Imrahtep's page

My party is in the Under-murk and has managed to corral a Drow nobleman in to providing them safe passage across the Drow realms. Last session they got to visit a Drow town, which was a pretty weird and prickly experience for all involved. Long-story-short, one of them acquired some Drow books, including a book of Drow Fairy Tales. (I was working off the cuff, and he said he was looking for very basic stuff, like an Undercommon grammar primer, etc.)

So now I need to figure out what kind of fairy tales the Drow tell their children. The best we could come up with at the table was:

"J'ak and J'eihll went up the hill to fetch a pail of poison. J'ak ended up at the bottom of the well with a broken neck, and J'eihll's parents succumbed to the venom shortly after dinner, leaving her solely in charge of the family estates."

Looking for suggestions for a game I'm running now. Let's say I have an character who was cursed with an immortality he doesn't want. He cannot die until he's fulfilled some very difficult and repugnant task. This immortality should be unpleasant in nature - maybe he's involuntarily become undead in some manner? It's got to be a nasty enough situation that he's going to want to try very hard to complete the task so that he can finally die and end his ordeal.

How would you handle it? What rules/spells/templates/bestiary entries etc would you invoke?

For reasons which don't bear going into, I needed to work up an 8 HD Agathion whose form is that of a Bear. Anyone want to take a look at it? I estimate it at CR7, but maybe CR 8 with all the fancy-dancy abilities. I see this guy as a big friendly lug. He's a protective type, and gets angry when his friends are threatened.

Agathion, Ursinial

NG Medium Outsider (agathion, extraplanar, good)
Init +3; Senses darkvision 60ft, Low Light VIsion, Scent; Perception +11

DEFENSE
AC 24, touch 13, flat footed 19 (+4 chain shirt +1 moderate fortification, +3 dex, +6 natural)
HP 85 (8d10+40)
Fort +11, Ref +5, Will +4; +4 vs. poison
DR 10 evil or silver; Immune electricity, petrification; Resist cold 10, sonic 10, SR 17
Defensive Abilities Ferocity

OFFENSE
Speed 40 ft.
Size large, reach 5 ft.
Melee 2 claws +14 (1d8+6 plus grab), bite +14 (1d6+6) or +14 Large Greataxe +1 Holy (3d6+7/x3+2d6 vs evil) or +11 Large Heavy Xbow +1 Holy (2d8+1/x3 +2d6 vs evil)
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 8; concentration +10)
*Constant - Speak with Animals
*1/day - Cure Light Wounds
*1/day - Paladin's Sacrifice

STATISTICS
Str 22, Dex 16, Con 20, Int 10, Wis 15, Cha 10
Base Atk +8; CMB +14 (+18 Grapple) CMD 19 (21 vs. Grapple)
Feats Power Attack, Improved Grapple, Cleave, Greater Grapple
Skills Climb +14, Handle Animal +7, Perception +11, Sense Motive +8, Stealth +8, Survival +10, Swim +10; racial modifiers: +4 swim
Languages Celestial, Draconic; speak with animals, truespeech
SQ lay on hands (4d6, 4/day, as an 8th level paladin), rage (22 rounds/day, as an 8th level barbarian)

ECOLOGY
Environment any land (Nirvana)
Organization solitary or troop (3-8)
Treasure standard

SPECIAL ABILITIES
Rage (Su) may rage as a barbarian of a level equal to the Usinial's Hit Dice

Ursinials stand 8-9 feet tall and weight around 500 pounds. They have the appearance of fierce Grizzly Bears who walk upright and move with unusual grace despite their bulk.

A while back I was involved with a discussion here about the possibilities of Non-Evil Liches. There were a number of ideas bandied about, but it was put forth that a non-evil lich wouldn't really be a lich anymore, and would in fact have to be some completely different type of creature. I was inspired to toy with that idea for a bit, and came up with an interesting variant.

So - submitted, for your approval/criticism:

Reliquant

The reliquant is a figure or legend and awe. The pinnacle of self-sacrifice and piety, the reliquant is a spellcaster whose extreme devotion to serving the greater good has allowed his soul to persist beyond the death of his body in order to continue doing good works. While many envy the idea of such immortality, the path of becoming a reliquant is only open to those who are willing to endure the strictest asceticism and practice total abnegation of the self. The process involves extreme fasting, renouncing all worldly posessions and earthly pleasures, and attracting a devoted following who draw inspiration from the potential reliquant's example.

To have any hope of becoming a reliquant, a character must spend years or decades pursuing an agenda of giving all they can in the service of others: going naked so that others may be clothed, going hungry so that others may eat, breaking his own body so that others may live. At the same time, the character must be a relentless force for the greater good: performing miracles, doing mighty deeds, and otherwise protecting others from evil.

Eventually, if he stays true to his principles, he may attract Supplicants: a fanatical following who are inspired by his example, study his teachngs, and record his deeds. These supplicants must then bear witness as the potential reliquant makes the ultimate sacrifice, giving his life in a heroic fashion to save others. If they are sufficiently moved by his final actions, they will then construct a reliquary where the character's soul will come to rest, and one of the supplicants will willingly give up it's body so that the reliquant may once more rise to walk the world, doing good and helping others.

The Reliquant's Reliquary

An integral part of becoming a reliquant is the creation of the reliquary in which the character's soul comes to rest. The only way to get rid of a reliquant for sure is to destroy its reliquary. Unless its reliquary is located and destroyed, a reliquant can return after it is killed (see Creating a Reliquant, below).

A reliquant may not construct its own reliquary, but through selfless deeds it must attract followers who become inspired to do so. The reliquary is crafted by using the Craft Wondrous Item feat. The reliquary will not work unless the reliquant interred in it is able to cast spells and has a caster level of 11th or higher. The reliquary costs 120,000 gp to create and has a caster level equal to that of the reliquant at the time of creation.

The most common form of reliquary is a sealed wooden or stone box containing bones or personal items from the original body of the reliquant. The box is small or medium and has 40 hit points, hardness 20, and a break DC of 40.

Other forms of reliquaries can exist, such as statues, shrines, or similar items.

Creating a Reliquant

“Reliquant” is an acquired template that can be added to any living creature (referred to hereafter as the base creature), provided it sacrifices its own life in service to the greater good and its followers create the required reliquary. A reliquant retains all the base creature's statistics and special abilities except as noted here.

CR: Base Creature +3

Alignment: Any Good

Type: The creature's type changes to Outsider. Do not recalculate BAB, saves, or skill ranks.

Senses: A reliquant gains True Seeing 60' at will.

Armor Class: A reliquant has a +5 natural armor bonus or the base creature's natural armor bonus, whichever is better.

Hit Dice: Change all of the creature's racial Hit Dice to d10s. All Hit Dice derived from class levels remain unchanged.

Defensive Abilities: A reliquant gains DR 15/evil and magic, and immunity to fire, acid, and all charms, enchantments, or other mind-affecting spells or effects. The reliquant also gains the following defensive abilities:

Sacrificial Remorse (Su): When a reliquant is destroyed, its spirit immediately retreats to its reliquary, which is generally in a heavily guarded and revered shrine surrounded by followers and supplicants. Within 1 week, one of the reliquant's supplicants will be overcome with holy fervor and give up their body for the reliquant's use. They will refuse food and water, falling into soporific meditation, ultimately dying as their body magically transforms into a new body for the reliquant. If any of the creatures who previously destroyed the reliquant's body comes within 100 feet of the reliquary during this time, they will be overcome with a profound remorse and must make a Will save with a DC of 10 + the reliquant's Hit Dice + the reliquant's Cha modifier or else they too will fall on their knees and become a supplicant, eventually starving themselves to death in pennance for their act and giving up their body for the reliquant's use.

Everliving: A reliquant has fast healing (10)

Melee Attack: A reliquant has a touch attack that it can use once per round as a natural weapon. This attack deals no damage but can have one of several effects (see below). A reliquant will never arm itself with a weapon and will not use any natural weapons or attacks it possesed in life.

Damage: A reliquant's touch attack is infused with positive energy and restores 1d8 hit point to living creatires + 1 point of damage per 2 Hit Dice possessed by the reliquant. As positive energy, this touch can be used to deal damage to undead creatures.

Special Attacks: A reliquant gains the special attacks described below. Save DCs are equal to 10 + 1/2 reliquant's HD + reliquant's Cha modifier unless otherwise noted.

Holy Aura (Su): Evil Creatures of less than 6 HD in a 60-foot radius that look at the reliquant must succeed on a Will save or become frightened. Creatures with 6 HD or more must succeed at a Will save or be Shaken for a number of rounds equal to the reliquant's Hit Dice. A creature that successfully saves cannot be affected again by the same reliquant's aura for 24 hours. This is a mind-affecting fear effect.

Touch of Grace (Su): Any non-evil living creature a reliquant hits with its touch attack must succeed on a Will save or permanenty fall into a profound state of meditation and prayer similar to endless sleep. Any spell that can remove a curse can free the victim (see the bestow curse spell description, with a DC equal to the lich's save DC). The effect cannot be dispelled except by the reliquant. The subject does not age and appears to be in a state of suspended animation.
Any evil living creature a reliquant hits with its touch attack must succeed on a Fortitude save or be permanently turned to stone. Stone to Flesh or any spell that can remove a curse can free the victim (see the bestow curse spell description, with a DC equal to the lich's save DC). The effect cannot be dispelled.
Any undead creature a reliquant hits with its touch attack must succeed on a Fortitude save or be utterly and immediately destroyed.

Abilities: Con +2, Wis +2, Cha +2.

Skills: Reliquants have a +8 racial bonus on Perception, Sense Motive, and Intimidate checks. A reliquant always treats Climb, Fly, Heal, Intimidate, Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (religion), Knowledge(planes), Perception, Sense Motive, and Spellcraft as class skills. Otherwise, skills are the same as the base creature.

Now available as a PDF in the Paizo store!

This book premiered at Gen Con and SOLD OUT. We hope to get more print copies in soon and get them to Paizo so that you can get that version as well, but for now you can enjoy the PDF.

This is a great resource for anyone who likes to play dwarf characters or for anyone who just wants to add a little extra narrative flavor to their game.

Enjoy!

Hello all - some of you may know me as the writer behind Dire Destiny Books' The Very Last Book about Mounted Combat, The Very Last Book About Alignment, and The Very Last Book About War. I'm pleased to announce that I'm Kickstarting a new project:

"Twilight Arcana - Queens of the Twelve Realms"

It's a fun card game and we're building an incredibly beautiful deck to go with it: I urge you all to check it out, and to share/tweet/pin/post it to help us spread the word.

Thanks!

I know that the FAQ currently says "Stay tuned for announcements" on how to set up independent events, but I thought I would go ahead and open the inevitable thread for such things.

This year, Dire Destiny Books is planning to host three events, and I hope to see many of you in attendance!

THE 4th ANNUAL JOUSTING COMPETITION at PAIZOCON

Once again we will be hosting the Open Jousting Competition, utilizing the performance combat rules from Pathfinder Ultimate Combat in conjunction with the Jousting variant from The Very Last Book About Mounted Combat. This is a fun event every year and it IS a spectator sport, so if you plan to compete be sure to bring your own cheering section. Prizes will be awarded to our top competitors.

THE BATTLE OF SOLLY'S FARM

War comes to Pathfinder as the forces of Good and Evil clash in an epic struggle. Using the new mass combat system from The Very Last Book About War, players will put their Pathfinder characters at the head of a mighty host of soldiers. Will your characters earn glory on the field of honor, or go down to ignominious defeat?

ALIGNMENT: LAWFUL GOOD vs. LAWFUL STUPID

Join a panel of Pathfinder writers for a rousing discussion of Alignment: it's uses as well as it's pitfalls. We will be exploring some of the many topics covered in The Very Last Book About Alignment. Panel members TBA.

I'm looking forward to seeing you all there!

I'm sure that Sara will let us all know when and where we can submit our events. Who else is planning to run something special?

Big Thanks to authors Amber Scott, Jim Groves, and Nick Milasich for coming out to participate in this year's panel discussion "Alignment: Beyond Good and Evil" at Paizocon. It was a wonderful panel and we had some insightful debate. I look forward to doing it again next year!

ANyone who enjoyed the panel should consider checking out The Very Last Book About Alignment.

If you don't have a ticket to the banquet on Saturday night, I will be running a special game on behalf of Dire Destiny Books: a dungeon excerpt from the adventure path "Tomb of Haggemoth"

Anyone who's interested can meet me in the Bar just before the Banquet starts and we'll find a place to play there in the hotel.

Just a reminder to all and sundry that the third annual Open Jousting Competition at Paizocon will be held on Friday. This is a fun event that can handle a lot of people so I want to encourage all of you to attend! This is a head-to-head competition between characters using the performance combat rules and the special Jousting rules from "The Very Last Book About Mounted Combat". It's fast and furious play where every roll counts! All materials will be provided, so all you need to bring is your good self!

Just like last year, we will be using a Swiss System for pairing opponents, so participants will be able to play throughout the event and we will not be using eliminations. Jousting is a spectator sport, so feel free to bring your own cheering section along! As always, prizes will be awarded to our top three competitors.

I look forward to seeing you there!

I've wanted to start doing PFS play for the longest time, and I was toying around with Hero Lab trying to build something to inspire me to get started. Looking at the Alchemist, I thought the vivisectioist would be perfect for me, but Hero Lab says it's not available in PFS. I was just wondering why?

Pathfinder Fighters are fantastic. In this age where it seems everybody has some kind of magical powers coming out of their ears, there is something to be said for the guys and gals who manage to get by on just guts and steel (with a little brains behind them).

Full BAB? Yeah, we got that. In fact, we've got better than that. Weapon Training, my friend: you're +1 to hit and damage with your magic sword? I'm +1 to hit and damage with ANY sword.

It's such a shame the heavier armors limit your Dex bonus to AC. Maybe you should spend all your cash on Mithril armor. Me? No thanks, I've got Armor Training.

Why u MAD bro? I can get by with just one ability: Strength. Or I can have both Strength AND Intelligence if I want to get more Skill Points. Or I can choose to focus on another ability entirely. I've got all the combat feats I need to do what I want in a battle. And I can find plenty of ways to be useful out of combat with my regular non-combat feats or secondary ability scores.

Fighters are the kings of combat maneuvers. We have the feats. Gods forbid you should have to battle fighter who specializes in tripping people. If she's also specialized with a flail, you are going to spend the whole combat on your back. Enjoy!

And what about all those feats that only fighters can get?

Fighters can penetrate DR without magic or special materials.
Fighters can Disrupt spellcasters
Fighters can get obscene bonuses on their chosen weapons, higher than any other Martial.
Fighters can specialize with Shields, for gods' sake!

But above all: do you have a preferred combat style that you like to play? The fighter can do it. Ranged? Better than a ranger. Unarmed? The right fighter build can out-punch a monk. Two-weapon fighting? Probably the only class than can truly make it work. Anything involving ANY weapon EVER? Please, this is the fighter we're talking about. He's the GUY WHO FIGHTS.

Sword & spell?

......

Hmmm... Okay you might have me there. I guess you'll have to get yourself some points of Use Magic Device and invest in wands. But sure - go to town. You'll surprise the hell out of everybody, if nothing else.

I love fighters. I love playing them. I love running adventures for them. Especially in Pathfinder, because Pathfinder fighters in particular are awesome.

...../________________
0===|___R_E_S_P_E_C_T_ >
.....\

Fighters of the world, step up and show your pride! :)

In the forests and mountains, orcs and goblins multiply in their thousands. Amid the stones of a crumbling necropolis, a foul sorcerer raises hordes of zombies. At the borders of gentle kingdoms, dark warlords gather armies and threaten invasion.

Your small band of heroes acting alone may blunt or delay these tremendous attacks, but sooner or later the hammer will fall. Your characters will need to organize grand defenses, arm and equip troops, or march into the field at the head of a mighty host. When that day comes, Dire Destiny Books has your back.

This summer, the people who brought you "The Very Last Book About Mounted Combat" and "The Very Last Book About Alignment" will be publishing the definitive guide to mass combat battle scenarios, including a fun new system that will allow characters to influence the course of large conflicts by using their heroic abilities. Get ready for...

The Very Last Book About War

Coming Soon.

I was listening to Private Sanctuary's podcast on generating ability scores and the rolling up of hit points was mentioned. Basically the only two methods brought up were rolling the hit die or else just taking the average result every level.

It occurred to me that you can get a more average result by either rolling two hit dice and taking the average of them, or else breaking down the hit dice into a 2-dice roll: 1d6 becomes 2d3, 1d8 becomes 2d4, 1d10 becomes 2d5, 1d12 becomes 2d6. I figured that this could not possibly be a new idea, and was wondering if anyone else generated hit points this way.

Also, to play devil's advocate - if you're going to go to the trouble of trying to make hit point rolling more average, why not just take the average?

I just wanted to pop out this thread early because last year there were some issues related to getting new events onto the schedule. I intend to keep watching the site for info, but I just wanted to make sure that I'll be able to set up the 3rd annual Jousting competition as well as another couple of events that I'm planning for Paizocon 2014.

If there's anyone I and other event organizers need to bug (or at least stay in touch with)please let us know here.

I'm not asking for huge reams of justification, just a ball park figure based on your personal experience. If you're playing a melee focused character, what do you expect to be putting out in terms of average HP damage per round, assuming you hit most or all of the time?

The Paizocon 2nd Annual Open Jousting Competition is now officially on the Event Schedule: 11:00 AM on Saturday!

Up to 40 Player Characters will compete head to head using the performance combat rules from the Pathfinder Ultimate Combat book in combination with the Jousting variation from The Very Last Book About Mounted Combat. Prizes will be awarded to the top three finalists of this elimination tournament. Bring any PFS legal character of up to 3rd level to compete or use one of the pre-gen Cavaliers that will be available. Jousting is a spectator sport, so feel free to bring your own cheering section! Fame and glory await the winners - be sure to secure your spot in the lists early!

Organizer Name: Dire Destiny Books
Rules System being used: Pathfinder RPG
Game Edition if relevant: current
Materials Provided y/n: YES
Age rating: 10+
game complexity (easy/normal/hard/etc): Normal
Experience Required (none/novice/veteran/etc): Novice
Prizes awarded y/n: YES
Additional notes: Spectators welcome! Carry a token from an admiring Lady/Lord to gain a special bonus!
minimum players: 8
maximum players: 40

I'd like to extend a special invitation to last year's champions to come and defend their titles! A galloping good time is guaranteed for all!

I'm getting out from behind the screen to play in someone else's campaign for a bit: low-level starting characters in a relatively open world. I have a character concept which I've wanted to do for a while, but I don't want to create headaches for the rest of the players or the GM.

I'd like to play an up-and-coming warlord. This guy is small potatoes now, but his goal is to be a leader of men and have an army at his command. He's all about high-level strategy and battlefield tactics, and it's his goal to make a name for himself winning battles. He's not going to be some moralistic crusader, nor a rapacious bloodthirsty conqueror: he doesn't have any particular philosophical motivation outside of his own career ambitions, although he'll attach himself to a cause if it puts him in command. He's just fascinated by war and has an affinity for it. (Think of George C Scott's portrayal of Patton) I've chosen Cavalier as his class (for reasons which should be obvious to anyone who knows me at all).

Here's the thing: he's going to want to be a leader and recruit followers wherever he can, but this doesn't necessarily mean that he's going to "Lead" the party. I'm sure I'll have him spending lots of gold on Hirelings and henchmen (he's going to need a retinue) but I don't want this to create tons of paperwork and problems for the GM. (Bringing a small warband with him into a dungeon, for instance, which probably won't work.)

So any ideas on how to make that concept work without hogging the spotlight or making things too difficult for the GM? What as a GM would you NOT want to see from a character like that?

I need to find a Sor/Wiz spell of 7th level or lower which will debilitate or inflict massive amounts of damage with no save. SR is okay. Ranged touch or touch spells are okay, although ranged touch is preferred.

Any ideas?

EDIT: a reflex save for partial is okay, as long as the partial is really really nasty as well.

I am officially excited.

I only get to do a couple of conventions a year and this is always my favorite.

I've been running my party through a heavily modified and updated version of that old TSR classic module, "The Lost Caverns of Tsojcanth". The final encounter of the dungeon takes place in a spherical room vs. an opponent who has no problem running up and down the walls. It's a cool encounter, but the flavor didn't really fit with my campaign. So I changed a few things about the room. It's now a planetarium:

If you click this link, you'll see that I sometimes get carried away with setting the scene.

The 12th level party I run games for contains an Inquisitor who makes a point of constantly cycling through his at-will alignment detection abilities while exploring, negotiating, etc. The players are about to stumble into an unexpected encounter a succubus, who (because she's been trapped in a mirror for a couple centuries) they will catch alone, relatively unaware, and poorly prepared. She will, of course, adopt a pleasing guise and try to convince them that she is just a harmless maiden and not at all a threat. However, there is no way the Inquisitor will fail to notice her alignment.

So should I just expect that this will be a brief encounter once the Inquisitor's spidey-sense starts tingling, or is there some way for her to confound his detection long enough to at least plead her case to the party? She can have no additional gear.

I just wanted to throw a post-con shout-out to the winners of the 2012 Jousting Competition, and give a big thanks to everyone who participated. It was a lot of fun to run the event, and I hope to expand it next year!

Here's a little bit of fun:

Prophecy is always dodgy in a game, right? But I can't help messing with it. I have some vague apocalyptic ideas for my current campaign - the party is 12th level now, so it's time for things to get start getting world-shattering.

There's already one vaguely disturbing apocalyptic prophecy floating around my campaign, but sadly the player that it was attached to has left the game, so some of the urgency of it was lost. Time to throw some new cryptic information into the mix.

I was inspired, and wrote some verse - it's not very good verse, and some of the lines are plagiarized, but it's not meant to be art. I wanted to share it, but I thought of a twist: I'll give you the verse, and then whoever feels like it can offer an in-character interpretation. You can just assume an earth-like generic medium-fantasy world vaguely similar to Golarion or Mystara or the Realms as the setting, and you're a scholar who has stumbled across this bit of bad poetry inscribed on an ancient artifact in a dead language. Just write what you think it means, and then I can use your "notes" as handouts for my players.

Or if you want, you can critique the poetry and offer better suggestions. I'm open. Anyway, here's your cryptic prophecy for the day.

Know the balance brokered here
Set aside all hopes and fears
A truce to last ten thousand years
A single turning of the spheres

Down the mountain from the sun
Holy fire and Archons run
Up from pits of darkness come
The endless hordes of jibbering ones

Order and disorder bent
Upon destruction, all intent
To slaughter all their minions sent
'Til weapons blunt and armor rent

Endless war the spheres did shake
Devastation in its wake
Such it seemed that it would make
The fabric of the cosmos break

By decree the Lords of Fate
Shut the door and barred the gate
Armies held in check and wait
A day to rest their endless hate

A jewel strung upon the night
A clever clasp to hold it tight
Until the time the stars are right
And all resume the ancient fight

The sands of fate will soon have run
The day of Arioch will come
The bridge repaired, the clasp undone
By mortal hand, or else by none

My PCs are a fun bunch. Last session they encounter a room with a Staff of Power in it. The staff is protected by a web of invisible mono-filament. After the wizard nearly cuts off his own head trying to reach the thing (seriously - it was a high DC reflex save and he almost missed it, and the random limb rolled was his HEAD), true seeing is applied and they find that there is a barely navigable path to the staff.

First, though - they try cutting the mono-filament. They nearly lose a magic dagger in the process, and the snapping filament comes close to severing the arm off the bard.

Eventually, one of them tries to navigate the dangerous path with the aid of true seeing. A few reflex saves later, the inquisitor is standing in a small space surrounded by dangerous filament, but the staff is within reach. All he has to do is take it. Seriously - that's the end of the encounter as far as I've planned it. All he has to do is take the staff and survive crawling back out.

However, he professes that it's too easy. He suspects that the moment he tries to take the staff, some mechanism or spell is going to try to push him into the filament web, and he'll die. So he makes his way back out of the web, taking damage from a failed save, but leaving the staff there, and the party tries several other futile methods of reaching it.

Eventually the bard decides to try to find the specific harmonic frequency of the filaments with his voice, snapping them with vibrations like an opera singer cracks wine glasses. I follow the rule of cool, so I give him a shot. He makes an excellent perform roll and all of the filaments snap at once.

Of course, the lashing threads not only damage the bard, but they manage to destroy the staff, and the resulting retributive strike destroys most of the room.

This is not the first time something like this has happened, and that's why I love my players so much.

Large encounter coming up down the road, and I know that the party's High-Level Bard is immediately going to Inspire Courage to help his allies defeat the horde of nasty critters besetting them.

I had the idea to give the bad guys one or more bards of their own, which would set up a cool dynamic of the Bards from the two sides singing/shouting at one another, each trying to drown out the other over the noise of the fight. My initial idea was that the enemy bards could try to "Countersong" the PC Bard's "inspire courage", but at first glance it doesn't look like the rules support that.

Any suggestions on how I can make that work within the existing rules, or am I going to have to bust out my magical Super-GM powers?

The fellow playing the wizard in my group just selected two new spells as he leveled: Fabricate and Disintegrate. We joked that all he needed to do now was research a spell called "Defenestrate" which magically creates a window and throws you through it.

How would you stat up such a spell?

The PCs in my game are currently 11th level, and are quite a tough group. I can still challenge them, but part of the fun for them at this level is wading through mooks and taking on things that would have put them down hard at level 5-6. Plus, just increasing challenge rating at this level starts to become a numbers game - higher ACs, higher Attack bonuses, Higher Hit Points, higher damage. So I am constantly trying to think up ways to increase narrative drama that don't rely on just increasing the CR of a given encounter.

The current adventure that the party is on (big dungeon craw) needs to end with a bang, and I want to try to find a way to create the possibility for a heroic death for one of the characters. Basically - put the party in a situation where, in order to avoid a horrible fate for all, one of them will have to willingly walk into something that will almost certainly prove fatal. Then see who takes the bait.

Now, my players are more clever in aggregate than I am - so I need some help! Also, I need some general advice, such as:

- How can I drop them into a no-win scenario without it being an egregious railroading?

- How horrible should I make the fate they need to avoid? The obvious thing to use is the threat of a TPK. I dunno if I'm willing to go quite that far, but maybe some sort of horrible curse? Massive level drain of some kind? It has to suck, but I don't want it to feel too gratuitous.

- The act of self sacrifice needs to be something any PC could do - not aimed at a particular power set or class or anything.

- There could (maybe should) be a small chance that whoever steps up will survive, but the odds of that should be really, really small.

- No need to require anything beyond death. The party has no cleric, but they do have other avenues to raise the dead. I don't really care about that. If they want to spend resources to resurrect or raise whoever "takes one for the team" then I don't think that in any way diminishes the act of self-sacrifice.

Any ideas?

Do the performance combat feats still "function" even when the character isn't performing for an audience? I'm thinking specifically of the ones that allow you to take an extra 5' step or move action on a successful performance check. Is there any way to apply those feats in "normal" combat?

It seems to me that the original Bard ability of "Versatile Performance" would be much more useful and in character for the Dervish (use Performance Dance on Acrobatics and Fly checks) than just making him better at dancing, which he's already good at anyway.

Basically it's what happens when a mad necromancer animates a small army of zombies, then somehow combines them all into one colossal-sized super-zombie that acts as one creature (potentially shedding zombies as it takes damage). I'm going to need to design this thing myself, but I have two potential starting points:

- apply the Zombie template to a titan or other colossal humanoid. Basically, it's a really big zombie with some special consrtuct-like properties.

- base it on an enormous flesh golem and add some undead properties.

I'm leaning towards option 2 at the moment. Any ideas?

I need the terminal velocity of an enormous rock expressed in feet per rounds. Wikipedia gives the an example of a skydiver with his arms drawn in which equates to about 1620 ft/round, but I'm curious is there's anything in the official rules about falling bodies.

Just thought that, as long as we're all waiting for the results from this year, it might be fun to post our submissions from last year that didn't make the cut.

Here's mine:

The Codex of All Vendettas
Aura: Strong Divination, CL 11
Slot ---; Price 80,000 gp; Weight 2 lbs.

Description:

This worm-eaten old tome contains the record of a multitude of grudges, debts, and feuds, all of which were repaid with violent revenge. There is ample room for further entries.

The Codex of All Vendettas may be used to swear a magical oath of vengeance upon a single individual person or creature. To begin a vendetta, a character must inscribe his desire for revenge in the Codex, detailing how he was wronged and the identity of his target. The writer’s motivation must be genuine - attempting to lie to the Codex will cause the inscription to fail. The target’s name need not be known: for example, targeting "the man who killed my father" would be acceptable.

Once the vendetta is inscribed, additional notation appears in the Codex offering clues to the target's location, habits and defenses. This grants the writer a +4 Insight bonus on all Knowledge, Diplomacy, Sense Motive and Survival checks undertaken to discover the location or identity of the target. When in combat with the target, the writer gains a +4 Morale bonus on Attack and Damage rolls, and may re-roll missed attacks due to concealment.

The vendetta is binding, and unless the writer spends every day attempting to track and kill his target, he suffers ability penalties as if under the effect of a Lesser Geas spell. The vendetta ends when the writer records a successful kill in the book or else dies in the attempt. Should the writer lose possession of the Codex, all benefits disappear, but the Geas effect persists until the vendetta ends.
The Codex will only support one active vendetta at a time.

Construction:
Requirements: Legend Lore, Lesser Geas; Cost 40,000 gp

What I learned from it:

The Coolest thing about this item was the name, which will shortly be making an appearance in my own campaign (in a modified form) but the entry is too long, too complicated, and basically amounts to the ranger's favored enemy bonus against a single creature while imposing a severe penalty on the user in terms of a geas. Roleplay: +1, Mechanics: meh.

I've always wanted to put together a character that approximated the look and feel of a wood elf wardancer from the Warhammer Fantasy Battle game: basically an unarmored two-weapon fighter with a feral feel. Usually I've tried to make it work with some combination of ranger or fighter or rogue, but I decided to take a crack at it going straight Barbarian all the way. I went for the "Savage Barbarian" archetype, because it seemed to tie more in with the feral aspect of the current iteration of the Warhammer Wood Elves and I didn't want him to wear armor. Here's what I came up with using a 15 point buy. You'll note that the ability scores are a bit odd. The idea is that he's uber fast and dextrous, and he uses his rage to make up for his deficiencies in Str and Con.

STR 14 (+2)
DEX 18 (+4)
CON 11 (+0)
INT 10 (+0)
WIS 10 (+0)
CHA 9 (-1)

1st level: Two Weapon FIghting. He uses paired short swords because he is going to be a finesse fighter and to help minimise the TWF penalties.

Rages for 4 rounds. When Raging, hits twice at +3 doing 1d6+4 with each blade. Armor class is an issue (14 normal, 12 when raging) but hit points aren't bad for 1st level (12 normal, 14 when raging)

Skills are Acrobatics, Stealth, Perception, Climb, Knowledge Nature. Total for Acrobatics is +8, giving him good mobility if he needs it.

As he goes up in level, the rest of his favored class bonuses go to Hit Points, and he takes the following rage powers / feats / class features:

2nd: Powerful Blow
3rd: Naked Courage, Weapon Finesse. By now he probably has Masterwork swords and some kind of AC buff item, like Bracers of Armor.
4th: +1 to CON, Surprise Accuracy, Powerful Blow bonus increases to +2
5th: Double Slice. Weapons are probably +1 at this point.
6th: Deadly Accuracy
7th: Natural Toughness, Damage Reduction 1/-, Power Attack, maybe has a Belt of Dexterity at this point to increase Dex/AC
8th: +1 DEX, Bleeding Blow, Bonus for Powerful Blow and Surprise Accuracy goes up to +3
9th: Improved Critical, Naked Courage goes up to +2, Upgrade weapons to +2
10th: DR increases to +2, Natural Toughness increases to +2, Auspicious Mark (not sure about that last one - the next rage power I want doesn't come until lvl 12.

That's as far as I got. Any suggestions for tuning this guy up? Anything obvious that I've missed? If I did this as a 20 point buy, should I boost Con or Str or both?

My game needed a MacGuffin for a particular plot that was kind of an opportunistic thing for me when the party was only 3rd or 4th level, so I threw in this incredibly powerful dingus that was obviously BAD NEWS and made it foreboding enough that even the party wizard basically sealed it in a lead box and (while he has been tempted to take it out many times) has yet to actually use it even though the party is now 10th level. It took several levels for him to research the thing and learn about it's powers.

It's basically a demonic gem with powers related to planar travel and divination. One of the powers rely on blood sacrifice and some of them require calling upon evil outsiders. Everyone the party knows about who has owned it has met a bad end or gone insane (or both) and it is associated with at least one major cataclysm.

So now I'm getting ready to introduce a related item into the campaign. It's much more "weapon-y" than the first one, can potentially be combined with it, and I want it to also be very dangerous, but the party is 10th level now and I don't want it to be so scary that they just lock the thing away without tinkering.

I don't run a horror game, but I DO like to introduce fear at the gaming table every once in a while. Scaring players is notoriously difficult, though - plop a gribbly monster in front of them and they're going to roll initiative rather than flee in terror. So I'm always on the lookout for new ideas!

What's the scariest thing that ever happened to you at the gaming table? It could either be an in-game event or something creepy/cool that the GM did or even a real-world scare that happened on game night.

For instance: a few months ago I ran a game that took place during a storm. While we were playing, a real storm sprang up outside, and at least one instance in the game when I said "Lightning flashes ominously and thunder rolls across the sky" was punctuated with an actual thunderbolt outside.

Hey, still tinkering with monk builds. Are there any feats or abilities that I've overlooked that allow a monk to kick or throw opponents and object great distances? Like, kicking somebody across a room or throwing them out a window, etc. There are a number of feats that will allow you to basically bull rush somebody to push them away, but you can't do damage to somebody by throwing them into a wall or a tree or some such. That sort of extreme knockback ability seems to be one of the only wuxia effects that's not spelled out in a feat or a monk ability.

I'm trying to build a formidable 9th-level monk - basically trying to recreate someone like Tai Lung from Kung Fu Panda to use as a potential antagonist. I decided to try using the Maneuver Master archetype, but I ran into problems almost immediately:

The Maneuver Master seems like he would not be good acting on his own, but needs to be a support fighter. He makes for an insanely good grappler if you take the right feats (improved & Greater Grapple, Body Shield) and he can trip & disarm opponents like nobody's business. In fact, with Flurry of Maneuvers, he can disarm, then trip, then grapple you all in one full-round action.

The thing is, if I'm reading the "Flurry of maneuvers" description right, he can't combine maneuvers and strikes - he's either maneuvering you or damaging you, but he can't do both in the same round, unless I'm missing something. This presents a problem, since it seems to me that unless he can somehow use terrain to his advantage (throwing or repositioning you off a cliff or into a set of spikes or something) then he'll have a hard time actually hurting anyone, especially if he's threatened by multiple opponents. He'll be able to hold them off for a damn long time, but taking them down will have to be done mostly with Attacks of Opportunity.

So - am I missing something, or is he more a support archetype than someone who could be a big bad guy in his own right?

Next, I think I'll see what I can do with a Master of Many Styles.

see them driven before us, and hear the lamentations of their significant others.

In honor of the movie this weekend, we need to stat up Conan. I'll Start with young, fresh faced Conan - just starting out on his Barbaric Journey. Because he is epic and because he cleave me in twain if I didn't, I'll give him 25-point-buy abilities.

Conan the Cimmerian
Human Barbarian 1 (favored class: Barbarian)
[Rage Statistics in brackets]

Traits:
Killer (deal additional damage equal to your crit modifier on a successful crit)
Bully (+1 on Intimidate, Intimidate always a class skill)

Str: 17 (15 base +2 racial) [21]
Dex: 12
Con: 15 [19]
Int: 14
Wis: 12
Cha: 12

HP: 14 [16]
AC: 15 [12] (+1 Dex, +3 Studded Leather, +1 light wood shield, [-2 rage])

BAB: +1
CMB: +4 [+6]
CMD: 15 [17]

FORT: +4 [+6]
REF: +1
WILL: +3 [+5]

Skills: 6 (4+1 for int, +1 favored Class, +1 Human)

Climb +5 [+7]
Intimidate +6
Perception +5
Ride +3
Survival +5
Swim +5 [+7]

Class Features:

Rage (6 rounds/day)
Fast Movement (+10' speed)

Feats:

Iron Will (+2 on Will Saves)
Power Attack (trade +1 to hit for +2 damage)

Melee:
Masterwork Greatsword Power Attacking: +4[+6], (2d6+7, 19/x2)[2d6+9, 19/x2]
Scimitar Power Attacking: +3[+5], (1d6+5, 18/x2)[1d6+7, 18/x2]

Ranged:
Composite Shortbow +2 (1d6+3, 20/x3)[1d6+5, 20/x3]

Somebody bump him up a few levels and let us know what your take on Pirate/Mercenary Conan is.

The real conflict in RPGs isn't heroes vs. monsters, or even players vs. GM. The real conflict in RPGs is the never-ending battle for supremacy between coherent narrative and random acts of protagonism.

And I'll be there. If you're in the neighborhood, stop by and see me in Author's Alley and say hello!

Who has exciting stuff planned this year?

I told them that things would get tougher once they reached a certain level. I told them that they were heading into dangerous territory. I told them that the gloves were off and that one of them would likely die if they weren't careful. And tonight I killed the first PC of my current campaign.

Heck of a fight. Tons of Orc Mooks and a few Orc Barbarians, a Troll, an Ogre Chieftain, and an Orc Chief. I knew someone was going to bite it by round 2. The party wasn't coordinating well enough. The Barbarian got caught out by 2 Orc Berzerkers, the Ogre Chief, and a couple of mooks. She held off that entire crew for five rounds while the others dithered and wasted their energy on CR 1/3 orc warriors. Orcs are tough bastiches, with that whole ferocity thing.

She bought the rest of them enough time to get their act together, and blunted the whole assault. Once she went down, the wizard lost his cool and let off an empowered lightning bolt at the lot of them that nearly did max damage. Reduced the chief and most of his remaining goons to a smoking hole in the ground.

So I'm raising a glass to all the PCs I've killed. Here'sa special toast to Ishma, the axe-crazy barbarian.

What PCs have you killed recently?

I had the idea of take a very dangerous CR 14 dragon down to about CR 9 by having it be cursed/crippled/falling-apart. It has suffered terrible wounds that have not healed, it is hideously scarred, half blind, half mad, missing lots of scales and teeth, etc - but still a formidable opponent for my level 7 party.

I was surprised to see that there are no existing templates which cover such a creature - although I suppose there's not too much call for that kind of thing. I came up with somethign on my own, but it's a little too complicated and random to really make a good template. Does anyone know of any existing rules to cover this situation in 3.5?

This class gets all kinds of hate. Is it just the fact that a straight rogue can fill the same archetype better? Is it that there's no real gameplay need for the class, or that it makes for boring gameplay, or what? Is it any good as a strictly NPC class?

Last night I decided to do something different for the evening's encounter. It was a wilderness throw-down between the PCs and a gang of trolls. Instead of getting out the battlemat and the dry-erase markers, I instead reached for my Wargaming terrain - the grass mat, the miniature trees, the plastic hills, and so forth - and arranged the encounter that way, with no grid. Instead we used a tape measure for ranges and movement, with the standard 1" = 5' rule. Basically, we turned back the clock to before 3rd edition.

I've gotten so used to employing a grid for combat that it seemed like a really revolutionary idea at first, but then I remembered that this was the de-facto mode for RPG miniatures combat before grid mats became the standard. I guess I've gotten so used to the idea of employing a grid in the last decade or so that it felt very fresh and novel. This is probably because back in the early days I rarely used miniatures and most of the action was expressed narratively rather than on a miniatures mat.

At any rate, the experience was very organic and natural and I think I might prefer it to using a grid in the future - especially for outdoor or non-dungeon encounters where the landscape is supposed to be more natural and doesn't conform well to straight lines. Here's the analysis from my players:

Pros:
- Easier time measuring ranges, more organic movement and use of space
- Easier to visualize the action, more representational
- Easier to establish flanking maneuvers
- Use of wargaming terrain makes the scene prettier and more compelling

Cons:
- More difficult to figure out threatened areas
- More cleanup time putting away all the terrain (setup takes about as long as drawing the map on the grid)
- More stuff to lug to the game (this one from me)
- Possibility for partial inclusion in Area Effects needs some adjudication

Anyone else leave the grid behind when playing these days? I'd be interested to know if anyone else has traded their battlemat for a tape measure - or if any of us never left the tape measure behind in the first place.

I seem to recall hearing that there was an errata that Spell Perfection could not be used to apply the Heighten Spell metamagic feat. Is that correct or am I mistaken?

While I was at Paizocon earlier this month, I brought my recorder along and got as many interviews as I could with some of the creators who make Pathfinder awesome: Jason Buhlman, James Jacobs, Eric Mona, Lisa Stevens, and many many more. Thanks to everyone who took the time to talk, and I hope to see you next year!

PAIZOCON 2011 INTERVIEWS!

You can hear more audio goodness by hitting up the podcasting thread in the General Discussion forum or browsing around RPGMP3.com.