Whether they be vile villains, able allies, or anything in between, the characters of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game NPC Codex come alive on your tabletop with this box-busting collection of more than 300 character pawns for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game or any tabletop fantasy RPG! Printed on sturdy cardstock, each pawn contains a beautiful full-color image of a character from the NPC Codex, as well as common animal companions, and numerous never-before-illustrated characters. Each cardstock pawn slots into a size-appropriate plastic base, making it easy to use in play alongside traditional metal or plastic miniatures. With multiple pawns of the most useful characters allowing you to create every single encounter from the NPC Codex’s encounter groups appendix, the NPC Codex Box is the best way to ensure you’ve got the right characters to push your Pathfinder campaign to the next level!
In addition to being part of the Pathfinder Pawns Subscription, Pathfinder Roleplaying Game subscribers who preorder this boxed set will receive a free PDF edition of this product when the boxed edition ships. (Note that you will need to have an active Pawns or RPG subscription at the time the NPC Codex Box ships in order to receive the PDF for free.)
Cover Art by Wayne Reynolds.
ISBN 978-1-60125-472-6
Contains 20 one-inch bases for Small/Medium characters and 5 two-inch bases for Large characters, plus these pawns:
Barbarians
1 Savage Mercenary (2)
2 Dwarven Rager (2)
3 Axe Warrior (4)
4 Dog Rider
5 Wild Lancer
The NPC Codex Box has become, next to the Bestiary set and an adventure path set, the collection of Pathfinder pawns I actually use the most frequently at the gaming table. The reasons why will become clear in a moment, but first I'll go over the usual rigmarole for those who aren't familiar with Paizo pawns.
Each pawn is a thick cardboard token with the name and artwork of a particular character or monster on both sides. The pawns fit into plastic bases that match the size the creature should take up on a regular 1" grid. The pawns are quite durable and they're a much more cost-effective and manageable way to get a wide variety of tokens than trying to collect individual plastic miniatures. An index on the back of the box matches the numbering of the tokens, so it's easy to find what you're looking for. The NPC Codex Box comes with over 300 pawns; many are unique, but there are multiples of some (for example, there are six "Beggar" pawns and two "Cautious Mages"). The box also comes with a couple of dozen of small/medium-sized bases and five large bases. There aren't any Huge-sized or larger creatures in the box. The collection matches the entries in the NPC Codex, a Pathfinder book that contains full stat-blocks for NPCs from levels 1-20 of each core class. With the book and the pawn box together, finding an appropriate NPC in the middle of a session becomes a snap.
I would guess roughly two-thirds of the pawns in the box are devoted to the core classes, with each class receiving twenty distinct pawns. The artwork is high quality, but I'm not convinced it always matches the description. The "War Priest" pawn, for example, just looks to me like a standard dwarf warrior, and there's nothing particularly flame-related in the image of the "Fire Cleric." The "Charlatan" looks like your typical back-alley rogue and the "Masked Lord" isn't even wearing a mask! There are a lot of little problems like this, so I wouldn't take the descriptions too literally when trying to pick a pawn for a particular purpose.
The prestige classes get a full forty distinct pawns, and I have to admit there are some awesome images with the set. I think if I were stuck for a character concept, I could just browse the pawns in the box and instantly get a couple of cool ideas. I should also mention that, with a few exception, the vast majority of images used are of the core races.
My biggest beef with the set is the fifty distinct pawns devoted to the NPC classes. These cover a variety of mundane professions, like beggar, diplomat, barmaid, mayor, guard, etc. The problem I have is that the artwork makes them all take dramatic poses, most look quite athletic, and several are armed. In short, many look more like adventurers than the sort of everyday-folk you would come across in a normal town. The barmaid is suddenly a supermodel wearing a revealing outfit with a "come hither" look, the diplomat has a sword on his belt and a cape blowing dramatically in the wind, the "recruit" has full-plate armor and a magic glowing axe, and even the "village elder" is a half-orc with a spear. Not every single pawn falls into this category, but there just isn't much in the way of variety in terms of body-type (no one's fat), social class (almost everyone is stylishly dressed), or posture (everyone looks like they're ready for something dramatic to happen in the next moment). I don't want to make a mountain out of a molehill, but I wish there were more that could easily blend into the background (just like in cinema, directors don't want to hire extras who are too distinctive and noticeable because it draws the viewers away from the actors).
The next eleven tokens are incredibly useful: each of the Iconics for the Core Rulebook classes. If you play PFS, you can imagine how often these would come out.
Finally, there's a collection of about twenty-five animal companions. Animals aren't really what one thinks about when it comes to NPCs, but it's really handy to have tokens for cats, dogs, horses, birds, camels, and more exotic things like constrictor snakes and even dinosaurs. I'm not a fan of the "pet" classes, but when people at my table do play them, it's good that they can find the token they need.
This is the box that I bring out when I'm running a game and someone has a new character and needs a pawn. It's easy to sort through and find something that fits the bill. As I said, I wish some of the artwork fitted the label better and that some of it was more "normal" instead of high-adventure, but all in all this set has become indispensable. It's well-worth the purchase, whether you have the accompanying book or not.
I have always loved the idea behind the Pathfinder Pawns, but even with a Bestiary Boxes 1 and 2 and a few Adventure Path pawn sets, I didn't really use them that often. Most of the time I stuck to my old minis, for two main reasons.
1) A lot of the common monsters like kobolds, hobgoblins, and bugbears were poorly represented in pawns. There just weren't very many of them!
2) There wasn't a great variety of potential PC's.
This box solves problem 2! This is a great set and a must own. Such a huge variety of characters from the common PC races. Plus a lot of great potential NPC's. Adding some animals is nice too.
If you are new to Pathfinder Pawns and don't know where to start, here's what I recommend:
These four will give you a solid base of almost everything you need. Everything else you get after that will add variety and zest to your pawn collection.
The NPC Codex box contains a stunning selection of individual pawns that may be used for players or NPCs. At the start of every session, I pass the NPC Codex Box around and let the players choose their pawn. The players love digging thru the box almost as much as I love sorting it for NPC pawns. Combine this box with the new Inner Sea Pawn Box for the various factions and cults to have every pawn you'll need to keep your Golarion campaign running fresh for years to come!
If you use miniatures and need a lot of colorful unique NPCs or PCs for your players than this is the set for you. Based on the NPC codex book, you will find all the previous artwork and more. Some double (like the guards), many don’t. All the core races are included, as well as some animals. With these alone can build an orc army, a dwarven megaforge, an eleven city, a medieval palace or a diversified metropolis.
It’s short on obvious specific cultists though, so if you need to run through the head church of Zon-Kuthon, this will not be enough. Unless you want to go on these with a magnifying glass, there is no point in heavily distinguishing the races. You may have a hard time telling apart the halflings from the gnomes, but I didn’t care and just lobed them into one bag.
The only real gripe I have is with the punch-out quality. If you are not careful enough, the imperfect cutout can damage the token. I had to fix a dozen tokens with glue (hence the -1 star), and even more needed their edges trimmed with scissors. So take care on your first go.
I've talked to Andrew about the possibility of multiples of guards and such, and he'd like to make that happen, and in an optimal situation it certainly can happen, but the product isn't finished yet so we can't make any guarantees at this point.
Do the Runelords or Skull & Shackles pawns have any guards in them?
I'm safely assuming that Skull & Shackles does have pirates though! :-)
I am really happy with the pawns so far and in a lot of ways I like them better than actual minis. I look forward to this coming out so I have more options for use as actual PCs since I am mostly limited to what is in the starter box at present.
I love the pawns!
Let's see, I can pay 35 bucks for 4 boosters of Pathfinder Minis(getting between 4-8 minis) OR I can pay 35 bucks for 250+ pawns that accomplish the same thing...for a poor, broke guy like myself it's a hands down no-brainer where the better value lies.
I hope you guys keep making the pawns for a long time.
My only complaint is that i'm sick & ****ing tired of Wayne Reynolds and wish you guys would feature some different artists on your covers more often.
Let's see, I can pay 35 bucks for 4 boosters of Pathfinder Minis(getting between 4-8 minis) OR I can pay 35 bucks for 250+ pawns that accomplish the same thing...for a poor, broke guy like myself it's a hands down no-brainer where the better value lies.
I hope you guys keep making the pawns for a long time.
My only complaint is that i'm sick & ****ing tired of Wayne Reynolds and wish you guys would feature some different artists on your covers more often.
7 boosters of H&M would get you 7-14 minis for 35 dollars you are correct for the most part.
Or get the Pawns which are nice too and it is a good way for someone that can't afford the minis to get a decent set of things to represent creatures in the game.
In PFS I always give my GM's a set of pogs if I am able to.. as most do not have the minis to support a scenario. It is a cheap way to go about it :)
Will this fill out the holes left by the Beginner Box races and classes? As of now, there are no pawns for when I want to play a half-orc character, or a ninja.
I'm not asking for every race/class/sex combination to be covered as in the Beginner Box... it just would be nice to be able to approximate them all, though.
There may still be art appropriate for crossing class lines. Though it doesn't sound like there are going to be too many in the way of "classic ninja"-looking characters if that's what is being sought. Hopefully with NPC Codex 2...
Will this fill out the holes left by the Beginner Box races and classes? As of now, there are no pawns for when I want to play a half-orc character, or a ninja.
I'm not asking for every race/class/sex combination to be covered as in the Beginner Box... it just would be nice to be able to approximate them all, though.
I doubt you'll see a ninja pawn in this set as the NPC Codex this box is a companion to only features NPCs built using the classes and races from the Core Rulebook. Of course that doesn't mean that there won't be a piece of artwork in the NPC Codex that might be suitable for a ninja.
Pathfinder Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber
The Rot Grub wrote:
Will this fill out the holes left by the Beginner Box races and classes? As of now, there are no pawns for when I want to play a half-orc character, or a ninja.
I'm not asking for every race/class/sex combination to be covered as in the Beginner Box... it just would be nice to be able to approximate them all, though.
As mentioned Earlier in the thread, this will cover out the full race/class/gender combination for the core classes only
Will this fill out the holes left by the Beginner Box races and classes? As of now, there are no pawns for when I want to play a half-orc character, or a ninja.
I'm not asking for every race/class/sex combination to be covered as in the Beginner Box... it just would be nice to be able to approximate them all, though.
This box will only cover the core rules book like the NPC Codex itself. So I doubt you will see a Ninja, Gunslinger or even a Samurai. This is just one of those things. They may eventually make a book to cover the APG, Ultimate Combat and Ultimate Magic books though :)
The Samurai and Ninja could be covered in a Jade Regent set. Okay, two posts mentioning it. I'm done asking :)
As for only using core classes, I'm cool with this, as I can easily use them as stand-ins for the APG+ classes, at least the ones i'm interested in.
I think another great resource has been the Pathfinder Tales blogged stories. Each one has new art. Even if I don't have time to read the story, I always scroll down to gawk at the usually impressive art piece. There's some great ones in there and would make great NPCs.
I'm curious to know how culturally diverse the NPCs will be. A fair chunk of my custom world is inspired by the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa. Will it all be European looking peoples and clothing? If so will there be future releases for "exotic" settings?
Hmm. I'm not sure exactly how they will be labeled, but "Human Fighter" wouldn't be the answer, because there will be several different human fighters. I'll ask Erik.
Hrm. I'm subscribed to Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, but I want to opt out of this one product (it's not a rules based book, and I use a very fine hex grid that covers most of my table, and have done so for years).
I'm glad everyone else is psyched though! This looks great if you use the standard scale stuffs.
Not everything in a given product area is necessarily tied to a sub. To navigate between items in a subscription, the best way is to use the previous/next sub product links right above the discussion thread.
The plan is to use the names the characters have in the book. Not the specific name, but rather the general name (i.e. "lurking assassin," or what have you). Every character in the book has such a designator.
I feel a little vindicated. Because I whined louder than most for these. And our local joint can't keep any of them in stock.
So let's be honest. The pawns are doing well, aren't they Erik?
And I will tell you straight up. The Paizo artists own. I just.. That's the only way I can think of saying it. They own like Elmore owned in his heyday. That's how hard they own.
Today's NPC Codex Preview makes me ask: will there be pawns for the animal companions that are listed in the book? Or should we expect to just use animal pawns from other sources?
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Michael Gentry wrote:
Actually a more accurate phrasing of my question would be: will the NPC Pawn Box contain art that is not in the NPC Codex?
It might.
But just from a rough estimate, they have more than enough new art from the book to cover those 250. Almost every page of the book has a new piece of NPC art, so 270ish pages of NPCs (not including the iconics chapter, nor the front and back matter), over 3 chapters, with a loss of about 5 per chapter is 255ish art pieces in total.
Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder PF Special Edition Subscriber
Now this is just curiosity, why is this set almost twice the cost of the unboxed sets? Is it the box and bases? Won't stop me buying it, but I am curious.
Like the NPC Codex and I'm looking forward to the release of the pawns. Would love to see a future release for pawns with ninjas, samurai, oracles, cavaliers, alchemists, witches, inquisitors, etc. PCs who are using one of these classes have a hard time finding suitable pawns.
I would really like to see some other colors of bases included for easily distinguishing key npcs on the battlemap. Including a handful of red stands to show aggressive npcs within a tavern filled with neutral npcs, for instance, or if the players use the pawns as pc tokens, then some green stands to single them out.
Obviously, this might be a bit too late to include with this box set, but maybe having another product that includes an assortment of stands would be great.
I don't know if you have the NPC Codex, but in that book, the Mounted Archer and Griffon Rider are, respectively, human and elven. I doubt that the Griffon Rider will appear with her mount, as she doesn't appear that way in the book's art. (The Mounted Archer doesn't have a picture at all, so I don't know about that.)
I was just flipping through my copy of the NPC Codex itself, and noted that there are a number of mounted NPCs (Dog Rider the 5th level barbarian, the aforementioned Griffon Rider, any number of paladins, etc.). However, I didn't see any mounted artwork in the book itself.
Will the pawns for those NPCs that are mounted show them as mounted, with size to match? Because that will make me a happy, happy person
