bonus to grappling active even when not using ki, or is to be used only with grapple checks gained through the ki-powered Grab attacks?

Reviving this topic in the hope of getting official confirmation one way or the other.