So the art is good then.Yes. :D
Awesome - ordered my copy the other night - good art is an important feature for me so glad it is top notch in this book :)
Has anyone made it to the "White Haired Witch" yet ?
Lookin for spoilers ;)
Has anyone made it to the "White Haired Witch" yet ?
Lookin for spoilers ;)
To paraphrase a small mushroom like humanoid: "Sorry your witch is in another book."
Apparently the White Haired Witch will appear in the Dragon Empires Primer that comes out in January.
Damn....I'm confusing the two books :(
Where is the Wing Kong Exchange located?
Where is the Wing Kong Exchange located?
In Goka, of course.
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Could I make a plea for the deity and national symbols in this splendid book to be placed in a Community Use Package so we can use them, for instance, on the Pathfinder Wiki?
Many thanks
J
So what are the new races' racial abilities?
The primer has most of the "crunch", but both have the stats for the new races.
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Honestly I haven't read it yet. Haven't had time yet. I just gave it a quick once over. All I can do right now is give you a rough page count for each section. regions get about 34 pages with each nation getting a single full page about them. But just giving it a quick look there seems to be a lot of variety to them. Then about 10 pages about life in the Dragon Empires. After that there is 20 gods, 6 of them are known gods worshiped there and 14 are all new gods.
There are nations undergoing upheavals and other sorts of chaos, but there are also other nations that are more stable, but with other adventure hooks.
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I love this book. thank you. Please do more products on the Dragon Empires. Especially more on Nagaji and Samsaran new races. I know the primer is coming. Is there anymore in the pipeline?
I believe and going from memory and parapharasing here. But I believe when asked about a World Guide hard back for the area, James said it would depend on how well DE and the primer did in sales. Or something to that effect. So basically if you want more then make sure everyone you know buys those books. :)
Just like the death of Aroden shook things up in the Inner Sea region, so did the fall of the empire of Lung Wa shake things up in Tian Xia.Fall of an empire doesn't need to make all its components into terrible places to live.
One of reasons I'm looking for "good" places is because it seems that the default Golarion tone for a nation is "this is a terrible place to live". Doesn't make sense to me: I would think at least a few nations would sound like okay places to live just from the fact that Real Life history wasn't always about constant, looming threats.
You can have "a nation in chaos or ruled by evil overlords", it's just for some reason every nation is like this. Doesn't feel real like that.
I think you're somewhat misinformed overall - both the Inner Sea and the Dragon Empires have plenty of places that are desirable to live in. Regardless of your personal preferences, there are nations that can cater for whichever emphasis you place on "good life" (merchant paradise, freedom lovers, meritocracies, and so forth). This does not mean these places are "uninteresting", all places have plenty of substance that can make for delicious plot hooks - but these plot hooks need not be born out of a gloomy, evil, or otherwise severe nation.
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I think you're somewhat misinformed overall - both the Inner Sea and the Dragon Empires have plenty of places that are desirable to live in.Where? The Pathfinder Wiki made every nation sound at least gloomy if not downright horrifying. None of them were devoid of problems that would plague the citizenry, whether internal or external.
I just checked the wiki and it said...
You'd have more to go on if you bought the books.
Honestly, though, I would happily spend time living in these places in the Inner Sea region:
Absalom
Andoran
Cheliax
Druma
Hermea
Kyonin
Land of the Linnorm Kings
Molthune
Nirmathas
Numeria
Qadira
Realm of the Mammoth Lords
Taldor
Varisia
Alkenstar
Jalmeray
Katapesh
Mwangi
Osirion
Rahadoum
Thuvia
Obviously, none of them are perfect but I just checked with reality and it turns out that the place where I currently live isn't perfect either: I get by.
Let's take Andoran as an example, you don't want to live in a small selection of isolated communities dominated by a logging consortium but elsewhere seems rather pleasant.
Or how about Nirmathas, yes there is border strife but it is in many ways a haven of peace and personal freedom.
etc. etc.
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SilvercatMoonpaw,
If you have a problem with living in a tyranny then I've got to wonder where you live.
I'm British, my country has been ruled by a privileged elite for hundreds of years but I get by.
Lots of countries have had semi-permanent border wars in the past, even now South Korea is not an unremmiting hellhole just because they are at-war with North Korea.
People happily live in difficult weather/food conditions all of the time.
And stressing about Varisia? The Shoanti are about as 'preparing for war' with Cheliax as the Americans are 'preparing for war' with the French.
Maybe we need to find out what your criteria for "nice place to live" is. Right now I'm getting the impression that modern-Scandinavia-or-bust is your criteria.
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Could I make a plea for the deity and national symbols in this splendid book to be placed in a Community Use Package so we can use them, for instance, on the Pathfinder Wiki?
Many thanks
J
Officially on my to-do list! I anticipate that I should get to this sooner than later.
Hell, even Geb has butter - if you want to compare modern-Scandinavia with anything :p
Also the book isn't in any stores here yet, so it's not nice in that regard either.
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@GeraintElberion: Perhaps it is an issue of presentation:
"Tyranny" is not a word I would use to describe someplace in the first sentence unless I meant to emphasize its people were suffering under oppression. I do not hear the word "tyranny" mentioned in the first sentence in describing Britain.
Mentioning "war" is an odd thing to me if the participants aren't actively engaged in open hostilities. Other than "incidents" that involve more posturing than anything else I do not hear South and North Korea doing anything close to actual warring.
I never said I had a problem with natural disasters.
If the Shoanti are preparing for a war that is highly unlikely why is it being mentioned? If it is at the same level as America vs. France and yet no one mentions that about those two countries it is highly paranoid to mention it about the Shoanti and whoever they plan to fight.
It all boils down to the fact that if these sorts of situations are mentioned as they were in the Wiki then I tend to assume someone meant them to be non-ignorable. Tyranny, war, anarchy, a savage land, destructive demons nearby: these sound like calls for someone to come solve the problem. If they are simply meant to be descriptors then less-charged words would be more appropriate.
Ultimately I'm looking for a place that sounds dull: nothing happens there that requires any form of problem-solvers. A place like this is needed for my kind of mind so I can actually conceive that said problem-solvers have a place they can go where they can stop and rest.
I would say that most of this stuff is mentioned to give GMs ideas for campaigns. For example, Molthune has invaded Nirmanthas in the past, it is a border that could have a war erupt at any point. So if a GM wants to create a war campaign they could. However, there is not a war going on now. And Tamran is far enough from the border that it would not be something that is mentioned all the time. The fact that Molthune has launched several incursions into Nirmanthas in the last hundred years, doesn't mean that they are constant. No more then England and France being at war in the Middle Ages.
I would say that most of this stuff is mentioned to give GMs ideas for campaigns.Which is something I have no need for: I can come up with adventures till it terrifies me. Hence why I hope for a dull place: it's the one thing I can't make sense of myself.
But that will never be written up in a gaming book. If you have 4 pages to detail an entire country you aren't going to write that nothing has ever happened in village X. You are going to write the details on where things might happen. I have never seen a campaign setting book detail dull places.
New languages: Hon-La, Hwan, Minatan, Minkaian, Senzar (language of the Kami), Nagaji, Samsaran
Eep, first we get some Fey speaking Aklo with its Lovecraftian associations, and now the Kami speak this? I'm beginning to wonder if Golarion is part of the Dreamlands.
Each nation gets a page of information. There's a multi-page timeline. There's a section on the zodiac and one on society. There's information on each Tian ethnicity. There's sections on foreigners and nonhuman-races in Tian-Xia. There's a page for each of the 5 new races.
Is there anything in particular that you all are interested in hearing about?
Three questions:
1) What information do they have on the place of kitsune in Tian society and culture? Are they regarded s monster or spirits, or more like the nonhumans of Avistan (i.e., as odd-looking and acting people, rather than divine servitors)?
2) Can nonhumans from Avistan like dwarves, gnomes, and such be found as natives in Tian Xia?
3) How much information do we get on their "Southeast Asia", the River Kingdoms of the nagas and the like?
And thanks for the questions you've already answered here.
Three questions:
1) What information do they have on the place of kitsune in Tian society and culture? Are they regarded s monster or spirits, or more like the nonhumans of Avistan (i.e., as odd-looking and acting people, rather than divine servitors)?
2) Can nonhumans from Avistan like dwarves, gnomes, and such be found as natives in Tian Xia?
3) How much information do we get on their "Southeast Asia", the River Kingdoms of the nagas and the like?
And thanks for the questions you've already answered here.
1)Kitsune seem to be viewed as pretty much just another non human race ala elves/dwarves what have you ...though there seems to be a disproportionally high rate of them (and samsarans) being taken as slaves by the more evil aligned nations. It seems that they have an almost gypsy/tinker/artist colony image on the whole with the positive and negative stereotypes associated.
2)I only recall one nation listing a quantity of avistan based races and that was Goka which seems to serve as "The Gateway to Tian Xie" for the majority of the world. There is the elven nation as well though that is pretty much only elves by the sound of it.
3)Same as the rest about a page. Heavy jungle and sawmpland, mysteriously inscrutable purposes from the naga leaders and a population of fairly servile nagaji. Apparently has a caste system of some form or other.
any help to you?
Creative Director
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I think you're somewhat misinformed overall - both the Inner Sea and the Dragon Empires have plenty of places that are desirable to live in.Where? The Pathfinder Wiki made every nation sound at least gloomy if not downright horrifying. None of them were devoid of problems that would plague the citizenry, whether internal or external.
It might be a better bet to check out the Inner Sea World Guide. The Pathfinder Wiki doesn't present the whole situation for a region, and often needs to condense information or resort to hyperbole in order to cover something.
While we made a very conscious choice to ensure that EVERY REGION in the Inner Sea region (as well as over on the Dragon Empires) has plenty of choices for different types of adventure and excitement, and as a result Golarion DOES have a grittier, darker feel to it overall. This is by design, so that it's a world where there's a lot of opportunity for the PCs to make a difference.
That said, there ARE a lot of regions that are safe and not gloomy to live in. It's worth keeping in mind as well that when we present information on a game world, we naturally skew toward the adventure stuff, so even a peaceful nation like Andoran or Varisia or Druma or Kyonin or Taldor or Osirion or so on might seem overly dangerous if you just judge what's written on a region by the amount of words spent talking about adventure opportunities verses safe, "boring" stuff like calm farmlands or idyllic pastures.
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Creative Director
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Ultimately I'm looking for a place that sounds dull: nothing happens there that requires any form of problem-solvers. A place like this is needed for my kind of mind so I can actually conceive that said problem-solvers have a place they can go where they can stop and rest.
In that specific case, though... if we do our jobs right, you won't find a place that's "dull" in Golarion. Because we generally avoid trying to spend time talking about "dull" places because they're, well... Dull.
That absolutely does NOT mean there's no "safe" places for people to go to stop and rest. There are locations like that in pretty much EVERY REGION in the Inner Sea. Of course... it takes a GM willing to let the PCs stop and rest in a dull place for such regions to actually translate in game to the players' minds... but such regions can absolutely exist pretty much anywhere in Golarion... EVEN in super-dangerous areas like the Worldwound. (Your players just might have to look harder to find them in places like that is all...)
It might be a better bet to check out the Inner Sea World Guide.Which costs money for something I might not like.
....and as a result Golarion DOES have a grittier, darker feel to it overall. This is by design, so that it's a world where there's a lot of opportunity for the PCs to make a difference.This is exactly the kind of thing I do not want.
....might seem overly dangerous if you just judge what's written on a region by the amount of words spent talking about adventure opportunities verses safe, "boring" stuff like calm farmlands or idyllic pastures.Which is the problem: the stuff you write about is the stuff I don't need.
Well then you have saved yourself from ever having to buy a campaign setting as I have never seen a campaign setting put out by anyone like this. You will just have to make your own.
Well then you have saved yourself from ever having to buy a campaign setting as I have never seen a campaign setting put out by anyone like this. You will just have to make your own.Which I am highly aware of. Still it shouldn't have hurt when I asked if a certain type of place existed in this product. A simple answer along the lines of "No" would have sufficed (this is not specifically directed at you, Justin Franklin).
I hope most people were, and I definitely was, thinking you were going more towards why don't these places exist in the world, where what you were really asking was are these places detailed in the book. Hopefully no offense was taken on anyone's part.
Three questions:
1) What information do they have on the place of kitsune in Tian society and culture? Are they regarded s monster or spirits, or more like the nonhumans of Avistan (i.e., as odd-looking and acting people, rather than divine servitors)?
Kitsune get along well with elves and samsarans, but are well-known to be tricksters amongst the other races and in mixed societies they often just pose as humans in order to avoid dealing with their reputation among the other races.
2) Can nonhumans from Avistan like dwarves, gnomes, and such be found as natives in Tian Xia?
You can find all of the core races and the new ones from Dragon Empires in Goka as well as humans of any ethnicity. Dwarves, gnomes, halflings, and orcs do not have any homelands in the Dragon Empires and there do not appear to be any areas populated by these races in the book beyond Goka. Nonhuman races are less widely known about in the Dragon Empires the further you get from Goka. Tianjing is a homeland for the Aasimar, the Tengu have Kwanlai, the Kitsune and Kami have The Spirit Forest, the Samsarans have Zi Ha, the Hobgoblins have Kaoling, the Wayang are most populous in the northern isles of Minata, the Elves have Jinin, the Oni rule Chu Ye, a Kraken rules Wanshou, the locathah and other aquatic races have Xidao, and the Naga and Nagaji have Nagajor. Beyond that, not too much is revealed about nonhuman societies in the Dragon Empires is written so far.
3) How much information do we get on their "Southeast Asia", the River Kingdoms of the nagas and the like?
And thanks for the questions you've already answered here.
Nagajor, Dtang Ma, and Xa Hoi are the main nations with a SE Asia flavor and like all the others they get one page devoted to each nation. Also, Minata could count as having that flavor as well, but I see them as a mix between that and the Philippines when I look for an analogue in the real world. Nagajor is the kingdom of nagas as you can tell by the name. Xa Hoi is a nation ruled by dragons and is one of my personal favorites. Dtang Ma is ruled by a group of five sorcerers of different bloodlines that rotate rulership between them every ten years (another of my favorite nations). Minata is a wide mix of different island cultures with cannibals, demon worshippers, headhunters, and a floating city of pirates thrown into the mix. The northern islands are actually the remains of a Krakatoa-like volcano.
Three questions:
1) What information do they have on the place of kitsune in Tian society and culture? Are they regarded s monster or spirits, or more like the nonhumans of Avistan (i.e., as odd-looking and acting people, rather than divine servitors)?
2) Can nonhumans from Avistan like dwarves, gnomes, and such be found as natives in Tian Xia?
3) How much information do we get on their "Southeast Asia", the River Kingdoms of the nagas and the like?
And thanks for the questions you've already answered here.
1)Kitsune seem to be viewed as pretty much just another non human race ala elves/dwarves what have you ...though there seems to be a disproportionally high rate of them (and samsarans) being taken as slaves by the more evil aligned nations. It seems that they have an almost gypsy/tinker/artist colony image on the whole with the positive and negative stereotypes associated.
2)I only recall one nation listing a quantity of avistan based races and that was Goka which seems to serve as "The Gateway to Tian Xie" for the majority of the world. There is the elven nation as well though that is pretty much only elves by the sound of it.
3)Same as the rest about a page. Heavy jungle and sawmpland, mysteriously inscrutable purposes from the naga leaders and a population of fairly servile nagaji. Apparently has a caste system of some form or other.
any help to you?
Yes, it's all very helpful, thank you.
1) Kitsune taken as slaves? Given what I've read of them in real-world mythology, this sounds like a good way for said slavers to end up dead or insane.
3) The caste system sounds about right, given that (at least in our world) the nations of that region were influenced as heavily by India as by China.
So far, it all sounds very good!
Kitsune get along well with elves and samsarans, but are well-known to be tricksters amongst the other races and in mixed societies they often just pose as humans in order to avoid dealing with their reputation among the other races.Three questions:
1) What information do they have on the place of kitsune in Tian society and culture? Are they regarded s monster or spirits, or more like the nonhumans of Avistan (i.e., as odd-looking and acting people, rather than divine servitors)?
Thanks for the kitsune information.
2) Can nonhumans from Avistan like dwarves, gnomes, and such be found as natives in Tian Xia?You can find all of the core races and the new ones from Dragon Empires in Goka as well as humans of any ethnicity. Dwarves, gnomes, halflings, and orcs do not have any homelands in the Dragon Empires and there do not appear to be any areas populated by these races in the book beyond Goka. Nonhuman races are less widely known about in the Dragon Empires the further you get from Goka. Tianjing is a homeland for the Aasimar, the Tengu have Kwanlai, the Kitsune and Kami have The Spirit Forest, the Samsarans have Zi Ha, the Hobgoblins have Kaoling, the Wayang are most populous in the northern isles of Minata, the Elves have Jinin, the Oni rule Chu Ye, a Kraken rules Wanshou, the locathah and other aquatic races have Xidao, and the Naga and Nagaji have Nagajor. Beyond that, not too much is revealed about nonhuman societies in the Dragon Empires is written so far.
Wow, it sounds like nonhumans have more nations for their own folk in Tian Xia than they do in Avistan or Garund.
And a homeland for Aasimar? That sounds like a great idea! I hope we also eventually get to see one for Tieflings as well.
3) How much information do we get on their "Southeast Asia", the River Kingdoms of the nagas and the like?
And thanks for the questions you've already answered here.
Nagajor, Dtang Ma, and Xa Hoi are the main nations with a SE Asia flavor and like all the others they get one page devoted to each nation. Also, Minata could count as having that flavor as well, but I see them as a mix between that and the Philippines when I look for an analogue in the real world.
Nagajor is the kingdom of nagas as you can tell by the name. Xa Hoi is a nation ruled by dragons and is one of my personal favorites. Dtang Ma is ruled by a group of five sorcerers of different bloodlines that rotate rulership between them every ten years (another of my favorite nations). Minata is a wide mix of different island cultures with cannibals, demon worshippers, headhunters, and a floating city of pirates thrown into the mix. The northern islands are actually the remains of a Krakatoa-like volcano.Xa Hoi and Dtang Ma both sound very cool from this description. And Minata sounds like the classic Java of old adventure stories, which is good.
Thank you for your detailed and very helpful reponse, sir.
This book makes me sad. I was looking for a little bit more crunch on stuff than "It is in another book" I figured for having a 19.99 price there would be more in there for crunching.