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The Starstone doesn't "ascend" anyone. Every single person who has taken the "test" was incinerated to a crisp. It is pure dumb luck, but statistically inevitable given the sheer number of people who risk it, that four people - Aroden, Iomedae, Norgorber and Cayden - already had a spark of divine potential that endured after their corporeal forms were destroyed they survived. There is in fact no test at all, which is why nobody who has passed remembers it, the stone is merely imbued with tremendous and thoroughly uncontrollable power. Aroden put it in a very public and open place for anyone brave or stupid enough to try because he couldn't harness it as a power source, and thought it was a useful way to either dispose of potential rival aspiring demigods, or at least distract them from more viable methods.
The other three Ascended are unaware of their tremendous fortune, and Aroden told nobody the secret before he died. But if one of them had, they all had reason to kill him - Cayden would have killed him for getting people needlessly killed and then be unable to reveal it without diminishing his own worship, Iomedae would have killed him for allowing his most able and dedicated servant nearly kill herself because he saw her as nothing more than a threat to his own power then as a useful tool when it failed, and likewise be unable to reveal the secret without diminishing her worshippers, and Norgorber doesn't need a reason and his worshippers wouldn't care, but he would appreciate the delicious irony of being the last one to know.
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The real reason orcs have such a martial culture is that they have been fighting a long and bloody war against a cabal of evil interplanar wizards throughout the span of history and, some posit that they will do so again. These evil wizards drove several species to extinction in their quest for power and completely wiped out an ancient civilization of dark elves deep below the surface. The changes their foul and arcane contracts wreak upon the fabric of reality rippling outwards without respect to any natural law, changing past, present, and future with impunity.
Even now, the malign influence of these wizards can be found in the pages of disused arcane treatises and bestiaries that refer to common spells by strange names, make reference to an entirely different taxonomy of dragons, or assert the existence of universal moral constants. Rumor has it that in seeking these scraps of ephemera out, one can learn more about the dire threat that still lurks beyond the walls of our reality in their isolated towers along a blasted and benighted coast on some other world.
I think a funny way to do a conspiracist character would be for your character to believe in some of the craziest stuff that happened in other Adventure Paths that the player would know because of their personal familiarity with the story but the character would have no way of knowing.
Obviously you don't want to spoil other players on other stories, since that would be rude. But stuff like "Elves are actually aliens" and "The Necronomicon is in Casmaron" should fly.
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I think a funny way to do a conspiracist character would be for your character to believe in some of the craziest stuff that happened in other Adventure Paths that the player would know because of their personal familiarity with the story but the character would have no way of knowing.
Obviously you don't want to spoil other players on other stories, since that would be rude. But stuff like "Elves are actually aliens" and "The Necronomicon is in Casmaron" should fly.
See... this is all well and good. But what you really gotta do is bring in your character from a custom setting home game. Some day, I'm going to take my very relaxed magical trust-fund kid Thistil and drop him in a Golarian game, acting on the wrong setting's lore.
"The gods we know are only those that remained behind and didn't ascend, clinging to their thrones.""Nobody knows for certain what happened to the gnomes, and I'm personally not sure what is pretending to be them now."
"The god of war maintains an endless cycle of self, cheating the natural order by overtaking each usurper's being- wait, what do you mean he's dead? When did that happen?"
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The halflings' True Name for themselves is not secret, nor has it been forgotten. It was hidden, locked away in a magical vault on a forgotten demiplane by ancient wizards. If it is ever found, every single one shall assume their true forms and join the ranks of their kin, the giants.
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I think a funny way to do a conspiracist character would be for your character to believe in some of the craziest stuff that happened in other Adventure Paths that the player would know because of their personal familiarity with the story but the character would have no way of knowing.
Obviously you don't want to spoil other players on other stories, since that would be rude. But stuff like "Elves are actually aliens" and "The Necronomicon is in Casmaron" should fly.
I once had an idea for a conspiracist character along similar line back when the OGL controversy was fresh, in that the conspiracies were just things from the game's predecessor that didn't exist in Pathfinder's universe or don't work that way:
"No, seriously! Neothelids are mutated larvae of a species of emotionless, psychic, squid-headed people who live in the Darklands and eat brains! They reproduce by inserting their tadpoles into your ear or something (and apparently it goes kinda funny if they use gnomes as the host for some reason), and it turns you into one of them! Neothelids are what happen if one of those tadpoles never gets put in someone, they just keep growing and never develop beyond animal-level instincts! What?! Neothelids are intelligent?! NONSENSE!"
"You gotta believe me! There are chickens in the Outer Rifts! Flesh-eating demon chickens!!!"
"Whadaya mean "Hell?" Aren't there nine of them? There are? But they're just called Hell collectively instead of "The Nine Hells?" WHADAYA MEAN ASMODEUS HAD A BROTHER?!"
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Orcs and dwarves were once slaves of an Orvian race of 'Vault Builders' whose name and origins are mostly forgotten (deliberately so, by the dwarves, and as a result of negligent interest in accuracy or record-keeping on the case of the orcs). They were pitted against each other by their cruel masters, even as slaves, and finally broke free of their master's pattern and worked together, for one shining moment, to escape their slavery and throw down their masters, before an act which was seen as a last desperate chance to preserve their people (the dwarves) or a craven act of betrayal and leaving their allies to fight and die while they cut and ran (the orcs), neither of whom remember it all that accurately, ended that fragile truce, and the dwarves and orcs have been more or less at war ever since, with orcs, in particular, nursing an ancient grudge at the dwarven 'betrayers.'
Orcs maintain that not only is this great betrayal fact, that the dwarves eldest know it, and is the reason why dwarven culture *trains* its youth from an early in techniques to kill orcs *specifically,* because it is a vital secret to their culture that they never admit they owe their own freedom from ancient slavery to orcs. They would rather slaughter every orc than allow this inglorious history to be remembered!
***
Razmir is Aroden, returned. He has been reincarnated, as the god of humanity, in this new form, and is proving his 'right' to be a god by walking the long and difficult road of incarnating once again as a human man, and pursuing his long-lost divinity. This is not the first time he has done this, either. It is the *nature* of the god of humanity to spend the first five or ten decades of each cycle as a mortal man, to better understand and identify with humanity, before ascending to divinity for another millenium. He's on the cusp of returning, and has begun to call the old adherents of Aroden, the loyal families and Harbinger 'cultists' to Razmiran, to be present for his much promised return.
The god of humanity is dead! Long live the god of humanity!
[Razmir himself loves this conspiracy theory and allows his inner circle to think he came up with it himself, but he's just taken advantage of some fringe Harbinger theory, and twisted it to take advantage of these flailing fools, so *desperate* for any sign of their dead gods triumphant return. He's even got a few priests scattered about to various areas where the Harbingers tend to lurk, fulfilling various 'prophecies' through arcane chicanery, to 'prove' that Aroden's return is gloriously nigh.
If your target demographic is 'gullible, desperate fools,' not trying to get the Harbingers on your side is just leaving money on the table!]
***
Norgorber has a theory about divinity. He has a long and complicated plan, which the Anaphexia are, unknowingly, helping him to enact. Records about certain 'lesser' gods like Hanspur, Gyronna, Naderi and Glaunder, mostly gods with few or no allies (or allies he sees as weak or noncommital, like Shelyn in the case of Naderi), are disappearing, or subject to revision. Some information is planted, other information changed, and still other information is removed not only from the written record, but 'redacted' by murdering those who know and speak of it. The ultimate goal is to see if, or how, mortal *perception* of divinity affects divinity itself. Can Norgorber make a god weaker, or stronger, or *not even a god anymore*, through changing the way mortals see them? It's worth a shot!
And if he has to employ half the assassins in Daggermark to subtly kill and / or discredit anyone who has ever heard about the worship of Hanspur to do it, and the rivers of the River Kingdoms run red with their blood, that's a price he's willing to pay!
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Ioun Stones of the Orrery of the Ancients
This chamber, located at the top of one of the few intact towers in Hyrantum, contains a most unusual orrery. At the center, over a meter across and lit by continual flame, is a stone sphere covered with fanciful giltwork representing the sun.
Orbiting it at vastly scaled down distances, and vastly scaled up speeds, are eleven ioun stones, representing the planets of Golarion's system, and as long as they orbit the central sphere, and she remains within the 20 ft. diameter chamber, the lich astronomer who resides in this tower benefits from the stones as if she had personally equipped them.
The stones cannot be removed from this room so long as the lich is active, but even if she is only temporarily dispatched (her phylactery not found to 'finish the job') her link to the stones is sufficiently disrupted for them to be seized as treasure. (When she reforms, she may well decide to track down the thieves are reclaim them...)
Aballon The smallest and closest orbiting stone to the 'sun,' this tiny grey iron sphere is barely the size of a peppercorn, and moves so quickly as to be a barely visible blur, making it both the smallest and fastest-moving ioun stone yet seen. When equipped, it's bearer gains a +5 ft. bonus to all speeds, and suffers no penalty to their Armor Class for taking the Charge action. Three times per day, when the user would take a 5 ft. step, they can move 10 ft. instead (with the usual benefits of a 5 ft. step). Once per day, they can ignore difficult terrain for a single round's movement.
Castrovel This cloudy green malachite sphere is the size of a grape, and confers upon it's bearer the Favored Terrain (jungle) and Favored Enemy (plants) class features of a 1st level Ranger. If the bearer already has these features, these bonuses stack. Additionally, the bearer gets their Favored Enemy bonus to the saving throws of natural attacks from creatures with the Plant type, or from poisons derived from plants.
Golarion This mostly opaque brownish amber sphere contains a barely visible miniscule fossil centipede deep within it, and is crisscrossed by hair-thin adamantine wires across it's surface, culminating in six tiny spikes, not even a quarter of an inch high. Representing destructive power constrained, the stone grants it's bearer +2 to both CMB and CMD to initiate or defend against a Sunder maneuver, and ignores the first 2 points of Hardness when they attempt to Sunder something. Their own equipment benefits from 2 additional points of Hardness against attempts to Sunder it, in turn. Finally, whenever the bearer would inflict damage that would reduce a creature to less than zero hit points, they can choose instead to reduce the creature to exactly zero hit points, and stable.
Akiton This banded red agate sphere allows the bearer to benefit from the Ferocity trait of a half-orc, usable a number of times per day equal to their Constitution modifier (minimum once). If they already have this trait, they can use it one additional time, and can also choose to be affected by a rage spell whenever at or below zero hit points, as long as they remain conscious.
Verces This zebra jasper sphere is black on one side and white on the other, and orbits in such a way that one side is always facing the bearer (or the sun, if 'equipped' in the Orrery of Ancients). If the white side faces the bearer, they benefit from Cold Resistance 5. If the black side faces the bearer, they benefit from Fire Resistance 5. The facing can be changed by the bearer as a standard action (that provokes an attack of opportunity). Either form of resistance is doubled against nonlethal damage of that energy type, such as from environmental extremes of cold or heat.
Eox This fire obsidian sphere lacks the brilliant display of the finest specimens, and is solid black, save for a faint impression of three green 'flames' within it, resembling somewhat the 'Man in the Moon,' or the figure from Monet's 'The Scream,' two eyes and a mouth open wide. When equipped, the bearer can speak and understand Necril, and has a +2 bonus to saving throws versus the supernatural abilities and attacks of undead or spells from the Death Domain or Wizards School of Necromancy. Additionally, a number of times equal to the bearers Intelligence modifier (at least once) per day, when the user makes a Knowledge skill check, whispered voices (can be heard as if he was receiving a Message spell, although the whispers are in Necril), the bearer can roll again on this Knowledge check and take the best result.
Triaxus This multicolored copper turquoise sphere has bands of warm orange and cool blue, and is warm to the touch when the ambient temperature is cold, and cool to the touch when the ambient temperature is warm. The bearer is always protected by an endure elements effect, and has a +2 to saving throws versus cold or fire effects, including extremes of cold or heat. It orbits so slowly as to appear immobile, it's stately progression only noticeable over the course of many days observation.
Liavara One of the two largest ioun stones ever seen, this grapefruit sized peach colored cloudy moonstone seems to radiate calm certainty. The bearer benefits from a +4 saving throw versus the nightmare spell, or similar effects that would assault their dreams, a +4 to Perception checks when they are asleep, and they are never flat-footed when surprised (even if they still do not get an action in the surprise round, if caught off-guard).
Bretheda The second grapefruit-sized labradorite sphere contains bands of dark blue and purple, and allows the bearer to cast alter self (CL 10) on themself at will. No matter what trait they choose to benefit from, their appearance does not change more than superficially, and they gain no bonus to Disguise checks, nor does their Strength or Dexterity change according to the size of the adaptation they manifest.
Apostae This pea sized brown tiger's eye allows the bearer to cast open/close cantrip at will, and has three charges per day that can be used to cast hold portal (1 charge), knock (2 charges) or a temporary version of wall of iron (3 charges, lasts only 4 minutes and creates only four 5' squares) at caster level 4. If the bearer is a spellcaster, they can expend a spell or slot equal to the number of charges that would be expended to use any of these spells without expending charges from the stone, but the resultant spell will be at CL 4, regardless of their caster level.
Aucturn This pea sized stone is oddly squishy and damp to the touch, and while it appears greenish-yellow to the bearer, it's appearance is inconsistent to all other viewers, never changing visibly when being looked at directly, but appearing different to different viewers, or at different times, sometimes as a gemstone, sometimes a tiny world, sometimes something organic and unwholesome, such as a feral animalistic or insectile eye, or a glistening hummingbird's heart, still beating, or something equally disturbing. The 'stone' has an Intelligence and Wisdom score of 10, a NE alignment, a single rank in Knowledge (arcana), Knowledge (dungeoneering), Perception and Sense Motive (giving it a +4 bonus in each of these skills), and can communicate telepathically with it's bearer, and will occasionally volunteer some (usually practical, if amoral) advice or even use Aid Other to assist it's bearer in the use of one of these four skills. It speaks Aklo, but it's bearer can understand it's telepathic communications even if they do not normally understand Aklo, and it might be persuaded to serve as a translator, albeit with it's usual macabre and sinister off-color commentary. Due to it's occasional recalcitrance, regular use of Diplomacy (or Intimidate!) on the stone is recommended to earn it's cooperation.
Hey, kill a lich-astronomer, save a bunch of Lirgeni remnants from whatever she's up to that's probably not healthy for them, and get *eleven* unique ioun stones as treasure! I kinda love doing the research for stuff like this, and looking up both the planets involved to get an idea what sort of ioun stone powers or traits would feel appropriate, and then what sort of precious and semi-precious stones would best fit the desired colors and qualities!
Wow, that was in the totally wrong tab that I had open, and not at all a Conspiracy Theory. Ignore the crazy person ranting at clouds...
Ioun Stones are a conspiracy! 'Cause... I can't tell you! They're listening!
"Ioun stones were named after a goddess who has been erased from the universe. Nobody knows what caused this, but the gods apparently blame a gang of interdimensional coastal wizards."