Finally ordered mine. Given that the cover is using the new Starfinder 2e logo, I think this is now the first Starfinder 2e product. I'm glad it's 100% backward compatible.
Mmm... I found it as a blog entry searching with Google. I don't know if it has a more permanent link elsewhere, but I found it here:
Is there a free PDF available of the standard character sheet that appears in this book? I've looked for it here on paizo.com and I can't find it.
This product is now available in Print on Demand. So I finally ordered this book Print on Demand. What is supposed to be on the inside covers?
Just ordered this. (Pathfinder Kingmaker Bestiary First Edition) I already have the Pathfinder1e Kingmaker AP volumes. How useful would the Pathfinder 2e Adventure Path book be to someone wanting to run the adventure for 1e, using new content, that already has the individual AP volumes? Obviously I could just run the AP-as-written from the original 6 volumes, but how necessary is the 2e version to incorporate the stuff in the new 1e Bestiary? I mean if I don't know where the new stuff goes, it's going to be a bit difficult to add in.
I'm in love. I never can have enough forest Flip-Mats.
I used to be a little more active on the Paizo forums before the advent of 2e (since I don't play 2e) but I still check the forums every so often, particularly to skim the 1e rules and homebrew sections to see if there's anything I'm not clear on or homebrew ideas I like, or, more likely to ask others what they think about a "wacky" idea I have for my own game. (I gave vampires the shapeshifter subtype, and I gave werewolves regeneration and a revival effect, so I've made some... uh... changes. I also took inspiration from the 2e vrykolakas entry to modify the 1e vrykolakas a bit.) I think there's actually enough Pathfinder1e content published already to keep me busy for another decade, and I've started homebrewing a lot more now that the system is basically completed, but I'm still buying Paizo 1e content because there's no way I could keep up with the actual product publication schedule. (I use Paizo's annual Going, Going, Gone list and target the items with the lowest stock numbers first.) I've missed some stuff, but that's bound to happen. Sometimes I read old threads and occasionally learn something new. (I only recently learned that an Immediate action on your turn counts as your Swift action, and an Immediate action outside of your turn counts as your Swift action use for your next turn.) I like tweaking monsters and templating stuff and making changes, so I wouldn't mind seeing more information on back-converting Starfinder materials to Pathfinder1e as I have all the P1e Bestiaries so those Alien Archives are looking enticing. Anyway, I'm around sometimes.
Wasn't sure which section to put this in. It's not Website Feedback, but a question about where to find something on the website. Short and to the point: Where is the Pathfinder 1e FAQ?
Is it still on the site? I'm not sure where to look.
We're not sure that even we can approve this Necro... Still as relevant today as when it was initially posted, I think, at least for Pathfinder1e players. I just read through it and didn't realize it was a necro-thread until I got much lower. Just because a discussion is old doesn't invalidate it, as I'm sure you know. I never thought about poisoned shuriken before, and never really gave much thought to using them with two-weapon fighting. Also, the first time I've heard of an ability to make ammunition "durable" so that's something I'm going to have to look up. If that's a thing, that changes my perception of some ammunition as well.
As we continue winding down our Pathfinder Adventure Card Game programDid I miss a previous announcement or was this just worded strangely? I came here after seeing a tweet that said the same thing. I was looking for an actual announcement post regarding the state of the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game.Is there a press release or anything about the product line ending or was it just being given a quiet death before this post?
OK, that was scary. Glad I found this thread.
I got the Puzzle Box Module PDF through Steam. It wasn't out yet when I bought my copy of the Kingmaker cRPG, but was listed as part of the tier that I bought, so when it came out it was added to the game resources and auto-downloaded. (I bought the Royal Edition tier, which Steam no longer offers, but the Royal Ascension DLC includes all the extras from that edition. I bought the Royal Edition and the Season Pass separately because it was a little cheaper at the time than buying the Imperial Edition, which was the same as the Royal Edition plus the season pass.) I've wondered how people with console "definitive" versions were supposed to get the out-of-game extras. I guess they don't? I'm guessing it doesn't have PC extras on it. If it were a CD- or DVD-based game, that might be a thing, but I don't think they expect people to have Blu-Ray drives on PC. (Most people may not even have disc drives of any kind anymore.) Anyway, the Puzzle Box has a couple new creatures, which is what I look for first in a new module. It includes a toy soldier swarm. I frequently reference AONprd.com so I would like it if they'd add Puzzle Box to AONprd.
I'm still buying stuff from 1e. I have almost all the hardbacks now (missing Villain Codex and the one with the organizations), and I'm slowly but surely filling in my Player Companion and Campaign Setting books. I'd still like to pick up some of the more recent P1e APs too. I missed Iron Gods, and I'm missing the first book of Reign of Winter and Mummy's Mask. (I did manage to complete my Wrath of the Righteous Set after awhile though, when I didn't think I was going to get to.) I'd like to get Strange Aeons, Return of the Runelords, and Tyrant's Grasp, but I can't afford to buy any full APs right now, and don't want to try to get them piecemeal. I've missed a few of the Campaign Setting books, particularly Technology Guide. I have a few later books that reference new mechanics in that one, so missing it is a pain. I could get a PDF, but I prefer to have the physical books. I'd like to see Paizo release some 1e Compendium hardbacks that collect things from all the softback books. Like a book with all the Combat Tricks or all the prestige classes or ALL the spells. Or a book that is just all the classes and archetypes. Of course then those books would be in direct competition with the original products with that material, so they wouldn't want to do it while they still have many of those in stock. But, you know, ideally, I'd like to see the Pathfinder 1e Hardback Library that looks like a set of encyclopedias and contains all the mechanics of the entire system, sorted by type of mechanic. That's a fantasy of mine. I just get tired of looking through individual player companions for stuff.
I've been getting Error 500 (Internal Server Error) on the main page since last night (I'm on Firefox 82.0.2 on Windows 10.) The error code is accompanied by a picture of a ysoki/ratfolk tinkering. Anyway, the menu banner (with search and links to my account and cart) still appears and I can browse the shop and the forum, but the main page content (the big ads about upcoming stuff, and anything else on that page) at paizo.com isn't showing.
I called and spoke to Joanne in Customer Service. She reviewed the order and indicated that she halted the order until the proper items are showing up as shipping in the order. Posting here to let the forum Customer Service team know so this issue doesn't tie anyone up by being processed a second time.
Small correction to what I said earlier. It's too late to edit my post. I said my werewolves have regeneration 10 (silver) and can resurrect on the full moon if not burned. I knew that didn't sound right. My werewolves have regeneration 5 (mithral or silver), not regeneration 10. They still have DR x/silver so I decided regeneration 10 was too much. Yes, I know nobody cares. It's OK though, I care. Also, I missed getting Strange Aeons. I had no idea that it encouraged a human-like appearance for the player-characters. That makes me more interested in it, and I was already disappointed that I missed it.
Still playing Pathfinder 1e. Now that the system is no longer "live," I'm working more on my own house rules and variations, as well as adopting more of the existing optional systems as I become more familiar with them. (And, of course, trying to buy all the Pathfinder 1e materials that I don't yet have.) GMing a sandboxy campaign in Ustalav, the same campaign I've been running since 2012. Player-characters are currently a NE plumekith aasimar fighter 10, a CN sylph cleric 9/evangelist(cleric) 1 of Calistria, an NG shabti druid 9 with druidic herbalism instead of an animal companion, and a CN elf bard 9 (faith Calistria, profession "courtesan"). The NE character is rarely very evil, and the NG character's player forgets half the time that he's not TN. (Levels are skewed between 9 and 10 because I start new characters at the level of the lowest active character in the party. Not everyone levels at the same time.) The player-characters are not mythic, but I do use some mythic monsters. (I plan to have a mythic fey lord grant them temporary mythic power at a point later in the campaign, if they ever get on that quest-line. Mythic power is required for one of the quests.) Main campaign villain is the nosferatu Viscount Oilic Galdyce of the Vale of Red Breath, or will be if the players ever turn toward that plot. (He is currently still staked in his castle.) I used the listed class levels for him from Rule of Fear, but he has a variation of the mythic vampire template (that loses the upgrades to vampire features nosferatu don't have) and the dread lord template from Horror Adventures. Since nosferatu don't do energy drain on slam attacks, but do CON and Wis damage when they blood drain in a grapple, I built him as dex-based with Agile Maneuvers. He is the highest CRed creature in the campaign at CR 17. (Second highest is currently a mature adult umbral dragon at CR 15, I believe.) Other adversaries include a trompe d'oeil moroi vampire witch (gravewalker) (given negative energy affinity so she still behaves as undead type), a dread ghast(*GRAB) rogue with Civilized Ghoulishness, a witchwolf skinwalker cleric of Jezelda, a blood hag witch (seducer) of the Green Mother, an implacable stalker bogeyman, a natural dire werewolf rogue, a negative-energy-charged bodak, a large mythic worg barbarian, a sentient mythic shield guardian flesh golem barbarian, a burning skeletal champion undead lord(*ToHC) antipaladin, a wight lord, a nabasu demon with 12 growth points, a berbalang cleric of Kabriri, and a dread ghast(*GRAB) awakened raven fighter/shadowdancer. *GRAB is Green Ronin Advanced Bestiary
It is not lost on me that a lot of my adversaries are monsters that can pass as human. (Dread ghast with Civilized Ghoulishness, witchwolf, blood hag, and a werewolf.) One is even a construct that passes as a vampire. I also use lead skeletons(*ToHC) that are constructs that look like undead. Campaign also includes "mook" shadows and wights with added hit dice and abilities, because I can't leave monsters well-enough alone. I have a furnace golem (*ToHC) made of hot chains. When it's in a dormant state, I built a hazard that is its chains functioning similarly to black tentacles. I also have vampire roses(*ToHC), but they're advanced increased HD medium quickling-templated(*GRAB) vampire roses that carry a curse that imparts a plant-like template on cursed creatures. That plant-like template is based on one in Green Ronin Advanced Bestiary, but I forgot its name. My werewolves have regeneration 10 (silver) and can resurrect on the full moon if they're not burned. The campaign was originally intended to run until level 11-ish, but the party is nowhere near solving any of the campaign's quests, so I'm estimating level 15 now for the end of the campaign, and that's being generous. It works out for the plumekith aasimar's player though, he really wants to hit level 11 to get the feat for aasimar wings. New additions to the campaign include using "Gritty Mode Wound Levels" from Pathfinder Unchained, and the Sanity and Expanded Fear systems from Horror Adventures. The players weren't enthused about the addition of Gritty Mode but they like it better after the first combat, when they realized I was applying it universally. I also really like occult rituals, so I've written two custom ones so far, one to function as restoration, and one to create a vampire rose garden that will attack undead. I have no plans to move to another system, though by the time I'm done with it, Pathfinder 1e will probably look quite different. One House Rule that is strictly my own is a change to Cure and Inflict spells to do heal/deal 2d4 damage instead of each 1d8 of the normal spells. This is a very minor change, but it shifts all the minimums and averages for these spells up slightly, without changing their maximums. For my next campaign, I want to do a low-magic human-centric occult game set in Gothic Earth (1890s London) from Masque of the Red Death, but using Pathfinder 1e mechanics. I'd like to run a one-shot sometime using the simplified skill list from Pathfinder Unchained and see how well that works. I don't think it would be a good fit for my eventual Gothic Earth game though, and I don't want to incorporate it into my current campaign.
The way I read this page, the D&D5e and Pathfinder1e bestiaries will be available on their own after the crowd funding campaign. Is that correct? I absolutely cannot back this now, but I'm interested in picking up the 1e bestiary later. I was disappointed that the Vampire Hunter D Pathfinder book (from Paizo) never made it to the website after that Kickstarter ended.
So, have any of these creatures since been used in any official Paizo products? It would be cool to see some of them go full canon.
You might consider also Abadar, as he's god of cities, law, merchants, and wealth. Sidewalks are a hallmark of cities, and, to some extent, I'd also say of merchants (shopping districts) and even wealth (as a display of wealth, they even have elevated parts of the roadside designated specifically for walking--such opulence!).
It might be a hold-over from rot grubs, that work similarly. Rot grubs, you have to roll to see how many infested your body, and they each affect you individually. Ear seekers don't indicate that they each affect you individually. Or, looking at it again, it could be because they crawl out of the body after the character's death, so knowing how many there are could matter at that point since each one could potentially affect someone else.
I've been hoping to see some information about this as well. Was this ever made available outside of the Kickstarter backers? I got the impression it was more of a setting book than a player companion, but that's just from the cover art I saw.
Thanks for this list, Feros. I can definitely see Exsanguinate being scary on some (all?) of those. Still disappointed that it doesn't work for vampires but penanggalen, manananggal, and vukodlak all look more appealing suddenly.
Proteans, angels, inevitables, and demons on the cover sounds good, but... Balors are overplayed. Maybe a vrolikai as the demon on the cover? Vrolikai are distinctively Pathfinder, even though they're a variation on the lifecycle of the nabasu. Vrolikai just look awesome too. At CR 19, they're pretty close to the balor's CR 20. Of course, comparing the two on the sheet, balors look way scarier. Sure, vrolikai can deal up to 7 negative levels with melee attacks (1 per dagger attack), plus have a negative level gaze attack, cast enervation at-will, and have a confusion melee attack, but balors have vorpal weapons. But still, vrolikai are just cool. I'd love to see them make the cover.
I used to GM my game in a game shop where I couldn't help but deal with strong-smelling food people brought to the table. When my game moved to my house (after the game shop closed--we tried another game shop before I made it a home game), I instructed my players to eat before they come, because I don't like the smell of their food. I've been very clear on the reason why I don't want players to bring in their meals, so any exceptions I've made have not been a problem so far. (I have made exceptions twice when players said, "We just have fast food hamburgers and fries. Can we bring them in?") Since I don't have that issue anymore... My biggest issues are probably when people don't give adequate notice that they won't be coming, and when players schedule other things that are not date-dependent on days when we had a session scheduled. ("A few days ago I made plans to go out to eat with my brother tonight. That's why I'm notifying you at the last minute that I won't be at the game that is scheduled right now.) That's not a valid excuse. The player already had plans to be at the game. Any plans made after that should be rescheduled unless it's a sickness, birthday, wedding, death/funeral, doctor's appointment, holiday, or involves a responsibility that the individual should not back-out of, such a commitment made to babysitting, or helping someone deal with a mental or physical health condition. ("I made plans to go out to eat with my brother" is not the same as "My brother is going through some stuff right now, so I'm spending time with him.") On the one hand, it's not my business what's going on with a player's family. On the other hand, enough justification should be given that the player isn't just canceling at the last minute due to a lack of appreciation that effort has been made to schedule people together for a game session. This mostly applies to last-minute cancellations and no-shows. (I used to have a problem with no-shows, but I at least get cancellations now.) While I don't like it when people cancel, regardless of the amount of notice given, I respect and expect that sometimes plans change. It's just "unjustified" last-minute cancellations (and no-shows) that really irk me. As for stuff that happens during the game, I'm also not fond of when my family members walk through the room and feel perfectly comfortable initiating conversation with my players that disrupts the focus and flow of the game. (This is usually not a problem as my family doesn't like to be around when we're playing anyway, but it does crop up sometimes.)
I have those in my campaign. Party picked them up from the remains of a dread ghoul rogue. Potions of inflict critical wounds. 102!) Openly rolled random encounter... Party rolls a 100 on the new custom random encounter table I just introduced for the campaign. "Oh. I didn't expect you to hit 100 right away. You hear the roar of the umbral dragon on the wind." The party is level 8. The umbral dragon is huge. That means he's at least CR 14 by standard umbral dragon age categories (actually CR 15 in the campaign, mature adult umbral dragon). They survived that only because I gave him some alternative prey more enticing than them. (It entered combat just behind a group of wandering wights it was already pursuing--umbral dragons prefer their meals undead.) 102!!) ROT GRUBS My party has encountered these a couple times now.
I like option B myself. The vampirism short-circuits the fey immortality but once the vampirism ends, the fey immortality comes back online. I would go with option C only if it were some kind of mindless undead. I think it's interesting if the body can become mindless undead and the creature can also be revived, but only if the personality only exists with the living creature. Option A still makes perfect sense. Perhaps undeath is a major form of permanent death within the First World. Saying that changes the behavior of the First World substantially though. Option B changes the First World the least, I think, while still giving plot hooks like "kill the undead fey so it can be alive again."
If you're looking for video game inspiration for Weeping Angels, I'd have to offer up the Boos (ghosts) from Super Mario. They only move when you're not looking at them, and it's always directly toward you to attack.
Hey, I just downloaded Wayfinder #13 today. I was planning to get it anyway but the Paizo Store Blog (front page) mention made it that much easier. I would like to be able to print some of it but don't want burn all my ink on that brown vein-textured background. I would recommend updating the PDF so the background is on its own layer that can be toggled on/off. That preserves the appearance of the document by default, but should allow disabling the background layer for printing. The document doesn't appear to have any layers presently. I'm not sure if that's a big task or little task, but I thought I'd mention it. I'd love to be able to print some parts of the book to keep with my game binder, and preserve the layout and graphics. (Admittedly I can still copy&paste the text into a text document and do it that way.) Love what I'm seeing in the book so far. I was surprised at how long it was, and it made me wish I had submitted something. (Ustalav is my favorite country in the setting.)
I used to really enjoy reading the Paizo Blog. Now, and for some time, every post is hidden behind a "Show Post" button and only gives a little bit of the top of the post, so it's impossible to tell whether I want to look at something or not except by what product line it is in. I miss when all the posts were just visible on the same page and I could just scroll to the bottom and click for an older month of posts. I realize this change to using post previews was probably done for some reason, but I'd like to suggest a "Show All Posts" button to restore the ability to scroll and skim the blog without having to expand each individual topic. As it is right now, I mostly don't read the blog anymore because it's cumbersome and I spend most of the time clicking "Show Post" on things I am not that interested in, because I can't tell if I care or not until I do so. A "Show All Posts" button would seem to allow for the best of both worlds. For people who benefit from having a preview, they'd still get their preview, but for those of us who would prefer to scroll down through the full text, stopping when something seems to warrant it, a "Show All Posts" button/link would enable the preferred alternate method. A related suggestion would be to add a series of check boxes at the top so posts of various types could be filtered out. I have no interest in the Adventure Card Game, for instance, so would hide blog posts about that for easier reading of stuff that I do want to read. Anyway, I'm sure there are reasons why both of these suggestions are bad ideas, but as it is, I end-up relying on Google search more to find stuff on paizo.com than I do browsing or the internal search. A few changes would vastly improve my user experience, and I doubt I'm the only one. Thank you for reading this. I hope it proves valuable feedback.
I also really hope the Grim Reaper gets more appropriate art. The art in the AP where it appeared didn't look like a Grim Reaper so much as Solomon Grundy.
If it's better that an NPC not be resurrected, the NPC could just not respond to Resurrection attempts. Trying to revive someone from death is never a sure thing. Any death could be that character's final death, regardless of the state of the body. Revivification against One's Will: A soul can't be returned to life if it doesn't wish to be. A soul knows the name, alignment, and patron deity (if any) of the character attempting to revive it and may refuse to return on that basis. Perhaps that NPC's soul is now happily at rest with its deity. The fact that demons stole its head is trivial. The NPC's soul wasn't in its head. It's soul is already with its god. It has no plans to return to mortal life and mortal suffering. The party can try to resurrect it, but any such attempts will fail if it doesn't wish to return to mortal life.
My dream right now is that one day Bastardhall will get its own hardback treatment like Emerald Spire, except F. Wesley Schneider has to write all of it. (Well, other contributors can work on the bestiary section, maybe.)
Quite a lot of his characters are easy to convert. There is a Thing equivalent, Michael Myers from Halloween is an (undead?) Barbarian, the sailors from The Fog are Wights. Less sure about Christine the Car... The undead sailors from The Fog could also be draugr from Bestiary 2. They have a nautical theme, and the darugr captains can use obscuring mist 3/day. Paizo PRD draugr The Fog itself could be a Hungry Fog from Bestiary 3. It's a gaseous ooze with negative energy affinity and spectral shapes move in the fog. Paizo PRD Hungry Fog I wanted to use draugr in my campaign but my campaign isn't on any significant water so I haven't used any draugr yet. Party is moving beyond the basic draugr threat level. I don't have Bestiary 4 yet. This thread makes me want it even more.
Another vote for published Bastardhall here! You could just publish it in segments. The thing about a Megadungeon is that it doesn't have to be published all at once, it can be ever-expanding.
An inquisitor gains a single domain. He doesn't gain spells from that domain. A subdomain is like an archetype for a domain. If you have a subdomain it replaces certain effects of a domain, so in an inquisitor's case it replaces the powers of the domain that is specifies and keeps the rest of the domains powers, and still grants no spells. An inquisition is like a domain that is for inquisitors-only and therefore doesn't have spells associated with it. You take an inquisition as though it were your selected domain. The inquisitor has one domain slot that may be filled with an appropriate domain (either modified by an appropriate subdomain or not) or by an inquisition, which counts as the inquisitor's domain. Sorry if this post seems redundant. I just wanted to try to put all the info together and clarified.
This. True Resurrection remakes the body whole. In fact, I always consider that any flesh from the previous body continues to exist as well after a new body is created, but the previous flesh is inert for the purposes of Raise and Resurrection spells, or any spells that create undead. (In other words it can't be used to Raise the person or turned into undead. It's just meat, not a valid corpse.) So it's possible that an adventurer could come upon their own corpse, still wearing their gear. Imagine the trauma a character might suffer if he finds his own corpse in the dungeon that killed him. Imagine the Resurrected mad wizard that likes to keep his own former skull around as a memento. "Whose skull is that?"
Of course the spell itself doesn't specify what happens to the former body, it just indicates it can make a new one.
You might look at the hexcrafter archetype for the magus. It's a magus archetype that has some witch hexes instead of magus abilities. I'm not familiar with the 3.5 hexblade class, so I may be off in left field, but you can take a look. I'm guessing the hexblade class was full BAB (since it was mentioned it has 4 spell levels), while magus is only 3/4 BAB and has 6 spell levels. Magus: http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/ultimateMagic/spellcasters/magus.html Hexcrafter magus archetype is on this page: http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/ultimateMagic/spellcastingClassOptions/m agus.html Both the class and the archetype originally appear in Ultimate Magic.
Ustalav hardcover is what I want most, definitely. At least in the Campaign Setting line. Followed by more Revisited-style books.
I'm bummed to hear Sean is leaving Paizo. When it comes to Inner Sea world stuff or Lovecraftian horror, I look for James Jacobs to set it straight.
Sean has been a big help to me in the various metal mini basing/painting threads I've started, particularly a few years ago when I was just getting started with metal minis. Not that I'm much more experienced now, but I'm confident where I stand thanks to the help and advice of SKR. Even though we've never met (I don't have means to attend conventions), I feel like you've been a big personal help to me in the hobby. So thank you for that. I'm bummed you're leaving Paizo, but I'm glad the two of you are doing what you think it best for the two of you. I wish the best for you two.
So is the 55th card the Prince of Wolves?
This is a question I've often asked, myself. Also, why aren't there more beautiful fey-like creatures, like the nymph, who identify as male (That's why I liked Bestiary 4's Fossegrim so much, by the way)? Why the Succubus (female-identifying demon) is a seductress, subtle and shrewd, while the Incubus (male-identifying demon) is a violent rapist? Don't forget satyrs. I always consider the Pathfinder satyr to be representative of the male sexuality aspect among fey creatures.
The mini actually looks like he's based on Graz'zt the D&D demon prince served by succubi. Graz'zt was an 8 foot tall ebony-skinned humanoid with a wavy-bladed bastardsword. (The Google Image Search for Graz'zt actually returns a picture of that mini among the results.) The mini has plantigrade feet though, and Graz'zt is usually depicted with digitigrade or unguligrade feet.
Far too old and far too distant. But if you need a crusty, middle-aged gamer who can type and submit works from home, give me a call! While I wouldn't call them crusty, I think you just described a possible Paizo freelancer.
I'm running a horror fantasy game set in Ustalav presently. Not Carrion Crown, but influenced by it. My players are level 4 and level 3 (mixed-level but all close to the start of level 4). The scariest things they've encountered so far were ghouls, a vilkacis, a brimorak, and rot grubs, though they've also faced festrogs (regular festrogs, vampire-festrogs, a menadoran festrog), Apocalypse zombies (human, wolf, and ogre), skeletons (burning, as well as bloody-acid, and mudra), rabid worgs, giant spiders, a giant rot grub, rat swarms, haunts, a human cultist of Jezelda, bandits, a bloodhound (variant bloodknight-templated riding dog) and vampiric oozes. Outside of combat they've also encountered a ratling, a giant worg, psychopomps (nosoi and kere), and are generally on good terms with a lar (except for the party's tiefling, who detects as an evil outsider). Party consists of...:
For exposition, my over-sized current party is comprised of a male rakshasa-spawn tiefling sorcerer (rakshasa bloodline), male human alchemist (forgot his archeytpe), male dhampir ranger (formerly played a female sylph cleric of Pharasma but wanted to play a more combat-focused character), female angel-kin aasimar summoner, male garuda-kin aasimar cleric of Sarenrae (formerly played a male human fighter but swapped party roles with the other guy, basically), and recently added a new player with a male orc barbarian (war dog archetype), and occasionally a male kitsune ninja (scout archetype), though that guy can't make every session and is only half-involved when he does show. The CR 1 ghouls were just scary because they paralyzed most of the party and would have killed veryone except for the alchemist with expeditious retreat getting them to chase him and lobbing alchemical grenades at them. One of the ghouls even started to drag away the paralyzed paladin when he realized his allies were being defeated, but the paralysis ended on other PCs and they defeated him. The ghouls frequently ran away rather than being destroyed (sentient undead), but eventually magic missile's range exceeded their speed. What was scary about the ghouls? Paralysis and ghoul fever, the loss of control of their own player-characters to the immediate paralysis and, for those afflicted, the ghoul fever was a lingering threat of "I could become that." Vilkacis is much higher CR than the party and incorporeal and has damage reduction, so even for the ones that had +1 weapons, they were barely scratching it. (The guy with the silver weapon wasn't there that session.) The party didn't defeat it, it eventually possessed an NPC that was in the town's pillory. So since the guy was already restrained, once he was possessed, the players got the hell out of there. They knew before encountering it that it was a possessing creature too, because the NPCs in the pillory had already experienced it once the previous night and told them about it before they experienced it. It almost possessed the party fighter but he made his save against possession. Were they scared? I think so. They couldn't tell they were even damaging it. It's still on the loose. In the morning they moved the criminals into the village church, which is under the effect of a Hallow effect (permanent Magic Circle Against Evil). Instead of dealing with it, they decided they'd avoid going through there at night. They haven't realized it can actually enter buildings yet, but it's new as an incorporeal undead and maybe hasn't realized that yet either. It's scary because, again, like the ghoul paralysis, the vilkacis possession is a loss of control. Not only could this creature kill me, but it could take over my character and my character could kill the party. The brimorak (small goat-headed fire demon) was just scary, I think, because they didn't really know what it was. It's a Pathfinder demon from outside the core Bestiaries, and it tore them up pretty badly with its miscellaneous fire attacks and spells before it teleported away (almost dead, but they don't know that for sure). They knew it was a demon foot-soldier of the Abyss but that was about it. That was fear of the unknown. Last session they experienced rot grubs for the first time and the party sorcerer almost died. Rot grubs are scary because they're not a combat encounter, they're something to be survived. They're the worms that infest the corpse (or even an undead, giving it a +1 CR), so they've even been presented up-thread without that name. You see a corpse. Perception check DC 15 to notice the rot grubs. If you fail the Perception check and you touch the corpse, you don't get a save, and you gain 1d6 rot grubs burrowing into your skin. If you succeeded at the check, you get a DC 15 Reflex save to avoid the rot grubs burrowing into you. 1d6 rot grubs. Each rot grub does 2 CON damage if you fail your fort save on your turn. (I messed up running them and only did 2 CON damage, not 2 CON damage per grub.) You can burn them out on the first turn, but take 1d6 fire damage. You can also attempt to cut them out with a DC 20 Heal check, but take 1d6 damage from cutting on yourself in the first round, 2d6 damage from cutting on yourself the second round you attempt it, and so on. (Remove Disease also kills the infestation but that's not readily available in my campaign.) Rot grubs are scary, not least-wise because you can kill yourself trying to save yourself from them. Our party sorcerer survived his experience with 4 hp left--he succeeded his round 2 Fort save and managed to cut them out on the second turn. If I had been running the rot grubs "correctly," he very well might have died (gone unconscious). Rot grubs are one of the few instances were you have to hurt your character to save your character, and just hope you help more than you hurt. That's scary on an OOC level. I think part of the thing that helps a horror campaign is saying a few things upfront. These are things I said at the start of my campaign: 1.) This is a horror campaign. I will be running creatures that are generally horror-themed, and you can expect that with this campaign. 2.) One thing that is scary in horror is not always having what you need. That means at times resources may be limited and I won't always be following wealth-by-level.
As concerns #2 particularly, I do think I generally stick pretty close to wealth-by-level guidelines, but I don't track my players' loot very closely. One resource I do limit though, is their access to divine spellcasting NPCs. In our current campaign the town cleric NPC is level 4 so can cast lesser restoration but can't cast Remove Disease, for instance. If they want that, they have to special order a scroll, which could take several days to arrive, and cost a pretty penny. (This will, of course become a non-issue once the party cleric is high enough level.) I don't try to kill my player-characters, and in-fact I do try to mostly stay within +0 to +3 CR of their level most of the time. I try instead to make them think I'm trying to kill their characters, and that death of the character is a very real and serious threat. The fact is the thing they're most invested in is their characters. Also, using diseases does a lot to help keep them nervous, I think. At one point one member of the party had ghoul fever, another had rabies (the kitsune, which was funny), and a third had zombie rot (from Apoacalypse zombies). Then they don't feel they're operating at peak performance. Once my party gets a few levels on them, they'll be very hard to manage in a "horror" campaign, but hopefully by then they'll be very well trained in actually playing -in- a horror campaign and respond appropriately anyway. So far player enthusiasm has been pretty good. One of them is a CE (possibly shifting to NE) sorcerer cultist of Pazuzu and routinely throws defeated monster entrails into trees as an offering to his demon lord and without the OOC knowledge of the rest of the party is also researching lichdom. Another is an N alchemist (possibly drifting toward NG) that is actually almost as afraid of the party as he is of the monsters. I recently reintroduced him to the campaign by having him be discovered in the vampire castle's dungeon being used as a blood-source. By his approval, his traumatic experience as a kept blood-source for vampires netted him a sanity check for a randomly rolled insanity. (He failed the check and has developed multiple personality disorder as a coping mechanism for his experience.) He has a real hate-on for vampires now too. A third is a NE dhampir ranger who is actively hunting ghouls because of something to do with his mother. With favored enemy: undead, he's the brave one. A few of the characters are less developed/involved but I think that has more to do with player capability than enthusiasm. I play in a game-shop so I don't really have the luxury of mood music or dimming the lights, or some of the suggestions made in guides to running a horror campaign, but I think it's still very possible if you establish certain expectations at the beginning, and you continue to meet those expectations, that your players will get involved with the theme of the campaign. Right now, for instance, I'm considering killing off a major campaign NPC the party knows very well.
Heck, I'll include a sixth player or a seventh player in my game if it means someone is likely to return for a game some other time. Pathfinder is a game that requires a minimum number of people more than it suffers from slightly too many people. Sounds like this guy just really doesn't want to game with you, and he's being a diva about it, threatening to cancel the game completely if others don't let him have his way. I'd say look for other games in your area, but failing that let them have a few sessions then inquire as to how it's going. If the GM wants to play he's not going to cancel his game because you asked. If it's going well, or even if it's going poorly, perhaps one of your friends might be interested in playing in another campaign with you, or even GMing one of his own with you as one of the players. Just because you're not in that game, doesn't mean some of those same guys might not be willing to be in another game with you. And if that GM is as big of a diva as he sounds, I wouldn't count on that game lasting too long anyway. Meetup.com is also a good way to find players and/or games though, as someone said. I played in a short D&D 3.5e campaign (my first tabletop experience) with guys a met through meetup.com back in 2004.
Silver bullets. I'm Commander Shepard and silver is my favorite way to kill werewolves in Avistan. Blood of the Night has actually grown on me some as a GM running vampires, but it was in the wrong product line and poorly named/targeted. Given the other products that follow that naming scheme, it should have focused more on dhampirs to follow the theme. Blood of the Night also suffered from too many roles, but not nearly so much as People of the North did. You can barely turn two pages in People of the North without seeing a role or two. I'm still holding out hope for Blood of the Moon.
I hope this book is very short on "roles." No roles is the perfect amount of roles for me. I'd love to see some feats supporting the full animal form as well. Animal form is sort of the red-headed stepchild of lycanthrope forms in Pathfinder. It doesn't even get an entry in the Bestiary. (For my own lycanthropes, I've incorporated the animal and hybrid forms into one stat block since they are very similar.) I just finished reading Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts (that I purchased here on Paizo). It's chock-full of great ideas for a DM/GM of lycanthropes, and is pretty mechanics light. I hope the new skinchanger player race does actually require using animal skins somehow, and isn't just the Pathfinder shifter-equivalent. I plan to have dhampir vampires in my campaign, so maybe lycanthropy-infected skinchangers too, if the skinchanger proves cool. (Dhampir vampires are very potent since their racial abilities bonuses stack--especially the svetocher moroi.) I still don't understand how the moroi "variant" dhampir is the svetocher when the standard dhampir should be the offspring of the standard vampire, right? I just run it as the "standard" dhampir and the svetocher are both possible offspring of a standard vampire (moroi) in equal measure. Presently there's a guy in my campaign playing a kitsune because he wanted to play a lycanthrope and it was the closest available match in a 0-HD race. It's also just far enough from lycanthropy that the locals (in Ustalav) fear him, but he's technically not the enemy.
That one gnoll wasn't immune to the pugwampi's unluck aura. :-P All the other gnolls laugh at him. They call him Poochie. Disclaimer: I have no connection to that campaign.
Torchbearer allows the first cohort pretty darn early. ;)Oh man, bonus points if you wind up with her being represented by the matching artwork and she somehow maintains that bored look throughout the entirety of this AP. The torchbearer artwork needs to get iconic status. I want to see her popping up in other materials, standing around while the heroes fight.
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