bkowal's page

This is why I follow Pathfinder Art on facebook.

If most novice groups never get these modules and the non-novice groups which get there are not challenged, then maybe the general assumption should be that the level of difficulty should be raised, to account for mostly experienced groups even playing the high-level parts of the AP's.

After all, the argument that "you can always adjust the encounters" cuts both ways. A GM can also always tailor hard encounters down when the group is composed of less experienced players (or experienced players who chose to collectively get a bit eclectic in their character choices ^^). If mostly experienced groups are the ones who run the high-level content, I think it should be Paizo's obligation to tailor their AP modules for them, too and not towards an idealized group of "novice players", who either are really only playing the low-level stuff or by the point that they actually have reached the high-level content should have advanced beyond the stage that they should be considered "novices" anymore.

Except that the novice groups are the ones less likely to modify the adventure. I'm very interested how often groups run adventures "as written." I love Paizo's content and don't consider myself anywhere near the crunch fanatic I usually see on these boards. But I find I am constantly restatting or adding encounter to make things more interesting or challenging. I have reverse engineered every major NPC I have ever used to at the very least get a good handle on their abilities and potential strategies.

That said, it is way easier on the fly to make a too powerful NPC pull it's punches or make a gross strategic error than to ret con a weak boss guy to make things more interesting.

Sounds like the worst idea ever if it actually worked, which it doesn't. Why would you want to destroy your enemies' sweet magic items? You know you get those items after you kill them, right?

I wish there were more "chosen weapon" enhancing spells in Pathfinder. Like a low level spell that gave obvious and flashy payoff for carrying a starknife would be really awesome.

I usually try to get clerics a sweet version of their weapon as early in the campaign as possible.

Still. Please do a full on Lovecraft, Call of Cthulhu RPG inspired Adventure Path sometime. The most optimistic part of me is hoping Bestiary 4 is groundwork for one next year.

Congrats RE!

For some reason I've always had it in my head that Taldor was like a post- Roman Empire Italy since they were in decline from a once dominating civilization and were so arts oriented. Their capitol is even called Oppara. Also it fit better in my head with Taldan bravado.

Cheliax always seemed way more British or French to me, with it's sea powered imperialism and high nobility.

Without a doubt in my mind the greatest is:

Iron Maiden - Seventh Son of a Seventh Son

Don't question it. Just game with it in the background.

I'm a little surprised the Eldritch Knights weren't all replaced with Magi.

Gambit Magus!

One more spell that irritates the hell out of me with its potency is
Make Whole. There is something very lame about never having broken things be a plot point.

Blindness in general usually feels like an undercosted effect to me in Pathfinder. It takes you out of combat pretty hard. I think this could be fixed by nerfing the game effects of the blind condition a bit or by making things like scent a little better.

The spell that always bothers me from players when I am running low level games and that I always feel especially bad about using against them is Glitterdust. Mirror Image is pretty damn cheesy too. I actually don't have a problem with Invisibility because Glitterdust is so good and prevalent.

I'm not going to get too worked up about mechanics with the old Planchette. I want them to use the damn thing. I'm going to go out and get a Ouija board and pull it out of my bag and hand it to them when they find it. I think it will be pretty fun when they get frustrated they just pull it out and start asking questions. I might make it only work for the Oracle in the party since everybody else isn't attuned enough. I doubt I'll limit them on uses per day, but that doesn't mean that obnoxious spirits aren't going to mess with them if they overuse it. I think it will be necessary for them to figure things out about things they don't really know anything about like haunts. Maybe I'll Knowledge(Religion) check to determine how quality my answers are.

I have played a ton of mtg, so the main things that bother me from Pathfinder is the lack of structure in the rules and game balance issues.

About six to eight years in, Magic did a huge overhaul with its 6th edition. They cut out a bunch of the useless rules and more importantly a bunch of the rules that caused a ton of complication and confusion for newer players. They made all the rules use the same logic and timing so that you could for the most part apply the core concept of the rules of the game to almost any given situation and the proper thing would happen.

I think PFRPG is in major need of this. Even the designers aren't able to apply the rules in a logical manner. Check out how many mistakes there are in the Bestiarys that come out. I don't think these are just typos and I also don't think they are purely the designers fault. You would need considerable math skill and a near flawless attention to detail to apply all the adjustments and corner cases that go into monsters. I honestly applaud that it hasn't been entirely scrapped yet. The basic mechanical logic behind the game is one of the things that makes PF/3.5 so awesome as a system. I just think the mechanical logic has gotten a bit too convoluted.

A lot of the people who know all the rules and the loopholes don't care about this as much. In fact they want the complexity because it makes them feel like they are better at the game. And they are. Many of the best magic players in the world hated the 6th edition rules change too. They were beating tons of opponents who didn't realize were there was an odd and often illogical rule or didn't understand how the timing worked.

Specifically, the first few fire I would like to see put out is a larger integration of CMB and regular combat. They feel like two different combat systems right now and they shouldn't. CMB feels very tacked on in the CRB. They often forget to even mention it when they clearly should.

The other area that consistently bothers me is game balance. The core problem of game balance is the attributes.

To start out, Strength is way too good. You can't effectively melee without making it your primary stat. It makes melee very one dimensional. It makes classes that should be centered around dexterity or other attributes end up just better if you just max out strength instead (I'm looking at you monk and rogue). I realize that this is how the world has been since the gods first gave us fire. I still think it sucks. I should be able to make an effective fighter that isn't muscle from head to toe. That concept is laughable in the current system. You can also argue that something has to be the best and I agree with you, I just think it can all be a little bit closer.

Strength also doesn't makes sense in regards to weapon damage to me. Namely that all weapons benefit the same from high strength. Slashing weapons make sense, but there is only so hard that you can stab somebody with a rapier or dagger.

The other problem is single attribute classes like Wizard and Sorcerer. I have a problem with any part of character creation where the ideal strategy is to max out one ability score as much as possible. It just way too easy. The game should be more intricate than that. It goes deeper than that with the magic using classes because in my experience it actually breaks the game, since with a 20 int and spell focus, the average enemy needs to roll upwards of a 15 to save. One idea I have is to make spell dcs based off the attribute used to save against them. So the dexterous mage is better with reflex spells and the wise mage is better with will spells.

The spells aren't balanced very well either. I don't understand how Glitterdust is a 2nd level spell when it single-handedly defeats every enemy that fails its save. Why are they getting an effective mass save or die this early.

Summon monster decks really should happen. Its pretty disruptive to hand off the Bestiary during an encounter. (I know. I know. Buy more copies) Especially while you are using said Bestiary for the encounter. One of my players has hand made the cards himself. Being able to flip through the summon list quickly with cards would be extremely useful. Even if you just do the lower level monsters, I would consider it a must have.

There is no reason you need to do all the monsters. They would probably be of limited use with giant complicated monsters anyway. I would just stick to the lower level ones at first.

The monster picture/knowledge skill decks sound like a great idea. They would be especially great for adventure paths. I would buy those, where I generally pass on the item card decks. Especially since this information is harder to put together on the fly in Pathfinder. I wish there was just a stat line for the monsters in the Bestiaries that was something like "Applicable Knowledge." A structured DC chart for each monster would be too awesome for words. I'd snap buy a book of that information.

Not sure this is errata. But noticed a few differences with the Sinspawn entry in relation to Pathfinder #1. They took away fast healing 1 and got rid of their +4 racial skill bonus to Hide and Move Silently which obviously translates to Stealth.