Rune's page

I really want to start GMing Society games online but I feel completely overwhelmed by all the decentralized informations and find myself completely unable to visualize any steps to start. Could anyone point me a how-to guide or explain the process to me like I'm five?

The PCs managed to convince Calmont that they would help him find Alseta's Ring, and then subdued him after he let go of Helba. They're bringing him to justice in Breechhill and should be pretty interested in his fate.

Question is: what happens to him now? Breechhill doesn't seem well-equipped to hold a prisoner for extended lengths of time, and they seem fairly lenient (but then again, this dude burned a traditional building down with children and elderly folk still inside). What are the possible outcomes for this situation?

The Calmont in my campaign lost most of his family and family home to goblins during the Goblinblood Wars, and is a violent bully that absolutely hates goblins. He set fire to the Town Hall wearing a goblin mask and let himself be seen running to the Citadel hoping people would blame the Bumblebrashers (and refuse Warbal's cry for help). He didn't manage to get any information about the goblins because his blind hatred for them didn't allow him to calm down and just listen.

And how would it relate to Survival?

So my PCs are dead set on trying to recruit Sivron Nal and the people of Cavlinor to their rebellion, as they (rightfully) fear that the Ironfang Legion will take over their area.

Has anyone made any developments to this town and its leader, Sivron Nal? Any tips on how the PCs could convince they to leave their lodge?

I'm building my first SF character and wanted to build a Kaylee-like mechanic - a person that doesn't have much combat training and does other stuff in combat. How could I go around doing that without being a burden to my party?

The party is comprised of a soldier, an envoy and a technomancer; the campaign is homebrew.

So in my next session the PCs (including a fairly standard bomb alchemist) are entering a pugwampi-infested ruin.

The pugwampis have a shatter spell-like ability. Even though it has a pretty low DC (10), some saves will probably fail due to the pugwampi unluck aura.

My question is: How should the shatter's area attack affect the alchemist? All of his extracts are stored in glass vials and the bombs are probably ceramic. Should he make a separate save for each extract and all remaining bombs? Only one save for all?

Used as an area attack, shatter destroys non-magical objects of crystal, glass, ceramic, or porcelain. All such unattended objects within a 5-foot radius of the point of origin are smashed into dozens of pieces by the spell. Objects weighing more than 1 pound per your level are not affected, but all other objects of the appropriate composition are shattered.

On some campaign settings, members of the halfling race have an unique name that they use to refer to their people as a whole, such as Mystara's "Hin" or Greyhawk's "Hobniz" (yeah, I know). The general idea is that "halfling" is probably a term created and used by other races, and can be perceived as a little insulting (you're being defined as "half of something").

So, do Golarion halflings have a name they use to refer to themselves as a people and/or race, or has that been stripped from them by slavery like almost all else?

Hey there folks, I'll be running a Starfinder game for a first-timer group next week and I need some advice.

The core concept of the game is that, Dark-Matter-style, the PCs wake up from a criogenic sleep in a ship with no specific memories about who they are and what they are doing there. They must explore the ship, gathering hints about their previous lives, and then make way in the universe learning about the universe as they go on. That way, I'll be teaching about the rules as they come along, and expanding on the setting on a session-by-session base.

The players will choose the main aspects of their characters during the first session. So at first they'll choose a race, then class/theme.

So, for this concept, my main issues are:

1) I'll have a limited time to read the rules. Which chapters should I prioritize? I already thought about not including starship rules for a session or two, to let the players feel comfortable with character-mechanics before moving forward.

2) I will be buying first-level gear for them. They will find the gear spread out around the ship. The problem is that I'm unable to know in advance which classes they will pick, so I need to provide a good and varied amount of gear (probably doubling up on some guns, etc). So, which gear are 1st-level must-haves?

3) Aside from the Alien Archive (which I don't have), where can I find some low-level enemies?

So I've subscribed for the 1st volume of Ironfang Invasion and still haven't received it. I know international shipping is spotty, but it's been almost three months and I've not received any news on this front. What should I do?

I'd like to cancel my Pathfinder Adventure Path subscription, please.

I messed up the order and erroneously added the Pathfinder Adventure Path #114: Black Stars Beckon book to the order. Would you guys please remove it?

Please do forgive this very basic question but this is actually the first time I'm actually buying from the online store (due to international shipping rates I generally get them from Amazon).

I really want to buy digital issues of the Ironfang Invasion AP as quick as possible after their launch, since I have a couple of weeks of free time and would like to start DMing soon (also the conversion rates for my currency at a good point right now). So how do I go about doing that?

From the product page I added what seems to be the physical copy to my cart, but there was no digital option. Is there a subscription service for the digital issues?

So my players have just finished book 5 and got Briar which has organically changed from a bastard sword to an Aldori dueling sword (the weapon favored by the queen). At the very end of the session they let me know they'll be using the legend lore spell on it as soon as possible. As a last disclaimer, I mean to fast forward 10 years from the defeat of Irovetti to the beginning of the blooms so the rulers will actually be coming out of retirement to face this last threat for their kingdom.

Question is: How much information should the spell give them? Any suggestions on how to convey that information as a "legend" instead of "this happened, followed by this"? Maybe frame it into a sort of a children's story or fairy tale (which it incidentally is)?

After DMing a very long Kingmaker campaign, I learned to appreciate excel sheets to handle most of the heavy load involved in Kingdom Building. So when I got to the Rebellion part of Hell's Rebels I thought I would help out my DM and hash out a functioning automated sheet to cut down on his work. A few sleepless nights of banging my head on the keyboard in frustration resulted on this and, seeing as I used a LOT of material produced by awesome people at these forums, I'd love to share it with you:

Rune's Automated Rebellion Sheet.

If there are any problems/miscalculations/bugs, please let me know (by posting on this thread or direct messaging me). A few notes about the sheet:

• Open it in Excel for better formatting. I have not tried it in any other medium (it looks awful on Dropbox). It uses the fonts SeriaRegular, Source Sans Pro and Newcomen Bold (for the title).
• It is locked to protect the formulas; any entry fields are unlocked and can be edited. These include: # of Supporters (which is used to calculate Rank), Population, Notoriety, Membership, Treasury, "OTHER" category of bonuses to Loyalty/Secrecy/Security (both the number and the name, so you can indicate the source of the bonus), Allies (and Boons), Number of Safe Houses, Officers (and their bonuses).
• My DM said we can have multiple people in Officer positions, but only one provides the bonus. So only the first Officer adds his/her bonus to the relevant stat (the Recruiter is an exception).
• You choose the teams from a drop-down menu; the team listing is on the second tab. You can enter custom (or bonus) teams by replacing the placeholder Bonus Teams.
• The checkbox for the possible Rebellion actions needs to be manually checked positive or negative (I'll work on that if I get the time - if you know the solution lemme know).
• As I'm not sure how Allies and their Boons work I'll wait for the adventure to progress before I try to implement their bonuses to the sheet - they'll need to be added manually.
• Please beware of spoilers - I'm playing this game and we literally just started using the Rebellion rules.

TL;DR: If you had to develop a code of conduct for a hardcore worshiper of Gozreh (maybe even one that happened to be a paladin), what would it contain?

I'm prepping the book 4 for my Kingmaker campaign and as I adjusted the encounters (the group has insane stats) I thought about this.

We know the King of Pitax went through a lot of changes during development, including various combinations of fighter, ranger, rogue and barbarian, and now we have a hybrid class that could showcase his diverse background.

So I ask you folk: Do you think King Castruccio Irovetti could be built as an Advanced Classes Guide Skald? And how would one go about on doing that (regarding rage powers, feat choices, etc)?

Positive points:

He would be able to have written all those scrolls himself via Scribe Scroll, bard spells and Spell Kenning.
• 
  The class has Medium Armor Proficiency and Martial Weapon Proficiency innately; no need to multiclass for that.

Negative points:

• Loses on the various other bardic performances. Might compensate a bit with scrolls, wands and spells.
• Loses a few feats (3, including Weapon Specialization, though he gets +1 extra damage from Arcane Strike).

Hello guys!

As the title indicates, I'm writing down some house rules to be used on my current (Kingmaker) campaign and others down the line. They focus most on the player character end (feats, traits, and class mechanics).

The goal: With these house rules I mean to enable certain ineffective builds a little less painful, and provide more options for others that are somewhat pigeonholed into using a specific weapon/mechanic (I'm looking at you, Dervish Dance!). I also aim to make martial characters a little more well-rounded, adding a couple skill points and reducing some of their feat taxes to allow for some non-specialized feats (my players generally like to have options, like a two-weapon fighter having one or two archery feats. Yeah, I know.).

That said, here we go (I'll try to italicize small changes in otherwise unchanged text):

Classes
Change the Cleric, Fighter, Paladin and Sorcerer core classes Skill Ranks per Level to 4 + Int modifier.
Change the Magus and Summoner base classes Skill Ranks per Level to 4 + Int modifier.
Any effects that would improve any of these classes' Skill Points per Level to 4 instead increases them by 2.

I simply hate 2 + Int per level. I feel Wizards and Witches need to stay there or else they'll put the skill monkeys out of their jobs.

If a class ability states that the character may use her bonus on a skill in place of her bonus in other skills (such as the Bard's Versatile Performance or the Vivisectionist Alchemist's Cruel Anatomist), she may immediately reassign the skill points previously assigned on the associated skills being substituted.

That's just common sense. The retrain rules already allow this somewhat, but are disrupting and expensive on a situation like that.

Fighter
Add the following line on the description of the Bravery class ability:

This bonus also apply to the DC of any Intimidate check performed against the fighter.

It always made very little sense to me that the fighter was as easily demoralized in combat as the wizard. It's also a very small bonus to a very specialized mechanic.

Skills

Craft

Change the following line on the skill's description:

Special: You may voluntarily add +10 to the indicated DC to craft an item. This allows you to create the item more quickly (since you'll be multiplying this higher DC by your Craft check result to determine progress). You must decide whether to increase the DC before you make each weekly or daily check. You may add +10 to the DC any number of times. Emphasis mine.

Add the following line to the Special section of the skill's description:

When you begin the crafting proccess, you may decide to craft hastily, spending more raw material but finishing the project sooner. You pay 1/2 of the item's price for the raw material cost, but your weekly or daily progress is measured in gold pieces instead of silver pieces.

Craft as-is is unusable in game. I find that my players take the craft skill in order to have something their characters made themselves, not for squeezing out a few coins. This way we reach a reasonable compromise.

Traits

Add the following traits:

Exotic Weapon Training: You trained for years in a martial tradition based around a particular, difficult to master weapon. Choose one type of Exotic Weapon. You are proficient with that weapon and make attack rolls with the weapon normally.

The majority of exotic weapons are not worth the feat. The ones that do are generally banned in our games anyway (like the falcata).

Martial Weapon Training: You served at a town's militia or trained with warrior-priests in a church. Choose two types of Martial Weapons. You are proficient with those weapons and make attack rolls with the weapons normally.

Please let me know if you think this one is too strong.

Monastic Martial Artist: You learned a martial art form focusing on mastery over a specific weapon as a path to perfection. You may have learned it during many years living on a monastery or by a single monastic mentor from far away. Choose a light or one-handed melee weapon you are proficient with. You treat that weapon as a monk special weapon.

This tries to add a little variety to the monk and provides a way to represent some character such as Li Mu Bai from Crouching Tiger. I want to be able to have a specific order of monks that uses a spear, longsword or even a spiked chain. Please let me know if there is a way to exploit this.

Skill Training: You pursued interests out of your field to better complement your talents. Choose one skill. You gain a +1 bonus on that skill's checks, and that skill is always a class skill for you.
This is simply to save time. My players generally come to the first session with a good enough idea of their background, and we generally discard the fluff side of traits. If you want your cleric of Erastil to be trained at Survival, just take it.

Feats

Most of my changes here mean to consolidate some feat trees to reduce feat tax, mostly involving maneuvers and TWF.

The feat "Dervish Dance" is removed from the game. Any class ability that would provide it as a bonus feat provides the Nimble Strike feat below.

Cleave (Combat)
You can strike two foes with a single swing.
Prerequisites: Str 13, BAB +1.
Benefit: As a standard action, you can make a single attack at your full BAB against a foe within reach. If you hit, you deal damage normally and can make an additional attack (using your full base attack bonus) against a foe that is also within reach. You can only make one additional attack per round with this feat. When you use this feat, you take a –2 penalty to your Armor Class until your next turn.
Special: When your BAB increases to +4, you can take another additional attack against another adjacent target that is also within reach and has not been attacked by you in this turn. The number of targets and attacks continues to increase by 1 at BAB +8, +12, +16 and +20.

Combat Expertise (Combat)
You can increase your defense at the expense of your accuracy.
Prerequisite: Dex 13 or Int 13.
Benefit: You can choose to take a –1 penalty on melee attack rolls and combat maneuver checks to gain a +1 dodge bonus to your Armor Class. When your base attack bonus reaches +4, and every +4 thereafter, the penalty increases by –1 and the dodge bonus increases by +1. You can only choose to use this feat when you declare that you are making an attack or a full-attack action with a melee weapon. The effects of this feat last until your next turn.

Double Slice (Combat)
Your off-hand weapon while dual-wielding strikes with greater power.
Prerequisite: Dex 15, Two-Weapon Fighting.
Benefit: Add your Strength bonus to damage rolls made with your off-hand weapon. The bonus to melee damage rolls from the Power Attack feat is not halved on attacks made with an off-hand weapon.
Normal: You normally add only half of your Strength modifier to damage rolls made with a weapon wielded in your off-hand. The bonus on melee damage rolls from the Power Attack feat is halved if you are making an attack with an off-hand weapon.

This here is one of my biggest worries. I don't mean for the TWFer to deal better damage than the Two-hander, but I mean to mitigate some of the penalties inherent to the style. Is this too much?

Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Combat)
Choose two types of exotic weapon, such as the spiked chain and the whip or the sai and the kama. You understand how to use those types of exotic weapon in combat, and can utilize any special tricks or qualities those exotic weapons might allow.
Prerequisite: Base attack bonus +1.
Benefit: You make attack rolls with the weapons normally.
Normal: A character who uses a weapon with which he is not proficient takes a –4 penalty on attack rolls.
Special: You can gain Exotic Weapon Proficiency multiple times. Each time you take the feat, it applies to two new types of exotic weapon.

Martial Weapon Proficiency (Combat)
You understand how to use martial weapons in combat.
Benefit: You make attack rolls with martial weapons normally (without the non-proficient penalty).
Normal: When using a weapon with which you are not proficient, you take a –4 penalty on attack rolls.
Special: Barbarians, fighters, paladins, and rangers are proficient with all martial weapons. They need not select this feat.

Spending a feat to get 1 martial weapon is silly. If you know how to use more weapons you get more versatility, but not raw power.

Master Craftsman
Your superior crafting skills allow you to create simple magic items.
Prerequisites: 5 ranks in any Craft or Profession skill.
Benefit: Choose one Craft or Profession skill in which you possess at least 5 ranks. You receive a +2 bonus on your chosen Craft or Profession skill. Also choose one of the following feats: Brew Potion, Craft Magic Arms and Armor, or Craft Wondrous Item feats. You are considered to have that feat, and ranks in your chosen skill count as your caster level for the purposes of crafting magic items using it. You must use the chosen skill for the check to create the item. The DC to create the item still increases for any necessary spell requirements (see the magic item creation rules in Magic Items). You cannot use this feat to create any spell-trigger or spell-activation item.
Normal: Only spellcasters can qualify for the Craft Magic Arms and Armor and Craft Wondrous Item feats.

Nimble Strike (Combat)
You have learned to turn your speed into power.
Prerequisites: Dexterity 13, Weapon Finesse, Acrobatics 2 ranks.
Benefit: When wielding a light weapon (or any weapon useable with the Weapon Finesse feat) with one hand, you can use your Dexterity modifier instead of your Strength modifier on melee attack and damage rolls. You cannot use this feat if you are carrying a weapon or shield in your off hand. The weapon must be for a creature of your size.

Yep, this is Dervish Dance for any kind of finesse-able weapon. I'm torn between letting it apply to any qualifying weapon or only one chosen by you. I also want to make this work for the elven curve blade somehow.

Two-Weapon Fighting (Combat)
You can fight with a weapon wielded in each of your hands. You can make one extra attack each round with the secondary weapon.
Prerequisite: Dex 15.
Benefit: Your penalties on attack rolls for fighting with two weapons are reduced. The penalty for your primary hand lessens by 2 and the one for your off hand lessens by 6. See Two-Weapon Fighting in Combat.
Special: When your base attack bonus reaches +6, in addition to the standard single extra attack you get with an off-hand weapon, you get a second attack with it, albeit at a –5 penalty. When your base attack bonus reaches +11, you get a third attack with your off-hand weapon, albeit at a –10 penalty.
Normal: If you wield a second weapon in your off hand, you can get one extra attack per round with that weapon. When fighting in this way you suffer a –6 penalty with your regular attack or attacks with your primary hand and a –10 penalty to the attack with your off hand. If your off-hand weapon is light, the penalties are reduced by 2 each. An unarmed strike is always considered light.

This reduces a LOT the feat taxes on Two-Weapon Fighting. At the moment, it also removes the need for a higher Dex. Maybe I should still require the Dex score?

Two-Weapon Versatility
You can fight with two different weapons equally well.
Prerequisites: Base attack bonus +6.
Benefit: When you fight with two weapons, you can apply the effects of certain feats and abilities from one weapon to the other weapon as well, as long as those effects can be applied legally. You can use this ability only with the following feats: Greater Weapon Focus, Greater Weapon Specialization, Improved Critical, Improved Penetrating Strike, Penetrating Strike, Weapon Focus, and Weapon Specialization. You can also use this ability with the Weapon Training ability.
Special: If a character already has any of these feats with both weapons, she gains no additional effect.

Lifted and somewhat reworked from the Tempest 3.5 class. It allows characters such as Ulf Gormundr or Valeros to use two different weapons and not get too penalized for that.

Vital Strike (Combat)
You make a single attack that deals significantly more damage than normal.
Prerequisites: Base attack bonus +6.
Benefit: When you use the attack action, you can make one attack at your highest base attack bonus that deals additional damage. Roll the weapon's damage dice for the attack twice and add the results together before adding bonuses from Strength, weapon abilities (such as flaming), precision based damage, and other damage bonuses. These extra weapon damage dice are not multiplied on a critical hit, but are added to the total.
Special: When your base attack bonus reaches +11, you roll the weapon's damage dice for the attack three times before adding bonuses, and four times when your base attack bonus reaches +16.

I know there's some unforeseen consequences to consolidating this tree, but it's almost 5 AM and I need to sleep.

Equipment

Add the following line to the scimitar description:
Benefit: You can use the Weapon Finesse feat to apply your Dexterity modifier instead of your Strength modifier to attack rolls with a scimitar sized for you, even though it isn't a light weapon.

Scimitar finesse is a common enough trope. This way you can start using it with Dex at first level and apply it to damage on second or third (instead of sucking one or two levels before getting Dervish Dance).

This Sunday I sat down with my 5 players to run a playtest homebrew game in our shared setting (incidentally, it's the PC's kingdom from Kingmaker).

The character rules follow:
- 20 point-buy (that was a little unpopular, we generally play with a higher point-buy because they enjoy having good mental stats to interact)
- 2 traits (one of them a campaign trait from a list - the benefits are similar to some regular traits)
- Average equipment.

Generally, I worked with the players to build their character; since I follow most playtest class threads, I could point out perceived flaws in the classes and suggest ways to fix them with feat or trait choices (such as pointing out that the Swashbuckler needs Combat Reflexes to perform his ripostes). They decided to build the following party (I feel the need to point out that they didn't necessarily built for DPR optimization):

-Khashnar, Half-orc Slayer (Power Attack feat)
-Thausk, Half-orc Bloodrager (built to be tanky - Ferocious Resolve feat)
-Galius, Human Swashbuckler
-Ralf, Human Warpriest of Erastil (built as an archer, Good blessing)
-Kotrak, Dwarf Warpriest of Torage (Good and Protection blessings)

I will post their impressions on character building and perceived qualities and problems during play in the following posts, but first I'll provide descriptions on the encounters they faced (all encounters used a battlemat, miniatures and some hand-drawn obstacles to make it interesting):

- 3 goblins (CR 1/3 each) in a forest environment (lots of trees, rocks and some difficult terrain)
- 1 Skulk (CR 1) and 6 Dogs (CR 1/3 each) also in a forest environment. The skulk started hidden, and then moved up to melee when the dogs arrived.
- 3 separate fights against 1 ogrekin (CR 2) each
- On the first and second fights there was a fence (move action to cross) that delayed the PCs in getting into melee and gave the ogrekins cover against ranged attacks. On the last one, the ogrekin was backed against a wall, preventing flanking.
- Finally, a lone ogre (CR 3!) in a forest setting

All that ocurred in a single day (even though they could have retreated and rest at any spot; their mission was time-sensitive and they felt they needed to rush). To any that care enough, I'll the story hooks later (I find that having at least a cursory plot made my players become more invested in the game).

I recently got the first two parts of the Jade Regent adventure path from my retailer and just ordered the next parts through Amazon at the behest of two of my players. I DMed the Rise of the Runelords AP to them, but due to players moving out of the city that campaign is on a indefinite hiatus.

So to make up for it and keep us still playing, I've decided to DM this. Problem is: we have only two players. Both are really into roleplaying and are not optimizers. Their character ideas so far are: a Weapon Finesse Varisian rogue and an elf druid (focused on melee fighting and shapeshifting in the future) with a roc animal companion.

These last few days I started thinking how to make this work. My main goal is to provide a somewhat stable combat experience (not too easy, not too tough) so they could focus more on exploration, developing relationships, etc.

Would Mythic Adventures offer this? I believe the themes mesh quite well into the story (the Amatatsu seal is cloaked in mystical power and destiny after all), but I don't know about the mechanics. I know they improve action economy and general resilience, so that's a big plus. Maybe just use a higher point-buy (20 or 25)? Both?

So, has anyone started considering ways to use the new Ultimate Campaign kingdom-building stuff in their Kingmaker campaign? Did you/are you gonna convert your kingdoms to the new building stats?

Maybe we could start working on numbers for trade agreements. Has anyone estimated the distance from the Kamelands to the River Kingdoms?

Quick version: How would you guys go about building a knight who rides a griffon? Per the Knights of the Inner Sea, to have a griffon mount you need to be 8th level and get it as a cohort from the Leadership feat. For my purposes that takes way too long. Is there any mechanical way of getting a "griffon companion" earlier?

Context: The players IMC have a small kingdom and they found some griffon eggs. They mean to hatch the eggs and nurture the pups. Their end result: a small order of cavaliers mounted on griffons. I'd like to have a lower-level mechanical way of dealing with that. Maybe a cavalier archetype that got an "animal companion"-like griffon (that started at a smaller size with less HD and progressed from there)? Would the griffon's Magical Beast dice prove too powerful compared to a regular animal companion?

My players have asked before, and as I wanted to get some props going (specially the charter they signed to protect the city) I'm wondering: Does Sandpoint have a special symbol, badge or coat-of-arms?

Maybe they use Magnimar's, since they are a part of that city bureaucracy? Maybe they have their own symbol, perhaps merging the four founding families'?

I'm about to start DMing this adventure path (the original version, though using Pathfinder rules) later today and wanted to ask the collective intelligence of the forums for pieces of your wisdom.

I have already decided to enact a couple of changes on the first adventure, based on wonderful and numerous threads here:

- Will run the festival for a time, give the PCs chance at the games (including the awesome Dragon Race!).

- The Pyro Goblins encounter will happen at the Rusty Dragon; goblins will be throwing improvised molotov cocktails willy-nilly.

- Ameiko will be suffering from a terrible debilitating poison (as part of Tsuto's plan of disabling the people who could prove troublesome to his plan), which will probably take her quite a few days to recover.

- Shalelu (who is a mentor figure for a female ranger PC) will be captured and held prisoner at Thistletop.

- Ameiko and her (drunk) father will have a confrontation in the Rusty Dragon before the whole Glassworks thing (so to expose more of that particular situation).

Do any of you guys have any advice about running this path? Anything you wish you had changed but didn't, or things that you did do to smooth things out?

So, the divine scion's weapon proficiency states that she can get the Weapon Specialization/Greater Focus/Greater Specialization without needing Fighter levels, taking as regular feats. Since those feats' only requisites are the previous feat in the chain, would anyone be able to simply get Weapon Specialization at level 7, Greater Weapon Focus at 9 and Greater Weapon Specialization at 11?

Would anyone with a single level dip in the class open up the feat chain?

What about a Cleric 1/Fighter 6/Divine Scion 1? Would she be able to make the following feat choices at the appointed levels (getting Greater Spec at level 8, 4 levels before any other fighter)?

Clr 1
Clr 1/Ftr 1 Weapon Focus
Clr 1/Ftr 2
Clr 1/Ftr 3
Clr 1/Ftr 4 Weapon Specialization
Clr 1/Ftr 4/Divine Scion 1
Clr 1/Ftr 5/Divine Scion 1 Greater Weapon Focus
Clr 1/Ftr 6/Divine Scion 1 Greater Weapon Specialization

I've recently joined a Skull and Shackles game on these forums with this character. I had her concept pretty solid and managed to hammer down most of her sheet during selection. But only when the game started I got the time to really do my research and honestly I'm a bit lost. Never played a monk before and specially not this specific complicated archetype, would really like suggestions.

Before I proceed, what I'd like for her to do mechanically would be to dish out damage. I'd like her to kick ass in a straight-forward manner, with as little "mystical" abilities as possible. The DM has warned us that the campaign is hard and brutal, and I don't want to be a burden to the group. The problems I'm facing are the following:

1) Monk bonus feats suck. I really don't want to get into the grappling business, so I ended up getting Dodge (simply because there's not a better one). At level 2 I'll probably get the Deflect Arrows (also 'cause there's nothing useful). At 6? No idea.

2) BAB +0 on first level. This precludes me from taking two very important feats: Power Attack and Weapon Focus (to get Weapon Specialization afterwards). I end up having 2 feats at first level that I have no idea what to do with.

I'd like to get Weapon Focus + Specialization at around the level it's possible (4) but I'm struggling with it. I could take Dragon Style at 3 (where I would take Weapon focus) and Dragon Ferocity at 5, and the benefit would be similar (+2 to damage that could scale with buffs, items, etc.). Suggestions?

I'm gonna be playing on a friend's Skull and Shackles campaign soon, and an image popped into my head. That's a badass pirate using a melee weapon on one hand (probably some sword) and a firearm on the other. My question is: How do I that without crippling my character completely to the point where I'm useless to the party?

My initial thoughts are going for Gunslinger at first level and probably going on until at least 5th. Then maybe proceeding as Fighter for the many feats I'll need. The DM will probably be using a very high point-buy and the Hero Points optional rule.

The issues I'm facing follow:

a) Which weapons? I think maybe the rapier (for Finesse and later agile enchantment) and a Pepperbox. The point is: How much am I gonna suck until I can get the 11.000 gp to even make this possible?

b) Funky TWF rules. I do know I can use a ranged weapon with two-weapon fighting, but how do I know whether a certain ranged weapon is Light or One-Handed? Specifically, the pistol and the pepperbox?

I DM a Kingmaker campaign, and most of the characters have the Leadership feat. As they tend to use their cohorts more as hirelings or second-in-command in their leadership positions, I don't have a problem with the feat.

For a story-oriented reason, I'd like for one of the cohorts (explicitly the rogue cohort of the rogue Master Spy) to try to assassinate his 'boss'. Although the character, according to his own background and personality could be persuaded to kill the PC, I feel that that player would feel cheated (after all, Leadership cohorts are supposed to be almost fanatical).

So I'm trying to come up with a extremelly strong reason for that to happen. If it doesn't rely on magic it has to be an EXTREMELLY good reason.

Dominate Person would definitely not work. I'd like the cohort to have even if a small part of his conscience, or he wouldn't be able to pull it out (the DC 15 Sense Motive check do detect an enchantment would kill the plan in its infancy).

The assassination attempt will probably be during a simple chat where the NPC will hold one of the PC's hand and with the other draw a dagger (using the Underhanded talent) and stab him in the gut.

So I turn to the good folk at the Paizo forums, asking for suggestions on how to carry that out.

Hello folks, I'm Rune and I live in Brazil. I have a small IRL group to which I DM a couple Pathfinder campaings. I have only the Pathfinder Core Rulebook in print, although I'm fairly experienced in referring to PFsrd while playing and recommending archetypes/feats etc. for my players.

I've been thinking about starting a weekly PFS game, but I honestly do not know where to begin. Language isn't a barrier for me, but it may be to some of my players.

Somethings I'd like to know is what do I need to start playing (rulebooks, adventures, etc). Sadly I have to walk a bare-bones approach, since international charges make buying even a simple $5 book ends up costing the equivalent of 20 bucks.

And lastly, I'd love suggestions on how to hook players up and expand the player and DM base. I mean, going from a homebrew campaign to a society one can feel stifling or restrictive.

I'm running a game in which, although elves aren't a majority, the group aims to build up a typical elven kingdom. By typical I mean mostly on wood areas, trying to live in balance with nature, etc. The kingdom building rules, though, go more for the feel of a typical "human" kingdom - vast farmlands to support enormous cities with an economy largely dependant on magic items. Seeing as I'm using 4th edition (and as I generally don't like the whole magic item economy) I also wanted to avoid that side of the rules. I'd like suggestions on how to deal with these issues, namely the following:

Problems:

1 - Consumption
Consumption is bound to ramp up pretty quickly; the system as written only has Farms as a means of reducing Consumption and most of the kingdom will be in forest areas.
Possible solutions: I thought of 2 possible solutions:
a) A simple one as "You may create farms in forested areas costing 8 BP." That would slow the claiming and building aspect, and maybe that's a good thing in this sort of campaign. But I find this still hurts the flavor a bit (a city in the forest surrounded by countless berry fields and etc).
b) Employ some small, specific choices, such as "You can designate a city as a "Elven City" when preparing the land. If you do, that city doesn't raise Consumption, but if offers a -5 Economy penalty due to resources being preserved instead of explored." I get that a -5 Economy in the beginning would probably hurt a bit, but after the first months or so, it would basically mean a -1 BP per round.

2 - Magic Item Economy
Although the magic item generation would probably fit into the "magic" elven kingdom, I'm using D&D 4e for this campaign, and the whole magic item rolls would be kindda clumsy. I also dislike the general mechanics of once in a while getting a big jackpot of BP. Thematically, I would also prefer a more stable, steady income.
Possible Solutions: I'd like to simply offer some kind of +X BP per round kind of option, possibly tying into the preexisting "magical" buildings. That could quickly run out of control, though, and I don't feel the kingdom should be composed of only herbalists and caster's towers.

Regardless of the specifics, I'll probably allow much more freely application of the BP cost reduction on buildings because of spells. I feel it will more easily allow the "we don't generate that much profit, but we use our spells and superior knowledge" vibe.

Any thoughts/suggestions?

In my campaign we are generally agreed on the casters > non-casters (and to be honest, that's not a question I'd like to debate in here) to the point that's getting to be a problem (the non-caster guys complain about the many save-or-lose effects, etc).

One point of discussion is the Casting Defensively check; while much harder at PF than it was in 3.X, it's still possible, and on high levels, easily doable. A caster adjacent at the party's fighter or rogue can cast a number of spells that will effectively 'win' the fight with one failed throw.

And so I've been thinking about getting rid of the Casting Defensively option for good. It would be a pretty hard nerf for the casters while still leaving them all the good variety of spells that has always existed and is one of the strenghts of the PF/3.X system.

So what I'm asking here is: Is it too much? Are casters gonna be too nerfed? What weird repercussions could this have in-game? I realize it's gonna affect mostly melee-casters like Clerics, Paladins or Magus, but I think it at least gives a martial guy a chance at fighting a caster.

Although I'm only in the beginning of RRR, my PCs are a bit overpowered (high stats, almost all of them have Leadership) and I'm really psyched about tuning up the final encounter of VV. They have already met up with the Varnling host and the PC baroness has a secret fling with Maegar, planning to marry him after some courtship in endured by both sides. Also, the mage has a fling with an elven witch (Varnhold's Spymaster that disguises as Lily Teskerton) on the council, etc.

tl;dr: Powerful PCs, want to add the Varnling Host to last encounter for maximum drama.

So I expanded upon the idea of the Four Horsemen (following up on an idea I read on the forums) and decided he would surround himself with a mockery of these deities, made upfrom the valiant people of Varnhold and his dark, dark magic (profane rituals, etc). I need some help fleshing out these ideas and maybe stats.

Spoilered for lenght and general spoilerage (?).

Please PEACH. Also, don't mind spelling errors since English is not my main language.

Hello folks, first-poster here.

I'm from Brazil and I'm a big fan of the work that the Paizo crew have done, which I could only follow through isolated issues of old Dragon and Dungeon magazines, but even those wese hard to find and expensive to say the least (netting the equivalent of 20 dollars).

I really want to get a subscription of the adventure paths and setting material, and to buy older editions. Question is: Is there any possibility of making an international subscription?

Also: Where do I start? GameMastery Modules or Pathfinder?

Note that I'm not talking about electronic versions; those I can't really enjoy reading and use on my games.

Sorry if my post doesn't adheres to the rules, but I actually had a hard time finding them. So I'll just adress the issue as perceived.

The Sorcerer gets Intimidate as a class skill (page 41).

Abyssal Bloodline grants Intimidate as a class skill (page 43).

Well, just thought I could point the mix up and maybe contribute to such a great project.

- Rune, from Brazil.