Leingod's page

Going back a bit to the earlier discussion about Anastia, I've noticed two important points from the Reign of Winter AP to consider:

1. The story isn't "Anastasia didn't actually die." In fact she absolutely did die, and her body was buried and everything. But Rasputin used a miracle spell to resurrect her from a lock of hair (as part of a backup plan for his main plot).

2. The trauma of her death and resurrection apparently gave Anastasia some form of retrograde amnesia. Whether that's still a thing or it cleared up naturally or with magic is up to the writers, but within the AP itself it was stated that she needed to be "constantly reminded" of her identity and past. It does write that she starts to recover some of her memories (mostly as a way to fill in the PCs on any important bits of information they miss out on elsewhere), but it never quite spells out that she remembers everything.

So, it could very well be that this, plus spending 7 years on a completely different planet, means that exactly how much of her RL upbringing and experiences on Earth she actually remembers by now is kind of up in the air. She might remember it all, or it might be as a barely-remembered dream, or anywhere in-between.

Pnakotus Detsujin wrote:

To rationalize this, maybe the Pcs actions have also the effect to sprone Baphon to action before he can regroup with the opportune forces for such strike.

Pretty sure that's why the counter is called Frustration. He's not acting rationally at the point, he's pissed and needs to blast something.

Quote:

I'm also perplexed why he uses a wish to blast an hole in a pyramid, when he's got not only disintegration,

Mythic Disintegrate doesn't increase the square cubage you can destroy over normal Disintegrate, so it wouldn't have worked. And reading over his history, Wish is his go to, he likes spamming it. Flaunting it.

He didn't want a hole he wanted an entrance.

Exactly. It's pretty clear from reading about him, both in the AP and elsewhere, that Tar-Baphon is not only an egomaniac, but also a drama queen. He's capable of subtlety, certainly, but in general he always tends to default to big, flashy displays of power. There was, for instance, no rational reason for him to try to use a wish spell to teleport Arnisant's heart into his hand; the disparity of power was such that he could have cast any number of lower-level spells that would have done the job just as well. It was purely ego-stroking theatrics. It's even spelled out in the very first book of the AP:

Nuance is lost on the wizard-king who once constructed a portal to oblivion in an attempt to slay a rival. Centuries of tearing at the walls of Gallowspire with his necromancy have only driven him deeper into the dark arts, searching for a spell powerful enough to finally shatter the Shining Crusade's mighty seals. He never realized that his brute-force attacks only strengthened the walls of his prison, or that the key to his salvation lay embedded in his own hand.

Tar-Baphon is many things, but "capable of properly judging the appropriate amount of force" clearly isn't one of them. Which certainly fits an incredible magical prodigy who is driven entirely by ego, ambition, and revenge against what are now truly ancient slights.

Rysky wrote:

SOLDIER-1st wrote:

Evan Tarlton wrote:

And to add to these:

The good elemental lords have been freed, which means that there's almost certainly going to be a throwdown, and since an organization of mortals from Golarion were involved in said release...

And I did not know about that. Where did that happen?

I know at least one was freed in PFS, they might have freed the others.

It is not impossible that I missed a meeting and need to reread the World Guide ASAP, but last I checked there was only one good elemental lord free (Ranginori, the Duke of Thunder). It probably would be a bit of a priority for him to start looking for his counterparts though; they all lost to their evil peers pretty decisively when the tables were balanced, so while the Duke of Thunder can certainly shake up the existing power dynamic he's going to need backup if he doesn't want to find himself stuffed back in an opal.

They won decisively "when the tables were balanced?" Wasn't it established that it used to be more or less an equilibrium, and that the good Elemental Lords were defeated because the evil ones managed a surprise team-up at the exact moment the good ones were all mad at each other and not cooperating?

Plus beforehand, the good Elemental Lords made a bunch of stuff in the Material Plane while their evil counterparts were all squabbling with each other, and IIRC it's been stated that the evil ones currently all despise each other and don't want to cooperate.

Like, the essential point that Raginori will have a strong motive to free his three counterparts to secure his own survival is sound, but the way you phrased it makes it seem like the good Elemental Lords are outright weaker than the evil ones, when it's more that *all* of the Elemental Lords are prone to fractiousness with each other and that whichever side is cooperating more at the time has an advantage.

1) "World has changed for genuinely better and less cruel". In other words, its not just that she figured out that being evil overlord would make every other nation to unite against her, the impression I got is that she is genuinely taken back at how world has developed over course of 10,000 years after the whole earthfall. Like she is genuinely impressed that the world isn't in constant war or there isn't just another tyrant enslaving everyone else. I think it also comes with feeling of "The world really is better place without us Runelords", meanwhile every other Runelord just thinks varisia as backwater place full of peons that they need to reconquer AGAIN and "civilize" once more.

That's actually a good and interesting idea. Sorshen keeping herself at least semi-aware of the outside world, unlike all the other Runelords, has kept her from being locked in stasis in more ways than just the literal: it's also allowed her to attain a measure of perspective on the changes in Golarion since then. Unlike all the other Runelords, she isn't having this kneejerk reaction of well, "Ugh, what's all this nonsense? Screw this, I'm going to bring back my empire." Sorshen's able to actually look at things with a more measured eye and ultimately realize she'd rather find her own place in this new world than try to carve out the exact same empire of old. And it may lead into more than just her change in alignment and creating a different kind of Thassilon. Case in point:

Oh, also, I liked the idea of Sorshen retraining out of lust enchantment as a step of atonement. It shows her turning her back on sin, potentially to practice every virtue at once as Xin intended. Plus, she may want to be fully CG at some point, but she's still in the process of atoning for her lifetimes of evil (which should also take a long time).

I actually think it would be even more interesting if, instead of a universalist, she re-specs into a runesage (the wizard archetype apparently invented by the Cyphermages). Because when you think about it, that archetype is essentially exactly what Xin would have wanted: It allows a wizard to embody the power of each of his seven virtues, but also to seamlessly shift between them (well, okay, it requires a week or so of downtime, but still). Of course, the trouble of working out her stat block probably makes that not worth the effort, maybe just have her express interest/approval in innovations like that.

Because when you think about it, it is one more clear instance of proof that Golarion has indeed moved on from Thassilon. Not just in the obvious physical sense that the geography is different. Not just in the fact that society itself has changed in ways great and small. But also in the fact that even *magically*, things have changed, and in many ways even a relative backwater like Varisia is more advanced than Thassilon at its height, not less. In Thassilon, the restrictions and specialties of wizardry schools were rigid and sacrosanct, divination wasn't even considered a valid school in itself, and the Runelords had all but abandoned Xin's own attitude of recognizing that other magical traditions had a lot to teach.

But now? The Inner Sea alone has been exposed to countless new ideas and magical traditions, and is inventing its own. Stuff like the runesage archetype in particular shows that the magical tradition of Golarion has moved past the rigid absolutism of Thassilonian magic; even if they don't have the raw infrastructure and wizardly might to build all the grand magics of old, there's clear growth and change that Sorshen might have come to appreciate and recognize as superior to what existed before. Whatever else she is, Sorshen is someone who devoted her life to the study and use of magic, and that means the advances made in the study and application of it over the past 10,000 years are *going* to hold her interest, so long as she doesn't have the knee-jerk reaction of dismissing it all as barbaric nonsense (as was apparently a very common attitude in Azlant and Thassilon), which is probably the reaction of the other Runelords. Which is why atypical spellcasters make good PCs in Runelord campaigns, IMO; you can play up the Runelords' unfamiliarity and frustration with them, especially if they recognize ones that are clearly derived from Thassilonian methods but taken in a different direction, like the runesage archetype or the Runeguard PrC (though I recall hearing the latter is sadly underpowered).

So, Sorshen's saving grace might be that she's the only Runelord willing to change with the times, in addition to being the one who had the time and opportunity to actually reflect on her behavior and whether she's satisfied with the way she's lived her life. Once she had nothing to do but think, she had to really, deeply examine whether she was actually happy with herself as she was, and apparently the answer was, "No." Maybe play up that Xanderghul starts having that revelation toward the end, but it comes too little, too late?

The problem would be getting this across to the players, of course. One idea would be to have her be very curious about, or even fascinated by, any PC who uses magic that probably wasn't extant (or at least not common) back in the days of Thassilon, like a god-caller summoner or any of the classes/archetypes originating from the Magaambya. And then she wistfully remarks that old Xin really did have the right of it, when he taught his students that Azlanti/Thassilonian magic *wasn't* the end-all, be-all they ended up believing it was.

The rules take a backseat to the story when the GM decides they would, especially at the end of the adventure and especially if they think the players would otherwise find the conclusion unsatisfying (and I do. I get the *intent* of it, and I like what it was going for, but I feel like the execution was lacking).

If at the table you decide "The detonation of the Radiant Fire scorches Tar-Baphon down to his very soul, and even after reforming his body next to his phylactery he finds himself scarred and burned, drastically weakened and in horrible pain," then that's what happens, no matter what the rules say or even what the book says. And there are several ways you could explain an aberration like that, just given the unusual circumstances and powerful magic involved.

And unless the Lost Omens world guide has some equally compelling reason for Tar-Baphon to go back into hiding (selfish and self-centered creature that he is, Tar-Baphon would *absolutely* put everything on hold and devote all his time and energy to searching for a way to heal himself; what's the point of conquering the world if you don't get to be dramatically slinging spells at the front of your army?), that's what happened in my setting. Tar-Baphon reforms, but he's been hurt, humiliated, and perhaps even stripped of some of his Mythic power.

At the very least, I'd have it so that mention is made that Tar-Baphon's hand is just gone now. That it doesn't regenerate with the rest of his body anymore and none of his or his followers' spells can bring it back. Maybe (either in addition or alternatively) make his severed hand that's found on the battlefield afterward an artifact of some kind that can be used against him.

The Order of the Torrent is noted as one of the smallest of the minor orders if not the smallest, and numbers two dozen full-fledged Hellknights. So that would be the minimum. Meanwhile, the largest of the major orders will easily number into the hundreds and perhaps even the low thousands.

Nethys. You just have to learn magic and do whatever you want with it.

So what is Vancaskerkin family tree anyway?

Orik, Verik(iirc I know it was Ve at least), Saul, Natalya(iirc how to spell name), the one from 100# bonus npc for giantslayer?

Saul Vancaskerkin's first wife was a beautiful Varisian harrower from Magnimar named Adreea Valitrosa. Unfortunately, she was a member of the Sczarni, who didn't approve of this relationship, and a month after Natalya was born they tried to kidnap her. Saul was warned thanks to his criminal contacts and the three fled to Riddleport, but Adreea took a poisoned crossbow bolt in the back and died.

In other words, Natalya Vancaskerkin is Saul's oldest child; or at least his oldest legitimate one, I wouldn't be surprised if he'd fathered a few bastards in his time. I'm allowed to use that word because I'm one myself ;)

Saul mourned the loss but eventually married his second wife; said wife was the mother of Orik and Verik. It isn't stated what happened to Saul's second wife and she isn't named, but when Orik and Verik left Riddleport, Natalya was left alone with Saul and his third wife Bertrida, who hated Natalya and eventually drove her away.

Saul has at least two brothers. One brother is Damon Vancaskerkin, younger than Saul by five years and barely a teen when Saul formed his first gang. Saul looked after Damon when he was growing up, but as Damon grew older he chafed at the company of people and found honest work as a caravan guard. He didn't like being connected to Saul's criminal reputation and grew distant from his brother, but still dropped in for a while and tried to keep Orik and Verik on the straight and narrow (no mention of Natalya, though). As Saul's criminal ventures failed him and his sons fled the town, Damon was permanently estranged from his family and left Varisia altogether.

Saul's other brother was the father of "Lullaby" Vancaskerkin, who hates her "awful" birth name and doesn't answer by it anymore. Lullaby left home when her parents split as her mother left her father for her uncle, Saul, meaning that Lullaby is either the half-sister of Orik and Verik or her mother was Bertrida, the woman who drove Natalya away. Lullaby wants to rebuild the Vancaskerkin family in Riddleport, hoping to follow in Saul's footsteps rather than the "equally shady legacy" of her father, who moved on to some small town on the island of Kortos. I'm not sure if this is a reference to some other adventure like a Pathfinder Society thing.

That is, as far as I can tell, the extent of what we know of the Vancaskerkin family tree so far.

I always read the forewards, and generally find them interesting, but I won't really feel put out about their absence.

I do find it interesting that there is no question that 10 Sky Citadels were built, yet some are disputed and others are lost entirely. Curious, no?

Not really. That happens all the time in history.

Going through some of the older threads on the Sun Orchid Elixir, the creators seemed to imply that the Elixir made Kirran immortal, but for the rest of us it just returns you to youth, which seemed to confirm that he's still alive.

I gotta say, though, what a lonely existence. Making this stuff year after year without ceasing, never leaving. He's definitely not alone in the Citadel but is that really how you'd want to spend eternity? Maybe he's capable of creating more than six vials a year and skipped out ages ago while they burn through the stock he left behind.

It's kind of weird that he ever agreed to it in the first place. Guy must have REALLY loved Thuvia to be up for that for any length of time.

Stereofm wrote:

Myrryr wrote:

I'm more curious why there aren't more teleport circles. It only takes a single lvl 17 wizard

I think you have the answer here

Considering that 9th lvl spell scrolls are available to purchase in every large city or metropolis with a 75% of finding per week, no it's really not an argument. Find a rogue or bard with UMD or a lvl 8 wizard that can roll a 10 on his CL check and just buy the scrolls and poof, you've still done it.

I think the availability of 9th level scrolls should be taken as gameplay/setting segregation.

Stereofm wrote:

Civilizing humanoids.

That would make for a great Asmodean villain story

Indeed. Orcs and goblins and gnolls might be a hard row to hoe, but hobgoblins and bugbears and possibly ogres would probably work well under Asmodean doctrine, with appropriate roles and motivations tailored to their own cultures (let the ogres think that they are feared and valued, while the bugbears actually *are*, etc.).

It would be intriguing to see something done with the blank slate that is lizardfolk. Ignored and neglected, they could be seen as ripe for an evil church / nation to cultivate and promise all sorts of 'come with us if you want to live' stuff (and then ruthlessly exploit and use as disposable arrow fodder and literally cold-blooded unblinking inhuman enforcers to terrorize their own human population). It wouldn't even have to be Asmodeans, which, in Cheliax, at least, are racist as heck. The church of Razmir could use some inhuman 'muscle,' and lives in a more lizardfolk-compatible marshy part of the world.

Some Asmodean societies might be able to pull that off, but others (like Cheliax) seem like they'd just go the road of trying to enslave most of them.

I think Asmodean societies in general would have the problem of becoming wrapped up in ideas of their own superiority, because that's the go-to explanation for any society that builds itself on slavery: we're the slavemasters instead of the slaves because we're inherently the best.

Leingod wrote:

zimmerwald1915 wrote:

Leingod wrote:

Resentment, for a start.

I think an adventure where you try to recruit talent for a struggling academy like this, or like the still-struggling Alabaster Academy in Kintargo, could be pretty fun for characters who like to roleplay stuff that isn't the conventional "save this, save that, kill those demons that are secretly responsible" fare. Maybe as a little side story for a bigger campaign.

Alabaster isn't a wizard school, it's a school for natural philosophers with a dash of wizardry added very recently - precisely to try and attract new talent.

That's what would make it interesting, IMO. Besides, you can't tell me that classes in botany, zoology, medicine, etc. wouldn't be useful for a wizard anyway.

You'd think that, but it turns out that Alabaster's troubles can be resolved by "killing the demons that are secretly responsible."

What? The serial killer got turned into a demon AFTER he was executed for his crimes, and I don't remember anything about demonic involvement in the school itself.

Unfortunately, there isn't a whole lot of information on Kyonin specifically these days, and the old stuff is contradictory in a lot of ways due to being so early in the setting's lifespan. And in Second Darkness every single elf was either useless or an a*++%&# (or both), and it seemed like they were all CN rather than CG.

possible cleric alignments

Aren't all the rakshasa immortals LE?

I don't think Chaotic Evil ones would be entirely banned, either. I mean, Rovagug certainly, and probably Lamashtu as well, but Demon Lords related to undead like Kabriri and Zura (demon lords of ghouls and vampires, respectively) are almost certainly not going to be banned. The Four Horseman probably aren't allowed, though, since they want to kill everything including the undead (much like Rovagug), but ones who are less genocidal like Zyphus are probably fine.

There might be some Neutral followers of Good deities whose portfolios aren't necessarily against the rule of the undead allowed as well. I don't agree with Erastil (he isn't really going to be okay with a huge mass of essentially slaves serving as living blood bags, no matter how many farms you have), but there might be possibilities for, say, Shelyn.

Ross Byers wrote:

Abadar's Taxfest falls on the equal of April 15th. For our non-US readers, that is the day that Americans are required to finish their annual tax paperwork.

One of my best friends is an accountant, and she loved that inclusion. Also I think it really humanizes the church of Abadar, which is appreciated.

It must really suck to be an Abadarian priest on Taxfest in really exploitative or corrupt regimes, though. You're obligated to let the guys vent their frustrations, you don't have the power to do anything but wring out the money you're told to no matter how poor they are, and Abadar is kind of a dick when it comes to charity so you can't even help someone out of your own pocket unless you do it as a loan or something.

To be fair, it makes sense that we don't know about him, since no one's seen him in living memory and the only sign he's still alive is that the Sun Orchid Elixir keeps flowing out. For all we know, he got killed and replaced or something.

Leingod wrote:

Resentment, for a start.

I think an adventure where you try to recruit talent for a struggling academy like this, or like the still-struggling Alabaster Academy in Kintargo, could be pretty fun for characters who like to roleplay stuff that isn't the conventional "save this, save that, kill those demons that are secretly responsible" fare. Maybe as a little side story for a bigger campaign.

Alabaster isn't a wizard school, it's a school for natural philosophers with a dash of wizardry added very recently - precisely to try and attract new talent.

That's what would make it interesting, IMO. Besides, you can't tell me that classes in botany, zoology, medicine, etc. wouldn't be useful for a wizard anyway.

As I recall, Kaer Maga, so called the "City of Strangers," is open to all races or species willing to behave themselves and engage in trade. I don't have the campaign book in front of me, but I think I remember goblins acting as sort of gangs of perpetual street urchins.

Not to mention the famous Troll Augurs, who work as the city's premier fortune tellers/information network for hire.

I'm considering developing some material on the Eastern Front Academy, which is a low-power new arcane school on the border of Taldor, just because I love an underdog.

And the interesting subtext is the school was started as an attempt to give the town resources as it's way too far in the boondocks to have any natural trade or political capital. But partially because it's new and far from anything it can't attract very good students, so most of them will be unwanted second sons from minor nobility or total newbies who just scraped the money together because they wanted to be wizards/alchemists.

What happens with small population of low-level wizard kids, a bunch of bored soldiers, and some prairie farmers under a lot of economic pressure?

Resentment, for a start.

I think an adventure where you try to recruit talent for a struggling academy like this, or like the still-struggling Alabaster Academy in Kintargo, could be pretty fun for characters who like to roleplay stuff that isn't the conventional "save this, save that, kill those demons that are secretly responsible" fare. Maybe as a little side story for a bigger campaign.

This is a pretty old topic, but since we've got so much new information on the wizards and wizard schools of Golarion, I'm hoping it might be worth it to resurrect. Especially since I really like the expanded view on the academic scene of Golarion (including the non-magic stuff).

These days, in addition to the Academae, we've got all kinds of knowledge about the Magaambya and Old-Mage Jatembe, the Arcanamirium in Absalom, the Twilight Academy, Dusk Hall... the list goes on.

So, what's your favorite magic school in Golarion, and why? Or which ones would you just like to learn more about?

For me, the Magaambya is definitely where I'd want to study. But on the other hand, just being able to say "I graduated from the College of Dimensional Studies" is almost worth it on its own, so even though I'm not entirely sold on spending any length of time in Katapesh, it's pretty tempting.

Well, said archetype is about focusing on "the militant aspects of their gods," and it specifically allows you to take the War blessing even if it's not usually a domain granted by your deity. So most likely it means taking gods who typically aren't considered "war gods" but have at least some militant aspect to them, and focusing entirely on that. That said:

Iomedae would probably be allowed, and might be one of the more significant ones. She's already pretty warlike, she allows for Lawful Neutral followers, and Cheliax isn't going to get mad about it since they don't outlaw her religion within their own borders (Nidal's opinion on this kind of doesn't matter unless there's actual violence and antagonism, because they ban all religions but Zon-Kuthon's within their borders anyway).

Torag would probably also be one, since he's a good of strategy and defending your own and such. Sure, he's most popular with dwarves, but he's still one of the Core 20.

Martial followers of Irori are usually monks, but it's not like he actually disdains fighting with armor and weapons, and the aesthetic focus on self-mastery might fit in well with the militant virtues of Molthune.

Abadar is all about civilization and he's already got plenty of followers devoted to defending it; since the Molthuni think their civilization is the best, why wouldn't a Molthuni Abadarian want to devote themselves to protecting and expanding it?

And so on.

I know this is a bit late for your question, but I'm looking for names of games as well, especially games which children of Golarion (especially the inner sea) might play. I saw one, I think from Raging Swan games, which would be played in a bar, called something like "The Thief and the Dragon", but I'm really trying to find games which children might play.

I was thinking "Settlers of Cheliax" might be one, "Gorumopoly", "battle of the hexes", or "Shoki on the Shore". But, can't really find anything. Maybe just have to be clever. Does anyone else have ideas?

"Andoran, Spirit of Liberty" has a game/sport called Prismati, which the Andorens learned from the fey of the Verduran Forest.

Is there any Gorum worship in Absalom? It isn't listed as a major religion there, but does it exist at all? Officially in any books?

There are almost certainly people in Absalom who worship Gorum (likely mercenaries, bravos and adventurers), but there's probably not an actual, organized church of Gorum anywhere there. Absalom is a place of culture and commerce; martial valor is useful and can get you places, but it's not something Absalom enshrines in a way that would see it considered one of the city's notable faiths.

Irrisen also has a significant population of Fey, Trolls, and Giant, so I imagine here might be a small population worshipping the Eldest or giant deities like Thremyr.

Don't forget demon lords, like Urxehl (demon lord of trolls as well as storms and disasters).

It's also interesting that the only NE fey Eldest, the Green Mother, is utterly inappropriate for a country in which green things cannot grow, making choices as to whom the 'winter fey' follow up for grabs, since there's no obvious choice (suggesting perhaps that the fey themselves who serve Baba Yaga are somehow unnatural, or twisted from whatever original roles they served?).

Well yeah, aren't most of them Winter-Touched?

http://karzoug.info/srd/monsters/W/WinterTouchedFey.htm

"Live" as in for the rest of your life, or for a number of years? Because I'd love to spend 4-8 years studying in Nantambu and then move to Hwanggot or Andoran.

Her clergy are specifically called out as being information brokers, and leveraging secrets about people for gain (personal, or otherwise).

Yep. You can learn all sorts of things from pillow talk, and the whole "sacred whore" thing that Calistrian temples go for is perfect for gathering and distributing illicit information.

UnArcaneElection wrote:

If you want to show me a true Chaotic Neutral (as opposed to Chaotic Evil(*)) deity, show me something like Deadpool achieving divinity.

Per the rules, as an Assassin, he must be evil. Funny and popular, but still evil, like the Joker or Harley Quinn.

Then again, he killed Phil Coulson, who I can't stand, so he can't be all bad... :)

Well, just because works as an assassin doesn't mean he's got levels in the assassin PrC; given his skill set he's more like a ninja, anyway.

Gorum's lack of distinction between purposes for violence essentially defaults him to supporting senseless violence.

I would say something similar for Besmara.

If you want to show me a true Chaotic Neutral (as opposed to Chaotic Evil(*)) deity, show me something like Deadpool achieving divinity.

(*)Or if you define alignment half steps like D&D/Planescape cosmology, which Pathfinder currently doesn't do, Chaotic Neutral (Evil).

If that's your criteria, then Gozreh's evil too.

Leingod wrote:

UnArcaneElection wrote:

Gorum is another one that seems misplaced as "Chaotic Neutral". I think that this and other similar examples stem from an ongoing confusion between Chaos and Evil that has been around since AD&D 1st Edition (really, since Basic/Expert/etc. D&D, although in some versions of that they didn't even try to define Good-Evil as a separate axis from Law-Chaos).

Not really. All Gorum wants is for people to fight. He doesn't care why they do it, just that they do. Gorum is called a god of war, and while he does like himself some war, he's more properly called a god of battle and martial prowess in general. He has no interest in questions of morality and really no interest in anything that doesn't relate to battle and martial glory, which is not an inherently Good or Evil thing in a universe that has an objective standard for these things and has judged that violence is not an inherently Evil act (which is good, because if it was then basically every Pathfinder campaign ever is an evil campaign).

{. . .}

Not all violence is evil, but senseless violence is evil.

Yeah, but Gorum doesn't specifically hold up senseless violence as the ideal, which is why he's a CN god instead of a CE one (I'm pretty sure there's at least one demon lord or infernal duke with "senseless violence" as a specific part of his purview). You can fight for senseless reasons, you can fight for practical reasons, or malevolent ones, or completely altruistic ones, and Gorum's cool with you either way, because it's all fighting to him. If you're a boisterous CG cleric or warpriest who prays to Gorum for strength and strong opponents, Gorum's just as eager to give you his divine power as he would anyone else who shared the thirst for glorious combat; no demon lord would do that.

Gorum is another one that seems misplaced as "Chaotic Neutral". I think that this and other similar examples stem from an ongoing confusion between Chaos and Evil that has been around since AD&D 1st Edition (really, since Basic/Expert/etc. D&D, although in some versions of that they didn't even try to define Good-Evil as a separate axis from Law-Chaos).

Not really. All Gorum wants is for people to fight. He doesn't care why they do it, just that they do. Gorum is called a god of war, and while he does like himself some war, he's more properly called a god of battle and martial prowess in general. He has no interest in questions of morality and really no interest in anything that doesn't relate to battle and martial glory, which is not an inherently Good or Evil thing in a universe that has an objective standard for these things and has judged that violence is not an inherently Evil act (which is good, because if it was then basically every Pathfinder campaign ever is an evil campaign).

If you look at Gorum's doctrine, he himself doesn't specifically advocate killing your foes; after all, he doesn't really care about the results of a battle, just that it happens. He certainly doesn't advocate attacking noncombatants, and in fact tends to take a dim view of it (though the moment that dumb, brave farmboy picks up his dead father's sword and waves it around at you he's stopped being a noncombatant in Gorum's mind). If Gorum is evil because battles tend to cause a lot of pain and suffering, then Gozreh's evil too, because the winds and the waves can cause all kinds of suffering without any actual malice on Gozreh's part.

The Esoteric Order of the Palatine Eye.

Basically it's a secret fraternity type organization like the Masons or Illuminati that has Tabris and some of his writings as the foundation.

Well, yes, but at no point is it ever said that they actually worship him. At most, they view him as a brilliant mentor figure, and perhaps (though it's unlikely) a role model.

Part of the reason for Besmara's alignment might be because she doesn't really care about your reasons for piracy, in much the same way that Gorum doesn't care about your reasons for fighting. Ryu from Street Fighter would work fine as a worshiper of Gorum because he loves fighting even though he's a nice, genial guy who protects the weak, for example. And in that same vein a CG privateer working for Andoran to capture Chelish slave ships to free their human "cargo" in return for bounties from the government is perfectly in line with Besmara's doctrine.

I'm not sure, but Skull & Shackles might have had some dinosaurs in it. It's possible (that I'm making this up...) that there might be a visit to a place called 'Raptor Island,' and not because of it's popularity with birds of prey.

But Drow riding dinosaurs? Or Drow who are were-dinosaurs? Or Drow hunters and rangers with dinosaur companions? Or Drow charging a human fortification out of the darkest jungles herding enraged triceratops before them as wall-breakers? Or Drider-like fleshwarps with the upper-half of Drow and the lower-half of ankylosaurs?

Not to my knowledge.

But obviously these things must exist, even if Paizo hasn't written them. :)

I don't think the Skull & Shackles thing was part of the published campaign, though I might be wrong. I do remember there were dinosaurs in Serpent's Skull, though; you even captured one or two of them for an NPC as a sidequest.

If you want, you can easily come up with crazy interpretations of various faiths, and suggest that Shelyn's church celebrates physical beauty as being virtuous over any sort of moral worth, and may even have some sinister agenda of 'beautifying' the areas around Sheylnite churches by arranging for accidents to happen to 'ugly' buildings (forcing them to be renovated) or to 'ugly' *people* (driving them out of the area, so that they don't 'bring down' the surroundings).

(I picked Shelyn for that example since she's close to the last god I could come up with an 'evil' interpretation for.)

I mean, that's not even "twisting" her teachings, that's outright ignoring them, because a big tenet of Shelynite belief is that beauty is more than appearance and that a beautiful soul is something far more wonderful than a beautiful face.

The warrior-scholar left a profound impact on the planes through his books, the Book of the Damned and the Chronicles of the Righteous. His efforts got him barred from heaven, and the books have scattered themselves all over the planes for many of the most powerful beings to read.

So is it possible for Tabris to have worshippers? Would he even have divine powers to grant them? Who- or what- would worship him and why?

You can worship him if you really want to, but you're not going to get any spells or anything out of it, and he's not really going to pay attention to you because he's kind of broken and doesn't think anything matters anymore, IIRC.

Tacticslion wrote:

... so are you suggesting that you'd want to play D&D - drow and dinosaurs?

... I'llletmyselfout

Weeell, I actually like the idea, but no, I was just curious which Pathfinder stories (APs, modules, tales, etc.) featured either of them, aside from the mentioned obvious ones, since they seem to be rather unused in Pathfinder. I mean, for example drow were featured in multiple supplements, but I can't recall stories, which they took even a mildly important place (or at all), aside from Second Darkness and I wondered whether it's cause is because the drow department is one of WotC-s cash-cows, so the Paizo folks lave that to them, out of courtesy and camaraderie, or just Paizo isn't interested in them that much, or doesn't want to feature them much, because of not wanting to turn drow into anything but a boogeymen.

Dinosaurs are just cool and I was just curious about the same, ie. which stories featured them?

Edit: I just realized your pun... Sorry, it's late over there. Well done sir, well done. :)

Well, they don't appear much because they've already written the drow as almost exclusive to the Darklands. Unless an adventure is set in the Darklands, they're pretty much out of the running by default. And even in the Darklands, they have to compete with duergar and urdefhans and all the other antagonistic races down there, many of whom are very interesting in their own right and don't have as much of the baggage of WotC coloring your expectations.

Besides, keeping their appearances relatively fewer means less temptation to turn every other drow into Drizzt.

As of the Worldscape One-Shot: Lord of the Jungle, two Roman demigods Romulus and Remus have been introduced.

But with their introduction, do you think more of Earth's other deities will follow? (I know of Osirion and Egyptian deities, I'm still waiting for them to be further fleshed out in Golarion lore.)

In other stuff like Worldscape? Maybe, they've got stuff like Sioni mucking around with John Carter of Mars, so why not? And there might be some references and cameos in the actual gameline books, but I doubt there'll be anything as major as the Egyptian gods being worshiped (or having been worshiped) in Osirion.

That said, many of the demon lords and such are deities from other religions. Especially Mesopotamian ones, such as Nergal/Nurgal and Areshkegal.

One good way to get a mixed party "in the door" on working together is to put them in a situation where they need each other, or where the decision isn't up to them. This is a good way to give in-character reasons to work together and establish some basic camaraderie and shared goals, just so long as everyone involved is mature enough not to constantly tweak each other's noses. To give some examples from the APs:

In the first adventure of Legacy of Fire, the party are a couple hirelings working for Almah Roveshki, each with their various reasons. Since Almah's paying for your services, she's not going to put up with you trying to kill each other, and she's got a 4th level fighter by her side to break up any fistfights or the like.

In the first adventure of Serpent's Skull (probably one of the best first adventures of the APs), your party is a bunch of passengers on a ship that got wrecked on an extremely dangerous island filled with monsters, cannibals and worse. Getting into squabbles about having an "E" in your alignment would just be monumentally stupid for everyone involved.

In the first adventure of Skull & Shackles, the pirate have been pressganged onto a pirate ship, where two very powerful figures on the crew decide they don't like the look of them and quickly become hostile to them, giving them a natural enemy to ally against and work together to survive. In fact, both Sandara Quinn and "Fishguts" Kroop exist to drive home the important of making allies on the ship ASAP. Of course, in the first place if you're playing Skull & Shackles you're probably CG at most, but still, that option is there.
---X---
Speaking of how mixed parties can be interesting ones; I was part of a Council of Thieves game where two of the PCs (whose players were dating) were star-crossed childhood sweethearts: one was a girl from one of Westcrown's noble families, who in a fit as a child slipped away from her family while they were out on the town and ended up in a bad part of town, where a tiefling street rat helped her get back, and they talked on the way. The boy slipped away so he wouldn't have to deal with her parents (knowing it likely wouldn't go well for him) and instead quietly followed them to their house. Whenever they could, they'd spend time together, and even shared their first kiss. But one day he was found in the house and had to flee, and the house was too well-guarded for him to ever get back in.

The two ended up going down very different paths: the girl became a typical power-hungry, paranoid, LE Chelish noble scion (if one with a very well-hidden soft spot for tieflings) who discovered a certain talent for conjuration and devil-binding, with eventual aspirations toward out-and-out diabolism. She was brilliant, sophisticated and ruthless, but she trusted no one and loved no one.

The street rat, on the other hand, fell in with a former Taldan noble who had become a hidden priest of Milani (apparently a reference to a previous character he'd played); this priest didn't just teach him the religion of the Everbloom, but also gave him an education in noble subjects like rhetoric, logic, poetry, etc. He became a CG bard who started making a name for himself for his razor-sharp wit and talent for satire, and he started secretly agitating for change.

They reconnected as adults just before the campaign started, and even though they had grown into very different people, their feelings remained strong, not least because both of them found it hard to trust others due to their backgrounds, but could still manage to trust each other. When the tiefling got recruited for Janiven's meeting, he brought along the noble, over Janiven's objections (on her own, until he pointed out that regime change could mean a chance to hold actual power in Westcrown in return for a few minor concessions that would benefit her anyway, since a happy and prosperous Westcrown is a powerful and loyal one, after all).

Honestly, those two played their characters so well and the interactions were so interesting than I only vaguely remember the character I was playing (a guy who saw his parents ripped apart by shadow monsters and decided to fight shadows with shadows by becoming a nigh-heretical LN cleric of Zon-Kuthon who twisted the whole "darkness, loss and pain" thing in ways that might have been grounds for losing his powers looking back). It was this whole great love story that went on throughout the campaign (though they were pretty respectful of not letting it swallow up everything else, so no one really had a problem with it since it was fun and we had our own stories and parts to play) and during it the conjurer became a diabolist behind his back even though her alignment had shifted to LN about halfway through the campaign so that she could have the power to protect the tiefling (who tended to be a little too reckless for his own good, and not just in combat), which caused a lot of problems when he found out. The conjurer became Westcrown's new mayor because her alignment and bloodline made her a palatable "face" for their efforts to clean the place up, and the bard left on a journey to find a way to break the infernal contract and free her soul from Hell.

Also, ever since that campaign I have every tiefling character from Cheliax I make call themselves by the last name "Thrune" (only in private if they still live there), because the tiefling made a point of doing just that, explaining to the party that every tiefling in Cheliax was the result of Thrune's "marriage" with hell, and thus every tiefling born of this union is a Thrune. And I have them cite a pamphlet written by him as their inspiration for the idea.

I haven't read the story, but it would seem to me that if Asmodeus thinks that *he* is darn near skippy the perfect supreme being, and his 'perfect' creation doesn't look a thing like him, then he's going to be mighty pissy about it.

There's an old saying that the most important thing a king can do is die (and pass on his legacy), and it's neat that Asmodeus, once creating his perfect creation, realized that he wasn't quite ready to pass on anything to a successor or gracefully fade away...

Well, he seems to have wanted to create the perfect being physically, and while Asmodeus is certainly vain I don't think he's quite narcissistic enough to say that he's the sexiest-looking thing in the multiverse.

SheepishEidolon wrote:

Mavrickindigo wrote:

So, that makes me wonder: What sort of creatures we as players would take for granted should GMs be putting in the "particularly rare" category to emulate the feeling of not knowing what a weak monster is. We can already assume the Tarrasque is on this list, despite being Rovagug's Herald. What other creatures would be hard to know things about, despite level 1 parties being able to take them on in a fair fight?

My interpretation: The Tarrasque is 'particularly rare', because it's rarely met:

B1 wrote:

The legendary tarrasque is among the world’s most destructive monsters. Thankfully, it spends most of its time in a deep torpor in an unknown cavern in a remote corner of the world—yet when it wakens, kingdoms die.

Few people will concern themselves with stories about a herald of one of many gods. Especially a god that's usually banned from worship.

Personally, I decide on the following rules of thumb: Higher CR means more rare, unusual for the region means more rare and exotic variant means more rare. Being off by 5 usually doesn't decide the battle...

Solar Angels and Balor Demons, have high CR, but are very common

"Common" is a stretch, at least outside the Outer Sphere. It'd be more appropriate to say they're well-known. They've had a major enough role in Golarion that most everyone knows they exist and can relate some story they've heard about them at least, even if it's likely not accurate. Same for dragons, or genies, or merfolk. Even if you live in an area famous for them, you probably haven't met one personally, but everyone you meet's got some story to tell about them. They're just so well-known that most everyone grows up hearing about them.

Regional species like grippli and nagaji and the like, on the other hand, are probably much less well-known outside their particular stomping grounds. Ask a guy in Avistan what a grippli is and you'll likely get a blank look, whereas people living in the Mwangi Expanse would probably know at least a little about the little frog-people that live in the jungles and hunt with poison arrows.

Then you get to the creatures that, for whatever reason, are very obscure. Some are outsiders who don't make a regular habit of planar travel or being summoned by casters. Some are alien species, particularly those outside of Golarion's solar system, like the kasatha. Some do inhabit Golarion but have limited contact with humanoid populations; the inhabitants of Orv are stated to be a mystery even to those living in Nar-Voth and Sekamina, and in the isolated Vaults of Orv, I'd bet that there are even many natives who could tell you much, if anything, about the neothelids. The Algholthu intentionally try to keep surface-dwellers from learning about them, and I'd bet even merfolk and tritons and the like don't know about more than a few of the varieties other than the common aboleth.

I also really really really like lamentashu because there's so much stuff about her

Hell, you can pray to her while pregnant and apply the fiendish template to your kid and ensure a safe (for the kid) birth
That's really cool

The whole "Mother of Monsters" angle really does do a lot to help Lamashtu stand out, not just among Demon Lords but also among the evil deities of the setting. Some settings seem to struggle with making different Chaotic Evil outsiders distinct, so it's good that her and Rovagug can't easily be mistaken for each other.

Which Empyreal Lord(s) would you think someone would have the most success trying to pitch to a particular usually non-Good race? Assuming off the bat this evangelizing mystery cultist has the Charisma and the character levels to get them to actually listen and consider it.

Immonhiel, CG empyreal lord of herbs, medicine and toads would be one option for appealing to boggards, in my opinion.

Jalaijatali, CG empyreal lord of natural music, rapids and waterfalls apparently already has worshipers who are Good-aligned lizardfolk.

Olheon, LG goddess of deservedness, nobility and rulership might appeal to proud kobold chiefs, though you'd probably need to alter your art of her to make her look more draconic for them to take her seriously.

Any other ideas?

Abraxas, Baphomet and Haagenti, mostly because I have a longstanding interest in things like the occult, secret societies, and the discovery of profane and powerful bits of knowledge. In general, the demon lords who are more subtle about their work and the price you pay for worshiping tend to be much more interesting to me than, say, Orcus or Angazhan.

I also like to show people Kostchtchie's name and challenge them to pronounce it, but I don't think that counts.

Does anyone know who Vildeis' arch nemesis and most hated foe is? Got a blind fighter I'm designing (Blinded Blade Style focused Sensate, because Rule of Zatoichi, I mean Cool), and need to know. Mostly because there's the Blinded Zeal Trait for Vildeis, and the Birthmark faith trait which is going to be Vildeis' holy symbol on his 'redominant' sword hand. As a drawback, I picked Foul Brand for his 'off hand', and can't quite decide on who to pick.

Currently I feel like Sifkesh is the most thematic choice, though my first choice was Szuriel.... Sifkesh is diametrically opposed in alighment to Vildeis.

I sincerely doubt Vildeis would actually say that she has an archnemesis or a most hated foe, simply because Vildeis loathes the very existence of evil to such an extent that she blinded herself rather than continue to see it. As far as she's concerned, evil has no place in the multiverse and all that is evil is on her hit list.

So you'd be better off giving your character some particular reason to focus on a particular "shape" that evil takes, be it Sifkesh or whomever else. Vildeis is quite uncompromising, but even she likely understands that her mortal followers might need to focus their efforts in eradicating evil to be effective, so as long as you're still hunting evil she'd probably be fine either way.

I've been trying to find more information about the prophecies of Aroden, but so far I've come up short. I know that prophecy has been unreliable on Golarion since he disappeared, but I'm wondering how detailed the prophecies were before then. For example, would someone familiar with his prophecies have known that Cheliax would split away from Taldor ahead of time, or would it have been fairly vague and the meaning would only have become clear in retrospect? Given that the Harbingers have apparently been trying to make various prophecies come true, it seems like his followers have a pretty clear idea of when certain things were supposed to happen.

I'm also curious exactly how the prophecies have failed since he died. For example, suppose that a prophecy indicates that a great darkness will fall across the land, bringing war and death in its wake, until a hero with a magic spear leads an army to victory against it. Would we expect nothing to happen, or would we expect something to happen but with an uncertain outcome? For example, would everyone be scared because some big darkness is supposedly coming and without Aroden there's no guarantee that the hero will emerge?

Well, the Starstone Doctrine apparently made quite clear that Cheliax would be the place where Aroden would rule the coming Age of Glory from (and his clergy was apparently able to calculate the exact date and time of it), and this was well-known enough that pre-Thrune Cheliax built its conquests on the idea that, as the place that he would descend to rule humanity from, Cheliax was thus a "precursor" to his reign. That's why a lot of Cheliax's government and imperial territories pretty much collapsed when Aroden died.

Most likely, the Starstone Doctrine doesn't specifically mention an actual Chelish state, just that Aroden's going to appear there and make it the seat of his government while he rules humanity for a thousand years. The vagaries of who's actually going to be in Cheliax is kind of outside the scope of what the prophecy's concerned with.

Anyway, prophecy is almost certainly something that was always of varying veracity, or else there'd be a lot more than the handful of societies that based themselves around it. The Starstone Doctrine is special because it was a part of Aroden's holy doctrine; it's contained in his church's holy text, The History and Future of Humanity. The real importance of the "breaking of prophecy" is that now even the foresight of the divine is in question, and even the biggest, most earthshaking, most venerable and widely accepted prophecies are suddenly up for grabs.

I think it's important to make the distinction that Aroden wasn't a god of prophecy, per se; that was and is Pharasma's bag. Aroden, as the god who represents the boundless potential of humanity, was a god of destiny and its fulfillment, particularly the destiny of humans to become great and powerful. Throughout the 4,600-odd years of the Age of Enthronement, humans lived with the bone-deep certainty that their destiny was a great and glorious one. And then all that certainty in their own greatness and potential was taken away, replaced only by endless questions.

Basically, the "breaking of prophecy" really just means that there's no certainty to destiny anymore, which on the one hand means that things could possibly descend into utter horror, but on the other hand it means that even the most hopeless situation might not really be hopeless, even if there's some prophecy saying it is or there isn't a prophecy that says it isn't. Out of universe it really just seems to be an explanation for why what the players do can still surprise and get the better of forces that should be able to see the future and know the unknowable and etc., etc.

I think one of the little blurbs in the Adventure Paths (IIRC it was one of the Kingmaker ones) is a quote by a preacher shortly after Aroden's death who was killed for preaching just that.

Adjoint wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

Also, she might be the most powerful of the Core deities because she has effective control over all reality if you use Paul Muad'Dib's criterion

After all, it is her finger staying on the pulse of Everything

Should she stop the flow of souls from progressing through her judgement, the outer planes will stop existing before long (cosmically speaking)

But what's the power if you cannot abuse it? She may control the most important things, but she may have very little freedom about it, if any her action that is not in accord with cosmic order is a risk to the universe's existence.

In this sense, she's little more than a glorified office clerk.

Pharasma is STILL the most powerful of the known gods, meaning that "glorified office clerk" has more power than Asmodeus, or any other God for that matter.

Imagine IF Pharasma DID "abuse" her power, the entire multiverse could unravel! But Pharasma is not the kind of god to abuse her power, she is the judge of the dead, that is part of what makes her HER.

USING your power is also different than ABUSING it. Think about it, for outsiders souls are currency, food, crafting material, etc, all rolled into one. She CONTROLS that resource and decides who gets what. Yes a very small % of souls do get stolen (from my understanding it is a comparative drop in the bucket in the grand scheme of things.). Yet none of the gods have the power to challenge Pharasma's control over this very important resource that everyone wants.

Are they incapable of standing up to her, or are they all just not stupid enough to think the other gods would just sit around and let them do that? Pharasma's in charge of the souls because everyone knows she'll be fair about it; if she wasn't fair, I don't care if she's "first among equals" in any sense, unless she's the literal Overdeity of this pantheon (and Paizo has stated in no unclear terms that their cosmology doesn't have one), she would have lost the job ages ago, because if she favored any one side a dozen different gods would team up to pitch a fit about it.

I certainly don't have a problem with the idea that Pharasma is the oldest and most powerful god, but she is not powerful enough to just do whatever she wants.

Irez was one of my top choices as well, for several reasons;

1) Her appearance is very atypical for a celestial, and I love it. She's got a neat naga-like vibe.

2) She's a patron to wizards, while empyreals typically have clerics, paladins, etc. stamped on their bums.

3) A patron of writing, inscriptions, runes, etc. AD&D, and PF after it, has always had a rich assortment of symbols, glyphs, sigils, etc. and a heavy focus on magical inscriptions, be they wizard's spellbooks or magical scrolls, and it's cool to have a (demi)god of such things, like Thoth's wife/feminine counterpart, Seshat, a goddess of writing. Christian doctrine has more significance given to the spoken word used during Creation, but other faiths delve heavily into the significance and study of the written word or inscribed characters, including Norse runes, Egyptian hieroglyphs and Hebrew gematria. I love that sort of stuff.

4) A goddess of harrow decks and harrow reading! Very much a Golarion staple, and it's cool to have not only a goddess of such things, but such an esoteric and non-humanoid-ish goddess of such things, playing with mythological connection between serpents and wisdom and secret lore.

5) And those mythological associations. Serpents and wisdom and hidden lore and the Native America Uktena/Unktehi/Uncegila (the horned lake serpent) all come to mind, while her artwork also suggests Egyptian influences, with the many scrolls and hanging inscriptions both suggesting a mummy's wrappings and the hanging written calligraphic charms/mamori pinned to houses to ward off evil or disease in Japanese tradition.

Fair enough. Thinking about it, it's kind of odd that Soralyon is the one that is more associated with Thassilonian runes/sigils being turned toward good use, though I guess it's because he represents old knowledge and monuments?