Pathfinder Campaign Setting: Inner Sea Races (PFRPG)

Catfolk have also gotten some new details, including the little-known name by which they call their people. :-)

...Khajit has skooma for you... :P

Duskblade wrote:

Please...PLEASE tell me Kuru are supported in this book. I soooo want more options for my Kuru character...pretty please James *looks at u with puppy dog eyes*

Sorry. Kuru are not really intended to be PCs first of all... and on top of that I'm pretty sure they're way too obscure for much of a mention in this book.

To James Jacob:

Ahem, my Kuru Brawler of Gorum might disagree with you.

hehehe

Aasimars and tieflings are, in my opinion, not one race but several. It never made sense to me why a tiefling with demonic blood would be functionally the same as one with devil blood. Furthermore, by spreading out into different specific races, we put a unique Pathfinder spin on these concepts and that helps us step away from the versions created by TSR, which is also good.

Put another way, the various tieflings and aasimars are NOT ethnicities, but are in fact separate races. There's not going to be enough room in the book to devote all the info we did to them in their 32 page books, so the main tiefling and aasimar sections will indeed mostly talk generally about them without getting into the specifics, but as of the time I'm writing this, the plan is to have all their mechanical variants in the book.

Fair enough. I can't say I've ever seen a player actually play up their flavour of Tiefling (or aasimar) to differentiate it from other tieflings, and as a result I saw blood of fiends/angels as simply trading in an inflexible stat spread for 1 flexible stat + a free +2 to a random stat.

I can certainly understand the reasoning used in designing Golarion tieflings as you have and the flavour your aiming for. I'll have to take a look at those books at some point and see how I can incorporate it into the gameplay more to place more emphasis on the flavour instead of "here's some widgets to help you optimize your character even more".

Catfolk have also gotten some new details, including the little-known name by which they call their people. :-)

A name other than cat folk would be a big improvement for me. I have this irrational but very strong hatred for the mere idea of cat folk. Then again I wasn't too fond of ratfolk until 3 months ago when I really started to grok them. My tweaked Korvosa have tengu clans(/gangs) on the rooftops and ratfolk in the sewers. Who knows what else I could squeeze in ;)

Personally I wish they change the resistances of the Aasimar/Tiefling based on the heritage. For example a angel blooded one would have Acid 5, cold 5, fire 2, elec. 2, and a +2 save vs poison. Another example would be a Rakshasa one would get DR2/piercing and a +2 save vs magic. Also it would cool to get a racial feat(9th level) that improves these defenses such as res. 5 would become 10, res. 2 would become 5, +2 save bonus would improve +4, DR2 would be DR5, etc.

Personally I wish they change the resistances of the Aasimar/Tiefling based on the heritage. For example a angel blooded one would have Acid 5, cold 5, fire 2, elec. 2, and a +2 save vs poison. Another example would be a Rakshasa one would get DR2/piercing and a +2 save vs magic. Also it would cool to get a racial feat(9th level) that improves these defenses such as res. 5 would become 10, res. 2 would become 5, +2 save bonus would improve +4, DR2 would be DR5, etc.

Between the 100 variant options in Blood of Angels/Fiends (which a GM might let you select thematically appropriate options from) and the Unscathed magic trait, you can kind of do some of that. :)

If only we could get a Blood of Angels/Fiends 2. Not to mention a "real" Blood of the Elements that did as excellent a job on the geniekin. An "Advanced Race Guide 2: Featured Races", focusing on the second tier races from the ARG would be my #1 most wanted Pathfinder book by a huge margin.

I agree Samy, it would be awesome to get ARG2 and making focus on all races in pathfinder except core.

Dragon78 wrote:

So they no longer have that water dependency limitation like they had in the older editions of D&D?

Nope. And in fact, in Pathfinder, they never did. They have the amphibious quality.

I like this!

So, does anyone know if the Mordant Spire elves are given any attention in here ?

Do tengu count as an Inner Sea race? Or are we too diverse and spread around to be considered as such?

So, does anyone know if the Mordant Spire elves are given any attention in here ?

That is a good question

Will the Ghoran get any love in this book?

Will the Ghoran get any love in this book?

Yes.

Dragon78 wrote:

Will the Ghoran get any love in this book?

Yes.

Will we finally get some Ghoran recipes?

James Jacobs wrote:

Dragon78 wrote:

Will the Ghoran get any love in this book?

Yes.

Will we finally get some Ghoran recipes?

No.

John Kretzer wrote:

James Jacobs wrote:

Dragon78 wrote:

Will the Ghoran get any love in this book?

Yes.

Will we finally get some Ghoran recipes?

No.

They are sufficiently delicious on their own.

James Jacobs wrote:

John Kretzer wrote:

James Jacobs wrote:

Dragon78 wrote:

Will the Ghoran get any love in this book?

Yes.

Will we finally get some Ghoran recipes?

No.

They are sufficiently delicious on their own.

Yeah, but they throw off the taste of wine and make your pee smell weird.

Edit: Some Pale Mountain gnolls once told me that if distilled and properly filtered, ghorans can make a decent drink, somewhat similar to date palm wine with a bigger kick. However, the hangovers were horrible and too much often leaves the drinker with hallucinatory memories and personality remnants of the former plant people.

Edit 2: No matter how well you tenderize, marinate, and season them, gnolls are nearly inedible.

I hope that there will be a trend of getting a hardcover campaign setting book every year...maybe even two.

Here's hoping the following Sub-Races will be getting some good stuff:

Ekujae Half-Elves (Wildborn)
Jungle Half-Orcs (Rainkin)
Moroi-Born (Svetocher)

Here's hoping the following Sub-Races will be getting some good stuff:

Ekujae Half-Elves (Wildborn)
Jungle Half-Orcs (Rainkin)
Moroi-Born (Svetocher)

Those are more ethnicities than they are sub-races. Some will be mentioned here and there, but not all. The book focuses more on the big picture for the most part, but where we've room we talk about specifics.

The book focuses more on the big picture for the most part.

As long as I get at least a bit of juicy stuff for the Wildborn then I'm good (from what I'm aware they are an Inner Sea ethnicity as much as a Varisian human is).

Quote:

The book focuses more on the big picture for the most part.

As long as I get at least a bit of juicy stuff for the Wildborn then I'm good (from what I'm aware they are an Inner Sea ethnicity as much as a Varisian human is).

Perhaps... but bear in mind that Varisians are SIGNIFICANTLY more common than Wildborn.

Will there be any new or different types of Dwarves or Halflings, not including there darklands variants?

This book is really focused on giving information about how the various races fit into the Inner Sea region, not creating new subraces.

he have any new stuff for Samsaran in this book ?

I'm hoping for some information about the Taralu dwarves of the Mwangi, myself. The Mwangi Expanse is barely Inner Seas, right?

I'm hoping for some information about the Taralu dwarves of the Mwangi, myself. The Mwangi Expanse is barely Inner Seas, right?

Again... super specific and minor overall. This book is not where we're going to be exploring all sorts of new information about minor ethnicities we've mentioned elsewhere, and in many cases, such as the Taralu dwarves, they might not even be mentioned at all. Inner Sea Races is meant to be a "ground zero" book, despite the fact that it's not one that comes out at the start of the setting's publication history. It's meant more as a compilation of what's come before, with some expansion here and there and clarification here and there. There's NOT a lot of room to spend on getting into the more obscure corners of an ethnicity like the Taralu at all, since there's so much more ground to cover for every other race.

There WILL be some info about samsarans. About a paragraph. Probably nothing new if you already have Dragon Empires, but if you don't, there's enough to let you know the basic gist of them—same goes for most of the other non-Inner Sea races out there. In a few cases, there are non-Inner Sea races we've said next to NOTHING about (such as catfolk) in the world's context, and thus their paragraph of info will be mostly new. But in the case of something like the Samsarans... not so much.

This is not, I repeat, a book that expands on what we've done already, so much, as it is a compilation. Same case as Inner Sea Gods. And as in that book's case, there's some new info in here... but the bulk of it is compiling informaiton from a wide range of diverse other books.

So that newcomers to Golarion need buy only one book rather than track down a dozen or so increasingly hard-to-find older publications.

Keep in mind also that Inner Sea Races is not as big as Inner Sea Gods, so there's not as much room to expand info anyway. (Inner Sea Gods was 336 pages long, whereas Inner Sea Races is 256 pages.)

I'm hoping for some information about the Taralu dwarves of the Mwangi, myself. The Mwangi Expanse is barely Inner Seas, right?

Yeah, it's not really Inner Sea region.

I haven't done dwarves yet, so I'm not sure whether the text talks about the Taralu, but I wouldn't expect much. This is very much an Inner Sea-focused book: we cover the major human ethnicities present in the region (the same ones that were in the Inner Sea World guide) and elaborate on their cultures, how they fit in to the Inner Sea region, how others in the region see them, how they see others, and so on, but if they don't have a significant presence in the region, they don't get much focus.

Will Catfolk get any new art?

Funny thread, this one.

I, for one, am really hoping that humans, elves, and dwarves get the most love of all.

Since halflings and gnomes are everywhere, they deserve proper presentation! Especially halflings!

Will Catfolk get any new art?

That is a good question.

Will catfolk looks be finalize? Or do we get a 4th variation?

Actually I kind of like all three represention be canon...it could lead to some very interesting social dynamics of the race.

It would be cool to have variant/sub races of catfolk but since there only getting a paragraph or two in this book I think we will have to wait a while for that.

I find it strange that halflings have no variants/sub races in pathfinder especially since they are so closely tied to humans in this version.

This is not, I repeat, a book that expands on what we've done already, so much, as it is a compilation.

Wait, so if I read what your saying right, this book is basically going to be a whole lot of old stuff we've already received with some splatterings of new stuff sprinkled here and there? Yes? No?

Quote:

This is not, I repeat, a book that expands on what we've done already, so much, as it is a compilation.

Wait, so if I read what your saying right, this book is basically going to be a whole lot of old stuff we've already received with some splatterings of new stuff sprinkled here and there? Yes? No?

Much like Inner Sea Gods was slightly revamped versions of articles from the Adventure Paths, material from Gods & Magic, and the Faiths of Balance/Corruption/Purity books with new material added in along with somewhat modified previous material, Inner Sea Races will probably mostly be material from the Inner Sea World Guide, Elves of Golarion, Humans of Golarion, Gnomes of Golarion, Halflings of Golarion, Dwarves of Golarion, Orcs of Golarion, and other such books, along with modifications and some new material. Whether you've already got all those, I can't say. Even if you do, though, it will all be in one book, at least, and with some of the 3.5 material (like Elves of Golarion) updated to Pathfinder. Whether that's worth it or not to you, is up to you, but it should certainly be useful for people who don't have all those books.

Quote:

This is not, I repeat, a book that expands on what we've done already, so much, as it is a compilation.

Wait, so if I read what your saying right, this book is basically going to be a whole lot of old stuff we've already received with some splatterings of new stuff sprinkled here and there? Yes? No?

As I understand it, that's exactly what Mr Jacobs is saying. I suppose a comparison with Inner Sea Gods is in order. It too was a compilation of previously released material with some new goodies here and there. If that book worked for you, it seems likely that Inner Sea Races will also be of interest to you. If not, then it's probably something you might consider skipping.

Will Catfolk get any new art?

Yes; this is in fact something we've been working on to nail down their look for good, since they're one of the races we've never illustrated the same way twice, alas.

Quote:

This is not, I repeat, a book that expands on what we've done already, so much, as it is a compilation.

Wait, so if I read what your saying right, this book is basically going to be a whole lot of old stuff we've already received with some splatterings of new stuff sprinkled here and there? Yes? No?

That's pretty much exactly what we did with Inner Sea Gods. Yes.

And it's only "old stuff" if you happen to have been around for years and have bought up all the earlier 32 page race books we published over the course of Pathfinder's life. That's not everyone, and in fact, the number of Pathfinder players we have today is MUCH more than the amount we had, say, when we published Elves of Golarion (which itself predates the Pathfinder RPG).

Since we rarely reprint 32 page books (the economics of doing so are pretty prohibitive), compiling that information into a big hardcover that CAN stay in print, and that CAN be sold in bookstores (bookstores do not like carrying 32 page booklets without spines) is pretty much the only option we really have if we want to keep this fundamental information about the races of Golarion out there.

It would be cool to have variant/sub races of catfolk but since there only getting a paragraph or two in this book I think we will have to wait a while for that.

I find it strange that halflings have no variants/sub races in pathfinder especially since they are so closely tied to humans in this version.

With a VERY few number of exceptions, we do not do sub-races in Pathifnder. There are aquatic elves and drow for elves. Duergar for dwarves. Svirfneblin for gnomes. That's about it. Note that all of those are races that are influenced by the Darklands (or in one case the ocean); they're not races who really ever rub shoulders on a day to day basis on the surface.

Catfolk do not have subraces. They may have ethnicities, but it's an error for them to biologically look as different as we've depicted them. Not every mistake is an opportunity to expand. Sometimes, they're just mistakes.

Mighty dinosaur, then i have some questions:
-will all the traits from the 32 page books be reprinted (and perhaps modified)? That would make it a real seller, especially for newer players and PFS.
-will there be anything regarding halflings and slings and halfling slingstaffs and a certain race trait? It would actually be awesome!
And all those feats could extend to the new halfling slingshot.

Mighty dinosaur, then i have some questions:

-will all the traits from the 32 page books be reprinted (and perhaps modified)? That would make it a real seller, especially for newer players and PFS.
-will there be anything regarding halflings and slings and halfling slingstaffs and a certain race trait? It would actually be awesome!
And all those feats could extend to the new halfling slingshot.

Not all the traits will be reprinted.

I'm not sure about slings and slingstaves. Maybe, but maybe not.

Hayato Ken wrote:

Mighty dinosaur, then i have some questions:

-will all the traits from the 32 page books be reprinted (and perhaps modified)? That would make it a real seller, especially for newer players and PFS.
-will there be anything regarding halflings and slings and halfling slingstaffs and a certain race trait? It would actually be awesome!
And all those feats could extend to the new halfling slingshot.

Not all the traits will be reprinted.

I'm not sure about slings and slingstaves. Maybe, but maybe not.

I *think* what Hayato's asking about slings is twofold:

James Jacobs wrote:

Hayato Ken wrote:

Mighty dinosaur, then i have some questions:

-will all the traits from the 32 page books be reprinted (and perhaps modified)? That would make it a real seller, especially for newer players and PFS.
-will there be anything regarding halflings and slings and halfling slingstaffs and a certain race trait? It would actually be awesome!
And all those feats could extend to the new halfling slingshot.

Not all the traits will be reprinted.

I'm not sure about slings and slingstaves. Maybe, but maybe not.

I *think* what Hayato's asking about slings is twofold:

— First, he seems to be asking if you'll revise the Warslinger trait from the Advanced Class Guide, which was ruled to only affect slings (and not halfling sling staves) back in 2013-ish.
— Second, he's likely referring to Ammo Drop and Juggle Load, which are two feats from Halflings of Golarion that, together, accomplish what Rapid Reload manages to do on its own. (I apologize, I'm trying to sound non-biased towards these feats and am failing miserably.)

Oh. In that case, probably no to both. I haven't seen the rules section of the book yet and won't for a bit longer, so I can't say for sure.

We could always summon Seifter and ask him. He's seen it.

Alexander Augunas wrote:

James Jacobs wrote:

Hayato Ken wrote:

Mighty dinosaur, then i have some questions:

-will all the traits from the 32 page books be reprinted (and perhaps modified)? That would make it a real seller, especially for newer players and PFS.
-will there be anything regarding halflings and slings and halfling slingstaffs and a certain race trait? It would actually be awesome!
And all those feats could extend to the new halfling slingshot.

Not all the traits will be reprinted.

I'm not sure about slings and slingstaves. Maybe, but maybe not.

I *think* what Hayato's asking about slings is twofold:

— First, he seems to be asking if you'll revise the Warslinger trait from the Advanced Class Guide, which was ruled to only affect slings (and not halfling sling staves) back in 2013-ish.
— Second, he's likely referring to Ammo Drop and Juggle Load, which are two feats from Halflings of Golarion that, together, accomplish what Rapid Reload manages to do on its own. (I apologize, I'm trying to sound non-biased towards these feats and am failing miserably.)

Oh. In that case, probably no to both. I haven't seen the rules section of the book yet and won't for a bit longer, so I can't say for sure.

I doubt that you guys did warslinger, considering that's not from the Campaign Setting / Player Companion lines. ;-)

So, does anyone know if the Mordant Spire elves are given any attention in here ?

And....I'm STILL wondering :P

Mordant Spire elves get mentioned, but only briefly.

Well, reporting back after completing the summoning ritual, and the answer was more complicated than expected, so for now, it remains at "Maybe."

Well, reporting back after completing the summoning ritual, and the answer was more complicated than expected, so for now, it remains at "Maybe."

Bad rolls on contact other department can result in madness, or even enmity with an archdevil, so you may have dodged a bullet!

I hope there will be some new info like were did Halflings come from, who/what created them, why are they found with humans most of the time.