Scott LaBarge's page

I've been playing the introductory 2nd edition adventure with my kids, and some of the scenarios give you as a reward the opportunity to "get" a boon from the box. I haven't found anything in the rules about what "getting" entails. In particular, can you just go through the available cards and pick the one you want? Or do you have to take one at random? ("Yay, a basic mace....2")

It feels like so much more of a reward if you can pick the one you want. So I guess what I'm really asking here is, does "get" mean "receive" (a la "you take what you get and you don't get upset"_, or does "get" mean "fetch the specific thing" (a la "go get it, girl!")?

I love all of these! But especially the new Ileosa. She looks marvelous. I hope the final paint job does justice to the deep reds on the digital model!

Great news across the board! I love the new giant, who has loads of dark personality, and as someone who's been asking for spell effect minis, the rope trick is perfect. I'm also getting ready to (hopefully) start a CotCT campaign soon, so more minis for that campaign will be most welcome! Huzzah!

I think I know the answer to this, but my son's been playing Tup (with terrific glee and regular recitations of his song, I should add), and we will have no peace under my roof until this is resolved. So:
When Tup banishes a spell and then uses his power to draw a spell, does the spell get picked randomly from the spell deck, or can the player choose the spell he draws?

Those are both creepy, awful, excellent picks! Excited about both of them, but especially the lemure, which is SO MUCH BETTER than the old one from Giants of Legends. That one's always been kind of an embarrassment. I'll be glad to have a replacement.

Love the elf, love the mercane. I doubt the goblin is going to see a lot of use at my table, but if I ever need exactly that mini, boy will it be cool to have it!

I thought I'd put a link to the job opening here in the blog, in case some of you miniatures stalwarts might consider a change in career.

Get behind me, Satan! (Besides, I doubt you're looking for a crusty old grognard in that role ;-)

I just want to run this scenario by people and check my reasoning. If you have Freedom of Movement (hereafter, FoM) up, it shouldn't be possible for a monster to swallow you whole against your will, but I can think of cases where one might *want* to be swallowed whole, and so might allow it to happen. (Something like this happens in an early Adventure Path adventure I know of.) So, once you had been swallowed, is it safe to say that, due to FoM, you would not in fact be grappled, and so could (a) make normal attacks to the creature's GI system with any sort of weapon, not just light slashing and piercing weapons, and (b) could climb back into the creature's mouth whenever you wished?

And I assume that FoM would give one no protection against, for instance, any acid damage one was exposed to while swallowed.

For easy reference, here's the Swallow Whole rules from the PRD:

I'm trying to figure out how to understand the way harm works, and I'm confused about how to determine how much damage the spell does w/ respect to damage with and without a successful save. Imagine, for instance, that an 11th level caster casts the spell against a creature with 50 hp. How should the damage be calculated?

Interpretation 1: The amount of damage the caster threatens to do does not take the target's hp total into account. In this case, the 11th level caster threatens 110 points of damage if the creature fails its save, and 55 points if the creature saves successfully. Either way, the spell ends up doing 49 damage to the creature, leaving it with 1 hp.

This makes the save effectively pointless for creatures significantly weaker than the caster.

Interpretation 2: The amount of damage the caster threatens to do does take the target's hp total into account. In this case, the 11th level caster threatens 49 points of damage if the creature fails its save, and 24 points if the creature saves successfully.

In this case, the save matters, even for the weakest possible targets.

I don't see anything in the text of the spell that decides between the two interpretations. I suspect that the 2nd interpretation is intended, but I can't rule the first one out by RAW. Your thoughts?

Not to nitpick, but shouldn't the RPGSS 2015 forum show up on the RPGSS forum lists before RPGSS 2014?

Those all look great! And the fact that you did a small lizard gives me hope that some fair day you may reveal the long hoped-for (by me anyway) shocker lizard mini I've been waiting for all these years. But these look great in the meantime, and I'm always particularly happy to see female dwarves show up. Don't know why you always leave off their beards, though ;-)

I've got almost every volume in the adventure path series (Giantslayer being the only exception, and I'll get to that soon enough), and I'm a big fan of the adventure paths in general, but I feel like I have to say something about the books themselves. I can't tell you how many times at this point I've had these books start coming apart on me to some extent or other. In the mild cases, it's just a couple of pages. In the worst cases, the whole thing comes apart one page at a time. (In my experience Serpent's Skull is the worst offender, but it's not alone.) I'm gentle with my books and never treat them roughly, but I do expect to be able to have them lie open on the table sometimes (without pushing them absolutely flat, of course) so that I don't have to keep hands on them while I play. I'd say that of all my volumes, at least 20% have had some kind of issue of this sort. I generally think very highly of Paizo and its products, but this troubles me, and I'd like to have more confidence in the adventure path printings than I do. I generally prefer to be positive in my postings, but I'd like to know how widespread this problem is. Am I the only person who has this problem?

My party's getting ready to invade an enemy stronghold where all the critters can use telepathy to communicate with each other, which is going to make maintaining the element of surprise pretty difficult. I know that an anti-magic field will suppress telepathy, but is there anything else (short of unconsciousness and/or death) that will do it?

Barca’s Haven
==========
Barca Lubell makes a decent living carting exotic big game down to the duergar markets of Hagegraf, and then hunting deadly Darkland specimens to sell to Tymon's arenas or Daggermark's poisoners. Two years ago, while hunting in Nar-Voth, she stumbled upon a small grove of violet fungi in an easily-missed cavern that branched off a main tunnel route. With the fungi captured, she realized the cavern itself was just as valuable a discovery. It offered a perfect waypoint for her caravans and hunts below, and gave her hunting parties a safe shelter in otherwise inhospitable territory. She even occasionally auctions off her stock here to trusted Darklands merchants.

Barca’s recent foray in the region was successful; she and her crew subdued a rare tentamort, and she fortuitously caught a sneaky wimblewyrm trying to loot her jewel stash. They presently rest in their haven before carting these new acquisitions above.

The Ruined Hide-Out (CR 8)
==========
Hazard: As the party unknowingly passes near the entrance to Barca's haven, a tremor (Into the Darklands 12) strikes, merely rattling the adventurers but triggering a deadly series of events inside the cavern.

Inside Barca’s haven, the tremor causes a partial cave-in, pinning Barca and some of her crew under the rubble. The tremor also diverted a nearby stream, which now gushes through the cave walls and begins filling it with cold water. Worse, a massive rock seriously damaged the iron box that holds the tentamort, setting it free.

After the tremor, read the following:
As the shaking subsides, a loud crunch of falling rock sounds from nearby, coupled with the unexpected clang of stone crashing into metal. A dim purple glow now shines where there was only darkness a few moments before. Suddenly, screams and shouts of alarm, surprisingly in Common, ring from that direction.

If the party investigates, it discovers a side tunnel, now only partially covered by a thick curtain cunningly crafted to resemble the surrounding stone walls. Phosphorescent fungi coating the tunnel ceiling cause the purple glow. The shouts from within the tunnel increase, joined by a high-pitched, raspy screeching and the sound of gushing water. A female voice yells out, “Be careful, that thing is worth a fortune!” The tunnel slopes gently downward around a bend.

Trap: Barca rigged a tripwire to collapse a part of the cavern wall on anything that intrudes. The resulting collapse creates a 10-ft. square of difficult terrain and doubles the flow of water into the room.
Collapsing Wall Trap CR 5
Type mechanical; Perception DC 25; Disable Device DC 20
----- Effects -----
Trigger touch; Reset none
Effect Atk +15 melee (6d6); multiple targets (all targets in a 10-ft. square)

When the party enters the main chamber, read the following:
The tunnel opens into a larger cavern with a shallowly concave floor, its ceiling covered with the same glowing fungus; torches in sconces give additional light. Another wide exit gently climbs to the north. Water gushes from cracks in the eastern wall, filling a growing pool in the bottom of the cavern. Dust hangs in the air where the southern cave wall collapsed, and rubble is scattered across that region of the floor. Three human figures lie pinned under large piles of rocks; two seem unconscious, but one, a bloodied but determined woman, shouts orders at four men rushing around the debris. A large wheeled iron box lies partially buried under a rockpile, one upper corner showing a massive dent, and its door swings open on damaged hinges. A small iron cage rests on the ground a few feet from the advancing water.

The roof of the cavern varies between 10 and 15 ft. high.

When the party enters the chamber, water covers the area marked on the map. Every 2 rounds, the pool rises to the next marked contour, expanding by roughly 3 ft. (If the trap was triggered, the rise rate is one contour per round.) Once the water reaches a wall, it rises up the wall six inches per round. Once the water rises two feet, the pinned hunters and wimblewyrm are underwater and (if conscious) must begin holding their breath. Any square covered with water is difficult terrain. The water is very cold, and immersion in it causes 1d6 nonlethal damage per round.

Rules for digging out buried hunters can be found at CRB 415; each hunter is trapped under 1 ton of rock.

Creatures: The tentamort was set free when the rockfall damaged its prison, and it now lashes out in fury and hunger at the nearest moving target.

Three wimblewyrms are present. One, Carrax, is captive in the small iron cage. Two others, Sylobur and Thrint, have been following the hunters and awaiting an opportunity to free their companion. Wimblewyrm acid is useless against Carrax’s iron prison, and he now watches the water rising toward him with trepidation. He thrashes around his cage, begging in every language he knows for someone to unlock the door. Sylobur and Thrint watch from hidden perches in the cavern roof, hoping to take advantage of the chaos to engineer Carrax’s freedom, though they realize they probably can’t get Carrax out of his cage on their own.

Barca herself is torn between the urge to ensure her and her crew's survival and the powerful desire not to see her investment escape or be destroyed. She is desperate to free herself so she can set about recovering the situation. When she sees the adventurers enter the chamber, she immediately offers them a rich reward if they can help subdue the tentamort and rescue her team. If the PC's attack the tentamort with lethal force, she yells angrily and pleads with them to find a way to deal with the creature without killing it.

Four of Barca's hunters rush about frantically, some trying to free their pinned friends, some trying to fight off the tentamort. To Barca’s chagrin, they are less concerned with subduing the tentamort than with surviving the encounter.

Tentamort CR 4
XP 1,200
hp 39 (Bestiary 2 261)
Tactics The tentamort climbs to the ceiling and makes use of its reach to attack from above. It focuses its attacks first on the hunters who are moving around, and then on the pinned hunters. Anyone who injures it becomes a new primary target. If it falls below 15 hp, it seeks escape.

Wimblewyrm (3: Carrax, Sylobur, and Thrint) CR 5
XP 1,600 each
hp 45 (R3)
Tactics Carrax seeks survival above all, and focuses all his energy on obtaining rescue. Sylobur and Thrint begin the combat by using jumble stone to drop rocks from the ceiling on humanoid targets. (This also alerts Carrax to his comrades’ presence.) Afterward, Sylobur tries to dig up next to Carrax to help him if possible, while Thrint digs behind the east wall and increases the flow of water into the room; the water then rises one additional contour per round.
Carrax then shouts a shrill promise in Undercommon that if released, he will relieve the flooding in the room and save them all. The key is on Barca's belt, presently inaccessible, but the lock can be picked with a DC 30 Disable Device check. If freed, Carrax is sorely tempted simply to bolt for the exit. A DC 20 Diplomacy check is required to convince the wimblewyrm to keep its promise. If he decides to help, all three swiftly dig a tunnel to drain off the water from Barca's haven; after 2 rounds of burrowing, the water begins subsiding at the rate of one contour per 2 rounds. Otherwise, he simply burrows his way to freedom.

Barca Lubell CR 5
XP 1,600
hp 45, presently 34 (use Monster Hunter stats from GameMastery Guide 257)
Tactics Barca attempts each round to free herself (DC 25 Strength check). If she succeeds, she tries to subdue the tentamort. She abandons her prizes (and the cavern) only when all hope is lost.

Barca's Crew (4) CR 1
XP 400 each
hp 16 each (use Caravan Guard stats from GameMastery Guide 282)
Tactics One hunter tries to aid Barca in escaping the rockfall, while another begins digging out the easternmost pinned comrade. The other two hunters fight defensively against the tentamort, using nonlethal damage if possible unless one of them falls, at which point they switch to lethal.

Dressed in exotic finery, this willowy humanoid has smooth skin of jet black, a graceful and athletic frame, and a hairless head topped by a crown of softly glowing crystals that flash as it moves; its sharp-featured face shines with manic and sinister joy.

Coryphae CR 6 
XP 2,400
NE Medium Fey
Init +9; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision; Perception +14

----- Defense -----
AC 21, touch 21, flat-footed 10 (+5 Dex, +6 dodge)
hp 65 (10d6+30)
Fort +6, Ref +12, Will +8
Defensive Abilities cut in with care; DR 10/cold iron

----- Offense -----
Speed 30 ft.
Melee 2 claws +11 (1d4+1)
Special Attacks enchanting dance
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 10th; concentration +15)
Constant—feather step
At will—charm person (DC 16), dancing lights, ghost sound (DC 15, quickened 3/day), lesser confusion (DC 16)
1/day—suggestion (DC 18)

----- Statistics -----
Str 13, Dex 21, Con 16, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 21
Base Atk +5; CMB +15; CMD 22
Feats Agile Maneuvers, Dodge, Improved Initiative, Mobility, Quicken Spell-Like Ability
Skills Acrobatics +18, Escape Artist +18, Perception +14, Perform (dance) +18, Perform (sing or percussion) +18, Stealth +18
Languages Aklo, Undercommon
SQ elegant maneuvers, evasion

----- Ecology -----
Environment underground (Nar-Voth)
Organization solitary, troupe (2-6), or company (8-12)
Treasure standard

----- Special Abilities -----
Cut in with Care (Su) If a coryphae successfully claims someone as a dancing partner (see enchanting dance below), until the beginning of its next turn any attack roll made against the coryphae has a 50% chance of targeting its partner.
Elegant Maneuvers (Su) A coryphae adds its Charisma modifier to its attack rolls and CMB, and as a dodge bonus to its AC and CMD. If the coryphae moves less than 5 feet in a round, these bonuses are lost until it moves at least 5 feet.
Enchanting Dance (Su) As a full round action, a coryphae may move up to its movement speed while dancing and attempt one combat maneuver against a single target (Medium or smaller) within 5 feet of any square it moved through. Its movement provokes attacks of opportunity as normal, but its combat maneuver attempts do not. If the maneuver succeeds, it claims the target as its "dance partner", pulling her along with it as the coryphae incorporates its partner's movements into the dance. Both creatures gain the grappled condition. At the end of the coryphae's turn, the claimed partner takes 2d6 non-lethal damage from her buffeting in the frantic dance, and must succeed at a DC 15 Will save or take 1d3 Wisdom damage. If a claimed partner's Wisdom score drops to 0, she falls utterly under the coryphae's command as though she had succumbed to a dominate person spell (CL 10th).
An individual can be claimed by only one coryphae per round.

In the elegant, darkly beautiful Court of Ether, the coryphae (pronounced KOR-i-fay) entertain and protect the nymph-queen Frilogarma. They live to perfect their dance, honing their skills both for love of the craft and the better to serve their demanding mistress. Usually encountered in groups, stealthy coryphae often approach unnoticed; a sudden burst of frantic music is the only warning that the coryphae have arrived. They gracefully sweep enemies up in their unearthly frolic, bewitching the weak-willed and turning them to their dark Majesty's service. Coryphae of both genders especially favor attractive and charismatic "partners", though they will readily welcome to the dance anyone who threatens their queen, however homely and brutish. If unable to intervene against intruders, coryphae skulk in the shadows and await their chance, but willingly sacrifice themselves to prevent harm to their liege.

Shadde-Quah Shoanti Cliff Dwelling. Calphiak Mountains

I'm playing an air elementalist wizard who's about to hit Level 11 and have his first chance to take Fly-By Attack as a feat since he got the ability to cast fly at will. I've been planning all along to take Fly-By Attack, but now that I'm right on top of it, I'm wondering if it's going to be all that great. (And my DM hasn't made up his mind whether to let me take it anyway, but leave that to one side.) Does anyone have experience using that ability as a PC, and how big a deal was it for you?

My true love gave to me: a defending halberd +3!

Keyhole Stiletto
Aura moderate transmutation; CL 11th
Slot none; Price 23,282 gp; Weight 1 lb.
Description
This +1 adamantine ghost touch dagger is often used as a sort of punch to destroy the working of a lock or other mechanical device (and bestows a +2 to Disable Device checks when used for that purpose), but its true usefulness becomes evident when its wielder is confronted by force magic. The wielder of a keyhole stiletto can ignore armor bonuses granted by a force effect (like mage armor or bracers of armor), and once a day, upon use of its command word, the blade can be used to cut a single small hole in a force effect such as a wall of force or resilient sphere. The hole can be any shape, but the blade cannot cut a line longer than 3 feet.
Construction
Requirements Craft Magic Arms and Armor, disintegrate and plane shift; Cost 13,142 gp

I generally consider myself pretty knowledgeable about the world of prepainted fantasy minis, but I ran across one this week that has me stumped. On Ebay I've now stumbled onto two copies of a mini that's clearly the sculpt of the Huge Red Dragon from WotC's Giants of Legend set, and it's painted just like that mini too, but on the bottom it's stamped "Ashardalon, Red Dragon", and the set symbol is the same as for the Wrath of Ashardalon board game (a little White Plume Mountain). The plastic bag for the mini has Konami written on it, too. I'm just wondering whether any other mini collector out there has seen this thing before, and knows anything about its provenance. Anybody?

Hope to see mine next week!

I'm thinking of working up my own series of adventures, which I'd like to set in Golarion, and I'd like it to involve playing a group of mercenaries who have been hired to fight on one side of a relatively conventional (medieval/renaissance era) war. Where in Golarion is such a war most likely to be found?

I've never been happy with the "dazzled" status, which seems to me it does so little it might as well not exist. A -1 to hit and to sight-based Perception checks? Wooooo.
My suggestion: have it give a miss chance instead. Could be as small as a 10% chance, but that would be potentially worth bothering with. I'd also make it stack with other effects that give a miss chance, like blur or concealment in obscuring mist.
If ever Pathfinder 2.0 comes out, I at least would like to see this change, and I'm thinking of house-ruling it in the meantime. What do other people think? Am I missing some game design consideration that would make this a bad idea?

I've had this happen before and puzzled over it, but it happened again tonight when I played, and I'd like to know how other GM's handle it. It could be a situation where the bad guys manage to capture a PC or NPC and put a knife to his throat, or reversed, so the PC's have a knife to the throat of someone they've captured. If it comes to the point where either the captive wants to break free or the captor decides to slit the throat of the captive, how do you handle the mechanics?

Does it matter whether the captor or captive tries to act first? Is an initiative check in order, with any modifiers applied? If the captor can go first, does he roll a normal attack, or should it be considered a coup-de-grace? What if he decides to do non-lethal damage, any changes? How do the grapple rules fit in here? I can imagine multiple ways of doing this, and I'd like to hear what other people would do. Thanks!

I've loved this set so far, but I'd have to say that this is the reveal I've been least excited about. Of the three, I like the priestess the most; the distended belly is very creepy, and I can imagine using her in other contexts as any sort of creepy priestess giving ready to give birth to something Man Was Not Meant to Know. But the alchemist isn't quite working for me; he looks a bit cartoonish to my eye, and from the picture he looks stuck a bit between human and halfling. Maybe he'll look better in hand.
As for Lamashtu, I'm sure she'll have some big fans, but for me it's the sort of mini that will most likely never see the table, both because it'd have to be such a high-level encounter and because she's just not my cup of tea. But I don't begrudge other people some minis they'll love!

Edit this thing. It's not too late!

So the party I'm running KM for just got back to their capital after a round of adventuring only to encounter Grigori for the first time. Their first meeting was tons of fun -- the party barbarian got enthralled by Grigori's oratorical fireworks, and when Grigori noticed one of the party's archers climbing onto a rooftop with his bow out, he drew the crowd's attention to it and made that work for him too. And when the party paladin (also the new kingdom's ruler) tried to speak against him, Grigori mopped the floor with him.
So far so good. But THEN things take a surprising turn: Grigori is berating the party for their horrible leadership and the crowd is getting more and more worked up, when suddenly the paladin draws his sword. Yikes, battle, right? But no, he lays the sword down on the speakers' platform and announces that he is stepping down from his leadership position until his and his fellows' leadership can be put on trial in one week's time. At which point Grigori insists that he be allowed to speak at that trial and, once he has that assurance, gets the heck out of there since this is a better outcome than anything he could have ever imagined.
So that's where things presently stand: the kingdom suddenly without clear leadership, the possibility for major upset, including the leadership of the kingdom falling into the hands of GRIGORI of all people, and I'm trying to figure out where I'm going to take all of this. If the party tries to beat Grigori at his own game of oratory, they're almost certainly going to lose, badly. (No one in the party is even remotely built for social challenges.) But I'm thinking this could make for a really memorable plot arc: Have Grigori turn the townspeople against the party, and force the paladin to keep his promise to step down. Grigori then uses his persuasive abilities to set himself up as the new top dog, and then puts his new-found powers to work subtly padding his own pockets and weakening the state from within -- perhaps even making the party his own agents, if he can manage it. And the party would have to stand there watching it happen as he decided for them how the Kingdom turns would go. (Man, I get giddy just thinking about it.) Then, when the troll problem starts really heating up, and the townspeople are finally getting wise to what a horrible leader he is, he absconds with a substantial part of the treasury and considers his job well done, leaving the party to face the trolls and pick up the pieces.
I'd love to get some feedback on this, though. What other notions do you experienced KM DM's out there have?

It's going to be a while before my character can use it, but thinking ahead re: project image, imagine the following scenario:

I cast invisibility on myself. I follow it with project image. I then cast another invisibility spell on the projected image (which is ok since invisibility is another illusion spell. I then cast offensive spells through the image. Question: obviously the image loses its invisibility. What about me, the original caster? Am I now visible?

It's crystal clear that an Antimagic Field doesn't suppress some spell effects when they're already present -- wall of force and prismatic sphere get specifically called out as exceptions, for instance. Does that mean one can also *cast* a new wall of force spell inside of (or into) an antimagic field? Or is it only pre-existing spells of that sort that are safe?

I'm thinking my wizard is soon going to learn the resilient sphere spell (RS hereafter), and while I've read lots of threads that discuss this spell, I've got a bunch of questions I haven't found answers to. Which include:

1. Does sound pass through the sphere? If someone is trapped inside a RS, can people outside it hear him yelling? If the sphere blocks things from moving through it, why not sound waves?

2. If you cast the sphere inside a medium other than air, does it create a bubble of air inside it, or does it surround whatever other medium it was cast inside of along with the target it was cast at? For instance, is a RS cast inside water filled with water? A RS cast inside fog filled with fog? A RS cast inside lava filled with lava?

3. If the sphere is invisible like a wall of force is, what happens if something runs into it at speed? (Same question for Wall of Force, really.) For instance, if I readied an action to cast RS (or Wall of Force) just in front of a flying creature as it dove toward me, would it have a chance to avoid slamming into it? What would be the results of such a collision?

4. Can a single RS trap more than one creature inside it? Say I'm a 10th level caster and so can generate a 10' diameter sphere; If I aim it at an intersection on a grid which has 4 Medium or smaller creatures in the 4 spaces around the point, do they all have to make saves or be trapped?

5. If I cast the spell at an enemy who makes the save, does the spell fail to happen at all, or does the RS still come into being, with the target outside of it? Does it thus effectively deny anyone passage into the relevant squares, whatever else may happen?

Any responses people have to any of these questions would be most welcome. Thanks!

I'm just upgrading my familiar (thrush) to a lyrakien, and getting ready to invest in some 1st level wands. What are your favorite 1st level wands for familiars to use? Here's my short list of stuff I'm thinking of getting first:
-- Grease (making allies slippery and making foes flat-footed, even if they don't fall)
-- Speak w/ Animals (intel; otherwise our party has no access to it)
-- Faerie Fire (likewise, otherwise party has no access)
-- CLW (obviously)
-- Ill Omen (no save!)
-- Obscuring Mist (when I get Fly-by Attack at 11th level, this will be AWESOME!)
-- Prot. from Evil
-- Silent Image
-- Magic Missile (for when there's nothing else for her to do)

I know there are awesome higher-level spells out there I'll want to get eventually (invisibility at the top of the list), but I'm trying to keep it cheap for now. Any others you think I should really give a serious look to?

These are nice! Since I sell minis online, part of my interest in new ones is always mercenary, and I'm sure the raven (given its popularity as a familiar) and winter wolf will be very popular. (Nice that the wolf is uncommon, too!) The weasel, not so much, but it's still a nice mini, and I don't think there's anything out there already that's like it. (The Fiendish Dire Weasel in DDM is smaller and never really worked for me anyway, and the only other thing remotely close was the Fiendish Dire Wolverine, which also never really impressed me.)
I am a little surprised, though, that you guys did a raven when there's already one presently available through the Dungeon Crawler line. Though I think I'll prefer this sculpt a bit.

I have a suspicion I've seen magic items before that permit the wearer to see through fog and mist, but I can't remember where, and I've never seen an item that does *only* that. But I would really like my crafting air elementalist wizard to make an item that does exactly that, i.e. let him see through things like obscuring mist and fog cloud. (Once he's flying at will, when the situation allows for it I intend to whip up an obscuring mist in the air and then rain down death from above while the enemy can't see me.) So, the question: how much should a magic item cost that allows the wearer to see through mists? Assume it's a slotted Wondrous Item, probably eyes, head, or neck; I'm imagining I'll probably add the ability to eyes of the eagle or a necklace of adaptation. I'd also be interested in what level wizard spell people think it would be to make oneself able to see through mists for, say, 1 minute/level. Thoughts?

Just saw this in my inbox:

Coming Later This Month to Kickstarter!

Dwarven Forge Game Tiles II: Caverns – in pure Dwarvenite

We wanted to alert everyone to our upcoming Kickstarter project featuring our new Cavern set and Add-On Packs. The project will begin later this month, so start spreading the word now.

We will release a full preview in the coming days, and we would very much appreciate your support.

Best Regards,

Jeff Martin & Stefan Pokorny

I for one am very excited! I've been looking forward to this ever since the last DF Kickstarter, and I've been getting great use out of my dungeon set from their first Kickstarter.

Woot!

Am I right that, assuming one can find a caster with the spell and level, it should be possible to purchase a casting of Permanency for 450 gp, plus the additional cost of whichever spell was going to be made permanent (which casting one could probably do for oneself if he had the spell?) If that's true, it makes permanent spells a pretty good deal even at relatively low levels before casting permanency for oneself is possible. I just want to check and make sure I'm not missing something!

I'm playing an air elementalist who's starting to get high enough in level that he'll be flying at will soon (woot!), and I'd like to create a couple of buff spells for him that will affect his flying abilities in something like the way expeditious retreat affects his land speed. I've basically had two ideas so far, and I'd like input from other people as a check on my reasonableness.

Idea 1: Call it "Expeditious Flight". I'm thinking 2nd level transmutation, standard action, V and S, Target you, 1 min/level. It would boost fly speed by 30', and I'm thinking provide an addition to Fly skill as well, whether by improving your flight category a step or by a boost tied to caster level, either straight +1/caster level or half of that. And of course this would not give you a flight speed if you didn't have one, only increase a pre-existing one.

Idea 2: Call it "Jet". I'm thinking 2nd level evocation, swift action, S, Target you, instantaneous. It would produce a powerful blast of air that would push one forcefully 60' in any direction -- basically a poor man's dimension door, but with shorter range and requiring you to go through the intervening space. It might even carry the same disorienting effect as dimension door does, as you have to take a moment to get yourself under control when you arrive at the end of the movement. Must use the full movement, and take equivalent falling damage if you slam into anything solid. Not sure how it should interact with attacks of opportunity (for movement through threatened spaces) or with attempts to escape a grapple. I'm not sure this needs to require a fly speed; one could use it like a one-shot jetpack, though you risk falling damage if you don't have a way to get back down safely.

I'd welcome thoughts on these spells. Do they seem reasonable and not OP for the level?

There are a number of OOP Pathfinder items that I think Paizo could stand to reprint, but one of the most obvious and pressing, if you ask me, is the Harrow deck. (The Kingmaker map folio is another, but nevermind.) I'm sure I'm not the only person out there who discovered it too late, and now it's incredibly expensive to buy it online. That suggests strong demand to me, anyway, and I'm sure Paizo could sell another run. What are the chances we could see it?

My air elementalist just hit 5th level, so all of sudden he can levitate at will, and I'm finding this all sorts of fun. For our first encounter, I had my wizard levitating all the time, and the party ranger was pulling him around on a tether like a big wizard balloon. I just want to check and see if other people read the rules as permitting that sort of thing. Related question: Can I use mage hand to move myself laterally or pull myself toward something fixed? (On the assumption that if I can't pull the other thing toward me, I can pull me toward the other thing. And how much wind would it take to push a levitating person around? How far would a strong wind push him? I'd love to get some peoples' takes on this.

Am I the only person who's ever thought that a Pathfinder campaign would be a great topic for a live action TV show? I mean a presentation of a campaign itself, not gamers playing the game (although perhaps at points that outside reality could be obliquely referred to.) I'd love to see Paizo work with a solid TV production company to do a version of one of the Adventure Paths in particular, whether exactly as written or with changes so as not to spoil it for people who hadn't run it themselves. But I think it would work best to take one of the paths that hasn't been so popular, maybe even one of the few that hasn't been updated from 3.5 to Pathfinder, since that's probably going to get less play anyway. Looked at that way, Second Darkness would probably be best, since elves and drow would probably be sexy and a big draw for a lot of people anyway. But it seems to me that the episodic nature of TV would work brilliantly with TV, as would the large casts you'd need for lots of minor characters, and it wouldn't even necessarily be that big a deal if PC's had to be replaced along the way, just as PC's die and get replaced with a new character in a normal campaign anyway. I think the success of big fantasy films and shows like GoT shows that there's a market out there for high fantasy, and this could also be a great way to get new players into the game. They could run it with the iconics (and honestly, who doesn't want to see Seoni, Merisiel, Freya, and any number of other iconics as flesh and blood people?) or with brand new characters no one has heard of before. I'd be thrilled to watch a show like this. What do the rest of you think?

Wow, another nice entry! I'm particularly excited about the Gorilla King, who looks amazing, and the Charau-Ka, which has been hard to find a good sub for. As a great lover of the Mad Monkeys spell, I love the idea of the monkey swarm, but I'd like to see a little more color on it. (That might be a repaint for me.) But I like the other too, all of which aren't really like anything else that's already out there.

I've been searching the messageboards for clarification on the Air Elementalist wizard's 8th-level Cyclone power, specifically whether it moves with him once he's activated it, and I have found only one post that claims it doesn't move, but without offering an argument or justification drawn from the rules. So, my question: when an Air Elementalist creates a cyclone, does it stay centered on him as he moves? Or does it stay put, and if he then moves, he probably has to move through the cyclone himself? Does he get any say in the matter?

And for reference, here's the original text for the power:

Cyclone (Su):

At 8th level, you can create a vortex of turbulent wind around yourself as a standard action. This vortex has a radius of up to 10 feet and a maximum height of 10 feet per wizard level you possess. Any ranged attack passing through this vortex automatically misses. Any flying creature moving through the vortex must make a Fly skill check or immediately fall from the sky, taking falling damage (the creature cannot make a Fly check to reduce or negate this damage). Creatures on the ground cannot pass through the vortex without first making a Strength check. The DC of this check is equal to 10 + your caster level. The vortex is faintly visible and can be spotted with a DC 15 Perception skill check. You can use this ability for a number of rounds per day equal to your wizard level. These rounds do not need to be consecutive.

And while I'm at it, it looks to me like the wizard can control the radius and height of the cyclone, out to the maximum dimensions. So if he wants to make a 5' radius and 50' high cyclone, he can do that. Yes?

I'm presently playing a wizard (a 3rd level elf air elementalist, to be precise), and like all low-level wizards, I'm trying to figure out ways to keep myself useful and effective for long adventuring days when I have to make my spells stretch. I have some strategies I've been using, and others I'm considering and planning to use as I go up levels and get more resources, but I'm betting other people have figured out interesting approaches to this too. So I'm going to list some things I'm doing/might do, and hope other wizard-players out there can add to my list.

I'd appreciate people focusing on low-level play, too, since that's where the problem is the most acute, in my experience.

So, stuff I've actually been doing:

-- This is going to horrify the Treantmonk-style optimizers, but in the short-term, my elf wizard has been very archery focused. His first two feats have been Point Blank Shot and Precise Shot. One of the first cantrips he always had prepared was Launch Bolt (from the 3.5 Spell Compendium), and he went around zipping off crossbow bolts like crazy (and did lots of damage, too!) I didn't even buy a bow at 1st level, just bolts, and saved up for a mwk composite longbow, which was my first biggish purchase. I'm tempted to take an archery feat at 5th level too, Focused Shot to be specific (add INT bonus to damage with bows), but unlike the first two feats, which will work with weapon-like spells, Focused Shot is limited to bows, and I'm not sure I'm willing to accept that when I know that late-game I'll regret it. So far, though, I've been squeezing off a controller spell to open an important combat and then relying on my bow the rest of the time, and my character has been useful and relevant in every encounter. My mid-range goal is to get the air elementalist ability to fly at will at level 10, pick up Fly-By Attack at level 11, and then zip around from cover to cover either casting spells or taking shots. Death from above and whatnot.
-- I find my familiar a lot more helpful at keeping me relevant than a bonded item would be. My thrush familiar has turned out to be an incredible scout in low-level play (+18 Stealth, +10 Perception, flight, speech) and has made a huge difference in allowing us to plan well and stay a step ahead of bad guys. It's maybe not a round-to-round something-to-do sort of thing, but everyone in the party is glad to have my little bird around. In her own way, she's contributed as much as the party druid's combat-centered wolf. In some ways more.
-- Wands. I haven't bought any yet (not enough $$$ on hand), but the ones I've found I use all the time. Scrolls too; I try to make sure I have enough gp on hand to craft a scroll at the end of the day with some unused spell from the day.
-- Cantrips. I try to keep at least one cantrip prepared that I can make good use of in combat. That was launch bolt early on, now I tend to go to ghost sound.
-- I ended up as the party face. He's got a decent Charisma (he's middle-aged, and that boost to CHA made a 14 not too expensive in point-buy), my thrush gives a boost to Diplomacy, and I took a trait that gave a small bonus and makes Diplomacy a class skill for me, so he had a +10 to Diplomacy straight out of the gate at level 1, and he's helped out the party pretty reliably that way. including a couple of clutch natural 20's. That's not useful in combat, but he gets his point across with the bow pretty well too :-)
-- My DM and I haven't talked about 3.5 Reserve feats, but if he'll let me take one, that's obviously another way to stay relevant round-to-round in combat. I have mixed feelings about Reserve feats myself, though, having DM'ed a campaign where I allowed them, so I may decide not to use them. My present DM played a wizard that I allowed to take a Reserve feat in that campaign, so I can probably get him to allow it if I want. But I still have lots of Treantmonk-favorite feats to catch up on, anyway ;-)
-- Alchemical items. I haven't made any use of these -- my money has been going toward spells to round out my spellbook instead of to tanglefoot bags and alchemist's fire. I also find it hard to see how these items are more cost-effective to a wizard than scrolls of low-level spells. But if you can afford them or have access to a lot of them for some reason, I suppose they allow you to take some useful actions in combat when not casting spells.

So those have been my strategies to this point. I'd love to hear other people's strategies for constant wizard usefulness!

Here's a rules question about spells that one can preserve in being with concentration, potentially for a very long time. Do you have to be able to see them the whole time to concentrate on them? The specific case I have in mind is as follows: I have summon swarm prepared, and the party is about to enter a new room we're confident has baddies in it. We're pretty sure they don't know we're there yet. I'd like to start casting the spell (full round), have an ally open the door as the casting is completed, summon the swarm into the room, and close the door. Could I keep the swarm in being with closed door between us so long as I'm concentrating, or not? Does "duration: concentration" really mean "concentration and observation"? I haven't been able to locate anything in the RAW to decide it. And I imagine the issue also applies to other spells like illusions that can stick around as long as the caster concentrates. What do you think?

Imagine my shock when I realized that a wizard could use a mithral buckler or small shield without penalty, despite non-proficiency! (I know this is old news for some, but it blew me away.) The question, then, is what the difference is between the two. If I'm reading the rules correctly, the only advantage the light shield has over the buckler is that it can be used for bashing, right? Other than that, the buckler is cheaper, lighter, and can be used with a bow without getting in the way? Am I missing anything? Stacked up that way, it looks like the buckler is a much better option for a wizard, since any wizard who ends up in a situation where he needs to do shield-bashing is in pretty deep. So is there any reason to take a light shield over a buckler?

As my present character (a wizard) moves his way up the levels, for now there are a few skills I'm maxing out at every level, but I found myself wondering whether that's always a good idea, even for the skills my character depends on most. For instance, obviously as a wizard I'm maxing out Spellcraft. But at what point can I say, "Enough, I'll be able to make every check I might reasonably ever need to make"? For instance, if my main uses for Spellcraft will be crafting and identifying magical items and spells, it looks like there's not much point in having more than a +23 modifier for identifying spells (so I'd be guaranteed to identify a 9th-level spell being cast, a DC 24) or a +34 for identifying items (like a CL 20 item, a DC 35). Since most of the time identifying items is something you can take 10 on, really that means you need a +25 max. So, doing the math, I figure by the early teen levels I'll have the following modifiers when I identify an item: +3 Class skill, +2 elf, +5 Intelligence (I expect to have a 20 Int by then), +2 for the Headband I intend to have by then, so +12 before I factor in the actual ranks. So I figure I need 13 ranks in Spellcraft to cover all bases, and anything after that is a waste. (If I factor in the use of the identify spell, I can probably make the +23 for identifying spells my target, and stop at 11 ranks.)
On the other hand, if I were investing in skills like Stealth or Bluff, there isn't really a ceiling to the investment, since they're usually involved in opposed checks, and so you never know how high the other guy's check might go. So for those, it looks like you might want to max it out forever.
So my question: What, for you, are the caps you put on skills you take? When do you say "enough" for the skills you care about?

I like all three, but especially Paeta. Also makes me hope we'll see a dedicated aranea mini one of these days.

Omigosh, super cool! Some of them look much cooler next to other minis than they looked in the preview (especially the Seacat, I think). And I think there are a few in there that we haven't seen previewed yet? Hard to make out details, but still, very exciting!