Hey all, I just saw this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMN9IIA1gmk and thought it would make as a pretty cool addition to the Guns & Gears book when it comes out. What I'm thinking is it's mechanically the same as a glaive or other polearm, but also can be used as a stand for a long-range firearm like a musket or arquebus with a single interact action.
So you could:
1) interact to place the bardiche
2) fire musket
3) move to another location or reload
I think placing the bardiche would mean you can't wield it like a weapon, so if you place then fire, you couldn't immediately attack as your hands aren't in the right place for that.
Maybe what I'm thinking is a bit too complicated, but I have a bit of a headache, so don't yell at me bro!
Anyway, take care and have fun pew pew-ing things!!!
I think most people have said some pretty helpful things, but I'm not sure you're starting out with character alignment on a good foot. I think you have your axioms wrong and thus I wrote a bunch, and you can read all of it below. I prefer a moral absolutism approach, but a relativistic approach can work, but IMHO you need to re-frame it.
tl;dr: you shouldn't base a character's alignment on how they think of their own actions but on how most other people think of their actions.
reductio ad absurdum: Making bank is fine, using all the laws to make bank is fine, making bank on drugs and slaves is fine - and Good - if you're a Denizen of Leng They should totally be LG in their stat block!
A note on how I run things, which you may find interesting or totally dismiss at your leisure:
I don't want to start a riot, but "Alignment as how the character rationalizes their actions to themselves" is very subjective, which is why in my games the alignments are fixed and mean a definite thing, but a characters alignment can change based on actions in relation to those definite, true things.
As in your example: Your character captures a criminal, collecting a sizable bounty.
* I could say that it is Good and I am Good that i have captured this criminal and personally profited from it.
* I can also be (in my setting, not yours) Evil and say that the community is safer because I have caught this criminal, thus I am Good. I beat them within an inch of their life when they offered up no resistance, but that is beside the point, the community is safer and I am doing my civic duty to catch criminals!
* I am upholding Law and - as an anarchist - each individual is the law unto themselves, thus the criminal stealing for his family is not a criminal at all, and I aid them in escaping, as I would a slave in Towny-mc-slavertown. Thus I am Lawful.
* I am Chaos incarnate, and capture the criminal, his family, and all neer-do-wells because - by statistics, probability and all that is random-clumping of data - they are probably all criminals and need to be hung for their crimes whether we or they know it! And I am Lawful as I am following mathematical laws of probability to catch criminals.
I realize that the Law-Chaos axis analogy is beginning to stretch a bit, but I highly doubt (insert reviled political figure here) ever thought they were "Evil" or "Unlawful".
Most of the time, how you see yourself is less informative than how others see you. How did you catch that criminal? How did you treat them while in captivity? Is the society they are being sentenced in and convicted in itself just?
There's a Pathfinder fiction from almost a year ago that shows this nicely. IIRC all Hellknights are Evil but I don't think Ulthor in this bit of fiction thinks of himself as "evil": Tales of Lost Omens: Rat Trap
Also, re-reading it, Hellknights are usually Lawful but apprehending an individual in a country not your own (Absalom isn't in Cheliax) and rando's in a bar accidentally getting in the way "Will be guilty of obstructing a lawful enforcement action." is not really following the law of the land - in this instance, Absalom. So he's not being particularly Lawful. Though, again, this axis is really hard to pin-down, without a concrete definition (and even then it can be fuzzy.
#BlackLivesMatter addendum:
I highly doubt that ANY of the cops who have killed anybody while on the job would label THEMSELVES as anything other than Lawful Good.
And I bet almost everybody would totally disagree with them! (I sure as heck do!!!)
I'm not stating this to get anybody angry, or to bring politics into our past-time, just using something that most people are probably thinking in one way or another.
Assurance does nothing at all. It is completely useless! For instance, you can't use it to climb, force open, or do any of the other abilities using the Athletics skill because they all use athletics checks: https://2e.aonprd.com/Skills.aspx?ID=3
Quote:
Climb: You move up, down, or across an incline. Unless it’s particularly easy, you must attempt an Athletics check. The GM determines the DC based on the nature of the incline and environmental circumstances. You’re flat-footed unless you have a climb Speed.
In order to make this Athletics check (and this applies to ALL checks) you need to roll: https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=174
Quote:
When you’re actively using a skill, often by performing one of its actions, you might attempt a skill check: rolling a d20 and adding your skill modifier. To determine this modifier, add your ability modifier for the skill’s key ability, your proficiency bonus for the skill, and any other bonuses and penalties.
Thus Assurance does nothing for a feat and is completely useless as you need to roll for everything.
I know a guy who's building this: https://github.com/serialhex/PF2e-TeX it's a complete setup that supposedly is supposed to do all the things. I need to kick his butt a bit to make some documentation, but most everything you might need is there and available.
I think he needs to update it too...
And to all the command line haters: if there is a command line version available, it's usually 5-10x faster to do it there, as you don't have to manually point and click things with a dumb mouse. Typing is way fast, and having a thing render at a single {ENTER} is much faster than scrolling through drop-down menus and clicking a button, then clicking {OK}, then double-clicking {I ACCEPT} then triple-clicking {YES I REALLY WANT TO DO THIS} then right-clicking and selecting the {YES I REALLY WANT TO DO THE THING I JUST TOLD YOU TO DO} buttons...
The new stuff looks awesome, and the obscene object oriented-ness of PF 2 is beautiful to behold. The modularity of it all makes me want to over indulge in archetypes until my character is optimised for dinner parties. Bring on the new book already!
That is the goal. Top-down, object-oriented modularity to make it so easy to plug and play, or to change something for your group without ripple effects. I have a personal goal to make players and GMs more comfortable with flexing their inner designers and houseruling and homebrewing things confidently, and our design for the game helps a lot with that.
I prefer immutable functional composition to the current object orientation everyone uses... just too many bad things can happen with shared references to mutable data in different threads running concurrently that you never know what might happen!
OH wait... this isn't a programming forum is it? :-P
(in all honesty, the comp. sci. ideas are being used extremely well in PF2!)
I think James Jacobs has said that this is something that is possible-but-exceedingly-rare.
In Nocticula's case, she went from Evil Demon Lord to Neutral Goddess. Changing alignment wasn't a decision, so much as something that happened. So, a devil or demon could potentially change alignments but doing so would be best modeled as an arc in an overarching story.
As for how PCs should approach that, it likely depends on the group/individuals and the situation where they encounter the being in question.
And of course Zon Kuthon became evil, with Shelyn believing/hoping he can return. Gods can always be exceptions, I suppose. But if beasts and gods can change, then maybe anything can. Characters have to consider how likely that really is, though.
I remember something James Jacobs (maybe not, could have been Amanda Hamon in this vid: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/412056804) said on one of the Pathfinder Friday streams, that Zon-Kuthon, in the previous version of reality, stowed away all of his memories and put it in a box in the far reaches of the universe. Then, in Golarion-reality-time, we have Dou-Bral getting angry at his sister Shelyn and running away to the dark places far away, eventually finding his lost memories, and then coming back as Zon-Kuthon. So, in short, he was always evil, just playing the "good son/brother".
OTOH, you have Erinyes which were (in D&D/Pathfinder lore) angels who went down to hell to fight devils, and eventually became devils because... reasons. They're not "evil angels", they're something different. So can a Pit fiend become good? Sure. It wouldn't be a Pit fiend anymore though.
Also, it'd be one hell of a story!
Personally I like the alignment system, as a general guideline for PCs, and having some outsiders be physical embodiments of these primal forces, akin to the elements fire, water, earth & air. Thinking about things this way, if a fire elemental decided to not be firey anymore, then they would no longer be a fire elemental.
That is very neat. I'd probably make it a level 7+ monster, because silence doesn't effect other creatures unless heightened to 4th level.
You don't have to stick to that too strictly. You can have a lv5 monster cast 4th level spells if it fits the concept well. Like []Lovelorns[] (lv4 creature) being able to cast Crushing Despair (level 5 spell).
If you want a PC to exploit the weakness of the creature, they'd need to be able to cast silence at 4th level, is what I mean, so the monster should be powerful enough to appear in that level range, unless being able to use that weakness is a reward for leveling up and fighting a horde of them.
Thank you for your comments Kasoh & Ediwir. I was really building it as a proof-of-concept to show how easy it is to go from idea to monster. It took me like 2 hours while at work to put it all together...
As far as Zapp is concerned, from what I've read/heard these tables ARE what Paizo uses to build monsters, but in a generally nice format that is useful for the public to see and read, not an internal document that only really makes sense to those who work there. I could be wrong about that, but that is basically the impression I got from Lyz and Mark on a few of the streams before the GMG dropped. This was a few months ago, iirc, but i could just be recalling incorrectly.
'What kind of sinners comprise this demon? Oh, I know, the people who don't silence their phones in theaters.'
- Kasoh
This creature is a conglomeration of souls of those who enjoy making noise in quiet places, like museums, libraries, and theaters. They are usually found in monasteries, peaceful glades, and other places where things are generally peaceful and quiet, doing all they can to disrupt the often times hard-won peace of the inhabitants. Incredibly intelligent and malicious, they wait for the perfect chance to cause the disruption.
Cacophony - Creature 5
----
CE - Medium - Demon - Fiend
Perception +12; darkvision, perfect hearing (precise) 30 feet
Languages Abyssal, Common
Skills Acrobatics +12, Athletics +12, Intimidation +13, Stealth +9
Str +2, Dex +3, Con +3, Int +6, Wis +2, Cha -1
Perfect Hearing a cacophony knows the location of everything within 30 feet of it that makes any kind of sound no matter how quiet, such as breathing, or a beating heart.
----
AC 21; Fort +9, Ref +9, Will +15
HP 77; Weaknesses cold iron 4, good 4; Resistances sonic 8
Silence Vulnerability Cacophony's are creatures of sound and noise, thus if they are ever caught in an area without sound - such as in the area of a silence spell - they are flat-footed, none of their special attacks work, and are frightened 2.
----
Speed 25
Melee [one-action] claw +13 (agile, evil, finesse, magical), Damage 2d6+4 slashing plus 1d6 evil
Ranged [one-action] targeted bark +15 (sonic, range 60 feet), Damage 2d8+7 sonic
Divine Innate Spells DC 26; +18 Spell Attack 3rd Hypnotic Pattern*; 2nd Telekinetic Maneuver** (at will), Shatter (at will), Sound Burst (at will); 1st Gust of Wind* (at-will), Bane**
Divine Rituals DC 26; Abyssal Pact
Cacophonous Roar [three-actions] (divine, evocation, sonic) The cacophony bursts out with a well-timed shout, roar, or just some unexpected noise that disrupts concentration. All creatures within 15 feet of the cacophony take 4d8 sonic damage and must attempt a DC 22 Fortitude save.
Critical Success - The creature is unaffected.
Success - The creature takes half damage and is flat-footed for 1 round.
Failure - The creature takes full damage, and stunned 2.
Critical Failure - The creature takes double damage, and is stunned 2 for 2d4 rounds.
Jarring Ring [two-actions] (attack, sonic) The cacophony attempts to weaken a creature. Make a strike, on a success the creature must make a DC 22 Will save with the following effects:
Critical Success - The creature is unaffected
Success - The creature is stunned 1
Failure - The creature is stunned 2 and flat-footed for 1 round
Critical Failure - The creature is stunned 3, they also gain weakness 3 to sonic damage for 2d4 rounds
* Has the Auditory trait instead of the visual trait
** Adds the sonic trait
On building this thing:
I had some time, so I wrote this up. Most of the numbers are not the EXACT numbers one would find when using the monster creation rules, but they are relatively close, and I think fit with this concept. Thank you very much to Kasoh for the idea.
License:
Creative Commons Attribution: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ for the demon itself; Paizo's community license for all the rules.
If you're making a demon, you might ask yourself, 'What kind of sinners comprise this demon? Oh, I know, the people who don't silence their phones in theaters.' And you give it a weakness, like 'all damage done by a silenced character' or something.
Charging $5 a player to choose 1 of 5 backgrounds, possibly get a few of the 3 alchemical items, maybe 1 of the 2 ranger feats, maybe a cool cat, a ring or 6, and possibly a few other things is quite a bit of money!
I'm currently playing Fall of Plaguestone so I don't want to read too much of what's in it, but it honestly doesn't take much to copy/pasta that info into some proper data structures and load it into a program. I know this because I am a programmer. An experienced programmer, who hears these gripes, and wishes to do some good in this world...
I would like the stats on the sword cane so we can see how OP hiding a SWORD in your walking stick is, surprising everyone when you pull it out and accuse the magistrate of being corrupt...
I *require* my players to use pencil and paper, for two reasons:
1. Creating a character for the first time, and having to level it up manually means you actually had to go look up the ability and write it down, and not just check a box. More than once I've had players not know what they can do because they had a tool put everything together automagically.
2. Phones, tablets, computers, game boys, iPods, Commodore 64s, and Babbage machines are not allowed at my table, nor are things like them. It's too easy to get distracted, and I'm not just talking about during combat. During role play interactions where the party is talking to Someone Important, inevitably I have to repeat myself because someone was playing on their Atari 2600 and not paying attention!!!
I realize this may seem Draconian to some, but I'm the Dragon Master!!! And these are my friends. If I was running Pathfinder Society stuff then I'd just roll more nat 20's against someone who wasn't paying attention :-P (not really, but I might threaten it)
And I'm kind of hoping we get some sort of grit/panache/stamina fluffed non-magical alternative to focus either in a new class or class option somewhere down the road here.
I don't think that focus in and of itself needs to be wholly re-flavored to be nonmagical for purely marital classes. For instance, the monks focus is called 'ki', and does 'ki' stuff. I don't know what the sorcerer stuff is called, but it's not 'ki'. So for a fighter getting focus powers and then calling it 'stamina' you have the nonmagical flavor, and can take feats that generally improve focus powers, like getting more focus points, and the devs don't have to write a feat for each class to give that class more focus points (though I think they did this anyway...).
I personally like the 'general mechanic that is re-flavored per class' as opposed to making more mechanics that are slightly different but are only different in ways you need to look up in a book in the middle of a session. 3.5 did this really well: 10,000 mechanics, each doing one different thing and not doing it very well.
One thing to note: if item bonuses are a thing (like for the aforementioned +1 lock pick kit) then we can definitely have epic dwarven smiths who have been smithing for hundreds of years and who come from a long line of epic smiths who were smiths for hundreds of years granting a +1/+2/+3 item bonus that would stack with a +1/+2/+3 magic bonus. I really hope this is a thing...
I do realize that one of the things the devs wanted to do was reduce the number of stackable bonuses. Because having a magic bonus, an item bonus, a conditional bonus, a class bonus, a weapon bonus, a status bonus, an awesome bonus, a bonus bonus, a fractal number bonus and a few untyped bonuses leads to insanity. And you don't even have to add in your unworldly extradimensional Cthulhu bonus!!! O_o
I've really wanted to play Strange Aeons, and assuming i get to play for once in my life, I'm going to play a human wizard, probably transmutation or conjuration specialist. I may multiclass into cleric to get more healing, or even occult sorcerer to get that... I'll have to see my options.
And yes, i know it's a 1e AP. We mostly do homebrew stuff but I've always liked the Cthulhu cosmic horror genre. Now i just have to convince my wife and help teach her how to convert 1e to 2e...
@R0b0tBadgr You heard a mix of different things. There in fact will be archetypes in core, but they will be of the "dedication feat" style. Level 1 archetypes will have rules in core, but there won't be any examples.
I'm still half awake and coming off of being very, very ill. What you said is mostly what I meant. Being able to take a pirate archetype or cavalier archetype or drider-riding drow archetype at level 1 is what i'm looking for; not fighter/wizard multiclassing dedication thingy at level 1.
We actually do know that level 1 archetypes are going to be a thing; rules for how they work are confirmed to be in the core rulebook. However, it's also confirmed that no actual level 1 archetypes will be in core.
And evidence suggests that level 1 archetypes are going to be in the style of PF1e archetypes - replacing the basic class features of a certain class, instead of being a dedication feat.
Level 1 archetypes?!!
For real??
Link? I believe you, but I totally missed this!
Also, this is great news!!
+1 on wanting a link. I knew that rules for archetypes would be in the core, and that there wouldn't be any in the core unfortunately, but I didn't hear anything about them being available at level 1. If this is true, it's exactly what I'm looking for!!!
I was more thinking, if you come from a culture, and everyone from this culture had the ability to get some cool thing. Now, because you left home to go adventuring, you don't necessarily have the chance to go back home to get the cool thing when you reach 2nd level. Especially if it is a *thing* you need to physically acquire.
The cavalier is a good example, as you get a mount. What if you're like a drider riding drow or something crazy. If you're in the middle of slaughtering halflings on the surface, how are you to get your cool drider mount when you reach second level? Why couldn't you get it at first? (Assuming everything is level-scaled) This way you could have your band of drider riding drow go up to the surface in their first adventure slinging spells, singing songs, stabbing swords, and stealthily shanking all in their path, all at first level.
At the moment, I'm making it a general ancestry feat & class feat... But that's just me abusing the system as a system abusing GM.
I am having a hard time seeing how a champion fits in though, I'd think their who concept of crusading for justice seems to conflict with a life in the circus. But I'm sure it can be done with some creativity.
"Hi, I'm Bob, strongman and paladin of Iomede. Let me tell you about how awesome Iomede is while I impress you all with my impressive feats of strength! They would be more impressive but I needed a high CHA so I would be a better performer so I could tell you how wonderful Iomede is. Oh look! A fight, I'll be right back after I break it up..."
I kinda like the ritualist idea, but IMO what I think of is someone taking a LONG time to cast a spell, that has major consequences for those it is cast on. I'm thinking between 3-9 actions, need not be consecutive, but can't try and cast something in between, so like attacking once or moving would be fine.
Aww.. shucks folks. I am just happy to have the opportunity to share my stories with all of you. This really is the first chance I have ever had to tell a long-form story and share it with a wide audience. And I really have to give credit to all of the great players I have had a chance to play with over the years, and this group is no exception. Great players make GMs better!
You're saying having an evil lich inviting hero parties into his dungeon and having his hapless minions (ie: the players) setup traps so that he can impress the vampress two dungeons over isn't long-form story-telling? ;)
Well.. I mean, other than that one!
Wait what??? What is this other one??? Where is it??? Where can I find it????? I NEED MORE JASON BULMAHN IN MY LIFE!!!!!! Once a week isn't enough for me... :'(
I don't think you can just take a random soldier or commoner and have them do 100 push ups, 100 situps, and 100 squats EVERY SINGLE DAY and expect them to hit 20th level.
You forgot the 10km run and not using AC the whole time to train your mind :-P
That's actually a perfect example for a PC. Saitama (aka One Punch Man) did a workout that is, for the most part, totally normal. And yet, after doing that workout for 3 years he is the most powerful hero on the planet, stronger even than hero's that have been doing it for years, decades even.
So no, not everyone in Golarion (or any other world you play in) can become a 20th level whatever. Heck, most probably won't break second level. The people running the towns that have a 5th level write up are pretty exceptional themselves...
I do wonder about hags. They're among the monsters I like the least, because they so obviously come from a place of misogyny... and they have no male equivalent. In folklore I guess that would be ogres, with "ogress" just another word for hag, probably, but in Lost Omens/Golarion? If a hag is an evil fey tied to spell-like powers and nature who always looks, in her true form, like a horrible old woman, what *male* fey is the missing piece of the puzzle here?
B/c I hope there is one.
I always thought that the mad scientist was the male equivalent to the witch. An old man wearing a long white lad coat in a lab with bubbling potions in beakers who laughs while creating montrosities and weapons.
The Teson is a fearsome fey creature in some ways very much like the Hag, but in others very different. The Teson are universally male, and are infatuated with magic, especially transmutation magics. Hiding in the deepest parts of the forest, they work on their experiments. One of their favorite past times is finding and capturing vain young women, and altering them in ways to make them grotesque, though not always on the outside. One of the worst things they like to do is mess with the victims brain in such a way that they always perceive themselves to be ugly and unlovable. They are also incredible creators, and some seek a Teson out in order to have them make unique and powerful items.
The Teson reproduce very systematically, creating their child in the lab, before eventually switching their child for someone else's. They also implant a desire to protect the child in the parents that is so strong they end up sheltering the child from all harm, stifling their growth. This leads the child, who wants to expand and explore, to despise their parents. This will quite often, in a moment of anger, lead them to kill their parents. The anger and hate will quite often lead the child to do horrible things to his mother and father - things I dare not speak of on a PG-rated forum.
It is said they're are no female Teson because any offspring that show female traits are kept by the Teson. As they hate women they probably torture the fetus, eventually killing it painfully... Or worse.
(Thank you scary harpy for the seed of an idea. Also, if anyone wonders as to where the name "Teson" comes from, it's Tesla and Edison smashed together. I think this is way more interesting than "hags can sometimes be guys"!)
I'm in the middle of building some supplements for second edition, and I want to know the status of making things like the Pathfinder logo community use. Also things like the action symbols and such would be nice too, as I'm currently using some that I've made by tracing the ones in the rulebook, but I don't want a cease-and-desist because a lawyer got sue-happy (I honestly don't think this would be an issue, but I do want to play by the rules).
I would really like to have at least this much pre-launch, as it's just two-people working on some cool supplements. I would love to be able to preview the rules so everything can be up to spec on launch day, but I highly doubt we qualify for that kind of access.
One thing I am curious about, some of the players mentioned a questionnaire that Jason had them fill out to get them thinking about their character. I was wondering if we could get a copy of that questionnaire because I'm very interested in using something like that for my next game.
I agree with your second and third points, but from a real world point of view, drinking alcohol was usually safer than drinking water, as the water was usually filled with bacteria that would give you dysentery (and thus, you die). So wine or beer was not only a thing to do at taverns, but a thing to do in general so you wouldn't be sick. I mean, how heroic do you think you would be if you had liquid poop running down your leg as you ransacked the evil lich's lair.
I understand being inclusive, but if you try and super include everybody, then remove wheat for all the gluten intolerant PCs... Just food for thought.
A fertility deity could be anti-abortion, but nothing remotely necessitates that. Fertility doesn't have to be strictly about unchecked and unrestricted growth, after all. It's very possible to have a LG fertility deity who is all about careful and planned cultivation, both of crops and of families, and that attitude in no way necessitates being anti-abortion (quite the opposite, if anything). And that's only one possible example.
While I can agree on your other point, as it's kind of semantics, this one I don't. Chopping down a tree just because you didn't plan on having it grow there isn't really the same as planting a tree and then later deciding it's not where you want it. Preventing a child being born is really easy: don't have sex. Planting a tree in a spot or having sex both have natural consequences. I'm not equating children to trees, but if you don't want to grow anything in the field, don't plant anything there. A deity of fertility and growth - unchecked or not - would be against abortion. Imo a deity against unchecked growth would have spells to prevent a seed from taking root in the first place, instead of burning the field down.
(Edit: killing people is always an evil act, imo, even if that person doesn't have a choice to say as much (in fact, doubly so for the voiceless))
Having more than just Lamashtu as a fertility deity would be good, and more realistic, but would that make the setting more interesting? This is kind of a balance in world building as adding a deity isn't just "and here is Bob the fertility deity who helps men & women become fertile, he's NG" and leave it at that is kinda lame. How did he become a deity? What else does he have perview over? What are his anethema? A good fertility deity would definitely be anti-abortion as that kind of defeats the purpose of becoming fertile in the first place, and seeing how PC paizo is in general, they probably won't do this. Also, being realistic, there would be deities that do what we consider horrible things, but their followers consider good. See Molech for a real world example of a god people worshipped that is evil by our standards (unless you are ok with burning children alive), but good and celebrated by their worshippers.
World building is hard, and while I don't agree with all of the decisions paizo has made they have a pretty decent pantheon. I would appreciate some more neutral options and some interesting good options, if less powerful. Also, restricting clerics to alignments makes sense in a world where good and evil are nearly tangible entities. Saying you are good while the god you worship calls for human sacrifice is saying that human sacrifice is good, or that you don't understand/believe all your deities tenants. By restricting this, it makes the starkness more real and understandable.
Here's an odd-ish question. I have a few friends who - for legal reasons - can't use the internet. I want them to be able to play and participate in the playtest, and that is easy (this is still a pencil-and-paper RPG). But if they want to add their voice to the surveys, I'm going to have to essentially print out the questionnaire and type in their responses. And I'm fine with this.
Unfortunately, I'm worried that responses may be email-blocked or something of the like, and so I may not be able to add their voice to the playtest. As the GM for these adventures, I want to be able to run the game for my 4 players, have them do the survey, and have all their voices count even though I had a few people write their response on paper and added it in later. So is this going to be feasible? Or am I going to be stuck with saying "Yeah I had 4 people play but you only get 3 survey responses"?
Thanks in advance.
P.S. And while I do know a few people who are currently incarcerated who would like to get in on the playtest, doing that would be a headache of its own... :(
Here's an idea Lyee. Play Doomsday Dawn (and the PFS scenarios if you're doing those) exactly as written (or as close to exact) to get a feel for how PF2 is as written and provide the asked-for feedback. Then, separately (and probably afterward) run a campaign using any house rules & monsters & whatnot, have fun, and provide that feedback to the forums along with any cool house rules that you came up with.
It's my understanding that Doomsday Dawn should only take a few sessions to run, so in the next year you could either run it like a dozen times, or once for your group, and then a 8+ month campaign starting at 1st level.
This is essentially what I'm planning on doing, so I can give the best specific feedback, and also give general "hey, I think these changes worked beautifully and added a lot of fun to the game".
I haven't read the actual story, but from a brief glance at Wikipedia, and from various other sources (like "The Forbidden Kingdom" w/ Jackie Chan & Jet Li, I know, HollyWood stretches tales blah blah) I have to agree with Saffron. To quote the first 2 paragraphs from the Wikipedia article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun_Wukong):
Wikipedia wrote:
Sun Wukong, also known as the Monkey King, is a fictional figure who features in body of legends, which can be traced back to the period of the Song dynasty.[2] He appears as a main character in the 16th century Chinese classical novel Journey to the West (西游记). Sun Wukong is also found in many later stories and adaptations. In the novel, he is a monkey born from a stone who acquires supernatural powers through Taoist practices. After rebelling against heaven and being imprisoned under a mountain by the Buddha, he later accompanies the monk Tang Sanzang on a journey to retrieve Buddhist sutras from "the West".
Sun Wukong possesses immense strength; he is able to lift his 13,500 jīn (7,960 kilograms (17,550 lb)) staff with ease. He is also extremely fast, able to travel 108,000 li (21,675 kilometres (13,468 mi)) in one somersault. Sun knows 72 transformations, which allow him to transform into various animals and objects; however, he has trouble transforming into other forms, due to the accompanying incomplete transformation of his tail. Sun Wukong is a skilled fighter, capable of defeating the best warriors of heaven. Each of his hairs possesses magical properties, capable of being transformed into clones of the Monkey King himself, and/or into various weapons, animals, and other objects. He knows spells to command wind, part water, conjure protective circles against demons, and freeze humans, demons, and gods alike.[3]
(the bold is my emphasis)
Later on, it makes this point under "Names and Titles":
Wikipedia wrote:
Xíngzhě (行者)
Meaning "ascetic", it refers to a wandering monk, a priest's servant, or a person engaged in performing religious austerities. Tang Sanzang calls Wukong Sūn-xíngzhě when he accepts him as his companion. This is pronounced in Japanese as gyōja (making him Son-gyōja).
and
Wikipedia wrote:
Sūn Zhǎnglǎo (孫長老)
Zhǎnglǎo used as honorific for monk, because Sun Wukong believed in Buddhism.
So yeah, Sun Wukong - the Monkey King - is LITERALLY a monk, and is referred to as a monk even by other monks. So this isn't like that Hells Angels biker guy you just met at a bar saying he's a Nun. This is one of the many ways that a monk can be.
Sure, there are some things that he can do because he is a supernatural being (like his hairs being able to transform into clones of himself) but many of his powers are from his Taoist practices.
I'm getting incredibly tired of people trying to force non-Lawful Good Paladins in. Just. It is wearing me down, personally, to the point where I've visited these forums less and less.
Yeah, I totally agree. While I don't think it unreasonable for there to be Paladin-like holy warriors for even Caden Calien, Asmodeus or Demogorgon, they are CERTAINLY not Paladins, and the angst around it is draining.
But, this is not a Paladin alignment thread, this is a debugging the code thread! And personally, I like TheFinish's change to the second point in the code:
"You must protect the innocent as best you can, and never knowingly cause them harm."
So, yeah, there's some more pennies for this discussion.
I was kind of hoping that the stealing armor/weapons thing could be used in combat...
Maybe there's another skill feat that reduces the time it takes to steal something, so between the two you might be able to do it. Especially if your bard is distracting them so they don't notice you.
... but at the risk of an explosion, it's time to reveal the most exciting revelation yet for the entire playtest book. In addition to the index, it also has...
...
...
a glossary of terms!
This is outrageous, it is a total nerf to people that spend their time reading the book cover to cover. How am I supposed to be the table system expert, when anyone can just look things in an index?!
A glossary is totally an argument tax. Now we are forced to look terms up in a glossary, rather than argue about it for 20 minute. This is actually going to reduce the amount time spent playing the game, because Adventure Paths are going to be quick and easier to get through.
I can't believe that Paizo are doing this. I might reconsider even getting PFe2. Maybe I will just have to ban the index and glossary at my table.
You are WRONG SIR!!! Having a Glossary is the One True Way and ranks up there in importance with LG Paladin Goblins as the One True And Bestest Good!!! Also, having a Glossary gives you not only MORE to read, but then you can easily memorize it, and be all smug when people ask for a definition, disagree with your definition, then calmly state "Well, go ahead and look it up then..." and have them read with dread exactly the words that you stated.
This is the essence of the Pathfinder Rules Zealot! Which should be included as a Core Class!!! The range of it's powers know no bound, with abilities such as Detect Wrongness, Channel Rules, CRB Bomb, Smite GM, and reactions like Opportune Rule Quoting that are triggered when someone does something WRONG (obviously this only works when Detect Wrongness is on, but for the Pathfinder Rules Zealot, it is always on, even when the game is off!) Unfortunately, you need to be of the OBJECTIVELY BEST alignment of CENGL! But this isn't a problem for the Pathfinder Rules Zealot, only for the people who OPPOSE the zealot!
@Mark, when are we getting a preview of this class???
I like the idea of a Chaos Knight bestowing a reroll & take the greater as a boon instead of the traditional +X boon that's usually bestowed. Or maybe a +NdX or something, like "Target gets +1d6 for attacks, on each attack, for the next round" so they roll 1d20+1d6 to see if they hit. Maybe a little clunky? IDK!
Breaking Rigid Thought -> Out of the Box? or Out of Box Experience? or There is No Spoon???
Warping reality to get a bonus to AC sounds cool, with the reaction to make an opponent hit himself is also pretty nice.
Ohhh LORD!!! A good index AND A GLOSSARY!?!?!?!??!?
And I second (or third, maybe fourth... I just ++ it) the request of having page numbers in the glossary. Having a quick definition, and then a place to go for more information would be awesome.
BUT is there anyone truly innocent in the world? "Let the one who is without sin throw the first stone".
To bring a real-world religion into this conversation (christianity as taught by Christ): no one is innocent. All are sinners and thus are unable to be right with God (and it's only through the blood of his son Jesus... I won't preach here). Thus, from a very legalistic standpoint you could justify having your LG Paladin of Jesus kill everyone who isn't a Christian (see: the spanish inquisition; which nobody expects). The thing is though, you have mercy, and forgiveness, and this is what Jesus actually taught. This is also what most good deities in fantasy settings actually mean (usually).
This is also a good distinction between L. Good and L. Evil: in the Evil counterpart, you're guilty automatically. No save, just punishment. (LN would follow the law, but jury trial first or some such).
Also, I would think that attempting to save someone's life - even a known murderer - would rank high on a Paladins list of priorities. Evil but maybe redeemable bad-guy you caught and was about to fall off a cliff, do you jump to save him even though it might be a ploy to escape and cause more havok? Yes! Should a paladin lose his powers over not attempting? Probably not if it's the first time, but probably yes if it's part of a long string of oversights (unless the player is just that absent-minded).
The Raven Black wrote:
One essential thing for me on this specific topic is that people clearly understand that innocent and Good are completely different things
Yes. Very Much So.
Tallow wrote:
An Evil Kobold Child running around picking mushrooms and minding his own business could be considered innocent.
If we had some clear idea of what was supposed to be so bad about Infernal Healing, we might be more sympathetic to the Paladin who says "I'm sorry you're going to die, but I won't help you. I won't do evil things, even to help good people."
Components V, S, M (1 drop of devil blood or 1 dose of unholy water)
and
Quote:
You anoint a wounded creature with devil’s blood or unholy water, giving it fast healing 1. This ability cannot repair damage caused by silver weapons, good-aligned weapons, or spells or effects with the good descriptor. The target detects as an evil creature for the duration of the spell and can sense the evil of the magic, though this has no long-term effect on the target’s alignment.
There is no reason for a Paladin to have the unholy water. The devil blood might be available, but probably only right after killing a devil. And honestly, if a Paladin carries around a vial of devil blood to cast this spell, then they're probably doing a few other amoral things they shouldn't be doing.
Also, it probably does bolster the armies of hell, at least a little bit for a short time.
I don't think it hurts to help people - newbs especially - bootstrap into game with a setting already somewhat at hand. And as much as Paizo doesn't want there to be, there will always be the kids who love role playing but can't afford $5,000 worth of books or subscribe to anything, and thus can only convince their parents to buy them ONE book. That book being the Core rulebook (maybe two if you're lucky, get a monster manual).
This gets them the rules, an overview of a generic & default-ish setting that most people are familiar with, and the rest of your school knowing you're a nerd. :-P
That being said, there was a set of books attributed to Gygax on world building, that included an "Extraordinary Book of Names" and a few others that have been out of print for DECADES. Having Paizo make a set of books like that would be FREAKING AWESOME and would definitely go on my wishlist and would eventually be bought.
Also, you can just ignore it if you don't want it. The fluff is there to make it more enjoyable overall. If you don't want fluff then they don't have to pay artists to draw all the characters & whatnot, and just have a wall of text!
The one thing I'd really like to point out, just to point out something that may or may not be obvious to some people.
The Paladin's Code seems very 3-Laws (or 3+0th Law if you've read all of the Foundation series). One of the things that Asimov did throughout the series is show how these three simple laws that most people would be like "Yeah, that seems foolproof" are actually *far* from foolproof, and can cause so much trouble all over the place.
I'm not trying to say we should stop trying to get the code as crystal-clear as possible, but there will always be loopholes. Hopefully Mark Seifter has read most of Asimov and realizes this, and thus does not get an aneurysm trying to make it 100% foolproof.
That's what I really, really want. Is a full index that I can use to look up stuff.
When I first got the Pathfinder Core book I geeked out on the fact that there was an index I could look things up in. Compare that to the 3.5 players handbook which was... Unacceptable.
I know I can use an app/the internet/search a PDF instead of looking up things in an index, but there is no where to type in your search terms in a dead tree. And having the rules in book form is always the best IMHO (instant access, no dead batteries, near-infinite screen size, etc...)
