William Pall's page

I'm going to be running The AoA AP for my group soon. I'm currently reading through the six books of the AP and have been skimming through the posts here in the forum to get an idea of what to expect as we play through the AP. Despite only being in book 2 of my initial read through, I understand that the core concept of the AP is "Establish your Power Base in Castle Altaerein and use the Teleportation Hub to see the world."

But, I know my group. Based on our experiences with Kingmaker, and building up Stachys and Merratt in War For the Crown, I could very easily see them being just as interested in developing the surrounding countryside of Isger in and around Breachill just as much, or more, than going on the world tour by way of elfgate.

I did some searching for info on Isger. As near as I can tell the government is holding on by a thread . . . the countryside throughout the nation is lawless and over-run by monsters and bandits. Elidir is in debt to neighboring countries for their assistance in the Goblin War of two decades past . . . and that's not even considering the fact that Hedvend IV is a puppet of distant Cheliax.

With all that said, I want to get feedback and advice here in regard to my idea of prompting my players to build up Castle Altaerein as the focal point for the instigation of a new revolution. Build up a powerbase and the love from the Isgerian people in Breachill and beyond to become a political threat to Elidir. To wrestle control of the nation away from Chelish influence and put it back in the hands of the people.

Like I said, I think that this will be something that my group will be able to sink their teeth into. I know that if I dangle this option in front of them as an AP sub-plot there will be things I need to consider, the very least will be a response from Hedvend, and his Chelish Masters.

So, I'm still fairly new to Starfinder and looking through the rulebook, when I got to the Starship section I was very happy to see what was there. But, also unhappy at how few options were there.
I would assume that there will be a future book that will have additional options, but until then, I'm curious What other options people have come up with.
The one idea I have I'm not sure how it would stated out. We have the Hanger Bay and Shuttle Bay options. They both take up multiple Expansion Slots, and (at least to me) feel very much options that are in the interior of the ship. I'm curious what BP and PCU cost would be for an exterior docking ring/clamp. Something secure enough to hold a smaller ship through Drifting.
What I'm picturing is a ship that has a fairly powerful drift engine that has as many of these docking clamps as they can fit that could hold a ship two categories smaller with no (or slower) drift engine. The larger ship acting as a ferry if you will.
Anyone with thoughts on my Expansion Bay option or have some of their own? New Frames, New Starship Weapons, New Bay Options?

Alright, I wasn't sure which forum to post this in, but I figured here or Conversions . . . so, whatever.

I got thinking the other night as I was playing the Star Wars MMO. In SWTOR they have what's called Legacy experience and levels. For those not familiar with the game it's a seperate experience track that every character you have gains, but which is shared between all your characters. It's gained at a slower rate than normal experience, but every new character you start you have whatever amount of Legacy you've already accumulated. The higher Legacy level you have, the more perks you have access to for all your characters.

Now, I'll freely admit that I don't think the Legacy system was implemented as well as they intended in SWTOR, but that's not here nor there right now.

What I was thinking is trying to figure out how I could apply a Legacy type system to my Pathfinder game. Yeah, setting up a seperate experience track for the players is easy (even if I just track it myself for right now), but I'm trying to think of ways I can think of legacy perks or boons that can be provided when their Legacy level goes up.

The only thing I can think of is if for one reason or another a player gets bored of their current character and wants to change out their PC for a new one. Their new PC would have their character level start at the same level as the player's Legacy level. It'd be easier than having them start from level one.

I'm just not sure what other options should be available to players as they get a high legacy. I plan to have the Legacy tracking persistant through multiple campaigns (within the same homebrew campaign world), but I thought I could push the idea out to the community to see if anyone else had thoughts.

Okay, I'm working on my own homebrew setting and made another post about having the five gods of the setting inspired by the five colors of magic in Magic the Gathering.
Thanks to the other thread, I think I've got a good bead on that, now for the next aspect of world building. For specialist wizards, we have the eight schools of magic. Obviously I can't assign a one for one transposition going from eight to five. But I think I've come up with a solution. My thoughts are as thus:

Black is Necromancy and Conjuration (Calling).
Green is Transmutation and Conjuration (Creation).
Red is Evocation and Conjuration (Summoning).
White is Abjuration and Conjuration (Healing).
Blue is Conjuration (Teleportation) and Divination, Illusion, and Enchantment.

I loose out on having a special conjurer. And I think that "Blue Wizards" will have to choose which "branch" they'll specialize in. In the setting, the Blue God is the God of Magic, so part of me feels that it's appropriate there would be more of them.

Thoughts anyone?

Alright, to make a long story short. I volunteered to run a Pathfinder game and somehow I said I would use a homebrew setting (which consists only of random stray thoughts in my head right now) for the game.

There was some character creation last night and the player who chose to make the divine caster asked what deity options they had. I'm horrible at explaining things, but what I told him (which really does match up with the stray thoughts in my head) is that there were only going to be five gods, each one based on a color of magic used in Magic the Gathering. Through the course of the night we figured that his Warpriest would have the White God (or Goddess) as their patron, with the Healing, and Good blessings.

So, that much I know is set. Now it comesto a matter of fleshing out the rest of the pantheon so that as the game advances there's internal consistancy. So far I've made a list of domains from the CRB and matched them up to the five colors as best I can and assigned alignments. I know it's not going to be exact because the five colors were not intended to be shoe-horned into Pathfinders alignment system, but it's something at least.

White (LG): Air, Community, Glory, Good, Healing, Law, Liberation, Nobility, Protection, Sun (10 domains)
Blue (LN): Charm, Knowledge, Madness, Magic, Protection, Travel, Trickery, Water, Weather (9 domains)
Red (CN): Artifice, Chaos, Destruction, Fire, Luck, Rune, Strength, War (8 domains)
Green (NG): Animal, Charm, Earth, Good, Healing, Plant, Weather (7 domains)
Black (NE): Darkness, Death, Destruction, Evil, Repose (5 domains)

Considering how few gods there will be in the setting, I'm okay with the large selection of domains per god. But, I'd feel better if Black had a few more.

I know I'm not an expert on MtG, but I'm curious if anyone can give their opinion whether I'm on the right track, if I'm oblivious to something? Also, if anyone has suggestions on favored weapons or really any suggestions at all.

Bear with me, I'm not sure if as I explain this it will make sense. I'll try to make this as succient as possible.

In my groups current Pathfinder game (set in 3.5 Forgotten Realms), I picked up the Leadership feat. My character is a LN Fetchling Monk 8 and just recently aquired a Shade template (homebrew modification from the DM of the 3.5 template).

For one reason or another, the idea I came up with for my cohort was to get a LN Mystic Theurge (Wizard/Cleric [Shar]) who focused on the magic item creation feats.

I think my train of thought behind the idea was that if the item crafter has access to both arcane and divine magic, there's a better chance of meeting the pre-req's for crafting.

Was my logic faulty in that? I know with the cohort's level cap due to the leadership feat is currently six, therefore he doesn't have any levels of the prestige class yet.

Is there anything I'm over-looking? I like the idea of a dedicated magic item crafter friendly to the party (assuming the party is willing to accept items crafted by a servant of Shar [evil laugh]). Any suggestions for the build?

While contemplating possible character idea's, one idea that popped into my head was a practitioner of [link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iaido]Iaido[/link], which consists of drawing and sheathing your weapon with every strike.

I was pondering how to portray this with 3.5/PRPG rules . . .

Off the top of my head I would say a high Dexterity, Quick Draw, and Weapon Finesse at the very least. Anyone else given this any thought?

Of course, I could just label it all fluff, but what's the point of that?

I love this community. The people here are awesome. But, due to how awesome you all are I'm in a bit of a pickle.

To be able to put all this in perspective . . . I was a charter subscriber to the Pathfinder Adventure Path back two and a half years ago. When WotC canceled the dead tree versions of Dragon and Dungeon I was unemployed and living in Michigan, one of the haqrdest states hit by the economic trouble facing everyone.

Right before the cut off for becoming a charter member, I was able to find gainful employment and was able to provide for an increase in the gaming budget to sign up for the subscription.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago. My wife goes in for surgery with her new gynocologist. Somewhat routine biopsy type to figure out the cause for some irregularities in her cycle. He wanted to treat the cause rather than just the symptoms.

We had an appointment with him for this coming Monday for surgery results. We got a call shortly after the surgery asking us to come in early. Last Friday we found out that my wife has Uterine Cancer.

We were told that it is very early stage for this type of cancer, it's been found earlier than is usual. We also have nothing to indicate it's spread beyond just the uterus. For those reason's we were told that it's not considered life-threatening at this point.

The reason it's not life-threatening is because the simple solution is to remove my wife's uterus. This will mean removing also the option of us having children biologically. We have been trying for kids since our marriage in 2002, and our common desire for a family is partially what brought us together around the turn of the millennium.

Because at this point it is uncertain, even with insurance, what expenses we may have in the future. I posted earlier this week in the customer service forums to cancel the charter subscriber status I've had and enjoyed. I indicated I would be re-subscribing once my budget allows.

Today in my e-mail I get notification that someone in this community gave me a gift certificate. Attached was the note, "For the Kingmaker AP - take care and best of fortunes". There's no indication as to which member of this fantastic community provided this gift.

I respect the anonymity that the gift was sent. I do not want or need to know who sent this to me. I can not express how much I appreciate this. The only problem . . . is I'm not sure if I want to set it aside for the Kingmaker Adventure Path.

There are some gaming supplies I have not been able to acquire yet, such as the Pathfinder Core Rule Book, Beastiary, and Campaign Setting and such.

In an effort to not dis-honor the intent behind this gift, I want to ask the community a question. Would using the gift certificate to get the rulebooks for the Pathfinder System instead of the next Adventure Path be considered disrespectful to the intent behind the gift?

As much as it pains me to say this . . .

Please cancel my Pathfinder subscription after Volume 30 ships. (Which I've received confirmation e-mail for).

I want to continue with Pathfinder, show my support, but due to recent cancer diagnosis in the immediate family, certain budgets are being reviewed.

I will re-start the subscription once budget allows for it.

[snarky, jovial sarcasm]Wow, thanks everyone for all the suggstions and ideas![/snarky, jovial, sarcasm]

Well, anyway, I just wanted to post further and pass some idea's by the community. it seems that for the firearms that my DM is letting me use, he has some house-rules that he's implementing.

Firearm is as listed in the PCCS, but doubled. (Scattergun still loses 1d6 damage per range increment)
Any smoke powder exposed to fire and/or electrical current (i.e. any unspent rounds I'm carrying when I fail a save versus fire/lighting) will explode. I can't remember the exact damage, but with 220 bullets he advised me it would be 114+?d6 points of damage.
Firearm damage still "Aces" as listed in the PCCS.
Firearms still jam on crit failures as listed in PCCS.
Rifles/Scatterguns reload one shot per free action w/rapid reload (limit one per round)
Pistols reload one shot per move action w/rapid reload
Smoke Powder market value is 50gp for one ounce, but with a DC 15 Alchemy check and expending 17gp of crafting materials, one ounce can be crafted. For every 1 that the check exceeds the DC, an additional ounce is created.

Anyone else have any house rules for firearms?

I was talking with a member of my gaming group and he’d mentioned a plan he had with his barbarian character. The character wields an Earthbreaker, a two handed weapon. He said that in the Complete Warrior there is a feat that allows a maul (also a two handed weapon) to be wielded with one hand, and it works similar to the Exotic Weapon Proficiency feats work.

He postulated that considering the similarities between Mauls and Earthbreakers, would it be balanced to be able to take an equivalent feat to the one in CW but for the Earthbreaker instead of the Maul. I believe his desire it to free up a hand in order to carry a shield and up his AC. The Barbarian has already died twice in the campaign (once being resurrected, the other time being re-incarnated [going from a human to an orc in the process]).

Since I don’t think he has internet access right now, I thought I’d post this. Is the idea of a feat for one handed usage of an EarthBreaker feasible? Are there already any feats in pathfinder that do this that we’ve missed?

I need help. for the life of me I can not figure out the 4e treasure allotment system. I've read and re-read the area of the books when it lists how to handled passing out loot, but it makes no sense.

How does one determine the parcels. I can't comprehend it.

I was in the processes of working on a first level dungeon (with enough encounters to get a party of five pc's from 0XP to level 2), and things broke down when I tried to figure loot. At this point, I have written that after two of the nine encounters that each PC's receive a Level 1 magic item. If that's all the loot, is it not enough, is it too much? I can't even figure out how it compares to what suggested in the rules.

Anyone able to help?

Hello! I've taken my husband's Paizo account hostage again so I could order some goodies for his birthday and Christmas gifts. I know some of the items were going to take awhile, I was just wondering if the order was close to being filled? He's getting antsy to have control of his account so he can check out the message boards.
Thanks!

Subject line says it all . . . my question is, how hard would it be to do? The extent of the Realms knowledge I have is what is comtained in the 3.0 FRCS. I didn't even get around to picking up the 3.5 update.

Of course, dragonborn would be excessively rare, "elves" would be able to refer to either Elf or Eladrin, but aside from a few minor changes, what's the big roadblock?

Is it that Magic works so differently? Okay, so Mystra had PMS one day (uh, she is female right), or any other reason you can think of for having her modify how the Weave works, and there ya go . . . magic now works differently.

Is it the abundance of High Level NPC's? From what I've picked up, the DM's who use the realms, don't use those NPC's anyway, so I fail to see why that would be a problem.

If I have my 4e Core 3, and my 3.X FR books . . . what problems am I looking at not wanting to jump forward 110 years and have a spellplague?

What's up with the icons next to people's names? I've been gone from the boards for a few weeks (full story in a separate thread down in off-topic titled "I got my PAizo back").

I kinda get the jist that it's for the organized play for pathfinder, but what if I want to get an icon but know that there's no chance I'll be able to participate in any type/form of organized play. Would there really be any purpose for me to join a faction? Would there be benefits to others? Which faction would I join?

I'm back. I never knew it would feel so good to be back.

Here, let me explain. My friends and I have been trying to talk my wife into trying gaming with us and for as long as I've known her. I'm sure tons of other gamers are in similar situations. Well, when 4e came out, one of my gaming friends that is also a good friend of my wife announced that he was going to be running a 4e game and it would be the best time for her to try gaming. She always said no because she was worried about feeling inadequate compared to the rest of us with our gaming knowledge. Our friend said "The games new, we're all on the same page here."

Well, it seemed to work, and we had our first session of Keep on the Shadowfell approximately three weeks ago. We gamed on a Saturday night. Sunday, I went with my buddy to another D&D game and I kept getting text messages from my wife asking if she could buy some dice.

When I got home that night, she told me what she’d ordered. A set of dice, a pound of dice (which is guaranteed to come with at least one full set), 2 individual d20’s, a dice bag, a set of 25 glass bead tokens, 2 miniatures, and paint. Oh, and then she tells me that I’m not allowed to log into Paizo, because it’s the site that she ordered the dice through, because then I’d see the order, and she ordered something for me that she wanted to it to be a surprise. (I think she has admited to herself that she's a gamer now)

So . . . we wait for it all to ship and be delivered. I didn't mind so much until I realzied that I couldn't get the PDF's of my pathfinder books, and then this weekend when the Beta was released for PRPG. I'm so happy that the UPS delivery showed up yesterday.

And . . . . she loves her dice. I love that she loves her dice. And I have Savage Worlds, my first non-d20 RPG since OldWorld World of Darkness. I can't wait to try out savage worlds . . I've heard nothing but good things about it.

Sorry, I've tended to ramble, but I wanted to share my experiences.

I would like to combine order #663585 which I placed today with my Pathfinder order #986636, if that is possible.
Thanks.

Hate to do this, but I'm trying to find a feat in one of my multitude of books, and I can't remember the name of it, only a vague recollection of what it does.

Basic concept is similar to Power Attack, but instead of being a ToHit/Damage exchange it is a AC/ToHit exchange . . . meaning that I can voluntarily reduce my AC in order to raise my attack bonus. Essentially, opening yourself up to be hit for the benefit of making the hit.

Anyone know what feat I'm talking about or where it's hiding form me?

I recently posted a thread in the WotC 4e forums asking for thoughts on how to create the equivalent of the 3.x Leadership feat for 4e. I'd post the link except the WotC forums seem to be down right now.

Essentially, I posted my idea's stating that I'd like to make a balanced way to have cohorts/followers in 4e. Essentially, the followers would use the Minion mechanic for the followers. If they drop during a combat, they don't necessarily die, at the end of the encounter, they make a save versus death, with a bonus if there is a leader/cleric/healing potion/etc. Course it doesn't even need to be a feat, it could be a paragon path for example.

The general consensus I got over at the WotC forums was "Don't do it. Leadership feat in 3.x was horrible. There's no way to have a balanced version." That's not what I was looking for. Anyone here have any thoughts?

EDIT: Just checked, and looks like the WotC forums are back up. 4e Leadership Feat - idea's anyone?

So this book will be all about Chromatic Dragons, and according to the description on the WotC website, they are including three new chromatics.

My thoughts are that the three new one's will be Yellow, Orange, and Purple. With the existing dragons being Red, Blue, and Green it would provide for the missing primary/secondary colors in the color wheel. Now if these new chromatics will be like any prior versions of Yellow, Orange, or Purple dragons . . . I doubt it.

Anyone have any thoughts on what the new chromatics are and what they may or may not be like?

Okay, so the range for the breath weapon is a close blast three, meaning that it takes up a 3x3 area, meaning 9 squares. And the Enraged Dragonbreath feat increases that range to close blast five, making thata 5x5 area, or 25 squares.

That seems like a rather large area . . . am I reading that right?

I just realized something. Eberron books are coming out in 2009, as is the 4e phb2. Are artificers a class that would show up in the Eberron book or is it possible they could be included in the PHB2 along with bards, monks, and druids?

I've been trying to keep my head in the sand about 4e developments as much as possible, so I can look at the book with an open mind when it actually comes out. But, I just can't help myself . . . I need to know what information (if any) there is for my favorite of favorite deities out there when it comes to the new edition of DnD.

Have we seen the 4e Wee Jas? Anyone? Anyone? Is she still out there? Someone please tell me yes.

An idea came to me the other day as my mind was in "Random thought" mode . . . and while part of me says "That's a stupid idea" another part says "That's fantastic!"

Now, while usually in situations like this any idea's I come up with are stupid . . I wanted to pose the question here.

For D&D 3.5 (and keep in mind I'm not posting this in the PRPG Alpha Test forums cause I don't think it belongs there), if we were to have the defender of an attack roll a d10 instead of having the base ten to their Armor Class . . . but then also, the attacker rolls a d10 as well, instead of the d20 . . . .

Would that remain balanced?

There's a book coming on on April 1st, called INFECTED. It's by a great new author named Scott Sigler.

This book is great. It's about a guy . . . pretty much an "everyman" type of guy, no one special, that contracts a disease. It's a sapient disease, that can think for itself and is growing inside him.

How do I know about the book if it's not even out yet? Mr. Sigler is one of a growing number of authors that have begun podcasting their novels. They release their books a chapter or so at a time every week. Mr Sigler has released five books in this manner and so far, they are all fantastic.

Recently, He signed a book publishing deal with a "big time" book company. The first of it's kind for the podcast author community. I'm just trying to spread the word the best I can to help those who'd like his work to find out about his book.

And remember . . .
It's a disease that thinks . . .
It's a disease that talks . . .
Pray that it kills you before it becomes
A disease that WALKS.

Okay, I need some help. . . I'm running low on audiobooks to read. need some advice on which ones to listen to.

I've been listening to podcasted audiobooks since late october of last year. I listen to them during my three to four hours of commuting . . . I know there are advertisements for other books on the one's I've read, but as I'm driving down the freeway, there isn't really a way I can write anything down as far as "oh, that sounds good", and by the time I'm back at iTunes syncing my iPod, I've forgotten.

Now, the podcasts I've listened to (in no particular order)

By Scott Sigler, Infection (coming out in hardcover on April 1, reserve your copy now at ANY book retailer! [Yes, I am a DDJ, so what!])
By Scott Sigler, EarthCore
By Scott Sigler, Ancestor
By Scott Sigler, The Rookie
By Scott Sigler, Nocturnal
By JC Hutchins, 7th Son Trilogy
BY Lonnie Ezell, Daughter of the Sun
By Mur Lafferty, Heaven Seasons 1-3
By Mur Lafferty, Playing for Keeps
By Tee Morris, Morevi Remastered
By PG Holyfield, Murder at Avedon Hill
By Kristianna Ellis, Nina Kimberly the Merciless
By Mike Luoma, Vatican Assassin
By Mike Luoma, Vatican Ambassador

I'm currently Listening to Tracy Hickmans, The Immortals (OMG, it's depressing) and I've still got in my iPod waiting . . . Fortress Draconis by Micheal Stackpole, Crescent by Phil Rossi, and Tee Morris's Bilibub Baddings.

Anyone suggest what I should get next?

Hmm . . I see . . Lack of a response is response enough.

Okay, so wasn't sure where to post this, At first I thought in 'other rpg's' . . but it said no d20 stuff . . . so yeah.

But, anywho . . . I've been running a Star Wars Saga edition game for a while now and I've run into a road-block. I know the next big thing that I want to have happen plotwise, but I'm not sure if I should do it, or mix in something small before it.

Essentially, I'm running the star wars game during the same timeframe of Episode 4, but it's an alternate universe game . . . the Duel between Vader and Obi-Wan in Episode 3 saw Vader coming out the victor.

Vader left Mustafar, with the corpse of his wife and the two babies. Yoda came and picked up Obi-Wan, who refused cybernetics to replace his two lost legs and left arm. Fast forward 18-20 years . . . Emperor Palpatine still has a firm grip on the empire, though the Imperial Senate has convinced him to name an heir, Lady Shalla, in case anything bad were to ever happen to the old man. Shalla is a young resourceful woman who took a shine to political machinations at a very young age, and while just barely out of her teens, has a very sharp mind on her shoulders, and is currently being courted by the great naval officer, Admiral Solo.

Vader on the other hand, has obliterated the Sith rule of two and re-built the old Jedi Temple as a Sith Academy. There, anyone the Empire finds that is Force Sensitive gets trained to be a Student, force users devoted to the Empire. Vader's star pupil is a young boy, who has recently taken the title of Darth Hel.

So, enough on the differences between my star wars galaxy and what people would expect. The first session started with my three players (one a Sullustan Scoundrel, one a Duro Soldier, and the last a human Jedi [being trained by the Force Ghost of Qui-Gon Jinn]) on the planet of Corellia, deciding that they want to find and join the Rebel Alliance.

They meet up with the Alliance, and get sent on a mission to free a Bothan spy from an Imperial Stockade. They get the spy out, but while running away, the bothan gets shot in the back and dies. He gives to them the death star plans, which they get back to their alliance contact.

They are then told to take the plans to Mon Mothma on Alderaan. Without a ship, they head into a bar to try and hire a pilot. They refuse the offer made to them from Boba Fett (before they realized who it was), but then end up winning a ship called the Millenium Falcon from a black guy in a game of sabacc.

They fly to Alderaan, just in time to witness the Death Star destryoing it. They then high-tail it out of there, not wanting to be seen by the DS. On a whim they head to Tatooine (one player noted that all Star Wars stories get to Tat at one point or another, might as well get it over with now), to try and find shield for the Falcon and figure out where to go with the DS plans now.

They meet up with another member of the alliance who's also a Jedi in hiding being trained by the ghost of Qui-Gon, and he tells them that Mon Mothma is hiding out on Dantooine. After running a quick mission for a Hutt that's trying to wrestle control of Tatooine back from Jabba's killer, Owen Lars, they head off to the person they're supposed to pick up the payment of shield from.

Right after he tells them where the shields are, the guy gets killed by a red lightsabre blade. A Student of the Academy had caught up with the group, tracking htem as fugutives for freeing a high profile prisoner from Corellia.

They defeat the Student, and then the four (the second jedi decided to come with them) head off to Dant. When they get there, they deliver the plans to a Captain Ackbar, and then decide to start exploring the rebel base.

The two Jedi get visited by Qui-Gon and he tells them to go into the Dantooine foothills . . . they leave and find a hidden enclave of Jedi, training under Master Yoda, Obi-Wan and others . . .

This is where the last session ended. I know I'm going to have the group take part in the Battle of the Death Star (not sure if it'll still be at Yavin). But I don't know if I should put anything before it, something character scale rather than ship scale. (if I do it'll also give me time to get my hands on the Starships of the Galaxy book for the BotDS). The PC's are at about fifth level I think, and their combat encounters have been about 50/50 since getting the falcon.

Any suggestions on what I can put in front of them. I would expect that once the ANH story arc ends and we start with the ESB story arc, I'll have them start searching for LS crystal's for the two characters with lightsabres (the human Jedi of course, and the Duro Fighter picked up the Students lightsabre's, getting proficiency withy them when he next leveled)

After seeing the threads about various MMO's on this board about setting up guild corporations and what not, when I finally got my beta invite for Tabula Rasa, it got me thinking . . . do any other paizoians plan on playing this game?

Figured I throw this out there and see what happens. I dunno if I'm gonig to pick it up . . (depends on if my wife decides she and her dad need their CoH fix . . .) but if I do . . it can't hurt to be able to call some paizoians as clanmates.

I'm running into a slight problem.

After watching a game solo session of DnD I ran for a buddy, my (non-gamer) wife has decided she wants to try her hand at the game. I check with my buddy, and he has no problem letting her join the solo campaign we were running. I helped her roll up a sixth level character so that she'd be on par with where by buddy's character is so far.

The problem I have is that she chose a druid. I've explained everything to her and so far she understands everything. My biggest problem is the WildShape Ability. Looking through the description it states that she could change into any animal of Small or Medium size she is familiar with.

So she can change into a Legendary Eagle (MM2) just as easily as a regular Eagle (MM)? How do I keep this balanced?

Note: To make it easier for her, I ruled that she can be "familiar" with a number of animals equal to her Wisdom score +1. But she can change which animal she's familiar with 8 hours of rest.

Okay . . . thus far, there have been two "articles" published under Issue #360 of Dragon . . . Fortress of the Yaun-ti, and Ecology of a Death Knight. When accessing the article's on-line, if you scroll to the very bottom of the page you can download a zip file containing a PDF copy of the "article".

After downloading and reviewing the PDFs I have really only one comment to say . . Wow! Who ever is in charge of layout over there at Dragon insider needs to be fired. No, wait, they should be flogged, and then fired. Grantd I only skimmed through the 25 pages of material (Fortress being 15, Ecology being 10), but there are very un-natural breaks to the formating of the pages. There's even multiple pictures that are split between two pages. I understand the desire to provide a pdf of your content, but seriously, put it in a useable form . . .

I guess I really should be posting this on the WotC forum, huh . . .

I apologize if this has been asked before, but is there any chance that the current line of GameMastery Modules will ever be compiled into one large book? I have wanted to pick up the subscription of the modules for a while now, but due to limited budgetary constraints can only pick up pathfinder.

I guess the way I'm envisioning this would be to take the modules in groups of six to 12. If it's one larger expense rather than multiple small expenses . . . I might be able to talk my wife into letting me get it.

I'm kind of expecting an answer of "No, we're not going to do what you're asking.", or even "We have no plans for this at this time.", but I learned that it never hurts to ask.

So with my RotRL campaign, I in advertantly stated that even though Tsuto was taken to negative hit points, he did stabilize while off camera.

So now, I'm unsure of what to do with him. I'm fairly certain I'll keep him off camera for at least the rest of Burnt Offerings . . . but what about afterward? Re-Curring villain?

I'd assume he'll be in the sandpoint garrison jail at least until hemlock gets back with the new recruits, and then at some point will be shipped off to magnimar to stand trial for the goblin raid . . . . he could escape from custody at any point really . . .

Any suggestions?

Okay, bear with me on this . . . I'm nearly asleep as it is, and this is the first time I've written a journal so it might not be the best.

Started up Burnt Offerings tonight with a buddy of mine. Yes, that's right a buddy, not a group of buddies. In the past, our gaming group has shifted in numbers as far as hoe many people could or would show up. He and I were the only consistent gamers. So I told him, "How about if I keep pathfinder in my bag, and the next time everyone else pulls a no-show, I run you through a solo adventure?" He agreed . . . I just figured I'd still have a few weeks before everyone bailed on us.

So . . . we started off rolling up a character for him. He asked for point buy on stats and asked for an extra amount of points cause I wasn't going to be scaling anything (my theory is that since he'll be getting four times the xp, the bell curve will let him catch up fast). I let him take 93 point straight buy.

So, he make a Female Human (Minkai) Swashbuckler that plans on taking at least one level of Dervish, named Miwa.

Miwa is at least one generation removed from the lands of her heritage, and so while she was taught to speak Minkain (Minkai-ese?)by her parents, she really has no ties to her ancestral homeland (and has no idea that the Kaijitsu family is in exile and such.)

Burnt Offerings started off with the goblin raid (of course) and Miwa preformed exceptionally, easily carving her way through part one.

For Local Heroes, miwa remained modest, insisting that she didn't do anything heroic at all. After the boar hunt she was convinced that Foxglove is about ready to propose to her when she eventually visits him in Magnimar . . . I guess I didn't stress how annoying he got to be.

For Shayliss . . . Miwa was able to talk her way out of getting pummeled by Shayliss's father. But Shayliss herself broke out in tears declaring how much she hated Miwa at that point, (didn't get high enough diplomacy to make everyone happy).

So then, after defeating the goblin in the closet, Miwa found out that Mr Vinder's punishment for Shayliss was to tend the general store until he died of old age. so Miwa went to keep Shayliss company.

Not quite expecting this, I'm not sure how well I played up Shayliss. One second she's looking Miwa in the eye and cursing her to death, and the next she's trying to convince Miwa to run away with her so they could finally be together. Honestly I think she came off as rather Bi-Polar/MPD . . . . which I guess isn't really that bad.

Andosana's arrival into town interrupted Miwa's playful banter (my buddy's convinced that he wants Shayliss as a semi-permanent love interest for his character), and so after the meeting with the sheriff and the elf Miwa went back to the Rusty Dragon for dinner with Shalelu. I may or may not have dropped hints that Ameiko and Shalelu could've been adventuring companions back when Ameiko left town.

Then, wit the glassworks, I glossed over the fact that the message from Tsuto was translated to common, seeing as how Miwa could read the original Minkai writing. Miwa ran off to the glassworks, and ended up climbing onto the roof to find a way in.

Seeing the goblins in the glassworking room gave her the incentive to repel off the roof with her rope, crash through one of the side windows, and tumble to a landing inside . . . at least that was her plan. Miwa repelled off the roof, and when she smacked the window, the only smashing was to her ego when she bounced right off of it and heard the goblins laughing at her from inside.

She eventually hacked away at the window and took out the goblins. Chased them down stairs to meet Tsuto, and took him out with one shot. (I declared that while he was at negative hit points, he stabilized while she was chasing down the last of the goblins.)

Miwa calledfor the city guard, and they came in and helped her clean up the mess of the glassworks and haul the Kaijitsu family out (one to the morgue, another to jail, and the last back to her home at the rusty dragon).

Miwa has read through tsuto's journal, knows about Thistletop and Nualia, and that's where we left off for the night, with Miwa being 1300 xp away form level 4.

I was reading the player's guide, and in the Race section it mentions the three ethnicities of humans. But it doesn't state anything one way or another about various ethnicities of other races.

Is this something that is being considered?

I realize it might be way too soon to be able to answer this, and that's assuming I'm able to organize my thoughts well enough to actually ask the question that I'm thinking.

Will there be the capability to tie specific characters to each other between adventure paths?

in an effort to attempt and explain what I'm talking about . . . think of the character tree from the old dark sun setting (assuming I'm remembering it correctly). And/Or, in a group I've been a part of in the past, the DM granted everyone a bonus "Ancestor" feat at the begining of the game, each of the feats were tied to abilities of Epic NPC's in the campaign settings history that also just happen to be the group PC's from the prior campaign. Or, something else that another DM used during our shackled city game was that at one point a floating castle appeared over cauldron and the people inside were another group of past PC's and they were offering character re-specs (it was right after the release of PHB2).

Is there anything planned that would allow people who play through multiple AP's to be able to form a "cosmic" connection between all their characters with?

I apologize in advance if I've got this in the wrong section of the message board. I tried starting a thread in the "product discussion" board, but the option wasn't there.

So, anywho . . . with this new job I have, I'm required to wear a tie four days a week. I figured that if I'm going to need to wear a tie, why not make it a good tie. I figured that a nice extra long silk tie with a d20 on it would be an extremely cool method of announcing my geekness to the world. But as I search the internet . . . I can't find any.

So, when I mention it to my wife, her response is "Didn't you look on Pee-izzo, or Pie-azzo, er . . you know what I mean" (Gotta love the non-gamer wife that is at least making an attempt)

I check here and there is no tie section. So, to make a long story short, I'd like to voice the opinion that I think Paizo should sell gamer ties to the gamer masses . . .

As it is written, so shall it be done!

I dunno how interested the various people here are in this tidbit of info . . . but I noticed this morning that WotC has posted on their website the Submission Guidelines for Dragon/Dungeon.

Just wanted to give people a heads up.

Sandpoint and Magnimar . . . is the relationship more akin to Cauldron and Sasserine or Diamond Lake and the Free City?

Please don't think ill of me. I love your abberant ooze's and seven deadly tentacled sins as much as the rest of you (except maybe R.Pett . . . I think the jury's still out on him . . . ), but from all the info i've seen punted around the pathfinder message boards the last few days there's something I want to find out.

Is this a world that I'll feel safe enough to bring my kids? Not that I have any yet, but once I do and when they're old enough to learn to game, will I be able to pull out Pathfinder from the get go, or will I have to stick with Forgotten Realms of Eberron . . .

Obviously I'm not asking for overly cute and cuddly campaign world. But I would like to know if there is a chance for adventures (or whole AP's) that aren't going to be so . . . "hair on the back of your neck stand straight up"-ish.

Hmm, not sure if I'm explaining this well . . .

No .. I'm not requesting N. Logue or R. Pett to be included in Pathfinder (I know that they're already in like flynn, or else I would be requesting).

But with everything going on the past few days I had comepletely forgotten about the latest issue of Dungeon I got wednesday afternoon. So i picked it (#146) up off the couch earlier today and started reading through the low levle adventure, I thought to myself 'this is really good'. I checked the author and then a flag went up in my mind. I went to my gaming bookself and pulled out Dungeon 137 and checked some of the by lines.

Geeze, I tend to ramble, sorry. To make a long story short, I would hope that you would include Tim and Eileen Conners as a part of your list of potential regular contributers. Both escape from meenlock prison and siege of the spider eaters are fantastic starting adventures.

Of course, all this is subject to them actually submitting stuff for pathfinder, but I hope Paizo realizes that they've got another name that can be added to that long list of people quality work is garunteed from.

I'm not sure if the powers that be are able (and/or willing) to answer this, but I've learned it never hurts to ask . . .

How long have you guys already been working on Pathfinder? How long have you known Dragon/Dungeon were going to be discontinued befire the public announcement?

I'm asking purely out of curiousity. By no means is this intended as some type of accusation that "You should have told us as soon as you found out, screw the NDAs!"

So . . . considering the higher quality of the materials that Pathfinder is published on, are copies of the book that are shipped going to be simply polybagged like Dungeon/Dragon are? I see absolutely no problem polybagging the magazines. But part of me fears that there would be more potential for damage for a book shipped in the same manner.

Granted, this fear might be completely unjustified. But there's a small part of me that would like reassurance that Paizo has already considred such things.

I'm sure someone's probably already thought of this, but I just realized it while skimming through the preview of STAP listed in Dungeon 138.

It states that the PC's are able to bargain for the assistance of Orcus, Malcanthet, or other demon lords . . . .

Would this also include the Lord of Occipitus in the event that the PC's are able to contact them?

I would think that if there's a group of players that's going through STAP that's already gone through SCAP, running into an old character could be . . interesting.

Okay, So I'm going to try to design my own homebrew campaign setting. But I don't know where to start. Do I start with a creation myth, do I start with deities, with geography, nations and politics?

Whenever I try to actually sit down and come up with something good, it never works cause I can't decide where to start. Anyone have any advice on the subject?

Okay, I just spent some 15 or so minutes typing out a big long post explaining the details of a situation in the last session I ran in the STAP. I went to hit the preview button and I got re-directed to the main paizo homepage. My excellent explanation and my request for opinions is not lost to cyberspace.

Anyway, because I don't wantt o type all that up again, my situation is this:

I just ended the STAP camapaign I was running because one of the players (who's character was the captain of the Sea Wyvern) decided that he wanted to spend more time argueing about how his character had the right to treat the passengers aboard the ship (we had just started chapter 3 tonight) likes his own personal slaves rather than actually play the game.

I'd given this players three chances. Strike one was when he attacked my livelihood. I am in sales, and he insisted one night that he knew more about the product I sold than i do, and everything I know aboutthe product is wrong and should therefore quit my job and find something else. Strike two was when his character used public urination twice on one session (once as an intimidation tactic, once as an attack/distraction). Strike three was tonight when his character learned that there would be passengers on the sea wyvern for the journey to the isle of dread and announced that passengers aren't allowed on his ship and that after the joruney got on it's way, if they didn't want to do the work that he'd assign to them they'd be thrown overboard.

Now, I was going to let the session end normally and then tell all the players seperately that there would not be another session, until the player announced that the captain was forcing all the passengers onto the deck (away from the bilge where they were quartered) and forced to strip naked so that they could be searched for spellcasting components (he wanted to know who summoned a water mephit). At that point I packed my books and dice and left.

Am I too thin-skinned to be DMing? The player did know he was on his last chance after getting the first two strikes in the first session of Chapter 1.