| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Dotting. This just might be my favorite thread on all of Paizo Forums.
...we don't have coed boxing, coed mixed martial arts, etc. There is a reason for that. We don't have co-ed bathrooms either. There's a reason for that.
Note that altho "cis" started out as a neutral term, it has devolved into a derogatory term. It's pretty tasteless to use it now. As a cisgendered dude, kindly speak for yourself.
I like my fantasy setting not to be overrun with modern western Political Correctness. YMMV Clearly, it is so much more noble to leave modern values out of your game as political statement, rather than simply seeing yourself as a purist of the fantasy genre.
Kappa - The Bestiary 3 description says that they love to wrestle.
A recently GM'd a game where these two monsters formed a wrestling club with a human fighter.
I'll have to say it's a toss-up between Arshea and Irez. Arshea for all the reasons listed above. It is refreshing to have a sex positive force on the side of good, as sex in role-playing games has been labeled as a weapon in evil's corner for so long. Irez because she appears to be a giant serpent-woman who lives in the ocean. She's a perfect example of how Paizo is creating unconventional celestials. Korada is also worth mentioning, because I'm pumped to see his stat-up when I grab a copy of Bestiary 4.
"Kitchen sink" is a relative term, bro.
Not to mention... it awakens the blue ones.
It has come to my attention that apparently I have been actively arguing against the existence of breasts. I was not aware that I was doing it, but after going back and reading my posts I realize their must be no other alternative. Because indeed, to argue against boobplate is to say that boobs must be always hidden. But this is not true. Boobs must always be everywhere, because women want it that way. It is all so clear to me now: men have never wanted to show themselves off to the extent women do. All women wear provocative clothing because they can't help themselves. They've shaped their own culture into one where you must "go big or go home" and we men have no role in it. How sexist of these women to exclude us, simply because we lack breasts of our own. How exclusionist and wrong that women get to wear such impressive boobplate armor and we cannot. So why be exclusive any longer? Boobplate for all! Men, women, children, dragons, gnolls, kytons, oozes... Everyone! Why let copyright infringement stop us? I want to see beholders and mind flayers in boobplate or this thread will have been for naught. Let us put boobplate onto other boobplate! Let us drag this boobplate into the twenty-first century! ... I'm probably leaving this thread for more productive ones.
This farce of a debate made up of people on one side going, "Guys, come on... it's clearly a sexist thing." and the other side going "NOPE NOPE NOPE Shut up NOPE NOPE." What really gets me is the people who say that they don't even like boobplate, but will still argue for it on the principle of showing up those "noisy feminists." Then we get to the people who are simply saying... "But I like boobs... D:" Hey, I don't blame you. I like boobs a lot too! They are wonderful! There is no shame in that (even snarky sarcastic shame). But you know... metal bumps on armor? Shouldn't really do it for anyone older than 12. Put boobs in your game if you want, but don't create weird new sets of armor to "accentuate" them in battle. What is more satisfying to you? A female warrior wearing a bumpy tin can into battle or a female warrior sweating in her more conventional tin can... taking it off after a battle... and then bearing her heaving breasts in lighter clothing. You can't tell me any of you really want to climb into bed with a women who is wearing boobplate? That would be strange.
A note about male version of "boobplate" since it keeps coming up. The grecian muscle cuirass was worn almost exclusively by generals and not by common soldiers. As many people have said, it was used to impress and intimidate people. However, certain individuals have neglected to mention that it was an ornamental armor not to be worn into battle. Military Leaders would be dressed in this manner of armor at parades and medal-giving ceremonies. Click the link below if you don't believe me. Now then, we can put to rest the notion of men "being forced" to wear impractical armor into battle. It assuredly never happened. Even if it did, what are the men showing off exactly? They are showing off muscle, which exudes raw power. Women are more than capable of having that kind of abdominal strength themselves. If muscle cuirass armor was actually viable, it should logically follow that women could and should wear it as well as men. Because according to your own words, the message of armor is to "impress" the enemy and exert dominance over them. Unless, somehow you've confused impressing the enemy with providing titillation for the audience. Go ahead and explain to me how a red dragon is going to be frightened by a pair of big metal boobies.
My question: Why should the females depicted in Pathfinder (or most other RPG) art be attired reasonably/sensibly/realistically? The males quite often are attired just as ludicrously. There is a difference between outfits that are sexy and lolawesome, and outfits that are flat-out exploitation. The implications of boobplate are that even in battle women must prove their femininity or else they are considered to be wearing "men's armor". I personally am far less annoyed with Seoni's outfit than I am with any character wearing boobplate. Seoni is a sorceress whose class features do encourage drawing her with a lack of armor. Though she is a "Ms. Fanservice" character, it doesn't come off as mind-numbingly stupid as putting a fighter in boobplate. Female Warrior: Yes, blacksmith. I'll wear this armor. I was afraid that nobody would know I was a women when I'm smashing in the skulls of goblins. Thank you for understanding that my gender matters more than my competence.
I shower every day.
Alright, boys. Don't paint me as a puritan now. It's shocking to see how much boobplate specifically means to some people. But sure, I'm the creeper. Look, this isn't about not including sexy in your game. The magus example is a class that doesn't wear heavy armor. He has every right to be showing off his abs and biceps. In fact, it may affect his arcane casting not to. ;) If you want to put your "heavily-armored" female characters in unfittingly skimpy armor or form-fitting armor or what have you at your own gaming table... go right ahead. But please don't try to disguise it as rescuing the virtues of a genre from the clutches of "overbearing PC meddlers". Be honest and admit that boobplate turns you on. Would you have it in your game for any other reason?
While I'm all for more female gaze in fantasy gaming, adding more of it doesn't make boobplate any more or less okay. Look, I get it. Guys like boobs. We're allowed to. That doesn't mean we can force our sexual preferences onto character designs under the pretenses of "it grabs attention and enriches the design." There are many other ways of making a character designs stand out, and even if none come to mind you can just throw a ton of belts or goggles on there. The reason why boobplate is the subject of argument, while oversized swords aren't, has to do with the context. Boobplate is an objectification trope towards women, and ultimately it is there for the sex appeal. Contrast with a big sword, which doesn't objectify anyone. Throwing egregious manservice at us equal the amount female fanservice is not the answer. You can still do it, but tone down the female designs for a change. There is already a huge backlog of boobplate and chainmail bikinis. For the people who want it, it is already there. We really don't need anymore of it right now.
I'm really happy with what Paizo is doing with Golarion in terms of representing cultures. Though some of the parallels with real world culture may seem overly similar, I'd rather have carbon copies of underexposed cultures than another planet of medieval caucasians. *Pitches tent* Don't mind me, I'm just going to set up camp in this thread. Good vibes here.
I love that the title of this thread could be used in a pejorative way. "You watch porn? What kind of unintelligent monster likes porn?" Just found that funny.
I'd rather this thread not become another thread for discussing "player entitlement". It hardly seems relevant to the topic of discussion: whether or not to leave a social gathering that fails to be a positive experience for an individual. Since we have now received testimony from a GM who left a game mid-go it should abundantly clear at this point that the sides of this conflict are not drawn along the borders of a binary DM and Player Identification. In addition, each situation where a person leaves a session partway through is wholly different and should be treated as such. There is no finite code of conduct or "solution" that covers all of these situations. Instead of assigning good or bad stigma to the phenomena as a whole, we should embrace the wackiness and variety of stories on this thread and continue to post more absurd experiences.
Well said, Ataraxias. I think it would be nice to get a few different GM perspective on this phenomena. I'd actually not be offended at all if a player walked out on one of my sessions. I would take it as an indication that the game did not match their tastes. Judgements towards my own character or the character of the players come secondary. (I don't mean in-game character, I mean character in the sense "personality") Truly, I think communication as others have said does wonders to solve these problems. I really want my players to know what kind of world they will be playing in, as well as the overall tone I'm going for. I certainly am not strong-arming any players to stay and play my game against their will. Likewise, a player who isn't having fun is somebody I don't want at my table (no jugdement towards their reasoning). For both our sakes, mine and the player, I would let them go everytime than adjust combat accordingly to accommodate the now-shrunken group. See, as a DM, I control everything in universe, but I have no gripes if real life is beyond my control once and awhile.
I agree wholeheartedly with the Monstrous Codex/Ultimate Monsters idea. Savage Species is one of my favorite 3.5 supplements. To have a Pathfinder equivalent of the book would be a dream come true, especially I find many of Paizo's monster design a lot more compelling than their D&D counterparts. That being said, I wouldn't mind a few less common races being featured as NPCs in the base class section of the book. Maybe one of the ninjas could be a kobold, or one of the oracles could be an aasimar. There is a lot of potential for flavor there, and that's something I put a lot of stock in.
I shudder to mention it, mostly due to the backlash this class feature seems to receive on these boards... A NPC Codex which features summoners would logically also have a section to detail their eidolons. There would be stat ups for eidolons corresponding to levels 1st-20th. I know this isn't everybody's cup of tea, but I would like to hear people's thoughts. Should eidolons by part of NPC Codex 2? I say yes. I am perhaps one of the few who enjoy eidolons mechanically and believe that such a section would not only be helpful for GMs who want to generate quick eidolons stats, but would add a lot of flavor and potentially give us some amazing artwork. Plus, the way characters in the codex are built, these eidolons wouldn't be min-maxed and the synthesist probably wouldn't even be mentioned.
Following the release of Bestiary 4, I would love to see an NPC Codex featuring the classes from the Advanced Players Guide. It would draw from the following list. Alchemist
If possible, having it include the Ultimate Magic and Ultimate Combat bases classes would be all the more better. Gunslinger (slightly worried about this one, tbh)
I often run NPCs and PCs of the advanced classes so it would benefit me immensely.What's everybody else's thoughts on a second NPC Codex?
To you, yes. But it will vary from player to player. Everyone who comes to your table is an individual with different preferences. You can't guarantee that your idea of a stand-in for their concept will go over well, nor can you have objective faith in it being the "right way" to play that concept. Wouldn't you be acting on a slightly arrogant sense of authority to assume that your players should have no issues with your decision? The decision you essentially made for them?
I have a story to back this one up. I'm currently running a campaign in which a player choose to be an elf. My writing for the campaign had thus far never addressed elves. It was an Asian-based setting where other races were center stage. There were effectively "no elves in my world." So I made a decision. Her character was the last elf. The others had vanished 200 years ago. Blamo! Awesome new plot point and player wasn't cheated out of a good character concept.
Everything is optional, but is there an equal amount of expectancy for a GM to allow CRB classes as there is for him to allow stuff from a magazine or website? No.I wouldn't have thought so before people jumped on me for running a game where I'm not allowing an optional rule from an optional book. But apparently, yes. If something was ever published anywhere all players have the right to play it, and the DM who doesn't allow it is just lazy. Straw man and irrelevant. This thread was never about the rules, it is about the GM's willingness to make small (as they usually are) concessions to players. It is also about attempting to remedy the common scenario of a player or players asking for something and having the word "entitled" stamped across there foreheads before the thought is ever considered by the GM.
There are no settings I know of that would be utterly destroyed by the existence of a single witch. At the very least, add a single sentence of lore to the world. Witches are rare, but in some remote corners of the world they do exist.
Honestly Scott Betts, have you ever GMed? Now that is just unnecessary. GMing is not some prestigious honor. You alone choose to do it and the players choose to trust with running the adventure. It isn't always glamourous, but it does come with a share of responsibilities. The most important of which is making the story ABOUT the player characters. This is the reason the entire structure of the game exists in the first place. Whether or not someone has GMed before is not a valid excuse to devalue their opinions.
Whenever I DM, I try to create settings which can fit as much content and options in as possible. I even go out of my way to create new options for my players. Maybe some would call me too lenient, but I think world-building requires some flexibility. Unless the DM has written out everything that exists behind every single tree in the world or catalogued every being that exists in it (which I do not recommend doing as it would be very time-consuming) then a DM must have be willing to alter their "vision" just a tiny bit for the sake of the players. By that I mean, nobody should be afraid to change the lore of their setting a tiny bit. It's your imagination the builds the world after all, not a immutable cage of objective logic.
Elementals aren't the same as the natural forces they represent. They are solid to an extent, otherwise they wouldn't be able to slam into other creatures. An air elemental is not merely "air" and fire elemental is not merely "fire". At least that's the way I see it. I think you might be reading too much into things a tiny bit.
I'm turning on the windshield wipers.
For the whole "eidolon as last resort" angle... Otherverse Games has a pdf called Eidolons Unbound that contains a section for eidolon flaws. One of these limitations is a restriction on summoning that prevents the eidolon from being called unless the summoner is at 1/2 his HP or lower. In exchange for taking this flaw you gain +4 evolution points. Could be something interesting to run by your GM. |