Creative Director
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Hi James,
Hope you had a great relaxing Christmas!
I was reading about the Pact Primeval earlier today, giving Asmodeus the duty of taking care of evil souls so the celestials don't have to worry about it. I wondered, did this agreement occur in the Golarion cosmology or is it strictly a 3.5 thing?The majority of our 3.5 world content is edition neutral. Very little of it, in fact, is stuff we've abandoned.
That said, we've deliberately given multiple takes on some of this metaphysical stuff to deliberately confuse you mortals as to which one is right. That's why we've published so many different creation myths, after all. ;-)
I see! Awesome, thanks for the response!!
Can I be cheeky and ask, if you were a mere mortal, which of the many you'd be inclined to believe? ;D
I'd say it was Asmodean propaganda and that in fact he was twisting the truth to advance his own agenda.
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James, what ways are there to advance golems to tougher at higher levels/increase their CR? Besides adding HD. Can they have templates added to them like the Advanced Simple Template and the Simple Class Templates?A golem can absolutely gain templates, provided that said golem qualifies for the template.
Any examples off the top of your head that a golem can take that you guys have made? Like, Lifespark Construct. That's a given, and there's ones that turn you into a construct such as Clockwork.
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Your GM knows your table's preferences better than we do, after all. I don't understand why so many GMs are so quick to declare that they don't need published adventures because their adventures are better, but at the same time don't seem confident enough to make rulings as appropriate for their own table. Seems like a double standard to me.
If I may chip in with my personal experience, the reason is that GMs are much more rarely challenged by their players regarding the adventures they come up with than they are challenged regarding rules adjudication.
Rules are perceived by most players as "objective", so they feel that they can (and should) point out when their GM is doing something "wrong" (in particular if they feel damaged by a particular rule interpretation).
Don't you feel that this (mis)perception might be the source of that "double standard"?
Obviously a sensible approach to the issue would be for GMs to consult with players regarding the most tricky issues and try to come up with some sort of consensus, and for players to then respect their GMs rulings. However, I found out that it can be surprisingly difficult to find a group where all people involved are that reasonable (since often it takes just a mildly antagonizing or attention-seeking person to generate mayhem).
Finally, as someone who asked a rule question more than 13 months ago and is still waiting for an answer, let me ask this: would it be possible for Paizo to accelerate somewhat the rate of FAQ-answering during 2015?
I remember that back in 2005 or 2006, WotC had a customer service that you could contact by email (or maybe some form) with your rules questions and they would respond via email within a short timescale. What would take for Paizo to organize something like that? I understand that you are somewhat understaffed, but I believe that many people (including myself) would be ok paying (e.g.) a small subscription fee to have priority access to such a useful service.
Thanks a lot for keeping this thread open, and happy holidays.
T.
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If I may chip in with my personal experience, the reason is that GMs are much more rarely challenged by their players regarding the adventures they come up with than they are challenged regarding rules adjudication.
Rules are perceived by most players as "objective", so they feel that they can (and should) point out when their GM is doing something "wrong" (in particular if they feel damaged by a particular rule interpretation).
I want to echo this. Coming up with your own adventures really is a different sort of thing from adjudicating rule interpretations. The former can be a lot of fun, the latter can be frustrating. What's more, the players expect to not know what's coming, and are willing to cut you more slack, with the story, but the also expect that they understand the rules because they've read the rulebook and have designed their character and tactics around them.
As GM, if I pull a weird rabbit of the hat in an adventure I've designed, players will have opinions on it but they won't question that I've done something wrong. On the other hand, they can (entirely reasonably!) question that I've interpreted the rules wrong, because they've read those rules, and may have read them more carefully than I have.
What's more, Pathfinder is a game with so many rules that cover so many situations that it doesn't encourage GM fiat in the same way that a game like (say) Fudge or FATE would. Whereas in one of those latter rules-light games I'd be pretty comfortable making a judgement and rolling with it, in Pathfinder I feel paralyzed because I strongly suspect there might be a rule somewhere that details how you're supposed to have done it. Often, I remember the rule is there, but don't remember what it is. This isn't exactly the same sort of thing, but it's related. Have I remembered it right? Have I done it right? How far am I straying from the system? In a rules-heavy system like Pathfinder, those questions are much trickier. There's also the question as to: is this a place where the GM just has remembered the rules wrong, vs. where the GM has decided to houserule something, vs. where there really isn't a rule for the situation and a judgement call is needed? If a judgement call is needed, the GM should feel comfortable doing it, as that's part of GMing. But, in a rules-heavy (nowadays nearly rules-overwhelming) system like Pathfinder, it can be hard to know if you're in one of those situations or not, or if there is an FAQ or a designer forum answer somewhere that's spelled out what the standard rules are supposed to be.
A rules-heavy system also makes adventure design more complicated, and I'm not sure people appreciate that. But, again, players don't expect to know and be in a position to contribute to a discussion as to whether the adventure design was done "right". So, I think it's entirely reasonable for GMs to feel much more confident about their own adventure design than they feel about their rules interpretations.
As an aside, though, people who think that their own home adventures are "better" than published adventures are probably just being a bit over-arrogant. I think it is entirely reasonably to believe that you can design adventures tuned specifically to your own group than published adventures can, because of course published adventures aren't tuned to any specific group (with exceptions like "We Be Goblins"), but are trying to have broad appeal. While it's true that some published adventures are just blah, there are a lot of really, really good ones out there, and people who think they can "do better" are almost all probably kidding themselves (again, unless it's specifically with regard to an idiosyncratic home group).
So it would be safe to assume that mortal residents of planar cities are sustained by something like the spell "Create Food and Water", used by the outsiders?
James, I came across an apparent discrepancy in how the starflight monster ability works. For shantaks and outer dragons, it states intra-stellar travel takes 3d20 hours and inter-stellar travel takes 3d20 days. For Oma, however, these times frames are expanded to 3d20 days and weeks, respectively. Mi-Go have it even worse, at 3d20 months and years respectively. Is this intentional, indicating certain 'bands' of potential maximum space-borne speed, or did someone just get confused with the wording in some bestiary entries?
Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
Here's a question for Mr. Jacobs:
How literal are Shoanti names meant to be? Like Krojun Eats-What-He-Kills.
Which is a wonderfully ominous name.
Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
I imagine they can use planetary gravity wells to accelerate via sling-shot effect to something in the range of at least several tens of thousands of miles per hour before setting off across the void. They are creatures with Int 23 and 20, respectively.
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On that note, do gods ever create "avatars" who are basically heroic individuals that when they reach the apex of their power realize, "I remember now. I am Iomedae/Pharasma/any other god, becoming mortal for a time. It's time to shed this mask and return to my divine realm and use the perspective and experiences of my time as this individual to make better decisions as a deity?" Like Vishnu, yanno?
Also, which is more representative of the hooked axe exotic weapon?
Yes, gods do and can create avatars. We haven't done rules for them yet though. And when/if we do... we'll probably just create them as unique creatures at whatever CR is needed for the story.
And I'm not sure what weapon the design team had in mind when they created the hooked axe. I wasn't involved much in that book's creation at all. The first picture you linked looks more exotic than the second one, so I'd go with that.
I see. Thank you for the prompt response! :)
Another question, what does darkwood look like, especially in terms of color? Is it solid black, like ebony, or more like a rich, dark brown color, like rosewood or black walnut?
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How exactly do runewells work and could their be a tune well that was not attuned to a runelord yet.
The runewells were created after the Runelords wrested control of Thassilon from Emperor Xin. They used the wells for harvesting the sinful essence from their slaves and citizens. By their very creation they were aligned with one of the seven sins, and thus, a Runelord.
For more information, I'd suggest reading/playing the Rise of the Runelords and Shattered Star adventure paths. All of the practical knowledge of how they work can be found in #2 The Skinsaw Murders, but for their greater implications and historical use, you'd need to read the AP's.
Hey James how do you feel about the idea that the gm is always right. Personaly as a gm I feel its a silly idea as I have been wrong before.
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Creative Director
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Any examples off the top of your head that a golem can take that you guys have made? Like, Lifespark Construct. That's a given, and there's ones that turn you into a construct such as Clockwork.James, what ways are there to advance golems to tougher at higher levels/increase their CR? Besides adding HD. Can they have templates added to them like the Advanced Simple Template and the Simple Class Templates?A golem can absolutely gain templates, provided that said golem qualifies for the template.
The Scarecrow from "Burnt Offerings" was the first one. There's the shield guardian template, which is specific for golems. I know for a fact that we've done Advanced Creature template golems all the time, but couldn't give a page number citation to you off the top of my head.
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Creative Director
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Your GM knows your table's preferences better than we do, after all. I don't understand why so many GMs are so quick to declare that they don't need published adventures because their adventures are better, but at the same time don't seem confident enough to make rulings as appropriate for their own table. Seems like a double standard to me.If I may chip in with my personal experience, the reason is that GMs are much more rarely challenged by their players regarding the adventures they come up with than they are challenged regarding rules adjudication.
Rules are perceived by most players as "objective", so they feel that they can (and should) point out when their GM is doing something "wrong" (in particular if they feel damaged by a particular rule interpretation).
Don't you feel that this (mis)perception might be the source of that "double standard"?
Obviously a sensible approach to the issue would be for GMs to consult with players regarding the most tricky issues and try to come up with some sort of consensus, and for players to then respect their GMs rulings. However, I found out that it can be surprisingly difficult to find a group where all people involved are that reasonable (since often it takes just a mildly antagonizing or attention-seeking person to generate mayhem).
Finally, as someone who asked a rule question more than 13 months ago and is still waiting for an answer, let me ask this: would it be possible for Paizo to accelerate somewhat the rate of FAQ-answering during 2015?
I remember that back in 2005 or 2006, WotC had a customer service that you could contact by email (or maybe some form) with your rules questions and they would respond via email within a short timescale. What would take for Paizo to organize something like that? I understand that you are somewhat understaffed, but I believe that many people (including myself) would be ok paying (e.g.) a small subscription fee to have priority access to such a useful service.
Thanks a lot for keeping this thread open, and happy holidays....
I think that the problem is one created by 3rd edition D&D. By creating a much more robust rules system that provided in-print rules for all sorts of things in play, the design team made the game much more robust but unintentionally shifted the onus of rules interpretation away from "Ask the GM" to "Check the book."
Paizo IS trying to streamline and speed up the rate at which the rules questions get answered. But at the same time, we need to focus on creating products, and making sure that the products are designed, developed, and edited well. Part of the theory of "Make sure the books are right the first time out" means that we need to spend more time fixing problems before they're printed, which leaves less time to answer those FAQ questions.
It's something we're working on. The "Pay for answers" solution is kinda distasteful to me, frankly... that's not the type of situation we want to engender. We put our rules up online for free for the exact opposite reasons. Pay-to-play isn't the point of Pathfinder, really
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Creative Director
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How exactly do runewells work and could their be a tune well that was not attuned to a runelord yet.
Each runewell is a unique magic artifact. We've got full rules for the runewell of greed in the Anniversary edition of Rise of the Runelords, but haven't yet printed rules for other types of runewells, really. Their very nature means that a runewell not associated with a runelord doesn't really make much sense.
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Creative Director
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Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
Here's a question for Mr. Jacobs:
How literal are Shoanti names meant to be? Like Krojun Eats-What-He-Kills.
Which is a wonderfully ominous name.
They're not meant to be 100% literal, but they certainly aren't made up entirely out of the blue. Those names have reasons and history behind them.
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Creative Director
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James, I came across an apparent discrepancy in how the starflight monster ability works. For shantaks and outer dragons, it states intra-stellar travel takes 3d20 hours and inter-stellar travel takes 3d20 days. For Oma, however, these times frames are expanded to 3d20 days and weeks, respectively. Mi-Go have it even worse, at 3d20 months and years respectively. Is this intentional, indicating certain 'bands' of potential maximum space-borne speed, or did someone just get confused with the wording in some bestiary entries?
It's intentional. Not every creature capable of starflight flies at the same speed... similarly to how not every creature capable of plain old flight flies at the same speed.
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Creative Director
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On that note, do gods ever create "avatars" who are basically heroic individuals that when they reach the apex of their power realize, "I remember now. I am Iomedae/Pharasma/any other god, becoming mortal for a time. It's time to shed this mask and return to my divine realm and use the perspective and experiences of my time as this individual to make better decisions as a deity?" Like Vishnu, yanno?
Also, which is more representative of the hooked axe exotic weapon?
Yes, gods do and can create avatars. We haven't done rules for them yet though. And when/if we do... we'll probably just create them as unique creatures at whatever CR is needed for the story.
And I'm not sure what weapon the design team had in mind when they created the hooked axe. I wasn't involved much in that book's creation at all. The first picture you linked looks more exotic than the second one, so I'd go with that.
I see. Thank you for the prompt response! :)
Another question, what does darkwood look like, especially in terms of color? Is it solid black, like ebony, or more like a rich, dark brown color, like rosewood or black walnut?
Ebony is a good comparison.
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Creative Director
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How exactly do runewells work and could their be a tune well that was not attuned to a runelord yet.The runewells were created after the Runelords wrested control of Thassilon from Emperor Xin. They used the wells for harvesting the sinful essence from their slaves and citizens. By their very creation they were aligned with one of the seven sins, and thus, a Runelord.
For more information, I'd suggest reading/playing the Rise of the Runelords and Shattered Star adventure paths. All of the practical knowledge of how they work can be found in #2 The Skinsaw Murders, but for their greater implications and historical use, you'd need to read the AP's.
I know folks are eager to help out... but please keep your posts to this particular thread to questions so I can answer them. Answering them for me only clutters the thread up.
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Creative Director
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James, we all know that Cayden is the Drunken Hero, and that he represents the alcoholics on the good side, but is there an evil deity that can also be represented through alcohol? If not, is there a particular evil deity that would enjoy nothing more than to corrupt followers of Cayden?
Not really. Maybe Haggenti, the demon lord of Alchemy, or perhaps Socothbenoth, the demon lord of taboo, or even Jubilex. There's no specific evil deity of drunkenness really. Maybe that's Bulmhan's influence on the game.... ;-P
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Creative Director
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Hey James how do you feel about the idea that the gm is always right. Personaly as a gm I feel its a silly idea as I have been wrong before.
I think that the GM is NOT always right, and in fact GMs who think they're always right are one of the worst things that can happen to the game. The best GMs are like the best scientists... they know that they can be wrong and are capable of realizing it and changing things to correct the situation.
More important to the game though is the player who's willing to let the GM's call stand during play and is patient to argue that ruling until after the game rather than grind play to a halt for something minor and trivial.
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They're not meant to be 100% literal, but they certainly aren't made up entirely out of the blue. Those names have reasons and history behind them.Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
Here's a question for Mr. Jacobs:
How literal are Shoanti names meant to be? Like Krojun Eats-What-He-Kills.
Which is a wonderfully ominous name.
What kinds of reasons? Do they speak to the Shoanti tribesperson's deeds? Personality? Appearance?
And if a Shoanti were the descendant of somebody famous, would they be allowed to take their ancestor's honorific if they did something equally heroic or awesome? Or would they just get something new that's unique to them?
James,
Sorry for reposting but these questions seem to have been missed in the holiday rush:
If Neutral Good Petitioners "take on the forms of animals that closely approximate their personalities," should that be reflected in their stats in size, speeds (including fly and swim), and natural attacks? Most of the petitioner types stay pretty close to their original form, so the lack of changes is appropriate, and for Larvae it's somewhat covered by them getting a bite attack instead of a slam (though it seems like they might be better with a slower speed and/or information on if they have any limbs), so it's the Cleansed who stand out to me as a "how would that affect their stats?" issue. I had a thing I was going to try and do with petitioners, and I have a couple ideas of how it could be handled or how to get around it, but I'm curious if you have any advice or input.
Actually, second petitioner question that occurred overnight: Does the deity you worship override your alignment in life in determining what kind of petitioner you become? Only for devout worshippers, or for most?
Also, what about deities whose alignment is different from the alignment of the plane their realm is on (you have at least four; Gorum and Calistria are in Elysium, Nethys in the Maelstrom, and Norgorber in Axis)? Do their petitioners usually become the type matching the plane, or matching the god?
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Creative Director
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They're not meant to be 100% literal, but they certainly aren't made up entirely out of the blue. Those names have reasons and history behind them.Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
Here's a question for Mr. Jacobs:
How literal are Shoanti names meant to be? Like Krojun Eats-What-He-Kills.
Which is a wonderfully ominous name.
What kinds of reasons? Do they speak to the Shoanti tribesperson's deeds? Personality? Appearance?
And if a Shoanti were the descendant of somebody famous, would they be allowed to take their ancestor's honorific if they did something equally heroic or awesome? Or would they just get something new that's unique to them?
All possible reasons would work. Personality, appearance, history, humor, cruelty, metaphor, and all the rest.
They might do "Son of Krojun" or the like, I guess, but they wouldn't take a parent's full name as their own. That'd get too awkward way too quickly.
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Creative Director
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James,
Sorry for reposting but these questions seem to have been missed in the holiday rush:
If Neutral Good Petitioners "take on the forms of animals that closely approximate their personalities," should that be reflected in their stats in size, speeds (including fly and swim), and natural attacks? Most of the petitioner types stay pretty close to their original form, so the lack of changes is appropriate, and for Larvae it's somewhat covered by them getting a bite attack instead of a slam (though it seems like they might be better with a slower speed and/or information on if they have any limbs), so it's the Cleansed who stand out to me as a "how would that affect their stats?" issue. I had a thing I was going to try and do with petitioners, and I have a couple ideas of how it could be handled or how to get around it, but I'm curious if you have any advice or input.
Actually, second petitioner question that occurred overnight: Does the deity you worship override your alignment in life in determining what kind of petitioner you become? Only for devout worshippers, or for most?
Also, what about deities whose alignment is different from the alignment of the plane their realm is on (you have at least four; Gorum and Calistria are in Elysium, Nethys in the Maelstrom, and Norgorber in Axis)? Do their petitioners usually become the type matching the plane, or matching the god?
For the most part, the stats themselves say what the petitioner can do. Appearance is mostly just cosmetic and doesn't make much of a difference on abilities and stats. Part of the reason for that, of course, is space concerns; if we had petitioners be as varied as the list of all the creatures who can die in the first place. That'd waste a lot of space. Feel free to tinker and add new abilities as you wish if you want to customize petitioners with flight or other attacks, but part of the point of petitioners is that they are all more or less identical and don't really have much in the way of unique personalities or appearances. That's the point of them ascending to full-on outsiders.
The deity you worship has a very strong influence on what kind of petitioner you become, but not the ONLY influence. It'd vary on a case by case basis, but on average, a devout worshiper would end up in his/her deity's realm. In a case where a worshiper was devout, it's 99% likely that worshiper would already be the alignment of their deity anyway, but in the case of a different alignment going to their deity's realm, their alignment would indeed change to match the new form.
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Hey James, happy new year
So I'm over at my parents house this week and I start to dig through some of my boxed up old D&D books and I (gleefully) look through some of the 3.x era adventures, including my signed copies of Red Hand of Doom and Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk. It did get me thinking though.
What on Earth lead to Wizards using that idiotic adventure layout with encounters separated from the rest of the story? It makes it so annoying to read the books that use it, and having to flip back and forth makes it less easy to use rather than more. I have to think that those who were forced to write using (like you and many other industry veterans) told them it was a bad idea to go at it this way.
Kudos to you for Red Hand by the way, probably the best 3.5 adventure Wizards published. If you were playing it in Pathfinder, where on Golarion would you put Elsir Vale? What would you use in place of the dragonspawn creatures in the adventure?
Also, didn't you break one of your own rules in regards to adventures by putting so many half-dragons in one book? Well, at least they weren't dire rats...
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They're not meant to be 100% literal, but they certainly aren't made up entirely out of the blue. Those names have reasons and history behind them.Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
Here's a question for Mr. Jacobs:
How literal are Shoanti names meant to be? Like Krojun Eats-What-He-Kills.
Which is a wonderfully ominous name.
What kinds of reasons? Do they speak to the Shoanti tribesperson's deeds? Personality? Appearance?
And if a Shoanti were the descendant of somebody famous, would they be allowed to take their ancestor's honorific if they did something equally heroic or awesome? Or would they just get something new that's unique to them?
All possible reasons would work. Personality, appearance, history, humor, cruelty, metaphor, and all the rest.
They might do "Son of Krojun" or the like, I guess, but they wouldn't take a parent's full name as their own. That'd get too awkward way too quickly.
What if the relative was several generations removed, like a great-great-great-grandparent or something (I'm interested in playing a Sklar-Quah descendant of the great shaman Koja Eyes-Aflame, who teamed up with Mandraivus of Lastwall to slay Kazavon)?
Have a Happy New Years.
And a question...
Are they interesting celebration of the New Years in Golarion? Or do they celebrate it pretty much like we do on Earth?
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Creative Director
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Hey James, happy new year
So I'm over at my parents house this week and I start to dig through some of my boxed up old D&D books and I (gleefully) look through some of the 3.x era adventures, including my signed copies of Red Hand of Doom and Expedition to the Ruins of Greyhawk. It did get me thinking though.
What on Earth lead to Wizards using that idiotic adventure layout with encounters separated from the rest of the story? It makes it so annoying to read the books that use it, and having to flip back and forth makes it less easy to use rather than more. I have to think that those who were forced to write using (like you and many other industry veterans) told them it was a bad idea to go at it this way.
Kudos to you for Red Hand by the way, probably the best 3.5 adventure Wizards published. If you were playing it in Pathfinder, where on Golarion would you put Elsir Vale? What would you use in place of the dragonspawn creatures in the adventure?
Also, didn't you break one of your own rules in regards to adventures by putting so many half-dragons in one book? Well, at least they weren't dire rats...
First off... please refrain from using words like "idiotic" in these questions. Turns out, there was a very good reason for WotC to use the delve format: It makes running the adventure in a tournament or convention setting a LOT easier. It does indeed make it both onerous and frustrating to read, and to write as well. I believe that if an adventure isn't fun to read, chances of the GM wanting to actually run it drop dramatically, and by that regard I do think that for home games the delve format is a failure... but it's not idiotic. It's just that they wanted to focus their efforts on making the adventures easier to run for someone other than the casual or home GM. It's not the decision I would have made, and indeed I fought (successfully) to keep the easier to read format for Dungeon magazine.
I'd set Red Hand of Doom in Isger. And would rebuild the locations to fit Isger, rather than shoehorning the Elsir Vale into it. I'd use the dragonspawn as listed, since they're kind of an integral part of the adventure.
Had I been the one to outline the adventure I would not have used ANY half-dragons. I was not the one to outline it. Rich Baker and the WotC design team did that. I was hired on to write 3/4 of the adventure after Rich had to abandon it when he was reassigned at the last minute to work on RISK, I believe. So by the time I was starting work, the plot was already set, and the plan to use the adventure as the launching point for a new classification of monster (the dragonspawn) was set in stone.
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Creative Director
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What if the relative was several generations removed, like a great-great-great-grandparent or something (I'm interested in playing a Sklar-Quah descendant of the great shaman Koja Eyes-Aflame, who teamed up with Mandraivus of Lastwall to slay Kazavon)?They're not meant to be 100% literal, but they certainly aren't made up entirely out of the blue. Those names have reasons and history behind them.Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
Here's a question for Mr. Jacobs:
How literal are Shoanti names meant to be? Like Krojun Eats-What-He-Kills.
Which is a wonderfully ominous name.
What kinds of reasons? Do they speak to the Shoanti tribesperson's deeds? Personality? Appearance?
And if a Shoanti were the descendant of somebody famous, would they be allowed to take their ancestor's honorific if they did something equally heroic or awesome? Or would they just get something new that's unique to them?
All possible reasons would work. Personality, appearance, history, humor, cruelty, metaphor, and all the rest.
They might do "Son of Krojun" or the like, I guess, but they wouldn't take a parent's full name as their own. That'd get too awkward way too quickly.
Anything's possible. No naming convention of any society follows their own rules 100% of the time. And for RPGS? Name things so they're cool first and follow the conventions second is my preference. Try to get them both to work of course.
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Creative Director
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Hi Mr Jacobs
Why paizo use the name of mythological demon/gods like Dagon, Pazuzu or Lamashtu but change it a little for others like Ereshkigal and Nergal?
Personal preference.
For Ereshkigal, I changed the name slightly because I wanted it to be something a bit more different from the real world myth, but also to imply that it might NOT be the same entity.
For Nergal, we already had one Nergal as a devil, and I also weighed the Warhammer Nergal/Nergul/Nurgal/whatever as well.
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Creative Director
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Have a Happy New Years.
And a question...
Are they interesting celebration of the New Years in Golarion? Or do they celebrate it pretty much like we do on Earth?
If I recall correctly, the celebration of New Year's in the Inner Sea Region is less about joy and more about fear. I could be wrong. It (and lots of other celebrations) are detailed in the Inner Sea World Guide.
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Anything's possible. No naming convention of any society follows their own rules 100% of the time. And for RPGS? Name things so they're cool first and follow the conventions second is my preference. Try to get them both to work of course.What if the relative was several generations removed, like a great-great-great-grandparent or something (I'm interested in playing a Sklar-Quah descendant of the great shaman Koja Eyes-Aflame, who teamed up with Mandraivus of Lastwall to slay Kazavon)?They're not meant to be 100% literal, but they certainly aren't made up entirely out of the blue. Those names have reasons and history behind them.Hey, Starspawn and Elder Things have it even worse - they actually fly through space as their normal fly speeds. Good thing they're immortal...
Here's a question for Mr. Jacobs:
How literal are Shoanti names meant to be? Like Krojun Eats-What-He-Kills.
Which is a wonderfully ominous name.
What kinds of reasons? Do they speak to the Shoanti tribesperson's deeds? Personality? Appearance?
And if a Shoanti were the descendant of somebody famous, would they be allowed to take their ancestor's honorific if they did something equally heroic or awesome? Or would they just get something new that's unique to them?
All possible reasons would work. Personality, appearance, history, humor, cruelty, metaphor, and all the rest.
They might do "Son of Krojun" or the like, I guess, but they wouldn't take a parent's full name as their own. That'd get too awkward way too quickly.
Okay! Thanks for the tip!
Weird question pair: Would telling potential players "Korvosa feels like Gotham City, while Magnimar's more like Metropolis" be an accurate comparison? And if it is, what city in the DC universe would be the best one to compare Riddleport to?
I'm sorry to bother you able up this but so you know if Erik Mona has a similar thread to this? I wanted to ask him if there is a plan to release any more of the sketches of the occult adventures iconics.
Bah. Only James Jacob can answer my earthshaking questions.
Who are you?
Bah. Only James Jacob can answer my earthshaking questions.Who are you?
Even more important: What method does TriOmegaZero use to determine whether he will post as TOZ or as TriOmegaZero?
Even more important: What method does TriOmegaZero use to determine whether he will post as TOZ or as TriOmegaZero?Bah. Only James Jacob can answer my earthshaking questions.Who are you?
Back on-topic!
JJ - Ever look at your life and think "Wow, I'm an adult. I totally don't feel like an adult."? If so, how often, would you say? I'm in my 30's and still feel like a big kid...it's...weird.
Gonna repost a few of my questions that didn't get answered over the break, too.
Do you think music played during gaming sessions can be an enhancement to the experience, or a distraction from it?
GM asking every player for a character's "Theme Song" to play when they use a hero point, do something awesome, or otherwise shine for the party...cool, or lame?
Since you are a Futurama fan (or at least a follower, by your answer to my earlier question on their cancellation), would you agree with me when I point to Bender as the world's most extreme example of Chaotic Neutral?
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I have heard a rumor that Ragathiel has some sort of rivalmance with Eiseth, the Erinyes Queen, sorta like Batman and Catwoman. Where in the books is this alluded to? I haven't seen anything hinting at it. It IS kind of a cool idea, though, the risen hellspawn and the fallen angel meeting in the middle...
Do you have any recommendations for what a Divine Obedience feat for Yog-Sothoth should be like? E.g. the rituals called for, the boons bestowed (or which major deities inspiration for said boons could be drawn from)?
Also, do you have any suggestions for Planar Ally options for Yog-Sothoth?
Happy New Year! :)
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Creative Director
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Weird question pair: Would telling potential players "Korvosa feels like Gotham City, while Magnimar's more like Metropolis" be an accurate comparison? And if it is, what city in the DC universe would be the best one to compare Riddleport to?
Not really. It'd be better to say Magnimar feels like San Francisco and Korvosa feels like Los Angeles. In that universe, Riddleport would still be Riddleport. ;P