Pathfinder Player Companion: Champions of Balance (PFRPG)

The 'Holster as a free action' bit only states that you have to have at least one Grit left in your pool, I think.
As I don't have my PDF with me, I cant say with certainty anything more than that.

Kvantum wrote:

Kevin Mack wrote:

Any good Iconic art in this book (Lini specificly?)

There's a nice piece of her that gets re-used for the back cover of her, eyes shut in quiet contemplation, as she holds a beautiful bright red rose in one hand and a dead, decaying one in the other.

So, yes. Every neutrally-aligned Iconic gets at least one piece. Bathazar's is used for the new Summon Neutral Monster feat, similar to the one from Champions of Purity.

Yeah, the Lini piece might be my favorite one for that character.

Wondering if Balazar is a lock for Champions of Corruption...

Balazar is summoning an inevitable on the final page of Champions of Balance.

The 'Holster as a free action' bit only states that you have to have at least one Grit left in your pool, I think.

As I don't have my PDF with me, I cant say with certainty anything more than that.

You are correct.

Actually, doesn't gun twirling (assuming GM Allowance for number of free actions) make a dual-wielding full-attacking pistolero build possible without an alchemist dip or prehensile tail? Or is it limited in number of times per round or cost grit each time?

If you have enough pistols to draw, sure.

Any summoner evolutions?

Nope.

The NPC wrote:

Any summoner evolutions?

Nope.

Le sigh....

Ezakim wrote:

flips to page 27

>:(

Uh oh, what lurks on page 27?

A personal attack!

Mikaze wrote:

@doc the grey and NPC: I don't have it in front of me at the moment, but there was talk about various organizations that have a heavy neutral slant like the Kalistrade, Green Faith, Hellknights, and such. I don't think there was anything especially human-centric, but I haven't read the whole book.

There aren't any new evolutions, but the back interior cover has the Summon Neutral Creature feat much like Champion of Purity's Good version. It calls in various neutral fey early on, then proteans, aeons, psychopomps, and inevitables. It also adds the Counterpoised simple template to creatures from the standard summon list, which has its own resistances and DR as well as the Smite Bias ability, which targets the four corner alignments(LG, CG, CE, and LE).

Does it have any requirements? I have a summoner cleric of Groetus in pfs that might just love that feat.

Can't get to the PDF at the moment, but I think it has equivalent requirements as Summon Good Creature. You should be good for it. :)

Pretty certain the only requirements are you have to be Neutral Aligned & capable of casting Summoning spells, but as I posted earlier, I don't have my PDF with me at the moment.

Gromnar wrote:

Is there anything Calistria-related in the book, or options that would benefit worshippers of her?

From what I understand this book is mostly non-religious stuff for neutral characters, since the "Faiths of" series handled those (although the options for Calistria were pretty bad in that book.)

Maybe they are waiting for Gods of the Inner Sea to give her some loving.

Mechalibur wrote:

Gromnar wrote:

Is there anything Calistria-related in the book, or options that would benefit worshippers of her?

From what I understand this book is mostly non-religious stuff for neutral characters, since the "Faiths of" series handled those (although the options for Calistria were pretty bad in that book.)

Maybe they are waiting for Gods of the Inner Sea to give her some loving.

But loving isn't her bag, but i'm sure she'll get plenty of attention ;)

The Golux wrote:

Actually, doesn't gun twirling (assuming GM Allowance for number of free actions) make a dual-wielding full-attacking pistolero build possible without an alchemist dip or prehensile tail? Or is it limited in number of times per round or cost grit each time?

If you have enough pistols to draw, sure.

Aside from the derringer method (which can be hilarious), if you can, after firing twin pistols, holster one pistol as a free action, reload the other one as a free action, holster the loaded one as a free action, draw the first one as a free action, load that one as a free action, and then draw the other one as a free action (which clearly would involve basically juggling, but seems to be allowed by this deed), you can repeat that sequence of actions and full attack with the two guns, juggling and reloading between attacks.

It just requires your GM to allow a dozen or more free actions per round...

(this is presuming you have the other things you need, quick draw, rapid reload, and alchemical cartridges. And, does Lightning Reload only work once per round? I forget.)

What does the book have for neutral necromancer's?

Mechalibur wrote:

Huh, that looks pretty cool. It actually doesn't even seem that overpowered to me, especially since it's a 1/day capstone.

My big issue is it's essentially not just one but two 9th level spells, one arcane only and the other divine only (domains, mysteries, and bloodlines aside) that a 15th level character can have access to. A Wizard 5/Envoy of Balance 10 with both Power Word Kill and True Resurrection (with no material component!) as once per days kind of pushes things for me a bit.

Not egregiously so, but a bit much.

And as far as the traps, all four new ones are based around adding an alchemical item into the trap so you basically spew its effects over a 10-ft. radius. Firework Trap, Limning Trap (nonmagical Glitterdust, essentially), Smoke Trap, and Noxious Fumes Trap.

You do realize it takes someone to go out their way to make a level 1 character, role play properly, and then take it all the way to 15 for this to even happen right? This is only an issue if the GM actually enjoys running games with min-maxers or lets min-maxers practically run his game for him.

zergtitan wrote:

What are the new grit feats?

In addition to the one I already mentioned above (Gun Twirling), there's also a new grit feat that gives you a new way to regain grit: by lying to your enemies! Whenever you successfully lie to someone using the Bluff skill, you regain a point of grit. It doesn't work on allies or on creatures with less than half your Hit Dice, but its pretty neat!

The other grit feat is called Named Bullet, which allows you to scribe a foe's name onto a bullet you create with Gunsmithing, granting the bullet the bane property against that foe. Crafting the bullet costs 1 grit and lowers your maximum pool by 1 point until you use the bullet.

Hm I coulda swore I saw something just like Named Bullet in one of the 3rd party Gunslinger products I have seen.

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil? A balance between law and chaos make a bit more sense, but why does balance have to involve evil? Why can't there be a balance between good and good? Screw evil!

I know that Named Bullet is a spell... I think it was in Ultimate Combat.

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil? A balance between law and chaos make a bit more sense, but why does balance have to involve evil? Why can't there be a balance between good and good? Screw evil!

If we define 'good' as 'that which helps others' and 'evil' as 'that which harms others', then it can be seen that a balance between them is sadly necessary. It is impossible for any living thing to long survive without either the use of supernatural forces or without killing other life forms and then eating them -- this is the classic example of a necessary evil. Likewise, it can be argued that helping another, too much and too often, is undesirable in that it leaves the helped individual unable to help themselves. Thus an excess of good can be seen as every bit as undesirable as an excess of evil, and seeking a balance between them, neither helping others too often nor seeking to harm others unnecessarily, becomes an understandable perspective.

But "evil" in a D&D cosmology isn't (just) that. It's things like Asmodeus, who loathes free will and wants to enslave every sentient being in the universe to punish us all for eternity because we have the temerity to want to make decisions for ourselves. It's daemons who want to devour all souls to deny every living being their afterlife, because they're angry at everything. It's demons who want to bully, oppress, and corrupt everything for no reason except their own fleeting pleasure.

Balance with that? Screw that.

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil? A balance between law and chaos make a bit more sense, but why does balance have to involve evil? Why can't there be a balance between good and good? Screw evil!

That's been a trope of D&D for a long time...I remember it coming up in Dragonlance fiction. I think the idea is that "too much" good ends up being like the Spanish Inquisition. But I agree with you that it's pretty silly.

But "evil" in a D&D cosmology isn't (just) that.

Yes, it is. Evil is that which wishes to harm. Good is that which wishes to help. Neutrality is that which recognizes that too much help is just as bad as any harm, and so strives to keep the two in balance.

It is very simple.

Anyone ever seen or read "Trigun"? A manga/anime series? It talks about this very balance. The main villain poses a question when the main character sees a butterfly trapped in a spider web.

"Go ahead and save the butterfly, but now you just killed the spider because it has no food to eat. Let the spider live, but now the butterfly dies."

That's a paraphrase, but you get the point. A neutral character would be the one to make sure all the spiders don't die or that all the butterflies won't die. Now which spider and which butterfly lives, that is an interesting topic for those espousing to keep the balance.

If you want to take it into the modern world, there are people who specialize in maximizing the "compromise" between parties. I would consider these people True Neutral or Lawful Neutral in a sense because they assure both parties are not wiping the other out, but agreeing to take some good with the bad in order to keep the balance of "peace".

If anything, neutrality is a wonderful alignment for deep roleplay. Only people who are used to thinking in black&white terms fail to understand its concepts.

Ehh I think it has more to do with the way the Aeons see the multiverse, that it is this giant ecology in which ALL alignments have their place and merit to exist within and keep the thing moving. That being said though I think the concept is meant to be something that seems silly and beyond to mortals and even most outsiders since they are the ones who feel it more intimately and aren't able to view the whole thing from a cosmic level like the Aeons can.

Axial wrote:

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil? A balance between law and chaos make a bit more sense, but why does balance have to involve evil? Why can't there be a balance between good and good? Screw evil!

That's been a trope of D&D for a long time...I remember it coming up in Dragonlance fiction. I think the idea is that "too much" good ends up being like the Spanish Inquisition. But I agree with you that it's pretty silly.

It is silly. Something like the Spanish Inquisition is "too good"... it's evil!

Because of the title, I imagined Sajan would be on the cover in Crane stance.

'Cause, yanno, balance.

That's sort of taken care of on one of the inside illustrations.

Wolfwaker wrote:

Axial wrote:

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil? A balance between law and chaos make a bit more sense, but why does balance have to involve evil? Why can't there be a balance between good and good? Screw evil!

That's been a trope of D&D for a long time...I remember it coming up in Dragonlance fiction. I think the idea is that "too much" good ends up being like the Spanish Inquisition. But I agree with you that it's pretty silly.

It is silly. Something like the Spanish Inquisition is "too good"... it's evil!

Yeah, gotta say, when I think Spanish Inquisition and horrible things like it, the last thing that comes to mind is "there's too much good there".

The only way stuff like that and the Dragonlance Kingpriest stuff could be read as examples of "too good" is if good and evil don't mean what they're defined as.

The Kingpriest represented an unopposed good "losing direction" and corrupting into something definitely not good. Without a real and recognizable evil to oppose, it started hunting for something, anything to fill that gap. And so Good became "good."

The kingpriest also did something really specific to trigger the Cataclysm, but I haven't read those novels in over a decade.

I'd expect a neutral who seeks balance between good and evil is one who holds both in contempt.

Yeah, gotta say, when I think Spanish Inquisition and horrible things like it, the last thing that comes to mind is "there's too much good there".

The Spanish Inquisition, and other things like it, are what happens when Lawful Good goes so far off the rails it wraps back around into Chaotic Evil ;P

Mikaze wrote:

Yeah, gotta say, when I think Spanish Inquisition and horrible things like it, the last thing that comes to mind is "there's too much good there".

The Spanish Inquisition, and other things like it, are what happens when Lawful Good goes so far off the rails it wraps back around into Chaotic Evil ;P

I think The Spanish Inquisition is what happens when an LG organization realizes that it can be LN and takes it way too far do in the end you have few LG, a lot of LN, and some LE that either don't realize they have fallen that far or excuse it away. Hell some might have even switched sides by that point to other gods by that point without realizing it.

In other news, WOOO! My copy is inbound! Now time to see what everyone has been talking about and I get to do it on my new smart phone. XD

The Kingpriest represented an unopposed good "losing direction" and corrupting into something definitely not good. Without a real and recognizable evil to oppose, it started hunting for something, anything to fill that gap. And so Good became "good."

The kingpriest also did something really specific to trigger the Cataclysm, but I haven't read those novels in over a decade.

I'd expect a neutral who seeks balance between good and evil is one who holds both in contempt.

Besides a certain amount of ethnic cleansing and slavery? He ask in hubris what Huma asked for in humility.

Basically he demanded the divine power to scourge the world of evil. Going so far as to claim himself to be so valuable to Paladine that loosing him would be like the god loosing his left arm. Then there is the fact that the Kingpriest's view of what was evil had become skewed at that point. He had declared a number of races evil and to be wiped out, not just the traditional always CE races either as well as declaring all faith in other gods except Paladine to be evil. Even Mishakel, Paladine's wife, got the treatment if I recall correctly.

Throw on top of that a hefty dose of supposedly faithful clerics of paladine actually give faith and worship to the Kingpriest and you have a recipe for a boatload of angry gods.

Suffice it to say, the kingpriest had gotten little out of hand.

Mind you, I don't think the morality of the "good" gods in Dragonlance bears up under close examination either...

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil? A balance between law and chaos make a bit more sense, but why does balance have to involve evil? Why can't there be a balance between good and good? Screw evil!

Neutral characters are by far the norm at our table...in fact I can't think of a character that wasnt neutral along at least one axis.

But we have never had anyone take the approach of "trying" to act in balance between good and evil.

The reality is that most people in the world are neutral...especially these days.
Think about it...how many LG people do you know ?
How about LE ?

Neutral alignments are easily the most "real" allignments, and as a result are the most easily grasped by the greater number of people.

I can't imagine playing a LG Paladine...because what would be expected of my character would seem foolish....and probably shallow, to me on a personal level.

Mind you, I don't think the morality of the "good" gods in Dragonlance bears up under close examination either...

In brief, how so?

In response to the Kingpriest's madness, the gods send a series of extremely frightening but utterly vague omens which the Kingpriest interprets in his favor; they then grant a fallen Solamnic Knight the only possibility of swaying the KP, but some random evil elves tempt him to fall further instead and he becomes a certain famous death knight; finally the gods rapture all their faithful clerics away and drop several asteroids on the planet, ensuring misery and horror for everyone whether or not they had anything to do with the KP's corruption and simultaneously depriving everyone of the divine magic and spiritual leaders that would have been really really handy at the time, causing the people of Krynn to - rightly, in my opinion - feel rather cheesed off at the gods.

All of this is in response to the actions of one highly placed paranoid lunatic, who is manipulating one of the 21 religions to oppress pretty much all the others.

I'm... not seeing any good, there.

Probably best to take the discussion about Dragonlance & the Kingpriest to a separate thread, folks. :D

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil?

By that logic, no one would want to be Evil.

Every alignment thinks it is the 'best' alignment (thinking of themselves as the 'good' that is the opposite of 'bad', not the 'Good' that is the opposite of 'Evil').

Good thinks Evil is selfish and petty.
Evil thinks Good is naive and a way of penalizing the strong.

Law thinks Chaos is random and capricious.
Chaos thinks Law is predictable and boring.

Neutral thinks ALL of these thing are true.

In response to the Kingpriest's madness, the gods send a series of extremely frightening but utterly vague omens which the Kingpriest interprets in his favor; they then grant a fallen Solamnic Knight the only possibility of swaying the KP, but some random evil elves tempt him to fall further instead and he becomes a certain famous death knight; finally the gods rapture all their faithful clerics away and drop several asteroids on the planet, ensuring misery and horror for everyone whether or not they had anything to do with the KP's corruption and simultaneously depriving everyone of the divine magic and spiritual leaders that would have been really really handy at the time, causing the people of Krynn to - rightly, in my opinion - feel rather cheesed off at the gods.

All of this is in response to the actions of one highly placed paranoid lunatic, who is manipulating one of the 21 religions to oppress pretty much all the others.

I'm... not seeing any good, there.

While I an understand your point I think there are details your missing. All in all agree to disagree and moving on.

Rather interested in those grit feats.

Axial wrote:

I find the idea of someone wanting to find balance between good and evil irritating and highly implausible. Why would someone think this way? If they believe that them creating balance is good, wouldn't they see themselves as good and imbalance as evil?

By that logic, no one would want to be Evil.

Every alignment thinks it is the 'best' alignment (thinking of themselves as the 'good' that is the opposite of 'bad', not the 'Good' that is the opposite of 'Evil').

I disagree. Being neutral doesn't necessarily mean you think it's the best alignment. It could, for example, mean you don't have the conviction to do good acts, even though you think that alignment is the ideal.

Is anyone willing to spoil the archetypes?

The new bloodline isn't an Inevitable one, but it is... Impossible.

Oooh! This sounds pretty awesome! I was actually just thinking about what kind of bloodline would make for a good "Adam Warlock, Quantum Sorcerer" concept, and this might do.

Tell my wife...I said...hello.

Kvantum wrote:

The new bloodline isn't an Inevitable one, but it is... Impossible.

Oooh! This sounds pretty awesome! I was actually just thinking about what kind of bloodline would make for a good "Adam Warlock, Quantum Sorcerer" concept, and this might do.

It's awesome! Basically you can see the math that underlays the universe and use it to do what you want. The 1st level ability is basically giving someone a taste of your vision and making them sick and eventually all your other abilities basically let you go "I reject your reality and substitute my own". Like eventually you can go I want to make a bag of tricks and just ignore all the crafting requirements and pop it out or look at a wall and go "you are a floor" and you can just walk up it.

I am so excited to make a cthulhu math sorcerer who can see the under pinning formulas of the universe and just ignore physical laws as humans understand them.

Is anyone willing to spoil the archetypes?

Yeah dude.

Basically you get 2 true archetypes, 1 new cavalier order, and the new aforementioned bloodline.

The 2 archetypes are the Negotiator Bard and the Survivor Druid.

The Negotiator is basically Phoenix Wright/Johnny Cockran lawyer who can talk himself and the party out of just about anything (or make people believe just about anything). Like you lose inspire courage to give everyone penalties against your social skills and illusion magic as well as appraise checks to cause people to buy or sell items to you at better prices. From their the class kind of snowballs through more ways to lie or change peoples opinions along with giving you some rogue talents to help out there (but none for sneak attacks).

The Survivor is a Druid arch that replaces a bit of your spellcasting and your wildshape with the traps mechanic that the ranger trapper has. I honestly really love this one since you end up with a new take on the druid who is more like a rugged survivalist or hunter who supplaments his powers with druidic magic so you get a druid that feels a little less fantastical but still so cool. Like I'm debating building like an Inuit survivor druid who roams the tundra with his wolf companion trapping game for his tribe. Also you get the launch trap abilities of the trapper ranger.

Man, I can't wait for this one to ship so I can get my PDF!!

Yeah, I'd agree that people can hold themselves to different standards than they hold society...I've had plenty of neutral characters who would generally prefer people in general to be good and lawful just because they would rather have people willing to risk themselves to prevent bad things from happening to them, and because they can acknowledge they appreciate dwelling in a reasonably ordered society...while still not having the necessary personal conviction to strive to that ideal themselves. And I doubt neutrality is the only one...I can imagine a good person on occasion wishing he didn't care so much...and I'm sure plenty of evil people that dwell in evil societies might wish that his neighbors weren't just as cutthroat amoral!

However, I do think that someone who actively seeks balance or neutrality as an ideology almost certainly believes it is the best alignment...just as much as someone who actively seeks what some might term evil...or good...or whatever. There's a distinction between someone who has an alignment because that's their natural inclinations or because they're trying to reach a certain mental personal ideal, and someone who has an alignment because they have a strong ideology where that alignment is the highest good. For a neutral character, perhaps they believe there is a greater cosmic significance to all things being equal and in their place, struggling against each other, and that if good were to finally triumph over evil, the imbalance would destroy reality or alter it so fundamentally that it might be the same thing. Or perhaps they believe that strong convictions only serve to set people at each other's throats, a more alignment-oriented perspective similar to Rahadoum's with deities, and that people need to curb those divisive convictions. That said...personally, 'zealous neutrality' is probably my least favorite kind of neutral.

Back to the book, man, Nethys offering the aeon subdomain really makes me start speculating. I mean, aeons are all bound together via the monad that makes them one with each other and the multiverse itself, and their Extension of All ability allows them to a limited extent to gain access to timeless knowledge filtered through all of existence itself. Meanwhile, we know Nethys found a way to know apparently everything, which drove him mad...furthermore, aeons are said to be at one moment beneficent and in the next utterly devastating...sounds quite a lot like Nethys' proclivities for creation and destruction. It also says that aeons build order out of the Maelstrom...I think I recall that that's where Nethys calls home? And since we know mortals might be able to get a glimpse into the Monad as per the Impossible bloodline...did Nethys tap into the Monad on a full-time basis, perhaps?

Of course, Sivanah offers it too, which is also pretty interesting considering her theme of illusions, reflections, and mystery...we know that aeons are merely reflections of something greater...almost illusions themselves, but illusions real enough to interact with reality...if what we perceive in front of us is the true reality, and not merely the shadow of a greater reality? Does Sivanah see a difference between what we think of as reality and illusions beyond mere degrees of how substantial they are? Aeons may tend to take more after gnostic views (which in turn draws heavily on Greek philosophy), but there's certainly some Buddhist themes you can almost effortlessly incorporate, in my opinion...

Of course, sometimes a subdomain is just a subdomain. Might be reading too much into it. But rampant speculation is fun!

Brief overview of new things:

Overall thoughts: Unabashed Gall is hilarious. I'm not sure how useful it is, but it's hilarious.

The new subdomains are mostly pretty interesting even without some of the fuel for thought.

The new ninja tricks seem a bit odd, since they seem oriented around taking damage, and it seems like most ninjas would prefer to avoid taking damage in the first place...Redirect Force almost comes across as more appropriate for a barbarian rage power, even. Kawarimi is pretty amusing, though...I just wish it was more than once a day, though I suppose that if it was, it might be too powerful.

The negotiator bard archetype is pretty interesting as a dedicated face, though I can imagine some DMs might be leery of potential abuse with the Appraise manipulation if their players tend to abuse mechanics.

The new grit feats are all a lot of fun, in my opinion...fabulist sounds great for a mysterious stranger...all the more mysterious because he keeps changing his history every time he tells it! Gun twirling seems fun, and named bullet is flavorful as hell...perfect for a Calistrian gunslinger, I imagine. "I've been saving a bullet with your name on it...punk."

The new alchemist discoveries, I like collective memory and intuitive understanding. Very flavorful, especially for a psychonaut or similarly flavored alchemist.

Arcane discoveries are a bit odd, and it's a bit problematic that one of them has the same name as a mythic power, in my opinion. Idealize seems quite potent, though, and balanced summoning definitely leads to some interesting mental images...

The Impossible sorcerer bloodline is pretty awesome, in my opinion. And it doesn't nail itself down to flavor, though frankly both suggestions (axiomite godmind and monad of the aeons) are full of possibilities. Spontaneous Generation gives them a reasonable chance of matching a wizard's crafting ability, along with their bonus feats, and the capstone is full of countless possibilities.

Barbarian rage powers...impelling disarm is pretty damn amusing. I have a mental image of a barbarian slamming a weapon out of someone's hands and kicking it right back into their face. Savage dirty trick looks pretty nice...especially combined with the dirty trick master feat from Bastards of Golarion.

Of the new spells, I'm a bit amused that in a book dedicated to neutral characters, a fair number of them are actually designed to be used against neutral characters...Ardor's Onslaught is the anti-neutral version of Chaos Hammer/Holy Smite/Order's Wrath/Unholy Blight, Counterbalancing Aura is the anti-neutral version of Cloak of Chaos/Holy Aura/Shield of Law/Unholy Aura, and Dispel Balance the anti-neutral version of Dispel Chaos/Evil/Good/Law. Because no one likes a fence straddler? We do have Arbitrament, though, the neutral version of Blasphemy/Dictum/Holy Word/Word of Chaos. Antithetical Constraint seems fairly powerful, though ironically, it's far less useful if you're true neutral, since unlike other alignments, who can now only be hit by one alignment, they can still be hit by four of them. Explosion of rot seems like a reasonabl blast spell for a druid, too...not as good as fireball, admittedly, but nice. I am a little disappointed that we didn't get some aspect spells to go along with angelic aspect...inevitable aspect would have been pretty awesome.

Summon Neutral Monster looks like fun, though I haven't gone over it in detail...I do like shae, though. And chaos beasts could be quite annoying with their curse...counterpoised creature is also an interesting template.

That said...now I'm really looking forward to Champions of Corruption, and not just because I'm in an evil game! Also vaguely imagining a mythic summoner or conjurer who takes Beyond Morality (the mythic version, not the arcane discovery) and Summon Good Monster, Summon Neutral Monster, and the hopefully upcoming Summon Evil Monster...

What does the Practiced Leadership feat do?

Being neutral doesn't necessarily mean you think it's the best alignment. It could, for example, mean you don't have the conviction to do good acts, even though you think that alignment is the ideal.

I agree, actually. I was referring to the neutral embraced by druids, philosophers, and others who actually champion balance (i.e. those referred to in the title of this book.)

Animals, commoners, and a great many things are neutral because they lack strong convictions, not because their strong conviction is that moderation is the best course.

What does the Practiced Leadership feat do?

Well, you need to have Leadership and have membership in the same organization as your cohort; as long as you and your cohort maintain membership in good standing within the same organization, the cohort gains a +4 morale bonus on Will saves against enchantment spells and effects, and your cohort as treated as thought they possessed the same teamwork feats you possess for figuring out whether you (but not your cohort) receive bonuses from the feat. Cohort still needs the actual teamwork feat to receive bonuses themselves.

Additionally, they list various bonuses for belonging to specific organizations (specifically, Free Captains, Green Faith, Hellknights, Pathfinder Society, and Prophets of Kalistrade) and having Leadership or Practiced Leadership. For example, if you have Leadership and are a Green Faith follower, you do not take a Leadership score penalty for having an animal companion, and if you have Practiced Leadership, your cohort can use speak with animals at-will as a spell-like ability (caster level 1st or equal to cohort's caster level, whichever is higher).