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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Bestiary (OGL)

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Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Bestiary (OGL)
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Here there be monsters!

What is a hero without monsters to vanquish? This 328-page book presents hundreds of different creatures for use in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. Within this tome you'll find fire-breathing dragons and blood-drinking vampires, vile demons and shapechanging werewolves, sadistic goblins and lumbering giants, and so much more! Yet not all the creatures in this book are enemies, for some can serve lucky heroes as allies or advisors, be they summoned angels or capricious nymphs. And it doesn't stop there—with full rules for advancing monsters, adapting monsters to different roles, and designing your own unique creations, you'll never be without a band of hideous minions again!

The Pathfinder RPG Bestiary is the must-have companion volume to the Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook. This imaginative tabletop game builds upon more than 10 years of system development and an Open Playtest featuring more than 50,000 gamers to create a cutting-edge RPG experience that brings the all-time best-selling set of fantasy rules into the new millennium.

The Pathfinder RPG Bestiary includes:

  • More than 350 different monsters
  • Dozens of monstrous variants to modify creatures and keep players on their toes
  • Numerous lists of monsters to aid in navigation, including lists by Challenge Rating, monster type, and habitat
  • Extensive rules for creating effective and balanced monsters
  • Rules for advancing monsters by hit dice, template, or class level
  • Universal monster rules to simplify special attacks, defenses, and qualities like breath weapons, damage reduction, and regeneration
  • More than a dozen feats tailored especially for monsters
  • Suggestions for monstrous cohorts
  • Two dozen additional animal companions
  • More than a dozen different wandering monster encounter tables
  • ... and much, much more!

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The Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Bestiary is available as:

Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-60125-183-1

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Last Updated - 9/12/2011

Other Resources: This product is also available on the following platforms:

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Without Opponents, Combat Sure Wouldn't Be Much Fun!

5/5 —

Bestiaries are Pathfinder's version of the D&D Monster Manuals: reference books containing descriptions and stat-blocks for hundreds of new creatures for PCs to battle, bother, or befriend. They're not designed to be read cover to cover, but that's exactly what I did for this review. The Bestiary weighs in at 327 pages and contains (according to the back-cover) over 350 different monsters arranged in alphabetical order.

The book starts with a two-page Introduction, and it's actually worth reading because it explains what the (28!) different categories of information in a creature's stat block mean. It also introduces the the "Monster Icons" scheme, wherein each monster receives three different icons to visually denote its creature type, terrain, and climate. I like the idea of the icons, but I find them too small and similar to be useful, and I'm not interested in flipping back to page 5 too figure out what they mean. I'm happy just reading the corresponding entries in the stat block.

For monsters, we start with Aasimar on page 7 and run through until Zombie on page 289. This is what the book is all about, but it's a challenging thing to review as my notes are full of bits of scattered remarks about dozens of different monsters. As I can't figure out a coherent way to synthesize them, I'm going to take the unusual tack of just including them as a sort of impressionistic picture of what's in the book. Skim to the bottom for more of the review.

"A"

--aboleths are a lot tougher than CR might indicate!

--Not officially Golarion, but flavour in entries generally compatible

--backdoor cosmology with angels stuff

--really good write-up of Solar Angels

--Army Ant Swarms are pretty nasty!

--like archons--I've never really seen them used outside of summoning, when no RP is involved

--azatas: CG celestials

Bs

--cool how barghests become greater!

--bebiliths: wow, awesome art for an awesome creature!

--bugbear artwork is weird, but fascinating bit on "The Nature of Goblinoid Evil"

Cs

--creepy Choker

--good mixture of animals and various types of monsters

--a lot of classic ones, but some new ones (like chuul) as well

--like history of cyclops and flash of insight power

Ds

--dark folk and dark stalkers?!?! humanoid subtype with language--never heard of them...

--demons! Good, engaging, clear explanation

--don't argue with a balor demon!

--great stories for demons--quasit familiars taking master's souls!

--devils! emphasis on hierarchy

--a good variety of tough foes, with lots of HP and resistances

--great writeup of lemure devils

--fantastic artwork all the way through!

--Devourers are pretty nasty for their CR!

--too many dinosaurs!

--dragons! stat blocks are so long, there's very little description

--driders and drow: underused

E

--elementals

F

--familiar (no idea that was here!)

--froghemoth--really?

G

--gelatinous cubes are really dangerous!

--genies

--love Shaitan genie art

--ghosts: emphasis on story-based customization, 2 page spread

--Giants!

--fun gibbering mouthers artwork

--goblins

--golems

Hs

--half- templates

--occasionally the titles aren't the most intuitive: "Herd animal, bison" for example

--need full stats for combat-trained horses

Is

--intellect devourer--WTF!

Ks

--kytons are cool/creepy

Ls

--lamia artwork is regrettable

--lich: gotta have 'em!

--linnorms are nasty, especially curses and poison!

--lycanthrope template

Ms

--medusas, minotaurs, mimics--all the classics!

--mummy rot sure is nasty!

Ns

-- nagas look dumb

--neothelids are intriguing! need more

--nymphs have cool boons

Os

--Oni need better explanation

Ps

--good amount of player detail for pegasi

Rs

--rakhasa: a lot of potential in the right campaign

--retrievers are scary

--rust monsters!

Ss

--sea hag artwork is great! (and evil eye comatose ability!)

--shadows can be quite more lethal than CR

--touch ACs are so low because of artificial natural armor bonuses, making Alchemists and Gunslingers especially powerful

--shoggoths arent very scary for CR19

--skum have surprisingly interesting write-up

--giant slugs too goofy

Ts

--tarrasque: bad pic, underwhelming

--troglodyte pic is great!

Us

Vs

--vampires: elaborate template

--vargouille's kiss is nasty

Ws

Xs

--xills are awesome!

Zs

--zombie pic is hilarious

Hm, that was embarrassing. Sorry!

After the monster entries are a series of appendices, and these definitely add value to the book.

Appendix 1 is Monster Creation, and it offers a very thorough and clear guide to monster creation. There are a *lot* of moving parts to creating balanced monsters in Pathfinder, so this will take some time until you get the hang of it. Appendix 2 is Monster Advancement, and this is another important part of the book because it shows GMs how to adjust creatures in the book to make them more or less powerful by adding simple templates (like "Giant" or "Young") and by adding racial hit dice or class levels. Appendix 3 is the section of the book I use more than any other, and it's indispensable: Universal Monster Rules. In order to save space and avoid repetition in stat blocks, common monster abilities are fleshed out here: everything from Darkvision to Damage Reduction to Incorporeal and more. Only very, very experienced GMs should try to run creatures just from the stat blocks without remembering to double-check what their monster abilities do, precisely, in the Universal Monster Rules. The same appendix also contains creature Types and Subtypes, which are like packages of basic information that all creatures of a particular category, such as demons or animals, share. Again, this is to save space in stat blocks. Appendix 4 is very short, and provides some advice on Monsters as PCs. I've never used it. Appendix 5 is Monster Feats, though some PCs may actually legitimately use some of them like Craft Construct. If you notice that a monster has a feat you can't find in the Core Rulebook, that's probably because it's listed here. Appendices 6 and 7 list Monster Cohorts (for the Leadership feat) and Animal Companions (for druids and rangers), respectively. Appendices 8-12 are indexes that help a GM who is looking for monsters of a particular type, CR, terrain, etc. Really useful information that most people who just use online databases probably never realized was available. Finally, Appendix 14 contains Encounter Tables broken up by terrain. These include average CRs for an each table, but I still think it'd be foolish to actually roll on them: in a Hill/Mountain, region, for example, your PCs could run into CR 3 orcs or CR 12 fire giants. A party that is challenged by the former would be curb-stomped by the latter. Good random encounter table design needs to have a narrow range of CRs before they become feasible.

I'm not a huge monster guy like some people, but I definitely enjoyed reading the Bestiary and I learned a lot about the core monsters of the setting. I know there are five later books that expand the selection far more, but much of what I see in APs and PFS still draws from this book. Along with the Core Rulebook, it's safe to say that the Bestiary was one of the releases that helped to solidify Paizo's reputation as a company that publishes the highest calibre of RPG books in terms of writing quality, artwork, design, and layout. It's not indispensable since there are multiple websites that present the same information, but for ease of use (and the joy of skimming), the Bestiary is one of those books that every GM should have.

It all starts here babee

5/5 —

One only two books you require to jump in and play Pathfinder, it is the essential meat in the gaming stew. As important and the core rulebook is, it is nothing with out this work.

Expanded and tweaked off the OGL 3.x material, its cleaner, better organized and tweaked for the Pathfinder rules. Every hero needs a foe, every damsel in distress needs a captor, and every GM needs a source of badies to keep the group on their toes. You will find it all here, between these pages is years of destruction and mayhem.

No matter if you playing Pathfinders own setting, one of your own design and creation, or another publishers material, this is the must have companion to your CRB.

They need more monsters

5/5 —

not as useful as the advanced raced guide for the monsters you could play as it does have a lot. i own this and well do my best to keep it hidden from my players. they keep trying to make them fight dragons... they are lvl 5

great reference book

5/5 —

This book has all the monsters you would need on a starting campaine

The standard by which all monster products will be judged by.

5/5 —

By now, there are several Bestiaries out in print, but when this book first came out you arguably needed to own it to play the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. Was it worth the purchase? Decide for yourself!

Crunch
When we talk about a book's crunch, we're looking at its game rules, mechanics, and similar stats. As a monster book, the Bestiary is 99% crunch, and for Paizo's first real Bestiary, it is absolutely fantastic. There isn't a whole lot you can really say about monster stat blocks; they work perfectly and there aren't any monsters that feel ridiculous for their challenge rating (CR). The book also includes several new races that are appropriate for player characters; in this book, we have aasimars, the tieflings, and drow, as well as the applicable but seldom appropriate deurgar, drow noble, and svirfneblin. The book stays true to the rules of its predecessors; when you look at a drow, you recognize it as a drow from previous games. Because of the significant power up that the core races received these classically "OP" races aren't very far out of line with your traditional player characrers, and as a result we don't see the Level Adjustment system in Pathfinder. If you're unfamiliar with the term, in older editions of Dungeons and Dragons, some races were deemed so powerful that you had to actually forgo class levels in order to be a member of the race. For example, if you wanted to play a drow, you had a LA of +1, meaning that your race counted as 1 class level when determining your party's level. This either meant you were more powerful than your friends or (and more commonly) your GM had you start at a lower level to compensate. And believe me, it is not fun to be a sorcerer of an LA race because of how far behind your party is! The racial benefits seldom made up for the loss of character levels and it was a pretty terrible mechanic all around, so good riddance.

Although the book's theme is classic monsters, Paizo manages to add its own spin on fantasy games by including weird and amazing monsters. A perfect example is the froghemoth, which is basically a giant aberrant frog-monster. As a huge Lovecraft fan, I was ecstatic to see monsters like the shoggoth creep up in Pathfinder as well. For a first Bestiary, the spread of monsters is well-chosen and you could definitely run a game with only this book if you really wanted to.

What probably amounts to the best change of all, in my opinion, is the changes to the rules for building your own monsters. These rules are difficult to comprehend and enact in other games, but the Paizo team does an excellent job of laying out step-by-step every detail in crafting your own monsters by including handy charts and tables. For a game that knew it wasn't launching with much material and that it wanted to be backwards-compatible with older products, it was a very wise choice to streamline monster-making as much as they did and its probably the best reason to keep a copy of Bestiary I in your library alongside future monster tomes. 5 /5 Stars.

Flavor
When we talk about a product's flavor, we're talking about its fiction content, its style, and its overall feel. This section is always very opinionated, because even though I whole-heartily enjoy Lovecraft and his works, there are those who don't like their minds thrust into insanity and the mere sight of a shoggoth or whatnot. When you read the Bestiary, the one thing that becomes very clear is that there simply is not much room for flavor. Most monsters get a paragraph and a half of descriptive text and a beautiful picture, but that's about it. Honestly, however, that's all this product needs. The monsters that are detailed are classic monsters, so the information provided about them tends to be enough that classic gamers can recognize the creature for what it is and new players can get a sense of wonder and learn enough about the monster to be on the same page with the veterans. The art is fabulous in this book and supplements the descriptions perfectly, even when the monster concept is weird text-wise a beautiful illustration helps to sell it to you personally.

The elephant in the room is that Pathfinder wants to have its own identity as much as it wants to follow in the footsteps of its predecessors. This means that every so often the Paizo team completely re-imagines and redefines the traits of a specific monster. Usually this happens to a relatively unknown or under used monster (we'll talk more about this in Bestiary III), but there is one monster in particular that is relatively well-known and got the Paizo makeover in a big way. That monster, which has become Paizo's mascot of sorts, is the goblin. To give a little bit of background, traditionally goblins have admittedly lacked character; they were little more than evil halflings in most settings. Paizo's very first adventure path, Rise of the Runelords, shook this up by drastically changing the image of the goblin; they were now psychotic savages who were obsessed with fire and scared of dogs and horses. They sang Children of the Corn style songs about death and murder and often filled a role as comic relief in many of the adventures they have been featured in while simultaneously managing to inspire fear and terror in many a party. In my experience, you either love or you hate the new look of goblins. Many classic gamers that I've played with deplore the "new" goblin if only for the art design; big heads, small bodies. Honestly, however, it doesn't bother me much; my gaming generation includes Warcraft's techno-suicidal goblins and Warhammer's hordes of insane, suicidal goblins; next to those, Paizo's take on the goblin fits in rather nicely.

For being limited to several paragraphs of text per monster, the Bestiary gives you everything you'd expect and more flavor-wised. Its a book of monsters that feel threatening and believable; there's nothing too dumb or too far out there unless you're a hard-core medieval traditionalist. 5 /5 Stars.

Texture
When we talk about a book's texture, we're talking about its grammar and layout, among other things. As someone who has actually sat down to try and write a bestiary, let's be clear that if there's one thing I get, its that stat blocks are HARD. They're hard to format, they're hard to standardize, they're even hard to spell check because of the sheer amount of text that a book like the Bestiary has. All of its complex jargon, half of it made of surreal naming conventions. With all this mind, if there's one place that the Bestiary is amazing, its the texture. There is almost no errors of any kind in this document. Perfect grammar. Perfect spelling conventions. Perfect formatting. Everything is perfect.

As you can see in the picture I included, the Bestiary breaks from traditional monster books in that it limits one monster page, with only a few exceptions (mostly animals and familiars). There is extreme attention to detail in the text placement, and its very impressive that the book manages to be as descriptive as it is with as little space as it has; almost every monster is illustrated, after all, so not only are you juggling stat blocks, but you're also juggling them with text descriptions and illustrations. This book is a marvel of editing and layout and nothing less. 5 /5 Stars.

Final Score & Thoughts
Crunch: 5 / 5
Flavor: 5 / 5
Texture: 5 / 5
Final Score: 5 / 5

This book does everything right. It is the shining star by which all monster-based products should be judged. For a first attempt, Paizo smashes their monster book out of the park, past all expectations. It makes me excited to start looking at the future Bestiary products.

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Silver Crusade
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

The name "drow" and certain elements of their description come from folklore and myth, so WotC couldn't claim a copyright on them. However certain aspects (Lloth, spider fetish) are copyrighted. Funnily enough, driders are open content - go figure.

The legalities of D&D monsters are a funny topic in itself, between OGL content, Tome of Horrors-ized content and several wacky issues (mind flayers being closed content but neothelids being open).

I think that several Paizo monsters have already reached a cult status and are becoming an internal part of Pathfinder culture. Pugwampis come to mind, as do Proteans, Boggards and Slurks.

James and Erik did several times state that their intent is to keep Golarion monsters firmly rooted in myth, folklore, cryptozoology and classic fantasty literature, drawing from open sources instead of inviting weird new stuff so just to able to copyright it and keep it for themselves.

To tell you the truth, I don't think Golarion suffers from the lack of beholders and mind-flayers. There's the serpentfolk that have enough mystery and 'scare' about them that I don't miss the flayers, and they give me a more lovecraftian feel which I love about Golarion

In all honesty, its these little things that set Golarion apart from other campaign settings for me. Its not 'another world with the same stuff and different fluff', its a world which looks like some others at first glance, but digging into it you realize it isn't. I've managed to catch my very experienced D&D players off-guard with Golarion, which isn't something Eberron achieved, for example. The only thing that vexes me about golarion lore is that it appears in chops and bits in adventure paths, making it very difficult to get quick refference.

On that note, it'd be nice to have a consolidated lists archive similar to the one on the WotC site to get quick reference on stuff.

Back on topic, I've looked through the book again to find these 'mistakes' I so brazenly claimed to find in the book, only to discover it was me who wasn't paying close attention to all the little things like size and such. So the only negative thing I can really say about the book is the lack of easily accessible upgraded version of monsters.

At some point I'd like to see a book with stat blocks for npcs with classes. like 10 different levels of fighters, 10 different levels of wizards, etc. Just quick stuff to throw in without breaking your head, you know?
Sovereign Court
Gorbacz wrote:
The name "drow" and certain elements of their description come from folklore and myth, so WotC couldn't claim a copyright on them. However certain aspects (Lloth, spider fetish) are copyrighted. Funnily enough, driders are open content - go figure.

Wow! I really had no idea that Drow were derived from myth. That is pretty amazing.

Gorbacz wrote:


The legalities of D&D monsters are a funny topic in itself, between OGL content, Tome of Horrors-ized content and several wacky issues (mind flayers being closed content but neothelids being open).

I am perturbed about Mind Flayers being closed source when it is obvious that their original concept was derived from HPL's Cthulhu and then boxed and stamped and copyrighted as their own by TSR/Wizards is a little disingenuous - especially when the whole Cthulhu Mythos copyright issues are so muddled up. In Call of Cthulhu, Cthulhu is reaching out of his prison under the waves at Rl'yeh by his powerful mind. Sure he is a god like creature and mind flayers aren't but I'm sure you can see the parallels.

The Beholder concept on the other hand is derived from the saying "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder", which I guess is more legitimate but not without some background in common literary usage.

Gorbacz wrote:


I think that several Paizo monsters have already reached a cult status and are becoming an internal part of Pathfinder culture. Pugwampis come to mind, as do Proteans, Boggards and Slurks.

I don't disbelieve you. I don't possess as much Golarion material as many here and I have arrived pretty late to the Pathfinder table.

Gorbacz wrote:


James and Erik did several times state that their intent is to keep Golarion monsters firmly rooted in myth, folklore, cryptozoology and classic fantasty literature, drawing from open sources instead of inviting weird new stuff so just to able to copyright it and keep it for themselves.

An excellent intent, but I wouldn't want to completely close the door on new monster designs not out of folklore. When you create a campaign of you're own you're creating a new world with its own folklore. In magical worlds, magic often can go awry either by accident, intent or simply the fact that magic exists at all sparking the creation of aberrations and magical beasts. Magic to me is tameable with knowledge and the use of proper spells and precautions, and yet magical experimentation (which would be good Craft skill) could result in unexpected results. Magic, unlike science is inherently unpredictable, or it wouldn't have the draw of possibilities that we can evoke in our campaigns Just my 2c.

Sovereign Court

Found this about Drow. Interesting.
Paizo Employee Director of Narrative
Marcus Aurelius wrote:
I don't possess as much Golarion material as many here and I have arrived pretty late to the Pathfinder table.

Here's a list of monsters that have appeared in the Bestiary sections of the Adventure Path books and other Pathfinder sources so far. Of course the descriptions on the wiki are just a summary, you can get an idea of the ones that interest you and search out the individual issues.

Sovereign Court
Adam Daigle wrote:
Marcus Aurelius wrote:
I don't possess as much Golarion material as many here and I have arrived pretty late to the Pathfinder table.
Here's a list of monsters that have appeared in the Bestiary sections of the Adventure Path books and other Pathfinder sources so far. Of course the descriptions on the wiki are just a summary, you can get an idea of the ones that interest you and search out the individual issues.

Thanks Adam.

Shadow Lodge
Marcus Aurelius wrote:


I am perturbed about Mind Flayers being closed source when it is obvious that their original concept was derived from HPL's Cthulhu and then boxed and stamped and copyrighted as their own by TSR/Wizards is a little disingenuous - especially when the whole Cthulhu Mythos copyright issues are so muddled up. In Call of Cthulhu, Cthulhu is reaching out of his prison under the waves at Rl'yeh by his powerful mind. Sure he is a god like creature and mind flayers aren't but I'm sure you can see the parallels.

Meh. The general appearance is inspired by Cthulhu, but as you yourself begin to point out, that's really where the similarities end.

The Exchange Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6

Just a thought, and not a criticism. Rather than fretting over the small handful of iconic monsters that are closed, let's be grateful that D20 and OGL happened at all, and opened up so much of this game for outside development. The right people at the right time made a huge different for our hobby.
Dark Archive

Indeed. And the cool thing about Pathfinder RPG is that we can convert the closed monsters ourselves with little effort if we really want beholders and displacer beasts in our games.
Silver Crusade
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Aaaand that WotC were kind enough to make Derro, Duergar, Aboleths, Inevitables, Guardinals, Eladrins, Purple Worms, Tieflings, Aasimar and a host of others open content.

And that Necromancer Games was smart enough to ninja-OGLize Dark Folk, Shadow Demons, Flail Snails, Flumphs and others.
Paizo Employee Creative Director
Russ Taylor wrote:
Just a thought, and not a criticism. Rather than fretting over the small handful of iconic monsters that are closed, let's be grateful that D20 and OGL happened at all, and opened up so much of this game for outside development. The right people at the right time made a huge different for our hobby.

This.

WotC could have retained MUCH more than just 11 monsters had they so wished.
Paizo Employee Creative Director
Gorbacz wrote:

Aaaand that WotC were kind enough to make Derro, Duergar, Aboleths, Inevitables, Guardinals, Eladrins, Purple Worms, Tieflings, Aasimar and a host of others open content.

And that Necromancer Games was smart enough to ninja-OGLize Dark Folk, Shadow Demons, Flail Snails, Flumphs and others.

Well... to be precise, they actually didn't make the name guardinal or eladrin open content at all. Which is why we changed to agathion and azata (both names derived from real-world mythology).

And derro weren't invented by WotC/TSR anyway; they're from Amazing Stories back in the 1940s.

Of course... WotC currently owns the rights to Amazing Stories... but I don't believe that extends to the actual stories in the magazine. Just the title.

But yeah... they were a lot more generous overall than they had to be.
Sovereign Court
Russ Taylor wrote:
Just a thought, and not a criticism. Rather than fretting over the small handful of iconic monsters that are closed, let's be grateful that D20 and OGL happened at all, and opened up so much of this game for outside development. The right people at the right time made a huge different for our hobby.

Good point, well taken. ;)

Sovereign Court
Kthulhu wrote:
Marcus Aurelius wrote:


I am perturbed about Mind Flayers being closed source when it is obvious that their original concept was derived from HPL's Cthulhu and then boxed and stamped and copyrighted as their own by TSR/Wizards is a little disingenuous - especially when the whole Cthulhu Mythos copyright issues are so muddled up. In Call of Cthulhu, Cthulhu is reaching out of his prison under the waves at Rl'yeh by his powerful mind. Sure he is a god like creature and mind flayers aren't but I'm sure you can see the parallels.
Meh. The general appearance is inspired by Cthulhu, but as you yourself begin to point out, that's really where the similarities end.

Well you should know Kthulhu. Get thy thoughts out of my mind and head ye back to sea soaked Rl'yeh. While you're at it, learn to spell your name correctly, or I'll contact Nyarlathotep and get him to get Azathoth to send a horde of night gaunts to tickle thee unto death! :) Ahh, you say: The Night Gaunts are not beholden to Nyarlathotep but to hoary Nodens:

And then you say:

"That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die."

Dern, foiled again ;)

Seriously though, I was being a little unfair in my statement about mind flayers. I forget sometimes what opportunities WOTC opened up to the gaming community at large by making 3.5 OGL. Sorry Wizards, I love you really.

I picked this book up last week and I like a lot of the creatures in there. Even though most of them are repeats, I find the pages very well laid out and easy to read.

A good friend of mine told me the other day that one of the other group members in the current RPG group he is in actually did some of the illustrations in at least the Bestiary. Tyler Walpole So I thought that was kind of neat. :)
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber
Vak wrote:
At some point I'd like to see a book with stat blocks for npcs with classes. like 10 different levels of fighters, 10 different levels of wizards, etc. Just quick stuff to throw in without breaking your head, you know?

I think it is called Pathfinder RPG GameMastery Guide and comes out in June.

Is the bestiary out of print or something? I notice several bookstores that sell it here in Sweden have it listed in their inventory as "temporarily unavailable". I tried mailing them and they tell me they do not know when they will get it. I've been itching to get my hands on this and I do not want to order from the US. I could get it from Sfbokhandeln but they sell it for 55 usd which is a bit too much for me.
Liberty's Edge
Ganryu wrote:
Is the bestiary out of print or something? I notice several bookstores that sell it here in Sweden have it listed in their inventory as "temporarily unavailable". I tried mailing them and they tell me they do not know when they will get it. I've been itching to get my hands on this and I do not want to order from the US. I could get it from Sfbokhandeln but they sell it for 55 usd which is a bit too much for me.

Yes. Paizo is currently out of both the Core Rules and The Bestiary. There are still some copies in the distribution chain that are floating around becuse of the way that Amazon returns and re-orders books through Diamond Comics. This was noted by Paizo in the thread here: Bestiary to Amazon?

Short strokes: The third printing of the Core Rules and the second printing of the Bestiary are due at Paizo in a little under a week and distributors world-wide (including Amazon) will get their copies shortly after that.
Ravenmantle wrote:
Indeed. And the cool thing about Pathfinder RPG is that we can convert the closed monsters ourselves with little effort if we really want beholders and displacer beasts in our games.

Been playing AD&D since 1st edition and have faithfully bought scads of stuff from TSR/WotC over the years but haven't played for quite some time. Been looking at Pathfinder vs 4e and 4e is just too much of a departure from what I want in my game (now that I've decided to get active again). I'm VERY glad that the splat books I have for 3.5 can be applied to Pathfinder because Beholders will ALWAYS have a place at my table! :)

RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32

We have updated the PDF of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Bestiary.

The PDF now incorporates all current errata to correspond to the second printing of the hardcover.

Errata to the previous version of the book have also been released on the Pathfinder RPG Resources Page.

To verify the version you have, please view the credits page. If the bottom of the page reads 'Second Printing, April 2010', you already have the most recent version.

Those of you who have access to the PDF may download the updated version for free here. (If the file shows that it has already been personalized, you'll need to repersonalize it before you can download the new version.)
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 32
Ross Byers wrote:
Errata

Woooooo! (thanks)

The Exchange Contributor, RPG Superstar 2008 Top 6

Much appreciated, Paizo peeps!
Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

Also, paizo.com orders for the Bestiary are now being fulfilled with copies from the second printing.
Grand Lodge
Adventure Path Charter Subscriber

Remember to vote for Pathfinder Bestiary for Best Cover Art & Best Monster/Adversary!

And don't forget to vote for Mark Green for 2011 ENnies Judge!

-Mark
My judge profile
James Jacobs wrote:


Heavy horse = advanced horse
Heavy warhorse = advanced horse with combat training
Mule = advanced pony
PRD wrote:

Advanced Creature (CR +1)

Creatures with the advanced template are fiercer and more powerful than their ordinary cousins.

Quick Rules: +2 on all rolls (including damage rolls) and special ability DCs; +4 to AC and CMD; +2 hp/HD.

Rebuild Rules: AC increase natural armor by +2; Ability Scores +4 to all ability scores.

Does that mean that heavy (war)horses and mules have an int score of 6? :P

What about animal companions that get their INT bumped up at level 4? Are they still treated as animals?
Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer
Krinn wrote:

Does that mean that heavy (war)horses and mules have an int score of 6? :P

What about animal companions that get their INT bumped up at level 4? Are they still treated as animals?

Rules questions have a much better chance of being seen by somebody able to answer them if they're posted in the Rules Questions forum.

I just recently got this book. I like it a lot. I really like the monster building section in the appendix. I also like the additional familiars and animal companions.

How come the stat blocks don't indicate what sizes are associated with different hit die ranges? If I remember correctly, the 3.5 monster books had this. How do you determine when a creature changes size when you advance it?

Also, I have some minor complaints about the artwork. I dislike it when monster manuals do not have pictures of the creatures that are described. I noticed these dinosaurs aren't depicted.

Elasmosaurus Dinosaur
Pteranodon Dinosaur

I also don't like the new look of the trolls. I think the 3.5 version looked much better.

I do like the new look for ogres.

As a referee, I am wondering if Paizo will ever provide print-quality downloads of the icons they use in their Bestiary publications (climate, terrain, monster type)?

The reason I ask is that I do a lot of creature creation, myself, and would like to emulate the Pathfinder style as much as possible in my notes and character hand-outs.

Yours,
David J Rust
Liberty's Edge

It seems there are errors in the Marilith stat block:

Quote:
Melee +1 longsword +24/+19/+14/+9 (2d6+8/17–20), 5 +1 longswords +24 (2d6+4/17–20), tail slap +19 (2d6+3 plus grab) or 6 slams +24 (1d8+7), tail slap +19 (2d6+3 plus grab)

Shouldn't the tail slap be +17 (BAB 16, STR 7, large -1, secondary -5)?

Also, shouldn't the 6 slams be +22 (BAB 16, STR 7, large -1)?

Why.. are kobolds as PCs so.. weak?
their stats don't even equal up to the weakest of the core races.
Contributor
Demonskunk wrote:

Why.. are kobolds as PCs so.. weak?

their stats don't even equal up to the weakest of the core races.

Not every type of creature is as powerful as a human, elf, or dwarf.

Sean K Reynolds wrote:
Demonskunk wrote:

Why.. are kobolds as PCs so.. weak?

their stats don't even equal up to the weakest of the core races.
Not every type of creature is as powerful as a human, elf, or dwarf.

I understand that - what I mean is that their stat bonuses are unequal.

They get a HUGE neg in strength, and a neg in con, and they only get a +2 to dex. Their racial traits are kinda.. crap.

Dwarves, by comparison get a whole laundry list of racial abilities AND on top of it they have bonuses equal to +4 and negs only equal to -2.

Kobold stats don't equal to the weakest of the core races because kobolds are weaker than the core races. You might as well ask why, say, troll or dragon PCs are so much stronger than the core races.
Joana wrote:
Kobold stats don't equal to the weakest of the core races because kobolds are weaker than the core races. You might as well ask why, say, troll or dragon PCs are so much stronger than the core races.

That's a flawed way of thinking.

"Different but equal" is how races for any setting should be written, otherwise there's absolutely no reason for you to have certain races unless you have someone who loves that race so much that they'll play it either way, or someone who wants the challenge of playing a severely gimped character.

Troll and Dragon PCs are much stronger than the core but they have a Level Adjustment to make up for the fact that they'll be stronger than the rest of the party for a while (AKA they won't level up until the rest of the party catches up to them)

kobolds are just.. crap. They get REALLY crappy ability scores, and almost no racial abilities. Kobolds are supposed to be gifted sorcerers, but they don't get any bonuses related to that - they're shifty little bastards but their dex bonus is only 2, etc.
Silver Crusade
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Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
Demonskunk wrote:
Joana wrote:
Kobold stats don't equal to the weakest of the core races because kobolds are weaker than the core races. You might as well ask why, say, troll or dragon PCs are so much stronger than the core races.

That's a flawed way of thinking.

"Different but equal" is how races for any setting should be written, otherwise there's absolutely no reason for you to have certain races unless you have someone who loves that race so much that they'll play it either way, or someone who wants the challenge of playing a severely gimped character.

Troll and Dragon PCs are much stronger than the core but they have a Level Adjustment to make up for the fact that they'll be stronger than the rest of the party for a while (AKA they won't level up until the rest of the party catches up to them)

kobolds are just.. crap. They get REALLY crappy ability scores, and almost no racial abilities. Kobolds are supposed to be gifted sorcerers, but they don't get any bonuses related to that - they're shifty little bastards but their dex bonus is only 2, etc.

"Different but equal" is how PC races in PHB should be written.

Kobolds are not balanced to be a PC race, and the rules in the Bestiary are there to make easily kobold NPCs with class levels. If somebody wants to play any of the Bestiary races as PCs, fine, but don't expect them to be balanced against the Core Seven.
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Kobolds are a non-standard PC race, why would they be written according to the same standards that a regular PC race would? Not everybody gets to be the special snowflake that's good at everything, and kobolds get to choose pretty much one thing that they're good at. A lot of times it's stabbing people in the back (or making traps so they never have to see their enemy), or being able to cast arcane spells (and not much else).
Sometimes it's fun to play a character that regularly fails their Will saves, or is small and sickly because they're the runt of the litter. I think kobolds fill that niche quite well (and I am fond of the scaly little guys, so I might be biased).
Demonskunk wrote:
Troll and Dragon PCs are much stronger than the core but they have a Level Adjustment to make up for the fact that they'll be stronger than the rest of the party for a while (AKA they won't level up until the rest of the party catches up to them)

I'm pretty sure PfRPG did away with Level Adjustment, although I'm sure there are still plenty of campaigns using the LA rules from 3e.

Lilith wrote:

Kobolds are a non-standard PC race, why would they be written according to the same standards that a regular PC race would? Not everybody gets to be the special snowflake that's good at everything, and kobolds get to choose pretty much one thing that they're good at. A lot of times it's stabbing people in the back (or making traps so they never have to see their enemy), or being able to cast arcane spells (and not much else).

Sometimes it's fun to play a character that regularly fails their Will saves, or is small and sickly because they're the runt of the litter. I think kobolds fill that niche quite well (and I am fond of the scaly little guys, so I might be biased).

well that's just it - they're NOT good at one thing. they're pretty much not good at.. anything specifically.

They're OK at roguish things, but they're horrid at almost everything else.

I love kobolds too (monster races in general, actually) and that's why I'm upset that kobolds are so.. poorly written.

yes, they are sorta geared towards being rogues, but at the same time they're not going to be good at it because they'll have HORRID hp and on top if it they'll do nearly no damage.

EDIT: GOBLINS have better stats than them.
/GOBLINS/
Demonskunk wrote:

well that's just it - they're NOT good at one thing. they're pretty much not good at.. anything specifically.

They're OK at roguish things, but they're horrid at almost everything else.

I love kobolds too (monster races in general, actually) and that's why I'm upset that kobolds are so.. poorly written.

yes, they are sorta geared towards being rogues, but at the same time they're not going to be good at it because they'll have HORRID hp and on top if it they'll do nearly no damage.

EDIT: GOBLINS have better stats than them.
/GOBLINS/

I guess that depends on our definition of "good" then, as I believe kobold rogues can be very effective. A single kobold rogue won't be able to stand up to a group of PCs, but a single foe rarely does, and a group of kobold rogues, using crossbows (where their Strength penalty doesn't come into play) and with the advantage of sneak attack, will definitely hurt a party before going down. Both kobolds (and goblins) get their strength from numbers, that's really the thing they're great at, and when played with tactics and teamwork (no matter which side of the GM screen you're sitting on) makes up for their lacking stats.

Sean K Reynolds wrote:
Demonskunk wrote:

well that's just it - they're NOT good at one thing. they're pretty much not good at.. anything specifically.

They're OK at roguish things, but they're horrid at almost everything else.
Which perhaps explains why humans, elves, and dwarves are the dominant races of the world, and kobolds and goblins aren't.

I'm really not appreciating the dismissiveness of these responses.

The Bestiary simply isn't The Big Book of Alternate PC Races. Pathfinder is not set up for PC kobolds, goblins, trolls, what-have-you. That is not to say that people can't choose to play them, but they are simply not created to be equal to the core races. That's not the assumption under which the rules were designed.
Contributor
Demonskunk wrote:
I'm really not appreciating the dismissiveness of these responses.

I'm not dismissing you. I just don't understand why you think that every intelligent 0-racial HD humanoid has to be as good as humans.

10 is the average ability score value (and the default value, with a +0 modifier) because we're humans and we use us as the baseline for other creatures. If we were kobolds, I'm sure kobolds in the game would be 10s all down the line, and they'd consider humans, dwarves, and elves to be races with bonuses to most or all ability scores and no penalties to ability scores. To people with stats like kobolds, creatures with stats like humans would be superhuman.
Sean K Reynolds wrote:
Demonskunk wrote:
I'm really not appreciating the dismissiveness of these responses.

I'm not dismissing you. I just don't understand why you think that every intelligent 0-racial HD humanoid has to be as good as humans.

10 is the average ability score value (and the default value, with a +0 modifier) because we're humans and we use us as the baseline for other creatures. If we were kobolds, I'm sure kobolds in the game would be 10s all down the line, and they'd consider humans, dwarves, and elves to be races with bonuses to most or all ability scores and no penalties to ability scores. To people with stats like kobolds, creatures with stats like humans would be superhuman.

the answer you keep giving me is "because they're weaker" which feels dismissive to me.

I'm asking why there isn't some kind of balance.

Yes, they're monsters, and yes of course they're inferior to larger races physically, but the thing I'm upset about is that their net stat gain is -4, which is the lowest net stat gain of any race in the game.

Kobolds are Cr 1/4 creatures - I get that, but if you're creating a kobold character, NPC or otherwise, why should you be starting at 1/4? because of these stats I'd need to create a kobold NPC at 1 or 2 levels higher than a party for them to be equal in ability.

The super low stats could be overlooked if they had any sort of racial bonuses to other things that balance it out, but all they have in the manner of racial bonuses are a +2 bonus to trap making, perception and profession: Miner, and Stealth and trapmaking as class skills no matter their class.

Then on top of that they have a light sensitivity.

These guys are bottom of the barrel - laughable even.

Yes they're at the bottom of the barrel, they're laughable. That's what they were designed to be - because someone has to. If you want to play a race that's not at the bottom of the barrel, play something else.
Shadow Lodge
Demonskunk wrote:
the answer you keep giving me is "because they're weaker" which feels dismissive to me.

Why are dogs in the Bestiary less powerful than lions?

Why are trolls more powerful than humans?

Your question is of the same nature. Not every creature is the same. Kobolds are designed to be fairly easy low level challenges for PCs so they are weaker than the typical PC.
0gre wrote:
Demonskunk wrote:
the answer you keep giving me is "because they're weaker" which feels dismissive to me.

Why are dogs in the Bestiary less powerful than lions?

Why are trolls more powerful than humans?

Your question is of the same nature. Not every creature is the same. Kobolds are designed to be fairly easy low level challenges for PCs so they are weaker than the typical PC.

Yes. their monster stats are low for that reason, but their PC/NPC stats should be equal to other NPC/PC race stats, so that when making a PC/NPC of that particular race you don't have to compensate to get them up to a certain level.

So you want two sets of stats, like drow and drow noble?
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Demonskunk wrote:
0gre wrote:
Demonskunk wrote:
the answer you keep giving me is "because they're weaker" which feels dismissive to me.

Why are dogs in the Bestiary less powerful than lions?

Why are trolls more powerful than humans?

Your question is of the same nature. Not every creature is the same. Kobolds are designed to be fairly easy low level challenges for PCs so they are weaker than the typical PC.

Yes. their monster stats are low for that reason, but their PC/NPC stats should be equal to other NPC/PC race stats, so that when making a PC/NPC of that particular race you don't have to compensate to get them up to a certain level.

But then you're not playing a kobold, you're playing a ...gnome with scales.

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