RakeleerRR's page

I (badly) sang these after jotting them down to provide a little extra pirate-sauce to our game and give some legends/foreshadowing for future encounters or events. Thar may be spoilers here... I'll never tell.

A couple more shanties to add to the Shackles:

Voices in the Waves (Sugar in the Hold)

I wish I was in Maidenspool, living in my fine stone house
But I'm hear-ing voices in the waves below,
Below, below, below

Chorus:
Hey, ho, below, below
Hear those voices in the waves below
Hey, ho, below, below
Hear those voices in the waves below

Bradesmar Wache had a mighty boast
Drenchport soon will be a ghost
But the Master of Gales called the wind to blow
Hear those voices in the waves below

(Chorus)

Locatha came up from the bay
Maidenspool won’t be the same
They drowned Wache’s Sunburst as their pay
And her voice is in the waves below

(Chorus)

Now Wache shouts out in into the wind
The Master must pay for his sin
And he cries out, "Ten diamonds for his skin"
Hear those voices in the waves below

Damned if it Didn’t Rain (Rollin Down to Old Maui)

When Sargava came to the Hurricane
We Pirates said we’d go
And we gave no damn when the Chels showed up
With their devils and crossbows
For freedom blood was spilled in a flood
And the Chels we killed and maimed
And though didn’t-give-a-damn when we drank our rum,
We were damned if it didn’t rain

(Chorus)
Damned if it didn’t rain, me boys
We were damned if it didn’t rain
And though we didn’t-give-a-damn when we drank our rum,
We were Damned if it didn’t rain

When Norgorber came to to his Priestess Main
Aiger stole Black.finger’s kiss
Captain Tevenida, known to murder men,
And make the Chelish piss,
She climbed the To-wer Black, A trap
While wielding magic blade
She never left The Black Tower’s cleft
We were damned if it didn’t rain

(Chorus)

The Cutlass Lass was a ship so fast,
It could fly right through the Eye
But a dragon beast, covered shells and teeth
Pursued her for her prize
She broke off sweet and through steam and sleet,
The Cutlass Lass made sail,
Hirgenzosk Caught her with his breath
A flaming blazing gale

(Chorus)

When Endymion was a Chelish Son,
And His wife a Chelish whore
He found her swoon In the bed of a Thrune,
And against him Vengeance swore
Now the Devil’s Own call the Shackles home
And Arronax calls us mates
When he sailed to town, Chelish upside down
And across it ol’ Crossbones

(Chorus)

And though we didn’t-give-a-damn when we drank our rum,
We’re Damned if it didn’t rain
And though we don’t give a damn when we drink our rum,
We’re Damned if it didn’t rain

If it doesn't happen organically the only good course of action is auditions that may not actually pan out. There may not be anyone at that level that enjoys Pathfinder 2e or develops the passion for it. Doubtful, but it's possible.

Wall of text. Sorry.

Background:

Ancient Grognard here. I consume RPG content all week, for a huge chunk of every day. When I'm not crafting terrain, painting minis, prepping for one of my two weekly sessions or writing/planning/creating content for them, I'm consuming other people's content for inspiration and lulz.

Wot we like:

I won't list every single podcast or stream I listen to or have listened to, because the litany is real. Just some relevant choices.

I've been an avid GCP fan since around episode four, when I first heard them. Of course, I think they would be a billion times better if Mr. Mona would just stop fooling around with publishing and actually join the cast permanently.

I listen to a fun little podcast called "Swiss Army Scorpion" that is goofing their way through Skull and Shackles and a love it. And I don't know why. They're not professional voice actors, they're just nerds like most of us, but they do a great job. They're also very silly.

I listen to Gathering of the Ages who are currently in Carrion Crown and, like Swiss Army Scorpion they're mostly just nerds and family. It's pretty fun to listen to other people with dedication and energy play a game you love.

What we think:

But Critical Role? Thursday is always an event for me and my daughter. I almost always make pasta from scratch and then we watch until we have to go to bed (it's a bit late here). Critical Role is amazing because the (as Matt Colville puts it) 'Professionally Charming People' that play have an honest passion for the game and are really damn professionally charming. They could be playing nearly anything and be captivating (and they do, sometimes...) But they play 5e. So we love watching them play and we love mocking the 'baby rules' of fifth edition. Of course, we're only joking. We enjoy a good game of Dread, Fiasco, Monsterhearts or Urban Shadows as much as they next person. 5e is fine. It's just not the game we love to play for 8-16 hours a week.

I have enjoyed Oblivion Oath in the same way... Maybe a little more - that I enjoy Gathering of the Ages and Swiss Army Scorpion. Some darn good storytelling and people who are passionate about the game (or at least about the session ;) )

However, and meant as no slight to the Oblivion Oath team (whom I have honest affection for, especially Sara who is constantly channeling positive energy around here) they are not professionally charming people.

Matt Mercer is a supernova for 5e because he happens to love D&D in any incarnation AND is a talented voice actor and creative person. Couple that with a fairly largish group of other talented creatives and viola. It's not a complicated recipe, it just has very rare ingredients.

Please cancel all of my Starfinder product line subscriptions.

Confirmed, in the Guide to the River Kingdoms there is an expanded map that puts Galt's political border many miles from the southeastern shore of Kallas Lake.

I have lived through edition wars of various roleplaying games, starting with AD&D.

I have no intention of investing in second edition. Not because I care anything about the system.

We'll keep on playing 1e because we have 10+ years of Adventure Paths for our two weekly groups to play through, and thousands of dollars invested in the campaign setting and rules for 1e. I'll be in my late 50s by the time we finish existing APs (and I am interested in running every single one of them) and since we have all the campaign setting books, the fun doesn't even end there.

Really amazing work!

I noticed that Riverton, while being listed as a part of the "southern River Kingdoms" is inside Galt's political border on your map. It's hard to tell from the ISWG map, but if it's true of Riverton then perhaps Galt's border runs parallel to, but not including the southeastern shore of Lake Kallas.

Because the game developers that have publicly run games have made comments that the missiles need to target different targets. It's entirely possible that Owen K.C. Stephens also misinterpreted the text I suppose.

Owen is muttering a lot here, but it's just audible when he assures the android that he can cast magic missile, but that they hit two different vines because mumble, mumble "target different targets."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RmFDrV8k7w

1:08:26

This wasn't the first time Owen made this comment about Magic Missile, but it was the only one I could find with a quick search.

This is why there's confusion.

In support of the opposite (and probably correct interpretation of the RAW) here's an early playtest in which two magic missiles were fired at the same target. Granted, this is an early playtest...

https://www.twitch.tv/videos/115988165

Around the 15 minute mark.

Our second session started with the group meeting with Gevelarsk Nor.

Despite describing the embassy in as disturbing a way as possible (I think I used the word Gigeresque at one point) and roleplaying Nor as amiable, but husk-like, the party was far more concerned with a camera following them around than working for Eox.

After some discussion the group 'decided' to take job, and were not surprised to receive communications from Astral Extractions and the Hardscrabble Collective.

Kaye had a lot of fun making Better of Ted references (or trying to hold them in) during the meeting with Ms. Joss in Bluerise and the group instantly liked the hard working Captain Serissa and the Dust Runner more than Ms. Joss's slick appointments.

I was interested to note that they refused refreshment at Bluerise, but felt compelled to politely drink black coffee in the Dust Runner's galley.

After much discussion and testing of Nor's orbiting camera drone they boarded the Hippocampus and got underway.

X, of course, chose the Gunnery position while Zajakti took over the Science station. No one was surprised when Kippip sat at Engineering, and by default Rena chose to be the Pilot - since Lance was certain (and correct, to be honest) that the Pilot was a more critical position than Captain.

I was surprised when they had no remarks about the Necroglider that attempted to intercept them. Syrinscape was a lot of fun during our very first Starship combat - and as nervous I was to run what I originally saw as a deep and complex system, I found it to be pretty easy to understand.

Before long the crew of the Hippocampus had destroyed the enemy, and Zajakti instantly asked to scan the wreckage. I told them that they had detected an ejected life boat or escape pod, and they came alongside and sent TED out to EVA the life boat onto the Hippocampus.

They found that it was empty, and spent no more time bothering with analysis, instead finishing their short journey to the quarantined Acreon.

Ever the cautios party (three fourths of this group also plays in our Strange Aeons campiagn and their paranoia has been sharpened to a nano-filament egde in that game) they thoroughly scanned the Acreon and the Drift Rock.

Life Science, Engineering and Perception checks later they had determined that there was some life aboard the Acreon (though they were not able to get a layout of the ship or exact readings) and that the Drift Rock was six kinds of unnatural.

They discussed for quite some time the best place to have the Hippocampus wait for them, as they wanted to be able to have a fast getaway and not to put the shuttle in danger.

They eventually chose to enter the Acreon through the aft airlock. Some light was produced for those that needed it, and they saw their first sign of Noqual. Kippip went to look at the work benches and the other began their investigations of things in this engineering bay.

The Akata that were hiding in the shadows pounced as soon as the airlock was repressurized.

Having read somewhere an analysis of full attacks at -4 versus regular attacks at no penalty, I decided to do an experiment. Since the Akata (Akatas?) had a surprise round I brought them into base-to-base at the port and starboard ends of the bay with the Mystic and the Mechanic.

Having a decent initiative bonus, both monsters were able to do a full attack on their turn before the characters could move.

Kippip, the Mechanic lost their stamina and Zajakti, the Mystic, was brought down to 2 hit points in the first round.

The crew made short work of them after that. Kippip's drone TED contributed well to defeating theirs, as did a Magic Missile from Rena.

X moved to support Zajakti and did a good chunk of damage to it, and Zajakti once again proved that Mind Thrust is a damn good spell as she did nearly maximum damage (17!) with it, and then spent Resolve to heal everyone that had lost hit points.

They searched the chamber to find anything else and then they contacted the Hippocampus.

Or at least, they tried to. I informed them that there was no response, and we stopped there.

When I was just a baby nerd there was an animated movie called 'Flight of Dragons' based loosely on a book of the same name and The Dragon and the George . It had a pretty strong influence on me at the time. I still own the book. Don't let the stupid DVD cover fool you, it wasn't quite that goofy.

I haven't seen it since then, so far all I know it was terrible, but at the time I thought it was pretty neat.

I'm guessing the 2 minutes to take 20 accounts for individual pieces of information, but if you're trying to research a topic there may be specific timeframes presented within the adventure itself.

Otherwise it's a bit silly to say you can be an expert in any topic in 2 minutes.

Absolutely. I think this intended for things like:

"The Deadrat Gang hangs out in Puddles"

or

"Space Herpes are only contagious to carbon based lifeforms."

Not becoming an expert on anything in particular.

In non-sandbox games time is usually important so taking 20 isn't viable.

I suppose it's possible they may not have the 2 minutes it takes to take 20, in certain dire situations. None of these are present in the first half of the book.

You could grip them by the husk...

RakeleerRR wrote:

In a setting in which the Internet/Infosphere is a thing I'm interested to see how these skill challenges evolve.

In the SFS adventures, the PCs just don't have access to the infosphere a lot of the time

Which makes sense to me. When you've got the time and the Infosphere it makes sense to me that lots of questions ARE trivially answerable. Not the really difficult ones unless you're already pretty good and "know where to look" (ie, eventually take 20 won't be enough unless you've invested a moderate amount into Culture)

This is also what I assumed. It just so happens that Incident starts on Absalom.

The problem with taking 20 not being enough is that means that the knowledge is completely inaccessible at that point via those skills. In Incident, for example, you could use Culture for just a little bit of the infodump required for the gangs, and the rest were only discoverable through Diplomacy or Intimidate. If you assume that someone puts a rank into Culture every level, and that they have a +3 or +4 starting modifier to Int - there's a very predictable threshold at every point of an adventure. There's no luck involved there.

As far as 'not having access' I see that being a very, very rare occasion - or a momentary inconvenience. If the party is assumed to have a ship, the ship is assumed (because it can, and because a player that is aware they can do so has no reason not to) to carry a downloaded data set. No mechanics are offered on these holographic data sets, but they are implied to contain a substantial snapshot of the entire Infosphere.

On page 430 under Information Networks:

"...all major Pact Worlds ports host basic encyclopedia-like data sets that ships can download to aid passengers in research when not in direct contact with an infosphere"

You can interpret that a few ways, but I feel like it's going to be interpreted that the players can take 20 on relevant checks.

For sure I agree that it makes sense. This is not an age in which information is stored in secret libraries... Well, not most information anyway. My concern isn't that it's nonsense, just that it's boring.

Warning: Rambling garbage that answers the OP's question, but not in a structured or sensible way. Sorry!

I have run the first half of Incident at Absolom Station for our Pathfinder group (Well... half of each of two groups.)

Much fun was had by all, despite me breaking an important rule of GMing and pontificating about how cool Absolom Station was. It went something like:

Me: "So, any questions?"
Player1: "No one had any questions."
Player2: "That's because he's been talking the whole time!"

/Facepalm. Yeah... I spent a lot of time talking about information from the Gazetteer... I spent a lot of time making sure the characters had workable, interesting back stories tied into the setting, each other and the campaign. I am ecstatic to have an original setting that isn't tied to existing art in the genre. I have no interest in playing an RPG based off of a movie or a television show. We have tried various flavors of Star Wars, Star Trek and Firefly. None of them were very satisfying to the creative types in the group. Starfinder felt new, different and exciting. We've played other, more original takes on SciFi like Traveller and even GURPS Space and they left much of our group flat. We got a little closer with the Void Core, but some of the mechanics in that system were very annoying... Not the least of which were the Infodumps during the 'investigation' sections of their adventures. This same problem reared its head a little bit during our first Starfinder session.

Anyway after I got out of the players' way, they had a good time. Combat is so very similar to Pathfinder as far as what dice to roll, how to put together your action and move, etc. It's so different in terms of pacing and options. Removing the five-foot-step made such a big difference in the way characters acted I'm wishing it didn't exist in Pathfinder. Cover was attended to, PCs were dropping prone and our Technomancer was shocked at how effective magic actually was in a universe containing energy weapons and grenades.

Then again, it's early. Starfinder may devolve into the Starfinder equivalent of full-attack-action-monkee clusters some day. We'll see.

Research "rolls" reminded me a little too much of a Void investigation. If one can take 20 on Culture, for example, with access to the Infosphere then you're pretty much removing that part of the game and just encouraging the GM to hand out a standard ton of data in one swoop.

Naturally if you have any sense you won't do this, but there's nothing written in the AP or the CRB to discourage that behavior. In fact it is encouraged with the way these checks were laid out in the AP. It's possible this format was chosen because of a lack of space in the book. Or, perhaps this was meant as a sort of introduction... The entire first half of the book seemed very tutorial-like to me, with softball encounters and simple problems. This is not meant as a criticism, but maybe an explanation of the way some of it was presented.

In a setting in which the Internet/Infosphere is a thing I'm interested to see how these skill challenges evolve. I hope they don't look like the ones in Incident at Absolom Station.

At the end of the first session we were all excited to play again this coming weekend. I'm looking forward to their first Starship combat.

Ambition is certainly one word for it! hehe

For some reason, I have not yet felt the icy fingers of burnout crawling toward me. When I run homebrew campaigns I usually get there within a matter of months, but with Paizo APs so far I haven't even come close. I guess having the minimum amount of prep (5-6 hours per book, maximum - not counting custom terrain, model painting, prop making) really helps.

Our Starfinder games are going to be pretty sporadic, as this is the campaign that we run when someone is out of town for the other two. As it happens, we have two 'bye weeks' this month.

I've also announced that unlike our PF campaigns, I don't mind who shows up and who doesn't - we will always play even if it's just me playing three NPCs and one player... Though I really hope that doesn't happen. The point is to encourage the curious, rather than what I usually do - which is demand commitment before I start something. Keeping it loose, essentially.

Hopefully our schedule will be slow enough that the books pass us soon!

I have liked most of and loved many of these stories. I have run out of new ones to read and have started on the ones that didn't interest me much at first.

My most recent and most favorite are Death's Heretic and the Redemption Engine.

They take place in various locations, both on Golarion and the Planes, but notables are:
Rahadoum
Thuvia
The River of Souls
The Boneyard
Kaer Maga (!!!)
Hell
Heaven

Salim is a wonderful protagonist, as he is deeply involved with one of Golarion's most popular religions, and at the same time possibly the least popular.

These aren't perfect books, but I was delighted to explore Golarion with a flawed hero on his indentured inquisition.

Unwieldly almost stopped our Vesk from using one, until we figured out:

1. Vesk can AoO with their bare 'hands'
2. Switching grips allows him to have his offhand free between turns

Yes, this prevents a full attack with the doshko if he still wants AoOs, but he seems fine with that. I have had no one even attempt a full attack yet.

So why did he want to use one? A 1,000 credit spending limit, 1d12 damage, "And it looks badass."

Session 1
2nd Day, Rova, 417 AG

I needed to bring our little troupe together in a sensible way while establishing their backgrounds and setting up the first encounter of Incident at Absolom Station.

Kaye's Vesk, he decided, was outcast from the Veskarium for some dishonor... Whether he was falsely accused or not was uncertain. He decided that X (He goes by 'X' since he can't give his real name or the 'Outcast' epithet he had earned among his own people) was doing mercenary work in the Disapora.

Gawain's Ysoki - a young ratdude named Kippip, was also working on the Disapora, and other than Kippip was a wanted outlaw Gawain didn't have much on him.

I decided that they were both doing some work on Broken Rock and by the leave of the Free Captains were doing fine. To connect the two characters I told Gawain that Kippip and his sister were raised as slaves in the Veskarium originally, and that the two of them had escaped from their life of servitude, only to be captured near Absolom Station when pursued. Kippip escaped with the help of his invention (A hover drone that Kippip had dubbed "TED") but his sister was captured. He's not sure where she is now, and it drives him to a greater degree.

Lance told me that he had come up with a name and a background for his Lashunta. First, Lance surprised by choosing to make his damaya a female. I fully expected him to stick with male, but still choose damaya for the stats. Second, he surprised the table by announcing that his Lashunta was actually the daughter of Lady Morana Kesh and that her name was also Morena. She had fled an arranged marriage on Castrovel and though he family was disappointed in her (possibly even angry) she was not pursued.

Even so, Morena Kesh (Jr? II?) goes by "Rena" just to avoid any... Entanglements. She fled Castrovel to attend the Arcanamirium and travel - the two things she loves the most.

So Lance was playing a psychic magical space princess. I'm still having trouble keeping my mouth closed. Throughout the session I was impressed with his bravery and we all had a lot of fun with Rena, so he clearly made a great choice.

Tristan wasn't certain about her Shirren's background. She named her Zajack'ti and we all struggled to remember and properly pronounce her name, but I'm sure it won't be long before it catches on. In the mean time, we took to calling her "Zee" for the sake of flow.

We decided together that Zee, born in Fullbright on Verces, had made a pilgrimage while young to Nchak and was so strongly effected by the visit that she devoted her life to the Queen's work.

We also decided that Zee was currently staying on Absolom Station, in a place in the Ring called Congregation. I told Tristan that Zee was working almost for free as a lab tech in the Lorespire Complex, and that she was staying in a temple of Hylax in a place called 'The Combs' - a honeycomb-like hostel for travelling arthropods (Or any followers of the Hylax, really) that the priesthood maintained on Absolom.

Our adventure begins some time in the past, just after Rena's commencement from the Arcanamirium and during Zee's employment in the 'spire. The Starfinders, doing some last minute recruiting for a project codenamed "Scoured Stars", hired Zee and Rena as additional support - promising them entry into the Starfinders proper as soon as they had proven themselves.

Meanwhile on Broken Rock a mysterious Kasathan later to be revealed as High Sola Tabishad Oseo Markola, was recruiting a couple of warm bodies for a dangerous mission...

Namely to stop the Starfinder's from succeeding at the Scoured Stars project.

Both groups journeyed out to where the Master of Stars and its convey was forming, and both shuttles were present when disaster struck.

In the wake of the wreckage, the four PCs were saved by the High Sola and a Starfinder that referred to himself as Fitch. They managed to return to Absolom after some salvage and searching for survivors and the High Solar dropped them off at King Curney's in the Armada before swearing them to secrecy.

During the week-long voyage back, the characters go to know one another and confirmed their commitments to become Starfinders, now more than ever.

They were only in King Curney's Kasbah for 48 hours before receiving the message from Kreel. They boarded the Oklimoro in some excitement, on their way, they thought, to finally joining the Society.

I took some time to describe Docking Bay 94 while I covered the map with pawns from the CRB pawn set, and played the Syrinscape Docking Bay 94 soundets. I could tell they were intrigued.

Then, of course, I put down the red-based pawns on either side, not really describing the gang members very well, just vaguely labelling them as 'scummy' and 'up to no good' etc.

We had our very first Starfinder combat!

All but three of the random NPCs evaporated in the first round. I kept a Contemplative pilgrim, a Sarcesian mercenary and a Lashunta ASC 'worker' around, the latter just dropping prone behind the infocenter counter and the other two taking cover.

The players watched the gang members shoot at each other and Rena advised the party to stay out of it... Which lasted until one of the errant shots hit poort Kippip right in the shoulder, doing most of his Stamina in one shot thanks to an unlucky (for Kippip) '6' on the damage die.

X ran forward and shot at one of the Downside Kings (though at this time, no one had really taken the time to look closely at them) with some effect and Rena unleashed the first Magic Missile, which was very effective at this level.

Zee chose to dive over to some large cargo containers - just on the other side of where the Contemplative was hiding, and she had a brief conversation with the being from the other side of the containers. She was loath to hurt anyone, but after a Level 21 thug hiding behind a barrel shot at her new fried she took her Mind Thrust out for a walk, and that was that.

After the combat, and after speaking briefly with the ASC robots that came to offer minimal (free) or serious (at a nominal fee) medical attention to survivors and take away bodies and perpetrators Rena find Chiskisk's contact information on the computer.

Much investigation occurred as well as sharing of dietary requirements and desires (X eats only the grey-flavored field rations. No, he likes them. Really.) A bar was visited in the Spike. Lots of computer use in the Moons of Sleep and eventually the party had uncovered everything and was ready to confront the Downside Kings at the Fusion Queen.

They came up with some bluffs or reasonable things to say to get in and talk to Ferani Nadaz and in the end they let X do the talking because I told him that as long as he was pretending (X insisted that it wasn't a total lie, so still honorable) to 'look for work' he could absolutely use Profession Mercenary to do some of the social rolls.

Now, during character creation Kaye was really interested in the Hit and Run combat style for the soldier (Yes, I recommended Blitz, but we don't always choose the optimal thing over the fun one.) We had talked about how that would work with using, say, a 2-handed weapon or firearm and we hit upon how cheap a 1st level weapon fusion like Calling was.

So when the group was stopped at the door and told to hand over their weapons... They did so. Kippip even took the weapon off TED without being asked to (Gawain was weirdly excited about this).

They had some drinks. They spoke to everyone involved, and once the Downside Kings were sure that they were actually mercenaries looking for work they told them the passphrase for the staff only area.

"Banana Candy" since I had to come up with it off the top of my head.

So eventually they end up in Ferani's office and after a few poor rolls, she tells them to bugger off.

And then what they had all been waiting for happened. X called his reaction cannon and shot the big Vesk bodyguard... Who did not go down and now had a gatling laser pointed at the party.

After the surprise round, the PCs still had better init rolls so a couple of crazy things happened.

X stepped up to Hatchbuster and switched his grip on the cannon to threaten the bodyguard with his claws.

Kippip ran over to a chair and broke off its leg to use as a weapon. I ruled that this was as good as club.

Rena used telikinetic hand to snatch Ferani's pistol out of the holster. I ruled that since she was in her home turf and not particularly bothered, AND surprised it might not be fastened closed and warned Lance that, while awesome, this trick probably wouldn't work very often.

Then Zee... Tied the door shut with the titanium alloy cable line that was still in her backpack and in no way confiscated as a weapon. I asked her to roll Engineering to tie it good and shut.

Natural 20!

Madness ensued. Magic Missile became MVP rather quickly while X kept the two criminals threatened in melee with his claws.

X took quite a beating and went to with 0 hitpoints. Hatchbuster had 1hp left and was looking to finish the job... When Kippip in what we all decided was a fit of righteous fury broke both kis lizardy knees with the chair leg. For some reason Kaye's dice hated him and Gawain's were practically on fire throughout the combat.

Zee used her incredible healing connection to fix up her allies rapidly and stabilized the bodyguard (against the frowns of some of her party.)

Some incredibly snarky interrogation from Rena and grumpy glares from X and the group had everything they needed. They stripped the gangsters clean and then left them alive.

Chiskisk was pleased with the results and assured them that as soon as they had the spare personnel and time an official confirmation of their acceptance into the Society would be arranged and then advised them to let station security deal with Astral Extractions...

The session ended as I explained how an alien with a multitude of legs and a good deal of zombie-like behaviors and textures delivered a jet black card (the prop of which I handed over to Tristan) as an invitation to the Eoxian Embassy.

Our little gaming group here in the desert of eastern New Mexico started playing Pathfinder APs regularly since February of 2016, though many of us are older gamers that have played RPGs since the early 80s. We have yet to finish an Adventure Path, but we're trying hard! Our very first foray into Pathfinder was a homebrew campaign that went Mythic and then completed around February of 2017.

After doing half of Hell's Rebels (a player retired) and half of Hell's Vengeance (the GM retired) and the first book and a half of Kingmaker (same retired GM from Kingmaker) we have reached book 5 of ongoing Curse of the Crimson Throne, book 2 of ongoing Strange Aeons and this last weekend we started...

Dead Suns!

Apparently I feel that I need to GM at least three times a week to really be fulfilled. So far, so good!

Since Starfinder is so new, I thought someone might enjoy seeing our progress and experience. I also find that journaling sessions helps me to remember important details, etc, down the road - so I'm killing multiple birds here. Die birds, die!

We had our Session 0 about a week ago. We discussed how the rulesets and character creation were different and then rolled up characters mostly together. One of the players was out sick, and a couple of our Pathfinder players expressed zero interest in the setting so our Session 0 had three present players and myself as GM.

Player 1 - let's call him Space Lancelot, or Lance for short, is our tactical genius. He's always playing the mechanics game during combats and really loves to work the system. He often offers advice to the other players at the table, but is pretty good about not trying to run their character for them or be too bossy.

Lance is currently interested in playing every 'type' of different character, regardless of tactical strength (he realized toward the end of our Mythic campaign that challenge is more fun than power for him) so he chose...
A Lashunta (Damaya) Technomancer Spacefarer.

If you're impression of Lance is that he's a bit of a power gamer and a bit of a rules lawyer, you are not wrong. He does a good job of avoiding the negative aspects of those labels most of the time, though, and as a GM I really really appreciate his contribution to the group. Often that contribution is keeping the player characters from getting their asses ripped out by the bad guys. In the case of our first Starfinder session, I was very pleasantly surprised at some of his choices.

Lance was a little annoyed that his 12 Charisma wasn't going to help him as a Technomancer much, and asked if he could use the Quick Pick attributes to skate around that. We took a vote anonymously and it was decided we would stick with standard options for now.

Space Gawain is our youngest player, having just entered High School. He and his mother comprise half of our Curse of the Crimson Throne group on Saturdays. Gawain is an interesting young man. He often enjoys just being an audience member along for the ride and does engage that often in the game portion of the game, but every now and then, after the party may have been wracking their brains or pounding their heads against the wall - or maybe just completely at random he will say something like:
"Wouldn't it be funny of actually the Plague Doctors were a cult of undead worshippers working for the Queen that we just met and actually she's the bad guy?"

Gawain loves SciFi and has been looking forward to Starfinder very much (he has been working on his own setting for a while now.) He decided to make a Ysoki Mechanic Outlaw with a hover drone.

Space Kaye just likes playing is probably the most well-rounded of the players in terms of which activities excite him. He's a big Guardians of the Galaxy and Star Wars fan. He rolled a Vesk Soldier Mercenary, though he was torn between that and the Solarian. I think I may have talked him out of the Solarian by telling him that they were a bit underpowered in the early levels according to semi-popular wisdom.

And last we have the player I will call Space Tristan. Tristan is my daughter. Her usual characters are slightly off center. She enjoys dwarven barbarians, witches, tieflings and long walks on an eldritch beach under the pale eye of whatever moon can bear to stand the site of mortality and madness. In Starfinder she decided to play a Shirren Mystic Xenoseeker with a connection to Hylax (though it was close between Hylax and other dieties, once she chose the Forever Queen she got really involved with it.)

I rolled up an Android Solarian to play alongside them in case we were short a person, but our Vesk Soldier made his way along eventually and we had a full four for the first session.

I look forward to not having a character/starship generator sitting on some PC-based bloatware.

RakeleerRR wrote:

"Quantum Dogs" sounds like the Hounds of Tindalos.

Or like the name of a gang from one of those really bad 80s post-apocalyptic scifi movies...

...I'm getting leather jackets made now. Quantum Dogs gonna ride!

For that matter, Space Goblins might work for that too.

There's only one way for the Quantum Dogs and the Space Goblins to settle their space differences...

Galactic dance off!

"Quantum Dogs" sounds like the Hounds of Tindalos.

It doesn't read like it gives you an additional action with which to throw it. It reads like you sabotage a weapon and then as Kitsch said, you can use it as you see fit - a trap or a grenade.

As in in-combat move I'm sure it's not more efficient than just throwing a grenade would be. As an improvisation it's pretty fun sounding.

If I were running this scenario I would say there's at least some chance that the fusion is noticed by whatever security forces are enforcing the clamp, and the soldier is asked to stay outside or some other measure to prevent the smuggling.

Of course, smart money would just leave the weapon in an alley, dumpster or being held by a space hobo and then called once inside, anyway. This is the fun part of the called fusion so I wouldn't go out of my way to prevent it. It's not terribly different from a holdout weapon, armor compartment (or Android torso sheath, etc.) Does not seem broken, as this is the entire purpose of the called fusion and the fusion does nothing else.

Beautiful, thanks!

I just had to print a couple of these out using comments to fill in - and I knew as soon as I did, there would be someone to do a fillable version.

Somewhere on the SF subReddit there are also some fillables to have some dropdowns and calculations. They weren't what I needed - I needed these!

Internet high-five!

The 5th level tactical Cryopike is 1d8 cold damage + no critical, reach. Seems inline for 1d8S + Wound, Analog.

Demon Knight1434 wrote:

.... they fired a weapon as a show of strangth and it back fired on them and to save there own skin in a magical bunker. they turned into lich's and id say its safe to say the same bonesages of today are the same from when that happend to destory their planet.

Is that for sure confirmed canon? There were several theories (of which that was the most common) last I'd read.

It's in the CRB, but flavored as 'according to popular legend.'

The last paragraph of the Reactions rules on page 248 are relevant.

You gain access to most reactions through feats, items, and

class features, but an attack of opportunity is a reaction that is
universally available to all characters.

Emphasis mine.

He can do this if he'd like to spend a standard to 'ready' the defensive action of dropping prone.

Otherwise it's a swift action, not a reaction. At least not without some feat or power or something.

Or I might be wrong, but I don't see anything that grants everyone a reaction of dropping prone.

so I realize this thread is no longer talking about this, but I just wanted throw my 2 cents in on the original question...

In my mind, when faced with the inevitable destruction of their world, but before the undeath solution was decided on; I would imagine Pharasma would have a huge up swing in worship by everyone trying to prepare for the end. Assuming the cataclysm didn't explode overnight this would have lead to huge cathedrals and centers for worship being built to her on Eox very quickly. Later, peer-preassure and general self preservation urges would lead a large number of these people to accept undeath.

Now that these enormous cathedrals are a constant reminder of the betrayal of their faith, this would lead to a guilt ridden, but still rather large body of worshipers. I like to imagine a heavy "forgive us for we have sinned" culture of self flagellating undead monks in their massive gothic cathedrals, begging Pharasma for her mercy for their weakness. This also makes one hell of a fun story hook that I hope to explore soon :D

That is quite lovely! I'm stealing this, even if it doesn't turn out to be true in some future canon.

It rings especially nicely as we have had a devout Pharasman (well, technically he's a devout whatever-god-is-listening-at-the-time, but Pharasma is important to him) struggling against the Ghoul corruption in our Strange Aeons game, so it would be quite clear to the group how such a thing would come about.

Is there still much of an Urgathoan presence on Eox?

It's the only center of worship listed for the Pallid Princess.

There's also a big difference between "I am created a Devil/Demon/Boogeywhatever and so I serve Evil!" and "I think I'll murder and torture a bunch of people or souls to become powerful and unliving."

So... Gas on that fire. :)

Rysky the Dark Solarion wrote:

Claxon wrote:

Rysky the Dark Solarion wrote:

Feinds are sentient creatures too. Is it wrong to go after them?

Nothing shown in Dead Suns contradicts Undead being Evil monsters.

Yes. Killing them for being Feinds is wrong. Killing them for doing evil things or because they are trying to kill you is justifiable.

Killing beings of pure Evil for existing is wrong. Okay then.

Killing any sentient creature merely because they exist is pretty sociopathic, yeah.

It's an interesting distinction. I have had Lawful Good characters (Paladins even) treat with a Devil they could have chosen (by all rights) to decide was 'Evil, so it must die' - simply because the devil in question was being polite. In the player's mind this creature probably deserved to be killed because of 'its very existence' but they couldn't bring themselves to do it. Perhaps a tiny part of their conscience prevented them from doing something that was so knee-jerk murdery. Naturally it devolved into murdery, but it started out very civil.

Kaer Maga has a publicly acknowledged district of necromancers. This is in the same city that boasts the Godsmouth Ossuary watched over by a fair sized contingent of Pharasmin devout. And yet, the priests haven't stormed Ankar-Te and put it to the torch. I don't see Eox being a Pact member as much different. If Pathfinder Tales can be taken as canon, even Pharasma's own Psychopomps made a choice not to molest the vile undead in Ankar-Te. Was it because even Pharasma could endure their sins as long as they were being orderly about it? Was there some other deal being made behind the scenes? Who knows...

Sometimes characters in stories have complicated reasons for things, and the alignment system doesn't really account well for that. Luckily having a thinking human being running the game instead of a computer makes it usable.

To be clear, I don't think there could be any public support for any sort of Pharasmin assault on Eox, due to all the various reasons pointed out.

But I do think the Church would certainly begin to take steps. Eox has been a valuable ally to the Pact, certainly. But they didn't come to that conclusion until at least one failed assault on Absolom. Anyone with half a brain in the Worlds should realize this alliance is only going to hold up until Eox feels strong enough to finish taking over the system.

And it's not wholly a problem with Eox, either. The Veskarium isn't the most peaceful of groups for example.

I love what the developers/authors did with Starfinder. It has a very Bablyon 5 feel to it. There's no good reason the Pact should hold up... But it has so far. It will be so much fun to see how it stays together, disintigrates or mutates. This is the kind of setting that is essentially made of plot bunnies running in every direction.

Lore refers the the text of stories, rumors histories and what is often referred to as 'fluff' in the text of the game. A body of knowledge about a subject. Sorry that wasn't clear. The game just came out, but the authors and developers provide us with what is known about the world...

I wasn't saying that ripping apart planes to make things easier was common sense. Sorry if that was confusing. It's common sense to assume that if large pieces of planes were deposited in the material plane at a rate of any great frequency then places like Absalom would be massive clouds of chaos and debris from these planes. The chaos and debris from the Armada are just squatters, not chunks of other planes, hehe.

"A bomb goes off"

"Every time"

These statements make it sound like every use of Drift is a catastrophe. That's an implied rate, however vague. It's false.

If you cause something terrible to happen by using a Drift drive it's an accident, not a premeditated act of evil.

...

This happens every time someone activates a Drift Engine, every time. It's not "astronomically small",

I don't understand why you are saying the chunks are always large enough to be an object, location or person.

From the core book it says verbatim "a tiny portion of a random plane."

This does not imply the size of something important. The incident in Dead Suns

To say that "This happens every time" where This equals "Something important is ripped out of a plane and embedded in the Material Plane" happens every time is an exaggeration. Something happens every time. But Dead Suns or a Dead Suns scale event does not happen every time. This is demonstrable in the lore and sort of common sense. The AP is about something that happened that is interesting and rare.

Yes, inevitably the universe will be shredded into a Maelstrom of chaos soup. No, there is no clear evidence that is happening at the rate implied by you Rysky.

Someone used the example of the Star Trek:TNG Episode "Force of Nature": in which the Federation discovers that using Warp Drive at a factor over five causes sever damage to spacetime itself. If you like that as a better analogy, it's there.

As far as the difference in evil between very slowly killing a planet and very slowly bringing about the apocalypse I don't think the Starfinder or Pathfinder alignment system tracks degrees of that nature. Both things are evil acts according to the proposed logic, or both things are not.

I get the feeling it's not hidden. I get the feeling the area around it is a war zone.

Mostly because that's how I want it to be.

But more seriously, if I recall correctly undead were officially recognized within the Pact World as having rights, so Pharasmins aren't legally allowed to kill them for no-reason. So I suspect it's a very cloistered city-like area which monitors the undead and looks for "opportunities". Keep your friends close and your enemies closer type of deal.

I like both ideas a lot. :)

That was my first thought - some sort of living resistance. But I don't see anything anywhere else that would hint to that and I find "Center of Worship" to imply... Well, a central point of worship, less of a hidden cult for a deity like Pharasma.

Considering how much Pharasmins enjoy the undead, why does the core book entry on Pharasma list Eox as a center of worship?

Maybe I missed something somewhere else?

RakeleerRR wrote:

"A tiny chunk" is likely insignificant. A one inch piece of my house could go missing and I might not notice for a very very long time.

What if the 1" piece ripped away was in the middle of your chest? That might be a bit more noticeable :-)

If my chest was the size of my house, the analogy would make sense.

RakeleerRR wrote:

The way it has been explained, it does not seem like an evil action.

"A tiny chunk" is likely insignificant. A one inch piece of my house could go missing and I might not notice for a very very long time. This one inch piece is probably much larger than the amount disturbed from a plane by using the Drift.

Dead Suns shows just how wrong this assumption can be :3

Dead Suns has something about my house in it? /boggle

RakeleerRR wrote:

"A tiny chunk" is likely insignificant.

Easy to say until it's asphyxiating halflings bouncing off your windshield. :)

All I can hear in my head now is:

Halflings off the starboard bow, starboard bow

The way it has been explained, it does not seem like an evil action.

"A tiny chunk" is likely insignificant. A one inch piece of my house could go missing and I might not notice for a very very long time. This one inch piece is probably much larger than the amount disturbed from a plane by using the Drift.

The chunk of hell example I assume is a rare occurrence. Many of daily drive fast moving slabs of metal and plastic that both produce varying amounts of pollutants (destroying 'a tiny piece' of the entire planet) and risking accidental death. Few consider this an evil action.

Please cancel my Pathfinder Battles subscription.

Bigguyinblack wrote:

Flat-footed is now just a -2 to AC and you can't take reactions.

A 5ft step is a move action called guarded step.
There is no -4 for firing into melee.
Charging now gives a -2 to hit instead of +2. You still take the -2 to AC.

Wait, why would you ever charge if that were the case?

Because your opponent is a double move+ away and you still want to attack in that round, I assume.

I don't know why they would reference a page number for a "type" clause.

Radiation as written is very nasty, which is probably why almost all armor gives bonuses to save against it or in some cases grant immunity to the 'low' intensity provided by the revelation. It's an incurable (without magic) poison that can inflict a disease (radiation sickness).

Against well armored opponents it's mostly useless. Against lightly armored opponents its pretty grisly.

I think this whole revelation is going to get errata that is only needed because they were trying to save page space. It's like giving someone a supernatural ability called "Fireball" and then referencing the Magic section.

Hark wrote:

Well Power Armor kinda has me concerned, reach is the only real advantage from what I can tell, otherwise Heavy or Light armor is probably going to be better for a character in most situations. The ACs aren't that great, for their level the STR boost isn't that to special and they generally have fewer upgrade slots than other armors.

The thing with powered armor is the mods. Maybe I misunderstood, but powered armor gets unique mods that aren't available to the other armor types.

I thought so too, but I think it's just the auto-loader and titan shield that is power armor exclusive. As far as I can tell, the biggest advantages of power armor are strength boost (not a bonus, but a flat 18, 20, etc.) and flat speed.

It is weird that they don't provide archaic shields, or technical advances on that theme. There are energy shields of various types, though none seem to be personal equipment outside the Mechanic's ability.

I don't find it useful to compare extant navy vessels which are designed to travel across an ocean in gravity with fictitious spacefaring fantasy vessels that may or may not run on unicorn farts and masochism.

+1 million internets for the Chicken Noodle song appearing in the first entry.