Dragon

Wyrmshadows's page

40 posts. Alias of sundragon2012.


RSS


Snorter wrote:

Further thoughts on Cattie-brie...

Puma Gouda

Ocelot Manchego

{EDIT} I can't believe my last post got deleted!
Oh, hang on, yes I can.

LOL

By the way, I liked your initial off-color post better. :)


1 person marked this as a favorite.
B_Wiklund wrote:
Wyrmshadows wrote:

Here are a couple non-Pathfinder setting bad names:

Ivan and Pikel Bouldershoulder (just awful on so many levels)
Cattie-brie (awful unless there is a norm that makes such a name fit)
Jilseponie (awful unless there is a norm that makes such a name fit)
Bestesbulzibar (just name the thing Baalzebul and be done with it)

I guess I picked on Salvatore because I really don't like how he names things.

To thrown in another Salvatore example. His piece in the Planet Stories Worlds of Their Own antho has an elven ranger called Tuntun. Uggh...

Wow, I just realized how much I don't like his naming conventions. Just bad.


I think that as far a generic fantasy worlds go, it is quite good. I too like the multicultural feel of the setting. As someone else said, on FR you can literally travel a couple thousand miles east and south of Waterdeep and still be in pseudo-medieval Europe. Nothing wrong with pseudo-medieval Europe, jut that there is too darn much of it.

My only gripe with Golorion are some of the names which for various reasons I just don't like. Fantasy naming is more an art than a science in my experience and I am very nitpicky about the names of nations and individuals.

Here are some Golorion names I don't like:

Cheliax (sounds artifial, don't like the X's unless there is strong precedent)
Osirion (Don't see why a fantasy Egypt without an Osiris needs such a recognizable lifting of the name)
Norgorber (ugghh....)
Xon-Kuthon (ugghh....)

Honestly, the above and a couple others are all that really stood out to me. IMO Golorion has relatively few god-awful names. I am used to seeing a large number of crap names in most fantasy settings.

Here are a couple non-Pathfinder setting bad names:

Ivan and Pikel Bouldershoulder (just awful on so many levels)
Cattie-brie (awful unless there is a norm that makes such a name fit)
Jilseponie (awful unless there is a norm that makes such a name fit)
Bestesbulzibar (just name the thing Baalzebul and be done with it)

I guess I picked on Salvatore because I really don't like how he names things.


Whimsy Chris wrote:
Wyrmshadows wrote:

To add an observation about LoTR.

LoTR IME is darker than most D&D/fantasy RPG campaigns I have seen. The danger is ever-present for the heroes in LoTR while in D&D death is sometimes nothing more than a speedbump. In LoTR heroes couldn't easily escape from foes using magic, they couldn't detect evil, they weren't fantasy superheroes (Legolas in the movies notwithstanding), annd they weren't dripping with magical trinkets.

In other words many D&D campaigns are veritable Disneylands compared to LoTR in regards to actual darkness. Many campaigns could learn a lot from LoTR as well as te writing of Howard and Moorcock to make things grittier. The more difficualt the journey, the most satisfying the victory.

I respectfully disagree. The examples you give - little magic, inability to detect evil, and no fantasy superheroes - doesn't make LOTR more dark, but more based in reality. What sets Pathfinder apart is its gore factor: eaten faces, missing jaws, dead soldier's blood used for red paint, rape, children eaten by sharks, and so on. A lot of these factors would be out of place in LOTR (I haven't read anything but the trilogy so I can't speak for other books), or at least not given gory detail. However, Tolkien does go at length to describe beautiful landscapes, poetry, heroic characters, and so on. Sure, many dark things happen, but it's the way they are told and what is given attention that ultimately leaves the impression.

I'm not saying that LoTR is darker than paizo's APs I am saying that its darker than most campaigns I've seen run by other DMs. Also, I think reality is darker at its heart than most D&D campaigns. The level of sheer awfulness in our own history is stunning. Any real empire could easily challenge most fantasy 'evil' empires for depravity. As an example, Rome may not have had devils walking around, but many Roman practices were certainly wholly evil by D&D standards.

Even though insane levels of utter depravity were rather rare, such as cannibal murderers and folks who would use blood as paint, the truth is that real life is often more full of banality, cruelty, petty evils, moral ambiguities, social injustice, racism, classism, mysogyny, ignorance, etc. than any fantasy kingdom not aligned to evil.


To add an observation about LoTR.

LoTR IME is darker than most D&D/fantasy RPG campaigns I have seen. The danger is ever-present for the heroes in LoTR while in D&D death is sometimes nothing more than a speedbump. In LoTR heroes couldn't easily escape from foes using magic, they couldn't detect evil, they weren't fantasy superheroes (Legolas in the movies notwithstanding), annd they weren't dripping with magical trinkets.

In other words many D&D campaigns are veritable Disneylands compared to LoTR in regards to actual darkness. Many campaigns could learn a lot from LoTR as well as te writing of Howard and Moorcock to make things grittier. The more difficualt the journey, the most satisfying the victory.


Please keep it dark.

I never liked the whole shiney happy killers thing and this is what adventurers are, killers. Even the heroes are killers, for a good reason perhaps, but still they are always dealing death. Killing is dark business even when it must be done.

The evil must be dark as a juxtaposition against the heroism of the good guys. All too often in fantasy evil is portrayed as fit for an immature audience unable to handle how cruel and malevolent evil can actually be. Dark enemies and a world where darkness is prevalent gives the heroes reason to act and can cause the players to become personally invested in overcoming such darkness.

My personal campaigns tend toward darkness on the part of the villains because I don't see a point in villains being kinda-evil. Kinda-evil villians don't cause the players to vicerally loathe them. Getting the players (not just the PCs) emotionally involved really makes a difference in connecting them to the campaign.


neceros wrote:
Now, before we go saying things like this I'd like you to realize that you are insulting people that actually like to do this very thing.
neceros wrote:
I love to roleplay, socialize, and have fun, but the greatest part for me is in building options and making characters. Granted, it's not the most time I spend in an RPG, but I greatly look forward to it.

Sorry to insult you, didn't mean to. The fact is that I have played Basic D&D, AD&D, 2e before 3e and I have to say that editions before 3e seemed much more dedicated to actually playing realized characters as opposed to builds. My players never spoke in these terms. First came the character concept then came the class and not primarily for optimization but for enjoyment of playing a certin type of character.

All the 3e era talk of builds has finally gotten to me I guess.

Also, much of what I see as criticism is a mathematical obsession over odd corner cases that simply never happen during an actual campaigns. Such odd situations instead represent things that can theoretically happen in play. Many of these situations are issues of DM arbitration and not issues of hard and fast rules created to prevent the potential of all abuse.

Maybe I'm venting...didn't mean to insult.


orcface999 wrote:

I tire of hearing about the value of a certain feat, or that this class is inferior. This is a roleplaying game, quit assessing the absolute value of every aspect to determine what the "best" character is. IMAGINE a character and build it, not to be the best, but to be true to itself. Then play the game using him, even if he has inconsistencies, hang-ups, or passions that get in the way of him being the maximum value. ROLE-PLAYING.

This is what mathematical analysis will get you--the only weapon the country has is a nuke--the only character in the movie "Spider Man" is Spider-Man--you messed up your life by not buying a Honda in 1987--your employer just replaced you....
There are places where math is appropriate--damage value comparison of weapons to make adjustments in the rules, not for selection-- and so forth.

Vic, I think you need to make "assignments" for focusing on certain aspects of the game. A free-form testing will leave areas untouched, and personal agendas followed, which ultimately is to no one's advantage (even if they don't realize it).

Amen Brotha!!!!

Damn, sometimes I wonder if people even play RPing games anymore in order to role play. Numbers this, builds that, corner case #33486 must be recomputed, blah, f'n bah, blah.

Fix the glaring problems first, then go to the smaller issues realizing that at the end of the day some portion of the rules will have to rely on....gasp....DM judgment.

It is obvious that play testing means play testing. The amount of outrage over Vic daring to suggest that play is more important than theory is directly proportional to the number of arm-chair critics out there vs. the number of actual players. And if there is some arcane mathematical formula to determine this...I don't want to see it.


Mad Elf wrote:
realphilbo wrote:
Or how Picard was better than Kirk
Now you start a real faction war ;=) Everybody knows that Kirk was the best. Ah, and for the record Sisko was lame. Cheers.

Sisko lame?

Sisko's combination of being a thinking man and a man of action makes him more a complete man than either Kirk or Picard....thus Sisko is obviously superior to either Kirk or Picard.


CPEvilref wrote:
Wyrmshadows wrote:


You do know that Pathfinder is a Beta Test Version right???? Errata isn't really an issue when the whole purpose of the current release is to test for bugs and tweak the rule set until it works as desired.

Calling Pathfinder Beta's gliches errata is the equivalent of complaining that a painter's unfinished work a bad painting.

It costs money (for the printed version), putting the word beta on something you charge money for doesn't excuse a reasonable expectation of quality. And what is and isn't reasonable is a matter of personal preference.

Considering that a print version is completely optional and a PDF version could have been gotten for free, it is a little nitpicky to harp on a little errata when every book has errata. Plus, there is more than a little quality to be found in the Beta so I think your expectations of quality have been met, at least if you have a reasonable expectation of quality.


CPEvilref wrote:
Pax Veritas wrote:

You know that Pathfinder already has a bigger errata than 4e, right? This is just yet another poorly argued and incoherent (see what I did there?) piece of written diarrhea from you.

You do know that Pathfinder is a Beta Test Version right???? Errata isn't really an issue when the whole purpose of the current release is to test for bugs and tweak the rule set until it works as desired.

Calling Pathfinder Beta's gliches errata is the equivalent of complaining that a painter's unfinished work a bad painting.


Unfortunately, a lot of the hand wringing and wailing about how broken 3.5e is because of issues like this that become a big issue when they are minor issues at best. The internet, like 24hr news cycles helps a small issue snowball. Not that 3.5e doesn't have issues, it does as all game systems do. However, I think that the nitpicky need to have everything absolutely spelled out in sacred scripture ie. the official rules is a 3.5e generational problem.

When I ran 1e and 2e I, like all the DMs I knew, would create a quick fix that would be a houserule. Dragon Magazine had a rule claification Q&A area but most gamers didn't subscribe so they had to do it themselves. 3.5e is rules heavy IMO and because of this it created a reliance on a rule for every situation. IMO this is one of the biggest of 3.5e "problems".


underling wrote:


Adding a true name clause for the planar binding spells has a couple of unintended consequences that I happen to like. First, it should severely limit the number of creatures most wizards could summon. In fact, it puts the number, type, and variety completely into GM control. I like this because it can safely resolve gamist munchkinism, and also adds a very nice in game dynamic. Even if you allow your player to find the true name of a wish giver, that is the end of the chain. true names are closely guarded secrets. there is no guarantee that your summoned efreet even knows a single one.

Absolutely!

Well of course I feel that way this is my solution as well. ;)

This solution is painfully obvious and removes the necessity of a full workaround that involves little mechanical changes for a very obscure problem. Often the minimalist solution is the way to go.


alleynbard wrote:
Wicht wrote:

Heh.

Lately, when I read threads like this, it makes me so very aware that though we might use the same books, the actual game some people play looks absolutely nothing like mine.

Same here. Every time I read one of these threads I truly despair. I have never had anything like this come up in my games. My players have never tried to take advantage. I guess none of us look at the system this way.

I can't believe any player would want to "win" by pulling one of these tactics. Yes, I know they exist, but it confuses me how such a tactic can be fun. And if I ever had a player like this in my game they wouldn't be there for very long, I don't care how close of a friend they might be. Either I would ask them to leave or they would not find my games to their tastes.

I must agree.

My players would try that kind of crap when we were maybe between 14-18yrs old but now there is no way they would do the kind of nonsense I have seen reported on message boards. I hear a lot about fixing things that have absolutely never come up in my games and a lot of loopholes seem like loopholes because of really crappy players who want to game the system and play it like some boardgame or videogame that you can actually win.

Pathfinder will not be able to fix all the loopholes exploitable by munchkin gamers and it shouldn't be asked to. The fact is that the more airtight a system becomes the more utterly suffocating it becomes. This is how 4e is for me because it suffers under the Tyranny of Balance which sacrifices everything so that everyone is equal all the time. DMs need to act like DMs and smack down attempts to cheat via loopholes.

I ran 2e for years and there were some pretty gaping holes in that system and still I had no difficulty DMing and changing the rules when necessary to make things work properly. I'm not saying that seriously flawed rules shouldn't be fixed officially just that every possible weakness cannot be patched.


A couple solutions:

Efreeti only grant limited wishes while Efreeti Nobles and similarly powerful genies of other types cast full wishes.

and/or...

(This is my personal favorite)

Require that in order to summon a genie, one must know its name. Its one thing to stumble upon an imprisoned genie and get some wishes, its another to summon it yourself. Nowhere in the genie mythos does it specify the mechanics of summoning so therefore maybe the mage who first summoned the genie knew its name. Additionally, any one mortal can only benefit from the wishes of any one genie once per year or even once per five years no matter what.

and/or...

Also, create a spell (if one doesn't already exist) that would summon wish abusing spellcasters to the City of Brass or similar location for punishment, very sever punishment at the hands of an enraged noble genie who is mightily offended that this silly mortal dares to keep enslaving his/her people. Or this can simple be as a curse of signifigant power that can only be removed by a great service to the genie race in question. If they abuse it again they are summoned again and summarily executed.

Problem solved.


True Neutral = Passionate Moral Ambiguity

In other words nonsensical in the extreme. If these passionately moral ambiguous types are working against some opressive, freedom denying element within a good society then they are woking against a non-good element of a good society. They are working against an evil element in a good society.

If good becomes opressive, cruel or malevolent it is no longer good. The Kingpriest of Istar on Krynn was not good. The racist prig Silvanesti elves of Krynn who enslaved their less civilized kin were not good. Good isn't tyrannical or cruel, as soon as it is, it is no longer good. Any setting that doesn't acknowledge that doesn't even know what good even means.

Another reason alignment is a joke in regards to expressing the true complexity of human/non-human motivation. If 4e did anything right, it made true neutral into unaligned, which is actully what a sane neutral individual really is.


BlaineTog wrote:
Montalve wrote:

Blaine is roght

want to have fun with those player lawful-stupid aligned?

use moral and intrigue, and see how they hit their head :D

i know i loved to do that to them :D

If your players want to play a *detect THUMP* game, you should let them. D&D isn't a "gotcha!" that the DM plays on the players, afterall.

No way in the world. No 'detect THUMP' games at my table. Did that when I was about 15 to about 17yrs old. I've gone about 20 yrs without running that kind of game and won't be going back.

All a DM has to do is run a game in a setting where a paladin has an actual code and a structure of behavior layed out by his god/church not just based on alignment, then it is easy to avoid the 'detect THUMP' mentality and have players have their characters act like actual individuals and not badly played bags of hit points.


BlaineTog wrote:
Lylo wrote:
What does give my PC license to murder?
Race. D&D condones genocide, as long as you're not a goblin (in which case you're evil for wanting to kill all humans).

Actually that is a very weak caricature of the "good guys" in gaming and like alignment is nothing more than a simplistic barometer of who is appropriate and inappropriate to kill in the game. All this is nothing more than a hangover from 1970whatever when D&D didn't actually have stories or complexity but was nothing more than an odd outgrowth of wargaming dedicated to killing stuff (I refuse to say the rest for the horrid cliche that it is). Even Paizo's simplest adventures are far more complex in regard to plot and story than the random dungeon crawls that were considered adventures when the idea of alignment was first conceived.

If one can act genocidally against orcs because they are fundamentally evil, then is is eqaully appropriate for a paladin to slaughter anyone who 'pings' as evil. In order to ping as evil, you are evil and most certainly guilty of something more serious than shaving gold coins or stealing chickens. If orcs can be killed for what they have done or what they will do, then every race is due the same treatment.


IMO one of the biggest problems of alignment is when a game master, like myself, is attempting to create a world that bears some similarities to our world of the past. Often, alignment is rooted in modern conceptions of good and evil making it an anachronism in the ancient/medieval world.

Rampant slavery, misogyny, militarism, wars in the name of God(s), etc were the rule of the day throughout history. The entire cultures of the ancient greeks, egyptians, romans, huns, mongolians, christian crusaders, etc. would in many cases be evil in alignment because they supported actions and social realities that are antithetical to our modern sensibilities. However, in their time, these peoples didn't understand morality as we do now and IMO cannot be fairly judged as being evil because they were merely creatures of their time.

IME alignment can create some strange, anachronistic sanitized settings that lack depth and complexity.


Carnivorous_Bean wrote:

No.

1. If you get rid of alignments, you'll have rewrite the system completely -- MORE than 4th edition did.

Yeah, I can definately see a probelm with removing it completely.

Carnivorous_Bean wrote:
2. Alignments are useful in a dramatic and aesthetic sense. Endless shades of grey mush beating on each other for grubby, mercenary reasons just don't have the same resonance as a good old-fashioned good vs. evil struggle.

I have to differ on that point. IME, what makes folks interesting is their complex motivations. As a fan of sword and sorcery fiction, I enjoy that characters in such stories are motivated by things mere mortals can understand on a viceral level. Even though the heroes may seem mercenary, they often ultimately side with good because only the insane would actively through their support the powers of hell for example. Conan may be a hard-arse but ultimately he is one of the good guys even if he isn't a Sir Lancelot type character.

Carnivorous_Bean wrote:
3. Some of us, including myself, think that there IS objective good and evil in the real world. I tend to think that curing someone's cancer and giving them a strawberry milkshake to boot would fall on the 'good' side, while kidnapping, torturing, and killing them would probably fall on the 'evil' side. So good and evil are as much a part of our world-view as say, light, air, or the ability to speak. Take 'em out of the game, and something BIG will be missing. Or rather, they'll be there, but everyone will be pretending they aren't.

I think there is an objective evil and an objective good as well. I tend to see evil as an absence of good rooted in ignorance. Even though there are nut jobs that think they are evil, the vast majority of folks who commit 'evil' acts don't believe themselves to be evil.

The suicide bomber who murders 300 in a crowded market truly believes he is doing good in the name of his god. IMO most evil is rooted in deluded thinking and even mental abberation and I certainly think that fantasy role-playing can handle this type of subjectivity. Maybe on a mortal level good and evil are subjective because mortals cannot know for sure but maybe on an immortal level alignment can come into play because they are closer to ultimate truth than mere mortals.


Fletch wrote:
For those of you who have used this system in high-level games, how much more deadly is it to the PCs? How many PC deaths per adventure are we talking here?

Please send me your system.

sundragon2012(at)gmail.com

Thanks.

Wyrmshadows


I've dumped alignment ever since I was running 2e. I hated the whole good guys where white hats and bad guys where black hats saturday morning cartoon aspect of it.

However, the D&D system has certain mechanics tied to alignment so instead of alignment as a force of nature (which makes for some overly simplistic realities) just use it as a shorthand to describe a character's basic outlook or leave it blank. In regards to mechanics, just reflavor certain spells to reflect a different paradigm. For example, protection from evil can become protection from adversary (or something more specific). Ban detect alignment altogether because if alignment isn't a tangible or even metaphysical reality it cannot be detected. If you wish, rechristen detect alignment as detect motive.

It takes a bit of work, but if the flavor is all that's changed, then it can work and simply remove anything you can't reflavor. I've done it, it works and there is no problem.

I am running into this issue with the setting I am writing up and decided to add advice for DMs/players who would rather not use alignment instead of attempting to remove alignment completely.


Wow, a lot of suspicious folks on this thread.

I'm writing up a setting and its going to be largely mechanic-free however, I want the option of easily accessing what I am certain are OGL rules, items, classes, concepts, etc. so I can do some support for Pathfinder, True20 and maybe even Savage World...only time will tell.

Being able to easily access the OGL Pathfinder material while in front of my word processor will make my workload easier. Call me crazy, but I am all about streamlining the process.


Just curious.

A Pathfinder specific SRD would be useful for 3pps who'd like to produce materials specifically for the Pathfinder RPG as opposed to generic 3.5e. Obviosly one could use the rules as presented in the Core Rulebook for the system, but an SRD is nice to have.


Vic Wertz wrote:
Wyrmshadows wrote:
Will a GSL that is friendly to 3pps make Paizo less likely to put resources into an OGL product like the Pathfinder RPG, the various APs and other OGL materials and instead focus on 4e if that is a viable option?

No.

Keep in mind that we made the choices we made before we even saw the GSL.

Huzzah!!!

Thou art wise Sir Wertz, truly wise.

:)


Let fighters fight.

No jumping 80' nonsense.

No falling from suborbital heights, smashing into the ground and getting up to fight....who is he Hancock?

No cartoony/anime stuff.

No magical field shattering, no cleaving through time/space with a rusty dagger and beating Orcus to death with his bare hands after disembowling Sauron with his right pinky fingernail.

For god's sake, 20th level isn't even epic, the fighter is still thoroughly mortal. A 20th level fighter isn't a demi-god. Allow him to do amazing things with his weapons and armor that still leave me thinking "Wow, I can see that happening without magic."

Allow me to add however that I have de-Herculesed and de-Zenad my D&D games a long time ago though some houserules and expect I will have to do the same to any version of D&D whether its 2e, 3.5e or Pathfinder and that's fine with me.


James Jacobs wrote:
Since the Pathfinder RPG is based on the 3.5 OGL, and the GSL covers 4th edition only, whatever changes WotC makes to the GSL won't affect the Pathfinder RPG at all.

What I mean to ask is...

Will a GSL that is friendly to 3pps make Paizo less likely to put resources into an OGL product like the Pathfinder RPG, the various APs and other OGL materials and instead focus on 4e if that is a viable option?


Neithan wrote:

To me, the problem with 4th Ed. is not the GSL, but 4th Ed.

I seriously have no desire to play that game. It lacks most of the things I want in a fantasy-roleplaying game. It's probably a very good tabletop wargame, but I'm not into these.

QFT

As a player and DM I have to concur. I have played 4e and it holds no interest for me at all. However, if 3pps can support OGL games and 4e I might support it but that would only be a bottom-line buisness decision.

As someone wanting to create a 3p setting, this is all about the OGL and the safety of my IP from having to mothball it on aother company's whim.

I'll be playing OGL games like True20, Conan D20 and Pathfinder no matter what changes WoTC makes to the GSL.


If 3pps will gain the following freedoms:

1. Create products for both the GSL and the OGL

2. Not lose control of IP due to an At Will Termination Clause

...I will publically take back all the horrid things I thought about WoTC....oh dear, that might be embarrasing.

If this happens it will help the industry greatly. My fingers are crossed.


I just read on enworld that WoTC is reconsidering the GSL and considering making it more 3pp friendly. Here is a link:

4e GSL Announcement

Here is a quote:

Linae Foster wrote:

“We recognize the important role third party publishing support plays in the success of the 4th Edition of Dungeons & Dragons. We have listened to the community and our valued colleagues and have taken their concerns and recommendations to heart. Our commitment to the health of the industry and hobby gaming lifestyle is reflected in the revisions to the Game System License.”

--Linae Foster D&D Licensing Manager

I sincerely hope that even if the GSL proves friendly to 3pp that the Pathfinder RP won't be affected. I have played 4e and it is not for me. True20 is my game and Pathfinder (as a 3.5 OGL property) looks very promising. I'm an OGL guy and I want Paizo to stay that way too.


Well I did kill a PC once...when I was about 15yrs old.

My best friend was being a jerk and was playing an extremely disruptive character who was killing NPCs and attacking other PCs and no matter how much I warned him to stop he just kept acting up.

Well I had bought the AD&D Wilderness Survival Guide (still an excellent book IMO) and had rules for lightning strikes...heh...heh...heh. Well a "random" lightning storm popped up and just happen to strike Drogar the Barbarian and he was fried to a crisp. He still doesn't know I wacked his guy and that was 22yrs ago.


I have fudged in the past and luckily my players never knew it. They would have my head if they thought that the game was rigged either in their favor or against them. There is something very satisfying in allowing victory or defeat to be determined by your skill and the probabilities of the dice.


I'm primarily a DM myself but when I play I don't need or want to be coddled. If I roll badly and die, so be it, if the DM rolls well and I die, so be it. I might not like it at the moment but I accept it as the price of playing a game that is supposed to be about heroes violently opposing violent evildoers not a game of candyland where we cry like 5yr old girls when our characters don't "win".

If characters can't die when they are supposed to...ie. when they are foolish, have bad luck, find themselves in an unwinnable situation, etc. why don't we put the dice away and just tell warm and fuzzy stories to each other?

I'm no meat grinder DM, my games often have more role playing than combat, but my players can expect that their enemies will try their best to kill them they same way I expect my players to do their best to kill the NPCs, monsters, or whatever that are attempting to kill them.

If I might add...I do allow hero/action points in my games because I run a low-mid magic level game and resurrection is rare. I don't want my PCs to die, but I just don't see the point of a game that lionizes violence and then removes the ultimate consequence of violence from the protagonists. Anyone who lives by the sword is risking getting cut.


I have to laugh.

I just bought the Pathfinder Campaign Setting book. Very, very nice. I'm happy to support Paizo's efforts.

I was reading the book and the name Abaddon jumped out at me...not just because I think its a cool name with a certain historical resonance, but because I, in writing up my own setting, have the name Abaddon included as well and.....its an outer plane of evil. Its not the same by any means, my conception is more along the lines of Abaddon being a replacement for the traditional abyss, but the mere fact that its also in the Pathfinder Campaign Setting makes me laugh.

I know that things like this happen because we all share the same world mythology and borrow liberally from myth and folklore. I have always been struck when I discover ideas I thought were mine alone are already published by someone else materials.


Hi All,

One of the things I likes least regarding 3.5e was the "christmas tree effect" in which there was a very heavy reliance on magic items on the part of the players who, if not properly equipped, would be slaughtered by creatures of the recommended CR.

This is fine if you are running D&D genre fantasy with magic dripping from everywhere and magic shops in town. Uggghh.....that is what took me from 3.5e to Mongoose's Conan D20 and True20. Both of these systems don't assume excessive magic.

I am 1000% behind Paizo's Pathfinder effort and am considering using the Pathfinder engine (along with True20) to power the new setting I've been creating. However, because of the nature of this setting and its level of magic (more akin to REH's Hyboria, Middle Earth or even old school Dragonlance as opposed to FR or Ebberron) I was wondering if the Pathfinder rule set will be a viable option. In this setting, magical items are named, quite difficult to create and are not sold...generally speaking.

Will I be able to use Pathfinder for such a setting? Is there a low/moderate level magic option in 3.5e that can be used? I'm not averse to adding additional +'s to character's ability scores to imitate the effect of "buffing" items but I was wondering if there is another way.


Of course there are analogues..some obvious...some less so. The fact is that there are very, very few settings that deviate strongly from earth analogues. It would take a masterful understanding of anthropology and an unbelievable amount of creativity to come up with a wholly unfamiliar world filled with different cultures none of which bear much resemblance to those of the earth. This isn't something I would expect nor really anything I would want.

There are some good non traditional settings out there such as:

Jorune
Tekumel
Athas
Avadnu Inner Circle Publishing (looking forward to seeing what they do with this...hopefully it'll stay 3.5e. If it ges 4e, they lost me.)

These places are pretty darn alien. For some folks, that is great. I know I love alien realities sometimes but more often than not we return to the familiar. I Was running a 2e campaign on Athas for several years before one of my players said, "I miss horses." I gotta admit, I missed horses too.

My favorite type of setting takes the familiar and switches things up enough to dust old tropes off and present them in a new way. As I and my writing partners write up my new setting I readily admit that I have been influenced by many sources from Robert E. Howard and Tolkien to Arthurian Grail Romances and Greek Myths, from ancient Celtic and Babyonian mythology to real world Saxon, Persian, Chinese, and African history. Actually, it would be impossible to note all of the influences one has because often what appears to be a brand new idea is actually rooted in a book you read fifteen years ago but forgot about.

If the setting is well made, with good fluff, internal consistancy and the illusion of versimilitude it will work...often in part due to recognizable elements. Too many worldbuilding types try so hard to be different that the differences seem forced and unnatural.

Just my two pennies.


It doesn't matter that Paizo is in business to make money, the fact is that Pathfinder is OGL means that it is ours. The mechanics are ours..the name is irrelevant. WoTC showed me how irrelevant a name is when they slapped the Dungeons and Dragons name on the mechanics they now call 4e. I'm a fantasy roleplaying gamer...not a D&D player/DM.

I'll play what suits my gaming style and cannot imagine changing that for the new flavor of the month. Some of the comments I read on messageboards call 4e an upgrade. 4e is not an upgrade it is a lateral move in game design and an improvement only if it serves the kind of game you want to run.

Even without Pathfinder, there is enough 3.5/OGL material available for a gamer to run campaigns for the rest of his/her life. However, I am very happy that Paizo is leading the vanguaard in keeping 3.5e a living system. Paizo and other companies doing the same deserve our gratitude....even if they want to make money. ;)


Kirth Gersen wrote:
Wyrmshadows wrote:
Political intrigues, great sagas, leading armies, aquiring a tower or castle, running a thieves guild, etc. should be the goals of high-middle and high level play.
If there were supplemental rules supporting some of these options, I think we'd see them used more often. I for one would shell out for an high/epic-level handbook that addressed these issues, instead of just listing more powerful monsters and detailing some planar city I might or might not decide to ever use.

Good point.

If WoTC would have created actual epic play options beyond epic-level dungeon delving badassery and that horrid city of Union where there were 21st level city guards or somesuch nonsense. I know that many play in an endless cycle of climbing into holes and looting, but I think that WoTC's imprimatur put on a deeper level of play at high level would go a long way to make such play a valid option for many who otherwise have no interest in such games.


I have to echo some of the thoughts already posted here. The "sweet spot" problem as I see it is that 16th level characters shouldn't still be just climbing around in holes and looting monster lairs. "Wow, I'm powerful enough to slay demons, dragons and even the aspect of an arch-devil..but all I want to do is climb into Trite Hole In the Ground #114."

Political intrigues, great sagas, leading armies, aquiring a tower or castle, running a thieves guild, etc. should be the goals of high-middle and high level play. Asking for the game to easily allow PCs to dungeon crawl as easily from levels 1-20 is a heck of a lot to ask.


I just downloaded Experimental Might 1&2 from RPGNow.com. I am interested in how to port some new ideas into my True20 game and my new setting. I am a huge fan of what Paizo is doing with Pathfinder to keep the OGL alive but 3.5e has left me a little cold. Too many rules and DMing a high level game is a pain in the rear. Hopefully Pathfinder can make higher leve gaming more fun...but that is for another thread.

However, what I am reading about in Monte's new books might be worth looking into for Pathfinder. The books contain combat schools (Fighting Domains), feat groupings (bonus feats, oblation feats, uberfeats), and this isn't merely adding new feats but adding ways to use feats that are IMO very interesting and would go a long way to making fighters more attractive without making them Wuxia (not my thing, sorry).

Then there are clerics, druids and wizards with a full 20 levels of spells which is extremely intuitive.There are spell-user disciplines which are basically spell-like abilities for clerics, druids and wizards. These are an excellent idea and add some nice color to the classes.

There us a lot like in there books and I really think that Paizo should take a look at these books and potentially include some of these both as core rules and potententially as optional rules in Pathfinder.

Hopefully this will happen with Monte on board.

As an aside, looking at what Monte Cook alone could do with some good variant rules for the classes. I have to believe the 4e was largely a money-making endeavor from WoTC. If Monte alone could do overhauls with 3.5e rules I imagine that with WoTC's battery of skilled designers a lot could have been done with the 3.5e rules that didn't require a new addition of the game to fix what was broken.