I know a new campaign setting is due out this year but i'm thinking it's going to have some changes but the overall format will be the same. As it stands the current campaign is just way to vague for my tastes. It gives an overview of kingdoms and general history but thats about it. the details on individual towns and cities is even more vague with usually only a small caption. why is there no REAL campaign setting, like a box set? i loved how the old forgotten realms campaign had i think 2-3 books, maps and everything. there were maps on just about every city. now i know golarion is huge and all but THAT was paizos choice. i would have started out with only maybe a handful of kingdoms in a curtain area fully detailed and grew out from there. instead of leaving a hole huge world left so vague
In pathfinder every kingdom seems to have some really interesting back drop,mentions it, but never explains it. an example is numeria and the crashed ship. ok we have a HUGE plot here that brings in robots,addicting "stuff" seeping out of the ship,technology, and worse off 7 skymetals that are shipped all over golarion but only adamantine is ever mentioned-since 2008?! these are big loose ties and it seems every kingdoms has twists like this adding to it. there's more information available in adventure paths, numerous other products, on certain cities and things mentioned in the campaign setting, but i feel the campaign setting should be more complete without having to scour numerous other books and buying tons of them too. just to run a campaign.
At the least i would like maps of maybe the few largest cities in each kingdom. you know, were adventurers might actually go to spend there hard earned gold. i know i could make a map if this happens(and i can bet you 100% it will)but there lies a problem in that. If i mock up a city what happens if i run an adventure later that shows the city in detail and it's completely different!?
i plan on running kingmaker and i can bet you once players start gaining some good wealth they will seek out New Stetven as a trading haven in search of magical gear. "players-whoa skymetals!!!...WHAT ARE THOSE!!? ME-um well er you know..adamantine. player- you said metals. what other metals are there!!? IS MITHRIL A SKYMETAL!!!?" in reality i don't even know if mithril is. what else should i throw in ...vibranium? lol.
now i'm gonna try to hunt up some more books detailing the surrounding kingdoms before i run kingmaker as my players are notorious for dropping an adventure to seek out something else the find interesting. i just wish the campaign setting offered more so i didn't have to.
so in summery i'd like to see a more complete campaign setting with more than one book. maybe a general one like it is now for players but another one for the GM with more details and "goodies".
i also wouldn't mind a "complete" book series. say
a complete guide to varisia, cheliax,taldor. maybe combining some of the smaller kingdom.
im not trying to be negative i just feel Golarion was rushed and GM's are left hanging.
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The campaign setting is a broad picture of the world and is by nature not very in depth. If you want more details there are lots of books that detail the individual areas in the Chronicles and Companion series. Chronicles is a GM supplement and the Companion books are player friendly sources. These detail individual cities, countries and regions and there are tons of maps and sources for these individual regions. If you are looking for something more detailed that's where you need to look.
If you are talking about running Kingmaker there is a River Kingdoms book that's all about that area. Also, since you have kingmaker the first book in the Kingmaker series details Brevoy, the kingdom the adventure starts in.
The skymetals can be found in PF #14, and to be honest, the new book is going to be huge at 320-pages, the kind of detail you want is ridiculous to find in a campaign setting book, that's what the aforementioned Pathfinder Chronicles are for, but they can't have everything detailed already, Golarion isn't even five years old yet, Forgotten Realms is older than I am! Of course their able to present lots of in-depth detail, they built it up over the years, however I think thats a mark against FR, too much detail. If your using the Chronicles to supplement the setting book, then Golarion gets it nicely right, hell Golarion gets it pretty right with just the campaign setting.
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an example is numeria and the crashed ship. ok we have a HUGE plot here that brings in robots,addicting "stuff" seeping out of the ship,technology, and worse off 7 skymetals that are shipped all over golarion but only adamantine is ever mentioned-since 2008?!
Went to PathfinderWiki and typed in 'skymetals' in the search box. This was the first hit;
In some cases, the info is out there. In other cases, such as adventuring in Varisia, the more detailed info you want is either in the Adventure Path itself, or comes out in timely Companion products, but you do not *need* any of that, any more than I needed Empires of the South to run games set in Mulhurond and Chessenta. I just looked up info on Egypt and Greece and ran with it.
If I wanted to run a game set in Numeria, I would pillage and loot whatever information I needed from other sources. The mechanical men would use Warforged stats, the addictive liquids would use drugs from whatever sources I wanted (the Freeport Trilogy, for instance) and my own imagination (silvery liquid acts like a mix between mercury and the Spice of Dune, enhancing mental function and reflexes in the short term, but, like mercury, causing long-term degeneration, forcing the user to ingest more and more of it, and eventually needing the silvery liquid just to keep up with their normal human levels of intellect and dexterity, due to nerve damage). If I didn't already have access to seven skymetals in the article online (and through owning Second Darkness), I'd just make stuff up, drawing upon my history of reading sci-fi, fantasy and comic-books. One 'skymetal' would have gravity-reducing properties. Another would repair itself when exposed to certain stimuli (like real-world memory metals, such as nitinol, but in this case, decaying other metals it is placed near, as it somehow pillages mass from them to repair and maintain itself). A third would contain energy within itself, and be highly sought after for use in weaponry or experimental research, as a wizard could cast shocking grasp into the metal and have the electricity remain 'trapped' in the metal until some trigger releases it, allowing soldiers of the Technic League to have spearheads 'charged' with a single blast of Shocking Grasp, or something. Another would be considered a 'plague' metal because it sickens those around it (because of radiation, which the locals wouldn't be able to recognize, and regard as some sort of traditional contagion).
If, later, information on the skymetals, silvery liquid or mechanical men is published that invalidates what I've already used, I can either adjust my own half-arsed creations, or keep using them, as I wish.
With campaign settings, I find it is a balancing act between being too detailed and too vague. Too detailed, and the GM becomes "locked" in his choices, can't really do his own things, without ending up "breaking canon". Too vague, and the setting doesn't seem alive. Obviously, different people have different ideas of what is too much and what is too little.
Yeah, I sometimes used to feel like TSR was keeping Greyhawk vague and Forgotten Realms detailed to appeal to different audiences who liked different levels of detail. I realize that wasn't REALLY TSR's thinking, but I did feel like that was the end result.
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Went to PathfinderWiki and typed in 'skymetals' in the search box. This was the first hit;
Set beat me to it. The Wiki has information on many subjects. But keep in mind it is much more encyclopedic than the books, so might not always be as fun reading, and is much more limited in the scope of the art we can use (just that which is opne as part of the community use policy or fanart). I know there are some people who use the wiki just to find out where additional information on a given subject is, and then read about it in the firsthand resource. We do have over 3022 topics and counting covered - usually each has at least 3 sentences. BrandingOp from the boards here has also been adding a bunch of things from the river kingdoms book in the last month or so. Most of the nouns from the current campaign setting book should be present in the wiki, and about 75% of them should have articles..
Personally I like Paizo's approach, it allows you to ignore information in the books you aren't going to use, but most of the relevant information on locations are in the 'Guide to...' books, which are easy to identify
I believe that Paizo does all this on purpose, to avoid the 'Canon Curse'.
so in summery i'd like to see a more complete campaign setting with more than one book. maybe a general one like it is now for players but another one for the GM with more details and "goodies".
i also wouldn't mind a "complete" book series. say
a complete guide to varisia, cheliax,taldor. maybe combining some of the smaller kingdom.
You mean like the Pathfinder Companion: Cheliax or the Pathfinder Companion: Taldor. Both of which are designed for players. Or the Pathfinder Chronicles: Guide to Korvosa or the book Pathfinder Chronicles: Into the Darklands for the GM?
there were maps on just about every city.
This book and similar covers that.
What you are asking for, Paizo is doing, they are simply not doing that in the Campaign Setting itself. IMO, the CS is a book of broad brush strokes that you can graph your own ideas onto if you are a tinkerer or you can create an NPC that is from (for example) Qadira when you need a desert dweller and don't have the book that covers Qadira or Balkzen when you need a high level Orc to be a general but your players do not want to believe that any Orc can make it that high.
i loved how the old forgotten realms campaign had i think 2-3 books, maps and everything. there were maps on just about every city.
Two things to keep in mind:
TSR lost money on every single box set they ever sold. Think about that for a moment: if it cost them $10 per unit (and that's a guess) on every box set they produced and they only made $8 back in revenue off each set, they lost $2 for every set they sold. That is (and was) a quick way to kill your own company.
We've looked at boxed sets and they're just not economically feasible. In order to produce a box set on par with the Forgotten Realms box set for Golarion, we'd have to charge $100+ for it and I don't imagine we'd sell enough to make it worth the time and investment to produce and print it.
Second thing to keep in mind is that it was our stated goal to create a campaign setting where nearly any style of play could find a home. Want a backdrop of revolution and murder? Galt! Want sci-fi elements with laser guns and robots? Numeria! Want a highly political campaign with back-stabbing nobility? Taldor! Want a good-guy campaign fighting slavery and oppression? Andoran! And so on and so forth. We give GMs and players the framework of our world with as much information as we cram into our source books, but we prefer to let the GMs and players adjust and expand our world as it befits their game.
To be sure, we're releasing products in the Companion and Chronicles line that further explore many Golarion locations and will likely continue to do so for as long as our customers keep buying them, but to be able to put a complete campaign setting into one book with everything you're asking for would not only be the biggest book we've ever done but would also run into the cost issues I mentioned above re: the box set.
TSR lost money on every single box set they ever sold.
There is no way that that sentence isn't scary.
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I believe that Paizo does all this on purpose, to avoid the 'Canon Curse'.
THIS. I like SOME detail. Maybe detail one site in each kingdom that every visitor should see, but leave the rest fairly open.
TSR lost money on every single box set they ever sold. Think about that for a moment: if it cost them $10 per unit (and that's a guess) on every box set they produced and they only made $8 back in revenue off each set, they lost $2 for every set they sold. That is (and was) a quick way to kill your own company.
That sounds more like a stupid business decision with regard to price setting as opposed to evidence that boxed sets cannot be profitable. People are paying 50 bucks for some rulebooks, what's another 10 for a good boxed set?
That sounds more like a stupid business decision with regard to price setting as opposed to evidence that boxed sets cannot be profitable. People are paying 50 bucks for some rulebooks, what's another 10 for a good boxed set?
Josh isn't saying they charged $8 for a $10 box set. He's saying the amount of money that came back to them, after the retailers and distributors took their cut, and after writing off the units that never actually sold, there was a loss.
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Josh isn't saying they charged $8 for a $10 box set. He's saying the amount of money that came back to them, after the retailers and distributors took their cut, and after writing off the units that never actually sold, there was a loss.
Yeah, like Josh said, he was producing arbitrary numbers as an example.
I personally like a level of vagueness. The fear that you showed of not wanting to mock up a map of a city, only to have it replaced when it's finally 'actually' detailed, is simple to fix: just tell your players that in your Golarion, this is what the city looks like, and more importantly that in your games, when you and the book disagree, the GM is always right.
If everything is finely detailed, I run into the problem of periodic arguments of what is and isn't canon, stacked on top of the monstrous task of trying to memorize a massive amount of information. Too much work for most working GMs.
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That sounds more like a stupid business decision with regard to price setting as opposed to evidence that boxed sets cannot be profitable. People are paying 50 bucks for some rulebooks, what's another 10 for a good boxed set?Josh isn't saying they charged $8 for a $10 box set. He's saying the amount of money that came back to them, after the retailers and distributors took their cut, and after writing off the units that never actually sold, there was a loss.
*takes a huge sigh*
Of course those weren't real numbers... I owned many boxed sets, thank you, so I am very well aware that they did not cost 8 dollars.
Simply put, if you're losing money on each unit sold, it's because you made bad business decisions. Whether it's too low of a price, shipping too many units, vastly over/underestimating demand, whatever.
Let me clarify my original statement. You seem to be hung up on the fact that my hypothetical example also used 10 dollars. If people will pay 50 bucks for a rulebook, I'd be willing to bet they would pay another 10 and get a good boxed set for 60 bucks.
Let me clarify my original statement. You seem to be hung up on the fact that my hypothetical example also used 10 dollars. If people will pay 50 bucks for a rulebook, I'd be willing to bet they would pay another 10 and get a good boxed set for 60 bucks.
Yes, but it was suggested, in this thread, that at some point when this was investigated, it would cost more than a 100 dollars for a good box set as opposed to $60.
From the descriptions, it seems that the cost of making (and transporting) a book and that of a box set are set far apart.
When dealing with other industries, packaging is often a HUGE cost (if not THE biggest cost) of products.
There was a time that the cup cost KFC more than the soda in it...
well i guess im one of the rare GM's who like an overly fleshed out setting. to me the point of playing in a campaign setting is to explore someone else world and take on fantasy and to have the design done for you. If i have to go about building up a world i might as well design my own.
now i know it would be unfeasible to map every city and hamlet but i don't think it is unfeasible to have a few maps of say, the kindom capitals or biggest cities.
"We've looked at boxed sets and they're just not economically feasible. In order to produce a box set on par with the Forgotten Realms box set for Golarion, we'd have to charge $100+ for it and I don't imagine we'd sell enough to make it worth the time and investment to produce and print it."
i would easily pay 100-150 bucks for such a campaign setting. and i think others would too. when you keep in mind all the books that would be needed to purchase to get just a little more info on a few things it could easily go into the 300-400 dollar range for all those other books. And the other books would still sell. even if the campaign setting had more info on varisia for instance and a city map or 2 i would still purchase a completely detailed book on varisia.
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I think you are underestimating how much content is out there. Check the wiki for information on Varisia and check the references at the bottom of the page. There is tons of information on the cities and places in the various sources.
The only sort of bummer is that a good number of these sources are Adventure Paths, personally I find they are worthwhile to own regardless but if you don't want to get the APs then you are not going to have the deep depth you seem to want.
Generally I only want/ need the depth of information on a specific area I am running a campaign in and can chase that down with reasonably few sources. If you just want everything on geography just to have it then you are going to have to chase down a lot of books with other content (for example Magnimar is detailed in Rise of the Runelords).
It doesn't sound like you've looked through the chronicles and companions lines at all and that is where the bulk of what you want is. Campaign setting is birds eye, Chronicles/ Companions are street view.
How well did Ptolus do business wise? That might be a good model for a highly detailed, well-made and expensive product.
If Paizo just copies other settings, we won't get original settings. They'll feel bland.
well i guess im one of the rare GM's who like an overly fleshed out setting. to me the point of playing in a campaign setting is to explore someone else world and take on fantasy and to have the design done for you. If i have to go about building up a world i might as well design my own.
now i know it would be unfeasible to map every city and hamlet but i don't think it is unfeasible to have a few maps of say, the kindom capitals or biggest cities.
"We've looked at boxed sets and they're just not economically feasible. In order to produce a box set on par with the Forgotten Realms box set for Golarion, we'd have to charge $100+ for it and I don't imagine we'd sell enough to make it worth the time and investment to produce and print it."
i would easily pay 100-150 bucks for such a campaign setting. and i think others would too. when you keep in mind all the books that would be needed to purchase to get just a little more info on a few things it could easily go into the 300-400 dollar range for all those other books. And the other books would still sell. even if the campaign setting had more info on varisia for instance and a city map or 2 i would still purchase a completely detailed book on varisia.
What you are asking for, is being done. Completely. Its just not in a box. That's the only difference. There's several hundred dollars you can spend on Pathfinder's setting material between the Chronicles and Companion material.
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How well did Ptolus do business wise? That might be a good model for a highly detailed, well-made and expensive product.If Paizo just copies other settings, we won't get original settings. They'll feel bland.
How did you get that from my question? I just want to know if there is a succesful precedent for the business of producing an expensive RPG product and charging a lot of money for it.
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 32
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I dragged out my old Forgotten Realms collection. The 2nd edition boxed set has ... very little on all the villages around waterdeep. You have to buy a supplement to get a few paragraphs. Checking "Waterdeep and the North" I find... 8 pages detailing everything in the area. Let's pick a town, Sundabar:
SUNDABAR
This fortified city, once home to dwarves,now houses men. Extensively rebuilt by men friendly to dwarves, it now trades with Citadel Adbar and Silverymoon, and can field an army of 2000 to turn back orc hordes. Its coffers were rich enough to hire the Flaming Fist mercenary company (see THE FORGOTTEN REALMS™ Campaign Set)once, to swing through Dead Orc Pass and fall upon an orc horde from behind. Great was the slaughter that day, and great the victory of men and dwarves.
Sundabar's population averages 36,000,and it is ruled by Helm Dwarf-friend, Master of Sundabar (NG 14th level fighter). Sundabar is known for its woodworkers, who produce carved furniture, musical instruments,
and travel-chests of unusual beauty and durability.
And that's it. Somewhere like Daggerford is indeed spectacularly drawn in "The North: Guide to the Savage Frontier" Gorgeous map, plenty of info - but in a separate product to the campaign guide. I honestly don't see how the Pathfinder Campaign Guide does not compare at the level of 'painting with broad strokes'. All the detail is in the various regional guides and they are being published as fast as they can be pronounced worthy. I think it's just as good as the 2nd edition box, followed by a zillion supplements (The Realms are always going to be unbeatable because they came out when I was 16 and playing D&D every night.)
Sure, I would love to see a few boxed sets and massive maps like in the yellow Waterdeep box or the grey FR box, but I would never call the Pathfinder Campaign Setting vague and lacking - the Realms were the same once.
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It's funny, just the other day I was thinking that Golarion has grown a good deal faster than any of the other campaign settings that I've seen that have come into existance since I've been in the hobby. Sure, it's not got nearly the amount of information out that that the Forgotten Realms or Dragonlance have, but those settings have been around for decades. Golarion has only been around for two and a half years, and I'd say the amount of source material and availible detail are equal to that of many campaign settings that have been around for 2-3 times longer.
Like people have pointed out, if you're only looking at the hardcover Campaign setting, you are missing a LOT. There's the whole Companion and Chronicle lines of products, and roughly half of each Adventure Path is supplementary material that builds upon the world.
why is there no REAL campaign setting, like a box set? i loved how the old forgotten realms campaign had i think 2-3 books, maps and everything.
Which FR boxed set are you referring too? Neither the Old Grey Box, nor the 1993 revision, contain substantively more detail than the Pathfinder campaign setting.
The former contained about 192 pages of content, including new spells and and adventure information on Myth Drannor (if memory serves correctly, I still have it in storage).
The 1993 revision contained a 128 book of general campaign detail, including deities, cosmology and recent history (time of troubles). A shorter 96 page book with much more detailed information on Shadowdale, as well as complete adventure for level 1 pcs, was also included. (224 pages, total)
Compare this to the unrevised Pathfinder Campaign setting, which is chock-full of 256 pages worth of Crunch and Fluff, without any page count given away to a full adventure for low level pcs.
I like the broad brush strokes and the "openess" of Golarion. I like doing my own homebrew stuff without worrying too much about interfering with canon or some change that will occur later.
I prefer the vagueness.
That said, I find that between the campaign book, the Chronicles, and the Pathfinder modules, there's plenty of detail there!
Plus, Golarian is only a few years old, it doesn't have decades of development the way the Realms did.
How did you get that from my question? I just want to know if there is a succesful precedent for the business of producing an expensive RPG product and charging a lot of money for it.How well did Ptolus do business wise? That might be a good model for a highly detailed, well-made and expensive product.If Paizo just copies other settings, we won't get original settings. They'll feel bland.
Ah, I thought you were referring to the level of detail. My 'stake.
well i guess im one of the rare GM's who like an overly fleshed out setting. to me the point of playing in a campaign setting is to explore someone else world and take on fantasy and to have the design done for you. If i have to go about building up a world i might as well design my own.
now i know it would be unfeasible to map every city and hamlet but i don't think it is unfeasible to have a few maps of say, the kindom capitals or biggest cities.
"We've looked at boxed sets and they're just not economically feasible. In order to produce a box set on par with the Forgotten Realms box set for Golarion, we'd have to charge $100+ for it and I don't imagine we'd sell enough to make it worth the time and investment to produce and print it."
i would easily pay 100-150 bucks for such a campaign setting. and i think others would too. when you keep in mind all the books that would be needed to purchase to get just a little more info on a few things it could easily go into the 300-400 dollar range for all those other books. And the other books would still sell. even if the campaign setting had more info on varisia for instance and a city map or 2 i would still purchase a completely detailed book on varisia.
I don't want to shell out $100 to $200 for a campaign setting.. but there seems to be plenty of extra info on various regions in Golarion in the PF Companians & Guides to.. books.Sure I'd like a regional map of each covered region , which wasn't done in the origional book. It wouldn't hurt to have a basic map of a key town or city for each core kingdom , to be fleshed out later in a companion. I liked the book but wished there was a bit more info but it wasn't nessessary.
This being my first setting I ever bought I was unsure of what to expect. I was going back and forth between Dragonlance and Golarion. Due the death of 3.5 I went with Golarion even though I got the 3.5 version of the setting. I've been using it for about a year now and love it. It has helped me give my games more depth. The many different types of government, climants, lots of places for player hooks, and a rich history. The support books the release every month or two and a steal at $20 each. So over all I like this setting a lot and my players do as well.
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*shakes head*
Let me start by saying I have both editions of the Forgotten Realms Campaign (box)Set. I also have the City of Splendors, The North, and an incomplete Menzoberranzan.
In any case the original boxset covers far less of the Realms then the Pathfinder CS. I'm not even talking about the silly add-on settings people either like or hate. I'm talking about Faerun proper here, there's the whole middle chuck on faerun that's not covered or barely covered. As for the "town descriptions" you mention, go back and have a look. It's less then 3 paragraphs and most are barely over a dozen sentences.
Now I love AD&D and 3e Realms, but I really don't want it any boxset to be like that ever again. If there ever was a boxset I would want Paizo to emulate, it'd be Necromancer's City of Brass set. THAT however came with a $70 price tag and was full black & white, something I know Paizo isn't going to do.
If we were to look at anything, one would have to look at the new Dragon Age boxset by Green Ronin, $30 full color with around 130 pages and realize you don't want a campaign setting to ever come like that.
He's saying the amount of money that came back to them, after the retailers and distributors took their cut, and after writing off the units that never actually sold, there was a loss.
Especially that bold part there. When Wizards came in to run an inventory check on TSR, their warehouse was full of stuff that just was never going to sell, ever. (Dragon Dice was a major culprit.) It was effectively valued at nothing.
Hey, don't knock Dragon Dice! Everyone expected to sell 500,000 units, but She Who Must Be Obeyed wanted them from the manufacturer at a lower cost per unit, and that required a print run of 1,000,000 units... even though everyone told her they'd probably only sell 500,000. Sure enough, the game sold 500,000 units (wow!)... and the rest sat there.
That's why smart companies are VERY cautious about their print runs.
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I have to scratch my head about the whole boxed set thing.
Yes I have boxed sets, Yes I'm keeping them out of love. But honestly, it's time to move beyond the boxed set. I don't know what it is currently, but backwards is not the way to go.
I think that the setting is evolving fine and the companion and chronicle books are doing nicely. How they will morph in the future will prove interesting.
There is currently only one thing that I can see a boxed set working and that's a starter "rules light" set.
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Campaign Setting - 256 pages (soon to be replaced with 320 pg book)
64pg Chronicles - 1088 pages (I counted 17 of these)
32pg Companions - 288 pages (I counted 9 of these)
Adventure Path - 1550 pages (approximate 50 pg each for 31 volumes)
3,182 total pages of Pathfinder campaign setting material
And this excludes the adventure portion of the Adventure Path volumes, the modules, the Pathfinder Society scenarios, map folios, card sets, etc.
Yes, some of this is duplicate material, but I'd say that's pretty damn impressive for a campaign setting that's only been around for two and a half years.
Oh, and every couple of months we get approximately 260 more pages. (Two 64 page Chronicles, one 32 page Companion, and 100 pages of Adventure Path supplementary material).
I am not familar with the Golarian setting, but the two world campaign releases I enjoyed the most are the original world of greyhawk. I liked the stats on each city, including resources, and minor writes ups on areas of interest, race migrations, religious or political systems. The other world I liked was Dragonlance: Dragons of Time (Taladas). I loved the source book describing each land, and really focused on describing the dominant races, and political relations to surrounding countries. The latter even had a map of the ruling Minotour city for the continent, versus the standard map of the continent.
I believe that is enough to run a world, and not drive up the price with mulitple maps or related source books.
Both were very basic compared to forgotten realms.
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Campaign Setting - 256 pages (soon to be replaced with 320 pg book)
64pg Chronicles - 1088 pages (I counted 17 of these)
32pg Companions - 288 pages (I counted 9 of these)
Adventure Path - 1550 pages (approximate 50 pg each for 31 volumes)3,182 total pages of Pathfinder campaign setting material
Pretty sure he's talking about the actual campaign setting hardback, not the campaign setting as a whole including all the accessories.
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I agree, at least in spirit, with the OP.
I decided not to purchase the Campaign Setting because it is so young. How could Paizo publish it with any detail at all -- details simply didn't exist?
Instead I decided to purchase the occassional Chronicles Guide. They're all made after the Campaign Setting & some world development (from APs and such). Plus, they're released as they're getting some specific development (for an AP usually). It just seemed to make more sense to get the Chronicles Guides that seemed to be interesting and useful.
Unfortunately, I've been really disapointed with the ones I have so far: Absalom, Katapesh, Seekers of Secrets and Cheliax (which isn't even a real Chronicles Guide but merely a flimsy Companion -- blech). It seems as if the principle behind the Chronicles Guides isn't let's publish some specific details of Fluff for X to "flesh out" this region of Golarion but instead seems to be let's publish more very broad, quite general information of Fluff for X.
Now, this is perfectly fine; lots of customers are likely looking for exactly that. I'm just one customer that's disapointed -- well, and the OP.
My real complaint is the lack of maps. It is really weak that we don't get good maps with these Chronicles Guides. The inside front covers may be a good place but the maps themselves have been a gross disapointment. Westcrown's is banal and Absalom's is so small you need a magnifying glass; Egorian's is interesting but Katapesh's is really poor -- one can't even tell it's in a desert-like area and apparently only about 200 people can live there cuz that's all the houses could support.
Now, for me to purchase more than the extremely occassional Chronicles Guide I'm going to want a poster map. A poster map of Absalom should have been absolute in its book. A poster map of Katapesh (the region) would've been appropriate and had Cheliax been a Chronicles Guide (which it should have been), a poster map of that region would have been good.
Hey, don't knock Dragon Dice!
Not intentionally knocking the actual game of Dragon Dice, sorry. I should have clarified that the management thereof was a big culprit, and it certainly was. (Even moreso than I remembered. You can choke a Tarrasque and shut off its regeneration with 500K sets.)
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Unfortunately, I've been really disapointed with the ones I have so far: Absalom, Katapesh, Seekers of Secrets and Cheliax (which isn't even a real Chronicles Guide but merely a flimsy Companion -- blech). It seems as if the principle behind the Chronicles Guides isn't let's publish some specific details of Fluff for X to "flesh out" this region of Golarion but instead seems to be let's publish more very broad, quite general information of Fluff for X.
I have to admit I'm surprised that people find the Guide to Absalom flimsy. I keep pooring over it and have to say that I have found "Let's Go Guides" not as detailed as that publication.
I often point to the guide as a indication of how to understand Pathfinder Socienty Factions interact with each other.
Perhaps I'm just not understanding it, other than the Map (which I can understand your view point, I'd like a poster map of Absalom too.) What part did you find lacking.
Personally the only thing that I have been wondering are the stats for "Gillmen" But I think that I can get that with human + aquatic template.
I think they keep in vague by design. For two reasons number 1 so their is more material for you to buy by adding details to the world. And the other one is so indvidual DMs can add details of what they want to the world. Its a skeleton that they are slowly adding flesh to and it alows you flesh out stuff also
Lamenting the death of the box set is a favorite hobby of mine. I'd like to move in a different direction from my traditional gripes so here goes.....
in effect Paizo is providing something of a modular Golarion box set with the release of a 320 page campaign guide, inner sea primer and the additional map folio.
What did a box set consist of back in the day?
Perhaps a 128 campaign book..... 96 page campaign guide..... 32 page adventure.... 256 pages in total coupled with between 2 and 4 maps and some fancy full page cards with some extra goodies.
Shove the 320 page book, the player primer, and the map folio in a shoe box wrapped in the 3.5 Thrives Poster and you can almost smell that new box set scent.
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I think they keep in vague by design. For two reasons number 1 so their is more material for you to buy by adding details to the world. And the other one is so indvidual DMs can add details of what they want to the world. Its a skeleton that they are slowly adding flesh to and it alows you flesh out stuff also
it also allows them to write adventures set there without disturbing canon.. if they had cannon lawyers saying "there's no castle in that part of the city it's a fur shop, shield shop and blacksmith"
it also allows them to write adventures set there without disturbing canon.. if they had cannon lawyers saying "there's no castle in that part of the city it's a fur shop, shield shop and blacksmith"
More of a great reason to keep it vague
it also allows them to write adventures set there without disturbing canon.. if they had cannon lawyers saying "there's no castle in that part of the city it's a fur shop, shield shop and blacksmith"More of a great reason to keep it vague
I like an intense level of detail. At the same time I don't mind redrawing a map, changing city locations, and killing off major NPCs to suit my particular campaign. Which brings me to my next thought....
why do we let canon lawyers or should I say fear of canon lawyers dictate products?
I think our society has an awful capacity to let the people who complain the loudest dictate what everyone else receives. We should spread the same misery canon lawyers' attempt to shovel onto players and dms who don't mind sculpting a campaign world to their own tastes...
Canon Lawyer: Whoa the campaign guide doesn't say that island is in this particular stretch of ocean.
DM: Yeah well the campaign guide didn't also say anything about the pizza i provided for the game. Based upon the stains on your shirt collar I daresay you confirmed the existence of the pizza. So where were we?
Canon Lawyer: Sailing in a galleon toward a non regulation unconfirmed island.
DM: ah yes. Well I decided to rewind progress levels a bit and revised sailing technology. The ability to produce galleons is no longer available. You are currently splashing around in the water and attempting not to sink under the weight of your armor.
The hell with internal consistency.