Yeah, water comes from a toilet, and I've never seen plants growing out of a toilet!
You like lattes?
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So ... how soon before we see a list of the monsters this bad boy will contain? I'm guessing not for several more months most likely.
Assuming that is the case, do we (the fans) know any of the monsters that will (or will not be) in it? Maybe we can try to compile a partial list ...
Also, James mentioned there will be new templates. Do we know which ones yet?
Thanks!!!
How about the Post Monster?
That's one of the sneakiest beasties out there.
Creative Director
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So ... how soon before we see a list of the monsters this bad boy will contain? I'm guessing not for several more months most likely.
Assuming that is the case, do we (the fans) know any of the monsters that will (or will not be) in it? Maybe we can try to compile a partial list ...
Also, James mentioned there will be new templates. Do we know which ones yet?
Thanks!!!
I suspect we're still several months away from showing off the list of the monsters that'll be in the book. We DO have a list in-house, but that could still change at the last minute, and I'd rather not confuse things by letting that list out into the wild before it's absolutely ready.
Templates are my favorite thing ....
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I suspect we're still several months away from showing off the list of the monsters that'll be in the book. We DO have a list in-house, but that could still change at the last minute, and I'd rather not confuse things by letting that list out into the wild before it's absolutely ready.
Oh please, please let there be Mi Go.
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Creative Director
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Oh please, please let there be Mi Go.I suspect we're still several months away from showing off the list of the monsters that'll be in the book. We DO have a list in-house, but that could still change at the last minute, and I'd rather not confuse things by letting that list out into the wild before it's absolutely ready.
There will be some more Lovecraft monsters. Not mi-go, though.
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There will be some more Lovecraft monsters. Not mi-go, though.Oh please, please let there be Mi Go.I suspect we're still several months away from showing off the list of the monsters that'll be in the book. We DO have a list in-house, but that could still change at the last minute, and I'd rather not confuse things by letting that list out into the wild before it's absolutely ready.
Yay!!!!
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I suspect we're still several months away from showing off the list of the monsters that'll be in the book. We DO have a list in-house, but that could still change at the last minute, and I'd rather not confuse things by letting that list out into the wild before it's absolutely ready.So ... how soon before we see a list of the monsters this bad boy will contain? I'm guessing not for several more months most likely.
Assuming that is the case, do we (the fans) know any of the monsters that will (or will not be) in it? Maybe we can try to compile a partial list ...
Also, James mentioned there will be new templates. Do we know which ones yet?
Thanks!!!
Fair enough!
Any hints regarding the templates? Pretty please? I'll give you a brand new shiny nickle ...
do we (the fans) know any of the monsters that will (or will not be) in it? Maybe we can try to compile a partial list ...
Classic Horrors Revisited lists the dhampir as a related creature in the vampire entry. It says the dhampir will appear in Pathfinder RPG Bestiary II.
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Gugs and hounds of tindalos and denizens of leng are all going into the Bestiary. Plus one more that hasn't yet appeared in a Pathfinder AP.
Hounds of Tindalos!!! <faints...awakes> You've just made my day. Then gugs and denizens of Leng! Very happy indeed ;) I was incredibly happy about Shoggoths in the first bestiary too. Were Night Gaunts in Bestiary 1, I can't remember?.. Good day!
Gugs and hounds of tindalos and denizens of leng are all going into the Bestiary. Plus one more that hasn't yet appeared in a Pathfinder AP.
Night gaunts!
Tickle (Su) !
Make it happen James! :D
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Creative Director
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Gugs and hounds of tindalos and denizens of leng are all going into the Bestiary. Plus one more that hasn't yet appeared in a Pathfinder AP.Hounds of Tindalos!!! <faints...awakes> You've just made my day. Then gugs and denizens of Leng! Very happy indeed ;) I was incredibly happy about Shoggoths in the first bestiary too. Were Night Gaunts in Bestiary 1, I can't remember?.. Good day!
No night gaunts yet. They and mi-go are on the short list of monsters to do though!
Weird, I got ninja'd on Night Gaunts, of all things...
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It wouldn't be so bad if he'd keep his mouth shut, but while I got him to stop naming the creatures as soon as he hears the description (even when I change it up a bit, he knows), he still has his "ah", "oh no", "damn", "I knew it", and so on comments, which can be pretty...You need to enforce the need for minimal metagaming. Every time he says something, make a note. Give the character less treasure, xp or other gooodies. Tell the players that every time thy pipe up or are metagaming in a way that is detrimental you are going to penalize their character.
I penalize characters who metagame during the session by lowering their chances of receiving hero fate points (house rule) which are based and awarded solely on good roleplaying. You would be amazed at how effective this rule is.
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No night gaunts yet. They and mi-go are on the short list of monsters to do though!Gugs and hounds of tindalos and denizens of leng are all going into the Bestiary. Plus one more that hasn't yet appeared in a Pathfinder AP.Hounds of Tindalos!!! <faints...awakes> You've just made my day. Then gugs and denizens of Leng! Very happy indeed ;) I was incredibly happy about Shoggoths in the first bestiary too. Were Night Gaunts in Bestiary 1, I can't remember?.. Good day!
Even more Yays!! Just remember that Night Gaunts pay homage to Nodens and not Nyarlathotep, at least according to my good yet lost friend Randolph Carter. ;)
New monsters is always a plus
No night gaunts yet. They and mi-go are on the short list of monsters to do though!Gugs and hounds of tindalos and denizens of leng are all going into the Bestiary. Plus one more that hasn't yet appeared in a Pathfinder AP.Hounds of Tindalos!!! <faints...awakes> You've just made my day. Then gugs and denizens of Leng! Very happy indeed ;) I was incredibly happy about Shoggoths in the first bestiary too. Were Night Gaunts in Bestiary 1, I can't remember?.. Good day!
Gugs and Denizens of Leng with the possible of inclusion of the Mi-Go and Night Gaunts? OK, as a Lovecraft fan getting this just became a priority. I was doing my own private conversion of these and other monsters I liked from previous adventure paths. Now you tell me I'll be able to buy a book that has them already done for me? Why, that's FANTASTIC!!!
Wonderful :) I hope monsters in this one are more detailed than the last!
This will give PFRPG what it's missing and will hopefully reduce the need to look at SRD for monsters!
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Creative Director
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Wonderful :) I hope monsters in this one are more detailed than the last!
This will give PFRPG what it's missing and will hopefully reduce the need to look at SRD for monsters!
The format for Bestiary II is going to be the same as the first Bestiary. There'll be over 300 monsters in all, most of them with a single page. We learned a lot about building a monster book this way with the Bestiary, so hopefully we'll be able to squeeze in a bit more information about monsters this time around.
But let me be clear: presenting a lot of flavor for monsters is actually the 3rd priority for a monster bestiary. First priority is to give all the rules you need to run the monster in a game—that's the whole point of the book. Second priority is to fill the book with art—monsters without art are forgotten and never used, and good art makes a book MUCH more successful. What space is left over after the rules and the artwork are in is pretty much all we have to work with for flavor and details, and that's not going to change because that's the way a Bestiary HAS to work.
Fortunately, we have plenty of other of places available for us to get superdetailed with new monsters. The Revisited line (and other books in the Chronicles line) are a perfect place for us to go into great detail about monsters, and we have no plans of canceling that line anytime soon. And secondly, a LOT of new monsters in Bestiary II are coming from Pathfinder Adventure Paths, where they all had 2 pages of information. Their incarnation into the hardcover Bestiary will reduce those two pages to one page... but their two page versions still exist in those Bestiaries. Anyone who loves new monsters really should strongly consider subscribing to the AP line, since every one of those volumes has 10 to 14 pages of new monsters in them.
There will be some more Lovecraft monsters. Not mi-go, though.Colours out of space?
Martenses?
Zoogs?
Animated trapezohedrons?
I'm a big Lovecraft fan. Anything of his that you bring out for Pathfinder will be much appreciated.
Wonderful :) I hope monsters in this one are more detailed than the last!
This will give PFRPG what it's missing and will hopefully reduce the need to look at SRD for monsters!
The format for Bestiary II is going to be the same as the first Bestiary. There'll be over 300 monsters in all, most of them with a single page. We learned a lot about building a monster book this way with the Bestiary, so hopefully we'll be able to squeeze in a bit more information about monsters this time around.
But let me be clear: presenting a lot of flavor for monsters is actually the 3rd priority for a monster bestiary. First priority is to give all the rules you need to run the monster in a game—that's the whole point of the book. Second priority is to fill the book with art—monsters without art are forgotten and never used, and good art makes a book MUCH more successful. What space is left over after the rules and the artwork are in is pretty much all we have to work with for flavor and details, and that's not going to change because that's the way a Bestiary HAS to work.
Fortunately, we have plenty of other of places available for us to get superdetailed with new monsters. The Revisited line (and other books in the Chronicles line) are a perfect place for us to go into great detail about monsters, and we have no plans of canceling that line anytime soon. And secondly, a LOT of new monsters in Bestiary II are coming from Pathfinder Adventure Paths, where they all had 2 pages of information. Their incarnation into the hardcover Bestiary will reduce those two pages to one page... but their two page versions still exist in those Bestiaries. Anyone who loves new monsters really should strongly consider subscribing to the AP line, since every one of those volumes has 10 to 14 pages of new monsters in them.
Just out of curiosity, have you considered just putting less monsters in and/or smaller images? The Bestiary is one of my favorite books you have made so far, and if I have one caveat to it (albeit a very minor one) it would be that some of the monsters could have used more flavor text than a couple sentences worth… especially some of the new ones like the Linnorms.
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Creative Director
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Just out of curiosity, have you considered just putting less monsters in and/or smaller images? The Bestiary is one of my favorite books you have made so far, and if I have one caveat to it (albeit a very minor one) it would be that some of the monsters could have used more flavor text than a couple sentences worth… especially some of the new ones like the Linnorms.
I agree that the linnorms should have had an introduction page like how the demons and devils got an intro page. But we realized that way too late in the game to fix it, alas.
As for fewer monsters or smaller images... neither of those options is attractive.
Fewer monsters = fewer options. These Bestiaries are meant to be as exhaustive a resource as possible, and fewer monsters means that it's less exhaustive.
Smaller art = wasteful. A monster illustration costs FIVE TIMES as much as a page of text on monsters. Therefore, we want to get as much bang for our buck from the most expensive part of the page—the art. Running it small reduces that bang, and makes the book look more cluttered and not as pretty. Part of our brand identity for our monster book is nice big pictures of monsters for every entry we can.
Now all of that said... putting in even more information on monsters would, in most cases, be strangely counterintuitive. Keep in mind that all of our hardcover Bestiaries are designed to be world-neutral. You can use monsters in the Bestiary in a Golarion game, a Greyhawk game, a Dragonstar game, a d20 Call of Cthulhu game, a home-brew game... ANY game that uses the Pathfinder or d20 rules. In order to keep those monsters world-neutral, we can't actually write all that much about how the monsters interact with the world and can't make many assumptions about how a monster might function in any particular setting. At one page per monster, we can get enough info about the monster that they feel nice and flavorful, but we don't start edging into weird territory where we REALLY could use a setting to hang monster text on.
Fortunately, if you're looking for more flavorful monster descriptions, we DO provide a lot of other options. With our revisited line of books, we generally end up doing 20 to 30 6 page monster chapters a year. We also generally do 3 to 6 more over the course of a year in the Pathfinder Adventure Paths. There, since those products are set in a world, we can afford to get really detailed about a monster without worrying as much about keeping things simple and easy to adapt to any old campaign world.
Fortunately, if you're looking for more flavorful monster descriptions, we DO provide a lot of other options. With our revisited line of books, we generally end up doing 20 to 30 6 page monster chapters a year. We also generally do 3 to 6 more over the course of a year in the Pathfinder Adventure Paths. There, since those products are set in a world, we can afford to get really detailed about a monster without worrying as much about keeping things simple and easy to adapt to any old campaign world.
Thanks for the answer. Again, I'm more curious as to the reasoning behind the decision-making than anything. It really is a master piece and IMO is far better than any other monster manual except perhaps the 1st edition AD&D Monster Manual.
To be honest, I've only recently started to truly look into your complete line of products beyond the core books… mostly due to the alluring flavor and set up of the Kingmaker AP (another masterpiece in the making). I have however picked up and perused the first (I think) monsters revisited book (the one with hobgoblins and ogres and such) at my FLGS and ironically, I just can't take the next step to buy it because I don't find the art particularly appealing.
A monster illustration costs FIVE TIMES as much as a page of text on monsters.Why did I have to become a word nerd text miner instead of an artist?
Because of a lack of artistic talent? I can almosy draw a stick figure..and its the art that kills up in production
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I agree that the linnorms should have had an introduction page like how the demons and devils got an intro page. But we realized that way too late in the game to fix it, alas.
Couldn't find linnorms in the D20 System Reference Document. Do the rights to these belong to Necromancer games? Just wondered because you use them but not the one's in 3.5?
BTW: Don't lose the art. Worth every penny!! The bestiary rocks, and the contributing artists are very good!
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Linnorms don't belong to anyone creatively except for the Norse. Since they are firmly entrenched in folklore, the creatures are open to interpretation from anyone.
Being a folklore nut and monster fan, I love what's been done with linnorms so far.
Thanks Adam. Were they like dragons in folklore, or something else?
Oh I so wish there was a table of contents we could see...
Oh I so wish there was a table of contents we could see...ditto
thirded
We'll eventually release the monster list... but not until we're a LOT closer to the book's release later this year. Still probably at least 5 months or so away from that blog post.
Hmmm thats not good this is May and October when its due out is 5 months away LOL
When we do get it im sure it will be great
If you are still taking suggestions for dinos I humbly request this one be considered: http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/prehistoric/pachycephalosauru s-wyomingensis.html
In some of my fantasy stories I use these guys as a replacement for horses.
If you are still taking suggestions for dinos I humbly request this one be considered: http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/prehistoric/pachycephalosauru s-wyomingensis.html
In some of my fantasy stories I use these guys as a replacement for horses.
It's totally a Medium creature, but Large-sized pachycephalosaurid would be a cool mount! Or this could be a mount for an insane dinosaur riding kobold cavalier!
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If you are still taking suggestions for dinos I humbly request this one be considered: http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/prehistoric/pachycephalosauru s-wyomingensis.html
In some of my fantasy stories I use these guys as a replacement for horses.
I'd wager that James Jacobs butted heads with the others over getting this one in.
Now this would be a cool mount, and a creature that wouldn't be very well known: Pareiasaur