Please cancel my Pathfinder AP subscription. It's been a good run, but ultimately food wins over gaming. I'll likely be back once I get that whole eating thing back under wraps.
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Seeing the new back-to-back offer on older magazines at the store blog has reminded me to pick up some excellent adventures. In your opinion, what would be your top 10 adventures (and the Dungeon mag #), in terms of uniqueness, playability, or just plain smackdown?
It occurs to me that when many players think of cities as large as Korvosa, they think of virtually unlimited resources up to the city's gp limit. Thus, even with the notations in "7 Days..." the idea that a disease could overrun the capabilities of the community could be initially unfathomable. Eventually it will become evident, true, that the city's resources are being stretched to its limits. But the sight of the Church of Abadar's way of dealing with the problem could very well turn PCs away from any dealings with them (since the church insists upon payment for its services during a crisis) and towards other institutions of faith. I imagine other churches would have similar problems with dealing with the throngs of the sick, but how might they deal differently than the Church of Abadar?
Throughout my time in playing D&D 3.5, there have been a number of foibles that rear their ugly heads again and again. House rules tend to try to fix these types of issues, but a player/DM can only house-rule against insistent power-gamers for so long until it becomes time to find other people to game with. And it seems I'm not alone in this matter: The 3.5 rules set is excellent, but it has its flaws. Over the past few years, a number of common problems have seemed to crop up again and again, problems that delay the game or cause no end of arguments.... Perhaps a list of game-breaking or game-grinding issues would aid Paizo in creating a Pathfinder RPG that people would be generally happy with. Even if it wouldn't, I'd be a bit interested to hear what has broken your games to a point of extinction. Some of the issues I've ran up against are the following, as both player and DM: Polymorph - So much errata, and with so much material to draw from it becomes a game of "What's the perfect solution to this encounter" or "I know the rules better than you". The spell hasn't in so much broken a game as it has grinded a number of games to a halt. Custom Wonderous Items - This often starts innocently enough, with a player wanting another ability that isn't covered by their options already. Unfortunately, the Estimating Gold Piece Values table is utilized/argued as formula rather than educated guess-work, and an unforeseen consequence slips by the DM; that item or precedence of the item might ruin a plot-line or skews the power level so much that the game becomes virtually unplayable. Telejack - The Scry/Teleport combo abused. Scry on a target constantly until he fails, then (likely when they are sleeping) teleport to their location and kill them / take their stuff. Good characters might rely on this only to take out the BBEG, while Evil characters (or characters that have recently undergone an alignment shift) have little reason not to do this as often as possible. There are defenses against this technique, but to have every target constantly have those defenses going all the time stretches the veil of disbelief beyond its natural limits. Splat Prestige - Custom, wacky character builds are fine and are part of the game. Every PC in the party having a minimum of 6 classes (many prestige classes) by level 20, though, can result in such anti-climatic encounters as no less than 21000 points of damage to Kyuss in the first round. I'm not saying that a simple Rule 0 won't eradicate these issues, I'm just saying that they've ended games in my past. What has ended your games in the past?
Hello all. I need advice and opinions regarding adding a new player to my game. More specifically, the wife of one of my buddies who I've been playing the game with for years. I know that she's never quite understood D&D or roleplaying, and that he at least wants her to give it a try. What ground rules should I set, if any, beyond the normal introduction of the game to a new player? What would be expectations for her interactions, particularly with her hubby? Are there any clarifications I should be sure to announce prior to the first game session? I'd like to make this work, if possible. Any suggestions or comments will be appreciated.
As is seemingly common for other DMs, I'm keeping a campaign journal for myself and the players. Currently the party just got out of Parrot Island, with one death - the rogue. They've made a bookstore their current meeting grounds, so I'm assuming they'll be there sometime in the next session. When they meet up, the store owner is going to announce that a book that the dead character already paid for finally came in. The book is going to have the Lotus Dragon warning note in it, and the title of the book - "There Is No Honor". With this rather quirky opportunity playing through, I wonder if I could sneak other adventure titles into the game while they are in that particular chapter. It certainly makes for a neat tie-in for the journal itself. Any suggestions? 
I am currently in process of getting a new player in my group, and am discussing with him the feasibility of certain types of PCs in the AP. He has asked about a mounted character - like a Paladin or Ranger/Fighter type. I'm not used to seeing mounted characters in my games (I'm quite fond of the "squeezing through tight spaces" encounters), and as such wonder about how focused on mounted combat a PC should be to allow him to not feel overly useless in large parts of the game (fighting on a ship, various dungeon crawls). What advise/nudgings would you give to the player? Have you had mounted PCs in your STAP game, and if so, how did it turn out? Are there any glaring adjustments to the game that should be made to accomodate a mounted character? |