Trialbyfireent's page

Why post about a sale the day after it expires???

I narrowly missed the 15% holiday promo for 2023, how often do these promotional codes happen? Does anyone know a way to get an out of season coupon maybe through an app or partner website?

It's one of those words like "racketeering" or "ironic." Only 5% of the population knows and/or uses them in the correct context, so it winds up in a lot of places where it doesn't belong. I'm a jewelry department supervisor professionally, so I might have more exposure to this particular word's misuse than others.

Loki_Thief wrote:

Please, for the love of Cayden, don't be that person!

No, not Cayden. If by some strange twist of fate I'm not in the Top 32, I'll just ask myself...What Would Calistria Do? And then I'll --

Or maybe that's not such a good idea. On second thought, let's go with What Shelyn Would Do.

I think either one would probably do sex to people. Happy middle-ground?

One thing to keep in mind, is that the VAST majority of the time a parry done by someone with proficiency in the weapon isn't going to cause any damage to either weapon involved.

It's either going to be a hardline block at a very sturdy part of the ricasso, or it's going to be a deflection of sorts, wherein the blade channels the force in a different direction rather than absorb it.

There's a reason Sunder is its own separate option, and that's because skillful use simply does not break weapons unless the other guy is deliberately trying to break it.

That's true. AND in this ruleset, most weapons will never penetrate the other's hardness. But rarely, they will, and the blade will wear down and need tending.

Logically, no. Logically, there shouldn't be magic either and dragons shouldn't be able to fly.

And as long as raise dead and the like exist, PCs WILL be immortal. I can see a niche group enjoying this, but not a wide subset of people.

Also, wouldn't the parry rules just result in parry offs between intelligent creatures? While it might be logical, it doesn't sound that fun.

Raising the dead takes an incredibly valuable diamond, and usually there are a very finite amount of those available.

As for parry, ultimately for one to occur some creature needs to take the lead and attack. You see parry-offs in every fantasy genre. Blades blocking blades. I'm not really sure why you think rolling dice to achieve an action would be any less fun than the thing they do already... rolling dice to achieve an action. I'm just trying to lay down a numeric precedent and guideline for an action that the book pretty much states cannot be taken, even though it seems like common sense to any fantasy fan.

If armour takes damage, shouldn't the weapons hitting it as well? I think, logically, slamming a rapier into a steel shield, or plate armour is likely to damage the rapier more. Also, differing types of damage will effect different types and materials of armour differently.

Personally I despise equipment maintenance mechanics, but if you're going to drag that millstone, you may as well drag the whole thing.

That's a good point. I'm a little embarrassed I didn't include that on my own. I'll have to amend the damage change.

Thank you.

It seems to me that this would make for very short lived PCs.

Not if they play smart, but that really is the kind of angle I was going for. As the system sits PCs are nearly immortal, and the simple truth is there should never be any amount of battle experience that makes your flesh more resilient than the armor around it.

Are you sure you really want to play PF? Wouldn't you be better off picking a different game system, that's closer to the game style you're looking for?

Because Pathfinder is the best system I know of. But being the best doesn't make it flawless. I've been playing it for years. Just fixing things. If I didn't know I want to play it I wouldn't.

Also, this really doesn't seem like it counts as feedback. Not to be snarky, just commenting.

Just posting some house rules I am experimenting with. If anyone has ideas or criticisms I'd love to hear them. Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy or perhaps even feel inspired, but please do leave me feedback on these.

Pathfinder House Rules 1.1

These rules changes to the Pathfinder RPG by Paizo are an attempt to rectify some logical problems in the game’s engine. The detailed rules change is accompanied with a brief explanation of the reasoning behind it. The following is a brief summary of all changes presented herein:

-Lethal damage causes bleeding wounds.
-Combat Maneuvers can be made in conjunction with attacks.
-Fortitude, Reflex, and Will are fixed values like Armor Class or CMD. In addition, a new Technical Maneuver Defense (TMD) is added to be measured against Demoralize and Feint.
-Missed attacks may still do damage to a creature’s armor or shield. Natural armor does not fully protect against attacks.
-Diseases roll against a fixed Fortitude, and make their host sickened.
-Some feats have been changed due to the removal of Attacks of Opportunity and the changes to Hit Points.
-A spell caster makes a focus roll against fixed Fortitude, Reflex, and Will for every spell that would normally allow a save.
-Hit Points calculation has been dramatically changed, making health much more dependent on size, and giving Hit Dice much less weight.
-Melee attack rolls are modified by Dexterity, and all attack rolls must exceed armor class to hit, rather than match.
-You can attempt to parry enemy attacks when fighting defensively, or using total defense.
-Poison rolls against a fixed Fortitude, but unerringly deals at least its minimum damage.
-Attacks of Opportunity have been removed in favor of an immediate action each round called a Reaction, which can be used for many things.
-Creatures of each size have unique strength benchmarks which determine what size of weapon they can wield and how.

Bleed
Wounds bleed. A weapon doesn’t need a special magical enhancement to nick an artery. The simple fact is combat is deadly dangerous. Getting cut, stabbed or beaten is something the layman avoids for very good reason.

Light Bleeding: Any creature with blood who is dealt lethal damage of 2 or less from a bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing source begins bleeding for 1 hit point every minute at the beginning of their turn. Each time this bleed damage would be dealt the creature makes a Constitution check against DC 5. If they succeed, the bleed damage is not dealt and the bleed stops. This effect can apply more than once. As an action that takes 2 full rounds, the Heal Skill can be used against a DC 5 to staunch one instance of light bleeding. Any magical healing staunches all light bleeding.

Heavy Bleeding: Any creature with blood who is dealt lethal damage of 3 or more from a bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing source begins bleeding for 1 hit point every round at the beginning of their turn. Each time this bleed damage would be dealt the creature makes a Constitution check against DC 15. If they succeed, the bleed damage is not dealt and the bleed stops. This effect can occur more than once. As an action that takes 1 full round, a creature with a healer’s kit can use the Heal Skill against a DC 20 to staunch one instance of heavy bleeding. Any magical healing of 5 or more from a single source staunches all heavy and light bleeding.

Critical Bleeding: Any creature with blood who is dealt lethal damage with a critical hit from a bludgeoning, piercing, or slashing source begins bleeding for 1d2+1 hit points every round at the beginning of their turn. This effect can only occur once. A creature afflicted with critical bleeding cannot stabilize when dying normally. As an action that takes 2 full rounds a creature with an open healer’s kit and someone aiding them can use the Heal Skill against a DC 25 to staunch one instance of critical bleeding. Any magical healing of 10 or more from a single source staunches all critical bleeding.

Apply Pressure: Any creature can make a Heal Skill check against DC 15 as a standard action to initiate staunching pressure. Once this pressure is initiated, it can be maintained as a move action each turn. Successfully applying pressure to a light or heavy bleed causes it do deal damage only half as often (though you still make constitution checks to stop the bleeding at normal intervals). Applying pressure to a critical bleed reduces the damage it deals to 1 every round.

Combat Maneuvers
Some varieties of attacks do other things too. Chopping at a person’s legs with a huge sword certainly isn’t as damaging as hitting a more central area, but it might knock them over. Furthermore, some actions should not be measured against a creatures combat presence, but rather its mental presence.

Combat maneuvers can be made as a part of other actions, usually with some cost to the action. Some maneuvers have new restrictions or oppositions.

Bull Rush: You can make a bull rush as part of any charge attack with a bludgeoning weapon that meets or exceeds your target’s touch AC.

Demoralize: You can attempt to demoralize an opponent as part of any non-withdrawal double move, any coup de grace, or any attack action or casting of a spell by taking a -2 to all attacks or focus rolls in that action. Whenever you fail to demoralize an opponent, that creature is immune to your intimidation for 24 hours. Demoralize now requires rolling against a creature’s Technical Maneuver Defense (TMD). Any conditional effects that add to Will vs. Fear also add to TMD against Demoralize.

Dirty Trick: Dirty Trick is unchanged.

Disarm: You can attempt to disarm an opponent whenever your parry roll stops an opponent’s attack, or whenever you maintain a grapple instead of a normal grapple action. You can also attempt to disarm and overrun someone at the same time, though both maneuvers are made at a -2 penalty.

Drag: Drag is unchanged.

Grapple: When attempting to grapple, you must first make a touch attack roll against the target. You can attempt to grapple an opponent whenever your parry roll stops an opponent’s attack. You can also attempt to grapple when making a claw, slam, tentacle, or unarmed attack, but if you do so the grapple check is made at a -2 penalty and the attack only deals half of its normal damage.

Overrun: You can attempt to overrun an opponent and disarm or steal from them at the same time, though both maneuvers are made at a -2 penalty.

Sunder: Any weapon attack that misses an opponent but exceeds their touch AC may still damage their armor, shield. See the Damage changes for full details.

Steal: You can steal items whenever you successfully maintain a grapple

Trip: When attempting to trip, you must first make a touch attack. You can also attempt to trip an opponent as part of any attack, but if you do so the trip maneuver roll is made at a -2 penalty and the attack only deals half of its normal damage.

Feint: Feint now requires rolling against a creature’s Technical Maneuver Defense.

Critical Threats and Hits
Once a person is very adept at attacking, he knows how to sink a kill against an exposed opponent. While it is true some weapons are more efficient at this, they don’t have a draconian hierarchy. Striking a vital spot is more dependent on personal talent than weapon wielded.

Weapons no longer have distinct threat ranges. Any attack, focus, disease, or poison roll that exceeds the target defense by 10 or more is a critical threat, though these still require a confirmation roll. Weapons with higher threat ranges lower this threshold, with 19-20 requiring an excess of 9 to threaten, 18-20 requiring an excess of 8 to threaten, and so on.

Damage
Armor stops incoming attacks. It takes a beating. Eventually everything falls into disrepair. That’s why it needs mending and maintaining.

Attacks Hitting Armor: Whenever an attack roll misses, if it exceeded the defender’s touch AC without armor or shield bonuses, it still deals damage to their armor or shield (Choose which randomly). This is considered a sunder attack.

Attacks Hitting Natural Armor: Whenever an attack roll misses, if it exceeded the defender’s touch AC with their armor and shield bonuses, it still deals half of its minimum damage to the defender.

Defenses
Why are offensive attacks rolled, but only some offensive spells are? This is one of the few things 4th Edition D&D got right. The burden to roll should always be on the attacker. Furthermore, because attacks and damage are of a much deadlier nature in this system, a defense must always be exceeded to constitute a hit. This makes damage 5% less likely on the d20, and an average of 10-12% less likely in the case of most balanced level attacks given the hit spread of enemies at equal CR.

Fortitude, Reflex, and Will are no longer rolled to resist spells. They are simply static defenses calculated like armor class, adding 10 and all relevant modifiers. Any effects these saving throws used to be made against now make rolls of their own, with a bonus equal to their listed save DC minus 10.

Creatures also have a technical maneuver defense (10 + ½ HD + Int, Wis, and Cha Mod) that demoralize and feint attacks are now rolled against. Any conditional modifiers that add to Will vs. Fear also add to TMD against Demoralize.

Armor Class, CMD, TMD, Fortitude, Reflex, and Will must be EXCEEDED for success, not just matched.

Disease
Being sick makes you, well… sick. Also because fortitude is fixed, the bacteria have to roll now. Lazy bacteria, get off your microscopic butts!

Diseases roll against the Fortitude defense with a bonus equal to their listed save DC minus 10. A creature with any damage or effects from disease is sickened.

Feats Changed
Some rules have shifted, and some feats needed to be changed in order to compensate for the differing paradigm. Since a major logical problem in the original engine was precision vs. power, it must be kept impossible to stack the two in the same statistic or ability score, except for magical enhancement of course.

Combat Reflexes
Prerequisites: Character Level 6th, Dex 15, Int or Wis 13
Benefit: You gain a 2nd reaction each round. If you have already used a reaction to cast a spell in a round, you can only cast spells at least 4 levels below the highest level you are capable of casting.
Normal: Non-staggered creatures only have 1 reaction each round.

Improved Combat Reflexes
Prerequisites: Character Level 11th, Combat Reflexes
Benefit: You gain a 3rd reaction each round. If you have already used reactions to cast two spells in a round, you can only cast spells at least 6 levels below the highest level you are capable of casting.
Normal: Non-staggered creatures only have 1 reaction each round.

Greater Combat Reflexes
Prerequisites: Character Level 16th, Improved Combat Reflexes
Benefit: You gain a 4th reaction each round. If you have already used reactions to cast three spells in a round, you can only cast spells at least 8 levels below the highest level you are capable of casting.
Normal: Non-staggered creatures only have 1 reaction each round.

Mobility
Prerequisites: Dodge
Benefit: You gain a +4 dodge bonus to AC against reaction attacks made by opponents when you pass through their threatened area.

Spell Focus
Benefit: Add +1 to focus rolls for all spells from a school of magic you select.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take this feat, it applies to a new school of magic.

Greater Spell Focus
Prerequisite: Spell Focus in the school to be chosen.
Benefit: Add +1 to focus rolls for all spells from a school of magic you select. This bonus stacks with that of Spell Focus.
Special: You can gain this feat multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take this feat, it applies to a new school of magic already affected by Spell Focus.

Stand Still
Benefit: When an opponent tries to pass through your threatened area you can make a combat maneuver check as a reaction. If it succeeds, that creature cannot move for the rest of its turn.

Toughness
Benefit: You gain 3 base hit points.

Improved Toughness
Prerequisite: Character Level 7th, Toughness
Benefit: You gain 4 base hit points.

Greater Toughness
Prerequisite: Character Level 13th, Improved Toughness
Benefit: You gain 5 base hit points.

Weapon Finesse, and any feats or features that allow dexterity modifiers to affect damage no longer exist.

Leadership no longer exists.

Focus Rolls
With save categories fixed, spells must now be rolled for, but this also addresses another issue: Caster multiclassing, and the relative uselessness of lower level spells against powerful opponents. Multiclassing casters badly shafted their ability to be relevant not just in combat, but in most situations of equal CR. Making focus rolls function based on total hit dice answers this (the damage of scaling spells will still function from caster level, as they should).

Spells no longer have save DCs. Instead, spells that would normally allow a save require the caster to make a focus roll against the appropriate defense type. A focus roll is 1d20 + ½ the caster’s character level + the caster’s relevant ability modifier. Treat exceeding the opponent’s defense as a failed save, and anything less as a successful save.

Hit Points
If you get critically hit, it should be a bad thing. If you jump in lava that can melt your armor, you should be dead. There really isn’t a whole lot of sense to hit points as they stand, and particularly the fact that a human could potentially take as bad a beating as a dragon. More flesh to beat on means more hit points. The smaller you are, the more fragile you are. A fly doesn’t get swatted and keep floating around.

Hit points have a base value determined by class/creature type and hit dice plus the creature’s hit point modifier (usually Constitution). This base value is then altered by the creature’s size. Determine base value by adding the maximum roll of a creature’s racial hit die to their hit point modifier, and then either 1 or 2 hit points for each class level, using 1s for d6s or d8s, and 2s for d10s or d12s.

A 3rd Level Human Wizard with 12 Constitution has 12 Base HP
(8 [max roll of racial HD] + 1 [con mod] + 3 [3 d6/8 class HD])

A 5th Level Dwarf Barbarian/3rd Level Rogue with 14 Constitution has 21 Base HP
(8 [max roll of racial HD] + 2 (con mod) + 11 [4 d10/12 HD])

Size and Hit Points: The size of a creature alters their base hit points by a percentage. Increase a creatures base HP by 50% compounding for each size above medium, or reduce by 25% compounding for each size below medium (rounded down). Whenever a creature changes sizes, any damage they have taken is increased or decreased by the same compound percentage (rounded down).

A 22 HD Gargantuan Dragon with 24 Constitution has 212 HP
(12 [max roll of racial HD] + 7 (con mod) + 44 [22 d10/12 HD]) x 3.375 [50% compounded 3 sizes: 150% - 225% - 337.5%) : 63 x 3.375 = 212

Melee Attack Rolls
The grand dichotomy of Pathfinder is perhaps the stand-alone power of strength measured against the trade of precision for power in the Power Attack feat. Why does strength alone make your attacks both more devastating, AND more accurate? Well, now it doesn’t, but it DOES let you do other fun stuff explained later. For now, your hand-eye coordination and agility determines your accuracy with everything.

Melee attack rolls add dexterity modifiers instead of strength. Attack rolls must exceed armor class to hit rather than match.

Parry
Come on now, it makes sense. He’s swinging at me. Can’t I parry it? The deadly nature of damage vs. hit points makes more defensive options necessary. And really this one should have always existed.

Creatures can use attacks to attempt to parry an opponent’s attacks. Any creature may delay their action to save a full attack, use a ready action to save an attack, or use a reaction attack to parry. When a foe makes an attack a creature wishes to parry, that creature makes an attack using their saved attack roll at its listed bonus opposing the incoming attack roll. If the parry roll exceeds the incoming attack roll, the attacks is parried and the weapons deal damage to each other. If either weapon is a natural weapon, instead half the damage is dealt to the creature with the natural weapon. If a parry exceeds the incoming attack roll by 5 or more, the defending creature can make a riposte attack, using the same bonus as the parry -5.

Parries cannot be made on attacks against which a defender is flat-footed.

Poison
Poison and venom don’t just stop at the walls of your veins and be all like “Whelp! He made his fortitude save, guess we are done here.” Poison will always do some damage. If you want a good countermeasure, I would suggest not getting poisoned. And look on the bright side, fortitude is fixed so the burden to roll is on the poison.

Poisons roll against the Fortitude defense with a bonus equal to their listed save DC minus 10. A poison that fails this roll will still persist through its duration, making a new roll at each frequency interval. Each interval always deals at least minimum damage for a poison. Poisons that cause unconsciousness instead cause fatigue or exhaustion (if the target is already fatigued).

Reactions
The nature of turn based combat creates an environment where you do your thing, and then you have to watch everything go to hell before you get to try and fix things again. Reactions let you interact out of turn to dive out of the way of bad things, or rush to somebody’s aid. Also, attacks of opportunity? I mean, come on. That’s just a stupid idea. I get to swing at them if they are open? And it just randomly happens? Can’t I just, you know… take that swing? What if I want to take it at myself? Attacks of opportunity were always an ill-advised, nonsensical mechanic that Pathfinder kept. I got rid of them. If you want to interrupt somebody’s spell, or whack them as they run by, just use your reaction attack. You can even throw something with it now. Really I think it’s a no-brainer.

Attacks of Opportunity are no longer a part of the combat rules. Combatants instead gain an extra immediate action after their turn that can be used until their next turn. A Reaction takes place simultaneously with whatever action it is announced during. A reaction can accomplish any of the following:

-Apply pressure to a bleed (Heal DC 20).
-A melee or thrown attack at a -2 penalty.
-A defensive maneuver (+2 Dodge to AC and Reflex)
-A move of any kind at half normal speed.
-A parry.
-A spell of level 0, or at least 2 levels lower than the highest spell level you can cast.

Reactions cannot be made before a creature could act in combat. Reactions become available again at the start of each combatants turn, and can be used anytime thereafter (including during their turn, or in reaction to another reaction).

Strength, Weapon Sizes, and Wielding Creatures
Power vs. Precision, the diametric opposition is now restored. But since we’ve established that, let’s redefine power. I want to weild Cloud’s buster sword now, please and thank you. Oh, and what about picking up that Halfling and beating on something with it? He’s like… bite-sized. I just want to take him and attack the brick wall! Well now you can. Just don’t let the ogres do it to you, because it’s really not ideal.

Each size of creature has a base strength expectancy denoted on list A-1 below. For every 4 points of strength you are above or below this, you may be able to wield larger weapons, or be forced to wield smaller weapons. However, you can never wield a weapon that weighs more than 1/4 of your lift overhead limit.

Table A-1
Fine 1
Diminuitive 3
Tiny 7
Small 9
Medium 11
Large 15
Huge 23
Gargatuan 31
Colossal 41

Wielding Creatures: If any creature weighs less than 1/4 of your lift overhead amount, it can be wielded as an improvised weapon. If the creature is conscious and unwilling it must be grappled first, and you must maintain grapple without the normal +5 bonus. Wielding an unwilling creature as a weapon adds an additional -4 penalty to attacks as the creature tries to escape. Any blow dealt to a target while wielding a creature deals the same damage to the wielded creature (including sunders). A willing creature can be wielded without the additional -4 penalty. Creatures have a range increment of 5 feet.

My players are very talkative as far as the npcs go and they innately distrust all the nobles. I'm having difficulty keeping them from visiting Aldern and I'm only on the first adventure.

We aren't through Burnt Offerings and the target of his affection Ferlanria (a fey druid) is already noticing small things missing. He was on her short list of suspects as far as she was checking. I had to insert a small boy into the Rusty Dragon hanging around her door calling her his girlfriend to throw off some suspicion because it was far too early.

You may have emphasized Aldern a little too much then. You generally want to use the Swallowtail Festival to create a lot of potential suspects for the Lust motivation. Jubrayl Vhiski at the very least is a good Red Herring for the theft of small items, and Sandpoint's population is large enough that you can take a little bit of creative license, but you probably want to stick with Sczarni gang members as the most prominent "dickish love interests." Whatever you can do to make Aldern more of a fly on the wall. In these situations especially, less is more. The less the players know about Aldern, the better. He should be curious about them more than they are curious about him, and after he leaves to collect Vorel Fungi from the Manor the rest is history.

I personally had five different suspects for my party to investigate by the time chapter 2 rolled around.

At one point they were absolutely positive Caizarlou Zerren the Necromancer was the murderer. He made some brief appearances ogling my party's cleric in town. (I may or may not have made him a creepy germanized necrophiliac character reminiscent of the doctor from Human Centipede to fuel the ICK factor, but there's no rule in the book saying that was off-limits)

Ven Vinder is built to be a suspect based on his connection to Harker, but I chose to juice the suspicion even more by giving him one of the Sihedron tattoos from Paradise Barge, with the story that he did some nightly gambling while visiting his sister in Turtleback Ferry months ago, and got the tattoo to bypass the cover charge. When Ven has the same seven pointed star on his wrist as the victims have carved into their chests, it sends up red flags, and also helps to foreshadow chapter 3. If the party ever goes to investigate Turtleback Ferry before Rannick is taken by the Kreegs, it is simply at a time after Paradise is destroyed/sunken, but before anything noticeably bad has happened. They will get bored of TF and move on after a few days.

Jubrayl Vhiski was my MAJOR ace in the hole though. My group's cleric had a momentary one night fling with Aldern, but was a little more involved with the scoundrel Vhiski who was buying gifts for her almost every day in an effort to get in her pants. When he finally worked his way to the bedroom though, the bell had long since tolled for Aldern Foxglove, who at this point was spying on the cleric. After seeing Vhiski, the selfish scoundrel of a man abuse her in the bedroom, Aldern stalked him on the way back to his home and beat him nearly to a bloody pulp in a dark alley. Vhiski survived but bore terrible, disfiguring wounds, and whole sections of his scalp that had been torn away inhibiting his hair growth. (This likened his appearance more to the dread ghast Aldern whose face and hair were already deteriorating) Vhiski accused the cleric of having him followed and beaten because she resented him. (Jubrayl was a true gentleman) When the cleric finally began to notice a grotesque figure spying on her and Orik Vancaskerkin through the window of her room, and noticed her holy symbol and some of her intimate clothing had gone missing, she immediately suspected Jubrayl.

The other two red herrings were people of my own invention added to the story, and they never rose to the level of prominence these three did, but they do serve as a momentary distraction.

Keep that in mind during future campaigns involving murder mysteries. Always remember to include that heinous human element. Murder is a heinous act after all, so if you can't mire it in sex, jealousy, scandal, and spite then you are probably playing with children under age 13 and I would have to suggest playing a campaign set in Equestria (The world from My Little Pony) and I mean that. My Little Pony: Friendship is Adventure can make really kickass pathfinder games.

That's also good advice for XP too. There are a lot of merits to scrapping it and calling level-ups when they are appropriate, but this does take away some sense of accomplishment from the players. Any time they have to overcome a challenge with little to no monetary reward, it makes it feel somewhat pointless.

In the practice of scrapping XP, you should probably at least use Hero Points in place of monetary gain when a tough encounter yields little. A destiny changing boost can be a very fun alternative reward to gold. Mind you this shouldn't happen often, as players having a bank of Hero Points can get ludicrous.

Oh and as for the goblins, they are primarily meant for comic relief which makes them far from pointless. Warchief Ripnugget watching the mock-raid over and over was incredibly funny because my party managed to sneak up on them and heard the whole thing, strolling into the room after all the goblins playing their characters had "died" and saying "I remember it differently, Warchief!"

Ripnugget himself is incredibly wily. Stickfoot's speed let him maneuver quickly out of harms way, or put himself in situations where he can fight the PCs one at a time. Another underrated fact is that he can often move with impunity, since his mounted combat feat can negate attacks against stickfoot.

Sometimes those things happen, but in many cases you can use unexpected happenstance to develop things further.

The cleric in my party accidentally killed Tsuto with a little touch attack fire bolt crit (She was trying to burn him for interrogation purposes, but she was standing at the other side of the room and he was merely grappled, not bound, so she accidentally shot the flame bolt into his mouth and exploded his skull).

This same cleric also threatened the jealous diva Allishanda when the girl tripped her on stage during a performance of The Harpy's Curse at the Sandpoint Theater (She was filling in for an AWOL performer and had gotten more flowers and attention from the audience the previous night) and was accused by Jubrayl Vhiski (The Sczarni Gang leader) of sending some filthy miscreant to beat him half to death in an alleyway after a date she had with Jubrayl ended badly (In fact this was a jealous Aldern Foxglove after spying on her, still slowly succumbing to the ghoul fever that will eventually turn him into the Skinsaw Man).

Both occurrences will help to fuel a criminal indictment for Tsuto's unlawful murder, a charge that could potentially allow me to introduce Justice Ironbriar early in the form of a feigned sympathetic duty-bound official who later turns out to be the leader of a cult of vicious killers (Not to mention my eventual plans to have Xanesha manipulate or kill Allishanda, repurposing her as an Envyspawn Bard).

My point is, don't always go strictly by the book. The world is a mess, and killing people can make it even messier. Expand on those hurt feelings and vengeful motivations. That's your role in running an adventure path. Make it your own. Each facet of Karzoug's forces seems generally isolated enough that a little extra flavor and improvisation won't jeopardize the flow of ROTRL

20th level play isn't really all that different from 1st level, it just opens more possibilities. The ultimate truth of what you try and achieve with 20th level challenges should be around the same as what you try and achieve with a 1st level challenge: Dangerous means potentially lethal in 2-4 turns for most characters.

The only difference in 20th level encounters is the number of factors at play. Mobility, Disables, and Buffs all take on very different mantles, but are essentially a means to the same end. 100 Damage to a character with 200 Health is relatively the same as 4 damage to a character with 8 health. The levels aren't meant to change the relative dynamic of the game, but rather to put the heroes head and shoulders above the lowly threats they may still compete with from time to time. After all, we all enjoy watching simple henchman and street criminals threaten superheroes in movies, because we the audience understand that poor sap has no clue as to the depth of the feces he's quickly sinking into. When a player is behind the wheel of that superhero, these observations can have an even more thrilling effect when a DM plays the part of the "in-over-their-head" villain well.

As for the villains who can still challenge the players, or even vastly outclass them in some cases, you have a few basic things to address about level 20.

1) Capstones: The cornerstone ability that elevates the character from mundane to near god-like status. Any potentially life-threatening encounters for level 20 characters should have some elements at play that make these capstones a necessity for success. In short, an epic challenge for a level 20 party should be something that a level 19 party has almost no chance of surviving.

2) The Basic CR Formula: CR 1 does not mean the encounter is challenging for a party of level 1 characters, it means it is run of the mill. Barring extreme circumstances, no encounter of equal level should ever really come close to killing a party member or forcing the group to flee, even if most of their resources are already exhausted. Use this general outline:
CR +0: Run of the mill, not meant to do much damage or really expend resources.
CR +1: Some heavy lifting. This might cut a few resources out of the team, but generally they can push through a few of these and still have a fair amount of steam.
CR +2: Challenging. This is what starts to exhaust a party, sometimes expending half their resources or more, and sometimes coming close to, if not killing somebody. At this level the party should be fighting an enemy of slightly less statistical output and turn economy.
CR +3: Epic. At this level the party should be fighting an enemy with equal or greater statistical output and turn economy than they have. The risk of total resource depletion and TPK is very real. Good rolls can get them through this with a little fight left, but they should probably be trying to find a hole to crawl into.
CR +4: Extreme. This pushes the party's limits in every way barring incredibly lucky rolls. Generally this level cannot be truly achieved by solitary monsters properly, this should always be a group such as a rival adventuring party, or a dragon or mad-wizard with henchmen.
CR +5: Asian Difficulty. Why are you doing this to your players? Because they are the enemy, that's why. Mistakes were made, a wrong turn was taken, and now only an incredible combination of luck and strategy can save them from a few hours of creating new characters.

Contrary to what people in this thread seem to say, I believe this same formula holds up at level 20. Remember that a hero class of level 20 is technically only CR 19, with two being CR 21 and a party of four being CR 23. I consider Pathfinder extremely well playtested, and if you pay close attention to potential tactical outs in any situation, you can find something to keep your players fearful for their lives.

Well one thing I can tell you is that you're fighter isn't having his weaknesses punished enough if he is getting to run around one-shotting everything. Fighters have a specific scalpel niche in the battlefield, and any creature used to fighting is familiar with what a physically overpowering foe looks like. I have a barbarian doing 11-20 damage a swing in my campaign, but I managed to keep my party on their toes through the Catacombs of Wrath and Thistletop by keeping a few things in mind.

1) The front-liner usually has a weak will save. This means that goblin warchanters, yeth hounds, Lyrie, and other curve balls you can choose to throw in can sometimes dismantle the front-liner with a daze or fear effect. The yeth hounds howling and natural flight ability is INSANELY potent, as it can send the muscle-bound murder machine running and crying (Dropping their weapon in the process) while the demon dogs glide after them with brutal charge attacks or trips. In the Catacombs of Wrath, you can have Erylium hit them with a suggestion to dive into her pool, then cast her Sleep Hex on them. That puts them in mortal danger, and usually takes away the next 2-3 turns of whoever decides to jump in and save them from drowning. Then you cast sleep on that person :P

2) They are weapon dependent. Don't be afraid to abuse disarm or spells like Shatter in order to cut their effectiveness. Remember that your monsters and bad guys aren't just XP Pinatas: They are fighting for their lives, and depriving their enemy of a weapon capable of splitting two of them in half every few seconds can often be a risk worth taking.

3) They tend to do high MELEE damage. It's not a crime for a GM to use the tools at his monsters' disposal. For example Gogmurt the goblin druid in particular can be an INCREDIBLY deadly encounter. The players should already be crouching in the Thistle Tunnels, reducing their speed by half. If they don't surprise Gogmurt first, chances are he or his firepelt cougar should hear them fighting with the group of ten desperate starving goblin refugees. If Gogmurt opens this encounter with an Entangle spell in the center of the party, their speed is cut in half again (For most characters, half of half speed rounds down to 5 feet per move action) which when combined with intermittent entanglement is devastating to melee effectiveness. Gogmurt is as well leveled as he is for a reason: He's killed a lot of longshanks, and these would-be invaders should be no different in his eyes until his spells are exhausted and he is surrounded. Keep in mind he can walk through the walls of the thorny tunnels without being impeded due to his woodland stride, so cornering him is nearly impossible. The same goes for Ripnugget, Lyrie, Orik, and Nualia. Ripnugget can cling to his Gecko as it walks up walls and ceilings. Lyrie can grease a hall and snipe with her magic missiles. Nualia does such incredible damage in her first six turns that she can break or often destroy a weapon with one sunder attempt, and still make a nasty claw attack at the rube holding the now worthless hunk of wood or metal.

4) Like NobodysHome says above, the character wealth per level is a campaign building guideline, but it does well serve you to stick to what Rise of the Runelords says your players find. Controlling player economy is a big deal, and strictly speaking it behooves you to keep your players relatively destitute. This serves two purposes: 1) You want a reasonable price offered for a job to be an effective carrot on a stick. I try to think of every gold piece as the rough equivalent of $20, which means 500 gold pieces as a bounty is the rough equivalent of $10,000. This should make players below 10th level salivate, because it's rare a small town like Sandpoint could offer much more than this out of its coffers (This is if you are in a situation like mine where they need additional monetary incentive). 2) You want to keep your assumed CRs relevant. Balancing encounters gets very difficult if you have to crunch the chances on all the raw numbers. If you don't have the NPC Codex yet, I highly recommend getting it, as the characters provided within all show very good benchmarks of where a character's magical gear should be (It's also an invaluable tool for creating and running encounters with rival adventuring parties.)

In closing, I don't think you are having your monsters do their jobs. There's a reason regular people don't want to go to war or play point man: Being in the fray sucks. It sucks very badly. You get flanked. You get tripped. You get focused.

You are the GM. There's a reason every party needs their spellcasters and ranged attacks. Make that reason stick and burn.

Damnit cheers.

Yeah, it's definitely the map item I am thinking of. In my 2500 votes it was probably the 3rd best item I saw, with mine being second and something chillingly awesome in 1st that I ripped off immediately for my home game, and I can't wait to complement the designer.

I'm just waiting on my free River Kingdoms PDF so I can finalize my archetypes and settle on one to submit for round 2. Oh my, that sounded conceded didn't it? :P

I only saw my item 3 times out of what I think was 2400-2500 votes, and it took me well over 1000 votes to see it once. The other 2 were after the 2000 mark within an hour of each other. Don't despair if you voted 500 times and never saw yours, if items that are blatant plagiarism can make it (and there were a few) then yours made it too. Good luck everyone.

Finished my archetype before I submitted my item. Figured I'm gonna make top 32 anyway, might as well get round 2 done with so I can focus on the hard round.

My archetype is elegant, simple, and awesome.

Just saw mine for the first time after 4 days of almost nonstop voting on my phone. I don't know how many pairs I had gone through, but I do know I counted 20 repeats of a few different items.

Don't lose hope. If your item was an original thought in your mind, and you put your juicy creative juice into it, it didn't get DQ'd.