Oh, hey, item idea for the setting. Thanks.
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Ooh, good point. It should be +12 over its normal CMD (+2 per additional leg over 2), so 32.
Unintentionally. Targets should be immune for 24 hours after making their save. Thanks for the catch!
Okay, another creature from the ruined city. This one is a spider infused with enchantment magic from arcane toxic waste. Currently named the Parlor Spider, though the name Hospitality Spider has also been suggested. Parlor Spider
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Parlor Spiders live in areas saturated with enchantment magic. They grow as large as men, and are striped brown and black, with thick, squat bodies. The strands of their web are transparent, and cleaned frequently. It takeas a DC 15 Perception check to notice the web from more than 10 feet away. Parlor spiders prefer to use their compulsion abilities to bring prey to them. They will typically hide in their webs and wait until something comes within 30 feet, then use Hospitality to get them entangled.
Gourmand CR 7
Extradimensional Stomach (Su)
Grab (Ex)
Swallow Whole (Ex)
Magical Beast Traits
Camouflage (Ex)
Scent (Ex)
Hide in Plain Sight (Ex)
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This broad, slightly flattened creature looks like a cross between a frog and a pig, with a flat nose over a mouth that extends all the way around its head and into its thick neck. Its forelimbs end in trotters while its much longer hind limbs are folded underneath and end in webbed toes. Its colors are mottled and blend into the swamp around it. Gourmands were created as living garbage disposals when the city of Sawreven was at its height. They can swallow anything they can fit in their enormous mouths. Since the fall of the empire, they've adapted to the swampy city, becoming ambush predators. A gourmand will usually try to hide in undergrowth until it sees something that it can fit in its mouth, at which point it will try to swallow it.
Eh. Never hurts to be more clear. If it's something like "This spell causes rapid hair growth," then a line "This spell has no effect on creatures that do not normally grow hair" works and is pretty clear.
For another divination idea, I'm thinking a monster that can pick one creature against which they get a dodge and attack bonus. Move action to switch so that the creature has to give up its full attack in order to change from one enemy to another.
Ooh, I like that. Prophet sickness.
I'm working on a ruined city that used to be the capital of an empire of mages that ruled the world, before hard-crashing a few hundred years before the game starts. The idea is that the buildings are largely sustained by magic, but nature (it's in a giant swamp/jungle) has largely reclaimed it, despite the towers still standing. Flooded streets, vines wrapped around walls, and beasts living throughout. Its filled with monsters and creatures that were either created by the ancient mages, mutated by centuries of magical toxic waste, or adapted after the fall. Among other ideas, I thought certain parts of the city would be more strongly affected by certain schools of magic (similar to the runeforge in Rise of the Runelords, only less intentional in-universe). This would mostly be seen in the flora and fauna. I haven't decided to what extent these will be templates added to existing animals and magical beasts, and how many completely new monsters I'll add. Here are ideas I have so far: Abjuration: Higher defenses would be the obvious thing, but it's a bit boring. Possibly adaptive defenses, where they gain energy resistance to whatever type of energy they've last taken damage from? I thought about some sort of ablative armor, but that seems like it would be annoying to keep track of on multiple enemies in a fight. Conjuration: Teleportation could be a fun effect. Possibly done as a move action, allowing them to avoid attacks of opportunity and difficult terrain. Divination: I've got some ideas, but I'm not sure how "fun" they are. Enhanced senses are the most obvious, but those are largely static, boring abilities. I thought of maybe a creature that can see the future a bit and automatically avoid one attack per round, or possibly let a creature take 10 on attacks. However, I'm not sure how much fun those will be in play. Enchantment: This has a lot of potential for fun hypnosis/charm effects. A giant spider that convinces you to lay down on its web, or a harmless little squirrel that charms you into becoming its bodyguard. Evocation: The obvious choice here would be elemental attacks or qualities. However, I'm struggling to think of anything that really pops. Elemental creatures are already very common in Pathfinder. Illusion: I'm thinking things like illusionary terrain and traps that force the party to take it slow as they explore. Maybe even lots of harmless creatures that are permanently invisible. The wizard casts See Invisibility and finds hundreds of tiny creatures casually walking along, completely unafraid. I like things that aren't necessarily threats, but are cool bits of setting. Necromancy: Living undead. That is, living creatures that have many of the qualities of the undead. They're affected by negative and positive energy in whichever way is most advantageous to them. That's only really going to matter if someone tries to channel, though, so some other features: Negative energy attacks. Ability to create skeletons from their prey (after they've stripped the bones). Ignored by mindless undead. Transmutation: I was thinking some sort of shifting of stats. Maybe something that can grow a big heavy shell for greater AC, or lose it to gain improved mobility and a bonus to attacks. Maybe something that can change its movement types. Something that can inflict transformations like that could be fun as well. Other monsters I have in mind: dwarf versions of existing monsters, like sewer-running purple worms. Hybrid creatures like owlbears, experiments that have bred true. A creature with an extradimensional stomach that can use swallow whole on creatures bigger than it. Those are the ideas I have so far. It's all still very loose, so I'm very open to ideas.
I hope I receive this soon. Got my shipping notice on the first, but the tracking link hasn't been working.
I hope the witch gets some decent player-focused abilities too. Gingerbread witch sounds awesome and horror-focused, but probably not something a player would be able to use outside of an evil campaign. Some new hexes would be great. The witch suffers a bit as a player character class because a lot of the options (particularly hexes) are designed with NPCs in mind (coven, child-scent, blight, infected wounds). Not that the hexes that are player-friendly arent nice, but some more variety would be grand.
I agree, the staff is just awful! Why, I put in for room service, and it arrived twenty minutes late, and worse, the food was cold! ...Oh, you meant the magic items. Yeah, I've never bought them as a player, though I'll keep one around if it drops as treasure.
Like Marks says lots of time "technically the rule is probably this, but I'd run it like this" This doesn't mean we can run it like Mark, we have to run it like as the rules say. Just for clarification, you mean "run it like the rules say for the purpose of discussion," right? Because I'll agree with that. I even wrote an essay on the subject once. Or maybe you meant "we need to run it like the rules say in Pathfinder Society," which is fair enough. But when you phrase it the way you have, it sounds like you're saying "we need to run it like the rules say in our home games," which I strongly disagree with. I'll agree that it's questionable whether or not reach of 0 gives a tiny creature 5 foot reach going purely by the rules as written. At the same time, I think it makes sense, and I would encourage other people to run it that way absent a firm "no" in the rules. And even then I'd say "This houserule makes a lot of sense, and you might find it more fun."
I think some people are losing sight of the problem. The problem isn't "How do I hit the high-AC guy?" The problem is "How can the high-AC guy get enemies to attack him instead of the squishies?" That is, he didn't mind them having high-AC, but he wanted to have a reason intelligent enemies would continue attacking the meatshield instead of the wizard. The fake armor someone linked earlier isn't a bad choice. Glamored armor to make the high-AC guy look easy to hit would work as well. If I were DMing, I'd just houserule in a feat to let them either do more damage to someone who's attacked their buddy (maybe have them designate a "ward" they're guarding) or let them get opportunity attacks on an enemy when they attack someone else. Something that says "Pay attention to me, thou evil jerkwad!" It would be easy enough to justify in character. "I get super angry when someone hits the person I'm protecting!" or "I take advantage of the fact that he's focusing on Melgrim the Incandescent instead of me!"
Jack Mann, if they didn't innately use manufactured weapons, they still won't with Higher intelligence. If they were born with tool use, they don't lose it. If we were to apply the rule from Animal Companions to Familiars, then they would, at least for manufactured weapons. It's a flat "may not use." Now, they won't innately have proficiency, I agree. But I don't see a justification in the rules for why a monkey Familiar, say, couldn't wield a tiny dagger at -4, or why an imp (which, as an outsider, is proficient with all martial weapons) couldn't wield the same without penalty.
I dunno, I'd argue that an animal companion's inability to use manufactured weapons has more to do with the fact that they normally have Int 2. Familiars start at 6 and only go up from there. As well, once you get into improved familiars, some of those normally attack with a manufactured weapon. Arbiter inevitables, for example. It doesn't make much sense for them to suddenly cease using their weapons once they become familiars. Of course, there's another issue. The weapons rules specify that light and one-handed weapons are wielded in one hand, and two-handed weapons in two hands. A dodo has none. Unless the weapon specifies it can be used without hands (like the barbazu beard), the dodo's going to have a tough time.
Honestly, OD&D was more geared to this kind of game. When Gygax ran it, you weren't really supposed to be going through a story with a plot. It was a contest to see how much gold you could get out of a dungeon and how long you could keep a character alive. The idea that your character could die at any moment was expected, and you could roll up a new one reasonably quickly, which is a must in a high-lethality, high-combat game. Part of the problem with this kind of adventure, beyond the system not doing a great job of mapping it, is that it's very different from a regular game of Pathfinder. You need to make sure your players are on-board with the idea, otherwise they're going to wonder why they're not actually accomplishing anything. In a regular game of Pathfinder, not only does the system kind of work against this (for the reasons already mentioned), but the expectations are different. Survival is very rarely a goal in-and-of-itself. You usually have some sort of quest you're on, a long-term goal that you're surviving for. If you don't make it very clear before the game starts that their only goal is to survive, then they're going to wonder when the actual adventure is going to start. Which isn't to say that it can't be fun, but it's something you need to want to play for it to be fun. Otherwise it's just frustrating.
To piggy-back on this, you need to make sure you have player buy-in. Because if they're expecting a regular D&D game, they're going to be very frustrated, since by normal game standards they won't actually be accomplishing anything. You need to make sure that they understand that survival itself is the goal, and you need to make sure they're okay with that kind of game. If you just spring this on them when they're expecting a regular D&D game, expect them to have relatively low investment in the game. Since you're planning on having it go into grand adventure style later on, I'd put some hints of that early on. Make it clear that they're not just trying to stay alive, they're surviving in order to reach that later goal. Toss them a few breadcrumbs along the way, like minor enemies or effects of whatever nonsense they're supposed to stop later on. Not every session, but often enough for them to know that there is more coming later on. What is E6? or P6? please? It's basically a version of the game where you stop gaining levels at 6, and only get more feats as they gain experience. It's good for keeping things at the gritty level.
This is one thing I felt the 4e fighter did very well. He didn't force anyone to attack him, he just took advantage of the fact that they weren't paying attention to him to get extra hits in. Feats that worked in a similar way (getting attacks of opportunity when someone hits your buddy) would be great for a bodyguard build in Pathfinder. Either you're protecting your buddies because the enemy is attacking you instead, or you're protecting your buddies by making the guys attacking them go down faster.
Hey, guys, do not point fingers at each other for who is a "real customer." We have a number of Pathfinder fans who purchase at retailers that make sense for them and people who are brand new to Paizo coming from this promotion. Please help us keep our community a friendly environment, even in hectic times like this. Thanks! I think the reference to "real customers" was referring to those who actually buy the product, as opposed to people who pirate it. So, those who buy at other retailers or are now buying through this promotion would still be real customers. I don't necessarily agree with the implicit point that Paizo should step down its copy protection, as this is an unforeseen event that is relatively unprecedented for the website. I suspect the problem will be solvable without a complete change from Paizo's current practices (which normally present relatively painless copy protection).
I could have sworn I hit reply on Marshmallow's post. Oh, how embarrassing.
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