I could probably get behind a small monthly subscription fee for this - say $4.99/mo like the old 4E D&D Insider - but paying hundreds of dollars to "unlock" books I already own when there are already far more competitive character builders out there? Best of luck to the devs, but seems a bit delusional to me.
Thank you for all that you've done; wishing you the very best and a well-deserved retirement!
Well, the Great Wheel cosmology has this conflict as well, between the Tanar'ri and the Obyriths (qlippoths are totally just the Pathfinder conversion/adaptation of obyriths.)When the Blood War debuted, Obyriths either weren't a thing, or were so different that the retcon has warped my memory... You're not wrong. Obyriths were defined in 3.5, though it was retconned that many of the non-tanar'ri demons were Obyriths or Obyrith lords, a primordial class of demons pre-dating the tanar'ri.
Well... Demons have Qlippoth to mess with right at home. Two forms of Chaotic Evil that absolutely despise one another- without getting into Demon on Demon conflict (Look at Lamashtu and Pazuzu: They aren't teaming up to take on the good guys at all). Well, the Great Wheel cosmology has this conflict as well, between the Tanar'ri and the Obyriths (qlippoths are totally just the Pathfinder conversion/adaptation of obyriths.) I always wondered something: Why is there a difference between demons, devils, and "daemons"? Well, they are different fiendish beings from different cultures (daemons are their own thing). When they were initially coming up with the planar cosmology of D&D, the idea was that there was a plane that corresponded with each alignment. Outsiders were made for each to fit, and they were just kinda' arbitrarily chosen.
Our table adds Con *score* to starting hit points (as 4th edition did), and that hasn't presented any problems. Monsters get the same benefit, so it just smooths out combat in the early levels and makes it so that a PC can't be easily killed in one shot due to an unlucky crit.
Aroden. Hands-down, no contest. The Ascended pantheon are actually my favorite deities in Pathfinder, but Aroden riles me unlike anything else in Golarion lore. And it's not really Aroden's fault - he's actually fine - it's Paizo's fault. Because for some reason, Paizo decided to do a J.J. Abrams-style mystery box with regards to the death of Aroden, and they did so in the most infuriating way possible. If Paizo's official stance was, "The death of Aroden is a mystery, and while we have our own official answer, we're never going to use it or release it, so you should feel free to explore it for your personal games without fear that we'll release something that would invalidate the events of your home game," that'd be totally fine with me. Likewise, if their stance was, "The death of Aroden is a mystery, and we will explore it in a future Adventure Path at some point," that'd also be totally fine with me. Instead, the official stance is that, "The death of Aroden is a mystery, and we may or may not ever release our official answer," which incenses me beyond a reasonable or rational degree to which I should care. Paizo seems oblivious to the fact that there are some people who care very, very deeply about canonical lore. If it's a space that's open to personal exploration, that's awesome, if it's a space that's well-defined, that's awesome, if it's a space that we know *will* be definitely, totally cool: each of those creates boundaries within which characters and stories can be explored. Aroden occupies a very different space, in which the mystery surrounding Aroden actively removes the ability to explore any creative space surrounding a pivotal moment in Golarion lore. And for that, he's a terrible deity.
Probably Uskyeria, the empyrael lord of hunting, prudence, and slumber; the bear is Uskyeria's sacred animal, and the domains seem to fit fairly well. http://aonprd.com/DeityDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Uskyeria In Tian Xia, I'd imagine Tsukiyo (in his aspect as god of the moon) would probably receive the worship of werebears.
Not only are Pathfinder Bards fantastic, but Paizo also did an incredible job exploring and utilizing the 6-level caster space (which WotC severely under-utilized). In fact, 6-level casting classes are all easily my favorite in the game, and bard is near the top of that list (along with alchemist).
Alright, I'm going to attempt to contribute a constructive post, here. Piccolo, if you're concerned about the power level of a Rogue, then honestly Pathfinder is probably a poor fit for your gaming preferences. You may prefer to get and stay up to date on the Work-in-Progress that is Pathfinder 2.0, or you may prefer the lower power level of 5th Edition Dungeons & Dragons. The reason that you're receiving the kind of reactions you are is because your concern is honestly absurd - and I don't mean that to mock or upset you. A well-built rogue is literally one of the weakest martial options that a player could bring to your table. At this stage in Pathfinder's life cycle, there are literally hundreds of builds out there (that are not that difficult to make) that out-damage a rogue. Seriously. Literally hundreds. I was going to say dozens, and then I just started doing the math. So - honest answer - if rogue concerns you, then Pathfinder is just not your game, mate.
Where is AM BARBARIAN when you need him?
In 40some years of roleplaying game practice. FInd me any paladin of Iomedae who recognizes the legitimacy of the current Chelaxian gummint... I'm not even sure Abadarites do. Sorry to Necro your comment, Klorox, I just wanted to point out that there are, in fact, some Order of the Godclaw Hellknight Paladins. Even more specifically, Queen Galfrey has a claim to the Chelaxian throne, is a paladin of Iomedae, and recognizes the legitimacy of Chelaxian rule. Even *more* pressing, Iomedae is, well... Iomedae - and she voluntarily works with Asmodeus out of respect of his legitimacy.
Their orientation should invert, but they wouldn't fall - an air walking character can be knocked prone, but they treat the air beneath them as a solid surface. I would probably have them make an Acrobatics check to avoid falling prone as they adjust to their new orientation - probably a DC 10 or 15 or so.
Could this be achieved by a slight tweak to your lich? An alchemical lich with the master chymist PrC achieves this dichotomy pretty well. Lichdom as an expression/alternative of the search for the mythical philosopher's stone is also pretty thematically appropriate. In fact, the Mutagenic Form class feature is so slippery, that not only does the mutagenic personality have a different alignment, but can also appear as an entirely different race - perhaps even appearing alive? For further fun, maybe the mutagenic personality is the one that went through the process of becoming a lich and it's the primary personality that's still Good?
This is a great point for me to repeat what I said in my last post, but from another angle. Playing the same character endlessly sounds *INCREDIBLY* boring to me. From a story perspective - not a game balance one - one of my greatest joys in playing D&D has been giving my characters a satisfying conclusion to their adventure. Our game world is also persistent, meaning that while I may move on and play a new character, my old characters are still there, doing whatever it was that they were doing. Noviliel, my character from Rise of the Runelords, founded the country of Storval, using Xin-Shalast as her new capitol. I feel immense satisfaction every time I think of her ruling her new nation, and I know it's taking up a ton of her time. She's busy; her adventuring days are behind her. Gulthor, my Hellknight from Wrath of the Righteous? He founded a new Hellknight order (the Order of the Lesion) and then ascended to become the new demigod of the Hellknights. And when we looked to Hell's Rebels, our group smiled with satisfaction at the knowledge that our Hellknight formerly of the Order of the Godclaw, and our Mythic Paladin of Iomedae surely were behind the Glorious Reclamation in some capacity. But he's mega-retired. He's building a demiplane, building his following, building his church - he's busy, and his adventuring days are behind him. Frag, my goblin alchemist from Iron Gods? He ended the campaign with a 44 Intelligence, and became a slum lord ruling over Scrapwall in Numeria, where he and his cohort continue to work at unlocking the secrets of creating the Philosopher's Stone. He's busy, and his adventuring days are behind him. And each of these three characters - three of dozens that I've played over the years - are so different, so unique, so fun to play. Living out their little lives - the very essence of roleplaying - was so fun, so pleasurable. My current character, Lossenmel, is a lazy, mercurial, quick-to-anger/quick-to-laughter alcohol-themed alchemist. All he wants to DO is escort Ameiko to become Empress of Minkai so that he can live out the rest of his days on a fat, cushy retirement. His whole goal is to retire. I'll smile fondly when I think back to him lazing about in the lap of luxury, too. And I have more characters whose lives I want to explore. I want to know what makes them tick, I want to know what challenges them, I want to know where they excel. I want to explore their relationships with their new friends - I want to experience the new characters that my friends' imaginations have produced. I want them to succeed... and I want them to have their reward at the end of their journey. My opinion of the statements that you've made thus far are that you have an extremely elitist attitude of your preferences rather than simply asking what game system would be a good fit for those preferences, while accepting that there are a large number of role-playing systems for a reason. Someone out there is willing to cater to yours, and you've received earnest, helpful advice trying to lead you there. Instead, you just seem to want to put down those that enjoy PF/D&D for its method of storytelling. Yes, game balance is *part* of that equation - as I said, it is THE core, fundamental principle behind PF/D&D. Game balance is not an enemy to storytelling, and it's baffling to me that you think that limitations somehow hold storytelling back. As I said, characters are defined by their weaknesses as much as their strengths. It sounds to me like you want to play multiplayer Skyrim. And honestly, I think that's okay - I bet it'd be a blast. I have good news for you, Bethesda is hoping to sell you Fallout 76 soon, complete with built-in griefing so that high level characters can prove their "superiority" over the little pissant noobs. D&D/PF is not the game to explore the method of character fantasy that you're seeking.
A character that can do anything or that can do everything sounds *INCREDIBLY* boring to me. Characters are defined by their limitations and weaknesses as much as they are their strengths. D&D/PF is built around the concept that individual characters are insufficient to overcome all challenges - relying on a well-crafted *party* that works cooperatively to overcome the campaign's obstacles is the CORE design philosophy at the center of D&D. If you're interested in a free-form roleplaying system - as others have already suggested - they are many and plentiful. I would encourage you, in fact, to check them out. Our group found BESM/the Tri-Stat system to be a terribly entertaining diversion a decade or so ago. D&D/Pathfinder is not your game if that's what you're looking to do. And in fact, after dipping our toes in the waters of RPGs that diverge from D&D, our group - that has *also* been playing together over twenty years (not sure why you keep repeating that as though it lends particular weight to your arguments) - made the conscious decision that gaming was more fun for us *with* those inherent limitations than it was without them. I find it shocking that - for someone who has played RPGs for so long - that you *haven't* ever been curious about trying other RPG systems until now. You really missed out on the RPG boom of the late nineties/early 2000's.
And once again fortune exists for a reason. Wow, over four years later and you're still repeating the same opinion as though your interpretation was the only valid one. You've posted the same opinion 26 times now in this thread (I counted). Out of 90 posts, nearly a third of them are you repeating yourself. It's time to walk away from this one; I think we can all figure out what your thoughts are on misfortune at this point.
Speaking for our group, our plan is that now that we'll have a stable, complete, finished version of the game, our focus is going to be on house rules. We're planning on taking a massive run at classes, archetypes, and feats and doing a rebalance appropriate for our table and cutting out a lot of fat to make a really lean system for our future games. Like DaveMage, above, I'm not particularly interested in new content, as for us, the existence of a "Definitive Version" of PF1E gives us the elbow room to make these adjustments without worry that our alterations will be affected by future content.
The word "worship" has no mechanical meaning in Pathfinder. Certain classes/feats have their own inherent restrictions that may force a character to be a particular alignment or set of alignments. From James Jacobs on the subject. Venerate and worship are synonymous with regards to Pathfinder. Not to bring our world into a gaming discussion, but people have historically done hideous, abominable things in the name of "good" Earthly deities and were "pious" and "devoted" in their own minds, following what they truly believed were the teachings of their deity. There is nothing in Pathfinder to prevent this kind of character. The GM thinks it's an interesting idea. Maybe it wouldn't fly at your table, but it's going to at theirs. Playing such a character could be a fascinating roleplaying opportunity. It is highly probable that the character will find themselves in an interesting scenario as a result of this disconnect.
the GM liked it, and it sounds fun to me, so I'm gonna run it This is half of what's important; the other half is making sure that the rest of your table likes the concept too! Once you have the buy-in from your group, that's really all you need. Sounds totally reasonable to me, though. No reason a character can't be a hypocrite - happens in life all the time.
Agreed; time to lock this thread.
I'll share what might be a controversial opinion, but it's true for my group of 7+ (that have been gaming together for over twenty years): we don't give a crap what gaming stores do, and have no interest in stepping foot into another comic book store. We buy all of our books/PDFs online, and couldn't be happier. Additionally, as a passionate supporter of PF1E, I am also confident and comfortable with the fact that PF1E is about to die. Paizo has released such volumes of material that we could continue playing PF1E for decades, and the fact that they'll continue to sell us copies in digital form years from now is more than I could ask for. Paizo can't do what you're asking for. If they're going to survive, they need to innovate and move forward. I may not have personally agreed with their decision to move to 2E, but it's done.
I agree that this is probably the only way that it can work. One of the most memorable roleplaying sessions our group ever had included some light PvP: Storytime:
One of the PCs was a dhampir, but none of the other PCs knew. As players, it was a huge table joke that the rest of the party had suspicions that the dhampir PC was, in fact... a werewolf.
So one session, the party rogue gets it in her head that she's going to "out" him as a werewolf. At a fancy dinner party, she pockets a silver table knife. Once she gets the party alone with him, she brandishes the knife and demands that the dhampir allow her to stab him with it. Her logic being that if the knife injured him, then he's *obviously* a werewolf (yes, ignoring the fact that a normal human would also be injured if they were stabbed by a silver knife). A small chase/skill challenge ensues, at the end of which, the rogue throws the knife at the dhampir bard. Natural 20. Deals MASSIVE damage. The party helped him up, cleaned his wounds, and told him they'd do whatever they could to help him with his lycanthropy, and that they understood why he was scared to come out to the party. You have to understand that the entire time, the whole table is practically rolling with laughter, including - and most importantly - the player that was attacked. Those are the only kinds of situations we've had PvP come into play; when all the players are involved, everyone is on-board, and it's almost always played to comedic effect.
Earliest entry looks 7th level with 5 levels of wizard and one martial. A Sohei Monk 1 / Empyreal Sorcerer 6 can go into EK at 8th and get wisdom to casting and armor. I am currently playing one and let me tell you, a Sorc 2 / Monk 1 is a slow burn. I hope to survive these early levels. I dumped str and cha to boost my wis and dex and I just weapon finesse so now I can land punches. With this build you'll eventually want monk robes to boost your ac. Earliest entry is actually Wizard 5/Eldritch Knight 1 with VMC Battle Oracle and the Skill at Arms Revelation. However, based on the double feats houserule above, I can't imagine that VMC is allowed at OP's table since it would - well - be pretty OP (pun intended).
The other way to go is Variant Multiclass Cavalier (Order of the Stars) - the feature you get at 7th level is bananas for an oradin. I think one of the strongest builds is to go Life Oracle 4/Paladin 2 or 4 (4 if Hospitaler)/Holy Vindicator 10 with VMC Cavalier (Order of the Stars).
I think that you and "most of your DM's" (how many is that exactly? Sounds like an exaggeration meant to serve as an appeal to authority) are being completely unreasonable. As many have already stated, Paizo made dipping *easier* than it was in 3.0/3.5 (the base rules from which PF is built), so if anything the RAI support the opposite assertion. I'm a DM and player; our group allows combined multiclassing and variant multiclassing (as well as fractional base bonuses, which I highly recommend), and while I wouldn't call anyone at our table a power gamer, we do like to build effective characters that fulfill their character fantasy (and we often use the excellent Bench-Pressing: Character Creation by the Numbers article as a way of measuring whether our builds are "effective"). Despite allowing so much freedom, the party for our Jade Regent campaign (in which I'm the DM) is: * Dwarven Red Tongue Skald 8/VMC Order of the Flagon Cavalier
Only one character has done any dipping, only one with a Prestige Class, and only one VMC. And the above pattern is pretty common across all of our parties (and not typical to specific players).
Not sure how much my voice will be heard as I've already been pretty vocal in my disinterest of PF2E, but as someone that always digs really deep into the lore of the campaign settings that I play, I want to add my voice to the din that disapproves of adding goblins as a Core race. I even played a goblin PC in our Iron Gods campaign, and he was a fantastic addition to the party! But Golarion goblins, by and large, are so nasty, evil, and vicious, that this is a MASSIVE retcon to attempt to push onto people. Even your newer gamers, who we've all heartily pointed towards Rise of the Runelords as the "gold standard" of Adventure Paths, are aware that this is just not a good fit. I really hope that you'll listen to what your passionate gamers are saying and reconsider putting goblins in the CRB as a core race. Absolutely introduce them as a playable race in future material, but leave them out of Core.
It's interesting being on the opposite side of an edition change. I was on the other side of the 3.5/4E break. Now it looks like I'm in the 2E camp. Amusingly, our group migrated to 4E before feeling utterly screwed over by WotC after they abandoned it so quickly (mechanically, I actually loved 4E), and we switched to Pathfinder. I felt that with the end-of-life of 4E, WotC was actually actively sabotaging their product to drive people away from it. Paizo's handling of the transition is so much more respectful.
Please see the FAQ, especially the question But I don't want to change editions! I want to play Pathfinder First Edition forever and ever and ever! Thank you for your response; this is extremely exciting! Compared to some of your competitors who have had a business model of "burn the old edition to the ground to force everyone to switch to the new edition", this is a tremendous relief - after all, it's the reason many of us switched to Paizo in the first place. Although I'm not interested in PF2E, your decision to continue to offer your legacy content has further cemented Paizo as my gaming company of choice, very well done! I assume that the forums will continue to exist in some form? The Adventure Path forums, in particular, are invaluable, especially to GMs (not to mention the wonderful community there). (This might seem a silly question to ask for those that aren't familiar, but a certain competitor of Paizo is notorious for wiping their forums completely and starting over when switching to a new edition, and I'd hate to see that happen here.) Lastly - and I'm sorry to be such a bother - with Pathfinder First Edition entering its final year, can we expect to see a release of the Harrowed Medium before it goes to the grave with PF1E? Please. Release it as a .pdf, for free in a blog post, anything. Don't just let the Harrowed Medium rot in a folder somewhere. Please let us have it.
Although I don't expect Paizo to continue to create new content for PF "1", do you plan to continue to sell material for the original version of Pathfinder (particularly Adventure Paths)? I, like many others, have active disinterest in switching to a new version of the game, but there are still decades left of AP's left for our group to explore, and we'd like to continue supporting your company, even if we don't go down this road with you.
Welcome to being a GM. If you want the PCs to always do what you want so that your story plays out perfectly the way you've mentally prepared, you should look into creative writing and write a fantasy novel. The character's actions seem entirely justified. Have you ever seen The Hills Have Eyes? That's what we're talking about when ogres enter the conversation. Fuzzypaws said it best:
As has been mentioned, this is a world of magic, where the forces of evil have the nasty habit of becoming undead. In this case, chopping up the corpse is prudent and done in the name of trying to prevent further evil from rising.
a raging unchained barbarian android would be cool! I'll name him Win10. He got his barbarian powers when an update went awry... his 'mother' had the same problem but was a mostly comatose high level witch with a blue veil known as 'Blue-Screen-of-Death' as she had a lot of XP.She really must have enjoyed looking at the Vista outside her home. I think this character could really excel.
You're in Advice, not Rules Questions, so I'm going to say, "Ask Your GM". Our group does allow archetypes to stack, provided they don't "interfere" (as Sean K Reynolds and some other devs do in their home games), so we'd allow this, though we're aware that it's very clearly against RAW. Arguing that it isn't and trying to browbeat helpful forum users into agreeing with you is not going to help your argument. A better question might be to ask something along the lines of, "Would this be too powerful?" or "Do you think it's fair to ask if I can do this?". As to whether it's too powerful? Maybe/Probably. Depends on your group, really. They are each top-tier archetypes *already*, without any need for stacking them. If you're combining two top-tier archetypes, it's probably too strong.
This seems the kind of thing that might have more repercussions with the mortal followers of a deity; I can't imagine a deity caring unless it's a truly major and despicable offense (even then, the response is more likely to be from agents of the deity than any reaction from the deity itself.) If the players burn down a church of Erastil and try to blame it on the church of Asmodeus (or vice-versa), they may have both angelic and infernal agents on their trail, but I can't imagine Asmodeus or Erastil directly smiting them.
Ragechemist, Brute, and Majordomo are the three obvious top contenders, which have all been mentioned, but I'm surprised not to see Sleuth and Metamorph listed, both of which trade away your spellcasting.
I went digging for it a while back and didn't have much success. I had it on an old hard drive, but I haven't tried digging out the old thing. I'd also love a copy if someone has it to share. I'm still far more interested in buying the Harrowed Medium from Paizo, of course... Edit: I'm an idiot. It wasn't on my old computer, it was on my phone's SD card. I hope it's okay to post this? (Should be, I believe all these pieces are available on public sources, and the original download was free for public use.) https://drive.google.com/file/d/1t_cImakJn2oSRpEnluZUGcqVEaMEt_T2/view?usp= drivesdk I'll start working on extrapolating a fan version this week/weekend.
I've been meaning to share this for some time, but after a recent eureka moment while preparing to run The Hungry Storm, I was finally inspired to write up a forum post. I'm aware that we're rather late to Jade Regent, but these forums have been incredibly useful for me - particularly threads like this one. Early on while preparing for Jade Regent, I did a lot of research into Tian Xia in addition to reading though the AP. I almost immediately latched on to the story of Shizuru, Tsukiyo, and Fumeiyoshi, but was disappointed to discover that they are hardly mentioned prior to The Empty Throne, when I feel that their story is the heart of the entire Adventure Path. Looking at the AP as a whole, I saw a divine play or proxy war, where the chosen of Fumeiyoshi (the Five Storms, led by Anamurumon) stood in direct opposition to the five imperial families of Shizuru, all warring over the throne created by Shizuru's love and Fumeiyoshi's greatest rival. I immediately wanted to reframe the background of the adventure path with this ancient rivalry standing at the center of it. In order to do that, I needed to fill in some blanks. We find that Shizuru granted the five imperial families the divine right to rule in 100AR, but little is known of who the patriarchs of these five families were, or why they were deserving of such a gift. Five Heavenly Knights:
I decided that these five patriarchs were the Five Heavenly Knights, figures of legend in Tian lore, who completed an ancient quest in Shizuru's name, thus earning the favor of the goddess (basically, they were an old adventuring group - I always love these little nods to old adventuring parties) and receiving her divine gift. This also fits well with the naming of the Shrine of Heavenly Sovereigns in the Empty Throne.
We also know that Tsukiyo then crafted the Jade Throne itself as an additional gift for Shizuru's champions. As I mention above, I cannot imagine a more natural reaction for the god of envy and enemy of both Shizuru and Tsukiyo to immediately covet Minkai and wish to claim it for himself. As god of the oni, I envisioned that he set his own plan in motion. As Shizuru granted her divine favor to the five Imperial families, Fumeiyoshi imbued his divine power into five powerful yai - the Five Storms - each one representing one of the five mythical elements: Earth, Fire, Wind, Water, and Void. The Five Storms:
This also obviously represents a significant lore change. In the core Adventure Path, the Five Storms is simply a name for the band of oni led by Anamurumon, but it seems to be a common sentiment and source of confusion that the Five Storms should refer to five specific, powerful oni. When developing the concept above, this was a space I deeply wished to explore.
I knew that Anamurumon would undergo a significant upgrade to a Void Yai (actually quite befitting the backstory given to him on page 7 of the Empty Throne), and was the last of the Five Storms yai imbued with power by Fumeiyoshi and tasked to supplant the five Imperial families. This also helps fill what I considered an odd timetable as explained in the Forest of Spirits with regards to the oni trapped inside the House of Withered Blossoms (though I also decided that I'd arbitrarily move their escape to several centuries earlier rather than only a few decades, considering that Minkai was founded over 4,000 years prior to the start of the AP.) A Mythic Upgrade:
I also decided that the Imperial Seals imbued their chosen heirs with mythic power (we like the mythic rules) - though I also made a distinction between the heir apparent and the scions granted power by the seal - so while Ameiko would gain mythic ranks, the Amatatsu scions (the PC's) would merely be granted the Marked for Glory and Mythic Companion feats as bonus feats. Part of the reason for this was that I knew I'd want to spice up my Five Storms yai with mythic ranks to make them stand out as Fumeiyoshi's chosen. I had all of the above planned before we played our first session of the Brinewall Legacy, but something has been nagging me that I only just figured out a solution for. Katiyana the Wind Yai:
I don't know why, but Katiyana in the Hungry Storm has bothered me ever since I first read about her. The very title of the book suggests a tie-in with the Five Storms; I envisioned a powerful oni working to ensure that the Amatatsu heir would never survive a trek across the Crown of the World. Instead, we get a strange villain-of-the-week, with an unconnected story and motive that coincidentally serves to further the goals of the Five Storms. Knowing that I wanted to make the above changes, I knew that I wanted to change Katiyana to be one of the titular Five Storms yai.
I'd already determined that Munasukaru (the oni left in charge of the House of Withered Blossoms, described as "the least of the Five Storms") was going to be my Earth Yai - after all, Munasukaru and an Earth Yai already share the same CR, so it seemed a natural fit. I'd also already determined that I wanted Nigankona, the Fire Yai oni that appears at the finale of Tide of Honor, to be the next of the Five Storms yai met by the PC's. I imagined that his entrance and confrontation as described on pages 48 and 49 to not be at Anamurumon's behest, but his own arrogant decision - taking matters into his own hands, so to speak. Lerrasuwa, the Water Yai referenced on page 63 of the Empty Throne was an obvious choice to take a more prominent role in my revised adventure. I decided to insert her encounter on page 14 of the Empty Throne, as the party attempts to travel by boat to the Shrine of Heavenly Sovereigns - it made sense to me that she would wish to ensure that the party could not pass the Torii Gates and gain entrance to the island. Anamurumon was my Void Yai, appropriately reserved for the final encounter of the Adventure Path. And as it turned out, the Wind Yai's description and powers seemed a perfect fit for Katiyana.
*Tell me* that doesn't sound like the kind of villain that would be trying to wrest control of the morozkos and turn them into weapons! It was everything that I wanted; a *perfect* replacement for Katiyana as-written. Katiyana's later possession of a yeti could simply be her re-forming as a yeti-based oni instead. There was just one little problem... Wind Yai are CR 16. I'd shelved this problem for months, waiting until I had to deal with it. This Sunday, I start running The Hungry Storm, so it was time to work it out. And the solution was so simple and elegant that I nearly smacked myself for not figuring it out sooner. The Katiyana that the party will meet at the Crown of the World will simply be a simulacrum of Katiyana. A simulacrum of an oni that has been working at the Crown of the World for near a century. And thus, even when defeated, it has been an oni for so long, that the simulacrum is granted true status as an oni, and re-manifests as a yeti oni. This of course left the *real* Katiyana to make her true appearance in a later adventure; as I plan to run the Ruby Phoenix Tournament during Tide of Honor, I think I will have her try to intercept the party before they can claim their treasure (a weapon wielded by one of the Heavenly Knights). So that's it! I was so excited to have figured out how to make Katiyana my Wind Yai that I just had to share the entire rework.
Baba Yaga, for instance, makes the cut. She's CR30, has been considered among the Eldest in the past, is level 20/mythic tier 10, has three instances of Divine Source (and is therefor able to grant access to four domains and four subdomains), but she chooses not to grant spells. First World - Realm of the Fey page 37 disagrees with you on Baba Yaga never being counted among the Eldest. I could swear I'd read something about her having Divine Source and electing not to grant spells to her worshipers, possibly on the James Jacobs thread, but I can't find it (and it's not terribly important in any case.) Generally, I agree with you. Mostly my point was that she could make the cut if she chose to and she chooses not to, versus Razmir who's "choosing to", but doesn't make the cut.
Cayden, Norgorber, and Iomedae are all ascended mortals that passed the Test of the Starstone, achieving demigod status (that's what the Starstone does.) They were each demigods for long enough that they ascended even further beyond being mere demigods. Also note that Cayden ascended in 2765 - nearly 2000 years before the current default assumed year of 4717. Immortality has absolutely nothing to do with godhood. Many PC classes can achieve basic immortality as a level 20 capstone. Razmir is flat-out a level 19 human wizard, that's it. He's no more a demigod than any other CR 18 creature - again, far below the actual demigod requirements I listed above (CR 25+, able to grant 4 domains and 4 subdomains.) Choosing whether or not to grant spells also doesn't adjust whether or not a creature qualifies as a demigod. Baba Yaga, for instance, makes the cut. She's CR30, has been considered among the Eldest in the past, is level 20/mythic tier 10, has three instances of Divine Source (and is therefor able to grant access to four domains and four subdomains), but she chooses not to grant spells. In any case, based on this thread and the baby one that you posted, coupled with your responses, I'm pretty sure at this point that you're trolling the generally helpful people on the Paizo boards. On the off-chance that you're not, hopefully the above information is helpful for you.
The Iron Gods:
Neither of the Iron Gods are actually gods - they're not even demigods, they're just mythic creatures with the Divine Source mythic feature.
In fact, the whole point of the adventure is that Unity is trying to ascend to become an actual deity, so even Unity is aware that it isn't one. In order to be considered a living demigod, Razmir would need to be level 20, mythic tier 10, and have taken three instances of the Divine Source mythic feature, which he has not done (we can assume that mechanically, this is the way that Irori and Nethys probably ascended.) Alternatively, passing the Test of the Starstone also grants immediate demigod status. All demigods must be at least CR 25 and be able to grant access to four domains and four subdomains. It's the actual requirement to be considered a demigod. Razmir flat-out doesn't make the cut.
It ducks when your party can go in more than 4 fights and still have spells and stuff.Why? Awful calm of you there, Tableflip.
Pathfinder 2.0 is the day I stop playing. Invalidate my shelf and I'll just walk away. More "Unchained" rules would be perfectly acceptable.
Just popping in to add my obligatory statement that: if Paizo launches PF 2.0, I'll never buy another product from them again. As Brother Fen eloquently put above, the day you invalidate my shelf is the day you lose me (and my 8-player gaming group) as a customer. We'll continue to play, but we will no longer buy new Paizo products. I will *vindictively* go out of my way to purchase used physical copies of products (which will be effortless as PF players purge their libraries) to ensure that Paizo doesn't receive a dime. Paizo got my business *because* I was a disgruntled 3.5 player. I did it to WotC, I'll do it to Paizo.
Our group (clearly) quite likes the mythic rules, but as players, we tend to take more flavorful options rather than the abilities that make us more effective in combat (probably half or fewer powers/feats are spent that route). We all tend to play well-built characters, but we heavily self-regulate. So it really depends on the group.
Lady-J, I was going to respond to your post, but I've sent you a PM instead, because this isn't the place for that conversation. Let's respect the purpose of this thread and stay on-topic, while being respectful to our fellow gamers. I think this thread was doing quite well before getting derailed. The topics of sex and sexuality are being discussed here pretty openly without moderation.
My approach has been very similar to this. Occasionally, my character's sexuality is part of their character concept (I've played a character that was part of a husband/wife duo, and another character that was designed as a flamboyant playboy vigilante), but much of the time, the character ends up "telling me" their sexuality over time through roleplay. I was extremely surprised to discover, for instance, that one of my most iconic characters (Gulthor, my Hellknight in Wrath of the Righteous) was gay. I hadn't given any thought to his sexuality until he was hit on by a female NPC and I realized that he had absolutely no interest in women at all, and would be far more interested and comfortable in the presence of other men. I've had asexual, bisexual, and homosexual characters over the years, though as a cisgendered heterosexual male, most of my characters tend to default to cisgendered heterosexual characters.
RDM42, I'm sure you think you are helping, but you really aren't. You're just making yourself look like a jerk. Don't be a jerk. It's literally the first rule of these boards.So the general gist here is: people who don't like them can spout off and go in all sorts of tangential directions that have nothing to do with helping the original poster, but anybody chiming in the other direction is 'being a jerk'. You're not contributing to the conversation, though. My first post was to share the fumble rules that we utilized in our game that seemed "fair", and to share the reasons why we eventually stopped using them. Others have provided opinions and analyses on why fumble rules are bad (relevant to the OP), or have shared what fumble systems have worked for them in the past as well as positive things that fumbles have brought to their gaming table (relevant to the OP). It's not even clear what your position is on fumbles, as you haven't actually offered up any advice to the OP on a functional fumble system that their GM might be be willing to pick up instead of their current one; you're just attacking other arguments that are against fumbles - which *could* mean you're pro-fumbles? EDIT: In any case, I've flagged a number of your posts in this thread, and I'm hopeful a mod will be able to tidy this thread up for the OP and remove all these argumentative/non-contributive posts so that we can get/stay on-topic (yes, including my last two.) Why don't you share what fumble rules have worked for you and your group?
Do they? Archives of Nethys has Ru-Shi listed as yet another +Dex/+Int. I do vaguely remember that they changed one of the skinwalkers, though. That was a little before I started paying attention to it. I wonder if Ru-Shi got the same treatment? EDIT: Ah! Found it! It actually got errata'd the other way. I'll have to shoot a message over to God King Nethys.
Male Lashunta are the only +Str/+Int race in the game. That's kind of an odd male exclusive.
Did you even bother reading the OP? This kind of a fumble system is exactly what we're discussing. Is your intent here to contribute to the conversation, or just to argue with everyone trying to assist the OP? Capn' Dancin' Bones has not participated in any online campaigns. |
