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Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Dragon78 wrote:
So what theatrical movies did you see this year and how would you rate them from 1-5 stars?

Focusing on movies I actually saw in a theater, and not including movies that had theatrical releases that I only saw at home via streaming or blu-ray...

Glass: 3
Vice: 3
Cold Pursuit: 3
Alita Battle Angel: 2
Happy Death Day 2U: 3
Captain Marvel: 4
Captive State: 3
Us: 5
Pet Semetery: 4
Avengers Endgame: 3
John Wick 3: 4
BrightBurn: 4
Secret Life of Pets 2: 2
Godzilla King of the Monsters: 5
Annabelle Comes Home: 3
Spiderman Far From Home: 4
Crawl: 4
Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood: 5
Hobbs & Shaw: 3
Ready or Not: 5
It Chapter Two: 4
Ad Astra: 4
Terminator Dark Fate: 3
Doctor Sleep: 4
Knives Out: 4
The Lighthouse: 5
Midsommar: 5
The Color Out of Space: 5
The Nightingale: 5
Meeting Gorbachev: 4

I'm sure I'm forgetting at least one or two...


Pathfinder LO Special Edition, Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, PF Special Edition Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Starfinder Superscriber

You see a lot of movies. :-)

How much time do you have to read? Say in a week, or a month.


Were Pharasma and the First Eight including Desna, Sarenrae, Ihys, Asmodeus and Rovagug deities when they were born, or were they at first merely a psychopomp, an azata, an angel, an archon, a devil or a qlippoth but later became deities?


Has Ihys always been supposed to be LG since he was first put into print?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Ed Reppert wrote:

You see a lot of movies. :-)

How much time do you have to read? Say in a week, or a month.

I do indeed see a lot of movies. On average, I probably see 3 a month in the theater, and 4 a week via streaming.

I've got time to read too, but remember that a big part of my job is reading, so when I relax I tend to look to videogames or movies first. Reading is something I generally do right before bed. I'll usually ready for an hour or 90 minutes or so, but if I get into a particularly compelling book, I'll make more time to read.

So, in a weak, on average, I spend I'd say 10 hours a week reading for pleasure at a minimum, and when it's a book I'm really into that can expand pretty significantly.

And watching 5 movies a week works out to about the same average, it's worth noting, as reading for 10 or so hours a week, so I actually spend about the same amount of time on movies as I do on reading.

Of course, add in TV shows or various you-tube gaming videos or camping videos or whatever happens to be my latest interest there and that bumps up the free time stuff.

As does gaming.

And as does writing. I often spend an hour or so a day after work doing various writing type things, although most of it isn't intended to be published at any time, and unless it's a freelance project (which isn't free time, of course) my personal writing these days isn't game-related at all.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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HTD wrote:
Has Ihys always been supposed to be LG since he was first put into print?

In my mind, yes. I'm not sure Wes ever considered what his alignment should have been, nor do I suspect anyone else has put much thought into what he was; if they have, no one's talked about it with me.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Aenigma wrote:
Were Pharasma and the First Eight including Desna, Sarenrae, Ihys, Asmodeus and Rovagug deities when they were born, or were they at first merely a psychopomp, an azata, an angel, an archon, a devil or a qlippoth but later became deities?

They were deities from the start. In some cases, they were also other things. Sarenrae was an angel from the start, Rovagug a qlippoth, and Asmodeus a devil, all as examples. Desna is very much NOT an azata; she's her own thing, and Achaekek isn't an aeon for certain, so they're not all firsts of those types.

Silver Crusade

Camping videos?


Demons tempt mortals into committing sins. But qlippoth don't wish mortals to commit sins. All they want is just to take the Abyss back and live a happy and prosperous life. They don't even intend to conquer other planes like devils, daemons or demons do. Thus can I assume that while Rovagug and qlippoth are evil, they are not as evil as Lamashtu or demons, right?


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Camping videos!!
Have you ever watched John Plant's "Primitive Technology" channel?
He does some amazing construction without using any tools he didn't make himself.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Rysky wrote:
Camping videos?

Yup; videos of folks doing survivalist stuff, akin to what Survivorman did but not so extreme, more or less.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Aenigma wrote:
Demons tempt mortals into committing sins. But qlippoth don't wish mortals to commit sins. All they want is just to take the Abyss back and live a happy and prosperous life. They don't even intend to conquer other planes like devils, daemons or demons do. Thus can I assume that while Rovagug and qlippoth are evil, they are not as evil as Lamashtu or demons, right?

Qlippoth aren't interested really in "happiness" or "prosperity." Those are mortal values, and the qlippoth aren't into those sorts of things. They are just as evil as demons, if not more so, since they're closer to the source of the Abyss's evil, and aren't "diluted" by shreds of mortal guilt or shame that might cling in tiny tatters to a soul once it transforms into a larva and thence a demon. It's much more likely for a demon to be redeemed than a qlippoth, and it's not something that happens to demons much at all.

If they did manage to kill the demons and re-take the Abyss... they wouldn't stop there. They'd continue killing to make sure to maintain the status quo of qlippoth only, and when it's just them, they'd go back to fighting themselves.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

CrystalSeas wrote:

Camping videos!!

Have you ever watched John Plant's "Primitive Technology" channel?
He does some amazing construction without using any tools he didn't make himself.

I haven't, but that's the type of video I'm talking about. Provided the person is charismatic and entertaining as well as being instructive. I want to be entertained as much as to learn.

Silver Crusade

James Jacobs wrote:
Rysky wrote:
Camping videos?
Yup; videos of folks doing survivalist stuff, akin to what Survivorman did but not so extreme, more or less.

Neat!

Non-sequitur, have you seen any of Almazan Kitchen's videos? They cook a lot of interesting meals outside in lovely scenery.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Rysky wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
Rysky wrote:
Camping videos?
Yup; videos of folks doing survivalist stuff, akin to what Survivorman did but not so extreme, more or less.

Neat!

Non-sequitur, have you seen any of Almazan Kitchen's videos? They cook a lot of interesting meals outside in lovely scenery.

Haven't seen those.


A magocracy is a country ruled by mages. Thassilon would be a great example for this type of government. Was Azlant a magocracy too?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Aenigma wrote:
A magocracy is a country ruled by mages. Thassilon would be a great example for this type of government. Was Azlant a magocracy too?

I don't believe so.


Do you like camping yourself, or just enjoy watching other people suffer.


The word Monad is an English word. It isn't even a proper noun, considering the fact that we put "the" before it, unlike Treerazer, which has no "the" before it. Thus the Monad must be a nickname. Then what would be the true name of it? I really wish Paizo to reveal the true name of the Monad someday.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Aenigma wrote:
The word Monad is an English word. It isn't even a proper noun, considering the fact that we put "the" before it, unlike Treerazer, which has no "the" before it. Thus the Monad must be a nickname. Then what would be the true name of it? I really wish Paizo to reveal the true name of the Monad someday.

The Monad is from mythology. That IS its name. Whether or not it's a creature or an idea or a location or a condition of reality is what's unrevealed. (My preference is that it's a condition of reality and not an actual entity.)

Paizo Employee Creative Director

captain yesterday wrote:
Do you like camping yourself, or just enjoy watching other people suffer.

I quite like camping, but I don't get to do it nearly enough.

And survivial/camping videos aren't about suffering, but surviving.


It looks like my Giantslayer campaign might take a detour into the Keening Hills, the haunted area in the Hold of Belkzen. Can you give me any pointers on how to depict the area? It has the definite vibe of someplace that's not meant for PCs to explore and conquer but to brush up against the edges of and survive to have nightmares of for the rest of their lives. Do you have any tips of how to impress on the players that they are not meant to hexplore? (I.e., that in an overall AP that is about being Big Damn Heroes, this is an interlude from Strange Aeons?)

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Joana wrote:
It looks like my Giantslayer campaign might take a detour into the Keening Hills, the haunted area in the Hold of Belkzen. Can you give me any pointers on how to depict the area? It has the definite vibe of someplace that's not meant for PCs to explore and conquer but to brush up against the edges of and survive to have nightmares of for the rest of their lives. Do you have any tips of how to impress on the players that they are not meant to hexplore? (I.e., that in an overall AP that is about being Big Damn Heroes, this is an interlude from Strange Aeons?)

Although the Hold of Belkzen is an export from my homebrew, it's pretty much just the name and the fact that orcs live there that made that transition. I've not had a lot of work on developing the Hold, and have no specific tips about what might be going on in the Keening Hills.

One way to show players that it's not meant to be a place for them to explore is to have them encounter things that they obviously can't really hurt but that aren't intent on murdering them. Alternately, have them encounter something that's obviously out of their league that's dead in a gully, killed by something unknown that's even worse. And then you can just have them hear more and more rumors about how awful things are.

And of course, your player characters don't know what's written in Giantslayer. If the players are that eager to go into the Keening Hills, then just move the location coming up next in the plot to that region, change names and flavor and such as needed, and presto, the PCs are back on track.

That said, if you're interested in making it into a sandbox, you can either design encounters to be hard but doable, or you can design them to be unworkable with the intent of scaring the PCs off. You know your group better than me as to which option would work better.

And if you want to keep it on track and be a Giantslayer game, step out of the GM role for a bit to talk to the players and ask them point-blank if they're not interested in the Giantslayer plot. It might be that they've grown bored with it, in which case it might be a better bet to start a new game.


James Jacobs wrote:
3Doubloons wrote:
So, by my reckoning, that makes Archons, Angels and Azatas the main Celestials and Devils, Daemons and Demons the main Fiends. Why is it then that out of Proteans and Psychopomps, it's the lawful Aeons that break the pattern of Monitors starting with P? ;)
Because those letter matches are coincidences, not design goals. Had it been from the start, I would have pushed to have Aeons be called Primordials, I guess.

I'm curious. Has you or Paizo actually considered to have aeons be called primordials instead?


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James Jacobs wrote:
If the players are that eager to go into the Keening Hills, then just move the location coming up next in the plot to that region, change names and flavor and such as needed, and presto, the PCs are back on track.

I'm leaning toward this option.

James Jacobs wrote:
I've not had a lot of work on developing the Hold, and have no specific tips about what might be going on in the Keening Hills.

Does knowing that the Belkzen book reveals

Spoiler:
that the Keening Hills are connected to the presence of qlippoth runestone
give you any ideas? I note you wrote the article on the subject in Beyond the Doomsday Door. I meah, I know I can swap out creatures for similarly-CRed specimens of those, but in non-mechanical terms, what might they experience on the outskirts of such an area?
Dark Archive

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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Speaking of Belkzen, it seems the orcs' entire pantheon as of 1E is strictly Chaotic Evil. Is this something that might change in the future, either as a retcon or to reflect their less antagonistic tendencies following their rejection of Tar-Baphon?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Aenigma wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
3Doubloons wrote:
So, by my reckoning, that makes Archons, Angels and Azatas the main Celestials and Devils, Daemons and Demons the main Fiends. Why is it then that out of Proteans and Psychopomps, it's the lawful Aeons that break the pattern of Monitors starting with P? ;)
Because those letter matches are coincidences, not design goals. Had it been from the start, I would have pushed to have Aeons be called Primordials, I guess.
I'm curious. Has you or Paizo actually considered to have aeons be called primordials instead?

Nope.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Joana wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
If the players are that eager to go into the Keening Hills, then just move the location coming up next in the plot to that region, change names and flavor and such as needed, and presto, the PCs are back on track.

I'm leaning toward this option.

James Jacobs wrote:
I've not had a lot of work on developing the Hold, and have no specific tips about what might be going on in the Keening Hills.
Does knowing that the Belkzen book reveals ** spoiler omitted ** give you any ideas? I note you wrote the article on the subject in Beyond the Doomsday Door. I meah, I know I can swap out creatures for similarly-CRed specimens of those, but in non-mechanical terms, what might they experience on the outskirts of such an area?

Just that it suggests a specific type of creature to focus on encounters there, but if you go for the "rename and replace" option above, then I'd ignore what we've said already about the Keening Hills and just go with what's on schedule in Giantslayer.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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3Doubloons wrote:
Speaking of Belkzen, it seems the orcs' entire pantheon as of 1E is strictly Chaotic Evil. Is this something that might change in the future, either as a retcon or to reflect their less antagonistic tendencies following their rejection of Tar-Baphon?

It's more likely that orc groups who turn away from chaotic evil ways will start worshiping deities like Gorum (which many do already) or even Gozreh. The orc pantheon is by design chaotic evil and they'll remain that way. If we do decide to adjust them, I'd like to tie it to a specific world event.

But to be honest, I don't see this happening. We just did a "Chaotic Evil divinity becomes non-evil" story with Nocticula, and I'd rather not do that all the time since that makes such an event less noteworthy.

Furthermore, I would personally rather focus on other elements of the setting overall, since orcs are kinda done to death between D&D and Lord of the Rings and Warcraft... I don't really feel personally inspired to do much more stories with them... but also because of the fact that orcs have some unfortunate racist themes that have built up over the years.

I just am not a big fan of orcs for a lot of reasons.


Some scholars of the divine believe that druidism is older even than the concept of worshiping a deity. Legends hold that the Green Faith grew out of an ancient conflict between four sects of druids that battled for control of a vast wilderness. Did this battle take place in Azlant? Did it take place before Earthfall?

Silver Crusade

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If Shamira takes over will the Midnight Isles become the Sunset Isles?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Aenigma wrote:
Some scholars of the divine believe that druidism is older even than the concept of worshiping a deity. Legends hold that the Green Faith grew out of an ancient conflict between four sects of druids that battled for control of a vast wilderness. Did this battle take place in Azlant? Did it take place before Earthfall?

Unless we say more in the Green Faith article in the Adventure Path it appeared in (and was later adapted for Ultimate Wilderness), then it's unrevealed.

My preference is for it to take place after Earthfall though. Druidism certainly existed pre-Earthfall, but I'm not sure the Green Faith did.

Silver Crusade

James Jacobs wrote:
Furthermore, I would personally rather focus on other elements of the setting overall, since orcs are kinda done to death between D&D and Lord of the Rings and Warcraft... I don't really feel personally inspired to do much more stories with them... but also because of the fact that orcs have some unfortunate racist themes that have built up over the years.

Not even to correct those themes?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Rysky wrote:
If Shamira takes over will the Midnight Isles become the Sunset Isles?

Possibly. It's more likely that the entire realm will change and adjust. In fact, in my head, I've got a proto-plot of a side effect of Nocticula leaving that realm behind causing all those assassinated Demon Lords to erode away and transition into the Rift or Repose or maybe even turn into a brand new powerful undead demon lord creature, which might end up destroying the entire realm and forcing Shamira or whoever else inherits the mantle of queen of the succubi to either fight to control (and justify to the Abyss that they deserve a role as a demon lord) the realm, or simply abandon it to the wilds and build a new home. In either case, the end result would be a new realm(s) that match more closely to those demon lords' personalities.

Unlikely for this story to happen though, so don't get any hopes up for it. Folks here have more interests in developing other parts of the setting other than the Abyss. I've had my chance to tell big stories, and it's time to let others have their say. Unless folks really push for a story like this of course. Reader requests and desires do drive our plans for what stories to tell, but they're not the ONLY drive—what developers here at Paizo want to explore is as important (and in some ways MORE important) as far as us deciding what adventures and setting stuff we want to produce.


But I thought that druidism equals the Green Faith since druidism means the religion of the druids. Are these two completely different things after all?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Rysky wrote:
James Jacobs wrote:
Furthermore, I would personally rather focus on other elements of the setting overall, since orcs are kinda done to death between D&D and Lord of the Rings and Warcraft... I don't really feel personally inspired to do much more stories with them... but also because of the fact that orcs have some unfortunate racist themes that have built up over the years.
Not even to correct those themes?

I don't feel qualified to correct them. I can work to correct homophobia and to get more positive representation of LBGTQ stuff into the game since I'm in that category, for example, and I've worked hard to address issues of misogyny with a LOT of help and input from women to get that whole thing turned around, but I don't have the self-confidence needed to "fix" the awful tropes baked into orcs. Including the awkward method of presenting them as "noble savages" which is, to me, also pretty awful. There's certainly SOME way, I'm sure, of presenting orcs in a way that's fresh and not steeped in racial coding or the like, and some of the developers here are attempting to go there with our adjustments to the Hold of Belkzen, but it's not my area of expertise.

I can't fix everything myself, but I can step aside and let people who are more talented at the problems I'm not qualified to fix and do everything I can to help them.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Aenigma wrote:
But I thought that druidism equals the Green Faith since druidism means the religion of the druids. Are these two completely different things after all?

They aren't completely different things, but they're not monolithic. You can have druids of Gozreh, or druids of Shelyn, or druids of the Eldest, or druids who follow their own personal interests and beliefs, or druids of other philosophies who don't follow the Green Faith.


In First Edition monsters have spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities. But in Second Edition it seems that monsters only have innate spells. Did Paizo remove spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities from the game entirely?

Silver Crusade

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James Jacobs wrote:
Rysky wrote:
If Shamira takes over will the Midnight Isles become the Sunset Isles?

Possibly. It's more likely that the entire realm will change and adjust. In fact, in my head, I've got a proto-plot of a side effect of Nocticula leaving that realm behind causing all those assassinated Demon Lords to erode away and transition into the Rift or Repose or maybe even turn into a brand new powerful undead demon lord creature, which might end up destroying the entire realm and forcing Shamira or whoever else inherits the mantle of queen of the succubi to either fight to control (and justify to the Abyss that they deserve a role as a demon lord) the realm, or simply abandon it to the wilds and build a new home. In either case, the end result would be a new realm(s) that match more closely to those demon lords' personalities.

Unlikely for this story to happen though, so don't get any hopes up for it. Folks here have more interests in developing other parts of the setting other than the Abyss. I've had my chance to tell big stories, and it's time to let others have their say. Unless folks really push for a story like this of course. Reader requests and desires do drive our plans for what stories to tell, but they're not the ONLY drive—what developers here at Paizo want to explore is as important (and in some ways MORE important) as far as us deciding what adventures and setting stuff we want to produce.

That would make for interesting evil campaign, demons vs Nightwalkers. I’d be interested in that at first thought.

Query, are Nightwalkers stuck with the spear hands or can they change them into normal hands to use stuff?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Aenigma wrote:
In First Edition monsters have spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities. But in Second Edition it seems that monsters only have innate spells. Did Paizo remove spell-like abilities and supernatural abilities from the game entirely?

Nope; those are all still in the game.

In 1st edition, what we called spell-like abilities are now known as innate spells.

Some monsters still posses actual spellcasting powers (such as nagas or hamadryads), but we've moved more toward giving monsters innate spells instead.

We don't have the 1st edition categories of "exceptional" and "supernatural" abilities, but monsters still have those types of abilities. When they're supernatural, they're given a school of magic rather than the less-useful generic "supernatural" notation. This way, when you use detect magic or have bonuses to specific types of magic or the like, we don't have to say something like "This is a necromancy effect" in the ability; we just put the word "necromancy", which not only tells you the ability is magical (AKA supernatural) but also tells you what kind of magic it is.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Rysky wrote:
Query, are Nightwalkers stuck with the spear hands or can they change them into normal hands to use stuff?

They'll keep their spear hands. This is one of the ways we distinguish our version of them from Wizards of the Coast, since these are one of those types of monsters like inevitables who don't have a real-world genesis and are 100% a D&D invention. Expect us to come up with a new name for them as well as a result if/when we start doing something with them; at this point, I've not figured out what to do there though.

But keeping the look of them, particularly the way in which they visual deviate from D&D's looks, is a lock. This means they'll keep their red eyes, and in the case of the nightwalker, keep their blade hands.


It seems that in Second Edition witches still use the word patron. But I remember you said the word patron is a misnomer, and isn't really the right word to use for how their spells work. You also said that a better word would have been focus or area of study or specialization. I'm curious. Are the patrons adjusted greatly in Second Edition that the word patron is not a misnomer anymore?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

Aenigma wrote:
It seems that in Second Edition witches still use the word patron. But I remember you said the word patron is a misnomer, and isn't really the right word to use for how their spells work. You also said that a better word would have been focus or area of study or specialization. I'm curious. Are the patrons adjusted greatly in Second Edition that the word patron is not a misnomer anymore?

It wasn't the right word in 1st edition. Turns out we can adjust how witches work in 2nd edition to make the word be the right word.

The Advanced Player's Guide playtest was not where we finalized that flavor and mechanic. You'll have to wait until later next year when the book's actually out to see the end results, at which point you can ask me again for clarification if it's still needed.


Wait, orcs have some unfortunate racist themes that have built up over the years? How are they related to racism? I thought hating and discriminating orcs are entirely okay because, while there are some good orcs, almost all of them are evil and do evil things.

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Aenigma wrote:
Wait, orcs have some unfortunate racist themes that have built up over the years? How are they related to racism? I thought hating and discriminating orcs are entirely okay because, while there are some good orcs, almost all of them are evil and do evil things.

That's not a topic I want to get into much here, and if you want to look into it, there's plenty of places to research it online, but yes, there's a lot of unfortunate racial coding that can be read into how some folks over the past several decades have presented orcs.


Kobolds speak Draconic. But according to page 142 of Inner Sea Races they were crafted by the vault builders. If that's the case, shouldn't they speak Terran or Orvian instead?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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Aenigma wrote:
Kobolds speak Draconic. But according to page 142 of Inner Sea Races they were crafted by the vault builders. If that's the case, shouldn't they speak Terran or Orvian instead?

Nope. Your source doesn't hard-code your language, especially in cases where tens of thousands of years have passed.


Listen to any / many podcasts?

Paizo Employee Creative Director

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There Might Be Chemists wrote:
Listen to any / many podcasts?

Not many, no. My commute to work is about 1 minute long if I drive. I usually listen to some when I do long drives home for the holidays... this year I'm flying, so my drive goes from 15–16 hours to a mere 4 hours, during which I plan on checking out the HPL Historical Society podcast and listening to some more of "My Favorite Murder," which Wes introduced me to on the long drive back from the HPL Film Festival back in October.

Dark Archive

James Jacobs wrote:
I just am not a big fan of orcs for a lot of reasons.

Any particular favorite humanoid race to put in the 'traditional bad guy' role? Gnolls, hobgoblins, other humans...

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