Search Posts
I know asking for information/advice about the mining techniques of a fantasy setting is like... PEAK nerd... But how do people mine the more fantastical materials? I feel something like adamantine, with it's DR and ability to ignore harshness being hell on the tools, would require a lot more than Dwarven gumption to extract.
An Adventure Path actually set in Tian Xia. A bit of spoilers for Jade Regent (An 8 year old story at this point), but you spend the first few books just traveling to Tian Xia, then you kind of bounce around a few places like a tourist on holiday, then arrive at Not Japan in the last book just in time for the grand finale. Honestly, while I loved Jade Regent, it would be like if the Mummy's Mask spent 5 books trying to get to Not Egypt and you arrived just in time to see some big scary mummy dude doing... mummy things...? (I haven't actually played Mummy's Mask. :O )
While I did notice that there are references to Goblin's love of fire, tendency to sing and the use of the Dogslicer, with the change to Goblins becoming more civilized, have Goblins given up on some of their old beliefs? Namely, that writing steals words from your head or that a horse's hooves will steal your soul? One of my favorite details from the We Be Goblins series is that the Goblin Alchemist's formula book uses pictographs rather than words.
Damage. Even though the Solarion and Vesk have built themselves to be very tanky with a very high constitution and highest tier armor they could afford the last time we were in a civilized area, they keep taking huge amounts of damage. The Mystic has become a healbot only because they keep taking so much damage on the regular. 50+ damage a round some times! Even in random encounter fights!
That was the range on a Hand Crossbow (in my copy of the playtest). That was really the only reason I selected it. The 2d4 thing was just because people thought they should have some kind of unique trait to them. But now that you mention it, it probably would be a bad idea. Maybe changing it to a d8 damage? Fan the Hammer - Change it to "for the purposes of qualify (using?) feats such as Double Shot or Triple Shot"?
Is that like a begrudgingly accepted okay or like "You know what, yeah ok" ? I need the clarification. :D
Quick Background: We are currently playing the Dead Suns campaign and to say things have been difficult would be an understatement. The campaign already wiped the first party and recently, we escaped by the skin of our teeth against a difficult encounter and only after getting a full rest and heal were we able to overcome the encounter, against by the skin of our teeth. We completed book 4 of Dead Suns last night and we are now level 9. I need recommendations on what we can do to our party to help so that every fight isn't a near wipe. Party: Minotaur Solarion, Vesk Soldier, Vesk Technomancer and a Kalo Mystic. The Solarion and Soldier are both primarily melee fighters, the Technomancer and Mystic are primarily skill monkeys (between the two of them, all skill checks are generally covered), the Technomancer does ranged damage while the Mystic has become somewhat of a heal bot. And as you can probably tell, we aren't exactly optimized. We have some time before we reach the location of the next book, so we can craft items to help. Thoughts or suggestions on things to help prevent the inevitable wipe that will surely come?
I just did some research and apparently, the world record for a revolver is 16 shots fired in 4 seconds. This was used with the assistance of a thing called a speed loader. (a contraption that holds a revolver load of bullets in a circle and makes quick reload hecka fast). Now that is worlds fastest, not regular enemies or low level PC's. And without the speed loader, I found a lot of professional marksmen could load their revolvers one bullet at a time in about 10-15 seconds. I think part of the mechanic that should keep guns balanced is the fact that they require reload times. So this is what I am thinking for the purpose of my Alkenstar campaign: Generic Alkenstar Revolver
Reload 2 a Generic Alkenstar Revolver reloads a single bullet, up to its maximum capacity of 6. Alternatively, you can Reload 3 to load 3 bullets. Speed Loader (or Moon Clip)
Feat: Rapid Reload
Feat: Fan the Hammer
I have been working on a campaign set in Alkenstar and this has given me a lot of ideas on how to implement guns into my new campaign. Because one of the issues I have seen while preparing this campaign is that the art depicting characters in Alkenstar, especially the Shield Marshals, often shows them using revolvers rather than flintlock pistols. There are some exceptions. Maybe because the campaign will have a more 'wild west' theme to it, the idea of giving the players weapons that can fire multiple times per round isn't as sacrilegious as some people. I will have to mess with the numbers, but the idea of 1 action = 1 bullet, 2 actions = 3 bullets seems like it could work. Just to toss an idea out there:
First off, just want to say I love almost everything in the play test. Good stuff. The one thing I don't like is a pretty minor change. Silver is supposed to be the standard coin unit. Players start with silver, the down time work tables award silver and the equipment tables are in silver. But then, the later tables in the book (alchemical items, magical items, etc) are in gold. I wasn't entirely certain if they were typos at first, since some items were surprisingly expensive when they cost gold. (Alarm trap is 20 silver, when it's basically a string with a cowbell on it, the same price of a Great sword). I would like if the tables used silver all throughout. It would make it just a tiny bit easier to read.
I had an idea that I wanted to discuss about a class with a different type of resource management. The idea is for a class similar to a Barbarian, but instead of a rage mechanic that last x number of rounds, the idea is a Fury mechanic similar to WoW or Diablo that increases and decreases throughout combat. Class would have good bab, good fort/ref, poor will, D12 hit die and light armor prof. Their main mechanic is: Fury: Starting at level 1, a Berserker gains a Fury Pool equal to their Con. Mod. (Minimum one) + their level. A Berserker gains a point of Fury every time they hit an enemy with a melee or thrown weapon or whenever they are hit by an enemy. So long as a Berserker has a single point of Fury in their Fury Pool, they receive a +1 Morale bonus to Attack and Damage rolls. This bonus increases to +2 at level X (and so on and so forth). In addition, many of the Berserkers abilities are fueled by Fury. At the end of every round, the Berserker loses 1 point of Fury. Ironhide: Starting at level 1, So long as the Berserker has a point of Fury in their Fury Pool, the Berserker gains Damage Reduction 1/-. This damage reduction increases by 1 at level 5 and every five levels after (to a max of DR 5/- at level 20). Fury Powers: starting at level 2 and every even Berserker level afterwards, the Berserker selects a Fury Power. Fury Powers require Fury to use and many require you to spend points out of your Fury Pool. (I only have a few ideas for Fury powers. Names obviously subject to change)
Just a thought. I thought it would be interesting for a class that had a more interactive resource pool feeling their abilities and the idea came to me. The Berserker is obviously similar to the Barbarian, but I think different enough that they could share the same battlefield without being redundant. And I think that while that Barbarian is stronger (the Berserkers bonus would always be half of the barbarians at the same level) I would think a Berserker could potentially last longer because their power keeps going so long as the Berserker keeps fighting. So yeah, that is my idea.
Because I cannot wait until August to find out the answers, I wanted to speculate and question the details of the Gap. An undisclosed period of time where the entire universe has amnesia and something went down. While I won't debate what happened (yet), I wonder what the initial events following the Gap were. For instance, was the Gap a total and complete amnesiac event? Did people forget their spouses, their jobs, even their names? Did entire political landscape have to be rewritten right then and there because no one could remember what it was like before? Is it possible that some person awoke to find themselves Kings because their clothes were the best in the group? Did wizards (technomagi) have to learn spells from scratch, scientist rediscover the laws of the universe and more? Were languages suddenly forgotten? Or did people still have a vague idea? Maybe they knew how to fly a ship but no knowledge of when they learned. A dozen alien languages rattling in their heads. A connection to the person in the room with them. Or is it just a loss of history. Full knowledge of their skills, capabilities and relations but a total lack of knowledge how they arrived in their current situation?
What do I tell my PF player that wants to be a Paladin or a Druid to play that works in the setting more? If they don't find those interesting enough, how hard is it to make a Space Paladin or pick a random tribal species and give them a Space Druid? A.k.a. how much work to switch pathfinder stuff over after the twink player gets bored and wants to drag some of his op builds over? I can just imagine: "faster than light ships, exotic aliens and laser weapons and you are playing an Archer Paladin?!" "What, Smite Evil still does more damage than anything else!"
I too was going to recommend a Shadow Caster. If you didn't already have the skill monkey, then an Arcane Trickster is fun (and since you would be skipping all the hard levels, probably infinitely better than most skill monkey builds). Uh... Magic Item Builder? Oh! Oh! Golemancer! A character focused on the building and maintenance of various types of Golems and other magical automatons! That would is a bit out there.
I know a lot of people dislike prestige classes for different reasons. Either they weren't worth it mechanically or their bonuses didn't compare with going 20 levels in a single class or that archetypes for the most part get rid of needing to wait 7+ levels for the benefits a prestige class might offer. But I still think they are really cool and I'm sad that they haven't had any support in what seems like forever. Especially if it had some really great flavor behind it, like the Hellknights, Riftwardens or any of the Pathfinder prestige classes, or if they had a really awesome theme, like Dragon Disciple (I do still see a Dragon Disciple on occassion in PFS, although they have mostly been replaced with Bloodragers). It was just kind of fun to me to work towards some kind of goal or to see a player get really invested in an organization and get access to special training. I understand why they are no longer popular (Archetypes are much better in nearly every way) but still. There is nothing stopping a player from taking a prestige class, but very, very rarely do you see it happen.
Damn, those are actually pretty good. My research suggests that guns became the default weapon of choice not because it made the Bow or Armor obsolete, but because it was cheaper to field a large number of rifleman than it was to field Bowman (who required a great deal of training) or heavily armored troops (who also required a lot of training and had the additional cost of armor, which was way more expensive than a gun). While eventually, firearm would become a superior weapon, it wasn't instantly, like Pathfinder suggests. I still might keep a portion of the armor penetration rules, but apply it to a type of ammo. Something like "Ignores X armor, but reduces the damage die to a lower die" or something similar for the purpose of balance. We will see. Thank you for the suggestion. This does indeed help.
Tomorrow, my core group of players and I are gathering to discuss a new campaign and I was going to propose a setting that I have been working on for a while that I can only describe as Victorian Fantasy. Not to be confused with Steampunk, which gets a lot of its themes and motifs from the Victorian era, but a setting that I imagine as 'if Lord of the Rings continued for a few hundred more years'. I have been working on it for a bit and several of the players I have mentioned it to seem to like the idea. This would almost certainly be a 'Firearms Everywhere' setting and while Paizo did an awesome job, I just generally dislike the rules for Firearms. I even posted a few weeks back asking for alternative rules and while I got a few suggestions, I wasn't that pleased and decided to go about making something else. I wanted to post them here and get some opinions on them and tweak them, should this campaign come to pass. Penetration
I could have sworn there was an armor enchantment that protected against bullets, but I can not locate it. If there really isn't, then I would add an armor enchantment that either either gives the armor a minimum armor bonus (As in, even if a character is using an elephant gun with armor piercing rounds, this armor can not be reduced below X) and/or an armor that can not be reduced at all. (Note: I am still researching generally era appropriate firearms, so the examples used are just generic 'Old west' weapons. Also, the numbers are going to change as I do more research and find out how powerful these weapons were. For instance, the Penetration of the Colt .45 is based entirely on that one scene in a Fistful of Dollars where the badguy can't shoot through Clint Eastwood's breastplate. Although, in retrospect, I can't remember what gun the badguy used.)
If Character 1 is wearing a Breastplate and Character 2 shoots him with a Colt .45, Character 1 only gets a +2 to his AC rather than the normal +6. If a moment later, Character 3 shows up wearing only studded leather (a duster, of course), he loses the +3 bonus to his AC, but no more since the Penetration can not reduce armor below 0. Reload
Gunslinger
Deadeye (Ex): At 1st level, the gunslinger can resolve an attack against touch AC instead of normal AC. Performing this deed costs 1 grit point per range increment beyond the first. The gunslinger still takes the –2 penalty on attack rolls for each range increment beyond the first when she performs this deed. (Because firearms no longer completely negate armor, the Gunslinger can spend a grit to complete ignore an enemies armor for one attack.) Lightning Reload (Ex): At 11th level, as long as the gunslinger has at least 1 grit point, she can reload a single firearm as a move action once per round. If she is using a cartridge, she can reload a single firearm of the weapon as a swift action each round instead. Furthermore, using this deed does not provoke attacks of opportunity. (Because I wanted to keep reloading as a Full Action, the Gunslinger would be the only class that could reload faster than a full round.)
If that title doesn't grab your attention, I don't know what will. Yeah, but no, this thread will be discussing very sensitive topics such as race and racism in gaming. I hope that we can all be mature adults and have a discussion about this topic without without it devolving into a cesspool. I am happy to say that in terms of pathfinder, I believe there is little in the ways of racism. Elves and Dwarves share pints at taverns, Tieflings join crusaders alongside Aasimar and no one bats an eye when a Linnorn Kingdom Viking ends up in Tian Xia. This might be my own view, having run a large number of pathfinder society adventures and adventure paths, but the circumstances of your birth are rarely, if ever, a factor. And on the rare occasion when it is, the character being openly racist is always the villain. I haven't read every PFS adventure or adventure path, but this has been my general experience. But this has not always been the case. In classical fantasy, the races usually dislike each other at best, openly hate each other at worst. The Elves and Dwarves always have an ancient feud, halflings are distrustful of the big folk and humans and orcs both seem to think "they aren't us, so they are bad." In some fantasies, the races might get together for the greater good (Lord of the Rings is a great example, where working together led to the defeat of Sauron and a new golden age) while in others, even in the face of almost assured destruction, they will fight each other (Warhammer seems like this, although, I know they sometimes team up). So, my question is this: which is better? Of course, a significant part of that relies on your table and their own maturity about such things. But assuming all is equal, which table would you prefer to play at? The table where racial equality is a thing might seem like they obvious choice, but it might seem silly and contrived. After all, people in the real world often find minor reasons to hate others, such as supporting the wrong local team or being born on the wrong side of what is basically an imaginary line that we have invented. If those people are also longer lived, were magically inclined or one of the other many fantastical reasons to be jealous of, then it might seem strange that everyone gets along. As compared to the alternative, it certainly seems better. But at the same time, it is a conflict that players can not overcome with weapons and spells. Conflict is what can create interesting stories and players and even educate people about prejudice. I have even seen this in one game, where a white player created an African American character during a world war 2 campaign. Both the GM and another player helped emphasize the mistreatment of African Americans during this period and while the player later admitted that he learned a lot, he stopped playing that character because the situation made him uncomfortable and frequently upset. Another situation, I had three of my regular players (all female) turn down joining a campaign set in the 1920s because they felt bring female characters in this time period would be terrible. A situation that I never thought about while designing a game with zoot suits and magical mobsters. In fact, the entirety of this thread could replace race with gender, but "fun with gender slurs" didn't have the same catchy title.
Just my 2 GP, but in my experience, the Alchemist can do awesome damage with their bombs, especially if you are smart with it. My fiance loves this class and plays them all the time. In one campaign, the players were searching for some goblins and the guy playing the BSF did the BSF thing and tried to single handedly take on the entire goblin village by himself, Leeroy Jenkins style. When he went down after one round, the cleric dragged the BSF into a building and it was my fiance's alchemist who was able to use bombs to wipe out the goblins over a couple rounds (there was a monk there too, but he really just kind of flailed around while trying not to be murdered by goblins). You might say "Well yeah, those are goblins! Of course her bombs killed those! They are weak and don't count." To which I respond "yeah... they are goblins... thats what you fight at level 1." At higher levels, everyone's damage scales appropriately. If your GM is throwing a bunch of guys who can't be killed in one or two attacks, he is throwing too much at you. Probably because you have at least one player who twinked out and does 120 damage at level 1 and threw off the power curve... sorry, bit of a tangent.
Basically, you shouldn't base your classes usefulness off of another players ability to break the game and instead base it off of your own ability to play smart and useful. Also, a good GM who designs a game to the players strengths helps too. (You know, the whole "If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree" thing) If you fight against large groups of enemies, Alchemist rocks. If you are fighting just one really powerful enemy, bombs are less useful, but you still have all the other alchemists tricks at your disposal. And even then, your bomb is still probably more useful than whatever piece of junk side arm you carry is.
Wow, this thread gets Necro'd a lot. 560. The Madman's Prophecy
So, I did a bit of debating (with myself) and figured that the build would require at least 1 level of Mysterious Avenger Swashbuckler, since Weapon Focus needs BAB +1 and if I wanted to go with Dazzling Display, it would probably be better to start out with that in the beginning. If I went with a pure Mesmerist build, I wasn't sure what to grab off the top of my head for that first level. Combat Expertise? (Eww.) Granted, if I did go trip or disarm, I would need to take it eventually. Or if I went with Vexing Daredevil Mesmerist, I would be able to Dazzling Feint to do either maneuver safely . I also debated taking a two level dip into Swashbuckler instead of one. My BAB would end up being the same by the end, but I would also grab Charmed Life, which is pretty fancy, but it would reduce the Mesmerist's already slow magic progression. These are the silly ideas I have for what is probably a terrible idea. :D
About a few weeks ago, I saw a rather beautiful picture on deviantart and upon seeing it, knew I must create this character for PFS. ( This is the image, in case you too want to be inspired. ) I have been working on a few ideas and the one that I have decided to take a shot at is a Mesmerist who is focused almost exclusively on debuffs. Basically, the first round of combat would be Dazzling Display (followed up with the swift action Hypnotic Stare on whatever looks scariest). Assuming I pass (Intimidate checks aren't really that hard to make, I have discovered), then generally most things have a -2 to most rolls for at least a round, with something scary suffering -4 to a Will save (which hopefully a fellow Pathfinder will use to their advantage, assuming I myself won't be able to take advantage of next round). Following round could be used targeting that scary guy with some Save or Suck, another Dazzling Display or making use of a whip to either disarm or trip. I am a bit uncertain as to which I would want to focus in and I have seen plenty of people claim that both maneuvers are kind of worthless. You can't disarm a lot of threats and after a certain level, a lot of enemies have flight, so tripping becomes a lot less useful. I am also a bit concerned about the 3/4's BAB limiting the usefulness of said maneuvers, (even if a whip grants +2 to disarm checks). So basically, tl;dr version:
Thematic stuff that most people won't care about but I do
Spoiler: I haven't sat down to flesh this out a whole ton, but the basic background is the character was born to the owner of a traveling circus and she has trained with many of the people, including the Ring Master (her father) and the Dire Lion Tamer (the show's main event). She would have a few thematic skills to emphasize her background (Perform: Oratory to get the crowd excited, Handle Animal for making animals do tricks, etc.) and maybe a trait, although I haven't seen one that fits the background yet. Unknown to her or the other performers, her father had obtained some relic that caught the attention of the Aspis Consortium and during a show, the Aspis tampered with the Dire Lion (illusion spell or dominate animal or whatever) and it attacked and injured several people. In the confusion, the Aspis took the artifact. The circus was dismantled and without a home, she wanted revenge on the Aspis. She approached the Pathfinders, known opponents of the Aspis, explained her situation and offered them the artifact if they helped her retrieve it and get justice for her friends.
When I suggest unique races, I also want to emphasize that I do not only mean something along the lines of "awakened" animals. While the Eagles of LotR or Aslan from Narnia, taking all the humanoids races and replacing them with intelligent animals is not what I meant. I want some new races that are completely unlike anything we have had before. I was flipping through the bestiaries looking for ideas and while a vast majority of it either Humans with (Blank) or just straight up monsters, a couple did catch my eye. There are two species called Thriae and Formian. Both are insect-like species, although the Thriae pretty much just Humans with (bee like qualities). A while back, when Starcraft 2 had first released, I talked with the other GM in my group about a race based on the Zerg. The Race itself would be composed of a large number of subspecies and most would be slaves to the hive mind. But one of the subspecies would be like Kerrigan, both connected and influenced by the Hive Mind, but free to act on her own free will and capable of influencing the Hive Mind. (I will let you know, I still haven't played Heart of the Swarm or the original Starcraft, so this idea was based entirely off of what I learned from the base Starcraft 2). Back to Pathfinder, I think a race along these lines would be a bit out there and kind of weird, but it would be totally new and something players haven't really done before. An insectoid species with racial abilities that focus on the unique nature of insects, such as carapace, multiple limbs and a hive mind. While the PC wouldn't necessarily be a Hive Queen, I personally imagine that subspecies as a kind of Nobility among the race. I never worked out how it would all play out mechanically, but I found it at least an interesting idea. As something a bit less far out there, imagine if Paizo created PC versions of common monsters. A medium sized, less powerful version of the Centaur. I can imagine a Khanate of Centaurs threatening empires and arguing with halflings about being used as a personal mount. Or young Naga adventurers, long before they are generic CR 8 humans with snake bodies monsters, trying to interact in a world with things like door handles. I even have a crazy idea about a playable race of Dragons. Not dragonlike Dragonborn or people with the blood of dragons. Give some reason why they start out at the same power of lvl 1 PCs (they are a different species or they are from a plane where dragons are weaker or because I gorram said so) and they can pick up feats or class abilities to further grow into actual, full power dragons. My point is not to just make a book with a typical Disney line up of characters and make them playable. It is to add either completely new and out there races for people to play or to even go back and take some older, classic monsters and make them playable. Preferably a bit of both.
The game you want to play, or at least the setting you want to use is Talislanta which after 5 commercial editions is now made free to download by it's creator at talislanta.org.Talislanta is good for weirdish humanoids, but isn't going to completely satisfy someone asking for playable eagles. The Eagles were just an example of a race that is not humanoid but could playable.
I find it interesting that in our hobby, we often craft these vast magical worlds full of fantastical locations, brilliant histories and powerful magics, yet these worlds are always populated by humans. Humans with pointy ears, short humans with beards, humans with horns or a halo, human humans. Of course, many settings have unique historical and cultural differences between Dwarves, Orcs, Tieflings or Halflings, etc., but when you boil it all down, the world is run by humanoids and everything else is just a monster. For a long while now, I have wanted to run a campaign that, while still having humans as one of the selectable races, would replace the other standard fantasy races with totally unique choices. For example, take Middle Earth. It isn't just populated by Humans, Elves, Dwarves and Orcs. In addition to Ents (which still follows the "Humans with Blank" formula, this being Humans with trees for limbs), Middle Earth is also populated by the Eagles and Spiders. Because of the movies, most people either don't know or have forgotten that the Eagles were a sentient race with their own ruler (Gwaihir the Windlord) and lands where they dwell. They weren't just Summoned Monster VII. They didn't just fly the Fellowship into Mordor because they feared the Mordor archers and siege weapons, just like they feared Gondor's. They weren't mindless beasts, but people. Now imagine the dynamic shift for a game if one of the players was a sentient eagle as tall as a man. Imagine how that world might have evolved differently if Humans, Eagles and Spiders commingled in such a way as standard fantasy settings might have Humans, Elves and Orcs mingle. The change in mechanics and setting seem very exciting to me. There are already creatures in the various bestiaries that are sentient races, capable of taking class levels if a GM customizes them. What I would like to see is a book, similar to the Advanced Race Guide, that introduces a series of very non-standard and unique races to the game. While it might have common monster types in it (such as a more balanced Centaur PC race), add other races and options. It would need a section dedicated things like magic item slots or how certain race might interact with certain items (To use the Eagles as an example again, they lack hands and can only grasp with their talons. Many items designed for humans might be totally useless to them and even simple things like a quill and paper might be outside their abilities.) "But Koujow, why not just use the race creator in the Advanced Race Guide or just post something in the Homebrew section to make them?" Well, mostly because not only am I terrible at building balanced homebrew material but I also don't feel myself terrible original. (See how I used only Eagles as an example for proof of that) Paizo has created a lot of interesting and fun stuff that is more balanced than something I might come up with. I am also uncertain how to approach some of the grander mechanics (see magic item slots or interaction between items not designed for your race). I also hope that others might see an interest in this as well and give their own opinion or views. If enough people think it is interesting, you never know, in a few years, there might be a new book. (I await your call, Paizo. ;D ) TL;DR -Less humanoid races, please
It is an interesting idea, although I feel like it might be a bit complicated to pull off. You are basically tearing out a huge chunk of the rule book by eliminating Arcane magic. A lot of play styles can't be reproduced with Divine or Psychic magic, so you are limiting what your players can do. If you had a player who wanted to play that awesomely powerful wizard or sorcerer-like PC (or any arcane concept here), they won't be able to create that experience with a Cleric or a Psychic (or any class here). They can still be great characters and it would be a great experience to try out new things, but it would be limiting a lot.
Feast of Ravenmoor maybe? Feast of Ravenmoor Yes! Feast is all kinds of creepy Halloween stories mixed into one! All of my players thought it was delightfully creepy and one later admitted that it gave him a nightmare that evening. There are a couple of encounters in it that are amazing. Never thought you could do a jump scare in a table top game.
A player asked me about changing the rules for Bleed effects for a future campaign so that he could make a character that focuses on Bleeds. A lot of people dislike Bleed and don't think it is very good. I can understand their argument (after all, many player builds can often nuke enemies many times their CL in a single round, who cares about 1d6 per round) but my group usually plays more thematically and less optimized than a normal group. Is it a terrible idea to change the rule to all bleed effects stack? Or even create a simple feat along the lines of "You may choose a number of bleed effects you cause on an enemy equal to your Int. mod. Those effects stack." (worded better, of course) be a better idea? I kind of like the idea of a character who kills people with a thousand paper cuts.
I generally disagree with the 'magic trumps technology' argument and I don't feel like it explains why technology just stops progressing in the medieval era. Magic is SUPPOSEDLY suppose to be a rare thing. Mechanically, its not. A majority of the classes have access to spells and spell casting and magical items are available in nearly everywhere. But thematically, people are suppose to be afraid of magic because it is weird and they don't understand and people keep summoning demons and zombies with it. Towns usually only have one or two NPCs that can provide magical services and the townsfolk usually begrudgingly purchase it from them. Second, magic is expensive. A spell cost Caster level × spell level × 10 gp. Most NPCs are paid in Copper or Silver (assuming they aren't serfs or slaves and are actually paid for their services) and they would have to save up for quite a while before buying a level 1 spell. Magical items aren't even on the table for them. (On a side note, in most towns, I assume a magical item merchant only has to sell one magic item a year to pay their rent). Nobles and (successful) adventurers can afford these services, but the vast majority of people that inhabit most settings can not. It would make sense that lesser folk would look for cheaper alternatives. I'm sure there is a spell that will collect food from a field, but it is probably much cheaper to buy some farm tools and a laborer or two than it is to hire a wizard.
I did a bit of searching through the suggestion forums and the search function, but I was hoping someone might be able to direct me either to a thread or even a 3PP product that present alternative rules for firearms. I have an idea in my head and I want to research if someone already did the mechanical work for me or if I would need to start from scratch.
This was my thought exactly. The Chase scene rules are a bit weird, but can be done very well. Earthquakes are a pretty terrifying deal and can't be replicated with a single round spell or the like. Players should be required to make a series of rolls, such as acrobatics to avoid opening fissures or climb checks to escape over fallen debris. Give them a couple choices like an Easy Acrobatics to vault over a fallen wall or a difficult strength check to help some nearby children over that wall. I say something like that because you were concerned on them being jerks. Give them a bit of obvious, good guy bait to earn them brownie points. Then when the earthquake is over, maybe the mother thanks them profusely and they can't get away to loot. Looting shouldn't really be a concern on their mind, since the world is literally falling down around them. Maybe after the earthquake, (if they are terrible awful people!) but give them an entire scene of stuff to do rather than "City falls down". Also, to further discourage looting, put one or more of the PCs families in danger. "Bob and Kevin's families both went to the Temple of Sarenrae earlier and you can see in the distance that it is collapsed! Oh no!" They SHOULD be more concerned with their families over looting random junk. Make another scene out of that. An earthquake and the immediate aftermath could easily be an entire session all on its own. Assassin's Creed: Rogue Spoiler
Spoiler: There is a scene in AC:R where you are in the epicenter of the 1755 Earthquake that devestated Lisbon, Portugal. Watch the video below for ideas on some things to throw at the players and see how destructive something like this could be from the players perspectives.
Conversation got a bit off track, it seems, but I will still say that even if there racial abilities don't match, NPCs don't minmax like players do. There are Halfling Fighters and Dwarven Bards and every other combination of every class out there. Even the terrible ones. But there are still plenty of NPCs (and adventurous PCs) who do things that are in character. A halfling society can't exist entirely on rogues and bards, despite that being what they are best at. Even if the Elves don't get some kind of bonus to doing nature stuff doesn't mean they don't actually like nature.
I was disappointed that there wasn't a Samurai inspired archetype for the Swashbuckler to create an Iaijutsu duelist. I know the Sword Saint is kind of suppose to represent that, but it didn't create the same feel for me. Also, the Sword Saint, while cool, does kind of stink. While it is technically possible to have a Swashbuckler use a Katana, it isn't really a good option and requires a lot of investment. Edit: I just remembered the Daring Champion, which was a cavalier with some Swashbuckler traits... I guess that is possible to jury rig an Iaijutsu duelist out of it, but I haven't taken too long of a look to figure it out. While it isn't the Samurai or Ninja, they did add a couple of archetypes in Occult Adventures that are Japanese inspired; The Onmyouji and the Kami Whisperer(?). They are ok.
Looking into, I see some very decent benefits. I am thinking taking two levels of either Steelhound and keeping my awesome armor class (plus the addition of Shield, as mentioned above) or dropping my AC a bit, going vanilla, and gaining a faster movement speed and uncanny dodge. It would also net me 9 rounds of Rage and I could cure my fatigue if needed with my Mercy (which I originally took to help out other PFS Barbarians! :D ) at the loss of Aura of Justice (which isn't very good), another Mercy (which does stink a bit) and a single spell per day. Honestly, when I need to get up into the monsters face, it seems like I barely ever get the chance to cast many spells, so I don't see it as THAT big of a loss. In fact, it does seem like a lot of gain. Anything afterwards would result in more loss than gain though.
I have been playing my Aasimar paladin on and off for a long while and she is level six at this point. Tonight during pfs, I discovered that the Bloodrager does not have the alignment restriction that barbarian does and a while back, I thought about multiclassing to help with the Crusader filled with righteous fury concept that I play her as. But I decided that it wasn't worth it. But with Bloodrager, I could better fulfill that concept by taking the celestial bloodline. I would get the ability to rage, boosting my decent damage and a couple decent powers, but I would lose out on future paladin powers and would be stuck with pretty much zero spells my entire career. Thoughts? (Because I'm sure it will come up, I've been playing this character since long before they removed Aasimar as a racial option)
A slight deviation from the main topic but still connected, how would you rate the Sha'irs ability to turn their tiny Jinn into not so tiny Jinn? I think it sounds awesome, but I'm concerned with basically putting the equivalent of your spell book into combat. I'm terrible at theorycrafting, but I have been watching this thread closely and you folk have been assisting me a lot. I want to build a PFS Occultist in the near future (Either vanilla or Sha'ir). Keep up the good work. :D
I was uncertain who to contact about this and I figured this would be the best place to start. Up until recently, I worked for a nationwide book retailer and it always seemed strange to me that the local game store seemed to have Paizo products on their shelves a week or two prior to us. I knew that all new books had dates placed upon them that prevented us from selling them prior to that date. According to my boss, anyone who sold the product prior to was subject to fines and even loss of their contract with the publisher and the rules were there to make sure all retailers had an equal advantage once the books came out. Even though I changed jobs recently, I still shop at the book retailer because it is 20 minutes closer to my home than the game retailer and I preordered Occult Adventures from them. It was estimated to come in later in August, once the store received all copies. (I believe August 15th?) Later that day, I happen to be in the area and stopped by the game store and they had copies for sale. This was on August 2nd. After speaking to ex-coworkers, they suggested I at least mention it to Paizo. I know that Paizo was selling copies at GenCon and perhaps gaming retailers receive their inventory earlier, but if not, then I think this is kind of unfair practice by the company and possibly a breach of contract with Paizo (If they follow similar contracts to the larger chain stores). I am being generally vague about this because if I am totally off base and this is all legitimate, then I don't want to create any kind of negative backlash with either company. If I am correct, however, I will provide the additional information.
It seems strange, because even when Bruce Wayne/Peter Parker/Insert your favorite hero here is caught in a situation where they are in their secret identity but need to fight bad guys, they still often use at least SOME of their abilities until they can change into costume. Unless... is that why Ra's Al Ghul beat Bruce Wayne in Batman Begins inside Wayne Manor? Because he wasn't in costume and therefore didn't have all of his class features?!
A friend of mine recruited me to a new game and I rolled up a Barbarian while another player rolled up a Skald. I got excited, but the GM isn't certain about the interactions between the Skald's Inspire Rage and my own Rage. The exact scenario we discussed and debated is as follows. Combat starts. The Skald Inspires Rage and my Barbarian goes off to smash. Two rounds later, my Barbarian needs to use one of his activated rage powers, so he must use a round of his own rage to activate it. The Skald continues to Inspire Rage because others in the party still benefit from it. Following that round, does the Barbarian need to continue use his own rounds of Rage to avoid fatigue or can he go back to using the Skald's Inspire Rage, at which point he will become fatigued once the Skald stops. I argued that the Barbarian is still raging, just from different sources and that it all counts as a single rage (also preventing rage cycling) while he believes that they are separate powers and that if I don't maintain my own rage, I will become fatigued. The campaign hasn't started yet, we were just discuss the mechanics.
Is Sun Wukong a drunken diety in Pathfinder? I don't remember the real Sun Wukong being a drunk in the stories I have read. Just a silly trickster. Back on topic, instead of Cleric, you could go Sacred Fist Warpriest. I'm suggesting a multiclass Monk/Warpriest. You don't have to retrain and I think a lot of the abilities would stack? At the very least, the Unarmed Damage would. And you don't lose Monk abilities from changing alignments, just the ability to increase them.
All three get their deities favored weapon as a proficiency and no, Pharasma's favored weapon is a dagger. (Because death is always associated with no other weapon than a dagger. Can't think of a single other weapon that better personifies Death.) Both of these things are interesting and I didn't know. I am going to factor both into whatever I do end up rolling. The ideas presented so far are really awesome and have really inspired me.
All three get their deities favored weapon as a proficiency and no, Pharasma's favored weapon is a dagger. (Because death is always associated with no other weapon than a dagger. Can't think of a single other weapon that better personifies Death.) For a brief moment, I contemplated a dual wielding, dagger throwing Pharasma Warpriest because it might be the ONLY Warpriest that makes use of the Sacred Weapon bonus damage and Weapon Focus would reduce the pain of dual wielding to pretty much negligible. Oh no, my attacks are at a -1? Whatever shall I do with my double 1d10 that crit on 19-20 (at level 10). But it gave me more of a Rogue-ish vibe and I see this character as a slayer of the Undead. If you wanted both you could take the Bones mystery and be a Spirit Guide and bond to the Life Spirit. Then you can channel positive energy to heal/harm, channel negative energy to command undead, all of your casting runs off charisma so your DC is strong and you have masses of uses of both options. Pharasma is a Death goddess, not Undeath. Worshippers of Pharasma hate the Undead and hunt down Necromancers and Undead down. They don't command Undead.
Just realized that a Oracle technically fits the bill too, although not as much thematically. Never played an Oracle either, but maybe Ancestor or Bones would work? IDK Envoy of Balance is... different, I will give you that. Being able to channel both energies would be interesting. But I almost feel the biggest problem with channel just doubles. Assuming no one has an animal companion or a familiar, you need a Cha of 20 to Selective Channel your allies out of the negative energy. Not hard to get with items/levels, but then if someone does have a pet or you are at a large table, then you might cause some friendly fire. I'm never ok with intentionally harming your allies. (And I curse every Alchemist who doesn't pick up the talent to exclude their allies from their bombs or Caster that throws a fireball into melee.) Depending on the scenario, if you are fighting large numbers of enemies (we got swarmed by 10 low level dudes last week), you might also end up healing the enemy. Take 3d6! Now heal 3d6! Now that I think about it, what order do they go off? I guess you could theoretically kill an enemy before the healing goes off. (This is all generally moot anyways, since most of the time, you fight only a few enemies at a time).
A bunch of friends recently joined PFS and want me to play with them, so I have to make a new character. I want to make something a bit different and I feel like I have never seen anyone in Societies play a priest of Pharasma, so I figured I would give it a try. But I am having some trouble figuring out how to build them. Having several other characters, I know the undead are a pretty common enemy, so a character with a passionate hate for the Undead would be useful. I am just uncertain if I should build him as a Cleric, an Inquisitor or a Warpriest. All three can let me play a very front line fighter with support abilities. Also, the divine casters are in low demand in my area, so I know a lot of tables with benefit from the spells. Any thoughts on what I could build or which would be more fun to play? I'm not looking for full builds, just ideas or suggestions. Bonus points to anyone who can help me figure out how to wield a scythe. I had originally planned on using it until I realized Pharasma's favored weapon is actually a dagger. And mostly because it would be kind of awesome, not because it is any good. (Although that x4 crit looks nice...)
I picked up the Skull and Shackles pawns yesterday and much to my sadness, I realized they didn't come with stands. Because I am silly, I didn't read the back that pointed this out in big, bold letters. So I decided to also pick up a Bestiary Pawn box (because those do come with stands) and I was wondering if there were any suggestions? I am debating between the different the Bestiary Pawn boxes and the NPC Codex Pawn boxes. Either way, the new pawns can be used to diversify or add encounters, so I am kind of wondering which one might be best.
Not certain if I should put a stop to the evasion argument because it is off topic or let it keep going because it is an interesting read. XD As for my opinion, people who argue about realism in games like this need to glance over to the dude in the dress who throws fire or the chick with antlers on her head that turns into a bear and then maybe rethink 'realism'. :D Anyways, a lot of good points and a few things I hadn't yet considered. I would like to see some more examples people have had in their games, but what I decided to do is to propose the options to the players. See which they think is a better idea and let them decide. I will be like "Guns deal a lot of damage, hit often and look cool. But guess what... bad guys have them too." lol
|
