Agathion, Leonal

Jideon Bloodmane's page

29 posts. Alias of Sir Longears.




Meliska:
Last afternoon you've got a message from Trek, Biely's closest friend. The message was short, just asking you to meet him the next day. It did not specify where, but probably meant his home. Trek wasn't specially sharp, but he had helped you look for your brother.

It was pretty early in the morning when you knocked on his door. In the distance, you could hear loud sounds that resembled things being demolished. It could certainly be just a new building being made, but could also mean another wild attack from the Gruul. They've been restless lately. Trek did not answer the door, even after you pounded the door and yelled for him.

As you were returning to the Chasm and leaving the Precinct Two, there was a loud hum in the air. Turning back, towards Azorius Senate, there was a tower shooting colorful energy upwards, as well as sanding pulsing waves outwards. It seems the Izzet have finished their project... another 'improvement' that would for sure not help your life.

As you were about to resume your way home, immense bright glyphs appeared above New Prahv. Something wasn't right for sure.

You reach the Tenth District Plaza. As usual, there was a lot of people there, but this time they were all looking at the center of it, pointing. Following their arms, you see a massive dragon on top of a building, one hand moving as if he was extremely bored. Pieces of stone and metal from the surrounding buildings were being ripped apart, as if hit by a massive tornado, all converging to the center of the plaza, where they were merging together to form what appeared to be an enormous statue... of the same dragon weaving the spell.

Dark Archive

Hi guys, I have a doubt regarding the ABP rules and I'd like to know what is the general consensus of them.

Here is the body of the rules. Emphasis mine.

Automatic Bonus Progression wrote:
All characters gain the abilities listed on the table below when they reach the appropriate level. Decrease character wealth by level to half the normal amount. The automatic bonuses are often more beneficial than that reduction in wealth, but characters have less flexibility, so the advantages and disadvantages balance out. Items that only grant bonuses to AC, saving throws, and ability scores don’t exist in this variant, and wish and similar spells never grant inherent bonuses to ability scores. Magic weapons and armor do exist, but grant only special abilities, not enhancement bonuses; calculate their prices with the table in the Magic Weapons and Armor section.

I believe it is pretty clear that magic weapons and armor only grant special abilities and to calculate their price we need to see the mentioned table. However, what about items that grant bonus similar to those covered in the ABP rules, but also grant other abilities, like Plague Rat Belt and Cloak of the Yeti?

What of these would happen?

1) Since they are not items that only grant bonus to AC, saving throws, and ability scores, they exist with no changes.
2) They don't exist at all.
3) They do exist but they don't grant the bonuses to AC, saving throws, and ability scores and I need to make calculations to find their new price?

I'm inclined to say that RAW it is option 1, and because of the "only" on the sentence mentioning the bonuses on non-weapon/armor items it seems to also be RAI.

Thoughts?

Dark Archive

Assuming you are a 20th level wizard with access to a 10th level spell, I have a couple questions, since it is mentioned that the 10th level slot " works a bit differently from other spell slots".

Archwizard's Spellcraft wrote:
You command the most potent arcane magic and can cast a spell of truly incredible power. You gain a single 10th-level spell slot and can prepare a spell in that slot using arcane spellcasting. Unlike with other spell slots, you don’t gain more 10th-level spells as you level up, though you can take the Archwizard’s Might feat to gain a second slot.

1) If you have an arcane school, do you get an additional 10th level slot of that specific school?

Arcane Schools wrote:
If you specialize in an arcane school, rather than studying each school equally (as universalists do), you gain an extra spell slot for each level of spell you can cast. You can prepare only spells of your chosen arcane school in these extra slots. In addition, you can prepare an extra cantrip of your chosen school. You also add another arcane spell of your chosen school to your spellbook.

It appears that the intent was for 10th level spells to be really limited in number, even considering you need to spend a 20th level feat to gain access to another slot, but being specialized in a school gives a slot for 'free'? It appears to be too good.

2) For feats and abilities that take in consideration your highest spell level (like Quickened Casting and Scroll Savant), do I consider my highest spell level 9th or 10th?

Dark Archive

As far as I've searched, it appears that in 2E Paizo have abandoned the 'Outsider' name and instead have broken the traditional outsiders of 1st edition in various groups or families. However, except from the elemental trait, neither of them mention the need of sleeping, drinking, eating and breathing!

Groups
-Celestial (Creatures that hail from or have a strong connection to the good-aligned planes are called celestials. Celestials can survive the basic environmental effects of planes in the Outer Sphere.)
-Elemental (Elementals are creatures directly tied to an element and native to the Elemental Planes. Elementals don’t need to breathe.)
-Fiend (Creatures that hail from or have a strong connection to the evil-aligned planes are called fiends. Fiends can survive the basic environmental effects of planes in the Outer Sphere.)
-Monitor (Creatures that hail from or have a strong connection to the neutrally aligned planes are called monitors. Monitors can survive the basic environmental effects of planes in the Outer Sphere.)

Families
-Aeon (These monitors are the self-styled defenders of reality. Traditional aeons have dualistic natures and forms, and they hold a dichotomy of interests, though axiomites and inevitables do not. Aeons other than axiomites and inevitables communicate via a strange telepathic hodgepodge of sensory sending called envisioning.)
-Angel (This family of celestials is native to the plane of Nirvana. Most angels are neutral good, have darkvision, and have a weakness to evil damage.)
-Archon (Members of this family of celestials are the protectors of Heaven and are lawful good. They have darkvision and a weakness to evil damage.)
-Azata (This family of celestials is native to Elysium. They are typically chaotic good and have darkvision and a weakness to evil and cold iron.)
-Daemon (A family of fiends spawned on the desolate plane of Abaddon, most daemons are neutral evil. They typically have darkvision and weakness to good damage.)
-Demon (A family of fiends, demons hail from or trace their origins to the Abyss. Most are irredeemably chaotic evil and have darkvision.)
-Devil (A family of fiends from Hell, most devils are irredeemably lawful evil. They typically have greater darkvision, immunity to fire, and telepathy.)
-Genie (The diverse families of genies hold positions of prominence on the Elemental Planes. They have powerful magical abilities.)
-Inevitable (These constructed aeons were created by the axiomites. Each type of inevitable is dedicated to a specific task. Most inevitables have weakness to chaotic damage.)
-Protean (A family of monitors spawned within the Maelstrom, these creatures are guardians of disorder and are chaotic neutral. They typically have darkvision, an amorphous anatomy, and a weakness to lawful damage.)
-Rakshasa (Reincarnations of evil souls, rakshasas are fiends that live on the Material Plane.)
-Velstrac (no description provided!)

Taking in consideration the lengths the developers have explained many aspects of the game, I'm in doubt if this is a change or a mistake.

Am I missing something/somewhere that states otherwise?

Dark Archive

Working on a homebrew word and now I'm revising the planes that I'll be using.

Is there really a point in having these two planes as separate?

What will I lose or make weird if the two are the same thing?


Hi guys!

I'm thinking about running a game that the players will have to invade the Whispering Tyrant tomb in order to kill him before the seal imprisoning him is destroyed. I know there is a stat block for him but it uses the mythic rules and I despise them with all my heart!

Because of that, I'm building the Whispering Tyrant as a level 20 necromancer with the dread lich template. He will be built with a 25 point buy and will have itens as if he was a PC so I think his CR should be around 24.

My problem is I'm not a "wizard player", so I'm in need of help to design the final encounter in a way that it will be challenging but not a TPK.


Map!

Openning for stealth dots.


Map!

Post your characters here!

Dark Archive

Hi guys!

I'm wondering if the following enchantments would stack for a spiked shield:

Impervious (weapon) +3,000gp wrote:
An impervious weapon is warded from damage and decay. A metallic weapon cannot rust and a wooden weapon cannot rot or warp, even by magical or supernatural means. An impervious weapon gains double the normal bonus to its hardness and hit points for each point of its enhancement bonus. The break DC for an impervious weapon and the wielder’s combat maneuver defense against sunder maneuvers against the impervious weapon each gain a bonus equal to twice the weapon’s enhancement bonus.
Impervious (armor or shield) +1 bonus wrote:
A shield or suit of armor with this special ability is especially hardy. It gains double its enhancement bonus to hardness and hit points (instead of just the enhancement bonus), its break DC increases by double its enhancement bonus, and it gains a bonus on saving throws against direct attacks (such as a rust monster’s rust ability) equal to its enhancement bonus.

Despite having the same name, one is designed to be used on weapons and the other on armor/shield, with distinct texts between them. As it happens, a spiked shield can be enchanted both as a weapon and as a shield.

So, if I make an adamantine large spiked shield (weapon part: +1 impervious)/(armor part: +1 impervious), would it have hardness 28 (20 + 4*1 + 4*1) and 60 hp (20 + 20*1 + 20*1)?

I'm making a character for a Wrath of the Righteous campaign and I'm intending to make this weapon a legendary weapon with the following ability:

Unyielding wrote:
A legendary item with this ability has double the hardness of a typical item of its type and triple the hit points. Furthermore, it’s immune to all attempts to sunder it made by non-mythic creatures. This is a persistent ability.

If the former is valid, would the unyielding double/triple only the basic hardness/hit points of the item or the modified by the enhancement bonus and magic abilities?

Would it be a) Hardness 56 [2*(20 + 4*1 +4*1)] and 180 hp [3*(20 + 20*1 + 20*1)] or b) Hardness 48 [2*20 + 4*1 +4*1] and 100 hp [3*20 + 20*1 + 20*1]?


Current Map | Loot | Critical-Fumble Generator

Opening for dots! My OCD is kicking me for making an opening post that is not an opening post... but I agree that not making one is hurting you guys.


Current Map | Loot | Critical-Fumble Generator

For decades, demons have ruled the Worldwound. Fearsome fiends of every stripe - their mottled skin harder than iron, teeth like serrated blades, and eyes burning with Abyssal flames - roam the ruined lands that were once known as Sarkoris, leaving their mark wherever they go. Four crusades have attempted to cleanse the land, but each seems to meet a worse fate than the last. Were it not for the line of magical wardstones along the eastern and southern borders, the demons would have long ago overrun north­ central Avistan and beyond.

The Fourth Crusade hasn't really ended as much as petered out, yet some refuse to accept that. Amid crippling shortages and record lows in morale among the crusaders, the Mendevian war effort teeters on the brink of collapse. Though the demonic occupation of the Worldwound is growing, as is corruption among the crusaders, a dwindling minority of paladins and priests maintain that the Fourth Crusade is still vibrant and alive, and that the turning point in the war is only a few days away.

[...]

:: Kenabres - Arodus 16 - Morning ::

For several weeks, excitement has been building in Kenabres... Armasse is coming! Traditionally an opportunity for scholars and priests to come together to study the lessons of history from wars past, since Aroden's death, this holy day has become more about training commoners in weaponry, choosing squires, and ordaining new priests. Over time, Armasse has grown to encompass jousting competitions, mock duels, battle reenactments, and other festival events. In Kenabres, the festival is eagerly anticipated, for it provides distractions from the horrors of being on the front line of the war. Smiles on faces normally marred by downcast eyes and furrowed brows do wonders for city morale in the weeks leading up to the event.

Today is the first day of the Armasse. Thousands and thousands of people, most of them humans, move around, trying to find a good spot to watch the opening of the festival... others stop by at food carts or booths containing weapons, armors and many trinkets that the vendors insist are able to protect someone against demons... others sign themselves for the physical competitions. A common sight in any border city of Mendev, many are crusaders from various companies and factions, many bearing some sort of banner or tabard.

Despite being a citywide celebration, the majority of the event, including its jousting matches and other entertainments, takes place at Clydwell Plaza, just west of the cathedral and even if it will only officially begin in about an hour at noon, with the blessing of the festival by Lord Hulrun himself, the plaza is already crowded. The plaza, as most of the official administrative buildings, is located on the Old Kenabres district - the original town of Kenabres, perched the edge ofthe cliff, looking down over the West Sellen - just in front of the Cathedral of Saint Clydwell, a champion oflomedae who sacrificed himself to seal a horde of demons within an inescapable prison. The cathedral is a great stone building with a green copper steeple and stained-glass windows portraying the imprisonment of various horrific demons. On the other direction, to the west, it is possible to see the Temple of Iomedae - which is the largest temple in Kenabres expect for the cathedral - and the Kite, a two-story stone keep with an engraved stone kite shield 18 feet long that houses the wardstone that helps keep demons from overrunning the Worldwound's borders.

Feel free to create a scene for your characters. As others will join you, they can continue your scene, thus letting you to interact with each other, or create their own scene. Feel free to create NPCs as you see fit. I'll try to keep my involvement at a minimum.


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Hey guys and welcome to my interpretation of the Wrath of the Righteous AP! As you can guess from the title, this will not be a standard WotR game, but instead highly modified for a couple of reasons that will be discussed further. Before we delve into it, let me tell you about myself, about how I intend to run this game and my expectations.

About me:
Firstly I’m from Brazil. English is not my first language but I believe I can express myself pretty well and I do not believe it will have any negative impact in this game, but I believe it is important to tell you that because, eventually, I WILL make some mistake (like switching thigh for tight… it happened once and it was hilarious!). I’m married, have 28 yo and have been DMing since I was 14. I know this is not a lot in comparison to some GMs around here but in Brazil it is quite significant.

I joined these boards in September of 2015 and was forced to withdraw from it due to real life reasons (really bad anxiety crisis) in beginning of 2017. Before taking this forced vacation, I GMed many games and played in others. To be honest, I believe that I overstretched myself with the number of games. This time, however, I’m restricting myself to only a couple games (4 at most) and only GM at one. Besides these boards, I have a tabletop group who plays weekly since June of 2016. I’m the GM of this group, even if at the moment I’m on a “GM Vacation”, where one of the other players took the mantle.

Specifically about the Wrath of the Righteous AP, I’ve already run it twice, at least part of it. The first time was in these same boards, where we managed to get until the second part of book 2. Unfortunately I had my crisis and had to end it. The second time was with my real life group, where we finished book 4 before deciding to quite due to the ridiculousness of the mythic rules (more on that later below).

Expectations:
I’m expecting at least 1 post per weekday and 1 post per weekend. I’m fully aware that life happens and sometimes you (or me) will have difficulty to post, but let’s try not to make this a habit. If know you’ll not be able to post for a couple days, please let me know. This AP is really combat heavy, so it is REALLY important for you to follow this posting schedule, or else this game will take forever. Again, being combat heavy, it is of uttermost importance for the players (you) to maintain a good amount of RP between yourselves and the provided NPCs. I’m much more interested in roleplaying than rollplaying. I want to be able to see what your character is doing, thinking and saying.

How I run the game:
Despite being a fantasy game, I’m really concerned by the realism of the game. That being said, I tend to follow all the rules, even if I may make some adjustments if I believe something is just silly or nonsensical. Between RAW and RAI, I’m far more inclined towards the later. Below, on the ‘House Rules’ section, you’ll see many adjustments to make this game look more ‘real’ and less ‘computer game’.

=Dice Roll=
I’ll roll for you anything that would be considered an automatic reaction to something the story does to you. This includes initiative rolls, most saves, and some perception, sense motive and the like. Whenever I have to do such a thing, I’ll spoiler these rolls, but you are all welcome to see them for yourselves.

If you want to do something, go ahead and roll some dice to keep the game moving. I’ll adjust these rolls to the situation if it is required. As an example, let’s say you want to influence someone and roll for a Diplomacy check. If, according to your post, I judge it is more a threat, I’ll switch to Intimidate. However, this is mostly important: I will not take silly rolls. We all know we can ‘preview’ our dice before posting, so I’ll not take useless rolls between important ones. As an example, let’s say you meet an NPC you wish to influence. If you throw me a poor Knowledge (geography) check to notice its accent before a high Diplomacy check, I’ll obviously be suspicious.

If you have to roll more than one thing in the same post, do so in the following order: (1) as it happens chronologically; and (2) in alphabetic order for things that happen simultaneously. If I ask you for a roll and you forget about it, you fail.

=Combat=
I will provide maps for combat via GoogleDrive and the link will be always on the top of the campaign page. Each combat post will have a spoiler with the initiative order, showing which characters are up to action in bold. If you fail to post your action in 1 day, I’ll bot you. You are free to post your action in any order (let’s say player 1 and player 2 are up) and I’ll adjust things if for some reason your action is not valid anymore.

=Player Discussion and OOC talk=
The campaign tab is just for IC post. If you want to talk to me or between yourselves, be it questions, suggestions, or even small talk, use the Discussion tab. It is called that for that specific reason! As usual, if we (GM and Player) disagree in something, you are more than welcome to present your case, but know that once I have reached a conclusion, it is final. Please, don’t insist.

If you we are in agreement and you believe this might be the game for you, let’s then talk about the Wrath of the Righteous AP. As I mentioned before, this is a combat intensive AP, but there is still room for good RP. Despite not being a recent one, I believe the story behind it is awesome and appealing… who do not want to fight demons and free the world from their clutch? I do. However, it has one huge flaw: the mythic rules. They are broken. Period.

If you are familiar to how high level pathfinder game looks a bit silly, multiply this by 10. In my opinion, it is broken beyond repair. My first instinct was to simply run this AP as a regular non-mythic game, but I wasn’t able to find enough evidence that it is doable, and nerfing the badies would be a disservice. Because of these reasons, I decided to go with an alternative system that should keep the PCs in par with the challenge without making everything silly. I’ll talk more about it in the following sections.

It is also important to discuss the tone of this campaign. I intend on making this as dark as I can. Once the characters are picked, I'll talk to you about what you are OK with, so I can know how far I'll be able to go.

I’m looking for 4-6 players for this game. This AP provides 6 different campaign traits, so I’ll take up to one player for each trait. This, however, doesn’t mean that I’ll take a particular character simply because it is the only one in a given trait… if I don’t like the character/player, I’ll rather have one fewer PC. I don’t really care about party composition.
This recruitment will take place both here in the Recruitment thread and in the Discussion thread. You’ll all start here, building your PC crunch and fluff. I’ll have many questions for you and only when I’m finished questioning you, I’ll give you permission to move to the Discussion thread so you’ll be able to RP with the other applicants.

I will keep this open for a couple weeks, not sure how many yet, but for sure I’ll make my decision before the end of November. I’ll give you a 48-hour notice before I close the recruitment to new ‘dots’. Once the recruitment window closes, you’ll still have another 24-hour to finish everything. Keep in mind that later applications will have a lower chance simply because there might not be enough time for me to deeply know your characters prior to selection.

Character Creation Guidelines:

Starting Level: 1
Wealth: average for your class
Classes: All allowed. Unchained obligatory when available (will work with you to convert a monk archetype). NO 3RD PARTY!
Race: Core plus Aasimar, Changelings, Dhampir, Ifrit, Oread, Skinwalker, Sylph, Tiefling, Undine.
HP: Max at first; half+1 thereafter or ask ME to roll for you.
Stats: 15 PB.
Traits: 2, 1 must be a campaign trait. You can get another one if you get a drawback.

Alternate Mythic:

You will not gain the usual (and broken!) benefits of mythic, but instead gain the following:
Mythic Abilities: Hard to Kill (as normal), Mythic Power (1 per tier/day, recover only 1/day), and Surge (as normal). You gain no other mythic abilities.
Ability Score Increase: Only 1 instead of 2.
Mythic Feats: You get a regular feat instead.
Upgraded Traits: All your campaign traits are upgraded at some point.
Prestige Class: When you get your first mythic tier, you must choose a 10-level prestige class. You receive an additional number of HP equal to half+1 of the prestige class HD. You also gain the abilities correspondent to your mythic tier as if it was your class level in that prestige class, however you only gain these abilities if you meet all the pre-requisites of the prestige class (as an example, if you take Arcane Archer but your BAB is only +4 at the moment, you’ll only receive the enhance arrows ability when your BAB reaches +6). You gain no increase in BAB, saves, skill points or class skills. You are also limited to the normal cap for a given ability of your own level (a 6th level wizard taking the veiled illusionist PrC would not receive an increase in spellcasting, since he is already at the maximum for a 6th level PC, however, if he later take a level in rogue, he would receive that increase retroactively; on a similar case, a 7th level rogue would not be able to benefit from a sneak attack increase above 4d6).

House Rules:

Spell-Like Abilities and Spellcraft: If a spell-like ability produces no visual effect (like charm person), there is no way for someone to use spellcraft to identify it.
Identifying spells: Different people conjure spells differently, so it is impossible for someone to know for sure the exact spell the other is casting. If you pass the check, you’ll know the school (and sub schools) and the general effect, but not the exact spell name. Different casting languages (casting in draconic vs. casting in elven), different philosophies (a sorcerer drawing from her blood and a witch using her patron), different religions (a cleric of Iomedae and a cultist of Deskari)… and so on, all increase the DC to identify a spell.
Gated Knowledge checks: Some subjects are so obscure that will require at least a couple ranks in a given knowledge check. As an example, no matter how smart you are, if you only learnt basic mathematics, you’ll never understand quantic physics.
Equipment Damage: Sometimes, you’ll take such a powerful blow that even if you blocked it with your shield or armor, it might take some damage. The chances are not that great, especially at lower levels, but it might become relevant later.

Application Requirements:

1) Download and read the Player’s Guide.
2) A complete character sheet. You need not to create an alias prior to selection.
3) A well developed background. I need to feel your character. The more you give me, the less I’ll have to probe you for questions. It is important for you to incorporate your character choices in your background, especially your campaign trait.
4) The well known 10-minute background. I know many of you do not like it, but I really do. For me, its important to know such things.
5) Your intended PrC.

Dark Archive

Hi! I'm having problems with completing my orders. On May 30 I added a new credit card and was able to purchase a couple products without any problem... now, with the same card I can't buy anything!

I've already checked and this card in question works normally on other websites.

Dark Archive

If the BBEG casts dominate person on an NPC and orders it to "Act normally, as if you were not dominated by me, but don't reveal you are dominated to anyone!", would said NPC live his life normally for the duration of the spell?

If the answer to the former question is a 'yes', would everyone else know he is dominated at all? Would the Sense Motive DC be still 15?

As far as I understood the spell, with this 'trick', the BBEG would be able to create a dormant dominate spell, only triggering it when he needs the target to do something (and only then granting the normal bonuses). The NPC's allies would not be able to know anything is wrong about him, correct?

---

I'm working on a campaign that needs the BBEG to have a couple people dominated, but since the Sense Motive to notice the spell is pretty low, it is unrealistic that he could do so without raising a lot of flags, which is obviously problematic.

I know that I can houserule as I want, but I hate to do things outside of the rules.

Dark Archive

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Hi guys, I've been toying with the idea of a mostly completely intrigue game (with little if no combat). For this, I'd have to find an appropriate setting to place my game and I really like the idea of a political game in Taldor, since it could take a lot of different angles depending on the PCs' choices.

Unfortunately, for this, I'd need a pretty detailed view of Taldor's politics. Most of Paizo material don't really touch about politics (actually a comprehensive approach, since it is a rather specific aspect of the game that is most likely ignored), and Taldor having no new books makes everything a bit worse. I've looked around other threads, there are a lot of great ideas but nothing concrete, so I've decided to, like we say here in Brazil, "to give names to the bulls".

Firstly, I think it is necessary to quickly explain my view of Taldor's real word comparisons. IMHO, Taldor current situation is kind of a transition from the Feudal system to a Byzantine one, even if there is no clue if it will finish its transition, remain as it is, or turn back. My reasoning to this is the fact the it is mentioned repeatedly that it has a Byzantine Bureaucracy and Byzantine titles for its nobility (a classic feudal term). Furthermore, it also mentions serfs and the complete lack of preoccupation to the desires of the common folk.

Another important consideration is that any design to be made about Taldor's politics, is that it MUST NOT be practical. It has to have many opportunities for those in the game of politics to maneuver their desires. Being as engineer, this is quite hard for me, since my brain is settled to a "make things functional" mode, but I'll try.

The Unbearded

Slaves: The lowest of the unbearded, the slaves have absolutely no rights in Taldor. Differently from other kingdoms where slavery is allowed, in Taldor it is not as significant simply because there are easier and cheaper options for those interested in such things, like the serfs, day laborers, dock workers, etc. Slaves are mostly used by lanistas (for the gladiatorial games), as houses slaves by some of the Senatorial class who are not themselves part of the nobility, or by the Zimar Corsairs to work in their rows.

With the unbearded comprising around 99% of Taldor population, it is not really surprising that slavery is not largely used, since most of the population would not be able to buy slaves (they can't properly buy food) and most of the bearded are already part of the nobility, thus having serfs to work for them.

Serfs: Different from slaves (if only in name), serfs are tied to the land instead of owned by someone, even if the distinction is almost insignificant. Mostly seen in the countryside, the serfs are the responsible for working the lands of their lords and raise their animals, as well as working for them in exchange for their protection. Aside from their responsibilities of production, serfs must also fight for their lords if requested, making the bulk of their lords' particular armies.

Free men (independent farmers, craftsmen, merchants, vagabonds, soldiers, etc): Found mostly around the cities, the free men pride themselves of not being 'bounded' by anyone, even if they are mostly wrong, since they depend on the good-will of those above themselves if they wish to survive and, hopefully, thrive. All of them must work to pay the heavy taxes imposed to them with the risk of being thrown in some forgotten jail or be sold as slaves (or sent to the Zimar Corsairs). Craftsmen depend on their guilds, merchants are subjected to additional trade taxes and the good-will of fiscals... it is not surprising that many of the unbearded join the army, one of the single jobs one can take and have the chance to improve in life.

The Bearded - Nobles

Knights: The lowest rank of nobility, knights are mounted warriors vassals to a lord, raising in prestige according to the power pertaining to such lord. A knight bound to a Baron would have much less prestige and a simpler life than one bound to a Count or a Duke. The term knight can also be used in a more chivalrous tone when employed by high born nobles who wish to take up arms.

Barons: Still part of the low nobility, barons are minor nobles just above the knights. Most of the nobles in Taldor are Barons, bound by the peerage system to higher nobles. The distinction between a Knight and a Baron is dim, since the first is a honorific and not hereditary title, while the second is hereditary. Both of them generally have s single small property and a minor amount of serfs if any to work for them.

Viscount: A non-hereditary title, a viscount is a noble with the responsibility to aid its Count in the administration if the County. Among the low nobility, it is a highly important title, even if looked down by the high nobility. With the rise of the Senatorial class, the name 'County' was changed to comuni, but the titles Viscount and Count remained.

Count/Marquess: A hereditary title of middle power, a count is considered the highest among the low-nobility but the lowest among the high nobility. With a couple barons and knights under their command, a Count has a considerable power under his will, even if they are still bound to higher nobles. A count has the responsibility for the administration of its county (nowadays called comuni), having a handful of serfs and taxes coming towards them. The differentiation between a Count and a Marquess is simply the location of their lands. The comunis located on the borders of Taldor are more exposed to foreign attacks, so they are controlled by Marquess, who have a distinct title and slightly higher influence.

Duke, Grand Duke, and Archduke: A hereditary title of high power, a duke has the responsibility to administrate a Duchy, thus receiving the taxes from its Countys and paying to the Grand Prince. With the advent of the Senatorial class, the Duchy was renamed to prefecture, even if the title of Duke remained. The title Grand Duke was created to give more importance to a couple Dukes who have a greater territory or a more strategic one, while the title of Archduke was used to represent the duke who is closest to replace the Grand Prince is case he has no heirs.

Viceroy: A hereditary title bestowed to a powerful noble with the responsibility of ruling a distant territory from the main Empire of Taldor. Nowadays, since the shrinking of the empire, there is no acting viceroy, even if a couple families claim the title with the hope that, once the territories are reclaimed, they'll be able to regain their power.

Grand Prince: The supreme power and the sovereign of Taldor and all its distant territories (currently none). His heirs are called Princes and Princess.

The Bearded - Senators

Clarissimis: The lowest among the senatorial class, the clarissimi are mostly secretaries of those Senators in charge of a single city. Its prestige would depend on the size of the city, and it is the first step from a common men into the senatorial class. A clarissimi is appointed by the Praetor of the city.

Magistrates: Above the clarissimi, a group of magistrates are responsible to council and help the Praetor to run a city. From tax collectors, to bank representatives, important guild representatives, etc, these men are effectively a city council. Some of these Magistrates respond directly to Quaestors and Magisters, with the responsibility of assuring that the Praetor is working according to the plans of those above them. The number of Magistrates varies according to the size of the city, ranging from around 10 to more than 50. Magistrates are appointed by Praetors and are hereditary.

Praetors: Praetors are responsible to the administrative function of a city, be it small or large. With the help of Magistrates and Clarissimis, the Praetors should assure that all the taxes are being paid, that the city and its roads are well-kept, the population are under control, etc. Praetors are hereditary and are appointed by the Prefecture Governors.

Spectabiles: Similarly to the Clarissimis, the Spectabiles are basically secretaries of those Senators in charge of a Prefecture. Even if possessing less prestige and power that a Praetor, being a Spectable is generally a necessary step if one intends to become a Governor in the few opportunities that allow it. Spectabiles are appointed by both Governors and Quaestors, depending on the function they will have. Spectabiles are hereditary titles.

Governors: In charge of a whole Prefecture, the governor is the second highest administrative rank among the senatorial class. With countless Spectabiles, Praetors, and Magistrates under their command, the governors are pretty powerful. Governors are hereditary titles.

Quaestors: Not tied to a specific territory, but to a specific function, quaestors are under the direct order of Magisters with the function of making sure all the orders issued by the magisters to be applied to each Prefecture, Comuni, and City. Their job is generally to fiscalize and not to implement the changes proffered by the Magisters. Quaestors are hereditary titles.

Illustres: Similarly to Clarissimis and Spectabiles, the Illustres are basically secretaries to those Senators in charge of the administration of the whole Taldoran Empire. Once more, even if not as prestigious as others titles, being a Illustre is generally a necessary step for those wishing to become Tribunes and Magisters. Illustres are hereditary titles.

Tribunes: One of the most prestigious titles, a Tribune has the responsibility of debate the new and current laws of the whole Empire. Every new law must be passed through the tribunes, giving them an immense amount of power and influence and are generally a "retirement post" for Quaestors and Governors, being appointed by the Praetorian Prefect. Tribunes are hereditary titles.

Magisters: Representing the most power office of specific matters, the Magisters act as a council for the Praetorian Prefect, being appointed directly by them. Their offices range from the control of religion, arcane arts, foreign policy, treasury, etc. Unlike other high ranking Senators, a Magistrate is not a hereditary title and each Preatorian Prefect can choose or dismiss a magistrate as he wishes. Instead, if the Magister was already part of the Senatorial class, he passes the title of Tribune hereditarily.

Protasekretis: Working directly for the Praetorian Prefect, the Protasekretis are responsible for the most high house, with the most important job of keeping all the imperial records. To avoid the risk of leaking some imperial secret, a Protasekretis is a hereditary title, even if working for a Preatorian Prefect which is not. The Protasekretis is appointed directly by the Grand Prince.

Praetorian Prefect: One of the most powerful individuals in the whole empire, the Praetorian Prefect has the responsibility to administrate the empire for the Grand Prince. Its power depends on how the Grand Prince wishes to meddle with the day to day administration of its empire. This title is appointed by the Grand Prince and is not hereditary. Much like a Magister, if the Preatorian Prefect was a member oft the Senatorial class, he passes the title of Tribune hereditarily.

Conflicts of Interest - Senators vs. Nobility

More than once there is conflict between the Senatorial and Nobility for the right to rule anything. With the advent of the senatorial class, it was clear that Counts/Marquess and Praetors would be responsible for the same territory. The same applies to Dukes/Grand Dukes and Governors. To mitigate this, many counts, marquesses, and dukes made sure to be also be part of the Senatorial class, effectively only changing their title when addressing those under his control.

Obviously this wasn't always the case, since such titles are appointed by those above in the Senatorial class. In such cases, a couple prefectures ended up with Dukes with effective no nominal power but still many nobles under his control, and Governors with the right to rule but without the strength to do so.

Among the Chamber of the Tribunes, another problem rose as the nobility would not accept to have their words to have the same weight of those not with a noble blood. To mitigate this, those that are both Nobles and members of the Senate, have a vote with a stronger weight (1.5) than those that are solely Senators. Even if in disadvantage, the fact that non-noble senators outnumber those of noble blood, give them a generally advantage in the Senate.

---

This is still a sketch, but I intend to further describe and develop each of these titles. Any criticism and idea would be most welcome.

Dark Archive

Hi, yesterday I was trying to buy Pathfinder Campaign Setting: The First World, Realm of the Fey PDF, but during the checkout it never fully completed... I've never received a message that the purchase was complete, nor an order #, nor an e-mail of confirmation like the other times I've bought here.

Imagining it was some issues with the site (like always happened before, at least for me), I tried several times until I finally gave up. Today I've received a call from the bank that I had 14(!) purchases here and that I should contact you.

I wish to know what is happening with the site (that I can't buy for some reason) and, most importantly, that I won't be charged for this... after all, even after these many tries I haven't received nothing (no pdf, no message, no e-mail).

Dark Archive

Hi guys, I'm having a little problem in understanding how this weapon ability works. I'm not sure which part of the wording of this ability is supposed to be fluff and rules.

d20pfsrd wrote:

Restriction This ability can be placed only on melee or thrown weapons.

The wielder of a sharding weapon can make a special ranged attack with the weapon in place of any melee attack. To do this, the wielder goes through the motion of throwing the weapon without releasing it. The weapon splits off a duplicate of itself that flies as if thrown by the wielder at the intended target. The duplicate gains a range increment of 10 feet for this purpose, but uses the same proficiency and otherwise functions the same as the original weapon. The duplicate vanishes after hitting or missing its target.

No make it easy for you to understand my doubt, I'll brake this ability down.

Quote:
The wielder of a sharding weapon can make a special ranged attack with the weapon in place of any melee attack.

In my understanding, the word 'special' means that this isn't a simple ranged attack... you aren't simply turning your melee attack into a ranged one.

Quote:
To do this, the wielder goes through the motion of throwing the weapon without releasing it. The weapon splits off a duplicate of itself that flies as if thrown by the wielder at the intended target.

Is this part just a fluff description of the attack or this ability turned a melee attack into a thrown one?

Quote:
The duplicate gains a range increment of 10 feet for this purpose, but uses the same proficiency and otherwise functions the same as the original weapon. The duplicate vanishes after hitting or missing its target.

What does this really mean? Is it a melee or a ranged attack in the end (or even a thrown attack)? My main doubt consists of how feats and other abilities work with it.

For an example, lets say I have a +2 sharding greatsword. When I fight with it in melee, it will work simply as a +2 greatsword, no issues here, but when I use the sharding ability, how does this interact with feats?

1)Would I need Power Attack or Deadly Aim to increase its damage?
2)How does it interact with ranged weapon feats like Rapid Shot, PBS, Precise Shot, etc?

So, is it a melee attack, a ranged one, or both?


Hi guys!

I'm GMing a Strange Aeons PBP game in these boards and I'm using the optional Sanity rules from the Horror Adventures. The problem is that I' think they are a bit broken the way they are written, being either too powerful or too bland depending on the PCs.

For example, lets take a standard point-buy and the classic party of 4 - a fighter, a cleric, a rogue, and a wizard. I'm not going to assume that neither of them are fully optimized, so here is how they look like:

Fighter: With most of his stats in the physical stats, a fighter would have a lower Sanity Score/Threshold/Edge and a low Will save to resist any sanity attack.
Cleric: As a caster who depends on both Wisdom and Charisma, he should have pretty good Sanity stats as well as a great Will save.
Rogue: Probably with a decent Intelligence and Charisma, the rogue's sanity stats would not be as bad, but his Will save would still be low.
Wizard: Similarly to the Cleric, but probably with a sole higher stat in Intelligence, he would have good Sanity stats (specially a high threshold) and also good if not great Will.

Now, as a GM, our job is to present a good experience for our players and I'm specially concerned about not punishing their decisions when those are not BAD decisions. For an example, it would be silly to punish the fighter simply because he took a fighter as his class... this is entirely different from a player who takes a fighter and dumps Wisdom to 7 to get more points into Strength.

That being said, if I want to use the sanity rules, I have to do so in a way that it is still fun for everyone, and that is where the problems begin. Here are a couple scenarios to help you understand my dilema:

1- High Sanity Damage: It is not easy to heal sanity damage (and it should not be IMO to better reflect the realism) but this poses a serious threat to the fighter and the rogue in our party. With lower will saves, they will most likely fail their saves and take damage, possibly gaining a madness. This is an awesome RP opportunity... ONCE or TWICE. Once your fighter has 4+ madness, it would become a struggle to RP all of them, and if we only see them as 'penalties', what is the point then? This leads me to lower the damage, so madness become less frequent, but still a lurking danger, which leads to...

2- Low Sanity Damage: With a lower damage, our Fighter and Rogue are a bit safer. They'll still eventually get one or two madness but I believe they can handle it. The problem now lies with the Cleric and the Wizard, whose would almost never get a madness, turning the whole system is just more bookkeeping. For them, the Sanity Score becomes just a big HP which will slowly get lower, but not a 'real' problem.

The problem is that it is entirely possible for a PC with a high Sanity Threshold, to be at 1/39 without a single madness! They would be in the brink of their sanity with not a single drawback! On the other hand, a PC with a lower threshold could be 30/39 with three madness... this seems highly unbalanced in my opinion.

The whole thing about the sanity edge seems a bit pointless if you never get a madness also. So, what I ask you, is how to fix it?

My initial thought is about looking at it in the same way as the Wound Threshold system, where they would get a couple penalties as their sanity goes down, but to where would these penalties go?


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Hi guys, I'm a pbp GM that will be running this AP here in the boards starting on Monday. Like in most of the APs in pbp format a 5th player really adds to the RP and helps a lot to keep the game flowing, which is specially important for us.

The current roster of victims players are:

-Alenka Farkasova, a human alchemist (chirurgeon/vivisectionist) who conducted forbidden studies with humans and animals back in the University of Lepidstadt
-Cerio Dreswitch, a human spiritualist (fractured mind) with a despair phantom of his long dead twin brother... if he had a brother in the first place
-Jenni Skulsplitter, a half-orc bloodrager (primalist/metamagic rager) with her blood tainted by an abyssal mark
-Mira Tullian, a human mesmerist who thanks to her problematic mother learnt to control her emotions so everyone around her would stay calm
-Professor Licius Mermont, a human investigator (questioner) who has a chair at the University of Lepidstadt, even if some obscure topics recently caught his attention

To adjust for a 5th player, I usually do so by adjusting the experience they receive, and for this, I work in different ways for the xp received from encounters and those received by Story Awards. Story Awards xp are the easier ones, since you simply add 1/5 more (multiply it by 1.25)... this way, instead of a 800xp you give them 1000xp.

For the encounters, it is a bit tricky, since each encounter as written would leave you a small deficit. A CR1 encounter would give the PCs 400xp (100xp each) but with a 5th player, each would get only 80xp instead. By itself, this would already 'balance the party', since by adding another player, all of them would get less xp and thus be slightly weaker... but no player really likes to get less levels, so instead I add more creatures/levels/templates to the monsters until I get the same xp.

For this AP, the math lead me to this arrangement:

Boiler Room: Add 1 Dire Rat and the Advanced Template to the Zoog
Storage: Add 2 Giant Centipede
Ruined Hall: Add the Advanced Template to the Beheaded and the Crawling Hands
Laundry Room: Add 1 Mesmerist level to Doctor Oathsday
East Courtyard: Add the Advanced Template to the Nightgaunt
Conference Room: Add 1 Pickled Punk
Ruined Office: Add 1 Dire Rat
Administrator Losandro's Office: Add the Advanced Template to Eliege Losandro
Records Hall: Add 2 Apostles of Orpiment
Records Room: Add 1 Apostle of Orpiment
Admiting: Add 1 Boilborn
East Ward Hallway: Add 1 Ghoul
Nurse Station: Add 1 Apostle of Orpiment
North Courtyard: Add 1 Ghoul
North Orderly Station: Add the Advancedt Template to the Voonith
Work Room: Add 1 Ghoul
Group Therapy: Add 1 Ghoul
Showers: Add 1 Ghoul and the Advanced Template to Klades
Tower Room: Add 1 Ghoul
Tower Highs: Add the Advanced Template to the Oneirogen
Guard Room: Add 1 Rogue level to Aggra "Bag Lady" Loomis
Hall of Oneirogens: Add the Advanced Template to the Oneirogens
Zandalus's Den: Add 1 Psychic level to Zandalus and 1 Sorcerer level to the Tatterman

I'll also be using the Sanity and Fear additional rules but so far have not decided about which encounters will risk sanity or need fear checks.

What are your thoughts? Do you think this will make some encounters too challenging or too easy?


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In a distant land polluted by an alien menace from beyond the stars, a great cancer grows within the earth. As its tendrils reach out through the dreams of those who learn and study its existence, a sinister cult grows more active in preparing the way for a devastation that will destroy more than the minds of would-be heroes. Can the adventures reclaim lost memories in time to stop the advance of a cataclysmic contagion that could threaten all of Golarion? Can they resist the mind-shattering truths revealed by the Yellow Sign, and the monstrous force it symbolizes? The Strange Aeons Adventure Path pits the heroes against the cosmic horrors of the Cthulhu Mythos, with new monsters, mind-shattering terrors, and explorations far beyond the known lands of Golarion.


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Hi guys, thanks for joining me in what I believe will be an awesome AP!

We still have a bit more than two weeks before I can get my hands on the first book and read/prepare it for you but I think we can get started with the character creation and a couple more important stuff.

Character Creation:
Starting Level: 1st level.

Abilities: 15 point buy. No ability may be lower than 8 before racial modifiers and even so, only ONE ability might be lower than 10 before racial modifiers.

Classes: Anything from Paizo is allowed. Barbarians, Rogues and Summoners should use the unchained version. Monks may use unchained or not. I think occult classes are a great fit for this AP so if you ever itched to play one, now is the time! In my opinion, more than in any other previous AP, this one will really shine with a really fitting class (and archetype), so I decided to break it down to you with my thoughts, dividing them in "Thematic", "Standard", and "Not-fitting".

  • Thematic: alchemist, inquisitor, investigator, medium, mesmerist, occultist, oracle, psychic, shaman, spiritualist, witch, wizard
  • Standard: arcanist, barbarian, bard, bloodrager, brawler, cleric, fighter, hunter, magus, monk, paladin, ranger, rogue, slayer, sorcerer, summoner, vigilante, warpriest
  • Not-fitting: cavalier, druid, gunslinger, kineticist, skald, swashbuckler

Races: Anything from Paizo with 11 race points or less is allowed, although much like the classes, I'd prefer a race that really fits the theme and the kingdom (Ustalav): changelings, dhampir, half-orc, human, skinwalker.

Alignment: No restriction, but I'm more inclined to good for obvious reasons. I trust you guys will not come up with CE.

Traits/Drawbacks: Two traits PLUS a Campaign trait and a drawback. I'd also like if you do not take the same campaign trait.

Hit Points: Max at first level. Subsequent levels will be rolled, each PC receiving a free re-roll for each Constitution modifier (Ex.: A fighter with Con 15, you'd roll 3d10 and take the higher).

Starting Gold: Average for your class or ask me to roll for you. Remember that, like the player's guide points out, you may not start with all you gear!

Background: I have high hopes that this AP will be pretty focused on a more storytelling campaign, so a good background is a must. Remember that you will be missing a couple years from memory loss (it could be fun to roll a d8 to determine how many years are missing). I'd also prefer for your PCs to be more locally tied, preferably from Ustalav. Another point that could be interesting is to not create PCs fully aware on the mythos... having a wizard/scholar among the group is completely ok, but everyone knowing a lot of stuff might ruin a bit of the enjoyment.

10 Minute Background: I just love this so here it is again. For this specific game, I'd like to add another step.
-Step 6: List one fear your character have and one fear that you have (if you are not comfortable with this, skip it).

Here is a quick link for the Strange Aeons Player's Guide. I believe you have already read it, but I put it here just in case.

Additional Rules:
Background Skills: 2 additional skill points to be spent in Background Skills. Craft (alchemy) and Perform (any) are not considered background skills for Alchemists and Bards/Skalds respectively.

Critical Hit and Fumble Decks: The Crit deck rules will only be applied to the PCs, since it is no fun to be beheaded by accident. Fumble deck will be applied to everyone.

Fear and Sanity Rules: These are two new systems from the Horror Adventures book. I'll talk more about them below.

Occult Skill Unlocks: From the Occult Adventures book, since I sense a pretty good fit. You can check them out HERE.

Stamina and Combat Tricks: Fighters receive Combat Stamina as a bonus feat at 1st level. Other classes might select this feat as normal.

Variant Multiclassing: Allowed for anyone interested.

Wound Threshold: Wound Threshold will be used to once more trying to make it more challenging. If during gameplay I sense it is causing more trouble than help, this could be removed. Both PCs and enemies will be subjected to this system. It has worked pretty nicely in all my games so far.

With the creation rules left behind, we need to talk about how to run an horror game via pbp. Since I've decided about running this AP a couple months ago, I started to look for tips on how to run a successful horror game and even if I found some good stuff, most of them are not really applicable to pbp (like music, dark ambient, etc). Here it is what I have found:

  • You need to want to be scared: There is no way for us to play a Horror Campaign if you do not want to be scared. I've read that there are two ways to achieve this... I can try to scare your PC, or you, but neither of these will work without your cooperation and willingness. I believe that this game could be really terrifying if I'm not the only one trying to scare you... you also should try to scare each other, like coming up with a vivid nightmare, making your PCs really afraid of what is going on.
  • Mystery: The less you know, the better. I'm really expecting that this AP will not throw goblins and orcs at you but instead creepy and unknown creatures... it is far more terrifying when we do not fight against something we know and know that "the CR is low so lets kill it". Because of this I'd like to propose to you two houserules (will talk about them later).
  • No spoilers: Continuing the mystery theme, another thing that goes along with Horror is the paranoia. Usually I put stuff in spoiler for you to check if you succeed at the check but for this game I intend to send you PMs instead (unless of course you all succeeded). I'm hoping that with this, when one of you comes with an information out of nowhere, the others will think if you have shared everything or not.

To accomplish this, we have two new rules from the Horror Adventures book, Fear and Sanity, and also the two house rules I'm proposing.

Fear

Instead of having just three levels of fear (shaken, frightened, and panicked), we now have two stages of fear (lesser and greater), and seven levels of fear. When you are subject to a fear effect whose level exceeds your current fear level, your fear level increases to that level. If you are subject to a fear effect of a level equal to or lower than your current fear level, your fear level usually increases by one. However, multiple lesser fear effects can’t force you to progress from a lesser fear level to a greater one. If you are scared and are subject to an additional lesser fear effect, you are staggered for 1 round, rather than becoming frightened. You can, however, accept the frightened condition rather than be staggered while scared if you prefer (such as if you actually want to run away).

Lesser Fear
1. Spooked: The nature of your surroundings or events that you have witnessed makes you uneasy. You take a –2 penalty on saving throws against fear effects and on Perception checks, as your mind conjures potential horrors in every shadow. However, you are ready to face danger, and gain a +1 circumstance bonus on initiative checks.
2. Shaken: Fear has taken hold of you and you are no longer thinking or acting clearly. You take a –2 penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, and ability checks.
3. Scared: You are noticeably afraid, jumping at shadows and easily panicked by odd sights and unexplained noises. You take all of the penalties of the shaken condition, except the penalty on saves against fear effects becomes –4. In addition, if being subject to a lesser fear effect would increase your fear level, you are staggered for 1 round instead.

Greater Fear
4. Frightened: You are so afraid that you must flee from the source of your fear. On your turn, you must move away from any source of fear you perceive. Once you can no longer perceive any source of fear, you can act as normal, but you still take all the penalties of the shaken condition. You can use special abilities, such as spells and equipment, to flee and must resort to such abilities if they seem like the only way to escape. If you flee from the source of your fear and it later reappears while you are still frightened, you must immediately begin fleeing again. If unable to flee, you can fight.
5. Panicked: This functions as the frightened condition, but you drop anything held whenever you are forced to flee and you flee in a random direction. In addition, you treat all sources of danger as fear sources and must flee from them as well. If unable to flee, you cower in fear.
6. Terrified: This functions as panicked, but you do not treat any other character as an ally and thus must attempt saving throws against spells that allow them, even if the spells are beneficial. If unable to flee, you cower in fear. In addition, once you have fled from fear, you do not act as normal. Instead, each round you roll on a table to determine your course of action.
7. Horrified: You are transfixed with fear and can take no actions. You take a –2 penalty to your AC, are flat-footed (even if you normally cannot be), and are considered helpless.

Fear Immunity: This replaced with Fear Resistance. Someone with Fear Resistance track their fear score as normal but suffers the effects of fear two steps lower. Furthermore, effects that would cause him to become spooked or shaken doesn't increase his fear level.

Sanity

As you might have guessed this system gives you a sanity score and losing it could cause your PC to gain some sort of madness. Each PC have a Sanity Score (equal to the sum of your mental ability scores), a Sanity Threshold (equal to the bonus of your highest mental ability score), and a Sanity Edge (equal to half your Sanity Score).

Whenever your PC takes sanity damage (be it from a monster, a disturbing scene or incredible profane and maddening experience) greater than your Sanity Threshold, you gain a lesser madness (if your total sanity damage is less than your Sanity Edge) or a greater madness. If your total sanity damage equals you Sanity Score, you are affected by the insanity spell, with no saves, until all your sanity is restored.

Once you get a madness you immediately suffers its effects and keeps suffering from them until you either get rid of them (similarly to a disease but many more checks), or until you completely heal your sanity damage (making you madness dormant). A dormant lesser madness only affects you again once your sanity damage exceeds your Sanity Edge, but a greater madness affects you as soon as you suffer any sanity damage.

You heal sanity, after 7 days of uninterrupted rest, equal to your Charisma modifier (minimum 1). If you seek help, an ally can attempt a DC 15 (if your damage is below your Sanity Edge) or DC 20 Int or Wis check to also heal his Int or Wis modifier in addition to your Cha modifier. Lesser restoration heals 1d2 points, restoration heals 2d4 points, heal heals 3d4, all only once per day. Greater restoration, psychic surgery, and limited wish restore all sanity damage.

Hidden HP

This is the first house rule. The idea is that you never know your current hp total, unless you are at full hp. The only information you'll get is your condition (healthy, grazed, wounded, critical, disabled, unconscious, dying, stable). I'm using this with my f2f group and it has been a blast. I hope that this will amp up in the uncertainty.

Hidden Rolls

This is the second and more trickier house rule. The idea here is that you'll never roll any dice. You just say what you want to do and I'll roll for you. This way, you'll be kept completely in the dark, never knowing if you failed a perception check or if there wasn't really anything there... the powerful hit from a monster that brought you from healthy to critical could be a lucky critical or the monster is too though... the shady figure talking to you might be bluffing you and you have no chance to suspect it. You'll be obviously able to continue to take 10 or 20 in the appropriate situation. I'd like that you think about it with care... I really believe this could be really fun (and cellular friendly for you), but if you think this will make you not enjoy the game, I'll drop this idea.

So, any more thoughts on how to run this game?

Dark Archive

Hi guys! I'm a PBP player/GM in these boards for almost a year and more than once I've been in doubt about how Bluff really works when you tell a lie and the poor fellow buys it.

Just to explain a bit more, I'm a heavy 'by the books' GM so the vagueness in Bluff always bugged me in contrast with the clear rules for Diplomacy and Intimidate.

When we talk about the interaction between PCs and NPCs, the fundamental stone is the NPC's attitude and it somehow dictates his course of actions (obviously based on his story/personality). As a GM it is easy for us to determine the starting attitude of an NPC and, depending on the skills the PCs try to use, how this particular encounter will occur.

In this regard, both Diplomacy and Intimidate are pretty clear in their interaction:

Diplomacy: With this you can change the starting attitude of a NPC to a more beneficial one (again helping us to gauge for the NPC reaction) and also make requests to them, another pretty straightforward stuff.

Ex.: John the rogue walks into a walled city to talk to the guard (initial attitude indifferent) and asks him to let him in, even if it is already past the time for newcomers and the gate is closed (make a request). John fails to persuade the guard so he starts to compliment him, even offering him a couple extra coins (influence attitude), which he succeeds. With the guard more friendly, he asks again to let their friends in (make a request, now with a friendly guard) and after a coins everyone is out of the rain in a cozy tavern.

Intimidate: Ignoring the other combat uses, Intimidate is also another pretty clear skill (or almost). Since it specifies that the target becomes 'friendly' towards you. I must confess that from here on it is a bit vague, but I'm inclined to understand that you are basically using Intimidate as Diplomacy, even if much easier. I generally rule that you need one check to make them 'friendly' and then another checks to make him do as you wish (using the same modifiers as a diplomacy check).

Ex.: John the rogue walks into a walled city to talk to the guard (initial attitude indifferent) and threatens him to let him in, even if it is already past the time for newcomers and the gate is closed (intimidate). John succeeds and the guard fears him, even if he also fears the consequences of such act. John threatens the guard a bit more (making a request via intimidate) and the guard soon realizes that it is better to risk his chances with his commander than against this dangerous man in front of him.

Now, the problem with the Bluff skill is that it doesn't tell us anything about the consequences if a NPC believes in the player... there is no indication if the NPC's attitude changes or if he is more open or not to a request (I'm assuming the player wants something and is not lying for the sake of it).

Ex.: John the rogue walks into a walled city to talk to the guard
(initial attitude indifferent) and tries to lie to him to let him in, even if it is already past the time for newcomers and the gate is closed (bluff). He tells the guard that he has a meeting with Julius Bilton, a local noble and succeeds. Even if the guard knows there is a noble with such a name and that it is unlikely that such powerful man would meet with such ragtag person, he believes the rogue.

Now what? The guard's orders are still pretty clear and he isn't allowed to let anyone in. Julius Bilton (the noble) might be a powerful man and going against his will might be a real problem for his career, but in this case would not an Intimidate be also required? If John decides to point out that helping the noble might be helpful for the guard, would not require a Diplomacy roll? Or is Bluff such a magical skill that you trample all the other skills/rules?

Does the NPC's attitude change while he believes the lie? Would the guard be friendly towards John while he believes the rogue will put him in a good word with the noble? And when he discovers he was fooled... would he become unfriendly?

My problem with Bluff is that it can be interpreted as both a ridiculously powerful skill (bypassing all other obstacles) or a really subpar one (requiring additional Diplomacy and Intimidate checks). I'm sorry if it was already explained in another thread but so far I've failed to find an answer for this.

Dark Archive

Hi guys! I'm a PBP player/GM in these boards for almost a year and more than once I've been in doubt about how Bluff really works when you tell a lie and the poor fellow buys it.

Just to explain a bit more, I'm a heavy 'by the books' GM so the vagueness in Bluff always bugged me in contrast with the clear rules for Diplomacy and Intimidate.

When we talk about the interaction between PCs and NPCs, the fundamental stone is the NPC's attitude and it somehow dictates his course of actions (obviously based on his story/personality). As a GM it is easy for us to determine the starting attitude of an NPC and, depending on the skills the PCs try to use, how this particular encounter will occur.

In this regard, both Diplomacy and Intimidate are pretty clear in their interaction:

Diplomacy: With this you can change the starting attitude of a NPC to a more beneficial one (again helping us to gauge for the NPC reaction) and also make requests to them, another pretty straightforward stuff.

Ex.: John the rogue walks into a walled city to talk to the guard (initial attitude indifferent) and asks him to let him in, even if it is already past the time for newcomers and the gate is closed (make a request). John fails to persuade the guard so he starts to compliment him, even offering him a couple extra coins (influence attitude), which he succeeds. With the guard more friendly, he asks again to let their friends in (make a request, now with a friendly guard) and after a coins everyone is out of the rain in a cozy tavern.

Intimidate: Ignoring the other combat uses, Intimidate is also another pretty clear skill (or almost). Since it specifies that the target becomes 'friendly' towards you. I must confess that from here on it is a bit vague, but I'm inclined to understand that you are basically using Intimidate as Diplomacy, even if much easier. I generally rule that you need one check to make them 'friendly' and then another checks to make him do as you wish (using the same modifiers as a diplomacy check).

Ex.: John the rogue walks into a walled city to talk to the guard (initial attitude indifferent) and threatens him to let him in, even if it is already past the time for newcomers and the gate is closed (intimidate). John succeeds and the guard fears him, even if he also fears the consequences of such act. John threatens the guard a bit more (making a request via intimidate) and the guard soon realizes that it is better to risk his chances with his commander than against this dangerous man in front of him.

Now, the problem with the Bluff skill is that it doesn't tell us anything about the consequences if a NPC believes in the player... there is no indication if the NPC's attitude changes or if he is more open or not to a request (I'm assuming the player wants something and is not lying for the sake of it).

Ex.: John the rogue walks into a walled city to talk to the guard (initial attitude indifferent) and tries to lie to him to let him in, even if it is already past the time for newcomers and the gate is closed (bluff). He tells the guard that he has a meeting with Julius Bilton, a local noble and succeeds. Even if the guard knows there is a noble with such a name and that it is unlikely that such powerful man would meet with such ragtag person, he believes the rogue.

Now what? The guard's orders are still pretty clear and he isn't allowed to let anyone in. Julius Bilton (the noble) might be a powerful man and going against his will might be a real problem for his career, but in this case would not an Intimidate be also required? If John decides to point out that helping the noble might be helpful for the guard, would not require a Diplomacy roll? Or is Bluff such a magical skill that you trample all the other skills/rules?

Does the NPC's attitude change while he believes the lie? Would the guard be friendly towards John while he believes the rogue will put him in a good word with the noble? And when he discovers he was fooled... would he become unfriendly?

My problem with Bluff is that it can be interpreted as both a ridiculously powerful skill (bypassing all other obstacles) or a really subpar one (requiring additional Diplomacy and Intimidate checks). I'm sorry if it was already explained in another thread but so far I've failed to find an answer for this.

Dark Archive

Hi guys, how are you doing?

As the title says this is just an INTEREST CHECK currently so I won't provide any build rules and I advise you not to lose your time by posting any builds here... I won't even look at them, sorry.

Not sure if you are familiar about anything in the two parts of what I'm proposing so I'll explain:

The Iron Kingdoms: I must confess that I'm a bit suspicious to talk about this because I just love the setting. It is a steam-punk world created by Privateer Press that was once supported by D&D3.5 and that changed its focus towards war games with beautiful miniatures and recently got back to RPG but with a new system. Unfortunately there is no support for PF. You can check it out HERE. In my humble opinion, the scenario us just great and challenging.

The Zeitgeist AP: The Zeitgeist is a 13 volume AP produced by EN Publishing that takes the players from level 1 through 20, recently finished. I haven't read all of it but the reviews are pretty convincing about the quality of the product. It is settled in a different world that I'm not really familiar but that has a similar steam-punk theme. You can find more about it HERE.

"But why are you asking for an Interest Check?" Simply because it will take time and A LOT of work to do it. The Iron Kingdoms is a pretty 'peculiar' world that requires a lot of work to properly convert other adventures to it (lack of planes and outsiders are the most problematic thing) so I'd like to know if I'll have enough players once I'm finished! This isn't a thing for now since I imagine it will take me a month or two (or even more) to properly do it to at least a couple of the books... it would be really frustrating if I convert and run the first book just to find out that the second one is a 'no-match'.

For the small amount of time I'm on these boards (almost a year now), I've noticed that many players refrain from playing in different scenarios than the Inner Sea (I'm included in this group) so I'm specially worried. Another thing that troubles me are the small love for Homebrews in favor for the Paizo APs and even if this isn't technically a homebrew, it might look like...

I must also say that I'm a pretty exigent GM with my players and clearly prefer role-playing than roll-playing. If you are curious, here are the games I GM in these boards: GM Advocate's Hell's Vengeance, GM Frosty's Reign of Winter, and GM Toothy's Wrath of the Righteous. If you are curious about the building rules when this comes out, take a look on the rules I requested in my other games... it will be almost the same.

Just to make it clear, I'll use PF rules and those who post their interest will be in no better spot than any other player in the future... it will only dictate if I continued with this crazy idea or not. Thank you for your time nevertheless!


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Instead of trying to figure out the best place/situation to put each of you, I'll let this task to you (and I'm not even ashamed)! It is still in the early hours of the morning. For your first post, I'd like a few introduction about your last day or two, as well as where you are and what you intend to do in the following hours.

The sleepy village of Heldren has rarely seen so much excitement or concern. Hunters from the nearby Border Wood speak of unnaturally cold weather at the height of summer that descended on the forest just days ago. Heavy snow followed, and those who returned spoke of an uneasy presence in the woods, as well as new, dangerous predators. No one knows what this event means, but the town's soothsayer, Old Mother Theodora, claims dark times lie ahead.

As if in proof of that dire prophecy, a badly wounded mercenary arrived in town yesterday, claiming to be a bodyguard of Lady Argentea Malassene. He told the village council that the noblewoman's escort came under attack by bandits and strange, wintry creatures near the edge of the Border Wood. He alone escaped, and Lady Argentea was dragged away into the forest. Now the townsfolk cast fearful eyes toward the snowy forest, worried what else might emerge to threaten their peaceful village.

Diplomacy (gather information) or Knowledge (local) DC 5+:
Everyone says the weather is unseasonably cold for midsummer-it even snowed in the Border Wood! Most suspect magic is involved, and some fear Qadiran agents played a role in it.

Diplomacy (gather information) or Knowledge (local) DC 10+:
Old Man Dansby claims that someone keeps stealing from his fields. His farm lies closest to the Border Wood, where half his crops have died from an icy frost and the rest have been carried off.

Diplomacy (gather information) or Knowledge (local) DC 12+:
A farmer's son took ill a few days ago after falling through the ice over Wishbone Creek. The boy said he spotted a white stag in the forest-and heard it talking-then tried to follow it.

Diplomacy (gather information) or Knowledge (local) DC 15+:
A group of rangers in the Border Wood called the High Sentinels usually keep bandit activity curbed. They're doing a poor job if brigands could attack a well-armed caravan and abduct Lady Argentea.

Diplomacy (gather information) or Knowledge (local) DC 18+:
Locals say a hunter named Dryden Kepp claimed he saw a giant white weasel on the High Ridge in the forest. No one believed him so he went back to trap it and prove them wrong.

Diplomacy (gather information) or Knowledge (local) DC 20+:
Two weeks ago, Lady Argentea Malassene traveled past Heldren on her way from Oppara to Zimar to meet her betrothed. Rumor has it the two didn't get along and Lady Argentea caused a scandal by calling off the engagement and returning home.


Current Map | Loot | Critical-Fumble Generator

Be welcome to our game! In the end I went for an all female group, even if it was a coincidence! I'll take a closer look in your crunch and fluff to see if everything is ok and then I'll give life to the gameplay thread with your introductions.

I hope to finish both of these steps as soon as possible, probably still today.

Dark Archive

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Hi dudes! I've been thinking for a while about creating a guide to help whoever is interested to make through the cut in a pathfinder game. Let me explain the reasons behind this:

It is a known fact that there are far more players than GMs around here and this leads to recruitment threads with an astonishing number of applications... for an example, I'll start a game in the following days for 4 players and the number of interested players is 40+! Ten times the number of available spots. I know not all games reach this number (some are even higher!) but this means that only the best will make the cut.

I know this is expected and you should be asking what is the problem behind this and the thing is that there are many players around here that for some reason or another gets denied the chance to play over and over again, while others play in 20+ games. IMO this process is much like some experience in your job... the more games you play, easier it is for you to enter other games, be it because you end up with a 'network' or because you get pretty good at making characters. The problem begins when you are a new player.

There is another matter that bugs me... the quality of the applications. Looking around these boards, I've noticed that there is much more love towards APs than homebrews (with exception of those gestalt games). This means that many APs recruitment end up with tons of interested players with pretty good characters while some homebrews see less interest and sometimes their GM, after spending many hours working on their games, end up with 'not really good' characters since they have a smaller rooster to choose from.

My intention here is to solve these problems or at least diminish them. If we can guide everyone interested in make better and better characters, all of them will have better chances of getting into a game and GM's will always have incredible players to play...

So, before posting anything about my preferences and advices, I'd like to ask all the GMs who have a small spare time, to tell me what you usually want/look for when you create a game. If possible, lets not focus on build requirements since it changes wildly from game to game (I prefer low point buy for an example, but many do not share this opinion)...

So, what you take in consideration when you pick a player for your game? Here are a few examples to make it easier:

  • Crunch or fluff?
  • Small/Detailed backgrounds?
  • Plenty of hooks/generic PC?
  • Number of Games the player is already in?
  • The attention the player pays to your posts?

What are your tips/advices for all the players? If this gets enough interest, I intend to compile it in guide, as complete as possible, to help both players and GMs to have a better experience in these wonderful boards!


4 people marked this as a favorite.

Hi guys I'm preparing myself to run another AP, now Reign of Winter. My other games are Wrath of the Righteous and Hell's Vengeance and I'm proud to say that I was able to get awesome players/PCs in both of them.

First, it is mostly important to say that if you seek a game to rock everything with a ridiculous gestalt 30-point builds, this is not a game for you. I'm looking for roleplayers and not rollplayers. This AP was designed for 4 PCs with 15-point buy and this is how I'm gonna run it.

Right, so lets get things moving... As you'll see, there is a lot of stuff down there and a quite a lot to do but bear in mind the I, as the GM, will devote many hours to get this game running so it is just fair that you also take a little time now to make great PCs!

Character Creation:
Starting Level: 1st like all APs.
Abilities: We'll be using a 15 point buy. I know many DMs use higher points, but I prefer lower points to make it more challenging. No ability may be lower than 8 before racial modifiers and even so, only ONE ability might be lower than 10 before racial modifiers.
Classes: Anything from Paizo is allowed, with a couple restrictions:
-Barbarians, Rogues and Summoners use the unchained version. Monks may use unchained or not.
Races: Anything from Paizo with 11 race points or less is allowed, although core races are much preferred. The only exception of the 11 point races rule are Tieflings and Aasimars. To balance things, both Tieflings and Aasimars do not get their spell-like abilities.
Alignment: No evil.
Traits: Two traits, one being a Campaign trait. You can take a drawback for an additional trait but I'll have the final word if it is a fair trade or not.
3PP material: Will not be allowed. Please do not insist.
Hit Points: Max at first level. Subsequent levels will be rolled, each PC receiving a free re-roll for each Constitution modifier. (Ex.: A fighter with Con 15, you'd roll 3d10 and take the higher)
Starting Gold: Average for your class or ask me to roll for you.
GOLDEN RULE: I think I took precautions to not allow any insanely overpowered build but if I think you are min/maxing, your chances for being selected are smaller.
Here is a quick link for the Reign of Winter Player's Guide. Please, PLEASE, read all of it for you to be more familiar with the setting. This is specially important because by its title it misleads players in making PCs tied to Irisen, which is not the case!

Additional Rules:
Background Skills: 2 additional skill points to be spent in Background Skills. Craft (alchemy) and Perform (any) are not considered background skills for Alchemists and Bards/Skalds respectively.
Wound Threshold: Wound Threshold will be used to once more trying to make it more challenging. If during gameplay I sense it is causing more trouble than help, this could be removed. Both PCs and enemies will be subjected to this system.
Critical Hit and Fumble Decks: The Crit deck rules will only be applied to the PCs, since it is no fun to be beheaded by accident. Fumble deck will be applied to everyone.
Variant Multiclassing: Allowed for anyone interested but can't be used in conjunction with common multiclass.
Stamina and Combat Tricks: Fighters receive Combat Stamina as a bonus feat at 1st level. Other classes might select this feat as normal.

How to Submit a PC:
Crunch: Complete crunch, including equipment, spells and stats for any companions.
Background: I'm far more interested in your PC's fluff than crunch so a nice Background is a must since it will also serve as a sample of you writing skills and creativity.
10 minute Background: This is in Addition to the written background and isn't just another 'formatting'. The information in this small sentences are here to give life and color to your PC so please add different content from the previous Background. This section has the following steps:
-Step 1: Write at least 5 concept elements that you feel are important to your image of the character. These can be a concept overview, a list of important life events, a physical description, a personality profile...whatever you need to get an image in your mind.
-Step 2: List at least 2 goals for the character. At least one of these goals should be one that the character has, while another should be one that you, as a player, want to see developed over the course of the game.
-Step 3: List at least 2 secrets about your character. One is a secret the character knows, one is a secret that involves him but that he is not actually aware of yet. This will help me in creating plots that center around your character. I will also be creating a third secret which you as a player will not be aware of, so expect some surprises!
-Step 4: Describe at least 3 people that are tied to the character. Two of them are friendly to the character, one is hostile. <- Unlike other games, this AP makes it difficult to use character-tied NPCs (won't say why not to spoiler anything) so this is optional.
-Step 5: Describe at least 3 mannerisms, or quirks that your character has. They don't have to be elaborate, but they should provide some context and flavor.

About Me:
Firstly, English is not my first language (I think you already noticed) since I'm from Brazil (yes, we have internet here!) and I'll probably misunderstand a post or two and will definitely misspell and forget a preposition or use a phrasal verb incorrectly so please forgive me... I'll do my best to do not screw everything.

For my experience, I'm relatively new in comparison with many other GMs around here... I'm 25 yo and have been playing since 15, being the GM most of the time. As happened to many around these boards, my RL group disbanded because of life reasons and since then I joined these boards, even if this is my first attempt at GMing in these boards.

If you are worried about my number of posts (~2800), please take in account that I joined these boards in September and have an average post rate of 300 posts per month.

About the game pace, I intend to post at least 1 time per day and would expect for my players to, at least, post 1/day during weekdays. During the weekends we could slow a bit, for life happens to everyone. Once I make a post I'll wait for 24 hours before moving along and if a player fails to post frequently, I'll have to remove him.

I'm looking for four players and will keep this recruitment open until, at least, June 26th. If by its end I decide there is not enough players that I really like (honestly I doubt it), I may extend it another week or two.

Besides the four players, I'll also choose another four for replacement reasons. If one of my PCs is removed/vanishes, I'll choose from these four players instead of opening a new recruitment. In case of the death of a PC (it sucks but happens sometimes), I'll give its player the opportunity to make another PC but if he decides to not do so or we can't agree about the replacement, I'll also look into those four spare PCs.


Longacre | Current Map | Loot | Critical-Fumble Generator

Open for further discussion before we get started!

For those who have not yet created an alias, please do so and put the following in the respective 'spots' (note the space in the beginning of the race and class lines):

Race: | HP: xx/xx| [ooc]AC: xx (xx Tch, xx Fl)[/ooc | CMB: +x, CMD: xx | [ooc]F: +x, R: +x, W: +x[/ooc | Init: +x | [ooc]Perc: +x, SM +x[/ooc
Class: | Speed xxft | [ooc]Spells: 1st x/x[/ooc | Active conditions: None.
Gender:Gender AL race class X

I'll take a complete look in your crunch to check if everything is alright!


Longacre | Current Map | Loot | Critical-Fumble Generator

Open for dot only!


4 people marked this as a favorite.

Hi guys! For a couple months I've been tinkering with the idea to run a game on these boards and even if I'd like to run a homebrew, I decided to run a WotR AP instead and I'm really enjoining it! I've got my hands in the Hell's Vengeance AP and also decided to run it!

First, it is mostly important to say that if you seek a game to rock everything with a ridiculous gestalt 30-point builds, this is not a game for you. I'm looking for roleplayers and not rollplayers. This AP was designed for 4 PCs with 15-point buy and this is how I'm gonna run it.

Right, so lets get things moving... As you'll see, there is a lot of stuff down there and a quite a lot to do but bear in mind the I, as the GM, will devote many hours to get this game running so it is just fair that you also take a little time now to make great PCs!

Character Creation:

Starting Level: 1st like all APs.
Abilities: We'll be using a 15 point buy. I know many DMs use higher points, but I prefer lower points to make it more challenging. No ability may be lower than 8 before racial modifiers and even so, only ONE ability might be lower than 10 before racial modifiers.
Classes: Anything from Paizo is allowed, with a couple restrictions:
-Barbarians, Rogues and Summoners use the unchained version. Monks may use unchained or not.
Races: Anything from Paizo with 11 race points or less is allowed, although core races are much preferred. The only exception of the 11 point races rule are Tieflings and Aasimars. To balance things, both Tieflings and Aasimars do not get their spell-like abilities.
Alignment: No good. We are the bad guys this time! Also, Lawful will have a preference against Chaotic. This doesn't mean that Chaotic is banned, but in a party of four, I'll pick no more than one Chaotic PC.
Traits: Two traits, one being a Campaign trait. You can take a drawback for an additional trait but I'll have the final word if it is a fair trade or not.
3PP material: Will not be allowed. Please do not insist.
Hit Points: Max at first level. Subsequent levels will be rolled, each PC receiving a free re-roll for each Constitution modifier. (Ex.: A fighter with Con 15, you'd roll 3d10 and take the higher)
Starting Gold: Average for your class or ask me to roll for you.
GOLDEN RULE: I think I took precautions to not allow any insanely overpowered build but if I think you are min/maxing, your chances for being selected are smaller.
Here is a quick link for the Hell's Vengeance Player's Guide. Please, PLEASE, read all of it for you to be more familiar with the setting.

Additional Rules:

Background Skills: 2 additional skill points to be spent in Background Skills. Craft (alchemy) and Perform (any) are not considered background skills for Alchemists and Bards/Skalds respectively.
Wound Threshold: Wound Threshold will be used to once more trying to make it more challenging. If during gameplay I sense it is causing more trouble than help, this could be removed. Both PCs and enemies will be subjected to this system.
Critical Hit and Fumble Decks: The Crit deck rules will only be applied to the PCs, since it is no fun to be beheaded by accident. Fumble deck will be applied to everyone.
Variant Multiclassing: Allowed for anyone interested.
Stamina and Combat Tricks: Fighters receive Combat Stamina as a bonus feat at 1st level. Other classes might select this feat as normal.

How to Submit a PC:

Crunch: Complete crunch, including equipment, spells and stats for any companions.
Background: I'm far more interested in your PC's fluff than crunch so a nice Background is a must since it will also serve as a sample of you writing skills and creativity.
10 minute Background This is in Addition to the written background and isn't just another 'formatting'. The information in this small sentences are here to give life and color to your PC so please add different content from the previous Background. This section has the following steps:
-Step 1: Write at least 5 concept elements that you feel are important to your image of the character. These can be a concept overview, a list of important life events, a physical description, a personality profile...whatever you need to get an image in your mind.
-Step 2: List at least 2 goals for the character. At least one of these goals should be one that the character has, while another should be one that you, as a player, want to see developed over the course of the game.
-Step 3: List at least 2 secrets about your character. One is a secret the character knows, one is a secret that involves him but that he is not actually aware of yet. This will help me in creating plots that center around your character. I will also be creating a third secret which you as a player will not be aware of, so expect some surprises!
-Step 4: Describe at least 3 people that are tied to the character. Two of them are friendly to the character, one is hostile.
-Step 5: Describe at least 3 mannerisms, or quirks that your character has. They don't have to be elaborate, but they should provide some context and flavor.

About Me:

Firstly, English is not my first language (I think you already noticed) since I'm from Brazil (yes, we have internet here!) and I'll probably misunderstand a post or two and will definitely misspell and forget a preposition or use a phrasal verb incorrectly so please forgive me... I'll do my best to do not screw everything.

For my experience, I'm relatively new in comparison with many other GMs around here... I'm 25 yo and have been playing since 15, being the GM most of the time. As happened to many around these boards, my RL group disbanded because of life reasons and since then I joined these boards, even if this is my first attempt at GMing in these boards.

If you are worried about my number of posts (~2500), please take in account that I joined these boards in September and have an average post rate of 300 posts per month.

About the game pace, I intend to post at least 1 time per day and would expect for my players to, at least, post 1/day during weekdays. During the weekends we could slow a bit, for life happens to everyone. Once I make a post I'll wait for 24 hours before moving along and if a player fails to post frequently, I'll have to remove him.

I'm looking for four players and will keep this recruitment open until, at least, the end of the month. If by its end I decide there is not enough players that I really like (honestly I doubt it), I may extend it another week or two.

Besides the four players, I'll also choose another four for replacement reasons. If one of my PCs is removed/vanishes, I'll choose from these eight players instead of opening a new recruitment. In case of the death of a PC (it sucks but happens sometimes), I'll give its player the opportunity to make another PC but if he decides to not do so or we can't agree about the replacement, I'll also look into those four spare PCs.


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Open for Dotting only.


Current Map | Loot | Critical-Fumble Generator

Welcome!

I'm really looking forward to start this campaign, even if, as you know, I'll not be able to start it until 02/29 because of an already scheduled trip.

Meanwhile, we can discuss any connection between your PCs backgrounds as well as a couple changes in your sheets to round any edges or avoid any overlapping in abilities (this is more important in a 4-person game than in a 5-6 game).

For now, I'd like to know about your experience with this AP (Sabrina already started it a couple times but not sure about the rest of you). I think it is not unnecessary to say that for those who have some experience to not ruin it for the other ones, right?

Gameplay is opened for dotting but if you can dot and then delete, it would be nice.

Now I'll take a final look at everyone's sheet just to check if everything is alright and will make another post in a couple hours!


3 people marked this as a favorite.

Hi guys! For a couple months I've been tinkering with the idea to run a game on these boards and even if I'd like to run a homebrew, I decided to run this AP instead, postponing my homebrew to another time, at least until I can figure out every aspect of it.

First, it is mostly important to say that if you seek a game to rock everything with your ridiculous gestalt 30-point builds, this is not a game for you. I'm looking for roleplayers and not rollplayers. This AP was designed for 4 PCs with 15-point buy and this is how I'm gonna run it... and even with this low-power level, it looks like I'll have to buff some encounters to keep things interesting.

Many GMs also advise against Mythic but I've decided to keep it, even if a little nerfed... after all, you'll grab the demon by it's horns so it just makes sense to keep it.

Right, so lets get things moving... As you'll see, there is a lot of stuff down there and a quite a lot to do but bear in mind the I, as the GM, will devote many hours to get this game running so it is just fair that you also take a little time now to make great PCs!

Character Creation:

Starting Level: 1st like all APs.
Abilities: We'll be using a 15 point buy. I know many DMs use higher points, but you must remember that this AP will give you Mythic Levels, and it means lots of ability increases. No ability may be lower than 8 before racial modifiers and even so, only ONE ability might be lower than 10 before racial modifiers.
Classes: Anything from Paizo is allowed, with a couple restrictions:
-Barbarians, Rogues and Summoners use the unchained version.
-Gunslingers and Occult classes are allowed, even if I'm not a big fan of them. So bear in mind that if you choose one of those classes, you are in a slightly disadvantage.
Races: Anything from Paizo with 11 race points or less is allowed, although core races are much preferred. The only exception of the 11 point races rule are Tieflings and Aasimars that fit quite well in this AP and are considered core. To balance things, both Tieflings and Aasimars do not get their spell-like abilities.
Alignment: No evil. We are the good guys remember? Also, Lawful will have a preference against Chaotic. This doesn't mean that Chaotic is banned, but in a party of four, I'll pick no more than one Chaotic PC.
Traits: Two traits, one being a Campaign trait. You can take a drawback for an additional trait but I'll have the final word if it is a fair trade or not. Regarding the Campaign Traits, in this AP they are more important and far more restrictive so I'd prefer to take PCs with different Campaign Traits.
3PP material: Will not be allowed. Please do not insist.
Hit Points: Max at first level and then average rounded up or ask me to roll for you.
Starting Gold: Average for your class or ask me to roll for you.
GOLDEN RULE: I think I took precautions to not allow any insanely overpowered build but if I think you are min/maxing, your chances for being selected are smaller.

Anything you create for this game will probably work, even MAD classes and insane builds, like a melee wizard and the sorts... so it is your chance to try something different.

Additional Rules:

Background Skills: 2 additional skill points to be spent in Background Skills. Craft (alchemy) and Perform (any) are not considered background skills for Alchemists and Bards/Skalds respectively.
Wound Threshold: Wound Threshold will be used to once more trying to make it more challenging. If during gameplay I sense it is causing more trouble than help, this could be removed. Both PCs and enemies will be subjected to this system.
Critical Hit and Fumble Decks: These rules will only be applied to the PCs, since it is no fun to be beheaded by accident...
Variant Multiclassing: Allowed for anyone interested.
Stamina and Combat Tricks: Fighters receive Combat Stamina as a bonus feat at 1st level. Other classes might NOT select this feat.

Mythic Rules:

This will work almost like it was presented on the Mythic Adventure book but a PC will only recover ONE Mythic Point per day.

Also, please, PLEASE, do not build your PC already thinking in a specific interaction with the Mythic Rules... I emphasize this because once you get your Mythic Tiers and start selecting your powers, abilities and feats, if things are getting imbalanced, I'll ask you to change it or nerf it.

The Mythic rules should be just the cherry, not the core of your PC.

How to Submit a PC:

I'm far more interested in your PC's fluff than crunch so a nice Background are a must. I'm no novelist and do not expect you to be one, so I do not need a full novel... a couple paragraphs might be enough, with at least the following information:
-Appearance;
-Where was born and how was your childhood;
-How entered your class;
-How did you end up on Kenabres;
-What is your PC's goals and ambitions;
-Appearance;
-Personality;

Besides the Background, I'd also like a few sentences on how do you intend to RP your PC and what would be your primary and secondary roles within the party. Remember that I'm taking four PCs so one-trick monkeys will have a hard time.

About Me:

Firstly, English is not my first language (I think you already noticed) since I'm from Brazil (yes, we have internet here!) and I'll probably misunderstand a post or two and will definitely misspell and forget a preposition or use a phrasal verb incorrectly so please forgive me... I'll do my best to do not screw everything.

For my experience, I'm relatively new in comparison with many other GMs around here... I'm 25 yo and have been playing since 15, being the GM most of the time. As happened to many around these boards, my RL group disbanded because of life reasons and since then I joined these boards, even if this is my first attempt at GMing in these boards.

If you are worried about my number of posts (~1600), please take in account since when I joined (September) and an average post rate of 320 posts per month.

About the game pace, I intend to post at least 2 times per day and would expect for my players to, at least, post once during weekdays. During the weekends we could slow a bit, for life happens to everyone. Once I make a post I'll wait for 24 hours before moving along and if a player fails to post frequently, I'll have to remove him.

I'm looking for four players and will keep this recruitment open until, at least, the end of the month. If by its end I decide there is not enough players that I really like (honestly I doubt it), I may extend it another week.

Besides the four players, I'll also choose another eight for replacement reasons. If one of my PCs is removed/vanishes, I'll choose from these eight players instead of opening a new recruitment. In case of the death of a PC (it sucks but happens sometimes), I'll give its player the opportunity to make another PC but if he decides to not do so or we can't agree about the replacement, I'll also look into those eight spare PCs.