
trellian |

For you other DM's out there: Will you allow non-OGL classes (and races) in your Pathfinder games? I just feel a little uncomfortable allowing one of my players to play something from Incarnum when I know with 100% certainty that none of the NPCs will ever be of that class. Then again, it becomes quite boring if only the 11 core classes are allowed....
One thing I'm definetely not going to allow are races and classes that are very world-specific, like warforged.

Connors |

Definately. I have all classes from the books I own in a list with all possible. I am very open to new classes and races, but often they have a cultural place in our CS setting too.
For example Monte Cooks runethanes are typical dwarven and giant spellcasters. I used to be a stickler, but now find it hard to deny a player something they really want to play. Why do that? I mean, when do all the other books get used if people stick to the core all the time. I suggest find a small niche for the class your player wishes and make them a small part of the setting. I am sure, even in Pathfinder, there can be small cults or groups that practice different magics.

mevers |

For you other DM's out there: Will you allow non-OGL classes (and races) in your Pathfinder games? I just feel a little uncomfortable allowing one of my players to play something from Incarnum when I know with 100% certainty that none of the NPCs will ever be of that class. Then again, it becomes quite boring if only the 11 core classes are allowed....
One thing I'm definetely not going to allow are races and classes that are very world-specific, like warforged.
Umm... Why Not?
What has the OGL got to do with what classes you let your PCs play in your games?
Why will their never be a Magic of Incarnum NPC in your game? If you want to put one in, you can easily replace a similar level wizard for it surely. For that matter, how many Magic of Incarnum classes are in a normal adventure path anyway? None.
The PCs are meant to be special, and a cut above.
Now I understand, races are different. If they don't fit in your world, then they don't fit in your world. But calsses are a metagame concept. The PCs don't know their class, and they definently don't know the class of the NPCs.

trellian |

I don't know, I'm still not overly fond of the PCs being completely unique in that they are 'one of a kind' in the world, but it depends a little on the classes as well. Something like the Swashbuckler or Scout isn't that strange compared to the other classes. Case to case basis is the way to go I think.
Still, I kind of like the idea of a PC becoming the first meldshaper as well.. hmm..

evilash |

For you other DM's out there: Will you allow non-OGL classes (and races) in your Pathfinder games? I just feel a little uncomfortable allowing one of my players to play something from Incarnum when I know with 100% certainty that none of the NPCs will ever be of that class.
Well, I usually tweak the NPCs myself anyhow, swapping feats, spells, classes, etc, so doing so in Pathfinder as well won't add any extra work for me. So, to answer your question, I will allow non-OGL classes, but probably not non-OGL races.

deClench |

When I run a game, anything goes. In my opinion, it should be about having fun and trying new things. Flavor-wise, I can't imagine denying a player the opportunity to play what race and class they want. Mechanics-wise, well... if it's broke, we'll fix it together, but that is usually a last resort saved for the most heinous of brokenness.
In turn, I expect the same consideration when I play.

ericthecleric |
Someone (who shall remain nameless) sent me the following secret memo between WotC and Paizo staff members. Apparently it’s for a new OGL PrC.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
FROM: (Classified)
TO: (Classified)
SUBJECT: The Munchkin PrC
Hi (Name Withheld).
We’ve invented the following (OGL) prestige class, because there are concerns that the game is too challenging. It’s not very balanced, but it should eliminate the threat of danger to anyone taking it.
THE MUNCHKIN
Munchkins are there to disrupt everyone else’s fun at the player’s expense. They excel in combat, and become even more powerful later on. There’s no organisation of munchkins, because they’re all so self-absorbed. However, from time to time several of them congregate in groups of player characters.
REQUIREMENTS
To qualify to become a munchkin, a character must fulfil all the following criteria:
Base Saves: +10
Special: You cannot qualify for the munchkin PrC after 5th-level; one must always be focused on being a munchkin. This means taking 1 level in bard, cleric, favored soul (Complete Divine), monk, and ranger (or any combination of other classes that meets the requisite save bonuses, as long as it’s achieved by 5th-level).
CLASS SKILLS
The Swiftblade’s class skills are: All
Skill Points at Each Level: Enough to increase every skill and sub-skill at each level.
THE MUNCHKIN
All of the following are class features of this prestige class.
HD: d12 Fort Ref Will
Level BAB Save Save Save Special Spellcasting
1st +1 +2 +2 +2 See below See below
2nd +2 +3 +3 +3 See below See below
CLASS FEATURES
All of the following are class features of this prestige class.
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: You are proficient with all simple and martial weapons, and with all types of armor and shields (except tower shields).
Ability Score & Skill Boosts (Ex): Beginning at 1st-level, you improve your Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma scores by +30. You also gain a +50 bonus on all skill rolls. For second level munchkins, these improvements are doubled (ie. for a total +60 improvement to the relevant ability scores, and +100 skill roll bonus).
Ablative Defense or Damage Reduction (Ex): Beginning at 1st-level, you face a choice between ablative defense or damage reduction. Once the choice is made, you cannot change it.
Ablative Defense: If you take any hit point or ability score damage, all opponents within one hundred feet lose 6 points from every ability score (multiple hits against you cause multiple damage, which all stacks).
Damage Reduction 30/-
Second level munchkins gain both abilities, and the values are doubled (ie. 12 point ability score loss within 200 feet, and DR 60/-).
Combat Skill (Ex): Beginning at 1st-level, you gain a +20 Insight bonus on all attacks, and to your Armor Class (including flat-footed and touch ACs). For second level munchkins, these improvements are doubled (ie. for a total +40 improvement to the relevant ability scores).
Death Touch (Ex): Beginning at 1st-level, you have a death touch. Any time your weapon (including natural attacks or unarmed strikes) hits an opponent, it is destroyed. There is no saving throw, and this effect applies even to creatures that are normally immune to death effects, such as undead creatures and those protected by the death ward spell. It does not affect creatures whose Challenge Rating is higher than the square of your character levels, so that’s CR 37+ for a human munchkin. For second level munchkins, the value is double the square of your character level; ie. creatures of CR 75+ are unaffected.
Regeneration (Ex): Beginning at 1st-level, you gain regeneration 30. For second level munchkins, you have regeneration 50. Only epic axiomatic holy cold iron weapons deal normal damage to you.
Spell-Like Abilities (Sp): At will, you can cast any spell of 9th-level or lower as a spell-like ability from the bard, cleric, druid, or sor/wiz list. As normal, you don’t need to meet the verbal, somatic, or material requirements, not even for experience point costs or high-value material components. Effects are created at caster level 20. You may use only one spell-like ability per round. If you have any Metamagic feats, you may apply these to the spell, without extending the casting time, but you still cannot create an effect of higher than a 9th-level spell. For second-level munchkins, you may create effects of up to 15th-level spells (ie. those affected by metamagic feats), and you create effects at caster level 100. You may also cast any epic-level spell, with a +3,000 bonus to the Spellcraft roll.
Whinge and Moan (Ex): Any time your spell-like abilities fail to overcome an opponent’s Spell Resistance, or when you take any hit point damage, you whinge and moan as a free action. All creatures within 100 miles of you, including your allies but excluding you, suffer a -10 penalty on Will saves for one minute. Should you be reduced to negative hit points, the duration is for one hour. Should you die (ie. are reduced to -10 hit points or lower), your body explodes, completely destroying everything within a 1 mile radius of your body (no save).
For second-level munchkins, you retain these effects, but if you are reduced to -10 hit points or lower, the explosion of your body destroys the entire world (or if you are outside the Material Plane, causes whichever plane you are on to implode).
One True Path: Once you become a munchkin, you are always a munchkin. You must devote all experience points to reaching the second level of munchkin. You do not gain any character-level related gains (such as character-level related ability score boosts or bonus feats) until you reach the second level of munchkin. Unfortunately, a munchkin does not operate on the normal experience point table, and it takes 50,000,000 experience points to reach the second munchkin level.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
I hope you don’t mind me posting this, Mike, but I thought people would be interested in seeing it. Damn, I’ve just revealed who sent me the memo.

Christopher Adams |

The runethane is a spellcasting class from Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed and Arcana Evolved. In addition to a few regular spells, they can place runes on places, objects, and creatures to produce magical effects.
The old Arcana Unearthed PDFs are quite cheap on the various websites right now - though, since you'd need the Way of the Staff and Arcana Unearthed Grimoire PDFs to make full use of the runethane you might as well buy the full Arcana Unearthed PDF - it's about the same price, and you get the Way of the Sword material as well.
Of course, the "director's cut" Arcana Evolved version is only $15.00 in PDF, too . . .

Connors |

Monte's runethane would do well as a Viking runecaster :) Though you may want to swap the spells available to Divine spells. (Well actually Monte's book only has one list. We have all dnd spells we have in books in 2 gigantic lists; 1 arcane and 1 divine. I let runethanes choose which list to take their spells from ;)).
In any case I HIGHLY recommend getting a copy of Monte's classes. Whilst they were designed to cover all generic bases, they work fine alongside the standard classes. As I stated, making each variant of a theme really adds to campaign setting.
eg: Fighters with archery feats are well-known in Kingdom 1; unarmored fighters are throughout Kingdom 2 (use Monte's unfettered); and in kingdom 3 fighters are heavily armored tanks (their leaders being warmains from Monte). The barbarians on the outskirts are associated with different totems and thus have totem warriors (mOnte) in their tribes, etc.
Cheers, C

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I typically allow all classes and most races. It keeps my skills and knowledge up to par as well as keeping things both interesting and mysterious for the players. All i require is that said players have a copy of their own books describing their unique classes/races. No one is allowed to refer to memory regarding rules specific to their respective class/race.
Thoth-Amon
p.s. I never allow gunpowder in my d&d games. For me, it takes away the d&d feel. But hey!, I'm funny that way. Does that make me an old-timer? Yes, i did start playing around 74-75. Thats 1974-1975, so dont go there. LOL

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p.s. I never allow gunpowder in my d&d games. For me, it takes away the d&d feel. But hey!, I'm funny that way. Does that make me an old-timer? Yes, i did start playing around 74-75. Thats 1974-1975, so dont go there. LOL
Hi Thoth,
don't allow this thread to be hijacked.
Sebastian seems to feel somewhat frustrated lately. The gun powder thread doesn't seem sufficient for him anymore. :pp

Kirwyn |

Imc I allow the warforged, and a bunch of arcana evolved, oriental adventure stuff, and some of the prcs from tome and blood, sword and fist, and so on. Most of the "Complete" stuff is out, it seems pretty wack, and thats about it. I have compiled a list of feats and class abilities that allow for more variation with the "core" classes to keep it real.

The-Last-Rogue |

My group is fairly experienced and collectively we own a lot of splatbooks -- that being said I have been hinting to them this upcoming campaign will be core-centric. In other words I doubt I will allows any classes outside of the base 11 (most classes are just variations on the theme anyway), with slight house rule adjustments, . . .PrC's and feats I may keep open to the complete books. My players like a decent mix of RP and rarely try to 'powergame' as it were . . .
Either way we are awaiting Pathfinder eagerly.

Klamachpin |

Between all of the members in my group we have almost all of the 3rd Edition and 3.5 rulebooks, splatbooks, alternative settings, etc. And yes, it's nice to include new shiny rules or incorporate something not usually seen to a game particularily if you are a PC. However, after so many iterations and variations of the same concept (Arcane Archer/Deepwood Sniper/Order of the Bow Initiate/Cleric Archer/etc. comes to mind), certain abilities become obselete while new ones take the lead and games become consequentally more power-based.
This trend is what makes DMs like myself want to hold back on books allowed. A player with a particular concept in mind can usually get away with doing it with just the core books - it's just they won't be munchkining a whole lot to do it, since the material is restricted. And when a player does munchkin in a limited rule set, it's far easier for a DM to judge whether or not the design is unbalanced - less rule sets and/or errata needs to be looked up for certain ability interactions.
For example, I like the rule of one magic system. Be it the core, the psionics, the incarnum, or what have you... choose one for the campaign and stick with it. It's too time consuming and confusing to try to adjucate and balance two different systems when they interact, so I resolve to just not deal with it. Now, if you have the tenacity to deal with that, rock on with your bad self. However, it detracts from the fun of the game for me and usually the other players in my games.

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Members of my group regularly "power-game" to get above-average combat-oriented adventurers. I usually allow any book brought to the table to be used, and I commonly see new classes and races from the Completes and Races books. I'm fine with that, as I believe it is the above-average or exotic character that becomes an adventurer anyway. I've allowed Celestial PCs, skulk PCs, gestalt PCs, intelligent items, dragon PCs, the Leadership feat, and lots more.
On the flip side, on a fairly regular basis I also deny certain material from those books. I've made it clear to my players that there are limits to be observed. Some things I've disallowed are: new magic systems, the Feral template, and the Irresistable Spell metamagic feat from an OGL campaign book. (I can give you the name if you just have to see it.)

Neil Spicer Contributor, RPG Superstar 2009, RPG Superstar Judgernaut |

My group is fairly experienced and collectively we own a lot of splatbooks -- that being said I have been hinting to them this upcoming campaign will be core-centric. In other words I doubt I will allows any classes outside of the base 11 (most classes are just variations on the theme anyway), with slight house rule adjustments, . . .PrC's and feats I may keep open to the complete books. My players like a decent mix of RP and rarely try to 'powergame' as it were . . .
Either way we are awaiting Pathfinder eagerly.
Same here, LR. I'll be the DM for our group's upcoming RotR campaign. And we may eventually switch off DMs between APs in Pathfinder so I get a chance to play a PC as well. Although we've got a pretty experienced group (many of whom have access to a number of splatbooks), we've all pretty much agreed that we're going "core" on this one. As we move around through the adventures and what-not, we might dabble with anything new Paizo provides in the "back" material or player's guides, of course. But overall, we're not looking to do a melting pot of all things OGL. It keeps things "cleaner" that way, I think.
--Neil

The-Last-Rogue |

The Last Rogue wrote:My group is fairly experienced and collectively we own a lot of splatbooks -- that being said I have been hinting to them this upcoming campaign will be core-centric. In other words I doubt I will allows any classes outside of the base 11 (most classes are just variations on the theme anyway), with slight house rule adjustments, . . .PrC's and feats I may keep open to the complete books. My players like a decent mix of RP and rarely try to 'powergame' as it were . . .
Either way we are awaiting Pathfinder eagerly.
Same here, LR. I'll be the DM for our group's upcoming RotR campaign. And we may eventually switch off DMs between APs in Pathfinder so I get a chance to play a PC as well. Although we've got a pretty experienced group (many of whom have access to a number of splatbooks), we've all pretty much agreed that we're going "core" on this one. As we move around through the adventures and what-not, we might dabble with anything new Paizo provides in the "back" material or player's guides, of course. But overall, we're not looking to do a melting pot of all things OGL. It keeps things "cleaner" that way, I think.
--Neil
Are you me? ;) Seriously though that is exactly me sentiment. For some reason I want a 'simpler', 'cleaner' game . . . to be honest it just sounds more fun right now. As for switching DM's, I am with that too . . .I seriously DM at least 75-80% of my groups stuff (which I love to do), but I get a serious hankering for some PC action, ya know?

Neil Spicer Contributor, RPG Superstar 2009, RPG Superstar Judgernaut |

Are you me? ;) Seriously though that is exactly me sentiment. For some reason I want a 'simpler', 'cleaner' game . . . to be honest it just sounds more fun right now. As for switching DM's, I am with that too . . .I seriously DM at least 75-80% of my groups stuff (which I love to do), but I get a serious hankering for some PC action, ya know?
Maybe I was created via one of the earlier edition clone spells? ;-)
But seriously, no. We're probably just cut of the same cloth. That's all.
I also DM our D&D games about 75-80% of the time. Our group has tended to switch off every other week through one-shot games using different systems and settings. D&D, D20 Modern, Alternity, Savage Worlds, d6, Mutants & Masterminds...you name it, we've probably tried it. We just started talking about transitioning from one-shots into something that let's everyone develop their characters over a longer career...i.e., a campaign. And everyone agreed that a medieval fantasy game like D&D would be the easiest and most interesting to do that with. So, now that Pathfinder's coming out, it seems like the most logical thing for us to use.
As the veteran DM for D&D games, I'm starting it off by getting the subscription. And, once we wrap up RotR, I'll hand off the next adventure path to one of the other players that would like to try their hand at DM'ing. I'll probably need the break by then, anyway. Opportunities to play in an extended game have been few and far between for me. One-shots are fun little morsels sometimes, but eventually you want an entire meal, you know?
So good luck with your game...and maybe I can eventually start a campaign journal here and relay how our RotR game plays out...
--Neil

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Funny that everyone would think the switch to OGL to cause in less variety... :p
First people at WotC already made clear that they would publish new fluff stuff, on the other hand there is considerably more OGL/ d20 stuff out there than D&D one. So the possibilities only increase... Just take the number of monster books already discussed in these threads here... ;-)
Greetings,
Günther

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I would. I don't like disallowing stuff if it's balanced. If that's what the character wants to play, what the hell.
I do, however, like to have whatever book it is that the class comes from so I know what I'm dealing with.
I've got a fairly strict "if I don't own, it's not allowed" stance as a DM. Some things may be really cool, and if I had the book they'd probably be allowed, but I'm not going to DM something that I'm completely clueless about (say, Incarnum, or what not).
Also, some things just don't fit thematically with the setting or campaign I'm running. That just how it goes.
The best bet for a player is to ask me if a particular option is available--I'll try to be accommodating, but I reserve the right to veto certain things.

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I'd be glad if my players wished to play something not in the core books.
So far I am one of only 2 DMs in my group and have a hard time to make them feel interested in playing anything not in the core books at all! But then they are anyway more interested in adventures and new monsters than in modifying their characters... I know it's odd! :p
Greetings,
Günther

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well I'm working up a gish type caster, since the Duskblade will be off limits. Also there's a nightblade on the WotC boards that someone is working on, kind of a stealth/assassin gish.
If (When) I get my gish to where I like it, and Paizo rejects it, I'll post it somewhere as OGL.
I'm not betting on anything I write being good enough.

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I'm generally very flavor-specific and don't even allow Monks in my games (nevermind the other OA stuff) but while I'll be disallowing Incarnum/Tome of Magic stuff from the game, I see no reason not to allow Swashbuckler/Hexblade/Spellthief/Scout/Favored Soul/Spirit Shaman/Warlock/Warmage/Duskblade/Dragon Shaman/Knight/Marshal/Artificer
I might even let in Bo9S stuff if someone else goes and buys the book.
Personally I think it's stupid of Wizards to not make those other base classes OGL. If they really want them to catch on as base classes they need to let other people fill in some of the gaps and put their spells on their spell lists. Otherwise they'll always be relegated to extra splats.

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Personally I think it's stupid of Wizards to not make those other base classes OGL. If they really want them to catch on as base classes they need to let other people fill in some of the gaps and put their spells on their spell lists. Otherwise they'll always be relegated to extra splats.
Agreed.