Closing-up shop, boarding and sand-bagging everything up, and heading for a hotel (LOL) two miles east from my house (a total of six miles from the Gulf).
Here's hoping for good rolls on our Fort Saves to keep internet and electricity for as long as possible, and Ref Saves to avoid the really devastating wind and rain.
Those of us in the area can try to post here with updates of good news for as long as we're able.
Identify (Spellcraft)
Disguise Self (Disguise)
Jump (Acrobatics)
I know there are others, certainly outside of Core -- something like Eagle Eye and Perception, etc.
Some Spells give a bonus to a Skill check, either in specific situations or all the time.
And there are Magic Items that do this, too:
An Elixir of Hiding gives the drinker a +10 on Stealth for one hour.
Gloves of Swimming and Climbing give the wearer + 5 on Climb and Swim.
The Hat of Disguise gives the person a disguise with a +10 bonus on Disguise checks.
A Cloak of Elvenkind provides a +5 Stealth in perpetuity.
- - - -
Why is there no Metamagic Feat that, I dunno, Doubles(?) the Skill Bonus given?
What would the Metamagic "cost" be, One-Level higher like Silent Spell, Two-Levels higher like Empower Spell?
....Then, what would The Magic Item cost? If someone used the Metamagic Feat, uh, 'Skill-Bonus-Spell', (whatever) to make the Hat of Disguise be a +20 instead of a +10, and the Cloak of Elvenkind be a +10 instead of a +5?
Long before Unchained was published I had already pretty well "Consolidated" the Skills in the d20 system -- and I've been continually tinkering with the Skills system here and there over the years, considering and then implementing tiny adjustments in-between Campaigns, with input from my Players of course.
Most recently I tried Background Skills but, in gameplay, they don't really get used so we've pretty much abandoned them. I give NPCs the Background Skills and let PCs have the option but, yeah, it just hasn't come up.
One of my absolute KEY design platforms was my demand to (try to) make all of the Skills useful and perhaps even necessary for gameplay. I always rankled at, for example, Perception being as vital as a friggen Ability Score(!!!) while, for example, Appraise was an inexcusable waste of graphite from your pencil.
Part of that also meant I tried to "Consolidate" the Skills based on the requisite Ability Score modifier and, in that, I feel I succeeded quite well: DEX, INT, WIS, & CHA all have six Skills (though that did mean I had to make an uncomfortable decision on Appraise, AND Sleight of Hand!), and STR has two Skills but hey, STR is mostly a combat thing.
So here is what my gaming group has been using for quite a long time now, and I'd love to hear what y'all think. I mean, I think it really makes the Skills mechanic balanced in Gameplay -- both compared to each other, and by Ability Score.
Acrobatics .... DEX (Avoid AoO; Tumble; Jump; Balance)
Appraise .... WIS (Determining value of all treasure, including bartering -- so you use it to see how much you sell your loot for)
Bluff .... CHA (Plus Innuendo and Sending secret messages)
Climb .... STR (Including catching oneself or someone else in a fall)
Diplomacy .... CHA (Roleplay for Attitude Modification and Persuasion (3+ rounds))
Disable Device .... DEX (Traps, you know.)
Disguise .... CHA (Any willing creature (3+ rounds))
Escape Artist .... DEX (to escape or tie-together bindings, etc.)
Fly .... DEX (Flying Combat)
Handle Animal .... CHA (Teaching tamed or charmed Animals, Int Vermin, or Magical Beasts commands)
Heal .... WIS (Healing HP and Conditions non-magically and determining health of others in Combat)
Intimidate .... CHA (De-buffing in combat or Roleplay for 'temporary' Attitude Modification)
Investigate .... CHA (Gather Information, whether openly or secretly (1d4 hours))
Linguistics .... INT (gain 2 Languages per Rank; Forgery attempts, etc; Language recognition; Codes)
Lore of Arcana .... INT (Dragons, Magical Beasts, Undead, Constructs)
Lore of Cosmology .... INT (Demons & Devils; Angels & Celestials; Religions & Alignment; Cosmology)
Lore of Humanoids .... INT (Race and Class and Ability Score knowledge: make Check> "Hey, that guy has Uncanny Dodge; This guy is a Witch with three Hexes." )
Lore of Nature .... INT (Fey, Giants, Aberrations, Elementals, Oozes, Plant-Monsters)
Lore of Society .... INT (History, Society & Culture, Norms & Taboos, Geography, Legends & Myths)
Perception .... WIS (Passive noticing and active searching)
Ride .... DEX (Riding Combat)
Sense Motive .... WIS (Detecting Bluff and Roleplay awareness of motive / intention)
Sleight of Hand .... WIS (Stealing; Concealing objects on a person)
Spellcraft .... via your Spellcasting Class (Identifying Spells; using magical devices, recognizing magical runes & symbols)
Stealth .... DEX (Hiding, creeping & evading)
Survival .... WIS (Tracking, Survival skills, non-magical or supernatural nature knowledge, wilderness & spelunking, finding a good place to camp, getting food & water)
Swim .... STR (including holding breath and rescuing someone who's drowning or sinking)
Mostly it follows the RAW for each of these Skills. The Heal Skill is dramatically improved making it valuable -- especially when there isn't a dedicated Heal-bot. Combining Spellcraft & UMD and then making it Class dependent (CHA for Sorcerers, INT for Arcanists, etc) made sense. Separating Diplomacy from Gather Info like back in the 3E days made sense (and renaming Gather Info to Investigate). In gameplay PCs always ask to use Swim and Climb to rescue drowning and falling PCs so may as well make it the rule. Putting Undead as part of Lore of Arcana makes far more sense than having Undead part of Cosmology (unless Jesus or the Catholic church is part of your Campaign Setting). Giving two Languages for Linguistics makes it more valuable. And of course, making Appraise the Skill needed to valuate your (even Magical!!!) loot is good; if you make your check you get half value as per RAW -- if you suck you get a little less than half value and if you're awesome you get a bit more than half. All the sudden Appraise is a usable Skill and not like the "Cooking" Non-Weapon-Proficiency from 2E. And Sleight of Hand as WIS, well, it is vs Perception & sometimes maybe Sense Motive, I dunno.
BACKGROUND SKILLS:
Perform;
Craft;
Profession;
Artistry;
and such have been pretty well relegated to Background Skills for NPCs. We've tried to include them but, frankly, it just never comes up. If someone ever actually plays a Bard I guess we'd have to make his Perform Background Skill into an Adventuring Skill. Or really, maybe we'd just make it a Class-Level check: Bard Level + CHA +3 sounds right. And in my game if you have Scribe Scroll or Brew Potion it means you Scribe the Scroll or Brew the Potion. Not make a Skill check too.
In the 3.5 Fiendish Codex 1: "Hordes of the Abyss" by James Jacobs, Erik Mona & Ed Stark, we are introduced to an NPC named Tulket nor Ahm who is the first Concordancer or Cataloger of The Abyss. It's implied that Tulket nor Ahm Numbered the Layers so, like, Demogorgon's Layer is the 88th because it was the 88th that Tulket nor Ahm catalogued and wrote a concordance of. And Orcus is on Layer 113 because it was the 113th Layer discovered by Tulket nor Ahm, etc., and etc.
As it turns out, in my current campaign I could benefit from a little more information regarding Tulket nor Ahm and am trying to find his publication history.
Is FC1 the first place where this character is published?
I couldn't find anything else from the 80s or 90s but, you know, the sheer volume of articles in Dragon Magazine (issues #1-#359) is pretty massive. There is a huge chance that if there's an article on Tulket nor Ahm that I just don't know it -- and maybe don't even have it. (And that's just Dragon Magazine; there could be other sources from where The Black Scrolls of Ahm were first published.)
If anyone knows, I'd Really appreciate it.
....
Also, if the FC1 is the first appearance of Tulket nor Ahm, just out of curiosity, is he a creation of Ed Starks'?, Erik Mona's?, or James Jacobs'? (I dunno, the naming convention "Tulket nor Ahm" sounds a little more the style of Erik Mona, but I'm kinda interested, one way or another. Of course, it could be a Carl Sargent creation and I just missed it.)
Other than the Richard Pett adventure from the AP, are there any other adventures, perhaps a PFS Scenario I missed, or any other dedicated products in Hongal?
I am one of the billions, or even trillions, of DMs who will not allow Magic-Item-Creation Feats beyond Scribe Scrolls & Brew Potions.
But in a few months when my current campaign ends and I start the next, well, the campaign I'm planning could probably benefit from PCs with the Magic-Item Creation Feats.
So I'm here for advice.
As you well know, the reason billions and trillions of us don't allow these Feats is firstly and most importantly, group treasure gets effectively doubled since the PCs just make it all at half price -- completely ruining the game. And secondly, not that the billions and trillions of us needed another reason, because the PCs want to stop the whole adventure and heroic plotline to sit in a room for a few weeks to make their Magic Items.
Here's what I'm thinking: Using an Item Creation Feat to create a Magic Item is 10% less than the full cost of the Magic Item rather than a 50% discount. Now the PCs can get their gear at 90% of cost which is not that terrible, I think.
Additionally, creation time will require only half the time dictated to by RAW.
What do y'all think?....
(Why do I get the feeling billions of DMs have been doing this for hundreds of years already?)
I'm building/designing a campaign and it's getting a bit cluttered/busy in my head. Reference material I don't have would be Very helpful, as would Any ideas, strategies on mixing/matching/transitioning the published material from which I'm drawing upon.
Thanks in advance to anyone who tosses out some advice / suggestions!
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The first bit of help is just my asking if there are any adventures or setting books that have material relevant to what I'm designing that I haven't yet considered.
Campaign Conceits / Purpose: Homebrew-- Aroden didn't necessarily die 100 years ago; he vanished, lost forever. Many of his Disciples went insane, many lost their Divine magic (etc), but a tiny few were relatively okay. I never intended doing anything else there; it just sounded more interesting to play over-the-table if that were the background instead of canon.
But I have a player who built an Oracle getting his power from Aroden (or somewhere, mwahahaha) who is obsessed with finding his lost god. Alas, that was not the campaign I had designed, so it was just that PC's background that we can play with a little from time to time in our current campaign -- which will be wrapping up in another six or seven Levels (I think they're 13th Level now.) But I've had SOO much fun designing Aroden background stuff that I want my next campaign to be Levels 1-20 "Where's Aroden" -- which is actually a little more like "What Happened to Joe's PC After Our Last Campaign Ended and His 20th Level PC Has Vanished, Too."
What I ended up concluding (while working through this Thread with y'all's help) is that Aroden was tracking down some Dark Tapestry stuff and got lost deep, deep in the space of Azathoth and Carcosa and etc.
New Campaign, Level One:
The PCs will awaken with no memories and play through the first volume of Strange Aeons, "In Search of Sanity." I'll tweak it a little bit, but it pretty well works for my needs almost exactly 'as-is.'
Instead of the Count having used the PCs from Strange Aeons, they are amnesiacs (and possibly insane without knowing) because they are Gatewalkers from that AP, which I'm having to significantly wrestle around with so it works for my needs here.
Finally, the bigger plot, beyond the problems faced in the opening adventure, are from Stolen Fate -- I'm reworking the overall background to tie in with my little Aroden-Dark-Tapestry thing.
Coincidentally, I was rereading the PF2 Playtest adventures Doomsday Dawn and it seems to fit perfectly for what I need, bringing in 'The Dominion of the Black' to the mix.
And also, at some point I will have the PCs play through the genius adventure "And Madness Follows" from Dungeon 134 -- it also fits very well (and quite frankly could have been a much better volume 2 of Strange Aeons than the one we got.)
But all in all, I'm starting to really wrestle with what I will be designing and putting together as a 1-20 campaign, starting with amnesia in a Ustalav asylum and the end of which sees the 20th Level PCs in the Dark Tapestry having learned the nature of the Gatewalkers, solved the Stolen Fate Harrow-Deck-Plot, defeated a thread of The Dominion of the Black getting Aucturn to beat-up Golarion, rescuing the old PC (from my current campaign) out in Carcosa or somewhere, and solving the mystery of what happened to Aroden 100 years ago.
So again, ALL ideas, suggestions, thoughts, bits of advice, whatever on the nature of the published material I'm using -- plus anything else you can think of that may fit in with what I'm trying to do but hasn't come to me yet -- is Very well appreciated!
What were the lands and people called prior to Soividia Ustav unifying the region in 2361 AR by driving out the Kellids?
He was born in the village of Ardis, which doesn't sound particularly Kellid or Sarkoran. Though a Varisian, his people would not have called the area north of Encarthan 'East-Varisia' or something like that. What was the name?
Are there any named people of Ustalav immediately after the final defeat of The Whispering Tyrant?
In any hidden crevice of a Setting book, or any barely visible footnote in an Adventure, anywhere in canon -- is there a named Ustalavic character who historically helped put the pieces of the Immortal Principality back together, and rebuilt Ustalav?
Some of the published NPCs have just enough Flavor background to whet the appetite of DMs using Sandpoint and her hinterlands. Is any more background given for some of the old NPCs that we have used in our previous games? Can you mention a couple who *do* have a little more design?
For example, in two of my campaigns, different players running different PCs have both been really interested in furthering a rapport with Das Korvut, a pretty grumpy, ornery NPC. But they liked his dogs. I've roleplayed some dialogue with Das Korvut here and there over the years, mostly downtime and such, but a little more background on such an NPC could really help.
For me, I've always wanted a bit more on the Four Families -- names and backgrounds of the *other* Deverin or Scarnetti scions. Also, I had wanted more detail on Jubrayl Vhiski but alas, I've developed him so thoroughly that by now, if Seven Dooms for Sandpoint has a huge amount of design for him I'll just have to transfer that to, like, a younger brother, best friend, or something. But that's always very welcome! (It's even worse for my 'Master Sorn' at The House of Blue Stones -- I desperately needed him to become a Cleric/Monk of Aroden for a PC who really was into Aroden so, you know, The House of Blue Stones is dedicated to Aroden. What can you do?
Nonetheless, I'm really excited to hear if any of the old dogs of Sandpoint that we've been roleplaying over the years are getting any new tricks.
Happy Arlo Guthrie Day wherever you are in the whole wide world. Don't forget to take twenty minutes, sometime today, to visit Alice's Restaurant -- in harmony -- and help end war and stuff.
The transition posts in Gameplay are up and ready for Roleplay.
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I would really appreciate if we can all strive to keep Gameplay dedicated to roleplaying in character -- not Out-of-Character Questions, Discussions, Comments and the like. This Discussion Thread is perfect to have all the peripheral conversation. The boon of that is that Gameplay really can read like a story; one can just read in-character posts and roleplay. .... In the same vein, if we can keep all dice rolls under Spoiler Tags I'd appreciate it. Combat rolls take up so much space anyway that it's really more aesthetic if they're hiding. Skill Checks and such, well, this is really important for me that you make an effort to keep them behind Spoiler Tags: Occasionally I won't have a DC for a Diplomacy, or a Knowledge, or a Whatever at the tip of my notes -- and if I see the Result of your roll before I can think about and determine an appropriate DC, well, that puts me in a tough spot.
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I'm in (Sarasota) Florida -- where is everyone else from?
Monday through Thursday are my most likely days for posting. Fridays are for my Homegame when the group comes to my house to sit around the table and throw some dice, move about some miniatures, and spit Nat 20s at all my monsters, mooks and BBEGs. Saturdays and Sundays are actually my most free -- and some weekends I can post and post and post. But often weekends are when I just unwind, rest, and do whatever in The Nine Hells I want to do.
Westcrown, The City of Nine Stars, has long suffered from a nighttime curse of Shadows. For nearly 100 years the formerly glorious port-town has been much more aptly nicknamed, 'The City of Twilight.' In Westcrown all the days are short, are overcast. For 100 years. And at nightfall ephemeral Shadow Creatures appear in the streets and parks, alleys and squares, claiming living souls for blackness and death.
Three Lord Mayors have been appointed in this century of twilight; at least the first two strove to improve Westcrown. But for the past twenty-odd years, current Lord Mayor and GrandCount, Aberian Arvanxi, has allowed the city to fall deeper and deeper into disrepair and despair.
Crime is up.
Trade is down.
A curfew that the second mayor (Dargentu Vheed) instituted temporarily at the nascence of his tenure has now lasted for generations -- with no new dawn seeming on the horizon.
I've ben doing some prep for Brevoy/ Issia/ Restov/ Rostland and the like, with some Russian Folklore thrown in to my research as it has always been seemingly a Russian-like area in the Pathfinder World -- been designing a campaign near Lake Baikol (Lake Reykol being Pathfinder's spelling). And it has occurred to me: Why isn't Irrisen out here in the East close to Brevoy, Issia and Lake Baikol (I mean, 'Reykol')?!
Can anyone help with the original design ideas / story of why Paizo decided to put Baba Yaga's daughters and granddaughters next to The Land of Linnorm Kings instead of PF-Russia?
Keftiu made a spectacularly good point on the 'Which Deity Will Die' Thread -- reminding us that "Asmodeus has an OGL-shaped target on his back" making me think that, business-wise, this could be the obvious choice.
(Of course, the name "Asmodeus" is not at all anyone's Intellectual Property -- but just like "Demogorgon" and "Orcus," the design for it has been so developed over the decades to be veritably unusable without redesigning them whole-cloth or tip-toeing on legal egg shells. Lamashtu via Paizo, on the otherhand, is significantly-enough different from the (practically non-existent) design of old D&D.) But Asmodeus, ....Yeah, I could see them wanting to go ahead and cut him out.
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So that brings me to this Thread.
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If Asmodeus is the one we lose, how will it be "Best"?
1) Should Mephistopheles just overthrow him and we get back to a similar status quo with the promotion of a new Arch Devil?
(Or if not Mephistopheles, one of the other Arch Dukes or perhaps even a Malebranche?!?)
2) Should Mephistopheles and Baalzebul overthrow Asmodeus and then throw The Nine Hells into a perpetual civil war to last The Ages?
3) Should Asmodeus just be dead and gone by some cause (Cthulhu?), or rather, be overthrown & killed, but then... Come back as a Ghost with a radically different background and completely new design (to get past any IP issues)?
. . . .
There is SOOOOO much potential for spectacularly good (brand new) game design here.
Part of me likes Mephistopheles overthrowing Asmodeus and ruling The Nine Hells as just, you know, keeping a status quo -- promote a new Arch Devil with some new redesign stuff. (I also like Asmodeus as a Ghost with a completely new design background.)
But I also can see that, if they just cut out Asmodeus and promote (for example) Mephistopheles, that could be a missed opportunity. Isn't it possible that a perpetual civil war in Hell, Mephisto vs Baalzebul, makes for a much more conducive Adventure Location?!?! Now, when rescuing A Paladin in Hell the PCs could play one side of the war against the other. And plenty of new campaign and adventure ideas really lend themselves to being played out in The Nine Hells like never before.
As an added bonus, this Paizo-Only Intellectual Property would be (as far as I know) the Only one out there. All the other games have The Nine Hells pretty much exactly as Gygax designed them all those decades ago. Nothing has really changed -- except that every Edition gets a new Arch Duke for the First Circle of Hell (Tiamat, Bel, Barbatos, the WotC one, etc.)
How important, really is the *County* of Urnst -- to the campaign setting as a whole?
It seems to me that The Duchy of Urnst has all the important history (Suel, Maure, etc.) -- and Nyrond and the other 'good-guy' lands around the County of Urnst ought to be able to 'absorb'(?) the small design details (such as Countess Belissica, Radigast City, High Mardreth, and even bits of its history of The Greyhawk Wars).
I'm thinking about 'deleting' The County of Urnst and just using The Duchy Urnst and Nyrond.
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If I take the County of Urnst canon and place the various bits within the Duchy of Urnst and Nyrond, and maybe keep some stuff geographically there -- how would I do it?!?
What would you do....
--With Her Noble Brilliancy, the Countess Belissica? Would she just be a 14th Level Wizard from House Gellor, and House Gellor is a powerful feudal power in The Duchy of Urnst under Karll Lorinar?
--With Radigast City and all its refugees from The Greyhawk Wars? Would they just be citizens who fled west from Aerdi during Mad Ivid's reign of terror and, though they're far west of their lost homes now making new lives on the Nyr Dyv, they're still considered citizens of Nyrond?
--With the Charn Castles and defenses of the North and Northwest border? Would they be the northern border of The Duchy of Urnst, or the NW border of Nyrond?
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What are some adventures and campaigns that you've done that really got into the County of Urnst?
It seems that it's always Nyrond, the Duchy of Urnst, Greyhawk, and even Furyondy on the other side of Nyr Dyv that get all the campaigns and adventures -- from Ivid to Iuz and beyond -- it seems the County of Urnst isn't really much of a thing.
The opposite of The Positive Energy Plane is The Negative Energy Plane, like the opposite of Lawful is Chaos. Okay.
Quintessence in PF is, you know, 'Soul-Stuff' created by The Positive Energy Plane. I was just browsing "The River of Souls" by Wes Schneider in AP 84, Pyramid of the Sky Pharaoh to refresh my brain on Paizo's 'soul-stuff.'
I'll grab AP 141 tomorrow morning when it's no longer so past my bedtime and read up on The Negative Energy Plane in "Into the Void" by Patchen Mortimer to see if there's an answer, but for now,....
When Paizo created their Campaign Setting and introduced Aroden as the dead god of Humanity / Society / Prophesy, as much as I liked it, I felt it would be more playable in my own games if he had just mysteriously vanished instead. Aroden was Prophesied to Return and usher in a new Age for Humanity and Society -- but instead he disappeared from existence. WorldWound rifts open; Aye of Abendego whirls around; Prophesy goes haywire and Divine Casters go insane. Yada Yada. Aroden is gone without a trace. (maybe dead, maybe trapped by a Demon Lord, maybe lost in a different Multiverse, whatever)
Some NPCs who still worship Aroden get spells, some not so much. Some have their sanity, er, some not so much.
Now I need help.
Several months ago when my group started a new Campaign, one of the players decided to build a Life Oracle of Aroden and try his hand as 'Party Healer.' And his character background includes an all-consuming drive to figure out what happened to his god.
I never intended to come up with an answer to 'What Happened' to Aroden! I just liked that 'He Disappeared' more than I liked 'He died"!
....I'm going to go through some of the Old Threads where we posited 'How' Aroden died looking for ideas to consider.
But I'm HOPING for some ideas from The Community on what happened to Aroden if he Didn't die, but rather just vanished.
A month ago I was working on the depth of The Inner Sea (I'm still hoping for additional opinions), and now I need the same for Lake Encarthan and The Lake of Mists and Veils.
Is the average depth and deepest trench mentioned anywhere in canon for Lake Encarthan or The Lake of Mists and Veils?
Later I'll go through my old GH and FR stuff to see about Nyr Dyv and The Sea of Fallen Stars (I've always imagined Nyr Dyv to be like Lake Baikal but deeper.) but in the meantime, here's what I got from a brief look at Google, for a reference:
The Caspian Sea (This looks great for Encarthan IF there's no published canon.)
The north part of the Caspian is on average only about 15-20 feet deep (more like how the Aral Sea was when I was a kid). The middle part of the Caspian averages about 625 feet deep. And the southern Caspian goes to 3,300 feet deep.
Lake Baikal is 5,380 feet deep, deeper than the average of the Mediterranean Sea and Gulf of Mexico. (I remember learning as a kid that Baikal held 20% of planet earth's fresh water.)
Our Great Lakes in the US are as follows:
Superior: avg. 480 ; nadir about 1330
Michigan: avg. 280 ; nadir about 925
Ontario: avg. 285 ; nadir about 800
Huron: avg. 200 ; nadir about 750
Erie: avg. 60 ; nadir about 210
In Africa, Lake Victoria averages about 130 feet deep and its deepest is about 275 feet in depth.
What are y'all's opinions and thoughts on various massive bodies of water in The Inner Sea region? (again, if there's no canon)
I'm working on Darklands stuff and I really need the average depth of The Inner Sea.
Ultimately I am thinking about Nar Voth or Sekamina locations that could have been carved or dug or drilled to the Absalom Undercity. (We can assume that when Aroden lifted Starstone Isle there was not likely caverns or tunnels that stayed intact to the Darklands below -- but over the millennia maybe inhabitants of Sekamina reconstructed them?)
Doing no more than three or four minutes of Google, here's what I learned -- as a guide to get me thinking about the sea floor around Starstone Isle & Absalom:
Mediterranean Sea -- average depth 5,000' (deepest trench 17,000')
Atlantic Ocean -- average depth 11,000'
Gulf of Mexico -- average depth 5,300'
Persian Gulf -- average depth 150' (deepest 300')
Red Sea -- average depth 1,600' (deepest 10,000')
Arabian Sea -- average depth heading out to the Indian Ocean 9,000'
Okay.
'Into the Darklands' suggests that even Sekamina only goes 8,000 feet below the surface, let alone how 'shallow'(?) Nar Voth is.
It seems that inhabitants of the deepest reaches of Sekamina under Thuvia & Osirian, under Andoran, perhaps under Cassomir or Ostenso, could have dug, drilled, tunneled or magicked their way, over decades or centuries or millennia, toward the 'unnatural' spire that Aroden raised as Starstone Isle.
Bottom line -- is there canon that includes ways to Sekamina under Absalom?
So, I have all six of the Bestiary Pawn boxes, all the Codices and such, and I think 18 or 19 of the AP Pawn Boxes. Easily enough tokens.
What I don't have enough of -- want more of -- is extra mooks.
For example: The Villain Codex has SIX "Bandits" (#160). Which is great. But sometimes I need more than six Bandits; I need nine or ten. Better yet, it has TWO "Glabrezu Outriders" (#77) -- great token! I Really need nine or ten of those!
The Bestiary only has TWO "Mummys" (107) -- I mean, I need about 15!
Now, there is some overlap -- I have "Gugs" from about six different Pawn boxes, probably more than a dozen total Gug Pawns. Great. But even though I have, like, ten or fifteen "Twisted Nail Orcs," I wouldn't say "No" to buying more of them.
Here's what I'm asking:
Is it financially plausible -- is there a demand for -- 'made-to-order' Tokens?
ONCE a Box of Pawns is Sold Out.
So, I understand Paizo can't just sell made-to-order Pawns from, like, the PF2 Bestiary 3 if they still have a bunch in the warehouse they're trying to sell.
But,....
With all the sold-out Pawn boxes from Pathfinder, could you set up a Page in your Web Store where we could special order a dozen of this monster and a dozen of that monster?
You could only make them 'to-order' so you're not stuck with any in the warehouse -- customers would have to understand that they may take 4-6 weeks or something before shipping (since they aren't printed until after the order is made).
I would certainly buy a whole heap of Pawns. I always need more mooks, and I really like using tokens on the battlemat.
Welcome everyone to our 'Council of Thieves' PbP Discussion.
I really like to keep our Gameplay Thread all roleplay and in-game text, rather than questions, comments and metagame discussion.
If we can do our best to keep Gameplay in-character, and our out-of-character stuff here in Discussion, well, I just think Gameplay is so much more fun to read.
In that vein, let's keep all dice rolls under Spoiler Tags in Gameplay. Please. And Thanks!
It has been 100 years since House Thrune, together with Asmodeus, cast down Aroden and took her rightful place as absolute ruler of Cheliax. 100 years since Westcrown was the capital of Cheliax. 100 years since the grand Arodennama statue in Westcrown cracked asunder and lost its divine luster.
While House Thrune rules Cheliax from her mighty Citadel, she allows her loyal vassals to manage the year-to-year affairs of the old city. House Arvanxi is most loyal to Thrune and therefore currently has the right to administer Westcrown through her patriarch, Grand-Count Aberian Arvanxi, the Lord Mayor.
Four other Noble Houses in Westcrown have also shown great loyalty to Thrune, and have therefore been rewarded with additional management responsibilities over the old city. Should Arvanxi show any disloyalty, one of these shall be ready to wear the mantle of responsibility for Westcrown: (alphabetically)
House Drovenge,
House Oberigo,
House Phandros,
House Salisfer,
I'm starting a PbP campaign and during Recruitment/Discussion, one of the players asked to 'Open' Gameplay for "dot-and-delete." I hadn't heard of that, but well, I guess it's a thing.
So I Posted that first 'dot' in Gameplay and then Deleted the Gameplay post -- I didn't want "dot" to be the first post in Gameplay obviously.
Now, a week or so later, and I'm just about ready to start Gameplay -- but I can't!
Apparently if one deletes the first Gameplay post, it whamboozles the whole thing almost as if I had called out for Hastur or Pazuzu three times.
But I'm not afraid!
I know you can help me!
Please fix my PbP Campaign so we can start Gameplay.
River Kingdoms seem kind of vanilla; the Kingmaker AP really was enough for me for this setting. Sarcoris Scar seems so much less interesting than The Worldwound does; I'd rather still have The Worldwound. Occult has to be done really well to really stick. I dunno. At least it's only a three-volume so it's not a massive commitment.
But as it stands I'm thinking about not getting the first two volumes and just getting the third because it's James Jacobs and sounds a little better.
So sell the idea to me.
What are you anxiously looking forward to from this one?
What's going to be awesome about this one?
What's in it that is exciting and brilliant and exotic?
What's going to be novel and feel fresh?
Why was Westcrown known as 'The City of Nine Stars'?
I can't find any reference to the origin or reason for that nickname.
Renaming it 'The City of Twilight' after Aroden's death makes sense (Shadow Creatures, you know) -- but why originally 'Nine Stars'? (And if there is a different reason for "City of Twilight"....)
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Um, less importantly, why is it "West"crown?
It's not west; it's central. I mean, I don't think they should have named their city, "Middlecrown" but still, it's not west.
We can go ahead and start going over more Campaign Flavor stuff and character creation stuff.
Campaign Setting:
The Shadow Beasts thing is obviously part of the AP but the origins are somewhat ambiguous -- sorta -- (and thus gives the DM some creative room). If you look at the published Campaign Trait, 'Shadow Child' in 'The Players' Guide,' you can get a feel for how much a player pre-AP may know. But in our game, you know that the Shadow 'Creatures' have been around since almost immediately after the disappearance of Aroden.
Also from 'The Players' Guide' you can see in the Trait, 'Conspiracy Hunter' a little about the mafia/thieves' guild, 'The Council of Thieves.' It's intended for use by non-Noble PCs, obviously, as it tries to make it seem that The Council of Thieves' is long gone.
I think your PC group -- with at least one Noble (an Arvanxi) -- will know that The Council of Thieves is mostly minor Nobles doing stuff together outside of the scope of their respective Houses. It actually makes a nice MacGuffin for me to start the Campaign, depending on how y'all develop your PCs. *I remember you mentioning that one of your PC ideas, Vulpiano(??) Arvanxi is intended to be the leader of The Council of Thieves (with the current leaders). You may decide to build him as your 1st Level PC with that end-goal in mind. 'Hey, my PC is a minor Arvanxi who's heard rumors about The Council of Thieves and wants to join them, build power, and them eventually rule the CoT.' If that's something that may interest you, well, it's about as Perfect a PC concept as this campaign could hope for. I mean, it fits perfectly. Also, and of much more importance, please let me know what you know of the, I think you said '3 leaders' of The Council of Thieves. If you have a bit of Spoilery info, I can weave what you know into your PC background and then build on stuff that your PC will eventually learn.
....Not for nothing, my old PC in CotCT, Ichabod, discussed with Abigail Thrune and Gorthoklek at length his mission to 'bring Ileosa back from Hell.' If you're really interested, I could wiggle a side trek adventure where your PCs work together with the NPC Ichabod in an adventure to The Nine Hells where they negotiate for Ileosa's Resurrection. It may be tricky, but if you like the idea, no reason we can't consider it.
PC Crunch:
I'll try to get my Skills here early Wednesday.
I'm really interested in seeing what you think of them.
As for the rest of my potential Houserules, maybe I'll just lay them out and you can cherry pick which ones you like and which ones you don't.
About five or six years ago in the James Jacobs Thread I asked why he used Aklo, the language for Cthulhu and Hastur and Them, also for wicked Fey. He taught me that, in fact, Lovecraft imported the name, Aklo, from wicked Fey folklore for his Far Realm creations -- turns out Aklo was the language of the wicked Fey before Cthulhu and Hastur started using it. As always I thanked James very much and moved on.
Now, all these years later, I'm back.
Because I now need Campaign-usable, playable information. (Sometimes these 'Ask-James-Jacobs' questions are more theoretical, and it takes years before they show up in actual play at your game table.)
So here goes....
Did the wicked Fey in The First World abandon Sylvan when some of them brushed consciousness with Entities of The Great Old Ones? Perhaps Count Ranalc himself has his lost history tied with peeking into the Dark Tapestry and driven mad by the whispers of Aklo. And it was Count Ranalc who then introduced Aklo to the wicked Fey.
Or do the wicked Fey speak Aklo for some other reason?
Could it even be that The Great Old Ones have no native language at all and that when they first brushed their consciousness (if you could call it that) closer to The Prime Material, that it was The First World that they gazed upon. That the Outer Gods learned Aklo from the minds of wicked Fey and now, eons later, it is the only language they use when their insanity reaches closer to The Prime Material?
Anyway, all thoughts and ideas are most welcome and appreciated.
And BIG Thanks if Jacobs is able to find a few minutes to answer.
(James Jacobs to Isle 4. Jacobs, Isle 4. Thank You)
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What is the relationship between Zon Kuthon and the various Kyton Demagogues?
Did Aroggus and his Cenobites flee The Nine Hells for The Shadow Plane and found The Abbey of Nevers prior to Dou Bral's Fall from Righteousness? Or after (which seems less likely)?
If so, how did Aroggus (and by extension, Sugroz, Inkariax, Barravoclair, etc.) react to Zon Kuthon's appearance as a deity in The Shadow Plane?
Thanks everyone in advance for your thoughts!
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Ultimately, I'm trying to get more information on this so I can better decide which of these Shadow / Pain / Torture Cenobites to use in which specific situations. My PCs are going to have to deal with themes and tones of X,Y,Z while we campaign in The Shadow Plane, so,.... Should I pick Aroggus or Zon Kuthon as my BBEG's deity.
So, if Zon Kuthon is the Boss of the Kyton Demagogues -- which seems not quite right considering their various write-ups in print -- I wanna know. (The published material ignores it: when discussing Zon Kuthon on the Shadow Plane it pretends Aroggus doesn't even exist, worse, when the Kyton Demagogues are discussed, not even whisper of Zon Kuthon is implied.)
Having answered an urgent call to Magnimar from Pathfinder Society Venture Captain, Sheila Heidmarch, you have courteously rushed to Heidmarch Manor in Magnimar's Alabaster District.
Upon arriving, you were immediately ushered from the Pathfinder's "Meeting House" (where one usually prepares expeditions for the Pathfinder Society), straight to Sheila Heidmarch's personal office suite -- encircled by a Mage's Private Sanctum. You see Sheila Heidmarch, her husband Sir Canayven, and a few other Pathfinders you recognize as equal to your prestige within The Society. Apparently you were not the first to arrive to this request.
"Thank you for coming so hurriedly -- though I know your experience has taught you that when The Pathfinder Society needs some urgent quest, you are among the elite we must call to get it done right." You can tell Sheila Heidmarch has already briefed the other visitors one by one, not waiting for everyone to arrive, in order to expedite this quest.
"Two nights ago I received a magical Dream. Apparently a certain Mister Refrum in Korvosa was terribly concerned about a man accused of being a serial killer. Mister Refrum believes this man is innocent of committing a series of grisly murders, and as such went to his friend, a Paladin and former Pathfinder, in the hopes of proving the man's innocence.
"The Paladin, with his friend Mister Refrum, learned some disturbing news. It worried them such enough to pay a third person in Korvosa to contact me via a Dream spell -- two nights ago -- in the hope that the Pathfinder Society would get involved. Thus, yesterday morning when I awoke I began some research. I used the resources here, a Scroll of Contact other Plane, several Sending spells to The Grand Lodge in Absalom, plus Auguries and Divinations by a Pathfinder Priest of Zohls here in Magnimar. This is what I've learned, and why I contacted you to come posthaste.
"The 'innocent' man is a simple Korvosan fisherman named Jarme Loveage. Fishing in Conqueror's Bay his net inadvertently dragged up a Devilish Relic from the sea floor. That Relic has possessed poor Jarme Loveage and is forcing him to all manner of depravity. The wretched fisherman is hiding out in the poorest slums of Korvosa, the islet nicknamed ‘The Styes’ by local Korvosans. There he is fully under the domination of the Devilish Relic. The Paladin friend of Mister Refrum, a former Pathfinder named Atoka, has not been able to locate him.
"For the Pathfinder Society, we would like that Relic. More importantly, were that Relic to fall into the wrong hands -- the hands of any one of a hundred devil-worshipping villains in Korvosa,… or The Darklight Sisterhood, or The Aspis Consortium, or the Temple of Asmodeus, or The Academae, (You get the idea) it could be used for Evil ends.
"If you aren't aware, a Relic is a powerful magical curio that gets more powerful the longer it stays with one person, with its own personality, almost, and is somewhat like a cross between an Artifact and an Intelligent Item.
"Certainly if this were any other magical item, even a powerful one, perhaps The Pathfinder Society could just get into Korvosa, find it, and get out. But in the case of an Artifact or Relic, many powerful factions will be getting involved, and it Will get political. Nonetheless, whoever finds it first is going to have the biggest bargaining chip, you know, 'possession is 9/10 of the law.'
"That is Your job on behalf of the Pathfinder Society. Go to Korvosa and talk to this Mister Refrum; find the fisherman Jarme Loveage and hopefully prove his innocence. But most importantly, retrieve that Relic. I am going with you. As is Sir Canayven. But we will not be available to help your mission. We will be staying with a local Lord named Vencarlo Orisini. He is a good man, honest and trustworthy, though his loyalties are to the Good people of Korvosa rather than The Pathfinder Society. We will be negotiating with him and likely Korvosa's Lord Magistrate, a reputedly good man named Neolandus Kalepopolis, for permanent ownership of the Relic. Keep us informed, and find that Item first.
"Do you have any questions while we wait for the last Pathfinder to arrive before we all Teleport to Korvosa?"
Here there begins OOC Discussion, Metagame coordination, real-life updates, and miscellaneous Gameplay explanation. The more we use the Discussion Thread for these essential parts of the gaming experience, the more we can stay in character in Gameplay so that it reads more like a story.
I will open Gameplay in a day -- for now we can begin our campaign Discussion!
Firstus:
Where is everyone from?
I am in south Florida (Sarasota), but am originally from north-central Minnesota and have been all over the country, especially the East and Midwest. Philly was my favorite place to live. So, having turned a short-story long, I'm Eastern Standard Time Zone (GMT -5).
Ron Lundeen mentioned that there is quite a bit of intrigue in this AP – though maybe he was specifically referring to volume one, Zombie Feast.
Can any of the developers or authors give us a bit more than that? Are parts of this super heavy roleplay with guile and innuendo and Skill Check gambits with very little combat? Does it have the ROLEplay vibe that large chunks of CotCT and WftC have? Is it so much more urban adventure and NPC development than classic dungeon crawl and wilderness adventure?
If your out there Ron Lundeen, or Mike Kimmel for vol. 1....
….If so, I am WAAAAY more ‘All In.’ A heavy intrigue/ roleplay/ guile/ urban setting AP – all in the backdrop of an Undead kingdom – is really awesome.
V.C. Sheila Heidmarch needs a group of experienced PFS(or PFS friendly)adventurers to expertly handle an emergency in Korvosa!
The presence of a Devilish Relic has been discerned in the poorest slums of Korvosa, and many power blocks are now feverishly hunting it. Sheila Heidmarch herself is Teleporting with you to Korvosa, though she and Sir Canayven Heidmarch will be staying with a local Lord, Vencarlo Orisini, negotiating for ownership of the insidious fetish once it is found.
This is a Pathfinder campaign that will end up taking place mostly in The Lower Planes of Hell and The Abyss, though it has the introductory McGuffin in Korvosa.
It first draws from among two of the best, most famous adventures in published history (by Richard Pett and Monte Cook), each trimmed down to roughly a ‘PFS-Sized’ Scenario. After that, the PCs will be asked to use a recovered Artifact to “Search, Catalogue and Detail the 666 Layers of The Abyss” (or if you prefer, ‘Explore, Report, Cooperate’) – well, you know, as many Abyssal Layers as you can!
After the quest in Korvosa for Sheila Heidmarch to find the Relic, you’ll have a righteous reason to visit The Nine Hells for a quick adventure, the end of which will see you get an Artifact that you can use (on behalf of PFS) to Gate into different Layers of The Abyss. In your forays into the 666 Abyssal Layers, you’ll do a bit of exploring and fact-finding (for posterity and PFS) before jumping back to the safety of Heidmarch Manor in Magnimar (or The Grand Lodge in Absalom). And then you’ll go back to The Abyss for more cataloguing. (Basically a bunch of miniature adventures in different Abyssal Layers. You know: Bizarre and awful landscapes, lots of Evil Outsiders. Danger and destruction. I’m sure you’ll all be fine.)
The core of this campaign, then, is the open-ended ’Let’s go check out The Abyss’ kinda thing.
We’ll roll a fun 1d666 and see where you end up for a few encounters!
Outside of the brief little bit in "Secrets of Roderic's Cove," are there any other adventures that take place in The Churlwood in Varisia? Perhaps a PFS Scenario?
We know that Star Tower in Scarwall Keep is one of the "Nails" that Asmodeus and Sarenrae used to seal-up Rovagug's prison. We know that there are other 'star towers' in the setting.
But have any been published, even just in reference, elsewhere? Like maybe, 'there's one in Casmaron, and there's one under the The World's Edge Mountains that's totally in The Darklands.'
....I seem to remember there's one in Nidal. Right?
What are the sources in which we have info on Galduria? I can only find the paragraphs in the original campaign setting books -- the blurb in RotRL, the blurb in the Inner Sea Guide.
Are there any PFS Scenarios in or around Galduria? Any fiction? Anything else I may be missing? (Or has anyone done a ton in homebrew around Galduria they'd like to share?)
Does anyone know the original inspiration or design purpose of Windsong Abbey in Varisia?
It always seemed to me to be an incongruous square-peg/round-hole eyesore in the setting made at the very beginning so that players could have somewhere for their PC-with-a-different-deity to be from when they started in Sandpoint. (And the AP volume in Shattered Star didn't do much to change my initial impression.)
But it's go so much potentially going for it, as a concept, if I could ever get the image of a friendly dinner table conversation with the Paladin of Ragathiel passing the potatoes to the Warpriest of Molech, the Inquisitor of Pharasma pouring some wine for the Necromancer of Urgothoa, the Cleric of Lamashtu sharing some fish with the Anti-Paladin of Pazuzu, and the high priests of Sarenrae, Szuriel, Asmodeus and Norgorber are debating cake or pie for dessert -- while all the while some 1st and 2nd level Monks are randomly in the background somehow learning Kung-Fu. ....Just so the setting has somewhere where a PC can be from if Sandpoint or Magnimar don't fit when RotRL begins.
If anyone can point me to any published material outside the basic paragraph in the campaign setting book or Shattered Star -- I'd greatly appreciate it. Maybe there's some fiction or a PFS Scenario I don't know about that will help me get a different feel for the place. ...Or if anyone has any anecdotes to share on Windsong Abbey's design history, I'd love it (or if you've altered it in your Homegame and want to share).
Has anyone wrestled with this yet? Any Design canon? Any hypotheticals?
My PC hit 11th Level and took that Level in Vigilante, got a cool alter-ego, and is moving forward as a 10th Level 'such-and-such', and 11th, 12th, etc., with a taste of Vigilante. And for my 11th Level Feat I took Leadership since we all got baronies and such from the King.
The other PCs know, of course -- that's how we play -- and my Cohort knows, of course. He's with my PC and the group all the time, regardless of my identity.
But what about all those hundreds of Followers?!?
At 11th Level each of the PCs earned from King Belvor IV a small tract of land in the Greyhawk Kingdom of Furyondy. My Followers will stay in my newly erected castle and the town around it. I, my Cohort, and the other PCs spend our downtime in our lands and then go out adventuring for King Belvor IV and Furyondy (or our respective Deities) from time to time moving forward in the campaign.
In this case it's even harder!
My PC's Vigilante alter ego pretends to be an Evil villain, secretly exposing corruption and bad guys in my duchy in Furyondy. My PC has 'Wanted' posters out for my alter ego and pretends to be hunting him down. (Of course, the alter ego won't ever get captured -- but his evil contacts and corrupt bad guys sure will, heeheehee.)
Now, of course the other PCs know my alter ego. And so does my Cohort.
But my Followers?!?
Has anyone actually dealt with a Vigilante with the Leadership Feat?
I've been on the fence for the past month-and-a-half now about turning back on some of my old subscriptions -- and I'm almost there. (God, my bookshelves are too full!)
In my Shopping Cart is a Subscription for the AP, and is my Subscription for Lost Omens. (plus a couple other books)
But when I go to turn back on the Adventures Subscription it won't let me start with the one I really want, Malevolence.
I guess it's too late to start back with that one, but I figured I had to at least ask:
Is there a way I can resume my Adventures Subscription with Malevolence?
This is for a Homebrew inspired-by and expansion of the adventure Tears at Bitter Manor -- but so little of the Steven Helt adventure is actually being used (not in Taldor, no retired adventuring-group MacGuffin, no 'ancient, ruined' manor house, etc.) that it's much more a 'General Discussion' question than a Tears at Bitter Manor- appropriate Thread.
The point of inspiration from the module is a Daemon (which I could change to Demon or Devil) who offers an unattainable gift -- eternal youth -- to an aging NPC if, IF, said NPC tricks and traps his close friends and family so that the Daemon can torture them and feed on their souls and, all the more vile, revel in the misery of the victims who know it was their dear friend/family member who betrayed them and trapped them.
In the published adventure (unless I missed it completely, which is possible), it is not written to which of The Four Horseman (or to which Harbinger if not an Apocalypse Horseman) the Daemon serves.
But in MY game, that will be critically important. I will build the whole adventure around it.
So,...
Which Demon Lord or Apocalypse Horseman (or Harbinger or even Archdevil or Malebranche/Whore-Queen) would be a PERFECT fit according to It's Title and Area of Concern and Domains & Sub Domains?
The Fiend (BBEG) will grant an NPC some specific, incredible WISH So. Long. As. the NPC betrays his or her close friends and family such that they know it was he/her who betrayed them.
....Who should that Fiend worship?
Okay, Quest for the Frozen Flame is only a month or so out and there isn't the feverish fervor on the Boards like there usually is.
For me, there are a handful of Paizo products I'm looking to buy, the Absalom book, Legends maybe, and Jacobs' Malevolence -- so I'm wondering if I should wake up the old AP subscription for Quest for the Frozen Flame -- both to add to my adventure resources, and also to get that 10% subscriber discount on the other titles I'm looking at.
But I am not really sold on Three volumes of Realm of the Mammoth Lords.
Can the authors/developers Pretty Please chime in and talk up this AP -- go into some detail about the trio of volumes as a whole and individually? I'd like some more in depth description of the campaign and its parts.
Hey Paizo, I'm going to go ahead and cancel my subscription to the Adventure Path line, effective starting the next AP, which will be Volume 166.
I'm looking forward to Volume 165 which you have processed and will be shipped out this week some time.
Alas, I do not intend to continue with Volume 166.
My collection of published adventures -- especially the 151 AP volumes to which I subscribed from Paizo -- is magnificent, appreciated, and will be hungrily used for many years to come. Thank you for Great products and Superlatively Magnificent customer service.
