magnuskn's page

This item was added in Battlecry!, but I am unsure what the item bonus to "Perception DCs" exactly does?

It is not an item bonus to Perception checks generally, I would say, given that the item is cheaper than many alternatives (Obsidian Goggles, Mirror Goggles), which only apply their item bonus to visual perception checks.

Reading it as if the item makes Perception DCs by opponents harder (i.e. they need a higher Perception check to notice you and your allies) seems counterintuitive to the item being a banner, meaning something which is prominently visually displayed.

You could also read it that you "gain" a penalty, i.e. the banner applies its "bonus" to your Perception DCs, making them harder. But that would clash with the wording, since you "gain an item bonus".

Anybody here who can explain to me what getting an item bonus to Perception DCs actually does?

Automatic Rune Progression is the goat and I wish PFS would adopt it. ^^ Very frustrating to hoard all your money for the fundamental runes until after lvl 5.

I'm totally honest here, seeing the lack of resized weapons in 2E was a huge relief, when I came over from 1E. I can't tell you the times I was frustrated over the last 15 years about wrong-sized equipment in the loot, the statistical lack of impetus to play a small-sized martial character and discussions with other recalcitrant GM's about if magical weapons and armors should not automatically resize themselves, like wondrous item clothes do. I am very much glad that this topic is done and gone in 2E.

Jim Butler wrote:

Our standard shipping methods are USPS, UPS, and DHL International. I suspect DHL will be the best shipping option for international orders but I can't guarantee that because it depends what's in the order and exactly where it's going. When the store goes live, you should login and go through Checkout to see what your options are. Here's an example of me shipping books to the UK using the least expensive option; the default is DHL.

UK Shipping Example

-Jim

Thank you for your response, but the problem is not the cost of shipping, but the hassle I will get with customs if the delivery is not by UPS. If it's DHL, it's very likely that the scenario I detailed will happen.

To be fair, I have my books delivered to my work address. I had it happen a few times that they were delivered on a Saturday (when the office is closed) and in all those cases the books were stored at a local kiosk which was working with DHL. I had to pay my customs fee there as well, so no travel to the remote customs office for me (which, the last time that happened in Hamburg where I live years ago, was at the ass-end of somewhere).

Then again, I have now two completely lost deliveries since moving to the new work address half a year ago, which had never happened before. :-/

You will be provided the tracking number provided by the carrier. The carriers we'll be using are USPS, UPS, and DHL. By default, the system will automatically include the least expensive option.

-Jim

Alright, I read this as all packages getting tracking with the new store, even with the cheapest option. That's a great improvement, thank you.

Jim Butler wrote:

aouar wrote:

I have some questions regarding the shipping method for my subscription. As I currently cannot select a specific shipping method for my subscription, I am limited to using the least expensive method available. Therefore, I would like to know if I can obtain the tracking number from the courier company, such as 1Z7W101A0799632559 (just an example), which is very important and even necessary for me. Alternatively, could I obtain this information by contacting customer service after the order has been shipped?

All tracking information that Paizo has available will now be emailed to you when your product ships; customer service shouldn't have access to anything that you wouldn't. The new systems should be sending everything to you that we have access to.

-Jim

@Jim

Dear Jim
Thank you very much for your response. However, I'm still a bit unclear about one thing. In the upcoming new system, if we choose the default least expensive shipping method, will we be able to obtain the logistics company's tracking number, rather than just the tracking number provided by Pazio? Could you please provide further clarification on this? Thank you.

Yes, more clarification on what tracking options will be available for international customers would be highly appreciated.

You mention tracking, but currently tracking is not available for affordable shipping (i.e. the least expensive) for international delivery. Almost every vendor I know in the US is offering tracking at affordable rates for international orders. Will tracking be added by default for international shipping now?

It is a huge hassle to not know where my shipments are, especially since the shipping cost already is very high for international shipments (for example my suscription this month for the AP module, Monster Core 2 and Alien Core came to a shipping cost of USD 56,25 WITHOUT TRACKING).

It's honestly really stressful at this point, because my last suscription from the month before has not arrived yet and I don't know if is still being held in customs or lost or whatever. It has been more than a month since it was shipped, too.

Actually, my current suscription shipment just arrived, which means the one from last month most likely has been lost, which is the second time this year. This could have been avoided if Paizo would provide tracking, like the 99% rest of retailers. I guess I need to contact Customer Service for a replacement shipment. <sigh>

You mention tracking, but currently tracking is not available for affordable shipping (i.e. the least expensive) for international delivery. Almost every vendor I know in the US is offering tracking at affordable rates for international orders. Will tracking be added by default for international shipping now?

It is a huge hassle to not know where my shipments are, especially since the shipping cost already is very high for international shipments (for example my suscription this month for the AP module, Monster Core 2 and Alien Core came to a shipping cost of USD 56,25 WITHOUT TRACKING).

It's honestly really stressful at this point, because my last suscription from the month before has not arrived yet and I don't know if is still being held in customs or lost or whatever. It has been more than a month since it was shipped, too.

The thing which is currently preventing one of my players (whom I don't want to lose) to accept 2E is that level is added to everything (except untrained skills), which for some reason is a huge turn-off to him. Weapon resizing doesn't even come into it. No, I'm not interested in running proficency without level games, as a GM I want the mathematical balance of the normal rules.

Dang, someone really wanted Merisiel to step on them.

There's the circuitous route to get the pre-remastered dragon bloodline powers with the pre-remaster Dragon Disciple archetype onto another bloodline. You just need to play the right race, i.e. a Kobold with the correct heritage.

Seems the dedicated "But what about Nocticula, huh?" thread went places tonight, since it's gone now. I miss all the stuff here in Germany while I'm sleeping...

Yeah, okay, I am going to do some pushback here. I like the concept of redemption, so I've always felt drawn to Sarenrae.

Nocticula's redemption, though, is something different from the redemption Sarenrae teaches. Sarenrae's concept of redemption obviously focuses on the concept of penance for ones misdeeds, i.e. "work for your happy ending". Nocticula is not like that. The article in this AP volume did not focus on it (James has mentioned multiple times that Nocticula is not primarily about redemption), but her entry in Divine Mysteries made it pretty clear that she knows that she cannot redress all the ills she has caused in the millenia she was a demon lord. So she just stopped doing evil and started doing good (although she was chaotic neutral when alignment still was a thing, her faith offering exiles a safe haven is something I personally would categorize as good).

Her faith is not about redemption, but her example still offers demons and other fiends a way to stop doing evil, by just walking away from it.

Honestly, leaving reviews to buying customers feels fine to me. We already got very few reviews per AP volume but we always get the one from the dude who just leaves one star without a comment, because he's on his third (or higher) account doing this, because he hates 2E on the principle that it isn't 1E.

That being said, migrating old reviews from verified customers seems like a good idea to me.

Evan Tarlton wrote:

** spoiler omitted **

Interesting, can you also share the Mythic Destinies if you don't mind?

Yes! It has shipped. :)

I'm surprised to see Xanderghul again, given the events of the previous campaign. Will there be an explanation for his return?

Tempest Keep Having his soul roasted was just a setback.

He did. And then he went into a bit more detail why it's not that much of a good idea to change the theme of the campaign, unless you are the GM and are willing to put in the work (which is a lot).

Yeah, same. But I am so much looking forward to the first volume of Revenge of the Runelords. Nocticula article, yes yes!

I just hope Sorshen survives.

What I hope is that we get high-level SF adventure paths. The developers were very gunshy about publishing high-level content for SF1E, I hope this changes with the more balanced 2E system.

Yeah, there's a whole other topic of Paizo's lack of responsiveness to player feedback there. I know the RPG business is not as the same as the computer gaming business, but they are related in theme at the very least. And most computer gaming companies have a much better feedback model, especially the small or mid-size ones, where they take negative feedback from their customers into account and interact with them.

Paizo developers, outside of James and just a little bit of interaction from the others (except Maya, who is doing a very good job) have a very strange model of customer interaction, responding seldomly to player concerns (two errata cycles per years with indeterminate dates to boot) and erratic communication (this forum gets very little outside of James and Maya, Reddit gets more and then there is some on social media which most people don't even see). It has a very "put the train tracks before the running train" feel to it and doesn't seem well planned out.

That being said, James and Maya are heroes for their presence here and goodwill to us. I just wish the rest of the developers would follow their example.

Though I'm curious about how the PF Remaster stands out from 2.0. Is there a good summary to read that anyone can recommend?

Generally it cleaned up some rules and class issues, removed all the OGL stuff, including alignment (which incidentally made Champions of different stripes much more playable) and generally buffed most classes which needed buffing (Wizard players may feel different ^^). It's still the same basic game, though.

Ravingdork wrote:

Individual responses to everyone

To be honest man, if you can argue against everyone in the entire thread at once like this, I don't really know what anyone is supposed to do to change your mind. Do you, like, WANT to argue about it? Or do you think someone has an answer that will satisfy you, and it just hasn't been said yet?

Making controversial topics and then argueing them to death seems to be one of RD's favorite pasttimes.

The smart design is to make the weapon able to teleport back to the creatures hand for low cost in those cases.

Alas, that's not the case for many officially statted NPC's/monsters. Always a nice houserule to have, though.

OTOH, some boss encounters rely on the boss using his weapon to make most of his abilities. Like with a dullahan.

PF2E. I was very resistant to 2E during the playtest and when it came out and didn't touch the system for four years, hoping to "sit it out" and that Paizo would publish a more 1E-like third edition.

I was simply not ready at the time to abandon the principles of 1E I liked, but the more years passed, the less enamored I became with them, since I am mostly a GM and have to deal a lot with the inherent problems 1E has in high-level campaigns. My own games became more and more filled with houserules to prevent the "stack as many bonuses as you can" gameplay. And when the Remaster was announced and I took a good first look at the published 2E rules, I found that the developers had basically adopted all the idea I had accumulated for myself during the intervening years, which made adopting 2E much easier for me this time around. I am also a bit happy that I skipped the less good versions of some classes by going late into the new edition (especially Swashbuckler, my favorite class archetype).

I've been GM'ing 2E for three quarters of a year by now (running Abomination Vaults, group is at level 5 and starting book 2 this Sunday) and I am loving it so far. I hope the promises of continued balance at the higher level holds up, but by reading this forum and Reddit, it seems that it isn't an empty promise.

The AP hardcover solution is good and I fully support it, be it for reasons of cohesion of story and also better shipping costs.

As for PFS, I am playing a bit of it and this new approach sounds problematic in many ways, which has already been expounded upon by many other people upthread. I hope the developers take the (so far uniformly negative) feedback to these changes into account.

What's the price point of an AP in the new format? I'm guessing $75ish?

-Skeld

I think somebody said USD 79.99?

I'm still quite new to GM'ing PF2E, but this has bothered me as well. I don't know if I want to houserule this for my first campaign. The thing is, even if DC's scale, the effects should not. So if an item has several upgrade stages (like many of them do), the player should still be incentivized to get the upgrade, because he'll get a better effect out of it. Or maybe replace the item with another one which just has a better effect altogether.

Huh. That should make it a bit easier on my shipping costs as well, although the ones for the big shipments will obviously be higher now.

The Lost Omens Travel Guide has some stuff on Thassilon. Apparently they like see-through fabric and ziggurats.

I object to the idea that it is somehow unique or special and required Sorshen's unique or special intervention to bring it into being or Sorshen's unique or special qualities to preserve it against the slings and arrows of the world. Because that would be what is necessary to justify her continuing to rule her own realm instead of settling down somewhere similar where she was not the absolute autocrat.

Okay, then. I guess her new realm would have spontaneously appeared then in one of the most inhospitable areas of the world, perfectly suitable to human life and a haven to people who need a refuge. <shrug> Sorry, I don't share this viewpoint at all. Absolute autocrats are there all over the world on Golarion and most of the few places which have some sort of other government are deeply flawed as well from a modern democractic viewpoint (as are our current governments, but there you go).

I have not seen Sorshen repent her past ways, which is why it does not feel like redemption to me. More like a self-serving move to stop being a target to anti-Runelords "heroes".

And it's true that "don't ask about the atrocities I did to get to my current power, just look at all the non-evil / good things I'm doing now with it" feels more like an easy way out than a real attempt to cope with the consequences of her evil acts.

Finally, if power corrupts, she should definitely get as far from it as possible. Which is not what she's doing.

Alright, a valid point, but one which I don't share. Yeah, it's an easier way of redeeming oneself than the standard one, but it works on people who otherwise would have stayed evil and continued harming innocents. It's all nice to have a lofty moral perch to moralize from, but if one demon follows Nocticula's example and just stops doing evil, that's hundreds or thousands of souls who will not go to the Abyss, erm, Outer Rifts in the future.

And people who have so much power as Sorshen can do more good if they use it from a position where they can exert influence, i.e. as a ruler of a realm. It's, for example, why I preferred the Empress ending to Witcher 3 to the Witcher ending.

magnuskn wrote:

I personally say that with great power comes great opportunity to do good and Sorshen setting up a kingdom where exiles and artists are welcome to live safely from people who persecute them is something someone of lesser power could not have done in the first place.

In fact these are dime a dozen in the Lost Omens Campaign Setting. Magnimar and Kaer Maga are two such, and they're even in the Saga Lands. Others include Nantambu, Lamasara, Kintargo, Vyre, and Pitax. There is little substantial difference in hospitality or freedom of expression as between them, or between them on the one hand and modern Xin-Shalast on the other; the most substantial difference is that Xin-Shalast is ruled by Sorshen and the others are not.

So, you object to another kingdom which does good for people and exists as a counterbalance for the more conqueror-like rulers in the area (including Belimarius and some Linnorm Kings) coming into existance? "There are other decent places in the world, somewhere else" is not really a good argument, IMO. Also Kaer Maga does have some vampires secretly ruling over it, IIRC.

Of the three 'hot babes get redeemed' stories, Sorshen's doesn't feel terribly redeem-y, and also feels more real to me than Noticula's. She's supposed to be super-intelligent, and a pivot to 'totes not the big bad at the end of the AP! don't kill me, bros!' makes sense.

It falls squarely in line with Nocticula's ethos, which is "I can't possibly atone for a millenium (or many multiple millenia in case of Nocticula) of bloodshed, but I can stop doing evil and start helping people instead". Which is a concept many people can't really grok, who are used to redemption as a concept where the person who atones first humbles her/himself into a lesser station than s/he used to hold, which is why Sorshen's redemption probably feels unearned to them.

I personally say that with great power comes great opportunity to do good and Sorshen setting up a kingdom where exiles and artists are welcome to live safely from people who persecute them is something someone of lesser power could not have done in the first place.

However, I did not run the 2018 adventure path Return of the Runelords. I read the entry on Belimarius and Sorshen in Lost Omens: Legends, but that does not tell give me enough information about their personalities for their encounter with the 20th-level Rise of the Runelords PCs in my incarnation of Golarion. I mostly need to tell the tale of whether the ancient runelords fought or cooperated. And I remembered seeing this thread about Sorshen, so I am here to learn.

If you have the books and don't want to spoil yourself because of the eventuality that you might run this AP as a player someday, I recommend looking into book 3 of Return of the Runelords, Runeplague. It has an extended section where the party deals with Sorshen in person (so to speak) and gives a good insight into her current personality.

Ectar wrote:

Teridax wrote:

Ectar wrote:

Accuracy buff?

Ancestral Memories.

Oooookay. Imperial, not Arcane.

Poor poor Arcane Draconic bloodline.

So talking about blasting, draconic sorcerers actually have it pretty good. I'm really enjoying the focus spells;

- the wings are just a very good fly speed, nice if you need it, or just another focus point in the tank
- the claws are pretty solid damage
- the breath weapon is the real winner though. Damage is comparable to a fireball, but this is a focus spell so it auto-heightens and you can do it throughout the day.

And in the case of the arcane draconic sorcerer: repeatable Force blast in a decently big cone. Not bad at all.

On top of that, solid bloodline spells too.

Yeah, I was about to point out the same. In terms of DPR, Elemental wins. In terms of accuracy, Imperial. But the Draconic bloodline wins in terms of throughput throughout the day, can have a force damage breath weapon and has good bloodline spells, including a very good blast with Howling Blizzard.

Turns out, Arazni is the weakest of the three for me, especially with her (undeserved, IMO) elevation to one of the top 20 deities of the Inner Sea.

Thanks, James. :)

Here's the text passage from Runeplague:

Important part bolded.

If someone has retconned some of those vampires to be still un-alive, that should have no weight on the original intent of the author, i.e. Sorshen releasing her army of vampires to go to the great beyond being a redemptive act.

Virellius wrote:

Gods forbid a girl try new things.

I quite agree. But going from being the absolute autocrat of a nation who wants for nothing, with the power to decide who lives and who dies, to the absolute autocrat of a nation who wants for nothing, with the power to decide who lives and who dies, doesn't strike me as much of a change. If she'd kept living in obscurity in Korvosa, or retreated to an ascetic existence, or placed her power and knowledge at the disposal of others, I'd find her rather more sympathetic and earnest.

God forbid she use her vast power to open up a realm for exiles and artists to escape to from oppressors. Not everybody has to live in sack and ash to repent for past misdeeds, doing enough good also counts.

vyshan wrote:

What was the issue with Sorshen to begin with?

Being a Runelord entailed a lot of mass murder and enslavement as a matter of course. Sorshen decided to avoid starting up with that again not out of any realization that her actions were wrong but largely out of fear of the sticky ends her fellows met. And she was spectacularly successful in avoiding that outcome for herself, going above and beyond evading any negative consequences for her past deeds (not having to give anything up in reparation or as an earnest of her good faith) to maintaining or increasing her lavish lifestyle, personal and political power, and status. It comes across, at least to me, as a blatant exercise in narrative favor.

She spent 10.000 years in conscious stasis, I think that counts enough of a punishment. And actually the idea of imprisoning people is (at least in the civilized countries) to reform them, so I think her self-inflicted stasis absolutely counts as being successful in her case.

Oh also unleashing a small army of vampires upon the world once she woke up. that and the whole baving in the blood of people to become immortal so she could have that 'revelation' to begin with.

She did not "unleash an army of vampires". She released them to die and go to the great beyond. Source: Runeplage, page 67, bio of the Sorshen simulacrum.

Still doing three (or in total four) 1E campaigns.

Strange Aeons: I am playing my favorite character of the lot, Doctor Ogol, a chaotic neutral elf Alchemist (think Doctor Insano from the Spoony Experiment). The GM is a first-time Pathfinder GM and has modified a good lot of the campaign, which turns out under him is very combat heavy and RP-lite. He seems to see the horror element in beating up the party with stacked encounters. We are currently still in the early stages of module three.

Iron Gods: Also in module three and, aside from the technological aspect, a pretty much standard Pathfinder campaign in terms of combat and roleplay. The technological items are really underwhelming so far and my character, a lawful good Monk named Lucien Kell, can't use them anyway. But it's pretty fun. :)

Ironfang Invasion: Currently on hold, I am playing a Sylvan Sorcerer named Barnabas Khaine with his lynx companion Mauler. We finished the second module and have now begun the first module of Hell's Rebels, where I am the GM. We'll return to the campaign after I finish the first module of that campaign. The story is good, but the lack of opportunities to sell equipment and get something appropiate for ones character is grating at this point.

Hell's Rebels: We have just begun this adventure path where I am the GM. I started with a prologue where I detailed what happened to the characters in the Night of Ashes. And we will just this coming Friday finish the official "prologue", i.e. the part where the players are on a set path of fixed encounters and now the sandbox of the city will open. I got some of the official stuff planned to pop up soon enough and I will also add some character specific events. Also, we'll see what the players come up by themselves. The rebellion system is running in the background for this campaign, since in my first Hell's Rebels campaign the other group found it to be too mechanic and this group decided before starting the campaign to focus more on the story and character stories. In any case, the prep time for the next sessions after the one coming next week will increase dramatically, but since I put in a lot of time to prep in the year before, it all should be pretty manageable.

I am also running every second week a 2E Abomination Vaults campaign, going into Fists of the Ruby Phoenix some day, where we are just finishing the first module in one week. And one day, when the Strange Aeons campaign is done, I'll start with a 2E Return of the Runelords conversion. Really looking forward to that!

Since Sorshen (by her own words) likes to work through agents, I suspect she would be delighted to make the aquaintaince of more capable heroes and be on her best behaviour.

A lot of classes can access the arcane list now with better class features. Imperial sorcerer is arguably the new wizard for PF2. Which I'm fine with as I greatly prefer spontaneous casting.

I keep hearing that, but I kinda want to know why? Yep, it has a great new focus spell, but it also does not have the skill monkey capability the bloodline had pre-remaster, due to its old level one focus spell not being there anymore. Being kind of a skill monkey has always been one of the corner stones of playing a Wizard and the imperial Sorcerer still lacks that, unlike, say, the sage Sorcerer in PF1E (which just had to struggle with a miserable base class skill list).

Can we not bloat up the system with a base class which can be expressed perfectly fine with the current skill system and the existing classes? Or maybe a one-page archetype in an adventure path?

Champions got Expand Aura at lvl 6 with expanded benefits later on, Defensive Advance and you can play their causes for a lot more deities than before. I think they came out very well, although their base chassis already was strong pre-Remaster.

Swashbucklers got really functional with the Remaster and are one of my favorite classes in 2E. Which is why I wrote a guide for them.

Golarion as a setting already resembles the 'zoo' folks are complaining about, though. It's never really been a low-fantasy "humans and one dwarf" kinda world, especially now that Orcs and Leshies are Common.

I think what Castiliano means is that Starfinder 1E just threw tons of races at you with each Bestiary, each with very little personality outside of its assigned gimmick. I personally would prefer more depth for each ancestry in SF2E.