Sepherum's page

Someone asked Gary Gygax what D&D was about, if not 'winning'(I myself remember people when I was growing up ask me re: roleplaying games "How do you WIN?"), he replied "Continued, successful participation."

I'm going to be at PaizoCon this year and I'm going to try and gauge the interest of doing a collaborative third party/fan-driven city for Pathfinder.

Huh. An event called "Secret Project Preview" by James Jacobs. I wonder what that's gonna be about.

A City Box Set of Absalom with an included adventure featuring much of the new content of Ultimate Intrigue. Just a guess.

Sepherum here-just a bump to say "Check out the Blight Kickstarter by Richard Pett and Frog God Games, it's a detailed city hardcover, includes an adventure and can be ordered in a Pathfinder version."

As soon as I get my next paycheck I'll support the Blight Kickstarter by Frog God Games. Can't resist me a cool-sounding city campaign. It's going to have more pages than the Slumbering Tsar even, with a fully detailed city and an adventure to Pathfinder L 10 (on the slow track, with accommodation for medium advancement if the DM wishes). I'm running the Sword of Air right now and it's a lot of fun. Hopefully this book will avoid the editorial errors I'm finding but it's no big deal. No reason Paizo can't do something like this. Spin-off soft covers, fan-generated content on zee interwebs, an AP separate but based in the city, ALSO an included adventure, each district of say, Absalom with a different author maybe. Oh, wait, am I repeating myself? Sorry for the necro thread!

Over 300 pages. At least one large poster map. Adventure to 13th level included. Pound, pound, pound. Who's with me?!?

I think we need to face that very fact. There's not a ton of Golarion lore incorporated into the game anyway-why wouldn't someone just start over with a new game?

Bluddwolf wrote:

As for the next step for this game, I'm afraid it's probably either a near complete start from scratch or just a shut down. If it's a shut down, I wouldn't expect another Pathfinder based PC game anytime in the distant future.

Not MMO. I don't think it will harm chances for Pathfinder cRPG much - unless it would have to rely on Kickstarter, then it might have problems. On the other hand I think that KS made by Obsidian for Pathfinder cRPG could still work - they have proven their capacity of handling kickstarter quite well. And with the current cooperation between Obsidian and Paizo, the Obsidian is the most realistic pick for Pathfinder cRPG.

I think the product differentiation aspect can be handled skillfully at next years'various cons. I mean that there is a new cRPG on the horizon that has nothing to do with the Pathfinder MMO; which could never shake the "unrestricted ganking" label. Even among my friends. Even after I spoke to them numerous times. Then an alpha test was presented as 'mvp' that people had to pay for and the 'war of towers' (which was what soured me). I think a Golarion-centered cRPG full of adventure and deep character creation will sell a million copies if it is presented from the beginning as having nothing to do with Pathfinder Online.

AvenaOats: I have long thought you had valuable things to say about perspective and playability, even the business model itself. But I think a cooperative game for Pathfinder ought to be based on online modules created by fans for a single player and/or party-based RPG. MMOs have hard sledding right now. I think that world-building features should be designed in conjunction with the peeps who make POS systems for restaurants. I'm serious. I once walked into a fine dining gig in downtown San Francisco and taught myself the Aloha system as I was bartending a busy restaurant. Command sequences that make sense to the average person, redundant screen popups and an intuitive interface so a neanderthal such as myself can make online Pathfinder adventures. Advanced users of course could shut off that stuff and make more refined inputs (outputs?).

Just checked out the City of Freeport by Green Ronin. Nice book. No reason Paizo can't do something similiar; using a slightly smaller font size they could add even more of an adventure in the last chapter.

By "APG" did you really mean "ACG"?

Oh, yeah. Too much coffee.

First off I aplogise if there are typos in this post, I'm working off my phone. That said, I would actually love to see a hardback Absalom with;

1) A more detailed look at its government structure, including at least names for all of the high council seats. This isn't the decimverate people, what those roles are and who fills them should be common knowledge in arguably the most important city in the inner sea.

2) A map with a scale that fits. People who've lurked these forums long enough should remember at least one thread where James had to chime in on the disparity in scale between the latest map and the first given population density at the time.

3) A working setup for doing arena fights in the Iorium, give us something to at least mold to our liking if not outright use to go along with that tasty morsel from the inner sea combat faction.

4) I seem to recall somewhere long ago a mention about a perhaps mythic Gyr. I would love to see this happen with a full stat write-up.

5) Maybe an adventure playing with the political shadow war to slake the thirst of our cloak & dagger / rp happy groups.

6) For that matter why not do a line of stand alone modules each to show off a diffrent section of the city. You started this once long ago. Did those two modules not sell well?

7) speaking of hangman's noose could be a great way to start in on a kingdom building / downtime heavy campaign where the players must rebuild precipice quarter and become it's council.

8) Wet our tongues some more about the starstone. Outside of a mythic snipit that well has been so dry for such a long time it's bleeding dire dust mite army units by now.

9) Give us army units for Absalom for people who want to stage a new siege of Absalom.

10) Full actual city stats for that matter, latest one is missing a population breakdown btw. Also, given that more and more new city qualities keep piping up, might be nice to give Absalom a unique one of its own.

11) Bust out with your Occult Mysteries and give us one or two...

...Right on. Myself, I would like to see an AP that began in Absalom in book I, then went plane-hopping to the strange places that never get any treatment for 4 modules, then came back to the City in book VI where the bozo who gave us the original mission betrays the PCs or somesuch.

I should mention that I took on the task of doing a massive city campaign myself in 2013-all of my own design. Complete with a large scale map, full history, over 130 locations fully detailed, npcs, monsters of my own design, guilds, political organizations, inns, businesses, shops, armories, street gangs and a sand box adventure with tons of side quests. For life reasons we had to stop after about 3 months but I will revisit it someday. It was great and a lot, I mean a LOT of work and it felt like homework every week as well. I would purchase such a product from Paizo especially in a heartbeat.

Sandpoint is pretty detailed. As are Korvosa and Magnimar. And by this time next year, Kintargo is gonna be pretty detailed. Westrcrown's pretty well covered as well.

A big hardcover book of a city would indeed be awesome, but fitting that into a schedule is tricksy.

Yeah Man I learned about your guys schedule this year at PaizoCon. Kinda brutal but worth it. I believe it would be a content-creating machine; with the different neighborhoods and people from all over Golarion coming for trade and whatever agendas. You could have a PFS season and a plane-hopping AP that begins and ends in the city. Instead of 'Pathfinder 2' we need an 'Ultimate Homebrew' packed with advice from the experts plus a bunch of home rule suggestions to help peeps sculpt their games; the rule suggestions could be requested and then refined instead of a playtest.

City State of the Invincible Overlord.

The first, and still great. Necromancer Games published a D&D 3.5 version of it (now at frogged games.com)

Yeah Bro I ran an epic adventure in 2nd ed City State years ago-it was the best campaign we ever did; lasted like 3 real-life years.

One problem that the Vigilante class has is the lack of a suitable milieu to exist in. I mean what every major gaming system has always had at some point: a fully detailed city. Not a gazetteer but a complete volume including a sand box adventure, tie-ins to other adventures, a website to submit home brewed modules, memorable npcs, a spin-off adventure path (not included of course) and appendices with urban specific spells, feats, new skill usages, a few monsters and a prestige class or two. Yep. A 120$ book. Here's where a Paizo staff member says, "Well, that's just not in our plans." It should be. Don't need a Bestiary 6. Definitely don't need a Pathfinder 2 (are you bozos insane?). You need Absalom: City of Ultimate Adventure.

I had a terrific first Paizocon. The highlight for me was (well, one highlight) in the RPG Design panel one of the guys looked at an empty bottle of cranberry juice on the table in front of him and started taking 'the cranberries of Golarion'thru development. Maybe there could be a food cart/vendor besides the coffee shop?

I can't wait for the actual game to start so I can (hopefully) see you thread-hijackin', post-jumpin', repeat-the-same-arguments-ad-nauseum bozos kill each other!

Hey, great map! Thanks, the color version is really useful!

EoX Hobs wrote:

That you, Nihimon, have taken it at face value without pursuing the source of its meaning among those who use it, even so far as to link our recruiting thread in your post so as to discredit me personally and The Empire of Xeilias by association, is quite possibly the lowest maneuver I have witnessed on these forums.

You're dancing around technicalities the same way Rawn did, and making a false appeal for Ryan to do the very thing he said he would not do as a means of trying to insulate your Guild from the consequences of your actions. It doesn't matter if you're an officer or not, what matters is that Keovar's post makes very clear that it is standard policy for Pax Aeternum members to vote for Pax Golgotha, and that your guild feels justified in doing so.

I supported Golgotha getting a Settlement in the Land Rush, vocally and sincerely, before this thread was made and again as soon as I saw this thread. I still support Golgotha getting a Settlement, because of my personal knowledge of the history of that group, and because of my personal respect for some of its leaders.

I had also ignored the fact that the OP and a later post by TEO ArchAnjel both linked to your involvement, because I didn't think it mattered, and it certainly wasn't worth fighting over.

What has me seriously concerned right now is Pax's decision to blatantly flaunt the fact that they're utterly ignoring Ryan's restrictions, a fact made very clear by Keovar's post above.

Dude, there are no 'restrictions'. Mr. Dancey stated that the behaviour was going to be allowed, he just wishes people wouldn't do it, as an example to others coming in. That sort of lame 'policy' actually encourages goonswarm-type bozos to take advantage while conscientious people refrain, imho. Because 1) It is allowed 2) There is a perceived material advantage to something allowed. GW declared a second landrush under new rules, NOT Pax or whomever. Now you're going to say 'Ryan has stated numerous times whatever is possible is not permissible.' But then GW is going to take the money. There are going to be grey areas in a pvp sandbox, fine. It is also clear that the first landrush was held too early and this is an attempt to cover for it. I don't recognize the legitimacy of saying-'Don't do this; but we'll take the money of people who do.'

The late Gary Gygax expressed it this way when some bozo asked what D&D was about if not 'winning'. "Continued, successful participation."

I don't see how a league of players with numbers, organization and focus-not to mention motivation-will 'just' be surrounded and destroyed no matter where they reside. Especially if they are active from the beginning; because structures will come before siege mechanics, player organizations before warfare mechanics, etc.

Sepherum wrote:

But I don't think of PFO as a 'commune' either.

I take it you also don't communicate well since it would be communistic, right?

Better dead than Red! Actually I was a member of ISO long ago. I hope there are social democracies in-game but I have a feeling it ain't gonna happen.

'Murder simulator' to me is a false flag argument. It assumes 'bandits kill, merchants die' when there will be competitive fights between the two. Don't know of many murder victims who knew it was coming-anyone going into such a hex would be forewarned and forearmed; thus generating jobs for guards, scouts, crafters, etc. There's not going to be much to do at first if you don't group up and pvp. I'm concerned about the game surviving until there is adventure, exploration and development. I like your idea for FFA PvP Zones not having exclusive resources if we indeed end up with them, and I don't think they would be among EE features either.

I urge everyone to try and reread this thread-okay, maybe a portion of it-with fresh eyes. The SAD mechanic is overly complex, clunky, and ripe for spoofs and abuse. Why wouldn't everyone work on a SAD feat/ability? Then the 'merchant' (or his guards) SADs the 'bandit'; which one goes off, whoever pushes the button first? Why wouldn't SADs be used between allies instead of trade? You SAD your ally, he accepts. You choose the stuff you wanted (obviously this exchange is set up beforehand) and he pays you later in a separate transaction. He also gets rep and perhaps influence. Wash, rinse, repeat. I don't see the point in introducing a mechanic that will result in endlessly chasing unintended uses in a game that's trying to avoid such abuse.

Sepherum wrote:

Does the merchant pass the mule on the way to town B? So now your merchant is once again unaffiliated (you said you had a settlement), there's no longer an army of alts (face it, you're not that popular) and there are no guards (which makes sense, their company kept disbanding).

I am confused by this and do not understand if you do not get the concept or if you are yanking Steelwing's chain.

Guilty as charged, Bro.

Sepherum wrote:

@ Nihimon: "worst imaginable implementation": Steelwing does that a lot.

Pointing out flaws in suggestions is now somehow bad?

Your suggestion was born out of wanting to limit SAD's I merely pointed out how people would use that to limit SAD's even further so it would end up that most cargo was being transported by unaffiliated mules.

This is exactly what happens in EVE. We use freighters that are part of the NPC corporations purely to avoid war decs. This enables us to run them around more or less risk free as long as we provide escorts for the low sec and null sec parts of the route.

I am not the one arguing for changes here it is you so don't lay this worst possible implementation thing at my door. You came up with a solution that is highly exploitable that shows your lack of foresight it says nothing about what I am arguing for whatsoever

In your answer to me you directly stated that a guard company could disband to avoid a feud-just like that!-and reform. If such a thing were indeed possible that would be terrible implementation of a game mechanic on GW's part. I believe that disbanding a Company (did you think one can do it in the middle of combat?) will have a number of consequences that can't be ignored: loss of influence, loss of control of storage, loss of funds, perhaps reputation, etc.

@ Nihimon: "worst imaginable implementation": Steelwing does that a lot.

The SAD mechanic should be scrapped. There, I said it. Complicated, clunky and ripe for spoofs and abuse. A venture company should have the option of declaring a one, two, or three day feud against a rival, spending influence, as normal. A single company can only initiatate one at a time. You can attack members, caravans and structures of sponsoring companies. Adventuring groups gain the hostility flags of all members. Just be careful of who you pal around with for the afternoon.

@Sepherum

read those dev blogs brother

Some might not be relevant to modern mechanics, but I think most are

I'm asking in what order they (tentatively) plan on implementing mechanics. For instance, they have said what will be in the MVP, but not whether rep will be there day one or how pvp is structured at the beginning.

Just to clarify, we will be working through these questions over the course of many months; there is no feasible way to hit them all and still continue working on the game. Also the best chance for you to get a question answered is to have several questions around a central theme. For example, this week we are doing an answer to the very first reply to my post as it asks several things about the same subject (divine magic). Those we can effectively answer and give enough hooks to put some good meaty answers on. Posting thirty questions on different topics does not give us enough hooks to answer any one question, so it they will have to wait until we do a lightning round.

Plus the first reply to your post was obviously the work of an unrecognized genius.

Does it really matter? They should just call it "Skill Training Distribution".

So, STDs? My Moms warned me about those Bludd.

The problem with "Goblin <part of anatomy>" is it doesn't stand on its own as any kind of explanation for what it does. PLEX is a Pilot's License EXtension. It makes sense for what it actually does. Your character in EVE is a spaceship pilot, and PLEX let you fly your ships longer.

Or maybe it's not a problem. Maybe it's evolution. Then again we could go with TANRGT. These Are Not Real Goblins' Teeth.

Seems to be alot of questions about clerics/divine spells and related stuff. Devs, take heed! They are going to be in the MVP and should get some public love!

Sepherum wrote:

I myself believe that barbarian, rogue, evil cleric and necromantic training should be available to CE, low-rep characters through tier 3. That would impede the planned use of alignment/rep as anti-griefing tools, I know. But that only people of High Reputation are the ones who can teach the most effective ways to go into a homicidal rage, stab someone in the kidney or call upon the powers of Hell doesn't make sense to me. If your reputation number is a product of whether you engage in griefing or not, so be it; let it effect both your alignment and rep. But I don't think a LE character should get a rep hit for creating undead; he/she is supposed to do that. If I cast Shriveling on a paladin in meaningful pvp, giving him a virulent disease that could spread to his party members, then yeah, it should move me towards evil-I'm probably already there. But why would the use of an evil/necromantic spell hurt my reputation? I'm evil-I'm supposed to shrivel bozos.

I haven't ever seen them say that doing evil things like assassination or necromancy will hurt rep. They can give the Heinous flag, which allows people to PvP you without rep or alignment consequences, but they won't negatively affect your rep unless you are also doing rep-lowering activities (i.e. free PvP).

Thanks for the clarification. Can't say I'm a huge fan of the Heinous flag but it does seem to have a place in tt and River Kingdoms lore. It seems a CE organization with a moderate rep requirement could be viable if you can stand griefers banging on the gates- "hey, let me in, I can change!"

Sepherum wrote:

Banesama wrote:

To clarify, CE with low rep will suck. CE with moderate to high rep, yet to see.

I hope it is possible to play CE without low rep. But the devs have consistently said, "We wish you luck."

For what it's worth, Giorgo recently brought this to my attention:

Lee Hammock (Goblinworks Blog: Screaming for Vengeance) wrote:

If you have a town full of CE people who are bloodthirsty barbarians who don't do a lot of griefing but instead are declaring war all the time, they can totally have a high Reputation, max level Barbarian trainer, etc...

I think they've been pretty consistent in saying "it will be possible to be a non-jerk CE, but we expect most CE folks will just be jerks".

That post is over a year old. As usual, read the entire bullet point and you get the sense that it's possible to have a high rep CE settlement but unlikely. I myself believe that barbarian, rogue, evil cleric and necromantic training should be available to CE, low-rep characters through tier 3. That would impede the planned use of alignment/rep as anti-griefing tools, I know. But that only people of High Reputation are the ones who can teach the most effective ways to go into a homicidal rage, stab someone in the kidney or call upon the powers of Hell doesn't make sense to me. If your reputation number is a product of whether you engage in griefing or not, so be it; let it effect both your alignment and rep. But I don't think a LE character should get a rep hit for creating undead; he/she is supposed to do that. If I cast Shriveling on a paladin in meaningful pvp, giving him a virulent disease that could spread to his party members, then yeah, it should move me towards evil-I'm probably already there. But why would the use of an evil/necromantic spell hurt my reputation? I'm evil-I'm supposed to shrivel bozos.

I don't think I'm alone in wanting some more details about divine magic and abilities. Is channeling (positive/negative) in store for the MVP? Do clerics have cantrips/orisons? Are all cleric abilities/spells/expendables tied to the holy symbol or just deity/alignment dependent ones? Luv ya, Sepherum

Yeah, I'd also like to send a shout out to Nightdrifter for the numbers-crunching, Harad Navar for the maps, Nihimon for the info, that artist guy for the UI symbols and everybody who ever posted a cool link for this lazy bozo-me-to enjoy the runup to the game more fully. You peeps are the cat's meow, the bees knees, da best.

Hey I just wanted to throw out a few ideas and was afraid that they would get lost because of the recent toxicity of the forums (one locked and another in danger of being locked). Please don't use this thread to start blaming who got toxic first. Many of the people arguing have, in the past, actually agreed, debated in a non-insulting manner, apologized to each other, and apparently PM'd and spoken amiably on TeamSpeak. Ok, so, here they are.
If you get killed and looted you become unflagged (immune) to pvp (not pve) for 10 minutes. The timer would start from when you retrieve your husk. You lose this immunity if you gain the Attacker, Criminal or Heinous flags and take a rep hit for doing so. You also lose it if you are rezzed by another player. Why 10 min? I think I read somewhere that it takes about that long to move across a hex. I don't think you could use this immunity to gather a bunch of immunes together for an attack/mission; they would have to heal, regain Power, refresh abilities and grab some new equipment. Also in any case when a bunch of bozos that you don't know or trust (you can see their rep) are starting to form you should be taking action no matter what anyway (running away, calling allies, prepare for pvp). This would make corpse camping extremely difficult.
Make starter/tutorial areas not just high-rep loss, Marshall patrolled, etc., but pvp FREE. These areas would be small. They can be supported by Pathfinder lore; this is Iomedae's Sanctuary, this place is under the Edict of Compliance by Asmodeus, Prince of Law, etc. This immunity could have a threshold determined by Goblinworks if they don't want players with some skills and achievements using the area as a completely safe place to run to. I know they don't ever want a player to feel completely safe as part of the overall plan, but, reconsider: a small spot where the newest of the newbies can learn game mechanics without being ganked. This is where you could allow duels which I know they also don't want.
Lairs, instanced or not, out in Wilderness hexes with treasure chests, monster guardians and consequence-free pvp. You'd know what you're getting into and it might be a blast. And there could still be the lairs that go under the normal rules as well.
And what else?

For the vey reason that Goblinworks can't control the use of cell phones, smart phones, email, PMing, Ventrilo, TeamSpeak, etc. out of game why shouldn't they offer their own metagame communication? As a game feature? You know, like a business. So let me get this straight, peeps are saying "Well, if you think metagame communication is an unfair advantage get it yourself"; but if PFO offers it it's immersion breaking? Gimme a break.

My main, my DT and the chartered company myself and my friends will form will be LE. This seems as good a place as any to state that more and more I'm coming around to the view of Proxima Sin: If I choose a character and my core alignment is Chaotic Evil, why does the mechanical anvil fall on my head when I haven't done anything? I presume I would start with a 1000 reputation like anyone else-why is it assumed I will immediately start RPKing and following around people making real world insults? If I'm a CE Barbarian raider-a role which should be completely supported and would generate a lot of fun content-I don't expect to stroll into Fort Riverwatch and buy a Cinnabun but why would the training at my warcamp be any worse? I don't expect the barbarian horde to have a settlement with high DI structures-that makes sense-but I am saying that training for low rep evil characters shouldn't be less powerful or harder to get, it should be different. So, yes, it should be difficult or impossible for our CE raider to go get Fighter or Wizard training based on his low rep, but rage powers? Fiendish sorcerous bloodline powers? Negative energy channeling? Sneak attack training at Thornkeep? I gotta raise my reputation to get those? A CE player expects to travel to dangerous places to learn dark secrets, and understands he/she will never be welcome at Brighthaven. I realize a CE character will engage in unsanctioned pvp; probably hoping for some nice loot; and I understand that by their very nature griefers will probably end up CE with reputations of -5500 or worse, but that someone who roles a CE character is automatically a griefer who will commit actions that will cut them off from npc settlements at -2500, who made that rule? Heck, you could just worship Rovagug, declare a feud against a good chartered company and start the killin'. Completely under the rules.

I don't think it's useful to single out developer statements, even rather definitive ones, and build a pyramid of (usually negative) speculation on them and get a little hysterical. Ryan Dancey, Stephen Cheney and Tork Shaw do not have the time to write a two page essay defending/explaining everything they say. They're, you knowing, talking. Like everybody else. What we don't need is "Ryan Dancey said the word 'drift!' Aaaaaaaah! I'm confused!" " Ryan Dancey said the only thing LE mercenaries are going to do is kill CE characters! Aaaaaaah! Kids, relax. PFO is going to be a complex game above and beyond even moving, building, crafting, fighting. Carefully consider developer statements in the fullness of the plan they have been honest about from the start; you know, context.
Now can there be LG low rep characters and CE high rep ones? Probably not. But reputation and alignment are going to be numerical values sitting right in front of you that can be managed. A paladin with a +7500 rep could just really kill anyone with impunity and the repercussions would not be crippling. Could he/she go on a murder spree? No. In the same way a CE character can kill a target just hoping for juicy loot or because of a personal vendetta, more willing to take more of a rep hit. Does he/she have to go on a murder spree, kill new players, etc.? No. His/her reputation could be something like -1500 and I'd still welcome 'em into my secret cult. They have their uses and it's how they want to play. You can roleplay CE without your rep going into the absolute gutter.
A final observation. Feuds, factional conflict, wars, killing people with murder stacks or the Heinous Flag, etc. is sanctioned pvp. Not calling it that is nonsense.

Just exactly what are we afraid of here? A large swarm of Open Enrollment Goons? I know that many are concerned about the relatively level power curve that is supposed to be present in-game-that a bunch of organized bozos can quickly train enough combat skill, don some inexpensive gear and then, I guess, overwhelm us with numbers. What happens when we hit 'em with 'relatively level' fireballs? They quickly train fire resistance? What happens when we heal ourselves? They quickly train to do the same? We'll have settlements, fortresses and watch towers already in place. They'll quickly train siege weapon expertise? This is not EVE, a bunch of crappy ships can't permanently destroy an expensive capital vessel; they can respawn to rejoin the fight but so can we.
Instead, if the worry is large well organized groups importing and playing the settlement/player nation/alliance/warfare game, complete with out of game communication, isn't that Pathfinder Online? The formational combat as described so far for PFO is a rather novel idea; that some army is going to suddenly show up and whip, say, Golgotha? I just don't see it. If there is a proposal to put aside differences and unite to destroy any entity that's going to ruin everybody's fun I'm all for it, just don't pretend that any commitment to answer such an SOS in force is anything less than an actual alliance. I also think it's a little early to be deciding who's going to play Leonidas.
And finally, I'm not scared of any invader. If they're dumb enough to stumble upon the Temple to our Dark Lord they'll regret it.-Sepherum

What some friends and I noticed is that while there are many proposed lawful/good/neutral companies and settlements (and historically there have been plenty of conflicts between such entities-enough to provide all sorts of content), there doesn't seem to be an idea for an evil cult for people so inclined to join. While the development of an entire settlement as such may be a bit ambitious (and Shadowhaven may have that covered anyway), we certainly intend to build an isolated, protected shrine where evil clerics can get training and evil characters can get affliction removal and healing and perhaps make their nefarious plans.
I've never quite understood the endless arguments over alignment and reputation. It seems to me one can roleplay evil (even chaotic evil) without griefing; certainly griefers will not be welcome in the Inquisition. The delineation of roleplaying your character and griefing seems to me to be simple. You can roleplay evil without corpse camping. You can roleplay evil without killing newbies over and over. You can roleplay evil without making racist, sexist, etc. comments. You can manage your reputation so you can take out particularly juicy targets for loot without RPKing. You can declare feuds and wars against good-aligned organizations. You can join evil factions. You can commit assasinations under the rules or try to spy and infiltrate. There is a difference between having fun and generating content and the actual griefers who certainly will be CE, low-rep and that we all want to sweep from the game.

Name: Inquisition of the Midnight Lord
Purpose: To pursue the dark and inscrutable goals of the Dark Prince Zon-Kuthon
Alignments: LE,NE,CE
In game goals: To establish hideouts from the beginning of EE; to blend into other societies and organizations; to build a shrine and/or watchtower by any means necessary before OE; eventually to create a settlement similiar to Nidal with an Umbral Court-like organization; to spread the blessed suffering of Zon-Kuthon throughout the River Kingdoms; and to role-play evil under the rules of Pathfinder Online.
All roles welcome.
Please PM Sepherum or feel free to email me at elcolachi@netscape.net to gage interest in my concept. Thanks, Sepherum

Summoner and Witch. Both classes that will never see PFO. Even if it's successful, there's just so many other things for the devs to do. Creating the eidolon is a lot of fun and offers different playstyles. The Witch always has options in any combat. To me, a minion such as the eidolon or animal companion are such force multipliers that there would be restrictions on what else you could slot along with them for game balance. Or they would be severely nerfed, which would make them useless anyway. Perhaps the Druid only could have a summon ability good for a couple times a day and then if you concentrated on refresh abilities for it you could have a sort of 'beastmaster'.

Please Goblinworks, I know this is the wrong thread, but give us some sweet sweet news about how Divine Magic is coming. We're begging for it! You got two weeks...

I was going to post a serious response to some of you bozos but I found my argument diluted somewhat by using the term 'Goblin Balls'. We need some new definitions around here-especially for those of us who never played Eve (MTX? Plex? Flux? Rex?). When Lord Sepherum reaches the depths of the Caves of Eternal Peril, proudly displaying his 20 'merit badges', perhaps the black dragon will just die laughing.

So, now we discard the initial choice of faction as trivial, as well as the roleplaying element? Trivial, as in, choosing to be a bandit, crafting or merchant archetype? You can choose a faction-or not. You can leave a faction. You can betray the other PCs in your faction. You can choose whether you're just going to defend against factional foes or be more gung-ho. The timing and execution of these choices, like all meaningful ones in game, should be based on your actual alignment and rep score and what you care to absorb/improve. Are peeps campaigning for no factional warfare for anyone 'cause it didn't make their Christmas list? Making choices mindful of alignment and especially reputation is the grief mitigation component of the entire system.

I do not believe the roleplaying value of factional warfare can be so cavalierly discarded. The competition between the Pathfinder Society and the Aspis Consortium throughout Golarion is a great source of conflict and adventure. Remember, for many Pathfinder fans, this will be their introduction to pvp, in an mmo, for the first time. It will serve as practice for later organizational warefare, without need for a 'red vs. blue' system. The factional warfare described is absolutely integrated into the rest of the game world. When factions fight, you will sell them consummables, weapons, armor and magic items. You will serve as guards and mercenaries in their battles and raids. You will offer them scouting and intelligence for a fee. You will manipulate them in diplomacy and ally with them in war. I'm going to join the Hellknight faction asap myself-can't wait.

I said this somewhere else but it bears repeating: Myself and my friends who play mmos always (I don't know the real reason or how it started) compare the monthly sub to going out to the movies. I can't speak for other places in the U.S., but here in Cally 15$ won't buy a single adult ticket plus a small popcorn. That'd be 17 bucks at my local multiplex in San Fran. Double that, take your significant other and maybe a bozo gets laid for once. My point is this. I don't mind the cash shop; if you can buy, with real world money, a building or item that is the equivalent of the highest crafters/builders, who is going to dedicate the countless RW hours to become a Great crafter/builder?