Morhek's page

Name: Shoshan
Race: "Human" Construct
Classes/levels: Magus 12
Adventure: Secrets of the Sphinx
Location: Sightless Sphinx
Catalyst: Userib
The Gory Details: The party got caught in the hallway south of the octagonal chamber. They'd already depleted some resources grinding through the Bodaks and Heqet, and then the Vrock room, and sent the Magus and the Rogue south to scout out the hallways leading to Userib's main chamber. Unfortunately, Shoshan failed a stealth check and alerted the Maftets and the Shadow Demon. The Shadow Demon alerted Userib and then mindjacked the Rogue when it got a chance, and by the time the rest of the party had begun trickling down into the hallway the Maftets had set up an ambush, setting up flanking with their Vanish SLAs and nearly downing several party members.

By the time Userib and his cohorts joined the fight, the Maftets in the sleeping chambers had already done some serious damage, and Userib killed Shoshan outright with an Unholy Blight spell. The party's Twilight Sage Arcanist managed to use one of the downed Maftets to fuel zir Twilight Transfer, resurrecting Shoshan, but it wasn't long before she was killed a second time, this time brought back by the party's Oracle casting Breath of Life, before Userib was mauled by the party's druid cohort's Tyrannosaur animal companion and finally kidney-punched by the party's new monk. But the moment Shoshan dropped the first time, the Hat of Disguise she was using stopped working revealing her mechanical form to the rest of the party for the first time.

Where can we look for Celtic-inspired people on Golarion ?

The Kellids in general have always struck me as very Celtic. The Taldan Empire pushing them back is a parallel to the Roman conquest of Gaul, their subjugation by and eventual split from the dwarves of the Five Kings Mountains makes Druma feel like if you were going to make anywhere on Golarion "Fantasy Scotland" it would be there, and Iobaria has a very Post-Roman Britain vibe to me, though with the roles reversed - Celtic-themed Sarkorians fleeing the fall of their own lands and settling Germanic-themed Ulfen territory. It's not a perfect 1:1 parallel, nor should it be, but in the same way the Kellids are influenced by the old Conan the Barbarian tropes, the character Conan himself was influenced by old ideas about Celtic warriors.

After six years, It's worth updating the party makeup.

Imdar's and Olivia's players had to drop out around the end of Book 1, and Bognor's player kinda faded away. We've had a few characters briefly involved, but too inconsistently to really count as regulars. And Toffi was killed a couple of levels ago by a band of Efreeti. So we currently have:

• Sedjawet: female garundi human Oracle 11 (Occult/Haunted), who discovered an unexpected familial connection to the threat plaguing Wati, and that her family's oracular powers may have more ancient roots than she expected.
  
• Suha Temitope: agender tiefling (beastbroof) Twilight Sage Arcanist 11 who helped the party stop the plague in Wati, whose Gebbite patron seems to have an unusual interest in the Mask of the Forgotten Pharaoh and its history.
  
• Shoshah: female warforged "human" Magus 11 who joined the party shortly after the death of Toffi, hoping to find out more about her roots.
  
• Nolla bint Yara al Gritcrab: female goblin Sniper Rogue 11 who joined the party after the auction, hoping to track down her stolen sandship.
  
• Qar Ingeshlogem: male pahmet dwarf Monk 11 who was hired as a guide through the desert and betrayed, joining the party recently looking for payback against his former employers.

As far as I know, one of the big things about Zon-Kuthon that sets him apart from the average fiend is that, while he and his followers can and will inflict unimaginable torments, he requires them to be entirely consensual. Inflicting it on the unwilling is meaningless pain, irrelevant - a useful tool to achieve a goal perhaps, but of no true significance. The sights he has to show you must be willingly and wholeheartedly embraced for it to truly mean anything. Requiring consent speaks to having at least some code of conduct, which reads as enough to categorise him as Lawful.

I dunno, I feel like you could just use the UAR period? Obviously there was no pretension at pharaohnism on the part of Nasser or the ASU, but equally it was a period of national reassertion and repudiation of foreign rule as opposed to one of domination of the country by an ethnically segregated foreign clique?

I'm prepared to admit I may simply be seeing what I want to see. One of my great interests is the ancient Mediterranean, particularly Ancient Egypt. But that's the phase that I have been drawing on for my campaign, and my players seem to find it rewarding enough.

Why Ptolemaic? I would've assumed that's the era that's missing the most, since there's no parallel to Hellenistic conquest in Osirion's lore, but you seem more well-versed in Egyptian history than I am.

I say Ptolemaic because of the parallels of a newly-independent dynasty of Pharaohs focussed on modernising along international lines. You also have the fusion of old culture and new, and an economic and military renaissance - the Ptolemaic Period until shortly before the Roman conquest was a decent time for Egypt after being carved off from the Persian empire, even if it was dominated by a new Greek or at least a Hellenised elite class. Khemet I and the Forthbringer restoration aren't really equivalent to the Greeks, but the dynamism of the time feels like it is.

Osirion is kinda a hybrid between the Ptolemaic and Mamluk periods of Egyptian history, and has plenty of pyramids and tomb complexes you can set a story in. As has been mentioned, Mummy's Mask is an entire six-book adventure set in Osirion, though you don't get to your first real pyramid until well into the adventure.

Where's the euphemism for heterosexuality?

As in, on Golarion there'd be equal use for that, right?
In front of kids or maybe in sacred spaces where celibacy is practiced.
Or are there places where alternate sexuality carries a stigma? I don't think mainstream adults care, at least not until straying into other species perhaps.

And Cayden's carousers makes me think of drunks not bisexuals. Or maybe people who get lustful when drunk. And I'd think he'd be more pansexual, but I'm a step removed from that lore. (Spellcheck doesn't recognize pansexual, so there's that...)

I didn't include one for heterosexuality, a.) because I couldn't really think of anything, and b.) because the more normalised something is, the less likely it needs a euphemism. There were all sorts of names for non-het relationships through history, usually similar euphemisms, but the term "heterosexual" only exists because someone invented the word "homosexual" to try and codify "deviant behaviour" and paint the alternative as the healthy norm. As far as I know, being non-het isn't actually more common on Golarion, it's only far less discriminated against, especially if magic can help make up for the limits of biology - all those sorcerous bloodlines need to come from somewhere. Heterosexuality still seems to be the baseline judging from the laws of inheritance, social customs, etc., and if it's thoroughly normalised then it doesn't need a name to refer to it. It just gets assumed.

The point about bisexuality being confused for generic lust is taken, however, it was a thoughtless stereotype and I regret suggesting it.

10.) A Nethysian plan (a plan so crazy it just might work).

11.) Joining the Iblydan legions (a euphemism for homosexuality).

12.) In a Prismatic Way (a euphemism for polyamory, referring to the Prismatic Ray).

13.) One of Cayden's carousers (a euphemism for bisexuality).

14.) A face only Lamashtu could love (ugliness).

15.) A party to put Urgathoa to shame (an orgy/bender).

As far as I know, Chelaxian territory is technically an Archduchy of Hell, and already counts as Hell's domain. Devils can already cross in and out of the Material Plane through conjurations by House Thrune and other diabolists through an equitable exchange of souls. If Hell wants to send its forces onto Golarion, it already has as much of a foothold as it could need, and mortal cannon fodder to throw at a problem before any fiend takes the field of battle - and as a bonus, many of those souls will then become new devils to further bolster its ranks. It might not be able to rush mass troops through a big portal, but devils are bigger planners than demons are anyway. Hell is happy to play the long game. More than that, I'm not sure why Asmodeus would WANT to open a bigger rift, since it risks retaliation in kind by the forces of Heaven. Hell is already pushing things with its patronage of Cheliax, and any escalation into a divine conflict risks breaking the cage of the Rough Beast, which Asmodeus is uninterested in dealing with as the rest of the gods.

I could, however, see some fiendish superweapon being involved, with potentially catastrophic effects. I heard a while ago that Cheliax was working on some kind of magical nuclear arms race post-Hell's Vengeance, but know nothing about it other than that vague description.

Did you mean to say that Cheliax was never a factor in Avistani geopolitics, as far as the published setting went? I don't think you did.

Yes, actually. At least since I've been playing, which is about ten years or so now, the Chelaxian state has never felt like it was truly a threat. It has always been on the backfoot. When the Inner Sea begins as a setting, Cheliax has already been declining for a long time in-universe, and it never felt like it arrested that slide. Which is why I really hope Paizo use this opportunity to do so.

This is just vibes, but Cheliax doesn't feel as "pushed" a villain as Tar-Baphon, if that makes sense? Like the setting could afford to lose it and keep chugging along without something else taking its narrative place.

I believe the wrestling term is "over." Tar-Baphon is over at the moment, and has a very recent, very public and very status quo-affecting win under his belt, even if he didn't get the Starstone - destroying Lastwall and overrunning the Eye of Terror with undead hordes that forced some of its neighbours to ally against him. He feels powerful, a distant but omnipresent threat who demands to be taken seriously, and must be calculated into any geopolitical decision in Avistan. The same can't be said of Cheliax since it lost Sargava, even though it was meant to be an ideal Setting Bad Guy for the Inner Sea. But that could change, if Paizo puts Cheliax over.

The Whispered Tyrant is a very good example if we're thinking about a war that sets Cheliax up for a bit of a revival, since it shows how even the good guys technically "winning" can still set the villain up to be in a far more powerful position. There are plenty of good stories to tell where the "good guys," ie; Andoran and the Pathfinder Society, can "win" in their specific missions, while Cheliax still accomplishes almost all of its other goals. What could be Cheliax's clean conquest and dominance in Andoran could be turned into a messy occupation that still gives Andoran and the Pathfinders the chance for a long guerilla resistance and covert espionage operations, which sound like great plot bunnies to base Pathfinder Scenarios on. Go full French Resistance on Cheliax.

But in the meantime, having restored its international image Cheliax will still be exultant and powerful, in a position to dictate matters to its neighbours, and able to finally throw its weight around for a bit.

then there is the Aspis thing.

There's another reason to give Cheliax a win: setting up the Aspis Society, whose headquarters are based in it, as a bigger threat as a rival group to the Pathfinders. Which Cheliax's star on the rise, they would likely benefit from either official patronage or the removal of competition, and you could use the unofficial covert war between the Pathfinders and Aspis Agents as a proxy for the bigger conflict.

Morhek, an Andoran resistance feels...right somehow, like it gives Cheliax cred, and revives a similar feel to the Bellflowers. Definitely makes the region more dynamic, and with the Whispering Tyrant pressing in the North, it's up to heroes to rise up more than crusades.

You could even make the Andoran resistance a coalition of the old Bellflower Network, the Eagle Knights, and the Firebrands, plus a few others, coming together in an uneasy alliance against a common enemy. As Andor shows, there's a lot of appetite for stories about ragtag groups coming together to fight an evil empire, and the kind of internecine jockeying for power and influence, even in the name of a greater good, that can create storytelling fodder.

Which all assumes Cheliax actually wins. I'm of the opinion that you don't make a potentially status quo shaking move unless you're actually willing to shake up the status quo, but then I'm the guy who thought they should have run the Vidrian revolution or the abolition of slavery across the Inner Sea as published events that players could affect, not off-screen changes. It's possible the adventure ends with an open-ended stalemate.

I don't know if I count Hell's Vengeance as a W, more like not taking as bad an L for once. A clear, unambiguous W is long overdue I think.

And as someone who hasn't been particularly interested in Andoran, a Chelaxian occupation of Andoran might get my attention. Especially if it brings Cheliax's functional borders right up against Taldor's, and sets up a protracted Cold War before the even bigger conflict that I've often thought would be perfect, with Cheliax as a fading great power trying to revive its fortunes, while Taldor's star is on the ascent but still fragile as it recovers from centuries of decline. Taldor funding and supporting the Andoran resistance, supporting an Andoran government-in-exile, Cheliax recruiting its own Quislings and Petains and consolidating the Lumber Consortium under the Chellish banner, the Andoran colonies going independent and having to rely more on their Segadan neighbours to fight of Chelaxian ships trying to assert their dominance, that sets up a very cool future status leading up to Inner Sea War II. Especially since, given their histories, most Inner Sea powers have no reason to look more kindly on a resurgent Taldor than they do Cheliax's waning iron grip. At least Cheliax has been doing something to oppose the Whispered Tyrant.

I don't think there is a canon known origin for Halflings, but their ancestral heartland seems to be central Avistan, around about where the Thassilonian Empire used to be, from which they radiated over the last 10,000 years. The ancestral Halfling ethnic group has returned to Golarion with the establishment of New Thassilon, furthering the connection. Whatever stock they came from seems to have come from there. Were there prehistoric halflings living alongside ancient Kellids, like Cro Magnons living alongside Flores Hobbits? Did the Thassilonians breed Halflings from human stock as a slave race while they were also enslaving the local giants, one for menial tasks and the other for brute force heavy labour? Did the Algolthu beat Thassilon to it, trying to engineer a replacement species for the Azlanti before abandoning the project? At this point, I don't think anyone would know except the gods, and they evidently aren't telling. As a people Halflings don't even (yet) even have a name for themselves as an ancestry distinct from humans or dwarves or elves. Was it taken from them by one human occupying power or another (Thassilon, the Taldan Empire and Cheliax being the big ones) or did they deliberately forget it?

I think most Halflings aren't especially interested in the "real" origin, but have a hundred different stories, and especially stories that explain how they put down roots in the area. Halflings were created by Grandmother Spider to personify her trickster spirit. Halflings are the children of Desna, and inherited her wanderlust. Halflings started as naughty human children who ran away from their parents and never grew up. Halflings were the dutiful servants of Ptah who taught them craft the same way Thoth taught humans language and mathematics. The First Halfling was brother of the First Dwarf and the First Human, the First Human was too afraid to jump the First Chasm and so founded the First City, the First Dwarf fell in and was squashed and stunted and carved the First Cave, but the First Halfling sacrificed his height to make up the distance and invented the long jump, remaining "Free." Halflings are actually giant-kin, and their True Name was locked away by Thassilonian wizards to stop them returning to their true forms and crushing the humans who enslaved them. Every clan and tribe would have its own story, and none of them are "true" but contain many Truths.

As a DM, my headcanon origin is the first one I suggested, that Halflings are simply an offshoot of human that have been around for millions of years ago, what you'd have ended up with if the Flores Hobbits lasted long enough to invent civilisation and meet Homo sapiens. Archaeological evidence is hard to find simply because smaller bones are more brittle and less likely to preserve, and the things they made get mixed up with Human archaeology and are hard to tell apart from something made on child-scale. That might even be a fascinating character and plot kernel, a halfling archaeologist who's discovered that Avistan's paleo-history is entirely wrong and is being denounced by colleagues whose careers are staked in a human-supremacist narrative so is looking for evidence, and hires adventurers to escort him into the Varisian badlands to find it.

Wow, that was in the totally wrong tab that I had open, and not at all a Conspiracy Theory. Ignore the crazy person ranting at clouds...

Ioun Stones are a conspiracy! 'Cause... I can't tell you! They're listening!

"Ioun stones were named after a goddess who has been erased from the universe. Nobody knows what caused this, but the gods apparently blame a gang of interdimensional coastal wizards."

Osirion Arabic

To be a bit more specific, the position in Osirion is more akin to Egypt after the Arab conquests. An Arab elite taking over from the old Greco-Roman/Byzantine elites, but the majority remained indigenous Egyptian. The Keleshites who took over ruled for several thousand years, but the Garundi are the majority and have their own culture and language and identity, the same way the Coptic community do. There's been some intermingling, but they're still distinct groups.

I do not know if this is cannon or not but I think the history of humans goes something like this. All humans were originally Kelid. The algholthu elevated some Kelids to fight their land dwelling enemy; the serpent folk. These elevated Kelid called themselves the Azlanti. Earthfall happens and the Azlanti are mostly wiped out. A few survive and form Thassilon, the Jistka Imperium, and Osirion. Much later after the rise and fall of these empires Taldor is formed by the last Azlanti; Aroden. Aroden becomes a god and Taldor starts expanding its territory. There were eight army's of exploration. The Kelid's were on the receiving end of more than one of these campaigns. The seventh army specifically wiping out the last of the Inger Kelids. This of coarse only applys to the inner sea region as other areas have different history's.

To my knowledge, the Kellids, Shoanti and Ulfen seem to have already been distinct groups before Earthfall, though the Kellids were the most widespread and common. Most Avistani ethnic groups are descended distantly from Kellids, but there's been a lot of cultural and ethnic shifts in the 10,000 years since Earthfall. In Taldor, Azlanti survivors mingled with Aishmayar of what would eventually come to be Qadira, and Taldans and Kellids intermingled where Kellid lands were conquered by the empire. In Cheliax, Azlanti survivors intermarried with Ulfen before they were also conquered by Taldor. The Varisians are descended from the Thassilonians who survived the destruction of their empire, and the Thassilonians were descended from the Azlanti. We don't know where the Azlanti came from, or how much the Algollthu changed them more than simple breeding would have.

The Garundi and Mwangi ethnic groups are related to each other distantly, but arrived in Northern Garund and the Mwangi Expanse from further south during the Age of Ashes and are not closely related to the Avistani. The Varki are descended from Eruktaki who migrated south from the Crown of the World and are more closely related to Tians. And there are more distant ethnic groups in Arcadia, Tian Xia, Casmaron, possibly in Sarusan, none of whom you could accurately say are descended from Kellids.

I guess in short, saying everyone is descended from Kellids is like saying everyone is descended from the Indo-Europeans. A lot of them are, and some of those cultures stayed closer to that original common ancestor than others, but the vast majority did not, and even for those who are, focussing on that ignores the ways those cultures diverged on their own and the other influences they have drawn on.

The Kellids are partly inspired by prehistoric Europeans, especially in the Realm of the Mammoth Lords, and Sarkorian God-Callers' eidolons remind me of some of the transitional figures you see in cave paintings, where you get wolf-bears, bear-deers, owl-bison, etc.

If I was going to flavour them with a more recent culture, for Kellids who live closer to what was Old Taldor I would look at the Celts, both ancient and Medieval, especially with their long history of being conquered or ousted by the Roman-esque Taldan Empire. The Isgeri Kellids were absorbed into the empire like the Gauls were, and are now within the Chellish sphere of influence as France was in the Holy Roman Empire, and the history of the Palakari Kellids in Druma seems to me influenced by Scottish history, but with dwarves instead of the English.

The halflings' True Name for themselves is not secret, nor has it been forgotten. It was hidden, locked away in a magical vault on a forgotten demiplane by ancient wizards. If it is ever found, every single one shall assume their true forms and join the ranks of their kin, the giants.

The Starstone doesn't "ascend" anyone. Every single person who has taken the "test" was incinerated to a crisp. It is pure dumb luck, but statistically inevitable given the sheer number of people who risk it, that four people - Aroden, Iomedae, Norgorber and Cayden - already had a spark of divine potential that endured after their corporeal forms were destroyed they survived. There is in fact no test at all, which is why nobody who has passed remembers it, the stone is merely imbued with tremendous and thoroughly uncontrollable power. Aroden put it in a very public and open place for anyone brave or stupid enough to try because he couldn't harness it as a power source, and thought it was a useful way to either dispose of potential rival aspiring demigods, or at least distract them from more viable methods.

The other three Ascended are unaware of their tremendous fortune, and Aroden told nobody the secret before he died. But if one of them had, they all had reason to kill him - Cayden would have killed him for getting people needlessly killed and then be unable to reveal it without diminishing his own worship, Iomedae would have killed him for allowing his most able and dedicated servant nearly kill herself because he saw her as nothing more than a threat to his own power then as a useful tool when it failed, and likewise be unable to reveal the secret without diminishing her worshippers, and Norgorber doesn't need a reason and his worshippers wouldn't care, but he would appreciate the delicious irony of being the last one to know.

Set wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

First, I am pretty sure Andoran will be the aggressor, which never looks good.

I like the theory that Andoran is outraged beyond tolerance when a cabal of powerful Chelish diabolists summon and bind their patron, Talmandor.

That would be beyond cool.

However, I don't see why Cheliax would do that, though. They've got several irons in the fire and don't need the complications of attacks from Andoran and friends.

It doesn't need to be an official act. Cheliax has enough wealthy, arrogant, and evil aristocrats (even by the standards of aristocrats) who would enjoy putting a thumb in Andoran's eye to do something that stupid without House Thrune's knowledge or backing. And from Andoran's perspective, would it matter if it had Thrune sanction or not? If Abrogail can't stop it happening, then she might as well be backing them.

On the broader level, it doesn't really matter who lights the powderkeg, as long as it gets lit, and Andoran and Cheliax can quibble over what was an official declaration of war after the war's over and they're deciding on terms for the loser.

The reason the Ruby Prince calls himself a prince, and not a king, is because he is actually a doppelganger working to bring the state under the heel of one or other Inner Sea imperial powers - some say Taldor, some say Cheliax, some say Qadira. Khemet IIIs twin siblings and co-heirs Ojan and Jasilia are allowed to slip away from courtly life to adventure so that they never realise their brother has been replaced, or they do so because they have already figured it out and are fleeing the assassins he would send to stop them revealing the secret.

Dragons do not exist. All reports of dragons are actually hallucinations by the hysterical and superstitious, particularly the colourful ones. Governments claim that dragons exist to discourage travellers from leaving the cities where they can control people, or to guide them along the specific travel routes where they can be monitored. What people THINK are dragons are actually dinosaurs that have strayed from their ranges in the Mwangi Expanse or rose up from the subterranean chambers where they survived the extinction of their kind in prehistoric times, but even the most intelligent are no more intelligent than an ape, and are only attracted to gold in the same way magpies are to shiny things. "Draconic" is a language invented by wizards at the behest of the governments to perpetuate the deception and because they also enjoy controlling The People. The Iruxi are in on it too, and speak perfectly good Common when we aren't listening.

If anyone be so motivated as to seek the plunder of souls from under Hell's dark dominion, caring not for the heavy weight o' Pharasma's cesure, then will Besmara not then bless their cause? Is not the Boatman Charon's vessel upon the Styx as tempting a target as ever plied the open seas? I say unto you all, the Pirate Queen cares not if one predicates their piracy upon a convoluted moral framework somewhat unmoored from the practical realities of more mundane sea-based looting, for this is fantasy and that sounds rad for the sorts of folks who are into that!

They're more like...guidelines, than actual edicts and anathemae.

With Paizo phasing out chromatic and metallic dragons, how will their presence be handled along the Golden Road? I'm aware of two major dragons in Osirion, though it doesn't sound too hard to keep the name and plot bunnies they represent and simply change them to primal dragons - Sussurex is already called the "Crystal King" and could be switched from a Blue to a Crystal Dragon, and Asuulek, being interested in a volcano with an extraplanar dimension within, is almost perfect for a Magma Dragon. But blue dragons being more common in the Thuvian desert (especially as guardians/hoarders of the oases) and Katapesh is fairly well established. Do you simply replace them with Cloud Dragons as the closest equivalents? Mirage and Fortune Dragons also sound like ideal inhabitants of vast desert sands that hide ancient treasures. Or is the Golden Road going to find itself populated by a more diverse draconic ecosystem?

The Azlanti had colonies on Golarion's moon and Akiton, while Starfinder canon has them enduring to found an interstellar empire in another star system altogether. They also created an entire construct Ancestry, the Wyrwoods, to serve them, who are capable of enduring for millennia.

'Pretty advanced,' at the very least.

In addition to wyrwoods, much of Jistka's advanced construct crafting was based on surviving Azlanti knowledge, found after Earthfall in a cave where they were stored after earlier tribes pillaged a surviving Azlanti fortress-city. Even most modern constructs are only a pale imitation of what the Jistkans were capable of at their height, which itself was based off looted scraps from a distant outpost, and what survives of Jistka's work has either broken, gone berserk or is starting to awaken to consciousness. If the Azlanti were even more advanced, and were already achieving interstellar travel when Earthfall hit, then they might have full robots more along the lines of what you find in Numeria, robots and androids.

In my mind's eye, Azlant at its height looks like a cross between Atlantis: The Lost Empire and Poseidos from Dinotopia, with a bit of Kobol from Battlestar Galactica. Leaning closer to the techno side of technomagic, making Aroden an anomaly, but with a mystical component to it.

I don't think there's a canon explanation, but I would expect it to vary by dragon type. Some are probably more caring parents than others, though when you're a giant flying reptile I doubt your sex is all that important after the eggs are already laid. A father can sit on a nest just as impatiently as a mother can. But I do think it's important that, although dragons are intelligent, they are not human and should feel like it. These things are massive, can live for centuries (perhaps indefinitely barring accident or incident) and have a perspective on the world that should feel utterly alien to us. We might be able to speak their language crudely, some of them may walk among us in humanoid guise, but we can't possibly know what it's like to truly be one, and vice versa.

As a headcanon answer, I like to think that the reason why dragons collect treasure (which they could never reasonably spend, and thus have no rational reason to value) is because it's a demonstration to prospective mates that they are worth the time and effort, that they can hunt and take on even serious adventurers and that they've been doing it long enough and successfully enough to prove their mettle, but long term mated pairs are rare, and after the eggs hatch whichever dragon parent elected to care for them does so just long enough to teach them draconic, how to hunt and fly (around 16 years, until they could as Young Dragons) and then kick them out of the nest. Not a lot of persistent maternal or paternal sentiment there, and they find the "little mammalians'" concept of it curious and strange. After they've reached a certain size, a child is just another competitor for resources, and I expect the same is true in reverse - siblings are competitors who need to be driven out of territory once it's established, while parents become just another potential predator. The reason why dragons aren't more common is because they tend to thin their own numbers. It comes across as brutal and uncaring to shorter-lived humanoids, but those dragons who bother to explain themselves accept it as part of the natural cycle - and remind humans, elves, dwarves, etc. that they should be very grateful that there aren't more of their kind, considering what their favourite prey tends to be.

As for kobolds, if one is unfortunate enough to find its way into the nest I feel sorry for that young kobold. If it isn't quickly eaten by one of the newly-hatched wyrmlings, it might survive if the dragon was curious, or wanted to raise an emissary to spread word of its magnificence among local kobold tribes, but I can't see most dragons having the patience for that except in exceptional circumstances.

As far as I know, no, Cyclopes haven't gotten smaller. They're just slowly using their oracular abilities, and losing touch with their mental faculties. But there are any number of ways you can justify building on that scale. Just look at Greek and Roman temples, or modern cathedrals, massive structures much larger than anything we would need, but where the size serves a theological purpose. Or you could assume that what you see is simply all that has survived - there may have been wooden inner structures filling out the outer stone shell, but that has rotted away thousands of years ago, leaving what looks like cavernous stone hallways.

Or perhaps the ancient Cyclopes simply had a taste for massive construction, to show off their wealth and power? The Gol-Ghan empire fell into decline due to its own corruption, perhaps the ostentatiousness of it can tie into that, buildings deliberately built to be ridiculously showy and wasteful to appease some enigmatic urge or serve some unknown purpose, perhaps something the dark masters they turned to demanded of them?

zimmerwald1915 wrote:

Zoken44 wrote:

The recognition of the Irisseni immigrants from that other place their current queen comes from has caused many questions of how the Osirion gods came to be on this plane. and a name has been whispered during storms in the far north. the name of another god who may have come through, his wing beats like thunder, they whisper the name "Perun"

Surely no one can have missed that the Russian diaspora in Irrisen is very conspicuously Christian?

I wonder what domains Jesus would give? and how they handle being christian in a land where gods are very much real?

People were unhappy about the inclusion of IRL gods like Cernunnos or the gods of Osirion. I'm not sure Jesus H. Christ himself is a third rail that Paizo want to touch.

Osirion Gods are a little uncomfortable around native Golarion Gods, And the Golarion Gods find the nebulous and intermingled familial relationships of the Osirion gods strange.

Lamashtu won't admit it, but she's afraid of Baba Yaga.

I think everybody's afraid of Baba Yaga. The woman could be a god if she wanted to, but decided it came with too many strings attached.

If we're getting into the Osirion gods:

Ra led the rest of his pantheon during the War in Heaven alongside the other gods, and then alongside the forces of Heaven and Hell against Rovagug, and that latter fight is where he first met Sarenrae. Over time the two grew close, both being sun gods who constrained a monstrous enemy that could devour the cosmos, Rovagug and Apep. Ra even became something of a mentor to her as she figured out her fledgling godhood and gave her tips about how to be the patron goddess of the Padishah Empire as it emerged. But by then he had already departed Osirion and left it to Horus, who in turn led the other gods to leave for their planar home(s). Sarenites don't always like to acknowledge the connection, since they think it diminishes her, but Ancient Osirian murals sometimes show Sarenrae standing beside Ra with his hand on her shoulder, the same way a father would be shown with a daughter, or a god supporting a king. Sarenrae has made it clear that she will no longer tolerate the deliberate destruction of Ra's iconography, even to convert it for her congregations. Horus on the other hand kept her at a courteous but professional distance, but his wife Hathor was a close friend, and has been inconsolable even by the Dawnflower herself since Horus and the others were cast out of Golarion.

Osiris judges (or at least, judged) the dead as he does in Ancient Egypt, but he did so with Pharasma's permission. When Set tore him to pieces and hid the pieces across the world, Isis sought them out. Whatever bargain she struck with Pharasma in exchange for resurrecting her husband remains between the two of them. But Osiris judged the souls of those who still worshipped the old gods as a lower court of Pharasma's tribunals. Isis is very careful that nobody knows what she agreed to, or rather, she had flooded the zone with many flamboyant and exaggerated accounts of what she might have agreed to and plays coy about which are true. Pharasma simply ignores all inquiries. Now that Osiris and Isis are gone, or at least their influence on Golarion is even weaker than before, his divine servants are trying to figure out what to do in his absence - do they just default to Pharasma's judgement again, or does Nephthys take her brother's throne and do the job that Anubis, Thoth and Osiris once split between them?

Sobek and Cayden are drinking buddies, and the two occasionally incarnate as a human and a lizardfolk to barcrawl - Cayden shows Sobek all the delights of Absalom's bars and brothels on a Friday night, Sobek shows Cayden the joys of a decent kebab, a hookah pipe and a bottle of date wine in Sothis, and the two are well known to the local guards of both cities who keep putting up Wanted posters of the two for their drunken shenanigans, unaware they're actually gods. Sometimes they invite Kurgess along, who doesn't really get the appeal of boozing but does like a well-run fight pit. They no longer invite Set after that night in Marblecourt.

Lamashtu tried, a long time ago, to destroy Apep herself, thinking he would be easy prey and she could devour the power of another god. She has not made that mistake again. With the disappearance of Ra and the gods that once protected him, Apep briefly manifested in the skies of Osirion before the lightning of Set blasted him back into the Twelfth Hour of Night. Not out of benevolence, but because if anyone is going to conquer and rule the cosmos it will be him.

All of the Osiriani gods consider Nethys an upstart and a usurper, an outsider who stole what was theirs, and is now partly responsible for the diminishing of their pantheon. Previously, there was only some tension between the clergy of Thoth and Nethys, since their mortal followers tended to come into academic conflict. Now it is open animosity among even the most amiable of them towards Nethys. Nethys, as usual, gives off mixed signals - he either doesn't care about their wrath and is confident he could weather it, or isn't even aware and might be surprised and offended to be blamed for it.

I'm not worried about what happens when Jacobs and Mona retire. They're not the only competent people who can maintain an overarching metanarrative, and even if their successors change things, change isn't bad.

But I certainly think having a proper book just for the history is a good idea, and that you can pair that with GM resources by having chapters on the ancient empires as plot fodder. Let that knowledge be cordoned off from knowledge of the modern setting, making it feel like something rare or that needs discovery, and also allow you to go into more detain than a general setting guide can. Let a hypothetical Lost Omens: the Golden Road focus on the modern world, with a few references to the truly ancient stuff to give a sense of antiquity, and then have a hypothetical Lost Omens: Fallen Kingdoms book have full sections on things like the Jistkan Imperium, the Tekritanin League, Ancient Osirion that you can use for plot hooks and story threads. The same applies to other ancient empires, like the Shory of Garund, Taumata Empire of Tian Xia, Koloran and Ninshabur in Casmaron, Old Razatlan in Arcadia, and of course Azlant and Thassilon, plus any others Paizo would like to create for parts of the world we haven't seen much of yet. Add in some archetypes, backgrounds, feats and spells to represent those lost or faded knowledge and skills, and the people uncovering and reviving them, and that would be a fascinating book to read.

He is also one of the few who can call her Meda.

He pronounces it "Yo, Meda!"

I do apologise, that was indeed meant for a different thread.

My headcanon is that Iomedae is asexual, but not aromantic. She is not just a patron of knights and crusaders, but of the chaste, courtly attraction embodied by Lancelot and Guinevere, pulled between desire and dishonour, where the beauty is in the tension, perpetually drawn out but never consummated. She's also firmly monogamous, and thus flamed out of Sarenrae's polycule because it just wasn't working - Iomedae resented Sarenrae's attentions being divided and clearly not being the senior partner, while Sarenrae struggled with the idea of compassion and love restrained. They remain cordial allies, but there's an unspoken tension there between them that their worshippers have misinterpreted as doctrinal. She briefly considered Ragathiel as someone more closely aligned to her own ethos, but Ragathiel is too much of a Blood Knight for her tastes, and there's some resentment on his end over the Hand of the Inheritor leaving his service for hers. For now, she's content to be single.

My headcanon is that Iomedae is asexual, but not aromantic. She is not just a patron of knights and crusaders, but of the chaste, courtly attraction embodied by Lancelot and Guinevere, pulled between desire and dishonour, where the beauty is in the tension, perpetually drawn out but never consummated. She's also firmly monogamous, and thus flamed out of Sarenrae's polycule because it just wasn't working - Iomedae resented Sarenrae's attentions being divided and clearly not being the senior partner, while Sarenrae struggled with the idea of compassion and love restrained. They remain cordial allies, but there's an unspoken tension there between them that their worshippers have misinterpreted as doctrinal. She briefly considered Ragathiel as someone more closely aligned to her own ethos, but Ragathiel is too much of a Blood Knight for her tastes, and there's some resentment on his end over the Hand of the Inheritor leaving his service for hers. For now, she's content to be single.

At least in my games, where I've tried to incorporate some positive Zoroastrian and Islamic influence that offsets the Jihadist tropes that the old Cult of the Dawnflower used to play into, Sarenites are an extremely diverse lot. Just about the only thing they agree on is the importance of the solar cycle, with prayers in the morning, at noon, and at dusk. But as the worship of Sarenrae has spread across Golarion, it often adapts to its local environments, rather than the other way around.

The most conservative and traditionalist congregations come from Qadira, influenced by the oldest traditions from the Padishah Empire (and even in the empire, Sarenites are divided into a dizzying number of sects who all fiercely disagree on what seem like small differences to outsiders), with large fire temples where people gather to revere the eternal flames they keep burning. Many of them have stories about one angel or another descending to light it personally, and the flames are often considered miraculous (though easy to imitate with a permanent Continual Flame enchantment). Qadiran Sarenites tend to think of themselves as the ecclesiastical Elder Statesmen among Sarenites in the Inner Sea, and assume other sects should simply defer to their "experience" and get frustrated when Sarenites from other lands don't pay Keleshite culture as much respect as they should. In Avistan, Sarenites have a lingering distrust of the Qadiran orthodoxy because of the history of persecution that associating with them earned their ancestors from Taldor's distrust - the collapse of the empire didn't do away with all that distrust, especially among Chelaxian authorities who see Sarenites as natural revolutionaries against the Asmodean order, and many Sarenites prefer to emphasise their own roots in Avistan than their god's Casmaron origins, devout Sarenites but loyal citizens. In Absalom, which largely stayed out of Taldor and Qadira's conflicts, Sarenites have historically been torn between a bunch of conflicting pulls that have strangely balanced out over time, and people haven't forgotten that it was a coalition of local Sarenites who rooted out the extremist Cult of the Dawnflower there. There are various sects who reflect phases when Absalom was more influenced by one side or another, Keleshite-style temples and mosques and Taldan-style churches, some differences in liturgy or ritual, but most Absalom Sarenites keep their international politics and their religion a separate matter and don't consider Sarenrae to take sides unless people are suffering.

Now for the parts I've done the most thinking on. Across the Golden Road, the worship of Sarenrae was spread by Keleshite travellers, traders and immigrants, but as they put down roots they adapted to different regions in different ways.

Thuvian Sarenites, simply because of their proximity to Rahadoum, but also some lingering influence from the Cult of the Dawnflower, are more militant than most, but are trying to instead focus on more local matters - Sarenite cavalry, not quite knights but light and mobile archers who once raided the borders of Rahadoum in the name of Sarenrae until she recently made her displeasure known and disbanded the cult, now turn their attentions to the bandits and Water Lords, or at least the Water Lords who refuse to allow travellers access to their oases, or prey on vulnerable travellers. As disenchanted Dawnflower cultists turn to darker patrons to continue their extreme agenda, or turn out to have always worshipped them and were using Sarenrae as a front, these also earn the wrath of Thuvian Sarenites. They also tend to be a bit more polytheist than the mostly henotheistic Qadiran organisation, incorporating more Empyreal Lords into their personal pantheons alongside Sarenrae, and use ancient dances to work themselves into a fervor like Norse shield-biting berserkers did - such dances were once a prelude to battle, and some date back to days of the Tekritanin League in modified form, but are now done to keep the traditions alive. Thuvia has a few temples in the cities built in the Keleshite style, but most ceremonies are held in the open air, especially among the desert clans.

In Osirion, the ancient traditions died hard and took a long time even stripped of royal patronage and national funding, and the worship of some gods never truly became extinct as the new Keleshite rulers tried to stamp out what they mistook for the superstitious worship of Rakshasa-like demons. As Keleshites put down roots there, the Cult of the Dawnflower - more aggressive in their proselytisation and more willing to consider new methods and new ideas - made Sarenrae more acceptable to the local populace by adapting the cults of sun gods like Ra and Horus, converting temples with open courtyards to let the sun shine in, and depicting Sarenrae in local fashion often with Ra and Horus standing behind her with a hand of endorsement on her shoulder (whether either god ever officially had any ties to her, or why she would need their endorsement, is something the modern Sarenite priesthood refuses to be baited into answering). But what was originally meant to be a tool to ease the native Garundi into a more "civilised" Keleshite culture, not a permanent tradition, backfired and over time, especially as Pharaonic culture has had a resurgence under the Forthbringers, the worship of Sarenrae as if she were one of the Gods of Osirion has become the norm. Traditional Keleshite-style worship is associated with the former rulers by both the Garundi and the remaining Keleshite populace, neither of whom have forgotten their resentments against Qadira - Garundi for being conquered by it, and Keleshites for being mistreated as a colony rather than an independent satrapy in its own right. On the other hand, local Sarenites are also suspicious of the neighbouring militant sects of Thuvia and Katapesh - not that they're cowards, or overlook injustice, but they of all people remember what an excess of zeal and too little foreplanning accomplished, since Osirion still struggles with its legacy, so Osiriani Sarenites come across as more reserved, quicker to urge caution and slower to act, but like a crushing tidal wave when finally roused to anger. Most Sarenite ceremonies in Osirion are carried out by a professional and trained priesthood, rather than having congregations, and on the summer solstice the cult image of Sarenrae is paraded through the streets sitting on her boat held atop the shoulders of her priests, but the average people pay their respects at shrines and continue the traditions during the solstices, including the sword dances, folk songs and plays reenacting episodes of Sarenite mythology, sometimes with an Osirian god or two thrown in for flavour - there's a lot of emphasis on Horus leaving the world to Sarenrae after he led the other gods to leave Osirion, solidifying her as a legitimate successor rather than a usurper.

In Katapesh, Sarenites became more esoteric and mystical, and have adapted the smoking of pesh to induct religious trances. Katapeshi Sarenites get side-eyed even by other Sarenites and have a (unfairly exaggerated) reputation as drug-addled hermits. But outside of Thuvia, who also bear the Dawnflower's complicated militant legacy, they're also the most willing to take up a sword and hunt down evil, since they're often the only ones willing to. They're also a lot friendlier with local Iomedean knightly orders than Sarenites elsewhere, who usually consider Iomedeans too unforgiving. It was Iomedean knights who rode to the defence of Solku's Sarenite defenders from a seige by gnoll slavers when nobody else would, and even though every knight died, the Sarenites have never forgotten. Katapeshi worship is often self-organised, or in small groups who democratically elect their leaders, and they pair their religious veneration with active community patrols - if the Pactmasters aren't willing to deter or investigate crime unless it's profitable, then a rag-tag citizen-militia will - and there's more of an emphasis on the flame that burns within than any flame that burns without, drawing on local Badawi traditions. The pesh mystics become more insular and reclusive over time as they lose touch with the concerns of the mortal world and pursue higher spiritual truths, which isn't entirely approved of by Sarenites who consider it their duty to put right the injustices that exist in this world before seeking the next, but their spiritual investigations are often important and highly respected.

Further south, you get to the Impossible Lands - Nex, Vudra, Alkenstar - where most Sarenites are traders or immigrants from Qadira, so Sarenite worship is a little more traditional and conservative there. The average Sarenite tries to keep their head down, build trade connections between the local merchants and family connections "back home," and be good citizens, and other people regard them as a quirky but mostly harmless minority. The wizards rulers of Nex, on the other hand, regard the cult of Sarenrae as the thin end of a wedge that Qadira might someday choose to push, the same way Nex feared Khiben-Said might have if he'd put down roots, and keep a wary eye on them. There are some scattered sun temples in the cities, but they resolutely stay out of Geb (at least officially - Pharasmins aren't the only ones who send covert agents across the border to stir trouble for the undead rulers).

I think one reason why racism against Tieflings in a diabolist nation seems like a disconnect is because we tend to think of "faith" wrong. If you think the average Chelaxian thinks of Asmodeus the way someone who worships a god does, that he is good, looking out for you, and his servants are benevolent, then yes Tieflings being herded into slums and ghettoes does sound a bit weird. But Cheliax doesn't really have that relationship with Asmodeus and the Hells, and I doubt even Asmodean clerics feel that way - you don't get to be a cleric without understanding (at least part) of what your god truly represents and wants. You just have to be completely down for it. Cheliax's relationship with Asmodeus and the Hells is more transactional, an exchange of goods and services. Just because Hell backs the Thrune dynasty doesn't mean people have to like them, or think its rulers are benevolent.

In that context, Tieflings suddenly become a threat to the human population - like half-elves, it's hard to hide an indiscretion when there's physical proof of it, but at least half-elves filter relatively harmlessly into the general human population. Every descendant of a Tiefling is also a Tiefling, and the more they have the more they dilute the human population. Especially in Cheliax, which has historically valued the (vastly overstated) purity of its Azlanti descent, I expect miscegenation in general isn't approved of by Chelaxian society. Among the nobility, Tiefling children are an embarrassment, visible proof of what should be respectably kept hidden. And your average superstitious peasant, kept dirt-poor and ignorant and occasionally terrorised by Asmodean Inquisitors and Hellknights who demonstrate the brutality of Hell as a deterrent, probably can't tell the difference between a Tiefling and a real devil and wouldn't understand the difference if it was explained to them. The fact that 2e Tieflings are now called Cambions, when 1e Cambions used to be a type of true demon born from an incubus, might also confuse things. The average Chelaxian can't even tell the difference between a Tiefling and some Aasimars/Empyreans.

Human nature has also shown that when times are hard there will always be some vulnerable minority who are just powerful enough to fear but always weak enough to be kept in line, that people can blame when times are hard. And for the last 119 years, times have been very tough for Cheliax - the death of Aroden and the rough times that followed the Thrune ascendancy, the loss of Ravounel and an uprising by Iomedean paladins, loss of Sargava, disaster in its Arcadian colonies and competition with Andoran, and the recent abolition of slavery probably is causing some social unrest as well, and just a general sense of imperial decline and the social and economic effects that brings. But there'll always be Tieflings to blame when the crops fail, or an Andoran corsair sinks your husband's ship, or a fiendish tyrannosaur eats your caravan while it's travelling through the forest, some rumour of cloven hoofprints after any theft, glowing eyes in a ram-horned head leering in the window when children go missing. And with the upcoming war, I'd expect rumours that the Tieflings are passing information to Andoran or are Andoran saboteurs as revenge for how they're treated to start spreading as paranoia sets in, especially if Cheliax suffers some severe setbacks and needs a propaganda scapegoat.

Knowing absolutely nothing about Sarkoris other than it's a formerly demon-infested realm once populated by the vaguely-Celtic kellids that has finally been liberated through the actions of knights, it would be neat to get some Arthurian influence there. Not the High Medieval Arthur of the Romantic epics, I mean the original Arthur of Welsh mythology, the warband chieftain who rode a talking salmon to free the god Mabon so he could help his retainer slay a cursed giant boar and win the hand of the giant Ysbaddadon's daughter. Not an importation like in Osirion, but something inspired by it could be extremely cool. Maybe some of the knights who stood against the demonic horde have passed into folklore and become local saints or Heroes, and their desperate stands to hold them back become the stuff of myth and legend? And since modern Sarkoris is undergoing such radical changes, that gives a bit of a blank slate for that.

Even if the Azlanti were (or at least could be) statistically different to modern humans, making a different mechanical "race" for them felt like the wrong way. It seems like it would be better as a template that a DM could slap on top of an NPC for, say, +2 CR, maybe the Advanced simple template? But I suppose you could do something with 2e Archetypes, like the Thassilonian Runelord archetype. But rather than representing racial superiority, a hypothetical Azlanti archetype should simply represent the effects of the Arcane Majykks and whatever physical augmentation the Azlanti had available that has been lost to time. Not that the Azlanti are likely to come up on Golarion very often, unless Aroden had a vault full of temporally frozen Azlanti supersoldiers somewhere.

I think there's a place for a certain amount of crunch. In a game where people want to play skilled characters whose ability to speak a language can have a lot of importance, the fact that one character speaks Andoran while the rest speak Taldane could make a Party Face character feel pretty satisfied in a situation where you can't reasonably justify a character who would even know the language of another country, or a second language at all. Learning languages used to be a lot easier, just putting a single skill rank into Linguistics, but spells like Comprehend Languages or Tongues would be absolute game-changers in such a scenario. But it does require the players to be willing to engage with that level of crunch, and understand and be fine with playing characters who will simply not be able to engage in certain scenarios. I played a character once who started not knowing any of the local languages and had to communicate through body language, and while there was some charm there it eventually wore off and became a frustration.

Even just changing what "Common" is can add nuance - in my Mummy's Mask game, the "Common" of the Golden Road and Impossible Lands is Kelish, since those regions had a much longer and closer trade relationship with the Satrapy of Qadira than they did with the Empire of Taldor and its successor-states, with mutually intelligible but distinct dialects of Osirian spoken by the individual nations. All my players' characters speak Osiriani, many speak Kelish, but none of them speak Taldane, the "Common" of Avistan, and it's made their run-ins with Taldane-speaking characters who have to switch to one of the other two feel like their region is its own thing. Especially given the level of exoticisation that non-Western coded nations are subject to, it's felt satisfying to them to see perceived outsiders have to adapt to them, rather than the reverse.

Given Absalom is home to some of the most prestigious magical academies in the Inner Sea, if Absalom's aquifers ever run dry they probably have a few Decanters of Endless Water or an equivalent item to keep them from falling below a certain level. In fact, that might make for a fun bit of mundane city intrigue and a plot hook for a low-level adventure - someone has been siphoning off Absalom's fresh water aquifers and hiding the fact by keeping the magic items on all the time, and now that there's been a bit of a drought and the items aren't replenishing it as much as they should a few adventurers have to go in and see what's stopping the Petal District from getting freshwater.

I'm with Zimmerwald1915 on this. The more you game it out, the more the events required for Qadira to even think about getting involved just don't make sense as part of this Adventure Path, but might make for a fascinating AP dealing with the imperial intrigue of the Padishah Empire with Qadira possibly declaring war on Taldor as a possible consequence of failure, perhaps after we get a currently hypothetical Lost Omens: Casmaron setting guide.

To add a bit to my previous reply, I think Asmodeus cares above all about power. If lying would make him appear like he's in a position of weakness, he'll be honest. If honesty would betray a weakness, he'll lie. But the outcome must (from his perspective) always benefit him in some way.

I think Asmodeus should be the greatest practitioner of the Xanatos Gambit in the Outer Planes - every outcome should benefit him in some way. If you sell him your soul, he wins. Even if you cheat him of the contract, by signing it in the first place you are tainted by the Hells, likely to be sent there by Pharasma's judgement, and he wins. If you escape him entirely by getting to Heaven, he'll wear down the universe itself in time and destroy you in the celestial war, which he expects to win. Even if he's defeated, he still has the key to Rovagug's cage that he can unlock whenever he wants, so even in death he still wins.

Although Asmodeus is clearly a Satan analogue, he doesn't actually bear the "Father of Lies" epithet. But if I was going to play him as a DM, his would be the "I have people to do that for me" style of swindler, who sticks to the letter of the law, and perhaps the spirit of the law when convenient. But the iron fist he rules the Hells with doesn't actually care about honesty or deceit, but about power - who has it, and who doesn't.

My favourite depictions of the Devil or Devil-like figures in pop culture are where he doesn't have to lie to get what he wants. His tradecraft is dramatic irony, giving exactly what they thought they wanted, playing into their vanities and lusts and desires, only for them to find they no longer want it, or have the capacity to enjoy it. Even by being someone who tries to dabble with diabolic forces, you have already swung the pendulum in his favour, and he may get your soul anyway. His henchmen, lesser devils and so forth, might wheel and deal, scheme and lie, but at the end of the day the Devil is the most honest creature outside of Heaven, who has never pretended to be other than what he is. If you get suckered, knowing the terms laid out, then frankly it's on you. He might lose a soul or two to a technicality, but he is happy to abide by the terms and play the long game because he knows that he'll win sooner or later, because while good is fragile and predictable, evil is eternal and lurks within the hearts of all men.

"What though the field be lost?
All is not lost; the unconquerable Will,
And study of revenge, immortal hate,
And courage never to submit or yield:
And what is else not to be overcome?
That Glory never shall his wrath or might
Extort from me."
- John Milton, "Paradise Lost" Book 1

If Volkorgoth isn't necessarily around anymore, I like the idea that the Orc pantheon doesn't have a divine realm at all, but that like the Golden Horde of Genghis Khan they maraud across the Outer Planes, sometimes setting up camp on Heaven's Shore where the angels try to prevent Incidents and other times invading Hell where the devils try to do the same, and then at other times plundering Axis before diving into the Abyss to slay a Demon Lord or two just to keep themselves sharp, their divine realm wherever the Orc gods happen to be camping at the time.

zimmerwald1915 wrote:

SNIP

I would say that in medieval society 90% of population was a peasants. Also, due to size of Cheliax and fact that Golarion comparable with Earth, Cheliax population would 20-40 millions.

As I understand, it's a little more complicated than that. Even if it's true, none of the Inner Sea's nations exactly map to the feudal model it was developed for. I recall that 3.5 had something like it for kingdom building, but there's no reason for Paizo to be bound to it if they don't want to be.

Sorry, that should read "empire on Golarion."

As I recall from Lost Omens: Travel Guide, the reason why teleportation circles aren't used en masse, at least for goods, is that a.) governments don't like it when people have a way to bypass their toll and tax gatherers or register their arrival for their records, and b.) teleportation has some unpleasant potential side effects when done on a large scale. I can't imagine those don't apply just as much to people as it does to trade goods.

As far as I know, the only places he was worshipped openly were the Shining Kingdoms, Absalom and Old Cheliax. There's no hint that Aroden was ever worshipped in Northern Garund as far as I know, in the Mwangi Expanse, or to the north where the Taldan empire didn't reach, or outside of Avistan except perhaps as Namzaruum. He's considered fairly obscure in Arcadia, a vague figure connected to the Kumaru Tree and the reason Arazni left her homeland.

Given the themes of Aroden's life and death, I wouldn't be surprised of "god of humanity" wasn't an accurate description, but a statement of intent, whether by himself or his human worshippers. Look at the three regions he's most connected to - the Shining Kingdoms, the Taldan imperial heartland founded by Azlanti survivors; Absalom, raised by Aroden's search for the Starstone, which had its own imperialist phase that came back to bite it; and Cheliax, which has historically tried to style itself as the natural successors of Azlant, was meant to be Aroden's empire on Earth. All built on different views of the Azlanti legacy. Aroden might not have seen himself as specifically the god of Azlanti humans and their descendants, both hereditary and cultural, but it seems to me that's how he would have been seen by his own worshippers, bringing the light of Azlanti culture to all of humanity (whether they wanted it or not).

I suppose it all depends on Aroden's definition of "humanity," and he's not around anymore to say.