I'm just curious, Erik: do the hobgoblins have a name for their own species other then "hobgoblin"? That seems like a human term applied to them. Also, do they have any caster NPCs in this book?
I'm really excited for more hobgoblin content; they are my favorite "enemy" race.
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Hey is there any chance you guys can sell this art as a poster without the logos...I really love pictures like this with all the details.
A bestiary soon? Well we get bestiaries every month :-p
I hope he's talking about Bestiary 5, not about another inner sea thing.
But must be, or Bestiary 5 isn't a October release but a Januari release, would be awesome.
The description itself lists all 20 of the monsters , and I can see each of them depicted on the cover - except for the serpentfolk!
Do I just not see it?
It's there, you just don't see it. If you look closely up by the logo, under the word "Game" you can see the serpentfolk, raising an item in offering to the frost giant. He is, alas, mostly obscured by the logo. But he is there. I just flipped through the art for the serpentfolk chapter of this book, and it is glorious.
On the other hand, the cover shows a mite (lower left corner with the ratfolk), which isn't mentioned in the product description...Also, in the upper left corner (in silhouette) there's what appears to be a minotaur (?)...
Neither mites not minotaurs are featured in this book (but, indeed, both are on the cover). Actually I'm not sure what that silhouette in the background is, but it's probably a minotaur.
Has the content of the book been changed from the initial product description, perhaps?Just wondering...
The product content has not been changed from the initial product description.
Thank you.
Carry on.
--C.
I'm just curious, Erik: do the hobgoblins have a name for their own species other then "hobgoblin"? That seems like a human term applied to them. Also, do they have any caster NPCs in this book?
I'm really excited for more hobgoblin content; they are my favorite "enemy" race.
Unless it's changed from Classic Monsters Revisited, hobgoblins are a "created" race; they may have simply adopted their creators' terminology and never bothered with changing it.
Very excited for this book! So many great monstrous races getting covered. It's like an expanded Classic Monsters Revisited. There's not a single monster in the list I'm not interested in, fantastic!
A lot of the monsters included are classics, but I'm looking forward to seeing an updated Pathfinder focus on them. Other races that are somewhat newer like ratfolk and serpentfolk are very promising, and I hope they become new classics. Maybe we'll see more ratfolk in Avistan!
Drow? Yes! Probably my favorite race. I've been wanting to see more of them in Pathfinder, ever since the switch from 3.5. The Second Darkness adventure path just didn't do it for me. Wayne's artwork is always great, love his style. I quite like the skin tone of the drow on the cover, and how she seems none too impressed with that vampire, haha.
Unless it's changed from Classic Monsters Revisited, hobgoblins are a "created" race; they may have simply adopted their creators' terminology and never bothered with changing it.I'm just curious, Erik: do the hobgoblins have a name for their own species other then "hobgoblin"? That seems like a human term applied to them. Also, do they have any caster NPCs in this book?
I'm really excited for more hobgoblin content; they are my favorite "enemy" race.
I suspect that origin could be retconned. I know James Jacob at one point wasn't that happy with how Classic Monsters Revisited treated Hobgoblins.
In my campaign, hobgoblins were created by the archdevil Moloch. After Lamashtu freed the four barghest lords from Hell, Moloch decided to take a few goblins and modify them into a perfectly disciplined warrior species. As a result, they pretty much see him as their racial patron.
Hey is there any chance you guys can sell this art as a poster without the logos...I really love pictures like this with all the details.
Historically, art prints have not done well for us. I think we're still sitting on an Age of Worms print from back in the Dungeon days. That being said, I know WAR sells prints of cover images at conventions.
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I'm really pleased people are digging the idea behind this book.
I suspect we'll do another Bestiary soon.
And a Pawn Box based on this book is, of course, a good bet.
Pathfinder Battles miniatures based on some of the art also seems likely.
But all of that is just speculation, you understand.
A pawn box based on this would be a wonderful thing, as the one hole that the pawns don't do a good job of covering is when you need more than, say, three gnolls or orcs at a time. This is probably a better way of addressing the need for more of certain types of monsters than just selling a sheet of gnolls, or orcs, or whatever...
Will this book have any new monster specific and/or racial feats?
New rules in each monster section, including feats, spells, and magic items.
I would think from this, yes.
This, like the NPC Codex, will be very useful for me. It is invaluable being able to set up an encounter without having to create N non-base creatures and/or NPCs from scratch.
On the other hand, it won't diminsh my appetite for an Advanced Monster Guide like Auxmaulous and I have mentioned before, nor an NPC Codex 2 covering the classes from the APG, UM and UC.
Nor, for that matter, for a Bestiary 5, though I cannot imagine how I'll ever manage to use all the cool monsters in the first four, never mind all the supplementary materials such as the Inner Sea Bestiary.
I am glad I haven't quite started my new campaign yet, though :)
Will only the statblocks appear on the PRD or will the other content matter (society, ecology, etc.) as well?
And will the PDF be $10 on this hardcover since it's in the Pathfinder RPG line?
Will only the statblocks appear on the PRD or will the other content matter (society, ecology, etc.) as well?
Unsure at this time.
And will the PDF be $10 on this hardcover since it's in the Pathfinder RPG line?
That is the plan!
No catfolk? Seriously?
Looks like they were keep with creatures that are constantly used and are usually adversaries. Can't say when the last time I saw a catfolk in any game was.
No catfolk? Seriously?
It looks like this Codex will focus on creatures used that are typically antagonistic. Catfolk aren't really any more antagonistic towards adventurers than, say, humans or elves.
EDIT: What the blue Abyssal monstrosity said.
Hmm, i suppose products like this will in the long run cut down on space taken up in module/AP statblocks and allow slightly more content for ratio. I wonder if we may have a future AP spoiler or two hidden in that list above.
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Maybe we can have an Allies Codex, covering Catfolk, Centaurs, Kitsune, etc
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Maybe we can have an Allies Codex, covering Catfolk, Centaurs, Kitsune, etc
All of my yes, absolutely, and $40.
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16, Contributor
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Allies last for multiple sessions and often you don't even need a full stat block. A party might kill off 20 enemies in a single session and always require full stat blocks. So GMs need about 100 times more enemy stat blocks than allies. Thus the need for books filled with people to fight are more in demand than books filled with allies.
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hello my name is Daniel hert i was wonder if someone can show me where it says if a template gets bonuses from the base creature plus the template and special ability if i could get an answer and what book it is in i would appreciate it
Many templates will state right in the beginning, probably in the second sentence, that, 'A blah-blah uses all of the base creatures statistics and special abilities, except as noted here.' Each template will be specified in whatever source lists it (so, the Bestiary, for half-dragon, half-celestial, ghost, half-fiend, vampire, etc.).
You can also find most of them online. For example, the half-dragon template.
So, in this case, if applied to a human, they retain their +2 bonus to a single attribute, bonus feat and extra skills, and if applied to a dwarf, they get all that dwarfy goodness, followed by half-dragon stuff (or half-fiend stuff, or half-celestial stuff, or ghost stuff, or vampire stuff).
As a result, you'll often see big bad evil guys in adventures listed as a 'human lich' or 'human vampire.' Technically, he's no longer really a human, but it's important to know that he started as a human, as that will give him different stats, etc. than if he started out as an elf or bugbear or fire giant or whatever.
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I still think of ratfolk as a player race not a "monster race" so there the only ones on the list that do not make sense to me.
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Allies last for multiple sessions and often you don't even need a full stat block. A party might kill off 20 enemies in a single session and always require full stat blocks. So GMs need about 100 times more enemy stat blocks than allies. Thus the need for books filled with people to fight are more in demand than books filled with allies.
Not if you're running an evil campaign. ;)
I still think of ratfolk as a player race not a "monster race" so there the only ones on the list that do not make sense to me.
In Pathfinder, maybe. But ratfolk = skaven. And skaven have been villains for much longer than Pathfinder has been a thing. Get some of the crossover sales that way.
This is Pathfinder, not Warhammer, so the whole skaven thing doesn't apply. When we were introduced to ratfolk they were stated as a player race, if you want evil rat people then use wererats.
Allies last for multiple sessions and often you don't even need a full stat block. A party might kill off 20 enemies in a single session and always require full stat blocks. So GMs need about 100 times more enemy stat blocks than allies. Thus the need for books filled with people to fight are more in demand than books filled with allies.Not if you're running an evil campaign. ;)
Because evil is less likely to have allies?
This is Pathfinder, not Warhammer, so the whole skaven thing doesn't apply. When we were introduced to ratfolk they were stated as a player race, if you want evil rat people then use wererats.
It certainly applies. Many gamers like to grab elements from one setting we like and insert those elements into other settings. A good example would be the skaven from the Warhammer Fantasy setting.
To have ratfolk appear in a book such as the Monster Codex makes a lot of sense, I think, *because* rat-like creatures are popular villains. The design team seems to agree with that. Now, those GMs out there who want to feature a skavenesque race in their games will have some more tools to work with. We have wererats *and* ratfolk, giving us a lot of options. For those GMs who have no interest in using ratfolk as a villainous sort, it's possible to ignore the ratfolk secion (a section that makes 1/20 of the book).
All this does nothing to invalidate ratfolk as a playable race. If your GM doesn't have any villainous ratfolk in his game, then that's perfect, and even if he does, that just opens up a lot of options as far as a heroic or at least non-villain ratfolk character is concerned.
Also, if I remember correctly, the ratfolk were featured as a monster in Bestiary 3 initially, before they were featured in Advanced Race Guide. Sure, they had stats for using ratfolk as 0-HD creatures (which means they work well as characters), but so do goblins, and ratfolk were still introduced (again, if memory serves) in a decidedly GM-focused book.
Now, that's not to say that they're not good candidates for player characters. As I see it, it merely implies that they work just as well in whatever role the GM casts them, such as skaven in a a game set in Golarion.
Those are my two cents. Your mileage may vary, of course. :)
I don't get why there's two giant chapters; there's far more than two types. It would've been a bit more reasonable to find one representative for giants, use that as an example, and save the space for something else (derro, dark folk, cyclops, catfolk, strix, morlocks, gargoyles, harpies, and so on).
Oh, well. I guess everyone has chapters they won't use.
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I don't get why there's two giant chapters; there's far more than two types. It would've been a bit more reasonable to find one representative for giants, use that as an example, and save the space for something else (derro, dark folk, cyclops, catfolk, strix, morlocks, gargoyles, harpies, and so on).
Oh, well. I guess everyone has chapters they won't use.
Here's your reason. And I'm sure grognards will cry foul about the lack of hill giants...
Here's your reason. And I'm sure grognards will cry foul about the lack of hill giants...I don't get why there's two giant chapters; there's far more than two types. It would've been a bit more reasonable to find one representative for giants, use that as an example, and save the space for something else (derro, dark folk, cyclops, catfolk, strix, morlocks, gargoyles, harpies, and so on).
Oh, well. I guess everyone has chapters they won't use.
So a popular module trilogy released thirty years ago cast a shadow this long? They could've just used hill giants and dropped the other two...
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So a popular module trilogy released thirty years ago cast a shadow this long? They could've just used hill giants and dropped the other two...Here's your reason. And I'm sure grognards will cry foul about the lack of hill giants...I don't get why there's two giant chapters; there's far more than two types. It would've been a bit more reasonable to find one representative for giants, use that as an example, and save the space for something else (derro, dark folk, cyclops, catfolk, strix, morlocks, gargoyles, harpies, and so on).
Oh, well. I guess everyone has chapters they won't use.
Tomb of Horrors casts an even longer one. It's a very nostalgic hobby.
Tomb of Horrors casts an even longer one. It's a very nostalgic hobby.So a popular module trilogy released thirty years ago cast a shadow this long? They could've just used hill giants and dropped the other two...Here's your reason. And I'm sure grognards will cry foul about the lack of hill giants...I don't get why there's two giant chapters; there's far more than two types. It would've been a bit more reasonable to find one representative for giants, use that as an example, and save the space for something else (derro, dark folk, cyclops, catfolk, strix, morlocks, gargoyles, harpies, and so on).
Oh, well. I guess everyone has chapters they won't use.
I've just never used frost/fire giants and cannot wrap my head around the appeal.
I will take fire and frost giants over hill giants any day.
The ratfolk are also found on Akiton, mostly as merchants. Also there description in B3 doesn't sound like a monster or enemy.
I am sad that there are no harpies, centaurs, fey, lamia, minotaurs, medusa, sphinx, lycanthropes, and a lot other actual monsters. It is a lot more work to give class levels to creatures with racial HD, especially the figuring out the CR value.
I am really interested in the vampire, serpentfolk, goblin, lizardfolk, fire giant, frost giant, troglodyte, boggard, and troll.
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I've just never used frost/fire giants and cannot wrap my head around the appeal.Tomb of Horrors casts an even longer one. It's a very nostalgic hobby.So a popular module trilogy released thirty years ago cast a shadow this long? They could've just used hill giants and dropped the other two...Here's your reason. And I'm sure grognards will cry foul about the lack of hill giants...I don't get why there's two giant chapters; there's far more than two types. It would've been a bit more reasonable to find one representative for giants, use that as an example, and save the space for something else (derro, dark folk, cyclops, catfolk, strix, morlocks, gargoyles, harpies, and so on).
Oh, well. I guess everyone has chapters they won't use.
And I've never used catfolk, and cannot wrap my head around the appeal. Different strokes, can't please all the people all the time, and so on.
To be a little less glib, space in a book, or for that matter a book's place in the production schedule, is finite. In contrast, the number of possible ideas and topics is essentially infinite. Including something, by necessity, means excluding a very large number of other things. They could have had only one type of giant. They could have combined goblins and hobgoblins into one chapter. They could have avoided orcs altogether, since Orcs of Golarion is already a thing and Holds of Bekzen is on the schedule. They could have not done this book at all and made Bestiary 5 or NPC Codex 2 instead.
This book at least seems to be based on archetypal foes (which means the game's history is relevant), with a common thread of being the kind of monster where you invade a lair with a bunch of similar monsters in it. (For instance, vampires are included, but not liches, because attacking a vampire lord's lair means fighting its spawn, while liches don't tend to clump in the same way.) They made the best choices they could.
Pretty much everyone has something they would have liked to see in this book that isn't there, or something in this book they are particularly excited about. Some people would have loved a chapter on Dark Folk. Some people hate aquatic adventures and don't want sahuagin.
The book comes out in three months. It's been written by now, and probably goes to the printer shortly. The cover art has been here for awhile. It is a little late to change the lineup.
Also there description in B3 doesn't sound like a monster or enemy.
For me, the description in the Bestiary is rather generic and, while it works well enough for the alignment given, it's a very simple thing to add to that bit of fluff and change the alignment to make the creature fit as a skaven, for instance. The default ratfolk is not a skaven, certainly, but the tweaks needed to make it a skaven are purely flavor-related, and the result is certainly a monster with a stat block to support that monster.
I have no idea about what specific game mechanics are featured in Monster Codex, and so I have no way of knowing if any of the mechanics will even fit a skaven theme, but the notion that ratfolk are included in a book such as Monster Codex implies to me that the designers also see ratfolk as a potential monster similar to how lizardfolk are considered monsters. I like it. I like that, should I decide to have ratfolk be a villainous sort (whether it's an individual ratfolk or the species as a whole), I have a resource to turn to.
I am sad that there are no harpies, centaurs, fey, lamia, minotaurs, medusa, sphinx, lycanthropes, and a lot other actual monsters. It is a lot more work to give class levels to creatures with racial HD, especially the figuring out the CR value.
As Warhammer Fantasy and other settings (including the Pathfinder campaign setting) have proven, rat-like creatures can be every bit as monstrous as minotaurs or lycanthropes. We have the wererat to represent that, sure, but the wererat plays a very specific role as a lycanthrope, I think, and in many cases the ratfolk is just as good a fit.
Ultimately, though, I hope the Monster Codex proves popular enough to warrant more than just one, because the concept seems cool, and there's a LOT of monsters to give the Codex treatment.
The fluff in Advanced Race Guide suggests that ratfolk are commonly accepted by humanoids and have no problem at all fitting into human cities.
It is a little late to change the lineup.
But it is never to late to whine loudly about the badwrongfun content we want that was not included.
I've just never used frost/fire giants and cannot wrap my head around the appeal.Tomb of Horrors casts an even longer one. It's a very nostalgic hobby.So a popular module trilogy released thirty years ago cast a shadow this long? They could've just used hill giants and dropped the other two...Here's your reason. And I'm sure grognards will cry foul about the lack of hill giants...I don't get why there's two giant chapters; there's far more than two types. It would've been a bit more reasonable to find one representative for giants, use that as an example, and save the space for something else (derro, dark folk, cyclops, catfolk, strix, morlocks, gargoyles, harpies, and so on).
Oh, well. I guess everyone has chapters they won't use.
Also of the giants that are popular in mythology, fire and frost giants are the most popular ones. Especially with the current popularity of the Thor movies.
At the end of the day, they had to pick 20. So unfortunately not everyone's favorite monsters made it in. I would have loved to have seen a lich and mummy information in there. But, they only have room for so much so I'm at least happy I got my favorite monster, the ghoul, into the book :)
It's the way publishing goes.
But, they only have room for so much so I'm at least happy I got my favorite monster, the ghoul, into the book :)
Now this has my interest, moreso than any of the others, simply due to how close Paizo tries to align the 3.5 ghoul with Pickman's Model ghouls and remain backwards compatible.