Goblin Squad Member. Organized Play Member. 35 posts (192 including aliases). No reviews. No lists. No wishlists. 4 Organized Play characters. 2 aliases.
The Ebony Blade, part of my series on the mid-1980s Avengers as 5e protagonists and antagonists. (Sadly, no one else seems to love Dr. Druid as much as I do.)
If that seems like fun, check out the rest - it's all free, and I'm having a blast building and playtesting it all.
Is anyone running, or planning on running, this in 5e? Iron Gods had a lot of 5e interest, and I'm wondering if Hell's Rebels has anything comparable.
I haven't started converting it, yet, but I'm thinking about it, and if there's any interest from other people, I just might. Recently, I put up the Hellbredrace, which seems perfect for the AP, over on my blog, as well as the Empyreal Lord warlock pact.
If there isn't any interest, I'll hold off on it until my group finishes Iron Gods, but if it's something other people would be interested in, I might just start looking at it early.
I don't know what it is about Iron Gods that inspires 5th Edition conversions, but there seem to be more for this than any other AP. Is it timing? Is it that GMs who are willing to include lasers and robots are open to different things? Is it that 5E has nothing for science-fantasy, and we have to make it up as we go along? No idea! Probably all of the above.
Like Badmudderfugger and Solomani, I've started a 5th Edition blog focused (for now) on the conversions I've had to do to bring 5e to Iron Gods (especially races and classes). (This is my first attempt at blogging, so it's a little bare-bones, right now.)
My first couple of posts are just about how my group handled (or chose not to use) completely random character generation, which was fun. The crunch starts with a conversion of the Kasatha, so that's fun. I've got more race conversions (Lashunta, Shobhad, Triaxians), monsters (from Distant Worlds and other places) and class conversions (mesmerist, kineticist) coming up, and I'm really torn on starting my own thread for them, or just adding to this one, so that it stays a one-stop resource. What do you think?
Iron Gods 5E conversions! These are Inspired by Badmudderfugger, so this seems like a good place to put them...
As part of the conversion of Iron Gods to 5E, I want to give my players more archeyptes to play with that fit the world. Here are my conversations of the Numerian Liberator Barbarian and Galvanic Saboteur Ranger archetypes and the Nannite Sorcerer Bloodline, all from People of the River. They're still in revision (particularly the formatting), but I thought I'd post the drafts here, in case anyone had feedback on them. Next up is a Shaman pact for the Warlock, since Warlocks as in aren't allowed in the game.
Numerian Robot Smasher (Barbarian Archetype): While most of your tribespeople keep their distance from technology, you seek to actively destroy the construct war machines of the Technic League. Without robot armies to enforce their will, the League will surely fall to your peoples’ might, returning your nation to its rightful rulers. This is a Barbarian archetype that gains greater ability to damage constructs. (Based on the Numerian Liberator)
3rd: No Defense: While you are raging, when you attack constructs, robots or clockwork creatures, your attacks ignore any damage resistances those creatures possess.
6th: Thick Skin: While you are raging, when a construct, robot, or clockwork creature causes you to make a save, you can add your proficiency bonus to the save, if you are not already proficient in it.
10th: Final Strike: You can choose to end your rage early. If you do, you cast shatter, using Wisdom as your casting ability and your proficiency bonus as the level of the spell slot, dealing both thunder and lightning damage.
14th: Robot Reaver: While you are raging, you double your rage damage bonus against constructs, robots, or clockwork creatures.
Expanded Hunter Ranger Archetype: You use your abilities to control machines, and your ability to destroy them, to protect the natural world from corruption. Add the following options to the Hunter Archetype: (Based on the Galvanic Saboteur Ranger)
3rd: Reprogram or Recycle: You gain proficiency with Engineer’s Tools, which you can use to shift the attitude of constructs, robots, or clockworks, provided you are not in combat with them. In addition, your attacks do an additional 1d4 points of damage to constructs, robots, or clockwork creatures.
7th: Machines are Predictable: When constructs, robots and clockworks attack you, they have disadvantage on their attacks.
11th: Construct Bane: When you use your bonus action to make additional attacks, those attacks deal 1d8 lightning or thunder damage.
15th: Terminator: You can use Stealth to hide from constructs, robots, and clockworks, even while being observed. In addition, your attacks against constructs, robots, and clockworks are considered critical hits when you roll a 19 or a 20.
Nannite Bloodline (Sorcerer): Your powers come not from a magical lineage, but from nannites in your bloodstream. This bloodline’s powers and abilities focus on personal transformation.
1st: Nannite Ancestry: Your bloodstream courses with nannites that protect you from disease, heal you in emergencies, and make your physical form more malleable. Your nannites can activate a number of times per day equal to your level plus your proficiency bonus, and can be activated consciously or unconsciously.
Nannite surge: You can take an action to activate your nannites, giving you advantage on one attack, saving throw, skill check, or ability check. At 7th level, you can use this ability as a bonus action. At 11th level, you can use this ability as a reaction.
Nannite healing: When you are reduced to 0 hit points, your nannites automatically activate to stabilize you. No action is required to use this ability. At 7th level, when you are reduced to 0 hit points, your nannites automatically activate to spend one hit die to heal you. At 11th level, when you are reduced to 0 hit points, your nannites automatically activate to spend one hit die to heal you, and cast expeditious retreat with a duration of one round.
6th: Nannite infection: When a creature fails a saving throw against a spell you cast, or when you succeed on an attack roll to hit a creature with a spell that has no saving throw, you can activate your nannites to cause the creature to be blinded, deafened, or poisoned for one round. You can use two nannite activations to cause the creature to be stunned or paralyzed for one round.
14th: Nannite spellcasting: When you cast a spell from the transmutation school, you can activate your nannites in place of sorcery points, treating each activation as one sorcery point. For example, if you wanted to cast a spell with the Twinned Spell metamagic, you could use two sorcery points and two nannite activations.
18th: Living swarm: the nannites in your bloodstream spread throughout your body, replacing your organs. You can activate your nannites to gain immunity to poison, immunity to disease, or DR 5 for one round. You can also activate your nannites to cast any spell from the transmutation school with a range of touch or self on yourself without using a spell slot.
What do you think? I tried to keep the power-level in line with the other archetypes in the PHB, but I'm relatively new at this, so I might have blown it, in places.
The players would finish the battle and see Golarion from space. They'd have time if they want to upload Casandalee to become a more benevolent goddess of robits while they're up there and could then use escape pods to fall back to Golarion.
Or don't. One of the PCs is a demi-god. The others are mythic (ish). What a great opportunity to say, "that world can keep on turning because of us. Where do we go, from here?" and turn towards the wider solar system. That's the last scene of a sci-fi adventure movie, even more than the heroes watching from Earth as their demigod NPC achieves apotheosis in a flash of light high above them. This is even more true if party members are aliens, themselves. "Let's go home... rockets fire away from Golarion"
One of the problems with APs is the lack of a cinematic ending: they tend to stop at a final battle, then the PCs get experience and sell their loot. (Chapter 6 is hard to write for every group, of course, because things have usually diverged from the plan so much, by then. Not every group or DM wants to fly into space at the end.)
I think that the characters and Unity should interact more, but not for the first four chapters. They have to figure out who and what Unity is on their own before Unity starts messing with them.
I love the Mad Max-style driving idea. Would that mess with the hexploration?
Absent any reasons not to, I'm putting this here in case anyone else is as jazzed about combining the OA feel and the 5E mechanics as I am. Feedback is welcome. I built this on a Warlock shell, with "talents" as invocations, to try to keep it balanced (to the degree that the Warlock is balanced, anyway). I can see a couple of ways it might not be "5E enough," but I think it balances and is still pulpy and fun to play. As I said, I've never built a class before, in any edition, so I'm sure it needs work.
Am I right that there are no 5E conversions floating around for the OA classes? I've been Googling like crazy, and haven't dug any up, yet.
I ask because I took a run at the easiest one (Kineticist), and unless there's a compelling reason not to (including license issues and total lack of interest), I'd love to post it here and get some feedback. I've never built a class, and since my players will be starting a 5E Iron Gods campaign shortly, I want to be able to give them OA classes as options. (I know my players - they like the weird stuff, so the base classes probably won't cut it.)
Is there a reason not to post a 5E Kineticist conversion here?
I recently read this post about single-use magic items ("relics") in 5E, and it occurred to me that a lot of tech treasure could be adapted to this mechanic, particularly if "timeworn" was a more harmful condition for the item, for example, "every time a timeworn item is used, there is a 50% chance of a glitch, and every time a timeworn item glitches, the character takes an additional -10 on next glitch roll." Eventually, every timeworn item will glitch out, and most items that you don't want to be permanent (like a specific weapon or armor) can start out timeworn.
These blog posts are excellent! Thank you for sharing them. I'm glad you're putting to much thought into this; I know it'll save me work, in a couple of months.
How are you planning on dealing with the difference in expected wealth and magic/ tech item accumulation between PF and 5E? As I'm planning this, that seems like a major disjunction between the adventure as written and the design philosophy of 5E.
Have you considered giving the 8-year old feat choices at level-up? It would impact the power, but how cool to say, "your character levels, so you can pick form these three abilities. You can always pick one of the other later, but which one seems most fun, right now?" At eight he's totally ready to make choices and see how they work out in play.
What? I don't approach everything a teacher... No, that's a lie, I totally do that. I'm still waiting for my kids to be old enough to play games like Fairy Quest with.
This is the stuff of fanfic, I know, but I would love to run knowledgable players through a Golarion in which all the APs had ended in some degree of loss, especially in the Northwest...
Spoiler:
where an asteroid destroyed much of Varisia, unleashing creatures from The Dominion of the Black on the Karzoug-controlled countryside, while the few Ulfen holdouts fight the oppressive rule of the Winter Witches. It wouldn't matter how CotCT ended, because Xin controls the southern half of the country, anyway. The humans of Cheliax, Andoran and Taldor fight demons in the bitter cold, and the war between the demons and the witches is the only reason either hasn't taken over the world. The heroes might have to find a way to travel back in time and change key moments in each AP...
Actually, now that I think about it, this might be a good frame to hang the "best module of each AP" adventure path idea that I've been kicking around. Sadly, my current group isn't as steeped in Golarion lore as I am, so they wouldn't get as much enjoyment out of it, I think.
I'm also hoping that the Swashbuckler version of Finesse stays. Dwarves have a long history of pick-wielding derring-do. (Okay, they didn't before this playtest, but now they are retroactively lauded in story and song for tumbling slowly around the battlefield with their light armor and buckler. Other dwarves have no idea what do make of them. They're basically the dwarf version of the Addams family, which is awesome.) It even lets us build the classic starknife-wielding Swashbucklers of Desna, Varisian heroes of old... In fact, if Swashbuckler Finesse let them apply Dex to damage, the starknife would be a viable weapon in a Swashbuckler's hands.
That people are automatically going to rapier/scimitar and assuming keen/improved critical is a flaw to me. It boxes the class too much. Kind of like now how a scimitar is standard issue for magi.
.
I guess a better option would be to keep the focus on critical hits, but grant to x2 weapons wielded the ability to change their base critical hit range to 18-20 (feat or archetype), stacking with effects doubling the crit range of the weapon. This way any x2 weapon can become a viable alternative to rapier/scimitar !
What about this wording for a deed:
Threatening Stance: As long as the swashbuckler has one panache, treat any weapons on the swashbuckler list (or just light/ one-handed piercing or slashing) as having a critical threat range of 19-20. If the swashbuckler spends one panache, the range increases to 18-20 for one round. This effect stacks with keen.
Now the gnome with the pick embodies the archetype of the gnomish swashpicker from gnomish legends. Sure, it does nothing for rapiers or scimitars, but that's the point: to open the choices up a little. If it had to improve rapiers, the numbers could be 18-20 and 15-20, but not stacking with keen or improved crit.
Arcanist- Batman
bloodrager- Batman
brawler- Batman
investigator- Batman
hunter- Batman
shaman- Alfred
slayer- Tom Araya
skald- Justin Beiber (voice makes people fly into a rage, right?) (Might be Tom Araya again, actually.)
swashbuckler- The Scarlet Pumpernickel
warpriest- Thor
Frerezar: it sounds like you're saying that the AP is less valuable to you because it's got gay all over it.
I sure hope that's not what you're saying, because that's kinda sad. Personally, it's more valuable to me because it's more inclusive, and if a deliberate decision was made to be more inclusive and that decision is going to be made again, I will support it with my money and my words.
To put it another way: gaming has no inherent social responsibility. However, while it will have exactly no impact if a straight teenager sees a heterosexual relationship represented in a module, the same is not true of a gay teenager. When I was sixteen, seeing Sosiel (a character who was a lot more like me than any giant masculine knight in armor) in a caring relationship with Aron would have rocked my world, and made it a little easier to get through my days. If the writers choose to keep a kid like me in mind, I can't ever see how that could be a bad thing. I mean, in this context it's not as though a straight kid picking up dice is going to say, "this male NPC is attracted to women, maybe I'm not so weird, after all." That kid never has to wonder about it, in the first place. Not for that.
If you're looking at that kid and saying, "you are less important than my false sense of verisimilitude," ... then I can't continue that sentence without breaking the first rule of the messageboards, y'know?
As someone who is bi, I saw the second couple and immediately thought, "that's an unusually high number of same-sex relationships for a gaming product; I bet someone is going to post about it." Sure enough, someone did.
Now, this could be an issue of parallel design: these chapters have two different authors, and if both wanted to include this element, no designer is going to write them and say, "Sorry, Neil, we have to change the characters you wrote because Amber already used up the gayness quota for this AP." Even if it's not, would anyone have blinked an eye if both couples had been heterosexual? Would anyone have said, "two opposite-sex couples in two chapters; obviously Paizo is pushing their heterosexual agenda, again. It really stretches credulity." What if the couples had been a half-orc/human and a half-elf/human? "Every time I turn around, Paizo is pushing inter-species relationships!"
In fact, I bet you'd never notice. Because it's "normal." That's how privilege works: the thing that challenges our preconceived notions of "normal" is an affront (even a minor affront), but the opposite doesn't register.
The thing is, there are story and plot reasons for the characters to be in relationships, and for those relationships to be what they are. Irabeth and Anevia's relationship wouldn't work if Anevia's past was different. It would lose power. Sosiel is a cleric of love. If he weren't in a relationship, that would be weird (at least one - I, for one, am a little disappointed at the monogamy of all of the characters; I'd love to see open relationships more fairly represented, and a cleric of love would be a great place to do that). There is already a female thief, so Aron is more memorable and interesting if he's male. That means that Sosiel has to be gay or female. I read something about Sosiel's brother showing up in a later chapter. If that's true, then Sosiel's relationship with his brother might depend on them being brothers, rather than brother and sister. Also, there's already a paladin, a female. Again, if you're traveling with two paladins and two thieves, it's just good writing to differentiate them like that.
I don't have all the books, but I would love to see a comprehensive list of every romantic NPC relationship that we see in the APs, just to see how the numbers really shake out. I see lots of people talking about the number of lesbian relationships in RoW, for example, but off the top of my head I can think of half a dozen heterosexual relationships that figure prominently in just the first two books (an engaged noblewoman, a married innkeeper, a widowed single mother, a woodsman and a fey, an evil queen, a bandit leader). Did it bother you that there were so many heterosexual relationships? If not, why is two same-sex relationship overkill?
I'm not saying that anyone is anything-phobic or biased or hateful, or anything. I think it's a matter of privilege and perception. Maybe a comprehensive list is the answer, after all. Are the numbers tiled a little differently than is the norm in the gaming industry, in the two chapters we've seen? Absolutely. Is it gratuitous? I'm not convinced that it is. Will it challenge some players' preconceived notions about the existence of homosexual characters in this world? I hope so; if it does that even once, then it has served a purpose, arguably, the highest purpose of fiction: to expand our conception of the world around us.
I just realized that I meant "rubenesque." No wonder it didn't make sense. Also, that's a heck of a public works' project.
Reading "w****" as "witch," it occurs to me: would the Witch class be banned in a civilized Roman-like society? Certainly, Oracles would work, and probably Inquisitors, but it might be nice to limit Witch (like Barbarian and Druid) to the Gauls, again, for flavor.
That's solid, and less work, though doesn't really solve the "more flavor for the region" problem. I'd drop Monks for the flavor, and use a Fighter martial artist, though. They'd definitely have Bards. Though, arguably, the Romans had cavaliers (at least, in the early empire), in the equites, and ninjas (in the sense that they had trained assassins).
OT: I've also heard Romanesque used in terms of people, as well (which is what I meant), as in "having curves like a Romanesque arch."
Assuming you're going to talk to your players, you might want to give them some additional value in return for restricting choices. "If you're from the Imperial Protectorate, you can't choose any arcane-magic classes except Bard, but you can treat Samurai and Ninja as favored classes, if you multi-class, and you start with one exotic Eastern Weapon proficiency" or "In the Aegrian Empire, there are no Gunslingers, Ninjas, Samurai, Cavaliers, Druids*, or Monks, but all spellcasting classes start with an extra spell known and martial classes start with an extra feat," or everyone starts with an extra trait, or something. Otherwise, as a player, it seems like restricting options arbitrarily.
*There is no way a Romanesque** Empire allows Druidic magic. Barbarians would probably be unwelcome, as well, since they have beards. Now, the Celtic nations to the North would have Druids and Barbarians, but probably no Wizard, Magus, Monk, or other literate classes.
**Okay, technically, "Roman-like" isn't what Romanesque means, but I kinda like the idea of a Romanesque Empire, where everybody is a little curvy.
If changing the name doesn't work for her (I can see the "the name is part of the character" argument), you could go with a nickname. No one she plays with at a hypothetical con needs to know that "Shay" is actually a reskinned Shalelu. Might save some confusion at other tables. (I can see you getting the "How are you playing Shalelu? Is she an allowed pre-gen?" question from other new players.)
"Eyes closed" is different from "blind." Blinded is a game condition, and while you can close your eyes to avoid gaze attacks, mirror image specifically calls out being blind.
To put it another way: allowing someone to close their eyes to negate a second-level spell is cheap. Name another second level spell whose effects are avoided by a free action that you can do every round. Maybe if it were a first-level spell, but at that level of power the illusion should be powerful enough to handle eyelids. Maybe if the fighter closed her eyes before the spell was cast and never opened them, I'd allow it, but as soon as you open your eyes after hitting, the illusion magic kicks in, and when you close them, those mirror images are burned into your memory.
Obviously, there's no official ruling, but I wouldn't allow it, and I wouldn't do it to a player.
Not that I want to do this, but would it be feasible to play a PC who is an Aspis Consortium spy? I assume that breaks the rules of organized play, although it would be awesome in a home game (the PC could get to die dishonorably in "Eyes of the Ten" or something).
I just want more variety, in general. Paizo has produced minis that aren't white, in armor that makes sense (not all of them, but this was a pretty low bar to begin with), in a variety of shapes. This is welcome enough that I'm actually buying minis for the first time, in twenty years of gaming.
That said, can I find a bald, female mini in sensible armor who looks substantial enough to represent my 20 CON mul, wielding a maul (her signature weapon)? No, no I can not. Because I can't have nice things.
If your problem is that there aren't enough male figures being produced because "most" gamers are male, you're confusing causation and correlation.
Forgot to mention: if, by RAW, magic item shops only make sense in metropolises, then there are about two dozen cities in the Inner Sea that would qualify, about one per major country. Even Magnimar, which is only a large city, doesn't qualify. If you do a search for "metropolis" on the Pathfinderwiki, you'll find a nice list of them. If you don't run on Golarion, but want to go exactly by RAW, then just make sure that all of your "big" cities only have 24,999 people in them.
It doesn't seem, to me, like the rules actually lean towards a magic item shop in every city, and games can easily run for years without ever seeing a city of more than 25,000 people.
The other thread got me thinking about magic shops that have worked in my games. Now, I'm not a huge fan of "Ye Olde Magic Item Shoppe," in which every first-level scroll, potion, and wand, every +1 item, and every minor magic item can be found. That would be less like a Wal-Mart and more like a Tiffany-Tesla-Boeing-hospital-Powell's. For me, it takes some of the wonder out of the game, and the fun out of shopping.
On the other hand, as a player I loooove shopping, and as a GM I like for my players to have the items they want, or the items that will help them overcome the difficulties I set before them. I don't necessarily want to seed every encounter with perfect items, because that breaks verisimilitude for me just as much as a Magic-Mart. ("The longsword is the most popular weapon in the world, but no one we fight seems to wield them. Why is that?" "Well, none of you specialize in longswords...") Without a magic seller of some kind there is no place for those +1 longswords to go. Sure, they could find individual buyers, but that would mean more time spent shopping and less time spenr adventuring, which is less fun for everyone. They want to Find Paths, not be Door to Door Magic Item Salesmen. Likewise, there is no reason to ever give players gold if they will never have anything to do with their money.
Instead, I choose to have fun with it. In Sandpoint: no magic shops. Too small.
Turvik, no magic shop...:
In Turvik, no magic shop, but the "settlement" rules say that Turvik should have some number of magic items. Luckily, there are various web pages that will roll those items randomly for me. Using one of those pages, I came up with eight arcane scrolls, six potions, two divine scrolls, and a wand, all of which were being sold by a drunken wizard who basically lives in a mead hall. He sells occasional scrolls and potions to finance his alcoholism. In another meadhall, the party can find a (recently) one-legged half-elf who wants to sell his +2 half-plate, +1 ranseur and ring of feather falling, because he's sick of losing limbs while adventuring. There are other items, five of them each worth over 10k gold, than can be found, but my players didn't have that much gold, so it didn't seem worthwhile.
Little towns are easy: by the settlement rules, the only a metropolis will have more than sixteen minor magic items (and even then will only have 16 medium and 12 major, tops). My players have only seen one metropolis, recently: Kalsgard.
This one was fun.:
I borrowed from Richard Pett's Your Whispering Homunculus, and tweaked them a little, then I gave my players a list as they explored. In the Amber Quarter, for example, they found:
Longman Sleen — Purveyors of Fine Skins, Tusks, and Fingers of Beasts and Monsters sounds silly, but they are the city’s highest-end seller of jewelry and clothing made from magical beasts.
Barghies Dog Armor: if you have a dog, Barghie has your armor.
Tanperenemy, Kifman, and Sludd – Rare Tobaccos and Pipes from across the Known World is a comfortable shop, full of chairs and couches, where thralls move quickly but gracefully to light your pipe, and you can sample fine tobaccos (and other smokeables) from across the Inner Sea. There is a glimpse, through a curtain, of a back room. (With a DC 18 Diplomacy, the characters can learn the password to the back room, which is the only place in Kalsgard to get arcane potions, since potions are a sign of witchcraft, and witches are forbidden.)
Rare Maps and Treatises is exactly what it sounds like. Had the party gone here, they could have gotten a magical map to make their journey easier.
Serendipity Antiquarian’s Hall: a wondrous item shop where the goods on display change daily, but whose proprietor swears there is no “back room” or “warehouse.” “What you see is what I have,” he says. (This is the only place to get "wondrous items," in town, and every day a new percentage chance is rolled to see what is in stock. This rewards frequent visits and paying attention.)
Every Incense: the name is appropriate – passersby often cross the street to avoid the clinging smells.
In other quarters, they found:
"Noble Svenn’s Scrolls – The only scrollseller left in the city, Svenn’s is a three-story building (two and a basement, really), with tens of thousands of individually holed scrolls, each organized according to their power source, power level and effect. Svenn knows that he is the only game in town, largely because he has run all of the smaller scrollsellers out of business. As such, he charges 10% more than base for all scrolls, and any that offer protection from cold or include fire-pased effects cost 50% more than normal retail. (Because it's always cold, see.)
Quibbley Oddities is less an “oddity” shop and more a “wandseller.” Magic is often frowned upon, however, so the front room is full of stuffed and mounted animals and second-hand knick-knacks. If he recognizes an adventurer, however, he ushers them into the back room. Here, and in the basement below, he keeps low-level wands, staffs and rods. If sweet-talked, he may have a higher-level item laying around.
All Things Owlbear, more of a boutique, a bizarre bazar that caters to owlbear aficionados. Here, you can purchase owlbear figurines in pewter, wood and precious metals, as well a clothing made from owlbear feathers and hides. Behind the counter stands a large stuffed owlbear and seems to loom over the proprietor, Gutter Clawfist, a former adventurer who lost half his hand to the creature on display before bringing it down. He knocks 10% off the price for anyone who has a owlbear related story (true, of course), and buys owlbear merchandise at collector’s prices.
Strength of Arm: One of the few shops in the city run by a half-orc (whose name is on the sign). Arm sells melee magic weapons of all kinds, and nearly any low-level magic weapon can be found here. He does not craft his own items, but rather runs the shop for a former adventuring companion, a dwarf named Kell. The two have a successful business despite not having spoken a word to one another in years.
Oort’s Armory: Oort is both the proprietor and the blacksmith, though his wife and five daughters manage the daily business of the shop. The Armory is not separate from his forge, however, and while there are many fine magical armors on the racks, the sound of his hammer echoes around you as you browse.
Magic armor and weapons are much easier to come by, but only up to a +1 weapon, or a +2 armor or shield (and those very rarely). The Linnorm Kingdoms are always at war, and battle is a way of life. It would be wrong not to keep weapons available. This means a lot of turnover, though, so individual weapons may not be in stock. At Oort's the characters picked up one of the daughters as their NPC crafter, and she has a... dangerous crush on one of the PCs. Think Alicia Silverstone and Cary Elwes. If there hadn't been a magic shop, they never would have had reason to bring her on board, and I would be down a plot hook.
Magic items above "minor" can't be bought in a shop. Making the magic items available as per the settlement rules allowed me to create these:
+2 Halfling Slingstaff of Frost, being sold by a sullen halfling whose party was apparently headed due East. (Did he lose the vote about going to a place where everything has cold resistance? Yes he did! was this a lesson to my party about the dangers of democracy in adventuring companies? Yes it was!)
+1 Blowgun: “I found this in a dungeon. A blowgun! Who even uses these things?” (The blowgun is particularly long and well made, and can be used as a quarterstaff.) (And there were bad guys later in the adventure who used blowguns, so this was foreshadowing.)
Ring of Climbing, Improved: Sold by a half-orc who just bought a bar and was retiring from adventuring. The inscription read: “Ad Astra per Aspira”
Immovable Rod: Being sold by an adventurer. It was a gift form her lover, meant to represent his love for her. She caught him sleeping with the group’s cleric of Calistria.
Bag of Holding, Type 4: There is a Belt of Incredible Dexterity inside (which is also a Belt of Gender Transformation).
Wand of Enlarge Person (1 charge): A sad rogue is looking to sell this, and a broken +2 greatsword for 7000gp
Broom of Flying: A sleek copper broom with the word Sirius etched on the side.
Belt of Physical Might +4. Gold trim, with an extremely large buckle bearing an auroch’s horns.
Staff of Fire: A long staff decorated with salamanders and efreetis that seem to move whenever the staff is lit by firelight.
Staff of Healing (0 charges): An adventuring cleric of Iomedae is looking to get rid of it, and is willing to bargain, as it ran out of charges too soon to heal the woman he loved.
Potion of Cure Serious Wounds: At the potion shop. Works, but makes the user’s eyes glow blue for one hour.
My group couldn't afford any of these, and didn't even follow up on most of them, which means that I get to use them again, later! I'm really hoping someone bites on the Bag of Holding...
I like for my magic items to do things. I remember a +1 greataxe that my players bought that had runes on the blade that seemed the glow like lightning whenever it struck. Just a +1 greataxe, but the player loved that axe and got it enchanted with electricity powers as soon as possible.
So, what interesting things have you done with magic shops/ magic item acquisition (aside from graverobbing or home invasion, aka "adventurers' bread and butter")?
What do you mean by bright spots? Golarion is intended to be a mix of settings, so that people who want Robert-E.-Howard-Land can have it, and people who want Vikings can have them, and people who want Ninjas can have them. That's the guiding design principle: pop culture mash-up with a fantasy overlay. If there are no hooks there for you, then of course you're dissatisfied: you walked into a McDonalds and asked about the vegetarian menu.
I'm not sure there is any such thing as "fantasy role-playing" that isn't based on real world cultures, or Howard, or Burroughs. Tolkien's societies all had real-world analogues. Fantasy is, by its very nature, a metaphor for our world.
That said, I can't think of a nation ruled by witches (Irrisen) or hobgoblins (Kaoling) or snake-people (Nagajor). There was technically no "Pirate Nation" in the vein of the Shackles. The Worldwound reminds me a lot of living in New Jersey, but I don't think it's directly based on Paramus.
Maybe what you need isn't suggestions for making Golarion less of what you don't want, but suggestions for different settings that will give you what you do want. GURPS has a legion of different books that might be the thing, for example. I've heard good things about "Houses of the Blooded," but I've never read it.
In the above post, "people-smuggling" should be hyphenated, because it is a single adjective. Without the hyphen, the phrase means "people [who are] smuggling kind[ness]." Obviously, if you were saying that you weren't raised by the ring-leaders of a kindness-smuggling operation (operated out of tunnels that run from Tijuana to San Diego, with trains full of teddy bears and hugs), then your grammar is excellent, and you should disregard this message.
Couldn't find the answer with a quick search: if a character with a familiar is put to sleep (with the slumber hex, for example), could that familiar use their empathic link as a standard action to wake their master up from a distance? I have some slumber-happy PCs, so I know this is going to come up when they run into other witches, or into characters with intelligent magic items on hand.
I'm already playtesting this, since I've houseruled finesse as a weapon quality allowing the option to use Dex to attack, and the Weapon Finesse feat allows characters to apply Strength to damage with those weapons. Hasn't broken my game yet: the Strength magus still out-damages the Dex ninja. Weapon choice is limited, and none of the finessable weapons do a ton of damage, and crits are based on Dex rather than Strength. (I've even given the ninja a boon that lets her use dex for strength and damage with a katana. Still not breaking my game.)
Not CN Qadra? Don is nothing if not a self-interested uber-capitalist. He should always have liquour in his pack, and tobacco. Save up for a squire vanity nd sleep with her.
Feats: Persuasive, Antagonize. You might look into the human feats from the ARG, especially Fearless Curiousity and Intimidating Confidence.
Every time I see this thread title, I imagine the Mindflayer Mobile, a sports car with a tentacled face on the front, and the Illithid 'Copter, with tentacles for rotors.
(Best read very, very fast): I played a gnome once who talked very quickly without stopping or using much in the way of punctuation and repeated himself frequently every time he opened his mouth to talk very fast if he had a point to make about anything and he would just go on and on talking and talking at high speeds like this circling back over the same points sometimes because when you talk fast sometimes people don't hear you well so you have to repeat yourself and he did it all in one breath whenever possible which is hard but I learned to breathe through my nose while I was talking out my mouth so he would make these complex suggestions for the group or to an NPC in a roundabout way but they were always pretty good suggestions because he was a high INT character and very thoughtful and smart and stuff so he wouldn't talk often but whenever he did it was like this all breathless and fast and tumbling you know and everyone tried to follow along but it got hard when he started... to... run... out... of... oxygen. (DEEP BREATH) His name was Glib.
Voice matters when playing a gnome, I think, but try to avoid the obnoxious falsetto that some players use. I actually quit a game once rather than listen to a guy who played a gnome in a nasal falsetto. Not cool.
