I recall in 3.5 (or at least 3) you could add/remove parts to/from a composite bow to adjust its Str bonus, so basically you could buy a +0 bow, add a +1 when you get the money, add another when you get more money, and so on.
As a GM, I've continued to apply it through my Pathfinder years (well, it didn't come out often, in truth), but now I can't see that rule in Pathfinder's Core Rulebook.
So, is it still there, somewhere, and I missed it?
Or has it just become impossible to do that, and once you buy a bow with a Str bonus, it is set in stone?
Or, yet, is it simply implied that it's possible to modify the bow at will? (I'm no bow expert, but the "composite" name suggests me that it is made of parts that can be changed.)
Let me say that i greatly favor role-playing, rather than optimization, both as a GM and a player;
*cough* Stormwind Fallacy *cough*
I didn't imply that the worst mechanical choices you make, the greater role-player you become. I said I want people to have the character they want (which favors role-play) and don't care about super-optimization, but I do care for too low optimization. Because it doesn't stay at the pace of the other (average at least) PCs and because forces me to be more careful in what I throw at the party and how.
Weirdo wrote:
Honestly, I think people underestimate small-size strength fighters.
To me, one of the worst features of that is the speed. I had an experience with a Dwarf Fighter who did nothing else in battle than just spending his rounds to move, and by the time he could attack, the enemies in his reach were dead and he had to move more, over and over...
It kind of traumatized me about low-speed combatants and I've always seen it as a huge drawback.
Dannorn wrote:
Have you tried asking the player what they want to do with their character?
Point of that is that without experience he has no idea what route to take... nor that can be much different ones, probably.
Dannorn wrote:
You said it looked like he was trying to build a tank, someone who doesn't necessarily deal out a lot of damage but gets a lot of attention and can absorb a lot of hits, so help him build that.
How do you do that, mechanically? I mean, in videogames you have skills that you use on a monster, and it'll keep its attention on you no matter what, but here, unless you use magic or some other ability (that a Core Fighter doesn't have), nearly any monster will prefer to go on easier prey, rather than tough and well-armed characters.
One thing I forgot to mention and that maybe was not remembered by someone else too, is that being Small size, the greataxe damage too is reduced (another reason why I made the "Power Attack" words sound again and again in his ears), but anyway, alright, I'll just go on and see where it brings.
I'm starting a new gaming group with three players at their first pen-and-paper rpg experience plus two with 3.5 experience. I will be the GM.
Let me say that i greatly favor role-playing, rather than optimization, both as a GM and a player; I mean I don't care to go digging the books for the perfect combinations or to look at guides telling me what's best or what's not for a build. As long as it is mechanically decent, it's alright.
Yet, there is one of those three first-timers who made a number of choices I think might be quite suboptimal.
(Note that only Core Rulebook is allowed. PCs are 1st level.)
- Gnome Fighter: Gnome has +2 to Con, but also -2 to Str, and has little other that really helps in combat (and actually, only against a few subtypes of creatures). Also, 20 ft. speed.
- Weapon: greataxe (slightly lower average damage and less criticals compared to greatsword, or less defense compared to sword-and-shield).
- Feats: Dodge and Toughness. While they aren't terrible feats on their own (I think), they're not the best for that character. I tried to suggest him Power Attack and Weapon Focus (especially since he has Str 15 with racial modifier applied, so he'll better use anything he can to improve hit-rate and damage), but he kept his ground.
To tell it all, initially he had picked different feats; I can't remember which ones, now, but I clearly saw he was trying to build a videogame tank. So I said openly that in true rpgs there is no such thing as aggro, and enemies, who aren't just pre-programmed, won't keep attack him "just because yes", if they deem better to go on someone else. When I said that, he changed to what I listed above.
Anyway, I don't want to force him to make choices he doesn't like, but I also fear that his PC will be greatly outshined by the other better-built ones, so I was wondering if I can have any good advice from you folks.
Using the guidelines for magic items creation, you can craft or make someone craft items that cast a given spell X/day upon command.
For example, a cape that uses Polymorph (level 5 spell) 1/day upon command, if crafted by a Wizard at minimum CL, would cost (other than the cost of the mundane cape) 16,200 gp (Command word: Spell level x caster level x 1,800 gp / Charges per day: Divide by [5 divided by charges per day]).
That carries some problems on it's own - it dependy heavily on the GM. If the GM rolls the loot there's a very good chance you won't end up with the stuff you need (like an Amulet of Mighty Fists) and while the other guys just shop their items the VoP monk is stuck with some luckluster stuff. I don't think the game and especially the monk needs more dependancy on luck.
Well, dealing with such a matter always requires some in-game attention and "maintenance", and in that specific case of course it would require exceptions if you're rolling random treasure. You should either place pre-decided items for the Monk or give (side)quests to recover or obtain those items (a gift from a master, a lost relic from a fallen hero, or whatever).
Besides, unless one usually just glides over the magic market matter and gives the PCs free access to anything they have enough money for, thus ignoring the actual rules, even shopping for whatever they want falls far from ensuring they have all the shiny things they need or want. And at that point, they don't end up much different from the random-treasure-relying VoP character they just have a few more options.
I feel Vow of Poverty shouldn't restrict a character (and it should be accessible to any character, not just Monks) in terms of gear carried. They're just tools for him. He just shouldn't have money, riches or stored possessions, own buildings or be in any position (on any level, be it personal, social or whatever) that would grant or require him to have all comforts and pleasant stuff. But gear is another matter. Basically, he should rely on found/recovered items that he actually needs for his purposes, or the ones he is gifted with (I mean in special-case gifts, not in party-sharing and spirit-breaking ones).
I know a +5 weapon is a treasure in itself, but you're using it as a tool, not as a display of richness or to buy anything that would actually make you feel or look rich.
Favorited.
Someone should make a pdf (or a series of them) with all the cool ideas of the 1001-type threads, if it wasn't that they often don't stop growing for a long time.
And also quick buttons and/or keyboard shortcuts to use them when some text is highlighted as in most messageboards, because always having to write evrything by hand is quite a bother... text-formatting, links, spoiler, and everything else.
Well, not just for play-by-post, but for every post.
Breath is supernatural. It doesn't require contact to function, like claw attacks or thrown quills; rather, it produces flame (or bolts, or whatever).
And even if it was extraordinary, I can easily see it still being usable as a physical manifestation of the ghost's past self. Quite the same as voice. Voice is made of sound waves produced by air passing through a physical canal, and a ghost can do it despite being unable to manipulate air and not possessing that canal. It's sort of a projection of his psyche in physical form. Same for the breath.
The matter is that you're still taking and using something that doesn't belong to you. If I took your car and drove around in it, that would still be wrong, even if I didn't make a profit doing it, or claim to be an FBI agent in it. The *exact* same principle applies to art.
You understand it's definitely not the same...
Samy wrote:
Now, you are right -- when it comes to art, everybody does it, yes. But most of us are just individuals, and most art owners don't bother to go after individuals. We only get away with it because the owners can't be bothered with suing a million Joe Averages. But Paizo as a company can't count on the same "flying under the radar" principle. If an actual company started using someone's art, that someone might be much more inclined to stand up and say, "Hey! Hang on a minute!" And depending on how much of an ass the art owner is, and how much money they're willing to spend on lawyering up, that could quickly escalate to a lot of trouble for Paizo which they would probably rather avoid.
All that still falls on the fields of taking that art to use it for profit and/or taking it from a source that isn't openly available.
So, users suggest/submit images that the site admins would have to aprove or disaprove?
Yes.
Samy wrote:
"Everyone does it" isn't a very good legal defense. It just makes it more embarrassing if you end up being the one who gets busted, prosecuted and actually convicted for jaywalking.
I agree with you that copyright/permission *shouldn't* be an issue, but until we get a reform in copyright law, it unfortunately *is* an issue.
Well, it's not like "everyone is stealing"... it's just that everyone uses pictures as messageboard avatars. No one is making a profit of it (I don't even see how that could be done, using them as avatars), claiming them as their own or whatever. As long as you don't actually steal a picture that isn't publicly available on the web (as in the iCloud incident a few months ago) or pretend to be a FBI agent just because you have its logo as avatar, what's the actual matter?
But whatever, just replying to the discussion... it's not like I want to insist on it, if Paizo already said no.
Nope, I was suggesting that users suggest their own 90x90 taken from whatever in the web or self-made.
For example, I go to DeviantArt, see a cool picture, crop a 90x90 portrait and suggest it. Of course, hopefully there will be sets of good pictures in any post, not just posts with a single picture of a stick-man or things like that.
Copyright/permission from owners shouldn't be an issue, since everyone on the web uses any kind of picture as a messageboard avatar every day with no one complaining about that.
Maybe someone asked this already, but since it's quite difficult to find without reading all this thread (and maybe others)... I've read custom avatars won't be added, but what about lists of avatars proposed by users (always 90x90 pixels), maybe in a specific thread (much like the Bestiary wish list threads)?
As a wanna-be PbP player, I have a very difficult time finding avatars for my characters.
I understand custom avatars may be unwanted because some users could load inappropriate/offensive ones (althogh nearly any messageboard on the web allows custom avatars, and that is rarely an issue), but proposed and accepted ones should be fine, no?.
Here's my character's story (I would have expanded on it more, but I see people on here don't make too large backgrounds, and also in an AP it won't probably come out so much as to need high detail).
Charsheet will be ready in a few days; today and tomorrow I won't have much time.
Spoiler:
Endlos Tiferet
House Tiferet track its ancestry in very old times. It raised to prominence in the age of the Shining Crusade thanks to knight Malkuth Tiferet, who led many troops against the hordes of the Whispering Tyrant. When afterwards Lastwall was founded, he established in Vigil with titles and awards newly gained from his deeds, his house always actively partaking in the watch and action against dark forces.
Unbroken through the centuries, the tradition of high spiritual strength reached Endlos, the last direct descendant of the hero of old.
But Endlos was undoubtedly the shameful stain on an otherwise majestic picture, for all he was worried about in his mid teens was going after damsels and feasts in aristocratic palaces, never taking seriously his training, neither martial nor spiritual, seeing the menaces of against which Lastwall is set as a somewhat distant thing that didn't concern him.
For those reasons, his father, council advisor Yesod Tiferet, tried to send him on expeditions as a squire as often as possible, so that his character might be tempered, he could understand what is happening outside of Vigil's safe walls, and also so that he'd be kept far from the eyes of Yesod's peers and wouldn't bring more shame upon his house.
And it worked, but it required a grim occurrence.
Endlos was serving as a squire together with others for a group of knights. Although he didn't like the job, he was treated with more respect than what he returned, as he would have fully understood later. And moreover, he had grown a solid friendship with his fellow squires.
He was eighteen years old, when his group was assigned to escort Petros Lorrimor, a scholar in his research travel beyond the ustalavian border. But one night just when they were returning to Vigil, they were stalked by a dark power. The group had met a few undead and other kinds of things before, but the knights always made short work of those. This time, instead, a shadowy terror seemed set on slaughtering them, and partially did. Never did Endlos experience fear and frustration as when witnessing that giant of darkness butcher his friends and the knights that tried to protect them.
In the end, only one knight, professor Lorrimor and Endlos were able to escape safely, returning to Vigil with a grievous heart. Among all the bad that came that time, one good thing could be found: the awakening of Endlos to his true and ancient call. He realized that the horrors told of in history are not just things of the past, that the danger looms much darker than what is felt behind supposedly safe walls, and that those walls stay safe thanks to the people protecting them. And also, he never again wanted to feel that powerlessness in seeing friends crushed like insects.
While being a follower of Sarenrae, he swore to Ragathiel in particular -the patron of heroes and rightful vengeance, an Angel as Sarenrae herself was in the beginning- that he would become no less than his ancestors, and from that day he strived to master combat, faith and spiritual power until he was ordered as a Paladin.
Meanwhile, he kept in touch with professor Lorrimor, who had continued his journeys and studies. The two maintained frequent correspondence, through which the professor provided Endlos with great insight about the horror they had faced together and all unliving things.
The last letter, though, was not from the professor himself, but rather the unpleasant notice of his death and the summoning to his funeral in Ravengro.
Perform (comedy, maybe) or Profession (ventriloquist).
You'd still need to keep some distance from the listeners, though, otherwise the actual source of the voice is too obvious (and of course, someone who gets a high enough result on Perception may notice it even from that distance).
There's nothing hinting at rounds, just a rather absolute "first attack".
And also, Smite Evil is fine as is, strong but limited in usage. More free x2 would be crazy, as was initially.
If you want to do whatever-you-want and are willing to invest a little time on it, MapTool can do wonders most others can only dream about.
Or MOTE, which is MapTool's closest heir (as far as I understand) and is about to come out.
Always for free.
24 Strength humans via RAW: they're level 16 Commoners. Gain 4 ability point increases for leveling up.
They definitely aren't level 16.
Why not? If the problem is that they didn't acquire xp through fighting, it's not a problem. Xp don't come only from fights.
Also, nothing prevents that they had diets (and substances, not necessarily of the bad type) available in this world and this era only which give them some bonus.
And feats designed specifically to do that, such as "when calculating the weight you can lift, your Strength is considered X points higher". Feats that we don't have in Pathfinder because no PC or monster would ever take them.
43. A mysterious knight wanders the outskirts of a small city, where unprotected farms are plagued by the raids of Ogres and their kidnapping people. This knight is said to have eldritch powers and invariably saves children, if they are involved, but doesn't care the least for the safety of adults (either ignoring Ogre threats of killing them or wrapping them up in flames along with the brutes), unless they're a child's parents. And if only adults are involved, he doesn't intervene at all.
He is in truth a Grave Knight risen from his own mausoleum in the area. He is following the steps of an ancient prophecy he obtained before he died as mortal, when he was a cruel conqueror, and by that prophecy he must save the life of twenty-three children, gain their trust and return them back to their life. Then, in a single night, he must ask each of them to come with him, bring them all to his mausoleum and sacrifice them to resurrect his army, which this time will be unliving... and undying.
29. Inspired by the path taken in his deepest meditation, an Asurendra has unlocked the final secret of the multiverse: how to exists in each plane simultaneously. So far, he was able to extend his existence to the Materia, Ethereal, Shadow and Astral Planes. Given time, he will expand to all the Planes, one at a time, and when he completes the process, he will be able to unmake reality. To be dfeated, he must be killed within a very short time-span in all the Planes he's currently existing.
Sorry for the late reply, I wasn't able to submit messages...
GM Bold Strider wrote:
If you are interested in playing PFS PbP, then I recommend the Flaxseed Lodge as an easy way to enlist for games.
Thanks for the kind recommendation. I fear I have to decline PFS, though, because (correct me if I'm wrong, I don't know PFS too well and this might be just my own misunderstanding) being official and all, it must adhere strictly to some rules and also the PCs jump from adventure to adventure with no real connection, while I hoped to play a "normal" campaign with no outer bounds for the GM.
thejeff wrote:
Another formatting tip: The dice rolls stay the same when you preview and then post, so you can preview, then add to your post based on the results (ex. Adding another roll to confirm a threatened critical, or just your character's reaction to an obviously good or bad roll) without cluttering the thread with more posts.
I think that's also to prevent cheating, although I fear that if one really wants, cheating these rolls is not that difficult.
Anyway, tell me if I got it correct: apart from the in-depth tips, basically I see a recruitment thread I like, I make a forum alias for the character I'd like to play there and compile its character sheet, and then reply to the recruitment thread saying I want to apply with that character, right?
Sorry for the late reply, I wasn't able to submit messages...
After figments and glamers were mentioned, I looked them up, and yes, it looks like what I wanted is the work of glamers, like Mirage Arcana:
PRD wrote:
Glamer: A glamer spell changes a subject's sensory qualities, making it look, feel, taste, smell, or sound like something else, or even seem to disappear.
So, a wall can look like it isn't there, and as if there is a corridor going somewhere instead, effectively giving a 3D impression, in theory.
That Crazy Alchemist wrote:
You could hide behind it, using the normal hide rules but you could never hide inside it as a way of disguising yourself as a statue, that is a glamer's job and should never be crossed over, to avoid invalidating glamers.
In this one I think the "disguise" part needs to be better defined. In the previous post you said he hid inside, and as long as it's hiding I don't get what's wrong with it. Leave behind the statue for a moment and imagine he made the image of a simple 10 ft. cube wooden box. Couldn't he hide inside that? The illusion has no physical barriers preventing that, and as long as he stays within the cube creatures outside shouldn't be able to see him, nor can he see what's outside. What would prevent it?
Same with the statue, assuming he can stay within the borders of the illusion, just as if he was inside a physical statue. Unless he meant to do something else, I don't get why he couldn't. The illusionary statue doesn't need to have its inside hollowed, anyone who puts his head in it won't be able to see past its shape anyway.
Emmit Svenson wrote:
I don’t allow casters to create convincing perspective games with figment spells, since the logical end of that path is illusionists who use Silent Image to put an occulus rift bubble around the head of an enemy (or, heck, all enemies in the area of effect!) and edit its field of vision however they like.
Well, even if the faux 3D effect could be produced, that wouldn't be possible anyway... it's true that the caster can move the image produced, but how would he move it in flawless concert with how a creature moves its head (which, at the slightest movement can get out of the oculus rift's screen)? It'd be similar to mimicking a creature's movements as if to make her believe she's in front of a mirror... you can't predict how it'll move.
Thanks for the immediate reply and assistance, it works now.
I hope the site being down till a few minutes ago wasn't due to trying to fix my problem...
"You have made three posts as "Unearthly Serpent". You can change your avatar name until you have posted 10 messages to the messageboards.
Click here to change your avatar name.
If you do not wish to change your avatar name, you can ignore this message."
I do ignore it and click on "submit post", but it stays in the page without submitting.
Not that anything differs if I don't ignore it... if I open the link in a new tab, it's as if I ignored it, and if I just left-click it, the page changes to my account settings, where no matter if I confirm my name and stuff, I still won't be able to submit replies.
Am I missing something or is it a bug? How do I get past it?
I know this section has nothing to do with play by post games, but since the dedicated part of the messageboards doesn't seem to have (as far as I can see) a subsection for things like this, I didn'tk know where else to ask.
I'm not new to PbP games, but I'm new to doing it on this site AND english isn't my mother language (I think I'm fairly good at it -consider that all my Pathfinder books are in english and I don't remember having a single issue with them-, but I may not get some colloquial linguistic constructions here and there or understand exactly what some words mean in certain situations). So, since I noticed this site has a number of features specifically for running campaigns and that all the recruitment threads are already overflooded with players wanting to join, I wanted to ask if any good soul is willing to introduce me to said features and advise me on how to properly join some game (other than trying to submit interesting characters, of course).
Sorry for the lame title, but I didn't know how to put it in short, nor what to search for to find relevant answers.
Well, using Silent Image and any of its more powerful version (Minor, Major, Permanent, etc.) we all agree that we can create the image, for example, of a bunch of spikes over a floor or along a wall.
But can we instead make holes into the floor, possibly with things inside them, or make a flat wall appear like it's a jail with dead people inside, and stuff like that? (That's what I meant by "negative 3D"... 2D that looks like it has depth.)
