Xenocrat wrote:
For the same reason WW2 terrorbombing did not cause people to surrender. Not to mention that China, Russia or the USA would not care much about Belgium. And defensive weapons do not have much of a disadvantage as they do not even need to reach orbit but just have to cross the flight path of the ships. They are also as good as undetectable until they are launched unlike the ships which can be seen all the time. Especially a low orbit would be very deadly for the attacker while a high orbit gives plenty of time to intercept incoming nukes. Running away from incoming missiles is also very hard when you are in an orbit.
Xenocrat wrote:
I don't think "light nuclear winter" would be enough. How many key population/industrial centers does earth have which you need to nuke? In addition to any defensive weapons/missile silos which threatens your fleet?
The main reason why people would visit Eox would probably be its lax laws and the ability to engage in certain vice without reprecussion (at least regarding the law). Castrovel might be the prime destination for people from inhospitable planets to experience nature. Sure, many planets have nature but Castrovel advertises with it, so when you have the choice of planets with biospheres and travel time being equal many would probably choose Castrovel.
I don't think that many people from planets with biospheres will visit other planets just for nature because of the time required for interplanetary travel unless prestige is involved. Even then I don't think this tourist segment would be very large.
MurderHobo#6226 wrote:
Not sure about Greyhawk but Dragonlance's Age of Mortals was not received well either. The drift is one part of what makes Starfinder unique and removing it now would only dilute the setting.
Instead of removing what makes Starfinder unique Paizo should instead improve the internal consistency of the setting to make better use of its unique aspects.
Xenocrat wrote:
Massed nuclear bombardment has the problem of heavily damaging the ecosphere. At one point you have to ask yourself what your goal actually is. Also, the orbit is far less safe for the attacker than how it is usually portrayed in SciFi. The attack of Klendathu in Starship Troopers is a good guideline how just getting into orbit and landing troops on the ground will turn out when the enemy is equally advanced as you are.
Sputt wrote:
Actually sending a message and sending images is exactly the same. Its just data. Only the volume differs. And that sending messages intra system works in 1d6-1 hours and breaks the laws of physics is stated in the core book exactly that way (using the drift, so no issue with something blocking the path).Laser I brought up because its a technology which is already implemented in the real world so no "science fiction handwaving". And with 200+ years of intra system cooperation why would bandwidth be limited and expensive instead of there being dozens of laser relay satellites from corporations and governments in both the orbits of the individual planets and Lagrange points? And if you have such sensitive data to be worried about interception then you just teleport the storage device instead of putting it on a ship.
Sputt wrote:
You already have space magic as according to the core book messages take 1d6-1 hours intra-system, specifically breaking the laws of physics. So the only question is bandwidth. And if you do not want to use space magic, there are always technological means to ensure large scale communication between planets like laser communication between relay satellites in orbit of the individual planets.
Franz Lunzer wrote:
Spoiler:
As Azata you get a 5 year old havoc dragon companion. While of course in the game mechanic she is treated as a companion you can order around she considers you "her bestest friend"
Franz Lunzer wrote:
One ongoing theme in Temeraire is that Spoiler: societies which treats dragons as equal perform better than how they historically did.
Also, Aivu from the recent Wrath of the Righteous game, although she of course is hardly a role model for a general dragon raising AP. But it shows how a raising dragon theme can work without a master/servant kind of relationship.
Ella_Shachar wrote:
So when Jews don't usually use it and the name not coming from Jews/Hebrew but from a general term from the Greek, why is it a Jewish term? Just because you have been told by others that it is and you have to feel offended by it?
MaxAstro wrote:
Yet when you subscribe to alignment as objective forces then staying evil would require as much dedication to the force of evil than staying good would.
mikeawmids wrote:
Sure I can rewrite AoE to require the players to think about how much force is appropriate instead of giving them a blanc cheque by making everything nonlethal, have them not loot enemies and instead rely on issued equipment and their pay, add NPCs and checks in case they try to swipe things anyway and introduce more cop dilemas. I can also rewrite large parts of Fly Free or Die to make the space trucker/trader PCs to actually earn money through trading instead of a nearly useless pseudo currency.But when I have to rewrite so much to make the gameplay fit the theme, why do I need to buy the AP in the first place instead of just reading the summary on the product page and come up with my own stuff?
The Raven Black wrote: AoE's system for loot is extremely problematic as written. You basically steal their whole wealth from anybody you want as long as you consider them guilty of offenses, even if you framed them yourself. It encourages PCs to play crooked cops, since honest ones will actually lose on wealth and equipment. Thats the whole problem. While advertised as a cop AP you are not playing cops, you are playing adventurers. Still charging in with greataxes and flinging fireballs and still looting your victims.
YawarFiesta wrote:
A modern national league certainly not, but a system where each regio sends a team to the capital once a year and they play against each other in a tournament could certainly exist. Together with regular games on a local level without any score keeping.
I still think 2E APs have a serious problems which also affects Starfinder. Paizo is, for whatever reason, using uncommon (for PF/SF) adventure hooks instead of the normal adventurers. Circus, City Watch, a tournament, space trucker, etc.
Either Paizo really has to lean into its uncommon scenarios and rewrite a big part of how adventures are supposed to play out for each AP or they have to go back to having generic adventurer APs as thats who the rules are written for.
Leon Aquilla wrote:
Pretty much. Humans have lost their main home planet (and it doesn't look like most of them managed to escape before that). They also exist on Akiton, but that is a small not all that hospitable planet. Same is true for Ysoki.Lashunta have their own planet but they are restricted to one continent and the population density does not look to be all that high. And Kasatha come from a tiny colony ship, so would be extremely rare in the Pact System outside of the big hubs. Compared to that Vesk and Androids would have huge population sizes as would Ryphorians, Anacites, Barathu and Verthani who would be the majorites in the Pact System. Shirren are a wild card.
The Raven Black wrote:
Sure there are no deep historic treaties in Golarion and some differences, just look at the at the role of nobility in historical politics and the complete lack of that in Golarion. But the "inspiration" like you call it is there and goes beyond the completely obvious (despite what some people who don't recognize it are screaming). The existence of the Ulfen Guard, the word Satrapy and the similarity between Sarenrae and the historic Persian faith shows that the designer had more than just "meme" knowledge of the sources he used. Which means that historical knowledge is quite useful as it shows you with what material the designer worked with and can help filling in the gaps. Although yes, this historical source ends at the border in most cases as each country on Golarion was likely designed in isolation and then everything was put together.
Rysky wrote:
You really need to learn more about history. Galt is not a meme version of revolution, France did resolve into exactly this kind of anarchy, including beheading the ones who supported it in the first place. It wasn't called Reign of Terror for nothing. Even the notable characters are similar. Qadira is in fact the only satrap in the inner sea region. And the term satrap was exclusively used for areas held by Persian Empires (even when they changed hands). Quadira also uses positions used by the Persians and even the characters have (ancient) Persian names.
Same for Taldor. It has the same background as Byzantium, the byzantine politics were famous for being convoluted and bloody, so much so that byzantine even became a word meaning exactly that. And Byzantium also inherited the roman system of prefectures which made it special to feudal countries existing at the same time. And as mentioned there is the Ulfen Guard.
Rysky wrote:
Completely and utterly wrong. Galt's state of anarchy is a direct and exact copy of the Reign of Terror in France. Thats government right there.And Qadira is a satrap. Dou you know what a satrap is? A form of provincial government used by Persians. It also has a Vizir with a lot of authority, another Persian specialty, although later coped by the caliphates. And right next to it you have Taldor, basically the Byzantine Empire including their history, use of prefectures, their complicated government and even having their own version of the Varangian Guard in the form of the Ulfen Guard with the exact same reason for existing.
And its not just behaviour, many nations on Golarion are obvious copies of historic real world nations (Galt, Qadira, ...). So when even the autors say "this is France/Persia but with magic" you of course look at how the historic France/Persia looked like when you want to know details the source books do not provide.
Kasoh wrote:
We might not know all the details and get some of them wrong, but the similarity between some parts of Golarion and historical Earth go far beyond details. I already mentioned Galt. It is a very close copy to France during the reign of terror. It not only features the same setup, the same instruments and the same institutions, but even some notable characters in Galt are very similar to real world persons like Robespierre. Another country is Qadira. Not only does the description fit Persia )or rather, a province of Persia), although imo with a Arabian blend which is not much of a stretch as Persia was later conquered by Arabians, the books also use Persian terms when calling it a satrap or having the position of vizir. Even Sarenrae who came to the inner sea region through Qadira has similarities to Ahura Mazda (the main Persian god) as both are unquestionably good sun deities. Why is this done? Because its a shortcut. Designers start with an already established foundation they can build up on and when you only have a limited amount of pages its easier to say "like France/Persia but X" and devout your pages to detail X. If players want more information, some which would be too special as to be practical to be printed in a game supplement, they can then open a history book and find tons of information there.
Deriven Firelion wrote:
It is, unless it isn't. Golarion if full of things copied directly from history, but some vocal people pretend that despite this history is not relevant to the game.When pressed they try to weasel out of it by saying "its not history, its tropes!" which is basically a other word for mythical interpretation (although I fail to see how Galt is supposed to be a trope and not a copy of historic France) But then some other topics are supposed to be seen through a completely modern lense despite pretty much all PCs being serial mass murderer under modern standards and not to be allowed to do what they do in the APs.
Zoomba wrote:
The thing is, pregnancy itself and also nursing babies requires the mother to stay at or close to home. After that period is over they can switch roles if its advantageous, but it might be convenient not to to avoid disruption of work when roles are switched. Not that staying at home has the same meaning as it does today (or rather, had half a century ago). In a typical pre-modern village there is plenty of necessary work to do at home so its not that one person is the provider and the other is not. Someone made the suggestion that there is a ritual or blessing which basically turns the milk of an animal into baby formula to allow someone else to feed babies when the mother is away, and after thinking about it I warmed up to this idea. That was basically the discussion back then and the point some people started to throw around insults and accusations.
Shirren_Human_Expert wrote:
Earlier Starfinder books had a big problem with too small population sizes. It got better with Near Space with Vesk cities actually having millions of inhabitants. But in general, the majority of core races would actually be small minorities in the Pact System because of their history or home.
The Raven Black wrote:
The big question is how does the Liberator recognizes what the real free will of someone is. The danger, and probably the biggest fall risk for Liberators, is to assume that free will means agreeing with him and that everything else is a sign of indoctrination.Where to draw the line between free will and coercion?
PossibleCabbage wrote: I still so no reason that Golarion should not be more culturally advanced than earth in some regards. Earthfall was like 11000 years before the present (and there was like a Star Trek civilization before it) whereas the earliest known human civilization on earth was around 3000BCE. Considering that chattel slavery still exists in many parts of Golarion in what whey are they culturally more advanced? Also as many nations on Golarion are heavily inspired by real world nations its a bit hard to at the same time be more advanced and yet still stay a recognizable copy.Edit: Or are you now talking about a different topic than Slavery and Liberators? Because I still do as that is the thread topic.
PossibleCabbage wrote:
Sounds more Redeemer to me. On the other hand, what is the Liberator supposed to do? Lock him up? Not exactly in line with what Liberators stand for. Make him work of his debt to society by doing community service, etc? Would force him to do something he doesn't want so a big no (prison slavery).Leaves either punish him with fines (physical punishment is not really an option either) or hope that the criminal understands that he did wrong. If he does not then.... what?
Sibelius Eos Owm wrote: ... If you consider something acceptable or not is subjective. Even with a modern mindset you will find many people who have no problem with working off your debt as long as the person is not mistreated and has a chance to eventually pay it instead of being kept in perpetual poverty even though that is (debt) slavery. And in regions where slavery is still practiced you will certainly get very different answers about what is acceptabel. What I said, or what I meant to say, was that "US" style chattel slavery (although not limited to the US but used around the globe. I only use US because most people here will be most familiar with that) was the worst kind of slavery based on: - Enslavement without any fault of the slave
Many forms of slavery used in history were better in one or more categories, for example it required the slave to do something to be enslaved like a crime or failing to repay a debt to slaves retaining their rights and posesions and have a way out if it. Up to the tiny fraction of slaves who lived a life of luxury.
You would even mean you have to define what slavery is. What about slaves who have been so indoctrinated to have accepted their lot in life (especially relevant for Liberators as they are all about personal choice). What about serfdom? Or the lowest rung in a caste system? Again Absu for the win for requiring you to check if someone deserves smiting before doing so.
Rysky wrote:
When I type that into google I get some very different results. You are free to correct me when I get something wrong, but what I write here is based on actual history. Those things happened, even when you do not like it.
Rysky wrote: You could also, I'unno, not try to downplay the other forms of slavery? How is mentioning different forms of slavery downplaying them? In history there simply was not just one form of slavery but many different kinds which varied by who could be taken as slaves, how they were treated and what rights they had. Often there were several types of slavery even within the same country. That ranges from the worst kind of slavery, people abducted or even born into slavery and worked to death, over temporary or even voluntary slavery who still had rights and even property of their own to slaves, as pointed out above, who lived a better life than most people and even though they were forcibly taken certainly did not want to leave once they got a taste of living a luxorious life. The first one was probably the most common (except maybe the born into thing, that was specific to the west/europe/usa as far as I know) and the one Paizo thinks of when talking about slavery. That slavery was "an upgrade" only applied to a tiny fraction of slaves.
Thing is, if you use more nuanced slavery based on history instead of always evil chattel slavery Paizo seems to have decided to use Liberators would quickly become too disruptive to be playable.
Thats why I like Absu as a deity as he has "Think before you smite" written into his code and thus can work in a less black and white setting. PossibleCabbage wrote: No one is ever "fairly enslaved" nor does anybody wish to remain enslaved. In Golarion as envisioned by Paizo that is probably true, but in history there were instances where people wanted to be enslaved because it presented a rare form of upward mobility. For example Osman Jannisary. They were essentially slaves, children taken from christian families at young age and trained into fanatical muslim elite warriors. Not unlike the Unsullied from Game of Thrones.
Another example would be the Mamluks, which translates into "slave dynasty". A not insignificant country whichs upper echelon was made up entirely by slaves purchased and abducted from far away countries and even the ruler himself was elected from within the ranks of slaves.
David knott 242 wrote:
That makes things more complicated. It was obviously written with only US chattel slavery in mind, but what for example with enslavement as punishment for a crime (assuming no wrongful conviction)?Or debt slavery when the slave, through his own choices and bad luck, accumulated enough debt to be enslaved when he could not pay it back? Or even choose to be enslaved under certain conditions as payment? Historically it was also very common for defeated soldiers in a war to be enslaved. When the slave was not pressed into service but chose to become a soldier wouldn't slavery be a consequence of his choice he accepted when he made it? It also touches on other things. The separation of church and state. While total separation is a modern concept there was always a conflict about secular and divine authorities. And while you have Rahadoum no noble anywhere except very pious ones would be thrilled to be overruled by clergy, especially as on Golarion you have dozens of different faiths. If they all could overrule him any secular title would be as good as powerless.
Wesrolter wrote:
When you cobble together the cheapest option with the new vehicle rules, sure. When you stick to actually published vehicles it gets a bit more expensive, especially when you do not use Dawn of Flame and instead of the Performance Cruiser your cheapest option for a flying car is the Police Cruiser.
Wesrolter wrote:
Because to have a domestic drone or even a flying, not just hover, car (something so common to have frequent aerial traffic jams) you need to be higher level. How does Joe Average level? And if Joe is not beholden to the item level rules why are the PCs? Why can't they take out a loan to buy stuff with? After all they have a starship as collateral (or is that worth nothing like it isn't in-game?)Answer: Because it would break the wealth by level system a lot of the game is build around. No matter how you turn it, lore/fluff and what happens in the game do not fit together at all. And while some people are OK with that, as they simply tune out everything except adventuring while gaming, in a really good system both what happens in the game and the lore would work together instead of being incompatible. So "A Galaxy of Tech" is a nice read, but if you try to use anything from it in the game as a player you are stopped hard.
Ixal wrote: Tiaras of Translocation Mk3 would rival spacecraft for interplanetary transportation because they are maintenance free and easily pay for themselves even when you undercut traditional spellcasting. Should of course be "undercut fares on spaceships." Spaceships themselves are of course another huge problem for fluff as they are technically free and everyone is fine with random people having nuclear weapons.
Rysky the Dark Solarion wrote:
And exactly those metagame constructs are the problem. Starfinder is full of them and they cause the game to be vastly different than how the fluff presents it, because the PCs can never match what they are supposed to be able to do according to the fluff. Owning a flying car like everyone else? Only at higher level because of level restrictions and exponential costs (when you stick to published designs). Those Joe Averages must be really rich to afford one. Seems like going adventuring was a bad career choice. The other problem is the abilities the game gives would fundamentally alter the setting when applied to the entire population instead of just being limited to the PCs.
The food industry would not exist as presented because clear spindle aeon stones are just so cheap and would save you a ton of money so a large portion of people would have them crashing the food market. Eating would be a luxury for special occasions. Likewise Tiaras of Translocation Mk3 would rival spacecraft for interplanetary transportation because they are maintenance free and easily pay for themselves even when you undercut traditional spellcasting.
Coupled with the ability to replicate anything with UPBs, including organic materials like food, there wouldn't be any need to physically ship items around. Its just data and UPBs.
Rysky the Dark Solarion wrote:
No it doesn't. A few pages are something different than an entire book of fluff. And even the small sections in Tech Revolution only really work when you completely ignore the reality of Starfinder with item levels restricting purchases, exponential costs (good luck buying a car in Starfinder) and the ability to replicate anything everywhere (why ship goods when you can instead ship UPB and a schematic?) and so on. Why would emergency care be anything other than serums of healing which are just so cheap? Clinics use Sprayflesh? Really? And media being shipped physically around the pact worlds instead of transmitted with encryption is also rather unbelievable.
Granted, sometimes the fluff does take specific game mechanics into account like how locks account for the lock spells ability to open two locks at once.
Fluff books were one of my favorites in Shadowrun.
You don't have to explain Paizos reasoning to me. I just disagree heavily with them as the hover chairs are very immersion breaking both by the way they function and how they fit in the setting. That the chairs change their attributes depending on the user is just plain stupid. Yes you can argue that the Nuar does not fit into the chair of the Dwarf to dodge the issue, but you have the same problem when a Dwarf uses the chair of a Nuar and no paper thin excuse. Or when a Human uses a Dwarf chair (both medium) etc. And Paizo did shoot themselves in the foot by making disabling injuries so easy to heal and augmentations so cheap and easy to use. When that is the case of course you, logically, won't have many disabled people in the setting.
And while others are ok with just saying "don't think about it" I am not. Not being allowed to think about aspects of the game world and not being able to interact with them in any creative way because they have been designed to be broken from the ground up destroys one of the main advantages and draws of RPGs.
Apart from the fact that augmentations in Starfinder are so cheap that the need for a hoverchair as disability aid is rather questionable, its cheaper to get several replacement limbs or a necrograft spine replacement (not needed if you rule that the spine is a valid thing for a prosthetic) than a basic hoverchair, having all attributes of the chair being dependent on the user is problematic when there is no user as the party is using it as a high tech wheelbarrow to carry their loot. And it also looks quite silly when the same chair suddenly becomes much faster because instead of a Dwarf a Nuar is riding it. It gets even more silly when the same chair is now suddenly not only able to support the 300 pound Nuar but also much more equipment as the Nuar happens to have a lot higher strength than his envoy Dwarf friend. In that case its more advantageous that the Nuar is using the chair and carrying the Dwarf on its shoulders instead of the Dwarf sitting in it. It would be better to give hoverchairs base stats for carrying capacity and speed, cheap upgrades for their stats and saying that characters starting with a hoverchair also automatically get all the upgrades they need so that the performance of the chair matches their natural abilities. (Although I confess, that would open loopholes of using hoverchairs becoming better than without them when you upgrade them enough. So there needs to be some kind of limit to that).
Leon Aquilla wrote:
A bit late for that as Verces exists. Also there is a bar on Absolom, I think both mentioned in Pact Worlds and a semi important location in a AP which is run by a pair of heavily augmented people. And when I remember right its implied that this is a lifestyle choice and not result of an accident, although I am not totally sure about that. |