HolyFlamingo!'s page

Hi everyone,

I recently got a surprise invite to a friend's Fist of the Ruby Phoenix campaign at a game shop down the street (yippee!). Problem is, I've never played anything that high-level without a bunch of digital tools doing the math and organizing my character sheet for me. Worse, I decided to play a druid (because it fits the party comp well and the current discourse has it on my mind)!

So, for those of you running complex, high-level characters at physical tables, how do you stay organized, roll/calculate quickly, and remember what your character can do?

Thanks in advance!

The Abomination Arsenal was a wild ride, so I'm looking forward to this!

I'm not crying you're crying!!! Happy pride everyone!!!

Over on the Starfinder 2e subreddit, Justnobodyfqwl commented on how the newly revealed Space Pirate archetype looks unapologetically powerful and exciting in a way that's a noticeable break from how PF2e often balances its content. And I agree: the archetype rolls a better version of the level 7 Battle Cry skill feat into its dedication at level 2, grants a two-action stride and MAPless double strike at level 4, a combination of Nimble Dodge and Opportune Riposte at level 6, and an auto-heightening innate spell that you can sustain via striking at level 8. Wow!! And it's all done in the spirit of the fantasy with plenty of imagination and silliness on the side. It's delightful, it's fun, and it's STRONG.

Too strong, perhaps? I don't know--it's definitely busted for PF2's standards--but balance is relative. It's likely that the melee-oriented feats will be more difficult to take advantage of if most enemies would rather avoid you. However, if everything in SF2 has this kind of oomph? Then I think we're in for a real treat. Doubly so if enemies have the same level of mechanical swagger; I wanna see rockstar features like Broadside Charge and Pirate's Parry all over Alien Core. But if it's just this archetype, or it's just players with these toys, then SF2 could wind up with a very stale, lopsided meta.

Regardless, when I showed this archetype to my wife, she immediately started workshopping a character while dropping hints she wanted a pirate-themed campaign in the future. If that's not effective design, then I don't know what is.

What are your thoughts, gang?

There's a lot of discussion about player options for SF2, but not much about toys for GMs. Which is a shame, because a good roster of creatures is essential for any combat-heavy, crunchy RPG! So, tell me about your favorite SF1 monsters and miscreants and what makes them cool! Let's build our own dream version of the first 2e Alien Archive together!

For me, I really loved the various humanoid foes in Interstellar Species and Pact Worlds. They covered a lot of campaign roles and level ranges, meaning there was a fantastic selection of options for when you wanted to do something more social and less dungeon-crawly. I also think anacites are adorable, and think 2e presents some unique opportunities to bring forward their various solar-powered and networking abilities.

WELL, DECK MY HALLS AND JINGLE MY BELLS! CHRISTMAS HAS COME EARLY!

While the "hidden until it swallows something" bit with the glass serpent is funny, I have a particular hatred of perma-invisibility, so I'll be eager to see how much of a difference revealing light makes versus brute force.

Self-destruct, though? That's a special treat just for me. I've had so much fun with exploding zombies in the past.

I volunteered to run a few quests and scenarios at my FLGS for PaizoCon. Just finished my first read-through of Lorespire's guide to org play, and apart from the chronicle-related paperwork I think I get it. I've also gotten my ID card and signed up for my first session as a player this weekend in order to build familiarity with the format.

I've been GMing various systems for about 5 years, PF2e specifically for 2 and a half, and have experience with both in-person and online games, for friends and strangers, using official modules and homebrew. However, I've never run a society game and have never had my own table at a convention. I'm deeply nervous and not sure what to expect.

Is there anything in the Lorespire guide I should pay special attention to? Any other resources or hurdles I should be aware of? What should I focus on or purchase as I prepare? I've got two months, so not the biggest rush, thankfully.

I don't care if the quai dau to is technically a huge creature; they're just a sweet little guy to me.

I've heard a lot of concerns about the 2e engine's ancestry paradigm being too restrictive to accommodate truly wacky alien species, reducing them all to "humans in cosplay" rather than truly imaginative, diverse character options. I think this underestimates--or at least misunderstands--what the system is capable of. So, I'd like to try to prove that 2e can handle some weird stuff, without sacrificing balance.

Now, it is absolutely true that the aforementioned balance tends to enforce some restrictions on what an ancestry can be absent of any feats: it gets, at most, three attribute boosts and a flaw, a size, vision, movement speeds, hit points, and a couple special features to make it stand out. That's a pretty narrow set of parameters, but thankfully feats and heritages can add a lot of spice. As feats are locked to level progression, however, we can sometimes wind up with stupid stuff like truly impressive movement types and immunities not coming online until pretty deep in an adventurer's career. This can break immersion sometimes--"What do you mean my character with wings can't fly until level nine?"--so we should do our best to avoid that if we can. Any ancestry should get its Special Thing as early as possible, and feats should elevate that Thing rather than unlock it.

So, I decided to tackle this beast by going straight for the wackiest species I could find, one that is often cited as an example of what 2e can't handle and also happens to be my favorite: Stellifera.

Let's get squiddy with it.

STARTING STATS: +WIS/CHA/FREE, -CON, darkvision, speed 20 feet, swim speed 30 feet, medium size, 6HP, 120ft telepathy (cannot audibly speak).

Wait, hold on, medium size? Aren't stellifera super little guys? Don't they only have 5 feet of land movement? And where's the strength flaw? Well, what I've actually done here is give you the stats for the hydrobody, not the little cuttlefish itself. Check this out:

Disperse Hydrobody: One action. You withdraw your psychic grip on the water surrounding you. You become tiny, take a land speed penalty of -10, and are enfeebled 2. You cannot breathe without assistive equipment when not in water. (Note that enfeebled 2 accomplishes the same thing in 2e as -4 STR does in 1e. Also, we're being less mean with the speed penalty, so our little cuttlefriend gets an extra square and thus can flop away from something with reach and isn't SOL on difficult terrain.)

Reform Hydrobody: Three actions. You gather moisture from the environment to create a protective sphere of water around yourself. Your size becomes medium, and you shed all penalties related to being outside your hydrobody. (Remember, you get three actions per turn in 2e, so a swift action roughly translates to a single action, and a full action to three actions. Somebody who is actually a game designer might finesse this differently.)

For now, I'm going to ignore how differently-sized gear would work because that's a lot of mechanical nitpickery and I am Not a Designer, but I believe this more or less accomplishes what stellifera are all about right out of the box. Note, however, that a lot of the goodies our cuttlebuddies enjoy are absent. What about the free cantrips, squeezy features, and immunities? Well, we still have two sources of power budget we haven't touched: feats and heritages.

Let's start with heritages. The stellifera basically has three Cool Things that make it feel special and alien: A) innate psychic powers, B) having a hydrobody, and C) being a cuttlefish. Since all stellifera get a hydrobody by default, we can focus our heritages on A and C.

Scarlet Stellifera: When polite communication fails, you're not afraid to use your chromatophores to make a point, expressing displeasure with bold flashes of solid color. You become trained in Intimidation and gain the Intimidating Glare skill feat.

Flamboyant Stellifera: You love to stand out, and have learned to express yourself through careful manipulation of your chromatophores and hydrobody. You become trained in Performance, and gain the Impressive Performance skill feat.

Deepwater Stellifera: You're well-adapted to the chilling waters of the oceanic abyss. You gain cold resistance equal to half your level (minimum 1), and treat environmental cold effects as if they were one step less extreme.

Murky Stellifera: You're better adapted to polluted water than other members of your species. You gain a +1 circumstance bonus to saving throws against diseases and poisons, and creatures within 60 feet of you cannot become concealed to you when you are both submerged in the same liquid body.

Gifted Stellifera: Your innate psychic abilities are more developed than most. You gain the Psychic Gift ancestry feat. (I'll describe the Psychic Gift feat below, but it's basically a free occult cantrip.)

So, already, we have more options for making our stellifera feel more cuttlefishy (the flamboyant heritage was inspired directly by my wife's favorite animal). However, we're still at a lower power level than 1e's default stellifera, don't have full poison immunity, and have to choose a specific heritage to get any poison resistance at all. This nerf is a bit of a bummer, but it's consistent with 2e's design paradigms. We also don't get cantrips without taking feats for it, but yeah, let's talk feats!

Lv1 - Psychic Gift: You've tapped into your ancestry's natural psionics to unlock greater power. Choose one common occult cantrip to gain as an innate, at-will spell. Special: You can select this feat multiple times to gain additional cantrips. (With this, we've locked in a way to get both of the 1e stellifera's innate spells as soon as level 1, or level 5 without the Gifted heritage. Unlike 1e, however, we have more flexibility in which cantrips we can choose, and can gain up to 6 innate cantrips by lv17, or an insane 12 cantrips by lv19 if we use the optional Ancestry Paragon rule. This, however, requires we forego all other feats and hyper-focus on being a natural psychic.)

Lv1 - Emergency Dispersal: Reaction. Trigger: you are about to take damage that would reduce your HP to 0. You sacrifice your hydrobody to protect yourself from a lethal blow. You gain resistance to the triggering damage equal to your level x2, and instantly use the Disperse Hydrobody action. You cannot use this reaction again until you have reformed your hydrobody. (The DR here is a shot in the dark; again, I am Not A Designer.)

Lv1 - Adaptive Hydrobody: You can adjust the size of your hydrobody based on your current needs and available moisture. When you reform your hydrobody, you can choose to become small instead of medium. Your new size persists until you next disperse your hydrobody.

Lv1 - Camouflage: Your chromatophores help you blend in with your surroundings. When swimming or outside your hydrobody, you gain a +1 circumstance bonus to Stealth checks to Hide.

Lv1 - Ink Cloud: You've maintained some vestigial defenses that most stellifera shed generations ago. Once per hour (or day? not a designer), as an action, you can disperse ink inside your hydrobody, causing you to become concealed until the end of your next turn. Special: You can take this feat only at 1st level, and you can’t retrain out of this feat or into this feat.

Lv5 - Flexible Hydrobody: You have fine-tuned control over your hydrobody, allowing you to shape it in more complex ways. When attempting to Squeeze Through, you may treat your hydrobody as one size smaller for the purposes of the check. (Whoop, there it is! With this feat, we now have a path to a "complete" stellifera.)

Lv5 - Stretch Hydrobody: As an action, you shunt extra water into one of your hydrobody's limbs, extending your reach by 5ft for touch spells, interact actions, and one-handed melee weapons. This extension lasts until the end of your turn, and you can take the action twice to extend another 5ft.

Lv5 - Ink Shot: Reaction, requires Ink Cloud. You've learned to weaponize your body's natural defenses. When you successfully hit a creature with an unarmed attack, you can choose to expend your use of Ink Cloud to render the creature dazzled (blinded on a critical hit). The condition persists until the creature spends an interact action to remove the ink.

Lv5 - Chromatophore Semaphore: You can attempt to communicate simple information via carefully timed patterns and flashes. Creatures that can see you may roll a Society check to interpret what you are saying (with a -2 circumstance penalty if you do not share a language), or a Perception check with a -4 circumstance penalty. The DC is usually equal to an easy check for your level, but the GM may adjust it depending on the complexity of the information you are trying to convey. Creatures that share a language with you and either have the Read Lips skill feat or have spent at least one week of downtime learning to communicate with you in this fashion automatically pass the check.

Lv9 - Psychic Empathy: As an action, choose one creature within range of your telepathy. You immediately learn that creature's disposition towards you, as well as the strongest emotion it is currently feeling. The creature may roll a Will save versus your Perception DC to negate this effect. This ability has no effect on mindless creatures.

Lv9 - Propulsive Exit: You shape your hydrobody into a jet of water just before it loses cohesion, which you can then ride to relative safety. When you disperse your hydrobody, as part of the action you may move up to your swim speed in any direction. Special: If you take both the Explosive Exit and Propulsive Exit feats, you must choose the effects of either one or the other each time you disperse your hydrobody, but not both.

Lv9 - One with the Mud: You've become especially adapted to harsh aquatic conditions. Your circumstance bonus to saving throws against poisons and diseases increases to +2, and if you roll a success, you get a critical success instead. Furthermore, you gain a +2 circumstance bonus to spot creatures hidden within 60 feet of you, so long as you are both in the same liquid body. Special: Requires Murky Stellifera heritage.

Lv9 - Extended Telepathy: Your telepathy's range extends to 240ft, and up to a mile for those you have known for at least one week.

Lv13 - Master Camouflage: You are especially adept at manipulating your chromatophores. Your circumstance bonus to Hide when swimming or outside your hydrobody increases to +2, and you can attempt to Hide without cover or concealment so long as this bonus applies. Special: Requires Camouflage ancestry feat.

Lv13 - Hulking Hydrobody: You've learned how to draw extra moisture into your hydrobody for increased bulk and strength. When you reform your hydrobody, you may choose to gain the effects of the rank 2 Enlarge spell. The effects persist until you disperse and reform your hydrobody again. You may do this once per day.

Lv13 - Explosive Exit: Your hydrobody disperses with explosive force. When you disperse your hydrobody and before becoming tiny and enfeebled, as part of the action you may roll to Trip, Shove, or make an unarmed strike against all creatures within your reach. These attacks are affected by and count towards your multi-attack penalty, but the penalty does not increase until all attacks are complete. Special: If you take both the Explosive Exit and Propulsive Exit feats, you must choose the effects of either one or the other each time you disperse your hydrobody, but not both.

Lv13 - Landlubber: You've gotten used to life on land. When outside your hydrobody, you instead take a -5ft land speed penalty and are enfeebled 1. In addition, double the number of rounds you can hold your breath before suffocating (this stacks with the Breath Control general feat).

Lv17 - Telepathic Mastery: Your telepathic sense extends to any creature within line of sight, and to planetary range for those you've known for at least a week. You gain Translate as a once-per-day innate occult spell. Special: Requires Extended Telepathy.

Lv17 - Duplicate Hydrobody: As a three-action activity, you can create a second hydrobody in an empty space within 30 feet of you. This hydrobody shares your hit points and all your proficiencies, and has both the summoned, mindless, and minion traits. When created, you can choose to give the duplicate any equipment currently on your person. The duplicate immediately takes two actions upon its creation, and two more each round so long as you spend an action to sustain it (as a summoned minion). If not sustained, the duplicate immediately disperses. If you disperse your original hydrobody, you can enter the duplicate by moving into its space. When you do this, it is no longer a summoned minion, but is instead treated as your normal hydrobody.

Again, I must stress that I am Not a Designer, and thus have very little idea what I'm doing. I also went way more overboard on this than I intended to, and wound up with damn near a complete ancestry instead of a few examples. But hopefully I've proved that 2e's engine can indeed handle weird aliens. In fact, I think the variety of feats presented here help stellifera feel even more special, without locking them into a specific mode of play (I went out of my way to provide feats that would be useful for all kinds of builds).

So, what do you guys think? Was the above theorycraft any good? Satisfying? What other space freaks should we take a crack at 2e-ifying while we wait for the official playtest?

Also, I'm not sure what Paizo's policy is re: homebrew on the forums, as I don't want to get any authors in trouble if this winds up resembling an actual, published stellifera in the future (lol, as if). So, if I need to delete this or put some kind of disclaimer that I'm fine with inspiring official content either accidentally or on purpose (again, as if lol), please let me know.

So, the greatest tragedy with the computer glitch gremlin--actually, I'm just gonna call it the glitch gremlin, because "computer" seems redundant (we can call the other one a "starship gremlin" or something)--is that, apart from a few guns, he has basically no tech to interact with at time of writing. This is a shame, because being able to wreak technological havoc would make for some incredible scenarios: the little dude could trigger hazards, hack/break important gear, or serve as a crash course for offensive use of the computers skill. But we don't have any of that yet, so for now this tiny stink-man has to make due with only half his kit.

Said kit, though, isn't half bad. I'm not sure where the fire weakness comes from (I guess computers don't like overheating?), but overall he's consistent with most of PF2's gremlins: tiny, limber, frail, and with a nasty little gimmick intended to make him as annoying as possible. The fact that he's tiny, can climb, and has decent stealth and acrobatics means that he can squirrel himself away in a hard-to-reach place and play tech-wizard puppet master from relative safety. The 20ft range of his spark attack was a bit awkward, but since he's got thunderstrike and electric arc too, it works well enough as a fallback if he really needs two actions to do something else. He's missing his networked technomancy ability from SF1, but adding concealment checks on top of the glitching condition would be a little TOO annoying, methinks. Maybe there can be, like, an elder glitch gremlin with a larger spell repertoire that shares the mystic's network spell feat?

Actually, let's talk about glitching real quick: while I like the element of randomness, the glitch aura flow chart is a little long for my tastes: Are you in the gremlin's aura? Okay, did you fail your will save? Okay, do you or any of the gear you intend to use have the tech trait? Okay, did you fail your flat check? Okay, NOW make the actual roll to Do Your Thing with a minus one. That's up to FIVE mechanical beats to accomplish ONE action. And while each is either a simple yes/no check, a d20 roll, or preschool arithmetic, these little steps add up quick. It's playable for sure--and an appropriately obnoxious representation of misbehaving machinery--but I'm wondering if it's worth cleaning up at all. Or maybe I just need to get used to it? I imagine SF2's going to be just a touch more complicated than its older, high fantasy sibling, and maybe that extra dash of crunch will stretch the bounds of the engine while helping SF1 fans feel more at home.

Anyway, I only ran one combat test with this guy, since as a -1 creature he's only threatening for a very brief, early game window. Since I wanted to make this one encounter really count (and give him some tech toys to play with), I rolled up a level 1 vesk soldier and android mystic, using the updated rules from Thurston Hillman's forum post on the subject. It was an extreme-difficulty, four-on-two encounter in a cramped computer lab with lots of places for the gremlins to scurry around and hide. And... it was pretty easy? Once the gremlins ate up their thunderstrikes, they couldn't do enough damage to compete with the two player characters, despite being fairly hard to hit. Glitching caused a couple missed shots and one stun--with that many gremlins in that small a room, both characters spent the entire combat glitched--and the amount of available cover combined with the short range of the soldier's weapon when on auto made it so that she only managed to hit multiple targets once. Her mystic buddy had no trouble keeping her healthy, but got a little frustrated with how she kept wandering out of their bless aura. They'd wanted to use runic weapon initially, but tech weapons can't take runes, so... >:( (Nah, as a balancing decision, it's fine; juicing up the damage and accuracy on stuff with range, AOE, and elemental damage would basically turn every single shot into a first-level spell or better. Those gremlins would've evaporated instantly.)

I think the big takeaway from this is that the glitch gremlin will function best when put in proper context. It needs some environmental toys to play with, and allies who can benefit from digital telepathy and the recharge weapon cantrip. Unlike tashtari, which you can throw into any wilderness encounter or showdown with the elf mafia, gremlins need to cause problems other than player HP removal.

As for the player options, I didn't spend enough time with them to really get a proper feel, but the mystic seems awesome (possibly the most accessible caster so far?) and I already like cool robots and big lizards. But the soldier... feels weird. Like, there's some inherent MADness to playing a character whose attacks will always be split between at least two physical stats--DEX for shooting, STR for melee, and CON for AOE--and only one of them will ever reach peak potential. I hope it gets legendary weapon proficiency eventually, as otherwise it'll have the worst accuracy of all dedicated martials, except on those turns when it can afford to burn two actions and half a clip on an attack.

A few months late to the party, but I finally got the chance to play with some of the materials present in Field Test 1. I love cool monsters and am curious about how SF2 might shape up against PF2 and SF1, and also tend to get a little nutty when it comes to combat encounter design, so like a completely normal person I spent my day off analyzing and playtesting Solar Beam Bluey.

First, stats. Compared to PF2's standards, both the tashtari and tashtari alpha fit into a mobile striker paradigm: high mobility and ranged accuracy, but physically frail and so-so damage output. Most of the numbers fit within expected PF2 parameters, but a couple things stood out: automatic persistent damage and high climb/land speeds. At low levels, persistent damage can be especially difficult to manage--especially when delivered from range--and few characters have access to such robust movement. Already, we're seeing a different meta emerging, one that fully expects PCs to have jetpacks and sidearms at the ready.

It's also neat that tashtari have both elemental damage AND resistance, which makes it look like SF1's energy-kinetic shenanigans will be preserved, despite the absence of split KAC/EAC. Speaking of, MOST of what our tripod doggy duo are packing is pretty consistent with their SF1 predecessors: the stat spread, the threat level, the sparkly fur, etc. Bristle Flash/Nova is worth pointing out, as it's less save-or-suck now, gaining consistency at the cost of a mild debuff. This kind of alteration to spell-like abilities should be familiar to anyone who migrated from PF1 to PF2. It also only works once per character--meaning you can't be surrounded by a pack of tashtaris who all dogpile you with fort saves until you crit fail and become blinded--and gained a new "feature" where it recharges after a tashtari spends 10 minutes in the sun. This has some tactical implications I'll get to in a bit.

One improvement, I think, is that the alpha now has a brand new ability--Solar Cry--that rains down fire in an area around it. This works like a miniaturized fireball and also allows any nearby tashtari to recharge their Bristle Flash. The damage output was kind of low--I think it could stand to have the die size bumped up one step, or just have one more die added to it--but thematically it's very cool. You finally close in on this thing, and it barfs a death rainbow on you. I love it.

Also, a potential error: the alpha has intimidation as a skill, but can't really use it RAW without a steep debuff because it doesn't speak any languages. I assume the intention is to have it howl/growl/stare down an enemy instead WITHOUT a penalty, but I think actually giving it an official glare or howl ability would be beneficial. Maybe have it be an AOE fear effect with a mild ally buff, envoy-style. Really reinforce its role as a pack leader, you know?

Now, onto the tactical implications of these guys. Based on their high/diverse movement, stealth proficiency, and reliable ranged attack--one that ALWAYS does a little persistent damage now, not JUST on a crit--it's clear the spicy puppers love to kite. Because their AOE debuff only works once, it's either best used as an opener or a defensive measure to cover a retreat, and the 10-minute recharge implies that tashtari absolutely love to play hit and run. You could have the same pack harass an adventuring party for multiple encounters, only daring to move into melee when they've weakened someone enough to safely score a kill. The fact that their athletics is only so-so means that they're going to pick their targets carefully, just like real wolves. Their climb speed suggests they'd be super happy in a forest or canyon, where they can camp somewhere with good lines of sight. Basically, tashtari have more than enough tools for a dirtbag GM to annoy the hell out of their players, which I consider a big win.

With all this in mind, I performed a four-combat playtest against a partially randomly generated PF2 party: a gnoll champion, a fleshwarp barbarian, a kobold psychic, and a leshy investigator. Each combat was keyed to extreme difficulty, and took place at levels 1, 3, 5, and 7. These levels were chosen specifically to see how well tashtari fit the roles of bosses, standard monsters, and low-level mooks. To represent the two genders of TTRPG player, I optimized the psychic and barbarian as best as I could for current Pathfinder meta, and stuck to flavorful, thematic choices for the investigator and champion. To take advantage of the tashtari's stealth, range, and movement abilities, I chose a shallow canyon with scrubby foliage and a few crisscrossing bridges as the battleground.

Here's what happened.

TEST 1: Two tashtari vs. a Lv1 party of four. Absolutely miserable experience. The pair of wolves stuck to the top of the canyon--out of reach of the party--and laserbeamed them to death. Nonetheless, the party came surprisingly close to victory, as the psychic managed to get the second wolf into the red before finally falling unconscious. In fact, the psychic--thanks to Thermal Stasis, Eat Fire, and Restore the Mind--was pivotal in allowing the party to last as long as they did, demonstrating that elemental resistances and patch healing are going to matter early and matter a lot in SF2. The persistent damage is what proved to be especially lethal, as the party simply lacked the resources or action economy to get their friends back on their feet before the burning effect ate up their death saves.

TEST 2: Two tashtari and one alpha vs. Lv3. This marked the point where the party was able to start and stay winning, as the barbarian was beginning to unlock some mobility options while the psychic wasn't burning through resources so quickly. The champ and investigator, meanwhile, had better healing, and the statistical gap had now closed enough that their skills could actually do something. Having more wolves on the field as well as a clear "boss" allowed me to experiment with more cooperative behavior, and I was able to deploy my favorite combination of having one or two creatures get up in the party's faces to hinder their movement, while the rest of the pack sniped from a distance. It was a very intense fight (few extreme encounters are easy), but the party felt less trapped in a hole.

TEST 3: Four tashtari and two alphas vs. Lv5. Now that the party was on statistically even footing with their foes, the true cost of a low-tech, melee-focused meta finally reared its ugly head. If they split up to compensate for being outnumbered, they'd be unable to heal each other. But, if they all ganged up on one wolf at a time, the others could pepper them from a distance and set off the healer economy death spiral. Since reloading, climbing, and chasing were all so taxing, missing hits felt incredibly punishing. The most mobile character--the barbarian--had a lot of fun charging after wolves that tried to flee, but doing so meant making themselves an obvious target. Nobody got through the fight without at least one wound.

TEST 4: Eight tashtari and four alphas vs. Lv7, AKA Too Many Wolves. Despite taking a billion years to run on account of there being Too Many Wolves, this was probably my favorite fight, as at this point the party finally had enough ranged options and mobility aids to close the action economy gap. Still, the investigator was desperate for a gun with more than two shots in the chamber, and it was really hard to decide who should get defensive buffs on which turn due to the wolves being able to focus fire on whomever they damn well pleased. I think it would've been really easy to make this fight suck super bad if I hadn't made the tashtari do things other than shoot twice and take cover: shootouts run the risk of getting boring if everyone digs in and nobody shakes things up. So, GMs in the future will need to take extra care to not let combat become routine just because everyone has a gun. Or throat laser. Whatever.

TL;DR: Overall, the tashtari seem pretty decently balanced for PF2's engine, preserve what made them special in SF1, and demonstrate the changing meta expectations for SF2. I'm a fan of these sparkly blue freaks, and other than some minor touchups to the alpha, have no complaints. Might test the glitch gremlin later, too, but would need to build characters with actual tech on 'em to make glitching actually matter.

Anybody else get the chance to play with these guys? What are your thoughts?

(Post-script shameless begging: So, I know that player-facing material needs to take priority in these field tests. PC choices represent a long-term commitment, so it's significantly more important to nail the feel and tuning of each option. Also, players outnumber GMs by at least four to one, and it's a huge luxury to have access to this pre-playtest material at all, but... Well, I want the dev team to know that I'm making massive puppy eyes at them right now. I would love to see more creatures, as a treat.)

OK, so please correct me if I'm interpreting this wrong.

1. We cannot publish Infinite products under ORC, but that's OK because we don't need to anyway?

2. If we publish an Infinite product based on a Paizo ORC product, we don't need any additional license beyond the Infinite license?

3. If we use Open Game Content from a Paizo OGL product, we have to publish it under both OGL and Infinite license as normal?

4. If we use setting/characters/etc but no Open Game Content from a Paizo OGL product, we don't have to publish it under OGL with the Infinite license. This is because the it's the Infinite license is what allows us to do that, not the OGL?

I think my favorite thing about Golarion is how much fun it is to play around with. It feels like a massive box of crayons with more colors than I could ever possibly need, but it's super easy to just grab a handful of them and go nuts.

One thing that I've been doing a lot of lately is making up magical/alchemical cocktails to add a little zest to my players' (many, many) bar crawls, so they have some minor mechanical toys to play with while also getting drip fed setting detail. For example, they're currently causing chaos inside a casino in Vyre, so I made them a drinking menu, taking thematic inspiration from Vyre/Ravounel's culture and various PF2e mutagens. They don't have any levels or traits as they're intended to be goofy one-offs, so I don't consider these publication-ready or anything, lol.

The Blackfinger: A shot of deep blue liquid with a drop of inky, black something roiling within. Said to contain the venom of a scorpion sacred to the god of thieves, assassins, and spies, it sharpens the mind, yet weakens the body. Thick and fruity with a smoky aftertase. You gain a +2 status bonus to intelligence- and wisdom-based skill checks for one hour, but are drained 2 for the duration.

Rhom-Razzle-Dazzle: Gnomish honeycap mushroom wine that fizzes and sparkles, with a warm and buttery flavor that tickles on the way down. Imbues the drinker with good luck, but dangerously emboldens them. You instantly gain a Hero Point, but you must pass a will save equal to your class DC to refuse any wager for the next hour.

Silver Raven: Consisting of good, clear vodka with ice and crushed herbs, this simple cocktail is light, botanical, and refreshing. Taking its name from the freedom fighters who helped liberate Ravounel from Chellish rule, it similarly frees the drinker from whatever else they've recently put in their stomachs. Any magical or alchemical effects from other imbibed substances instantly end, and you gain one stage of alcohol poisoning (GMG pg. 120) with no saving throw.

What kind of minor homebrew--be it small details, one-off gameplay mechanics, or little plot/character beats--has Golarion inspired in your own games? I figure I'm not the only one who loves making stuff like this, and wanted to see what everyone else is up to. I've lurked keftiu's threads about regional adventuring parties, and while those are pretty boss, I wanted a space for the little stuff.

This really Sweenies my Todd, Paizo Pals.