Werebat's page

This is purely a lore/history question.
The description of Andoran says that all nobles either abdicated or were exiled after their revolution, and their lands and holdings were confiscated by the new state.
I have a campaign book that I want to run that is not a Paizo adventure path, and is not set in Golarion, so I need to transplant it. For geographical reasons, Andoran makes the most sense for the campaign to begin in, but the first adventure features a noble patron who is not all that they seem.
How could I possibly reconcile this with Andoran? Obviously, the "noble" could just be an elected official, perhaps a wealthy merchant. But are there any Andoran nobles still living on their ancestral lands, or at least in their ancestral mansions and keeps? All lands and holding were confiscated, but surely they were not turned out onto the streets - and what of nobles who allied with the revolution from the beginning?
Just fishing for some ideas here. Actual canon would be great, but I understand that it might be hard to come by.
I'll be running this campaign with the Savage Pathfinder rule set, FWIW, but I don't think that fact is terribly relevant to my question.

http://newsroom.hasbro.com/mediakit/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=1002538

OMG! Did Paizo even register on the HRC's radar? Did Hasbro BEAT Paizo when it comes to LGBT friendliness? WHAT-*WHAAAAT*?!?

* * * * *

PAWTUCKET, R.I.
--
Hasbro, Inc.(NASDAQ: HAS), a global play and entertainment company, has been selected among America’s top corporations for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) equality by earning a perfect 100 percent score on the Human Rights Campaign’s (HRC) 2017 Corporate Equality Index (CEI).

Having some enemies where you can relax the worries and just play a murderhobo is good for the game.

It might make it EASIER to run and enjoy, but is that really a good thing? What are we accepting about how to treat others who are not (culturally/racially) like us when we game this way?

And it would have been simple to create enemy mooks who players could relax about killing wholesale. Look at Warhammer's "Greenskins" (orcs and goblins, mostly) -- they are one phase in the life cycle of a fungus, that happens to be mobile and sentient. "Birthed" from mushrooms, they have no sex (although they are arguably male in gender), and reproduce via spores sent out when they die (which explains why they are so warlike). They may LOOK a bit like humanoids, but in reality they are so alien in physiology and outlook that an entire community of them could be put to the sword without much moral angst.

Skaven are a step closer to what we are, but they too have no sentient females (their females are huge, "barely sentient" creatures who exist solely to birth litters of Skaven pups as often as possible), and in a way both races make a pro-female statement by being examples of what an entire species might be like if it lacked mothers or female role models (but I digress). They do not have or need "families" as we understand them, and they are by nature and "nurture" a race of backstabbing, treacherous -- well, rats. One could imagine isolated Skaven being raised contrary to the dictates of their culture, but even then, they are creatures "touched by Chaos", which in Warhammer is another way of saying that they are at least in part demonic.

And demons, in almost all game worlds, are as justifiably killed on sight as are the undead -- at least the mindless ones.

Eberron is far more inclusive of race and culture than Golarion, regardless of "intent".

There is no question that Paizo really TRIED to be inclusive, or progressive, or whatever adjective you want to use to mean "accepting of and welcoming to people with traits outside of the mainstream".

That isn't what I asked about, though. I asked about which setting really WAS more inclusive, not which one TRIED to be more inclusive.

WRT the LGBTQ community, Golarion offers officially LGBTQ NPCs in positions of power and authority. WRT women, Golarion offers female NPCs in positions of power and authority.

But Eberron does that too. Changelings are by their very nature physically genderfluid, able to become male or female, cis-gender or trans-gender, or anything along a whole spectrum of sex and gender, at will. Warforged are asexual beings (and I am not certain that even Golarion has featured any overtly asexual beings in positions of power and authority) who (mostly) lack gender.

Meanwhile, Eberron's version of the Catholic Church is run by a young woman, the Blood of Vol was founded by a female, and there are several nations and Houses led by females.

So these are mostly a wash.

Now imagine that you are a foreigner, a non-White foreigner, sitting down to play an RPG.

Both campaign settings let you play humans of various ethnicities and cultures. While some of these may superficially resemble real-world ethnicities and cultures, none are exact matches, so this is a wash.

But look more closely. One of the campaign settings features humanoids -- people -- whose identity as people is so denigrated that they seem to exist simply to be killed by the heroes, their lives, land, and property forfeit to members of the PC races by virtue of their race. These people have little or no culture to speak of, no history of import, no contributions to the world they live in. They are "critters" who exist to be slain by their racial superiors.

The other setting has those same humanoids, but developed culturally and historically such that their personhood cannot be denied by simple virtue of their not being a part of the dominant race(s) and culture(s) of the world. In Eberron, goblins ruled the main continent once, and (together with orcs) they saved the world from alien monstrosities. Their cultures may be flawed, but so are those of the humans, gnomes, dwarves, and other PC races that share the world with them. While their cultures may tend towards violence, confrontation, slavery, and other "evil" (or at least unsavory) things, they are also worthy of respect and consideration in their own right, and have undeniably contributed to the history and growth of the world.

As a foreign national and member of a culture other than that of the USA/EU, I know which setting *I* would feel to be more of a comfortable "safe space" to game in.

And it may be that WotC was not aiming for this, while Paizo was -- but that is irrelevant. The fact remains.

Eberron's changes were made to change the way standard monsters and races operate.

Paizo's innovations on the other hand are a deliberate effort to aid in real world inclusiveness.

It's no contest really. The way you can tell is that none of Eberron's changes are the kind that have produced the backlash from recidivist players the way Paizo's have.

That's how you can tell if something is truly progressive... see if there is any backlash.

What you are saying is that Paizo TRIED really hard to be inclusive, but I didn't ask which setting was INTENDED to be more progressive, I asked which one actually WAS more progressive.

Similarly, I wasn't wondering which setting "stirred the pot" and antagonized bigots more -- I was wondering which one was actually more progressive.

Making it look like you tried hard to make a cultural point, and upsetting people who disagree with that point, is not even the most effective way to effect change in society. Consider any number of ham-handed "Christian" themed video games vs. something like Doug Ten-Naples' classic "The Neverhood" -- The Neverhood is CLEARLY a Christian-themed game, that is CLEARLY trying to "push" the ideals of Christianity, but it does so in such a subtle and entertaining way that it's easy to miss -- or at least not consciously notice -- what it is doing. This in many ways made it more effective at that angle of what it was trying to do.

Depends on how you define 'Progressive' [I am certainly not a fan of economic policies labeled such.]

I'd say Eberron's treatment of the gods as 'maybe yes maybe no' is pretty progressive.

Good point -- I had not even considered Eberron's treatment of religion.

I've been discussing with friends which of the two campaign settings -- Pathfinder's Golarion and D&D's Eberron -- is the more "progressive"? By this I mean which one is more inclusive and inviting for a wider spectrum of players.

For example, Golarion clearly appeals to the LGBTQ community, with NPCs who are specifically LGBTQ.

On the other hand, Eberron has an entire race (changelings), who are by definition genderfluid beings who can choose to be physically male, physically female, and/or of any sexual orientation and gender identity.

Meanwhile, Eberron goes to great pains to explain that no monster is "always" a given alignment, and nonstandard alignments for humanoids such as goblins and orcs seem to be very common, as opposed to Golarion, where goblinoids and orcs are much more likely to be "evil" and savage.

Moreover, Eberron gives these humanoids rich cultural histories, and does not resort to relegating them to being the "other". It would seem that those of different cultural identities in the real would might be more comfortable playing in the Eberron setting, where "humanoid" races (who are thinly veiled fantasy stand-ins for people of ethnicities other than Caucasian) are treated with more dignity and respect. Goblins in Golarion are fire-obsessed lunatics, while in Eberron they once ruled an empire and are in fact the "first people" of the campaign mainland.

What do you think?

I have a problem. One of my players has created a "broken" character, that is to say that she is ridiculously powerful.

There are no overpowered characters -- only insufficiently creative GMs.

(Annoying weasel noises and tittering, smarmy laughter)

It's always a shame when science and progress get blocked by petty trifles.

We could be in space by now, living in colonies, if not for the flaws of our species.

Maybe.

Maybe if we found a way to remove those "flaws", there would be unforeseen consequences of a disastrous kind.

Sometimes what looks like a flaw actually does serve an important purpose.

Hello, once my players killed an orcs clans. After clawing through the barbarian chieftain his witch wife and his warrior concubines, they found three orcs toddlers. And the PC barbarian simply killed them.

Considering orcs are naturaly evil, that's not an evil act, but they were small kids, anyway.
So it was plague control or terrible crime?

Depends on whether they are Tolkien orcs or, say, Eberron orcs.

Of course, Warhammer orcs don't seem to have a childhood (or females), so the question is moot with them.

Pathfinder orcs? I don't know. PF seemed to be in some ways a reaction against Eberron when it came to humanoids; as if it was making a point to say that its goblins and orcs were NOT the sort of people who could forge nations that (while possibly objectionable on some levels) one could basically reason and coexist with. Thus, PF humanoids are portrayed in a much more negative light than those of Eberron.

However, are they IRREDEEMABLY evil? Is it IMPOSSIBLE for a young orc to grow up to be "good"? I don't know that that's stated anywhere either.

What would be the alternative to killing the orclings? Leaving them be to starve to death or be eaten by wildlife? Bringing them to a city and letting them loose on the streets after the orphanage refuses to take in the "monsters"?

Also because they don't understand how brutal the misfire rules are.

Well, that tends to happen when they never see the brutality in action. I had a gunslinger in my last campaign, which ran close to three years of bi-weekly playing. He went the TWF pistol route, and his guns misfired maybe three times the entire campaign.

Brutal? I wouldn't really know about that. Never really saw those rules in action.

Aw... This little guy looks like he really belongs on my Underworld Blood Bowl team!

Hey, this is maybe not the perfect place for this question, but I couldn't think of a better one so please bear with me.

I'm a cis/straight male, age 42. I've been gaming with more or less the same crew for years now (some of them since high school). We're almost all cis/straight men.

A while back, a slightly younger (now 30-ish) gay guy joined our group. He's a great guy, and we all like him. He's pretty openly gay, or at least has been so with us since we met him. We're all cool with that and while there's some non-malicious joking back and forth, I've never gotten the impression that it's ever made anyone at the table uncomfortable (he starts it most of the time). He's been playing with us, on and off, for about a decade now.

We're about to start a new campaign, and he's made it a point to state that his new character for this campaign will be gay. While he's played at least one (female) character with an... unusual sexuality in the past, this is the first time he's made it a point that his character will be male and gay.

I don't really think that this is going to be much of an issue for the rest of us, and I'm not really asking what we should do or how we should deal with the situation. What I'm asking is this -- if you are a gay man, and were in the same situation, what kind of concerns would YOU have? I'm trying to look at it from his angle rather than my own.

I mean sure, I could just ask him, and I probably will -- but it wouldn't hurt to hear other opinions too, I'm thinking. For some reason I have a sense that his choosing to actually play an openly gay character is significant (he's previously played a lizardman and a female witch). This is mostly just a hunch on my part, but on the off chance that he's taking a risk here I'd like to have some idea of what his concerns might be.

Thanks in advance to any who might have some light to shed.

So, from the lack of response, I'm going to assume that there's nothing offensive about this to any of the GLBTW people who read it.

Good to know.

I'm angry about people I will never meet playing the game differently.

That angers me as well.

As written, Pathfinder is now an all-things-to-all-people rule-set, with everything from laser guns to ancient priests to gunslingers to World War I soldiers.

So... League of Legends, the RPG?

Pathfinder is not a cookie.

If you're playing 3.5, you're playing 3.5.

If you're playing Pathfinder, you're playing Pathfinder.

And somewhere along the line, it became the case that if you are playing PF with all of the 3.5 stuff that doesn't directly contradict the PF rules, you are POSTING FLAMEBAIT IF YOU MENTION A PROBLEM YOU ARE HAVING IN YOUR CAMPAIGN!!!ii!111eleven1!!!onehundredandeleven!!11i1!

Edit: The local theory is that many of the people who have conniptions over this are either optimizers who never bought most of the 3.5 books, or have since disposed of them.

I also tend to think that OP post manages to both blow things completely out of proportion (I don't think anyone at Paizo expects every single option in a rulebook that was ever published to be open for player use), and also tries to flame as many different groups as possible in one paragraph.

I don't see that at all, and think you are being thin-skinned.

Telling people that they are entitled to their opinions but he doesn't want a rehash of those opinions in this particular thread is not "flaming" them.

You are illustrating WHY he said what he did.

Wait -- people take the Prehensile Hair hex for reasons OTHER than reloading pepperboxes so they can TWF with them?

(The rest of their levels being Gunslinger, natch)

Yeah but with magical (a wizard did it), you could argue that they are indefaticably a female/male and therefore superior. Okay I wouldn't argue that, but other people who were part of the society would. The Drow could even argue. "Why not have all Drow Female? They are superior right? It would make us a better species as a whole."

Heh, imagine having an uprising in Drow Society. The Matriarchy trying to stop the rebels from administering Sex Change Potions to all the males of the Drow as to make a level ground for them to work with.

You could also take the potion after a self exile, and subsequent transfer from one major Drow Hub to another. Just change your name. You just become a new person, and leave the old world behind.

Or the Matriarchy quaffing Sex Change potions to become MALE, and then declaring that MALE drow are superior!

For added fun, they purchase said potions from the same gnome who sold them to the men.

"And when every last cent of their money was spent, the Fix-It-Up Chappie packed up -- and he went!"

32. A length of rope threaded between a number of evenly spaced spheres, each about the size of a baseball (depending on the size of the giant)

33. The mangled skeleton of a goblin

34. Several mushrooms growing in the dung. If ingested, roll d%:
01-50: They taste disgusting (DC 12 Fort save to avoid filth fever)
51-70: Eater must make a DC 20 Fort save or lose 1d6 Con to poison
71-85: As above but eater Confused for 1d100 minutes on a failed save
86-98: Eater is under the effects of an Enlarge spell for 1d4 hours
99-00: Eater affected by Giant Form spell for 1d4 hours

Not sure where to post this, but this seems like the place.

I write a blog for my Blood Bowl team on another web forum.

I don't usually write anything that even lightly touches on lesbianism, but this recent piece might. I'm just wondering if there is anything in this that the LGBTW community might find offensive (especially lesbians, but you know, whatever). I understand that a lot of lesbians find "lesbian titillation" in writing and other mediums to be offensive.

Note that at least two of the characters are probably bi, and might engage in sex with other species (although this hasn't been more than implied). Also, I guess this piece unavoidably includes hints of incest.

Here it is:

* * * * *

"Sisters!" growled Eugenia the Bog Hag, "It is time!"

One by one, the three sisters took their places around the ring of mushrooms, stones, and eldritch sigils and disrobed, revealing all manner of hump, lump, and imperfection to the moon and midnight forest. Eugenia and Aneira's bony green and ivory frames contrasted even more than usual with Gretchen's pendulous bulk, which was riddled with warty splotches of an even deeper hue than the rest of her bruise-colored hide.

They were alone -- even Groxx and Bogger were forbidden to witness the hidden rituals of the Hag's Sabbath, held only one night of the year at a time when the winds of magic blew most favorably for witches' hexing.

And tonight, there were dark hexes to work.

Together, they writhed obscenely and chanted the foul cant of their loathsome kind, words of gibberish and black malice made sound. Limbs both fat and spindly swung and weaved in dissonant harmony as weird tongues of green flame sprang forth from the ground at the circle's center to lick at the spinning shadows of the hag sisters.

Eugenia cackled as her dark, lank locks slapped wetly on her slack and withered bosom, quickening the pace of her mad but methodical prancing. Gretchen bounded from rock to mossy rock, exhibiting a kind of hulking grace as she danced the circle counter to wild-haired Aneira, whose milky eyes appeared to pose no hindrance to her own ability to whirl and gambol. The green flames grew in height and intensity with the crones' chanting and dancing, and embedded within the ritual was an implicit supplication to the dark power of the hags, some unnamed spirit of chaos or worse.

And then, as the flames reached their crescendo and the sisters' gyrations twined their bodies together in lascivious abandon, a sacrifice was made -- a sacrifice of Toadbrew as well as other things whose particulars are best left unsaid.

Appeased, the sinister force whose aid had been sought gathered itself to do their bidding. Its manifestation sprang simultaneously from the darkness of the wood and the glowing green of the flickering flames, a roiling force of shadow and unnatural light that careened erratically about the sisters and their circle before rising and exploding outward in all directions across the night sky.

Exhausted, the hags collapsed against each other and slumped to the ground, still holding one another's taloned hands.

"It is done," panted Aneira, her cold breath frosting the air above her pale face.

"Aye," gasped Gretchen, the black wires of her hair and thick flab of her body spreading out on the dirt and leaves beneath her. "An' not one moment too soon, neither. I ain't near as spry as I used ta be!"

Eugenia merely laughed in satisfaction and examined the stars above with a gaze that shifted quickly from wondering satiety to cruel calculation. "They should be feeling it right about now!"

And indeed they were. Every soul who had tippled even the slightest sip of Toadbrew in the last day or so was touched by the magic of the hags' patron spirit, it finding even traces of the strange liquor to be swift conduits through which it could easily enter their systems and their psyches.

And as it did, it shut them down, changing their eyes to a featureless lambent green and leaving them just conscious enough to do the bidding of the sisters. Here a blacksmith rose from bed, there a band of brigands ceased their gambling and left their hideout as one, and elsewhere a group of goblin scouts abandoned their subterranean mission to heed the call of a new master. All equipped themselves as quickly and set out as quietly as possible, leaving no word to their loved ones or superiors. Most disappeared into the night and began making their way inexorably to the hags' circle, although none of them had any clear idea of their destination.

Eugenia closed her eyes and grinned toothily as she thought of them -- all of them. No doubt many would fall victim to the dangers inherent in their journey, and others would be restrained by loved ones and other meddling types, but most would make it. With Toadbrew selling the way it was thanks to Girgenti's distribution, it would be enough to assemble an army.

A hag's army.

I approve of this thread!

Drejk wrote:

With common sue-happy mentality in USA I wouldn't be surprised that they are more afraid of people suing them: "You gave me gay blood?! noo! Wargh! Give me ten zillion dollars because you made me a sinner! My right to be bigot was violated by proving that gays have the same blood as righteous folk! No! It can't be! Waaarrghhh!"

At which point, any moderately-competent lawyer will suggest that the client shut up, sit down, and watch this episode of M*A*S*H.

Or that one episode of Family Guy where it was revealed that homosexuals have acid for blood (ergo, the blood they were given couldn't have *really* been from a homosexual, or they would be dead).

Werebat wrote:

Was thinking about the view you express here and it would seem that it would technically allow for lesbians to get each other pregnant, if one partner were heterosexual but trans and the other were cisgender but willing to look past the physical. That's... Interesting.

Also, if you have a situation where a trans woman and a cis woman make a baby, the trans woman isn't heterosexual. That would be a bisexual or lesbian trans woman, with a bi or lesbian cis woman.

Thanks, Crystal. That's EXACTLY where I was going with that!

Edit: BUT! The cis woman could well be heterosexual if she were either unaware of the trans woman's gender identity, or didn't accept it.

TheJayde wrote:

DominusMegadeus wrote:

You need to open your eyes, sheeple. Gender, Race, Sexuality; these are all meaningless in Pathfinder.

I would take this more to heart, if you didn't start off calling everyone sheeple. Sheeple being a term that pretentious jerks like to use to think that they know more than other people, and have a more open or enlightened mind. If that isn't the case, then instead you're saying that everyone else is stupid and extremely closed minded, which is just an insult to us all. Either way, there is no winning by using the term.

Just a joke post, friend. Sorry if you felt looked down upon.

I get the joke, but you should be careful about using the term in general. You don't want to wake up the sheeple!

There are a lot of different ways for different couples to have kids. I'm not sure any of those need a "That's... Interesting" applied to them. That's all I'll say about that, since again, this is getting off-topic.

You misunderstand, I think. I'm talking terminology. Would my example be terminologically correct? If so, that's interesting. Not necessarily the people themselves -- well, they'd be interesting too, maybe, but that's not what I'm talking about.

I'm really not familiar with these terms you're throwing around -- if I'm right about their meanings, that leads to some interesting conclusions (for example, in this lingo, lesbians can get each other pregnant). It sounds like you're thinking I'm being derogatory, when that's not really my intent.

I guess this is primarily a roleplaying question, about character backstories and how they're incorporated into your at-table play.

Getting somewhat back on topic, I'm working on a homebrew world that has a race in it that would be... Eh, not actually transgender now that I think of it, but... Well, you decide:

They're amphibians with a three-stage life cycle. They hatch from eggs in swamp pools, swim around as mostly animalistic pollywog things for a time, and then come out of the water when they grow limbs and dry-ish, warty skin (like a toad or eft).

They live for a time in this state, as intelligent beings in villages and other communities that have cultures, language, etc.

Eventually they undergo another transformation, this time returning to the water and degenerating into mindless floating sacs anchored to the bottoms of their pools by tough stalks. At this stage they are sexually mature, and pretty much don't do anything else other than breed and filter feed (ejecting sperm or eggs into the water around them).

It is in their second stage of life that they might interact with other intelligent races, and take up the adventuring life (although most wouldn't dream of doing this, as they are quite culturally tied to their breeding pools, which they naturally consider sacred, or at least very important).

As intelligent beings in their second life stage, these guys would either be considered asexual or maybe presexual. I suppose they might have gender identifications similar to those of human children, but then there are no sexually mature adults in their communities to model much in the way of gender roles for them.

So, not trans, but -- possessed of an alien sexuality, which may not even be a sexuality at all.

This is getting off-topic, so I'll make one comment here. You're misunderstanding genderfluid. The idea isn't that a genderfluid person's identity is shaped by society. It's that it remains fluid in spite of the binary system of gender that society as a whole enforces. So it's kind of the opposite of the way you're describing it.

Also, you're conflating sexual orientation (gay, straight, bi, asexual, etc) with gender identity (trans, cis, genderfluid, etc.) Two different things.

Fluid takes the shape of its container. Maybe another word would be better. It sounds like you're describing the gender version of bisexual.

Was thinking about the view you express here and it would seem that it would technically allow for lesbians to get each other pregnant, if one partner were heterosexual but trans and the other were cisgender but willing to look past the physical. That's... Interesting.

So -- I'm just making sure here -- it is the OFFICIAL ruling of the Paizo team that a gnome alchemist should be able to qualify for the Arcane Strike feat, using his alchemist (or other class) level as his caster level for purposes of the Arcane Strike feat. This is because of the Gnome Magic racial trait, which grants several cantrips as SLAs (or, alternatively, the Pyromaniac alternate gnome racial trait). Correct?

Of course I would assume that a gnome with insufficient charisma to have the SLAs granted by Gnome Magic or Pyromaniac would be unable to use those racials to qualify for Arcane Strike.

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I have a question.

People seem sure that a gnome of any class would qualify for the Arcane Strike feat due to getting SLAs from the Gnome Magic racial trait. However, Gnome Magic states:

"The caster level for these effects is equal to the gnome's level."

That would seem to indicate that the effects themselves, rather than the gnome, have caster levels.

If this were true, the gnome wouldn't qualify for Arcane Strike. His Gnome Magic SLAs might, but SLAs don't get feats.

Right?

It would also be good to point out that not everyone is a fixed gender. Some people are more like liquid and fill the container given.

Eh... I recently encountered the word "Genderfluid" (on another gaming board, actually) and it made me wonder.

A fluid, or liquid, is something that conforms to the shape of its container.

The idea of "genderfluid" effectively asserts that society can in fact determine the effective gender of at least some people.

This would seem to reinforce the notion that some heteronormatives have that it is important that they control the gender exposure of young people, in order to assure that they be more likely to grow into heterosexuality. It would seem to justify their fears that "exposure to gays will make my kid gay".

It would also seem to fly in the face of the notion that homosexuality isn't a choice. The last time I checked -- what was admittedly a while back -- the idea that homosexuality was a choice wasn't considered very progressive.

Not sure if certain people really want to open that box.

Werebat wrote:

pezlerpolychromatic wrote:

FuelDrop wrote:

You know, if you choose to play a Goblin Alchemist then you should probably expect to get killed.

I mean you're a Goblin! of course you're going to die.

Usually by self-conflagration.

Or when the team troll decides he's feeling peckish in the middle of a throw team-mate attempt -- oh, wait, this is the PATHFINDER message board!

Ah yes, and in a pinch goblins can be considered ammunition.

That they can, Jim -- that they can!

I'm pondering the possibilities of reskinning a summoner so it appears as a sort of tinker/mechanist/golemancer who crafts constructs that do his bidding.

The eidolon could simply be a golem that the "summoner" constantly tinkers with and makes upgrades to.

"Summoned" monsters would be a little trickier, but could be handwaved as portable mini-bots that -- I don't know, unfolded from storage cubes?

Just a half-baked idea I'm wondering about. Any suggestions?

...if Seal Team Six burst into a room with flash bangs and assault rifles, which one of them may be transgendered is probably going to be the last thing on even the biggest bigot's mind.

I'm still laughing about this, maybe a minute after having read it. Thanks!

It just occurred to me that, given a standard Pathfinder game, where sex-swapping magic exists, the closest you could come to playing a TG character would be the equivalent of a rich guy dressing up like a homeless person and living out on the streets for a while. He can do it, and he can get a glimmer of the experience, but no matter what he goes through HE'LL ALWAYS KNOW that he could walk away from it all whenever he wanted to.

The TG iconic shaman might or might not be physically female, but whichever she is, she certainly knows that she has the OPTION to be physically female if she WANTS to be, without much trouble.

That's a very different situation than the one faced by TG people in the real world.

Hey, Paizo. You know I love you, but you have forgotten to represent us women gamers on your staff. You have zero women on your RPG design/dev team, so you are not even reaching the lowly three percent number of women designers in the video game industry. And your newest hire in editing, which is a field that women tend to dominate in general publishing, is a man. Please add some diversity in your staff. You are a leader in diversity in gaming in publishing, so please be a leader in diversity in hiring, as well.

We look to you to lead this industry against sexism.

OP, I tip my hat to you. That was well done. Well. Done.

<Applauds>

I am not saying that it wont be a part of who they are, I am just wondering what such a change would actually mean. If a transgender person could literally wave a magic wand and be the sex that matches their gender in every way, what would that do for the person? Would they do it? How does that impact their identity? How would that impact cultural norms around it?

Would there be any differences culturally to the acceptance of a boy who wants to be a girl or vice versa if there was literally a way to make them that other sex? Not just look a certain way, but actually be that other sex. Would people be more comfortable with it? Less? Especially in a world loaded down with literally miraculous magic like a pathfinder world, it seems like there should be some kind of impact.

There is another way to look at this.

In the real world, there is no method of actually changing a body's sex (XX to XY, for example, resulting in a body with a fully functioning reproductive system). You're pondering whether or not a world where such a thing WERE possible might impact society's treatment of the transgendered.

In the real world, there are also no wide variety of "races", such as dwarves, elves, etc. But look at how humans have treated OTHER HUMANS with slightly different heritable cosmetic features.

It's quite possible that fantasyland is just a nicer place than the real world.

Variant intelligent species trying to share our planet with us would be much more District 9 than Lord of the Rings.

So when considering what you are considering, you must consider also that fantasyland is no more or less than what its creators make of it.

Meanwhile, Pathfinder is a lot more about killing stuff, taking its treasure, and leveling up than it is about harmonious race and gender relations. Heck, unless I'm mistaken, Paizo intentionally designed PF humanoids to be less compatible with humans and demi-humans than they had been becoming in D&D -- you know, that whole Eberron thing.

FuelDrop wrote:

You know, if you choose to play a Goblin Alchemist then you should probably expect to get killed.

I mean you're a Goblin! of course you're going to die.

Usually by self-conflagration.

Or when the team troll decides he's feeling peckish in the middle of a throw team-mate attempt -- oh, wait, this is the PATHFINDER message board!

Any way to run Blood Bowl in the Pathfinder game? I mean, have the party actually BE a Blood Bowl team, with maybe some NPCs or cohorts as the disposable linemen?

Alternately, has anyone run a Dark Sun type game where the PCs were gladiators and had them engage in entertaining combats? I ran one back in 2e D&D where the party started out on a makeshift network of planks and scraps of cloth that abruptly levitated thirty feet into the air at the Sorcerer King's command. PCs had to make the equivalent of Acrobatics checks in order to avoid falling at the surprise levitation, then had to keep making them all through the combat due to the narrow nature of the plankwork. Ropes tied to some of the planks allowed fallen combatants to climb back up to the action -- and avoid the pack of beasts that were released into the arena right after the plankwork levitated into the air!

A player is interested in playing a witch with a Soul Bound Doll familiar.

Seems reasonable to allow the witch PC to take the Improved Familiar feat in order to do this.

But at what level should the SBD become available? For example, the witch would have to be level 7 with the feat in order to take a mephit as a familiar.

Edit: Soul Bound Doll

boring7 has the dark of it, I think.

I've played a number of characters who were conceived female, but born male. It never really came up in game.

Why did they wait nearly 40 years till the current crisis to be putting real effort into a vaccine?

They might have been distracted by some other deadly virus that has been around for roughly the same span of time...

Great question, Ragnarok.

I started playing D&D way back in the red box days.

We moved on to AD&D, then 2nd Edition, then 3rd Edition. When 4th Edition rolled around, I and my gaming group (mostly friends from college by that point) decided it wasn't for us and liked the feel of Pathfinder more.

I guess you could say it felt like a better progression of the rules to us.

I personally liked how PF guided players away from multiclassing mayhem, beefed up some classes that needed it (sorcerer, for example), and rewrote some of the more problematic 3.5 options such as the Scout class in order to bring them back down to earth.

Today we play Pathfinder because we're still running one campaign that started about three years ago, and the other GM who is just starting out is using PF because he's most comfortable with it. The general consensus seems to be that we're getting ready to move on to 5th Edition D&D, though.

PF has just become too "bloated" for our tastes -- there are many ways to describe this, but the one that comes to mind first (because I've been doing it this week) is that it takes forever to pore over every PF book that exists trying to build characters for fear of missing some interesting or competitive option. Don't look at me like that -- if there's ONE powergamer at the table, EVERYONE has to be one or they'll be swimming in his wake the entire campaign.

So, the short answer would be -- I switched to PF because I didn't like what I saw in 4e, but I expect I'll soon be switching to 5e because I'm seeing it as a possible refinement of PF, or maybe a palatable synthesis of 3.5 and 4e, as I realize PF has grown to have lost much of what I liked about it in the first place.

Back me up here, folks -- this has become a major showdown between myself and the GM of our local campaign.

Playing a non-standard race (just like always), and I know the GM was soured by this from the get-go. As a result, he's being pissy as usual and trying to put the kibosh on everything cool that I can think of for my character to be able to do. Lame!

So here's the sitch: I'm picking my two traits, and one of them is going to be Adopted. GM rules that Adopted only gives me the OPTION of spending my OTHER trait on a trait from a race not my own. In other words, I have to spend BOTH of my traits to get ONE race trait from a race that isn't my own.

OK, I'm interested in keeping the peace and respecting this guy's rulings. Fine. I don't kick about it and just roll with it.

Next thing you know, he's giving me guff about my choice of race trait. I chose to be raised by humans and to select their race trait of Bonus Feat (I need it for my build). He insists that that's not the kind of trait that Adopted gives you. I point to the core rule book where it's clearly listed under Human Racial TRAITS.

I'm obviously correct but this guy just won't let it go. He's being completely unreasonable and not only has he insisted that I cannot take Bonus Feat, but that I'm "locked in" to his weaksauce interpretation of Adopted because I agreed I was taking it for "flavor" reasons only and he's sick of everyone "powergaming".

That's right -- I can't change my traits! I'm stuck with either throwing a trait away or wasting the other trait on one of the human traits from the back of the APG.

How ridiculous is this? The RAW is obviously in my favor and he's pitching a fit because he can.

Just out of curiosity, why did you want to be a cat in the first place? We're you a bit concerned with little things like not having hands?

Furries are a real thing.

3.) Imposing your personal tastes on the players (by far the most common. "I don't like special snowflakes, I'm limiting everybody to Core" of "I don't like these options for various reasons like balance or flavor, so I'm cutting them out").

I'm of the opinion that very often, what a campaign setting is NOT is every bit as important as what it IS.

If you remember Dark Sun, you might understand a GM who would disallow a PC gnome pirate who rode around on a dog, even if the player offered a "cool backstory" about how his character got zapped to Athas from another world via Prismatic Spray spell or some such.

So if the GM wants to run a tribal-style campaign set in a cold world with barbarians, druids, and sorcerers, a player who digs in their heels and INSISTS on playing a wizard, gunslinger, or similarly incongruous character is being kind of a tool.

Werebat wrote:

Fewer options are always bad. ALWAYS.

Blanket statements about absolutes are generally wrong.

But not always, right?

I don't mind players choosing to play something odd, but I do mind them insisting on playing something that in no way fits in with the campaign setting or game the GM wants to run.

So there's nothing inherently wrong with a player wanting to try out a ratfolk alchemist or something, so long as it fits (even if it requires a little bit of stretching) the campaign setting the GM has worked on creating.

But it's kind of irritating to have "That Guy" belly up to the table and insist on playing some improbable race/class combo that was most likely cribbed from an optimization board because it gave the most "plusses", and happens to have absolutely nothing to do with the campaign (or is in fact antithetical to the campaign -- a lizardman swashbuckler in a tribal arctic campaign, for example).

QQs about "stifled creativity" are sort of irritating when the player is exhibiting a complete disregard for the theme the GM is aiming for, especially when a bit of digging reveals the build in question to have come from an optimization thread.

Fewer options are always bad. ALWAYS.

Pathfinder, in its purest form, is a game reserved for "buildmasters" who have huge heads shaped like summer squashes, with energy bolts shooting out of them. These buildmasters are capable of sorting through all of the rules and options in order to create the most perfectly optimized, min/maxed characters.

The real fun in Pathfinder is in poring through rules minutia in order to create slightly more perfect character builds than the other buildmasters have already created.

It is also acceptable for a player to look up these optimized builds online and emulate them at the table.

Fewer options available will never stop the optimization buildmasters, but it will make the true essence of the game less fun for them, and therefore is anathema.