Woke - I regret mentioning the concept, now :P It was just a throwaway remark following a tabletop Hell's Rebels game I DM'd a while back where I had to remind everyone that the default in Avistan is feudalism
In terms of woke, I was just messing with ya :)
Oh, you... *shakes fist* :P
Thanks for engaging so much with this thread, it's definitely helping me focus my thoughts.
Heavily Revised Background, feats, talents, spells, and (some) gear now up in the alias. Still working on outlook and motivation, personality and appearance.
I haven't put Androk in there at all, although editing him in would be straightforward. I have written some NPC interaction into her background, simply because I lack the writing skill to make "she did this, and then she did this, and then she did this, and then she did this..." anything but drudgery to read.
Woke - I regret mentioning the concept, now :P It was just a throwaway remark following a tabletop Hell's Rebels game I DM'd a while back where I had to remind everyone that the default in Avistan is feudalism...
Whatever Eponine's motivations (and I'm still working on them), she has zero interest in turning Galt into Andoran-style democracy, or a "property is theft" type commune.
Communes - I'm still reading about the Erastil Commune in the Gazette, but it looks at first glance that their objectives are diametrically opposed to those of the up-and-coming bourgeoisie (aka the middle classes). Have I got that wrong?
Dice hell - thanks for the clarification :)
Middle-class - is "winemaker" acceptable? I would imagine that the middle classes can afford drinkable wine. If not, I will re-sculpt: this campaign has really caught my imagination and I'm willing to make significant amendments to the concept in order to make it work.
Still holding off on the Background 2.0 but I am making decisions on crunch and other stuff. Feats and Traits are decided upon (see Decision spoiler) but not written up. Gear not started, although I have a first draft of possible Organisations and Teams.
rolling hit points, d8 HD:5d8 ⇒ (2, 3, 7, 1, 2) = 15
Oh, thanks for that, dice gods. Half +1 it is then.
Understood, thanks. Like I said, first draft so easily fixable.
Are you ok with Androk being a family friend? It would make sense for her to look him up when she returns to Isarn, and it would give him the opportunity to 'sound her out' over a series of conversations before inviting her to join the conspiracy.
If that doesn't work for you I'll come up with something else.
@Lilli - thanks, still forming Eponine's motivations and personality so it's good to get inspiration.
@Lilli - thanks, that does make sense. I'm trying to read too much at once, I think.
@GM TWO - thanks for the additional clarification. I think I have something along those lines: draft background and general concept for Eponine d'Ambreville (neé Charthagnion). Happy to take criticism and feedback.
Background:
"Noblesse oblige." Those were the last words Eponine's father (Marquis Etienne de Charthagnion) spoke to her before she left to study at the Arcanirium in Absalom.
The Second Decree had come into force years before - Eponine was born into relative poverty - but the family had been one of Galt's premier vintners and had some wealth outside of Galt. There was enough to get Eponine through university, but after that she would be on her own. Just getting her out of Galt had taken every last string and favour that Etienne still had outstanding. As it happened, the funds expired about the same time he did: a week or so after graduation, Eponine received a letter from a friend of the family, Androk Jeggare, that her father's continued involvement in politics had led to the inevitable - and final - consequence. For what it was worth, the injustices he was protesting were real and his stance was morally just. In Eponine's view at the time, that plus a guillotine will get you decapitated.
Not content with that, the Gray Gardeners had torched his home and his few remaining books. House Charthagnion had been renowned for two things: its wine-making, and its learning. The Revolution had extirpated both.
Burning the letter, Eponine vowed never to return to Galt. (Youth was ever impetuous.) In need of money, and in possession of a certain set of unique skills, she spent the better part of the next five years in a variety of interesting occupations across Avistan. She acquired a perspective on the various forms of government, as well as a reasonably serious amount of wealth, much of it through trade and investment. She was even starting to dabble in moneylending. She was, she thought, happy, as these things go.
What brought her back to Galt was another letter from Jeggare, about ten years ago. It was three parts emotional blackmail to one part reason, but the reasoning was annoyingly sound. With the fall of the Cabinet of Skulls, there would never be a better opportunity to return and quietly begin remaking Galt in a better image. In addition, had she considered that the plight of Galt was at least in part due to the aristocracy not having made needed reform in time, thereby precipitating the revolution? She would never have a better opportunity to mend that ancestral error. As her father had always said, "noblesse oblige." (There's the emotional blackmail.)
Gritting her teeth, Eponine liquidated her various investments and travelled to Isarn. Not as a Charthagnion, of course. The Marquise (as she now was) de Charthagnion would be most unwelcome. No matter. Over her career she had acquired a number of skills, one of which was an aptitude for forgery. Putting together a new identity was straightforward - and thus was born Eponine d'Ambreville, merchant to the middle classes.
On arriving back into Galt, Eponine was horrified (but unsurprised) at the chaos, squalor and upheaval. It turned out that simply executing the people who know how to govern, or make good wine, and handing the reins over to the ignorant masses, results in shambolic government - and (worse!) undrinkable wine. One of these, at least, she could fix.
In the decade since, Eponine has built up a fledgling revival of Galt's wineries. Although still a shadow of what it was, the middle classes now have access to acceptably drinkable wine. And that's just the start: the initial profits from that have been reivested into other enterprises - one of which is a guard and courier service for hire. Trade depends on movement of goods across town, and the streets are simply not safe even in broad daylight. The city guard are unreliable - at best; to say nothing of the gangs. While the rich and powerful have their own full-time guards, individual shopkeepers have no such resources, leaving them prey to all manner of banditry. Setting up a reliable convoy system has revitalised part of the city, as well as Eponine's funds.
Next on the to-do list is better food: in Eponine's view, this is a conspiracy that will march on its stomach. Once the middle classes are reintroduced to olive oil that tastes of olives, eggs with reliably yellow yolks, bread baked in a proper oven by people who take pride in their work, entrecote of beef, escalope of veal, foie gras, the occasional truffle, and a hundred different varieties of cheese, they will remember that the ancien régime, for all its many faults, at least got the basics right.
And if, to achieve this, Eponine has to kill every last motherfvcking one of the Revolutionary Council, the Gray Gardeners, and any other débile who gets in her way, well...
noblesse oblige.
Philosophy/outlook:
Eponine is not "woke." She is not a social justice warrior. She has not parachuted into Galt with the liberal Western sensibilities of 21st century Earth.
The aristocracy fvcked it up. Big surprise. You put the jackpot on inherited titles, well, you get what's coming to you. But it's not like the masses have done any better. At all. Democracy just means mob rule.
New idea: put people in charge who know what they're doing. You'll be able to tell they know what they're doing by the way they do other stuff, like run businesses and employ people. If you can make the delivery-carts run on time, chances are you have a clue.
Oh, and watch how they treat people who work for them. Treating employees like dirt is tacky. Shoving poor people into tenements and charging them exorbitant rent is tacky. Let's not be doing that, alright?
Outline mechanics:
Eponine will be a human wizard going up to level... whatever this campaign goes to.
Still thinking it over but probably an illusionist.
The other bit of the gestalt will be vigilante (avenger). Social identity will be the Influential Merchant. Vigilante identity will be the Marquise de Charthagnion.
Still mulling over the traits.
Council and personal timeline:
4667: First Revolutionary Council (4667-4672)
4672: Rane Council (4672-4673)
4673: Galtan Unity Council (4673-4678)
4678: Golden Council (4678-4684)
Born -- 4684: Cailean Council (4684-4686)
Age 2 -- 4686: Council of Perfection (4686-4687)
Age 4 -- 4688: Common Council (4688-4689)
Age 8 -- 4692: Galtcreed Pact (4692-4698)
Age 14 -- 4698: Eye of Law (4698-4699)
Age 16; departs to study in Absalom -- 4700: Imperial Council (4699-4701)
Age 18 -- 4702: Council of Enlightenment (4701-4705)
Age 21; graduates; receives letter from Jeggare informing her of father's death by final blade -- 4705: Cabinet of Skulls (4705-4709)
Age 25; receives 2nd letter from Jeggare -- 4709: The New Revolutionary Council (4709-Current)
Age 35 -- 4719: Current day (4719)
EDIT: Holy cr@p, have a nasty feeling I made poor 'nine sound like the most miserable heartless sort and she's really not - she's NG [well for a given value of G, I suspect we'll all end up getting our hands dirty in this campaign; eggs to omelettes], she cares about people and she'll have great social skills. Perfectly personable and charmante. It's just that in Galt, veiled contempt isn't so much a feat as a lifestyle choice. Or, in the immortal words of the Bard, she's mad as hell and she's not gonna take it any more.
Thanks GM TWO, that's really helpful. I'm nowhere near the crunch but I will put up a draft background for comment once I have some time to type it up.
I see you aren't keen on a gazette - do you have particular ways/skills in mind for getting Artistry(criticism) and/or (philosophy) over to the middle classes?
And now for something completely different: Vidrian has a flag. And I can't help but notice that it continues the pattern of revolutionary countries using blue and/or (usually...
On a different tangent, I second the general sense of "Wait, WHAT?!" on the death of the Gorilla King. Was this announced somewhere else and I missed it, or was that an intentional Wham Line in this blog?
Hm. So, is "temporarily immune" the replacement for "bolstered"? If so I approve.
Not sure about the different modes - Exploration in the playtest didn't really work very well with my group, but maybe we were doing it wrong (in my/our defence, the rulebook was almost incomprehensible).
EDIT - still not completely sold on the icons-as-actions (or is it the other way around?) but I think that horse has sailed.
...or, indeed, a lover of warm-hearted animal killers!
@Samy - In the event that I get picked, I could do with some guidance on what deity Jassminder should follow (I have very much lost track of the FR deities and I don't even know which ones are still 'alive').
Unless you don't require paladins to follow a deity?
Hah, just too late to be included in the very useful post, but I'm now ready, I think - unless you spot anything obviously missing.
Light Crunch:
Character Name: Jassminder Shah
Race: Human (Keleshite)
Class: Paladin (Tortured Crusader)
Str 10, Dex 14+2, Con 10, Int 10, Wis 12, Cha 7
Feats: Point-Blank Shot; Precise Shot
Traits: Freed Slave (Regional, Katapesh); Foe of the Strange (Campaign); Blessed Touch (Faith)
Jassminder's 5 Memories:
1) As a child, seeing her owner murdered in the streets of Katapesh (watching with interest as his blood pooled in the street; waiting for the town watch to arrive. Only much later did she wonder whether she ought to have felt anything).
2) Realising that she was ‘different’ from the other acolytes she was training and studying with: the things that bothered them, that made them happy and sad, didn’t affect her.
3) Her first kill: the satisfaction of body and mind working in perfect coordination to send her arrow straight into the bandit’s eye. (The same sense of satisfaction as if she had hit the bullseye of a target. As for killing someone? Well, yes - it's not a training exercise. The arrow was supposed to kill him.)
4) Her capture and interrogation by ‘them’ and being tortured until she told them everything - which took longer than they expected, since the psychological elements of torture didn't really affect her, although pain of course works on everyone. (She has no idea, now, of who 'they' were; she can’t remember her answers, or even the questions). In-game, this is my rationalisation for her relatively low stat score: her body is still recovering from the trauma
5) This one is not so much a memory as a certainty: she knows she didn’t escape. ‘They’ let her live because they thought it was crueller than just killing her.
Jassminder is Lawful: orderly, methodical (all her arrows are fletched in the same way, with the same amount of twine wound in the same pattern), rational and above all, calm even in the midst of battle. Well aware that no plan survives contact with the enemy, she survives by being well-prepared: even when she has to improvise on the spur of the moment, she does so on the back of well-rehearsed and well-trained movements. She is not given to panic, or to moments of impulsive individualism. She is also truthful: it’s enough effort that her entire emotional life is a pretence, and she has no inclination to complicate things further.
Jassminder is Good: morality for her is not a question of feeling or personal preference, but of rational choice. She prefers the company of people who are good, because they are less likely to betray her or stab her in the back or enslave her. She may not share their propensity to, say, go all ‘gooey’ over small children and kittens and the like, but she would rather live in a world of good people than in a world of evil people. Keeping the good people safe is Jassminder's role, and if that means evildoers have to be eliminated, so be it. But she doesn’t take joy in killing: she vividly remembers her first kill, but hasn’t bothered to remember any of the subsequent ones (and there have been several). Bragging about killing, or keeping trophies or notches or records of kills, is something she finds incomprehensible: they’re dead, you’re alive, end of story, move on.
It’s important to note that Jassminder is not completely devoid of emotion; it’s more as though there’s a party in a house she is walking past: she can smell the food, and hear the laughter of the guests enjoying themselves, but there’s a wall between them and herself. It’s not something she worries about. She may not participate in the emotional highs of ‘normal’ people, but she doesn’t suffer from doubt, fear, despair, panic or any of the other afflictions ‘normal’ people have to endure. About the only time she feels anything comparable to emotional closeness is in the aftermath of good sex; and that creates a conundrum, since she enjoys the sex but emotional closeness is unfamiliar and uncomfortable. So far she has yet to find a rational solution, since complete abstinence is out of the question – the body has needs and appetites, after all.
In terms of appearance, Jassminder is relatively compact (just over 5 feet in height), although her broad shoulders tend to mean people perceive her as taller than she really is. Her hair, like most Keleshites, is black, and she wears it long because it’s easier than cutting it regularly.
Her eyes are dark and tend not to meet other peoples’ very often, usually making initial contact and then darting away, looking down. She is aware that most people are seeking to make some sort of connection when they look at you, and (not being able to make that sort of connection) she finds it uncomfortable; so she avoids it.
Jassminder appears to be in her mid to late twenties, although she has lost track of her exact age – along with most of her memories, it seems. She doesn’t fidget, or have any particular mannerisms; although perhaps her ability to be still no matter the circumstances, until she explodes into action, is a mannerism in itself. Even when caught by surprise she is highly unlikely to flinch or jump.
So, I roll a 1 at Lv.2. By then, I might have a couple thousand gold in my share. I will gladly spend the 540gp!
And it's not like you have to raise all the way to max. Max is, after all, maximum, not what the adventure expects you to have.
True, but as one of the few plain-Jane human recruits, I gotta represent Human Nature. Human Nature says I must spend my money until I fill that insatiable hole in my heart. (That's why HP is missing: a literal void in a vital organ!)
Dotting. Still going through the player guide, so this is subject to change, but I've been thinking for a while now about playing a somewhat... sociopathic* Paladin and this seems a good AP for it.
Will you allow the Tortured Crusader archetype from Horror Adventures?
*Important note: I do NOT mean "antisocial" - I seriously dislike PvP - and I do not mean "kill-crazy", either.
Interesting concept! Your house rules are a little different, but variety is the spice of life :)
Preferred APs
- War for the Crown (I had to bow out from a great game of this due to RL but I loved what I saw)
- Carrion Crown
- Strange Aeons
- Serpent's Skull
- Kingmaker (disclaimer: I'm running this AP at present)
About me:
I came back to these boards just over a year ago after a long absence, so I totally get the way these things ebb and flow.
My hours are... irregular. I'm generally on GMT, but I travel a lot. Some days I can post loads, some days I may only get one or two posts in. I would greatly prefer PbP for that reason.
There are times when I'm not able to post but I have always been good about letting people know in advance. I do my best not to hold the story up.
If you want a sample of my roleplay as a player rather than a DM, click here. I started off playing almost entirely male characters, but more recently I have been having a go at playing female PCs so your house-rule is fine with me!
@DMW - that's a reasonable counterpoint, although I do think that if done properly it would avoid being a 'feat tax' and would be more of a character choice, i.e. "do I as a Rogue spend valuable feats becoming better with my dagger or do I focus on doing Rogue stuff better."
In my view, having that as an option makes the game better (but I do realise this is subjective).
If you are untrained, you get no bonus at all, but you can still add a modifier from a relevant ability score to represent your raw talent. If you are trained, you add your level plus 2, along with any other relevant modifiers. If you are an expert, you add 4 instead. Masters add 6, and characters with legendary proficiency add 8.
OK, promising. Untrained doesn't give a negative, but you don't get to add your level - I think that works, on balance. And having Expert/Master/Legendary as 4/6/8 is much better than the playtest's 2/3/4. Glad they adopted that change.
My other issue with proficiency in the playtest was the way it seemed fixed (apart from skills) - there was no way to improve proficiency with weapons or armour, beyond waiting for the right level - and that was only in certain classes.
I'd like to think that my Rogue (say) could invest enough in weapon training to be as good with their knife as any Fighter; or that my Fighter could invest enough in armour training to be as proficient as any Paladin.
On the other hand, maybe Paizo deliberately wants to keep the distinctions between the classes: you want to be Legendary with weapons, play a fighter; you want to be Legendary with armour, play a paladin. I don't like that (too prescriptive for me), but I can see the rationale.
A brace of knives flung backward slowed them enough to give her a lead, but she knew that would only buy her so much time—once they realized she wasn't packing silver, they'd lose what little caution they had.
Niiice. "Packing silver" is very Pathfinder noir - reminiscent of the Dresden books (that's intended as a compliment, btw!) :)
"Merisiel was the kind of dame that attracted trouble - and that was how she liked it."
Yup! I actually get sent both the image Paizo's chosen and a rules element they want to showcase, so I have to figure out how to fit the one into the other. Sometimes it's fairly obvious or Mark will send me a suggestion, but other times there's a bit of a puzzle to solve before I can even start writing. Fortunately I usually find that constraints breed creativity!
If I could favourite blog posts (and seriously, going forward, this needs to be a Thing) this one would be a shoo-in :D
And yay for countersong! You don't see it very often at the gaming table, but it's a TPK-saver on occasion.
"Guyad" - heh. I think it was the late, great Terry Pratchett who had a dryad respond to the "I thought you were all female?" line with "Stupid. Where do you think acorns come from?"
Agree completely with posters above: PF1 was a continuation of someone else's work (done brilliantly, as proven by all of us here on this forum and not playing 4/5E).
PF2 is Paizo's chance to show they can make their game. And that means making it their art.
This may be off-topic, but I've always found it weird that the 'stereotypical' dwarf weapons were axes - given that so much of an axe is wood, while dwarves are famed for their metal-smithing. (And wood doesn't exactly grow well underground, either.)
It's always seemed to me that the typical dwarf weapon should be a sword or knife, which are about the only weapons almost entirely made of metal. So I heartily approve of the clan dagger :)
But I digress - great drawing, and I love the evolution from Harsk 1.0. Also the point made in the video about him being not just a dwarf, but a Pathfinder Dwarf: I think that comes across really well in the new illustration.
Interested - and definitely not laughing! It's good to get more DMs on the forum :)
Have to confess, though: my paper/hardback CRB went the way of all things some years ago and I never replaced it due to the d20pfsrd and archives of nethys coming online. I now cannot remember what is and isn't Core, so please gently point out any errors I may make.
For example, am I right in thinking that traits aren't Core?
Sigh, "Kazmiri's Cryptographic Theorem." I am not surprised that those pampered dandies at the College of Mysteries misuse technical terminology.
Cryptographic - related to using secret codes and ciphers.
Cryptologic - related to the study of secret codes and ciphers.
Cryptanalytic - related to breaking secret codes and ciphers.
I could forgive Kazmiri naming his spell a "cryptologic theorem," since cryptology is the general term. But the correct name for a deciphering spell would be "cryptanalytic."
And don't make me explain the difference between a code and a cipher. I will give examples and homework.
As for Lomal's Revealing Incantations, yes, that is the proper first step. Look at the puzzle. Eyeball the data, we used to say.
Dr. Erin Schram, retired NSA cryptanalyst
I love Paizo forums: come for the gaming, stay for the erudition!
Although in general, I'm inclined to go easy on grammatical and linguistic issues: not everyone who posts here has English as a first language.
Yeah, in D&D as was, goblins were what you threw at the party when they weren't high enough level to face orcs.
Paizo took goblins and added awesome to make Pathfinder goblins - little red-eyed, oval-headed psychopaths who'll burn down your home for fun while singing about it.
Honestly, it was love at first sight. I bought every module of that AP and never looked back.
I have the concept, the class (Lore Warden), the background, the personality, and the traits* - all I lack at the moment is time to write her up. Hopefully this evening...
*DM Brainiac - is it ok to reflavor a trait? Thinking of taking the Charming trait ("good-looking and knows it") but turning into something like "good-looking but doesn't know it" - would that be allowed?
I like the idea of the necromancer, as well: Listen, if anyone's going to rule the world with a legion of undead, it's going to be ME! Not some pathetic has-been who managed to get themselves imprisoned for over a thousand years.
In other news, I still suck at making decisions. Nearly there, I promise...
So far it looks like
Dhampir Inquisitor
Dhampir Monk
Halfling fighter (?)
Human Necromancer (?)
I've always thought that was odd: if you're channeling positive energy, then it should affect everyone (and likewise for negative energy). How does the energy know what it's being used for? Is it the photons in the Y-tube all over again?
In other news, I'm still making up my mind/paralyzed with indecision (take your pick)
That is a fair point, but I was looking at the map and thinking how much river traffic must go past on the Tourondel River: tempting prey for orc raids, and thus you'd need guards for the river barges.
Agree on the fast swimmer thing being not really a great thing, but I've never got much use out of Woodland Stride either so it all evens out.
Anyway, I'm changing my mind again... I'm too used to being the DM, I think ("why do I have to choose?! I'll just play EVERYONE!!!!!")
