MeleeMonster80's page

OK, I have a player in a Pathfinder Society group that wants to make stone full plate. There are rules for stone as a special material in Ultimate Combat. They seem a bit unbalanced for magic armor -- a fraction of the weight and cost and removes the "fragile" condition if magical.

There are also rules in the Inner Sea World Guide for "stoneplate" which is far less forgiving.

I've searched the forums and can't find a ruling -- are either (or both) of these items legal for Pathfinder Society play?

J-Rokka, sorry this thread went dead. Shortly after my last post the campaign kind of fizzled out -- I got really busy at work then got a job with a new company so I didn't have the time necessary to sustain the campaign. My group has just been periodically playing canned adventures to keep our skills sharp.

The zombie swarm was easy:

#1, it's "huge" in size
#2, it has the Str, Dex, Wis and Cha of the component creatures (in this case, standard human zombies with the "Advanced" template)
#3, Make that ALL STATS use the component creature. I assumed 10 creatures PER SWARM for HP purposes
#4 Read the Swarm rules and apply them:
**It doesn't make attack rolls. If a PC is adjacent to or inside the swarm, they take damage and whatever other nasty effects that result from being attacked by the component creatures.
**Immune to spells/effecte that target individual creatures

#5 Be flexible -- you might have to fudge a few things to make it go.

I used multiple "swarms" in a few encounters. It worked.

Hope that helps, and good luck with your campaign!

10. In a world were magic is a thing of the past and legends and magicians perform mostly parlor tricks the first dragons reawake and magic returns just in time to face the armies of the long forgotten enemy. [Think Dragonlance or A Song of Ice and Fire)

11. Driven and hunted a carawane of former slaves tries to find a new home, as their parents have died to secure their chance of freedom it falls to their children to prove that their sacrifice was not for nought. (Think Darksun)

DARKSUN!! OMG, that's one of my favorites from 2nd Edition. P.S. Paizo, that would be an awesome reboot! I'd totally buy it...

In keeping with the thread:

294: A disease in your hometown turns the infected into zombies! When you flee the destruction you find your village was not alone -- civilization as you know it has collapsed. The heroes must survive the apocalypse and rebuild society.

MeleeMonster80 wrote:

I'm not even playing out fights with standard Zombies anymore...I just assume a few encounters with a pack of 10-20 per day, no xp awarded. The players are fine with this...it just gets tedious to roll out the ridiculously one-sided encounters.

One of the most important things you will have to do in this kind of setting is maintain pace and tone. Think of left for 4 dead. The game intentionally pushes the pace along. If the players dawdle too long, zombie horde. But there isnt a constant stream of zombies, because it can get tedious (or too threatening).

It is ok to handwave a few minor encounters with zombies but you dont want them to become just a background image. There are always ways to spice up encounters with low level undead, such as having a carriage/barn/other vehicle or building with survivors trapped in it surrounded by undead. Of having a seemingly normal pack of undead with some much more powerful versions snuck in there.

If you are going for a walking dead style survival horror theme, the key is the players can never get comfortable. Otherwise the zombies might as well be orcs or whatever. Yatzee over at zero punctuation said it best about left 4 dead. You could take the zombies out and put in fluffy teddy bears and it still would have been a zombie game. That is the atmosphere you want to create.

I solved the problem nicely by treating the masses of low-level Zombies as a swarm (I cheated on the rules a bit...I know normally nothing larger than Small creatures in a swarm...but it works). In certain areas, the players are engulfed in a swarm of Zombies and take damage and make Fort saves against Zombie Rot each turn. This does a variety of things:

1) Discourages sitting still
2) Discourages player complacency when dealing with Zombie-infested areas
3) Discourages overt, hack-and-slash tactics
4) Makes for easy and frequent minions for higher-level undead "bosses" and others that can control undead

It worked very well this week -- the players wanted to save some townspeople and tried to just walk through an infested walled town...every round they were not in a building with the door shut they were considered in difficult terrain, taking 2d6+3 damage and making a DC 15 Fort save against Zombie Rot. They got the point in a hurry!

The campaign seems to be going well thus far...I plan to incorporate a Graveknight Antipaladin as the major villain over the next few sessions...we'll see how that goes.

I'd like to thank everyone who has posted their ideas here...I either cannibalized them for my own purposes or outright plagiarized them! Any other tips or suggestions from the community?

I'm not even playing out fights with standard Zombies anymore...I just assume a few encounters with a pack of 10-20 per day, no xp awarded. The players are fine with this...it just gets tedious to roll out the ridiculously one-sided encounters.

I'm currently running a Zombie Apocalypse campaign, and I was worried about the same thing...but I'm over it. Yes, those classes get bonuses, but the sheer numbers of undead cause them to run out of channels and elites pretty fast...plus, many unread have channel resist and a good will save, do they rarely take full damage.

The biggest threat in the party by far has been the alchemist with his bombs...devastating to a group of Zombies because they have bad reflex saves.

My advice from experience...don't worry about it. Overwhelm them with quantity, and those little tricks won't matter much.

Great ideas, thanks! I love the herders idea!

It was used like channeling...there's really only one way to use it...problem is, Charisma is a dump stat for clerics except for channeling, and he's the closest thing the party has to a tank, so he didn't have the extra stat points to invest in CHA. He did 2d6 damage and the Zombies made their saves more often than not...so he was doing around 4 damage per channel...and got 3 channels...he wasn't that effective against 30 Zombies in one encounter and 2 leveled Zombie Lords in another with no rest in between.

As discussed previously, channel is the most overrated class ability in the game. It sounds MUCH cooler than it actually is. Its only useful purpose is non-combat healing that doesn't burn a spell slot. Are you really surprised at the reault?

OK, so we've done 2 sessions of Zombie Apocalypse and here's what's happened:

1) Party finds crazy Alchemist trying to make a super-mutagen using human test subjects is the progenitor of the zombie infection.
2) Low-magic world based on Medieval Scandinavia.
3) Society has broken down, no economy, must scavenge for the GP value of stuff to craft items...and it takes a LONG time...
4) Players thought channel energy was going to be the best thing ever...and have discovered it is not in the least. Like screen doors on a submarine...
5) By far the biggest threat is the party Alchemist with his bombs -- DEVASTATING to groups of zombies.
6) One of the party members has contracted and gotten over Zombie Rot.
7) The party has fled their island home (P.S. they were on an island at the start) and are sleeping in the middle of the water on a tiny boat.

The players seem to really like the setting, and I'm having fun, too. I created a Zombie Swarm by modifying the Swarm rules that keeps the concept of bunches of CR 1/3 Zombies roaming around scalable to higher levels, and I made a modified Zombie Lord template that can summon and control Zombie swarms, are intelligent, and can have class levels so they'll never get stale or too easy.

The next phase is to introduce the party to a broken world. I need some ideas for factions of not-undead that will allow some variety in role-playing and encounters. Any ideas, Pathfinder Community? And let's be inventive...I don't need suggestions for Lawful Good clerics and paladins trying the "cleanse" anything... :)

Also, no skeletons involved...they're too Lame. ZOMBIE apocalypse, not skeleton wimp-fest... :)

I agree with Ashiel that channel is overrated...I've stopped worrying about it. Since the campaign is primarily an exercise in survival, I've decided to award XP primarily for completing objectives rather than for individual zombie kills, anyway.

My group has no attention span and constantly wants to re-build their characters to some goofy build they came up with, so it will probably work for them...

Great, advice, folks. Thanks! I knew I could count on the community for the best solutions to my toughest gaming problems.

Hmmm...I don't have Photoshop, and I've never used it before. Here are the resources I have available:

Excel, Word, Powerpoint, the generic "Paint" program that comes with your PC accessories

That's what I'm working with...I know it's not much...

Thanks for the suggestion, though!

OK, so it really bugs me when a DM is lazy and doesn't make proper maps for his encounters and campaign setting. It's really difficult to play the game on a blank piece of graph paper or other equally crappy grid-like object.

I'm about to start a truly amazingly-awesome ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE! campaign (see this URL for additional discussion on this topic: http://paizo.com/forums/dmtz4xzt?Zombie-Apocalypse#35) and I need some super awesome map-making resources.

Unfortunately, my wife is less enthusiastic about this game idea (or gaming in general) than I am, and would put my nuts in a vice if I went out and purchased something like Campaign Cartographer or other map-making software.

So, once again, I appeal to the Pathfinder community for help. How can I make functional (not necessarily pretty) game maps for use on a computer display for my super-awesome ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE! game?

I was thinking something along those lines, too...that way the loss of one PC isn't so devastating...plus, it would be fun for the group to fight an infected ex-friend!

I was gonna say a bungling Alchemist who was in over his head, in keeping with my low-magic game concept...

Agreed, channel is not something I'm worried about...or Paladins...they're great against one big baddie, or a small group, but swarms are still problematic for th
em.

I think I like the "save the world" goal...it would require epicness, so that should keep the PC's occupied for 25-ish levels! :)

Holy crap! Do you wanna come over and run our game? That was awesome! Great ideas, thank you! I'll be utilizing a lot of those suggestions.

Dude, just slow-pitch stuff to them to help get them used to the basic concepts and mechanics. Have them fight a lone Orc or something easy. Once they get comfortable, introduce the idea of multiple characters per player -- if they're game, work the new characters into the campaign. That in itself can be a fun role-playing situation!

I've done this a couple of times, and I've found that each player will view one of his characters to be the "dominant" personality -- his go-to guy for role playing. That's OK...in full parties, it's been my experience that one or two of the players are the dominant role-players anyway, and the rest of the group usually sits in the peanut gallery until their unique skills are needed or combat begins. That's a group dynamic for you...just let it happen!

The key is, make sure your players are having fun. If you have to bend the rules a little or intervene with a "hand of God" now and again, then so be it. Good luck!

That's a good idea, Seagull...maybe a plague Vampire or something...and he can have a thing for mortal chicks and sparkle adorably in sunlight. I can use the campaign to teach a lesson on the importance of having a boyfriend...

Sorry, just being sarcastic. Seriously, though, great idea!

Ha! Love it, Shifty! I'm totally using that one.

Yeah, but can that be applied to a Zombie?

The SRD has all different kinds of zombie templates and you can stack them. I was simply going to add the "plague zombie" template to other ones, like "fast zombie" and "Zombie Lord". Oh, and I do plan to be absolutely devastating to the PCs... ;)

Great stuff, folks...keep it coming!

Grim and gritty...low magic items. No economy to speak of, so unless you craft it or find it, you're out of luck. To compensate, the PCs will have a generous stat allowance at creation. Looking at 4 to 6 players in regular attendance. I also plan to be a jerk and require a survival strategy for food, water and shelter from the players.

Good point Apple...any recommendations?

I'm toying with the idea of running a zombie apocalypse-themed campaign and I'm looking for cool ideas. It seems like the various zombie templates available in PF will allow the game to scale well as the PCs advance...plus, I really like AMC's "The Walking Dead"! A few concepts I'm wanting to incorporate include:

1. The zombies are caused by a disease, not raised by an evil nemesis.

2. The zombie threat has caused a complete breakdown of civilization.

3. While big evil nasties did not cause the apocalypse, they are using the situation to their advantage.

Basically, I'm imagining that "The Walking Dead" and "The Road" had a baby, then "Fallout 3" and "Oblivion" had a baby, then those babies had a baby.

I'm open to suggestions...whaddya got, Pathfinder community?

Marc, I'm sure that feat is awesome, but I'm not going to spring 6 bucks so my brother can have a broken mount... :) I'll pass that bit of info along to him, though.

1) I thought pegasi can speak. but perhaps not. Regardless...

2) ask if you can use the "Natural Spell" feat to get around the limitations. Not exactly accurate, but close enough. Or you could take at least 4 levels of druid and take natural spell anyway which is still within the rules.

Thanks Golem! Natural Spell might work...I'm sure he'll be salty he has to take a feat to cast, though...

Also, the bestiary entry for Pegasus reads "Common (cannot speak)", which I take to mean the Pegasus can understand common, but cannot speak it.

Ok, so my GM is great about encouraging "creative" character development...he wants our characters to be stupid powerful (at least in our imaginations...) so it's that much more satisfying when he makes us run away with our tails between our legs.

Anyway, one of the players (my little brother) is playing a really well-built mounted archer that rides a Pegasus (of course). We just reached 7th level, and he wants to take the Leadership feat, despite his 6 CHA score, so he can have his Pegasus be his cohort. A little outside the norm, I know, but our GM, in keeping with his philosophy, will allow it as long as the Pegasus' first 4 levels are its Pegasus HD.

Ok, here's where things get really weird: the archer wants the Pegasus to have his 5th initial class level be Cleric. I pointed out that this may not be the best option as a Pegasus cannot speak, thus eliminating the ability to use Verbal spell components, nor does it have hands, which makes somatic, material and focus components impossible. He argues that the horse grunting and moving its hooves/wings is good enough since these are his natural means of fulfilling these component requirements.

I can't find in the rules where it specifically says one way or another. The closest thing we found was the rule on ploymorph casting, but that assumes the caster is in a foreign form while casting.

Any advice?