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With the release of Obsidian Twilight, the latest in Pathfinder Roleplaying Game-compatible settings, I am wondering about interest/demand in new settings for the system, especially with the thoroughness of Golarion. Are folks interested in 3PP settings? If so, why?
I know I'd like to know how people feel about them. The adventure I'm developing Curse of the Emperor's Stone is the precursor to at least a city setting and likely an entire continent/world. Be nice to get thoughts on how open people are to settings from 3PP.
M
I'm not really interested in 3pp settings for Pathfinder, for which reason I haven't even looked Obsidian Twilight or most other Pathfinder compatible settings. Golarian is sufficiently large and interesting so far that I haven't needed to look elsewhere.
What I would be interested in seeing is 3pp microsettings, if that's a good term -- products that made use of Pathfinder rules to develop a lost jungle city, great harbor, desert trade city or what have you that could be dropped into any environmentally suitable location (in Golarion or not) for use in an individual campaign.
Such products should have adventure hooks rather than fully realized adventures, and focus on developing only the immediate surroundings; more than just maps but intentionally designed so that they are "Golarion compatible" without being fully integrated into a specific locale (which of course they shoundn't be in any case, not being Paizo canon products.)
I like that term, microsettings.
M
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I'm not really interested in 3pp settings for Pathfinder, for which reason I haven't even looked Obsidian Twilight or most other Pathfinder compatible settings. Golarian is sufficiently large and interesting so far that I haven't needed to look elsewhere.
What I would be interested in seeing is 3pp microsettings, if that's a good term -- products that made use of Pathfinder rules to develop a lost jungle city, great harbor, desert trade city or what have you that could be dropped into any environmentally suitable location (in Golarion or not) for use in an individual campaign.
Such products should have adventure hooks rather than fully realized adventures, and focus on developing only the immediate surroundings; more than just maps but intentionally designed so that they are "Golarion compatible" without being fully integrated into a specific locale (which of course they shoundn't be in any case, not being Paizo canon products.)
VERY informative. Please, keep it coming. Thanks!
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Yes and no. If it is a interesting well done setting that catches my imagination then yeah i would. A example Iron Kingdoms by Privateer Press was very inventive. (not flaming just expressing a opinion here) Eberon is a bad example. To me it just felt like they tried to cram to much into the setting.
A good setting has a full history, a focus and follows a internal logic. Of course finding something new and interesting to make that has not already been done is challenging.
What I would be interested in seeing is 3pp microsettings, if that's a good term -- products that made use of Pathfinder rules to develop a lost jungle city, great harbor, desert trade city or what have you that could be dropped into any environmentally suitable location (in Golarion or not) for use in an individual campaign.
First off, Microsettings is a great term!!! So great that LPJ Design will be using in the near future.
Such products should have adventure hooks rather than fully realized adventures, and focus on developing only the immediate surroundings; more than just maps but intentionally designed so that they are "Golarion compatible" without being fully integrated into a specific locale (which of course they shoundn't be in any case, not being Paizo canon products.)
You might want to check out Rite Publishing Evocative City Sites line of products. They might be what you are looking for in Microsettings product.
Microsettings is a fantastic term! We just make use of that as well.
As far as more detailed settings, we are working on one for release in late 2011, with lots of detail/fluff, including history, culture and religion. We are also in negotiations with an award-winning fantasy novelist to publish a world setting based on the author's novels. More to come on that.
Robert
4WFG
In addition, one might consider the setting of Albion Armitage's Astounding Arsenal to be a Microsetting - you can drop it into anywhere.
Mor Aldenn, the City of Magesis absolutely a microsetting as well, though some of the surrounding lands have been detailed as well.
I'm actually not that familiar with Golarion (my group plays in our own homebrew setting) so I've never really given any thought to where Mor Aldenn would be located, if anywhere... somewhere away from civilization, I guess, at the heart of an ancient forest...
- Axel
If anything... The Midnight Setting would certainly be one I'd be interested in seeing updated for PF.
Beyond that though, Golarion is suiting my needs quite nicely now.
You might want to check out Rite Publishing Evocative City Sites line of products.
I have looked at those, and such things are potentially useful but on a smaller scale than I'd been thinking -- nanosettings, if you will (and no, I don't suggest that term should be adopted as well): individual businesses or structures rather than the complexes or settlements I was thinking of.
Aside: I'd like that product line better, I think, if the format was a single .pdf rather than four or five separate files in a ZIP.
In addition, one might consider the setting of Albion Armitage's Astounding Arsenal to be a Microsetting - you can drop it into anywhere.
I can't tell from the ad copy on this whether it'd have enough scope to bypass the object I had to the Evocative City Sites above. I wasn't looking for adventures, but the advice provided in the product on scaling the adventure for different levels makes it more palatable.
Mor Aldenn, the City of Mages is absolutely a microsetting as well, though some of the surrounding lands have been detailed as well.
From the several products available describing its history, local geography, and gods, Mor Aldenn doesn't strike me as being sufficiently generic or Golarion friendly for my personal definition of "microsetting", nor does it carry the Pathfinder label.
I personally would be interested in Pathfinder-based, Golarian friendly (but not location specific) 3pp's of a scale larger than that of individual buildings but smaller than that of most countries.
A hidden valley in the mountains, an island or small archipelago, a sunken *cough*Azlanti*cough* city (wait, did Sunken Empires do this?), etc.
But there's no reason the term can't be applied to other game systems and products outside the scale I've mentioned, so Louis Porter, 4WFG and others can use any definition they like when applying that label.
AAAA starts in a city and involves a trek into the wilderness to get the titular location. It's not necessarily set anywhere specific, though the places are named - it's not necessarily in any of the lands of Golarian, for example (it can't be - 3PP can't use PF product identity) but it easily might be. If that's not a "microsetting" I'm not really sure how you're using the term.
If I have an interest in a setting, I'll buy books for it, but only when it doesn't hurt my ability to buy books for settings to which I'm already committed.
What I like is a 3rd Party setting that either includes a short adventure with it, is an adventure, or has a few small adventures published to go along with it.
That way I can buy the book and the 1 or 2 supplemental adventures for it. If I like the setting, I can run it. If I don't like the setting, I'm only out the cost of a few products and I know I've got all the resources to run it.
I'm a big Golarion supporter because I like the total-immersion aspect it has (not to mention that the setting is awesome), much like Forgotten Realms had the complete immersion angle covered in 3.x and prior, but I don't want that in all my settings because that would be too much material to keep up with.
So I guess what I like is to follow one Super-Setting line (such as Golarion or FR), and just buy enough of other settings to dabble in them should I want to run a campaign.
I currently own the 3.x core material for Golarion, FR, Ravenloft (any book I could get my hands on), Masque of the Red Death, Ghostwalk, d20 Modern: Urban Arcana, Monte Cook's World of Darkness, Eberron, Spirosblaak, Hamanuptra, Sidewider Recoiled, uh... the biblical times setting (forget its name), Thieves' World, ... and at least one more that I get mixed up with Thieves World, and probably more.
Presently toying with the idea of buying the 3.x Blackmoor stuff (if it's still available when I get to it).
So I guess my point is that I really like campaign settings and I like to buy enough to taste them, but I don't want to make a huge investment in every one that comes along.
I'm definitely interested in more settings. Golarion is very not my thing.
What is your thing?
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I'm definitely interested in more settings. Golarion is very not my thing.What is your thing?
It’s a ferocious beast with fangs like this…
I mean, anything that fits in one book, box set, or limited volumes (less than five) and has no other support is a microsetting in my book. I think the best was the three part setting that WotC/TSR did that I can’t remember the name of at the moment. :-P
I mean, anything that fits in one book, box set, or limited volumes (less than five) and has no other support is a microsetting in my book. I think the best was the three part setting that WotC/TSR did that I can’t remember the name of at the moment. :-P
Jakandor?
I mean, anything that fits in one book, box set, or limited volumes (less than five) and has no other support is a microsetting in my book. I think the best was the three part setting that WotC/TSR did that I can’t remember the name of at the moment. :-PJakandor?
Forgotten Realms?
Eberron?Dark Sun?
As much as I love Golarion, I am interested in other settings too...but they have to be significantly different. Not something to compete with Golarion, but rather a totally different idea. Dragonstar, for example (I think that's what it was called), did that with 3.5, making it like...space opera fantasy. Something like Spelljammer, too, where it's very different, or Iron Kingdoms, capturing that steampunkish type feel.
That's the direction I'd look for with other settings (not specifically steampunk necessarily, just something significantly different in feel).
LPJ Design plans to release small microsetting like Obsidian Twilight and Pirates of the Bronze Sky roughly once a year and having supplements release to support these setting depending on who well they microsetting had sold. Osbidian Twilight: A Place Beyond Hell patron project is a direct example of this type of support system.
For me I like settings, and micro-settings (Or as I call them plug-n-plays).
In homebrews I like to, on occasion, mash up various settings, or have all of them accessable. So the more unique locations the more options I have for the PCs to do.
Ho ho! These are exactly the sorts of things that come out from Open Design. Hall of the Mountain King, the Zobeck Gazetteer, and Tales of the Old Margreve. From Shore to Sea, the Paizo Adventure, tied directly into Sunken Empires, and it detailed one very small island. If you buy both in conjunction, it's a microsetting.
I was going to log in to post that I was interested in modular setting elements, a la Freeport, but I see I've already been beaten to the punch, and that a better term has already been coined, too! So... OK. You go, guys.
That said, it's unusual for me to not be interested in settings. I've always been interested in settings for D&D, and the Pathfinder rules are just an evolution of D&D. I don't know if, in the long term, it's a good thing or a bad thing that the Golarion setting and the Pathfinder rules have become so tightly tied together, when with D&D I'd frequently bounce from setting to setting -- Eberron to Iron Kingdoms to Forgotten Realms to homebrew to... well, you know.
In the short term, I think it's good, because it drives sales, and heck, I actually really quite like Golarion as a setting. But in five years, when Golarion is as detailed as Forgotten Realms was in it's late 2e heyday? Don't know.
I actually don't feel like the Pathfinder rules and the Golarion setting are all that tied together. The core book shows the iconics (which aren't actually setting-specific) and has a base set of deities and there's a PRC tied to Pathfinders...can't think of anything else. Seems no more tied to the setting than D&D 3.5 was to Greyhawk. What am I missing there?
M
I'm very eager to see what Andrew of Sagawork Studios comes up with. He has an old-school style setting I believe he is developing to house many of his products/adventures etc. While I like Golarion its a bit "all over the map" for my tastes and I would like something a little "lower fantasy" or more confined in scope.
I actually don't feel like the Pathfinder rules and the Golarion setting are all that tied together. The core book shows the iconics (which aren't actually setting-specific) and has a base set of deities and there's a PRC tied to Pathfinders...can't think of anything else. Seems no more tied to the setting than D&D 3.5 was to Greyhawk. What am I missing there?
M
I would agree, I think paizo did a good job of keeping setting material out of the rpg rules. The only direct tie is the descriptions of the races and the gods listed for the cleric, but those are easily swapped out as needed. Everything else is pretty setting neutral in my opinion, with the exception of the Pathfinder Chronicler Prestige class ofcourse, which is obviously strongly tied to the setting.
I actually don't feel like the Pathfinder rules and the Golarion setting are all that tied together. The core book shows the iconics (which aren't actually setting-specific) and has a base set of deities and there's a PRC tied to Pathfinders...can't think of anything else. Seems no more tied to the setting than D&D 3.5 was to Greyhawk. What am I missing there?
M
From a rules standpoint, yeah... it's not anymore tied to Golarion than the 3.5 game was tied to Greyhawk. But from a customer standpoint, and a product standpoint... all the things that are difficult to quantify yet incredibly important... I think Pathfinder and Golarion have been tightly tied together.
It doesn't have to have been that way, it just is, because Paizo release more setting info than anything else. And certainly you could use the Pathfinder RPG to play Eberron or Forgotten Realms or whatever... I just suspect that not many people do.
With the release of Obsidian Twilight, the latest in Pathfinder Roleplaying Game-compatible settings, I am wondering about interest/demand in new settings for the system, especially with the thoroughness of Golarion. Are folks interested in 3PP settings? If so, why?
At Raging Swan Press we've had some success with The Lonely Coast which is a free to download campaign setting. It was designed to be easily inserted into a GM's personal campaign so I guess it definitely falls into the "micro campaign setting" category. This year we are basing pretty much all our products there, although again they are easily adaptable to a GM's personal campaign. I think the key with this type of setting (and any support materials) is that they be richly detailed without referencing massive campaign changing events which a GM would have to shoehorn into his campaign backstory.
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I mean, anything that fits in one book, box set, or limited volumes (less than five) and has no other support is a microsetting in my book. I think the best was the three part setting that WotC/TSR did that I can’t remember the name of at the moment. :-PJakandor?
Heart that setting. *start digging around for it*
@LpJr design thanks for the pimpage.
@Damon Griffon
Aside: I'd like that product line better, I think, if the format was a single .pdf rather than four or five separate files in a ZIP.
I really don't know what your talking about it all does come in one PDF, the extras within that file are A4 size pdfs of the maps for the rest of the world (not the US) that does not use 8.5x11 paper.
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There is the microsetting Coliseum Morpheuon 16-20th level domain on the Plane of Dreams, that will be coming soon as we are just waiting on some paper mins and maps at this point.
Questhaven, The Evocative City will be a Urban Setting that you can plop down anywhere, as we are preparing the patronage project for that minisetting.
We are also looking at producing the Kaiden setting.
It all does come in one PDF, the extras within that file are A4 size pdfs of the maps for the rest of the world (not the US) that does not use 8.5x11 paper.
Ah! Okay, my bad. I'll go have another look.
It all does come in one PDF, the extras within that file are A4 size pdfs of the maps for the rest of the world (not the US) that does not use 8.5x11 paper.
Perhaps my confusion on this was due to the number of [apparently] identical download links I was faced with when buying these items through RPG Now:
Evocative City Sites: The Rogue's Gallery Tavern (PFRPG)
Evocative City Sites: The Rogue's Gallery Tavern (PFRPG)
Evocative City Sites: The Next Inn
Evocative City Sites: The Next Inn
Evocative City Sites: The Next Inn
Evocative City Sites: The Intimate Shape Festhall
Evocative City Sites: The Intimate Shape Festhall
Evocative City Sites: The Intimate Shape Festhall
Evocative City Sites: Lorn's Entrepot (Abandoned Warehouse)
Evocative City Sites: Lorn's Entrepot (Abandoned Warehouse)
Evocative City Sites: Lorn's Entrepot (Abandoned Warehouse)
Evocative City Sites: Kavit M. Tor’s Emporium of Collectible Curiosities
Evocative City Sites: Kavit M. Tor’s Emporium of Collectible Curiosities
Evocative City Sites: Kavit M. Tor’s Emporium of Collectible Curiosities
Evocative City Sites: Bedlam Asylum (PFRPG)
Evocative City Sites: Bedlam Asylum (PFRPG)
Evocative City Sites: Bedlam Asylum (PFRPG)
Evocative City Sites: Bedlam Asylum (PFRPG)
As far as I know I've only bought these items once (unless some of them were in the Haiti relief bundle?) as a bundle of the six titles above.
They should not be identical links I will check into this (as when I upload them I give them different names.
Edit:
I have reassigned the names of all links to be sure, could you double check for me, and see if you are still seeing things in multiples (and only Wyrd of Questhaven, Items Evolved:Rituals and Fantastic Maps: Dragon's Lair was part of the hati bundle).
@Dark Mistress. If I got it right, we agree about Eberron. I thought the setting was great, except the part where they tried to claim that if it was in D&D then it existed in Eberron. I feel that any setting will have something that just doesn't belong here. Eberron didn't have any place for a strictly Arabian or Oriental feel to it. A setting needs to have a flavor to it. There can be multiple flavors all over that world, but that doesn't mean everything produced as core Pathfinder will actually fit.
My needs for a setting are as follows:
1. Originality: Doesn’t need to be over the top, but doesn’t need that “I’ve seen this before” mentality too much.
2. Vanilla: This part of the first, really. Plain vanilla settings are out there. We don’t need another one.
3. Plug & Play: If this is a micro-setting, then it needs to be able to be plugged into an existing campaign. An example with this is “Freeport.”
4. World shaking: If it is a micro-setting, then it won’t have a special class or PrC that comes off as there are already millions of these guys out there. No micro-setting should have a base class that tries to imply they are wide-spread. That can make fitting it into a existing campaign almost impossible.
5. Don’t reinvent the wheel: If another 3pp has made something OGL that does what you want & the customers give it positive feedback, why make up your own version? If you like a monster from the Tome of Horrors, why make similar creature? Just use that one. I really wish some of you guys would get together to put out a ‘multi-publisher’ product for things that could be used for all Pathfinder based settings. Maybe you guys could collaborate on some vehicle rules or something. That way it will be pretty standard.
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Well I wasn't overly found of Eberron, I didn't think it was bad just not found of it. To me it just felt like they tried to cram to many different things into the same setting and jam them together and it didn't always work.
On the flip side one of my friends in my main gaming group loves the setting. *shrug* so each to there own.
I have reassigned the names of all links to be sure, could you double check for me, and see if you are still seeing things in multiples.
The link names appear to be identical only in RPG Now's list of products I've bought. For example, I see this on their website under My Account:
Evocative City Sites: The Next Inn
Evocative City Sites: The Next Inn
Evocative City Sites: The Next Inn
But if I "Save As", these are the names that come up:
Evocative City Sites The Next Inn.pdf
FinalExterior-NextInn2 (1).jpg
FinalInterior-NextInn2 (1).JPG
I asked RPG Now about the redundant names earlier today, and their response was "Every so often there's a small glitch that seems to append multiple download links of the same file to a single product. These are not multiple purchases and your account was not charged beyond your original purchase."
Perhaps the Customer Service rep there wasn't paying attention: these are not multiple links to a single file, but redundant link names for multiple files associated with a single purchased product.