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If I'm adapting an adventure path for a solo campaign, should I have the player make up other characters or have NPCs tag along?That's up to you, but when I've run solo campaigns in the past I've always included a few NPC companions for the player character. Not only does this help keep the game's action economy going and help prevent incapacitation or unconsciousness from being unduly punishing, but it helps to give the game a sense of relationship building that's missing if you don't have a group of PCs constantly interacting. In fact, depending on the real world relationship you have with your player, this can let you get into some really interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships that would be a lot more awkward to roleplay out in a group! (Of course, player and GM consent remain, as always, the number one thing to keep in mind!)
So NPCs instead of multiple PCs for the solo player, correct? What if there aren't any 1st level NPCs?
And yes, I like really interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships~ : 3
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If I'm adapting an adventure path for a solo campaign, should I have the player make up other characters or have NPCs tag along?That's up to you, but when I've run solo campaigns in the past I've always included a few NPC companions for the player character. Not only does this help keep the game's action economy going and help prevent incapacitation or unconsciousness from being unduly punishing, but it helps to give the game a sense of relationship building that's missing if you don't have a group of PCs constantly interacting. In fact, depending on the real world relationship you have with your player, this can let you get into some really interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships that would be a lot more awkward to roleplay out in a group! (Of course, player and GM consent remain, as always, the number one thing to keep in mind!)So NPCs instead of multiple PCs for the solo player, correct? What if there aren't any 1st level NPCs?
And yes, I like really interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships~ : 3
Multiple PCs for a player work as well, but in my experience, the game is more enjoyable as a player if you're playing one character. The GM is already playing ALL the other NPCs in the game, so adding a few more is no big deal.
And as the GM you get to make whatever sort of helper NPCs you want, so there's always 1st level NPCs as far as that's concerned. If the Adventure Path doesn't have NPCs that would make good choices, whip up some of your own design. If I were in this situation, I'd let the one player read through the Adventure Path Player's Guide, let them pick their background and all that, and then I'd build up 2 or 3 helper NPCs as first level adventurers to fit in other backgrounds that would allow me to tell a more compelling story as they interact with the campaign and the PC.
Multiple PCs for a player work as well, but in my experience, the game is more enjoyable as a player if you're playing one character. The GM is already playing ALL the other NPCs in the game, so adding a few more is no big deal.
And as the GM you get to make whatever sort of helper NPCs you want, so there's always 1st level NPCs as far as that's concerned. If the Adventure Path doesn't have NPCs that would make good choices, whip up some of your own design. If I were in this situation, I'd let the one player read through the Adventure Path Player's Guide, let them pick their background and all that, and then I'd build up 2 or 3 helper NPCs as first level adventurers to fit in other backgrounds that would allow me to tell a more compelling story as they interact with the campaign and the PC.
All right, so far so good. So how do I make NPCs that fit in with the PC's personal story without them being a one-note harem? Especially in the context of interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships.
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All right, so far so good. So how do I make NPCs that fit in with the PC's personal story without them being a one-note harem? Especially in the context of interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships.Multiple PCs for a player work as well, but in my experience, the game is more enjoyable as a player if you're playing one character. The GM is already playing ALL the other NPCs in the game, so adding a few more is no big deal.
And as the GM you get to make whatever sort of helper NPCs you want, so there's always 1st level NPCs as far as that's concerned. If the Adventure Path doesn't have NPCs that would make good choices, whip up some of your own design. If I were in this situation, I'd let the one player read through the Adventure Path Player's Guide, let them pick their background and all that, and then I'd build up 2 or 3 helper NPCs as first level adventurers to fit in other backgrounds that would allow me to tell a more compelling story as they interact with the campaign and the PC.
That's pretty much up to you. I'd suggest letting the player build up their character and then looking at the rules options they chose and looking at the personalty and history they decide on and then build NPCs to compliment or challenge those choices. How much of this becomes a one-note harem is 100% up to the GM and player. Do what's fun for the table... don't worry about it having to be something that's fun for everyone.
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I was getting ready to run a tweaked* Wrath of the Righteous campaign, when I came across something that confused me greatly.
I'd previously thought that the Wardstones extended a barrier over the entire nation, but I was puzzled when I read that although they prevent teleportation into and out of the country, the actual DEMONS KEEP OUT zone is only a mere 300ft radius around the stones and between them along the border.Is there supposed to be something that stops demons just flying over it?
*The knock-on effects from the group's actions in Iron Gods have resulted in a severe escalation of the weapons employed on both sides. Cyberdemons with blightburn spitting chainguns, Mortars firing Holy Demonbane shells and all kinds of other fun goodies.
Originally, when the wardstones were first concepted, they were kinda slapdash in what they could and couldn't do. The whole concept of them bugged me; it frustrated me that they worked on only "plot" rules to enable a single adventure's plot, without much regard or thought into how they interact with the world as a whole. The fact that they were supposedly linked to one river that ran along one border didn't explain why the demons didn't just go other directions, for one thing. My attempt to justify their purpose started in the Inner Sea World Guide, on page 301 where I statted them up as an artifact, but at the same time I didn't want to entirely and completely "turn off" all the advantages demons have, 'cause then why bother fighting them at all?
That said, one of the more subtle elements of the way the demons work is that they are specifically NOT trying to "win" the war. To the demons of the Worldwound, defeating the crusaders means there's no crusaders left to defeat, and they don't want that. That cuts off the supply of souls and torment victims. So they fight just enough to keep things going. In part, they don't just fly over the wall because they're more comfortable with the environment within the wall; the wardstones DO prevent the Worldwound from continuing to expand, after all. But also, there's an element of the demons always having the upper hand but teasing the crusaders, giving them false hope over and over and over again. By not just "flying over" the wardstones the demons also give the crusaders a false sense of security.
Remember, demons aren't mindless chaos destroyers. They're generally VERY smart; on par with devils and angels, and capable of carrying out complicated long-term plans and deceptions. Chaotic evil doesn't mean "Must make every choice at random and can't work together or be sneaky."
All right, so far so good. So how do I make NPCs that fit in with the PC's personal story without them being a one-note harem? Especially in the context of interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships.That's pretty much up to you. I'd suggest letting the player build up their character and then looking at the rules options they chose and looking at the personalty and history they decide on and then build NPCs to compliment or challenge those choices. How much of this becomes a one-note harem is 100% up to the GM and player. Do what's fun for the table... don't worry about it having to be something that's fun for everyone.
Good to know. : )
In building the NPCs, one thing I like to figure out is "why are they following the PC?" When they're equally powerful, what makes the PC special?
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Movie you had the hardest time getting through but still ended up liking?
How does the reproductive system of cecalia work?
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All right, so far so good. So how do I make NPCs that fit in with the PC's personal story without them being a one-note harem? Especially in the context of interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships.That's pretty much up to you. I'd suggest letting the player build up their character and then looking at the rules options they chose and looking at the personalty and history they decide on and then build NPCs to compliment or challenge those choices. How much of this becomes a one-note harem is 100% up to the GM and player. Do what's fun for the table... don't worry about it having to be something that's fun for everyone.Good to know. : )
In building the NPCs, one thing I like to figure out is "why are they following the PC?" When they're equally powerful, what makes the PC special?
1) What makes the PC special is that they're controlled by someone else, not the GM. What makes them special is that they aren't played by someone who knows what the plot is.
2) And that said, an NPC accompanying a PC is always going to be at a disadvantage because the PC has one person focusing on them, whreas the NPC has to share that focus with everything else. A player will often be better at playing their one character and building the best option for that character over the course of a campaign than a GM who'll have to do the same for EVERY other NPC.
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Movie you had the hardest time getting through but still ended up liking?
Hmmm... there are certainly movies that I've ended up liking but will probably never watch again, but I honestly can't think of one that I had a hard time getting through but still ended up liking.
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All right, so far so good. So how do I make NPCs that fit in with the PC's personal story without them being a one-note harem? Especially in the context of interesting/fun/unusual PC/NPC relationships.That's pretty much up to you. I'd suggest letting the player build up their character and then looking at the rules options they chose and looking at the personalty and history they decide on and then build NPCs to compliment or challenge those choices. How much of this becomes a one-note harem is 100% up to the GM and player. Do what's fun for the table... don't worry about it having to be something that's fun for everyone.Good to know. : )
In building the NPCs, one thing I like to figure out is "why are they following the PC?" When they're equally powerful, what makes the PC special?
1) What makes the PC special is that they're controlled by someone else, not the GM. What makes them special is that they aren't played by someone who knows what the plot is.
2) And that said, an NPC accompanying a PC is always going to be at a disadvantage because the PC has one person focusing on them, whreas the NPC has to share that focus with everything else. A player will often be better at playing their one character and building the best option for that character over the course of a campaign than a GM who'll have to do the same for EVERY other NPC.
I mean in-setting. In a party of 1st level adventurers, all else being equal regardless of differing capabilities, why would the rest follow this one other person they just met?
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I mean in-setting. In a party of 1st level adventurers, all else being equal regardless of differing capabilities, why would the rest follow this one other person they just met?
That's the job of the GM to figure out. You get to create these helper NPCs, so create NPCs that want to help. And they certainly don't have to have "just met" the PC. In a case where you've only got one player, you have a lot more leeway to look at that player's background and draw inspiration from that for their companion NPCs. They could be siblings or friends for example. And you can look at the Adventure Path as well, particularly the Player's Guide. The same reasoning that a Players' Guide suggests for why a bunch of players want to adventure together works just as well for a GM coming up with companion NPCs.
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By chance I found this thread while I was researching backgroundinfo for a roll20 adventure I'll start with my fridaynight group ... and what coincidence that the protagonist of this thread is one of the authors of the campaign we played until the current calamity kept us apart ...
Thank you James for Savage Tide!
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Are there any plans on making a world gazeeter, like with the lost omens world guide but with the rest of the continents.
We aim to produce 4 Lost Omen books a year. Not all of those will be gazetteer style books, nor will all of the gazetteer style books be about continents. We have a LOT of other stuff to talk about. I suspect we'll do more world gazetteers for other continents some day, but I doubt we'll do them for all the continents, and the rate at which they'll be coming out will be very slow and far between other books.
We WILL be exploring other continents here and there though, in bits and pieces of Lost Omens books or in adventures.
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By chance I found this thread while I was researching backgroundinfo for a roll20 adventure I'll start with my fridaynight group ... and what coincidence that the protagonist of this thread is one of the authors of the campaign we played until the current calamity kept us apart ...
Thank you James for Savage Tide!
Thanks! Have fun with Savage Tide! That said, please keep posts to this thread to questions for me... or if you have feedback like this, please try to add a question to the post. Questions for me can be about anything (although I rarely answer rules questions).
Oh, speaking of Savage Tide, it presented Iggwilv as a CR 30 wizard/archmage. If you were to stat her up in Pathfinder, would you keep her at CR 30 (on par with Baba Yaga) or bump her down to CR 28 or 29 (assuming Graz'zt got bumped down from 32 to 30)?
Ok, James, question:
In Chapter 8 Serpents of Scuttlecove there is this intriguing NPC Tyralandi, HalfIncubbus-HalfDryad ... whose idea was she?
Are there any Good deities that like Dinosaurs?
Erastil propably would like the herding ones ...
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Oh, speaking of Savage Tide, it presented Iggwilv as a CR 30 wizard/archmage. If you were to stat her up in Pathfinder, would you keep her at CR 30 (on par with Baba Yaga) or bump her down to CR 28 or 29 (assuming Graz'zt got bumped down from 32 to 30)?
Pathfinder doesn't currently really have a scale beyond level 25 set in stone for 2nd edition.
In 1st edition, though, I'd set Iggwilv at level 30 or maybe level 29; she's certainly on par with Baba Yaga or close. Graz'zt I'd maybe put at level 29. Dunno. I was never a big fan of Graz'zt.
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One of Desna’s anathema is to “cause fear or despair”. Does it make sense for a PC who is a lay worshipper Desna to use Intimidate to Demoralize foes, or should I find a different deity for my PC?
That's not something a devout Desna would do, nope. Desnans would be more about bluffing or tricking foes rather than being bullies.
From Lost Omens Gods and Magic:
Ascension to godhood is a real and living thing on Golarion; **deities including Arazni**, Cayden Cailean, Iomedae, Norgorber, and most recently Casandalee were mortals on Golarion who ascended to become deities.
Does this mean that like Arazni, Casandalee is now a fully-fledged god?
With the conversion to PF2, which APs of PF1 are counted as completely resolved (positiv/negativ)in the official timeline?
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From Lost Omens Gods and Magic:
Ascension to godhood is a real and living thing on Golarion; **deities including Arazni**, Cayden Cailean, Iomedae, Norgorber, and most recently Casandalee were mortals on Golarion who ascended to become deities.Does this mean that like Arazni, Casandalee is now a fully-fledged god?
I suppose so. There hasn't really been a concerted effort, as far as I know, to specifically define which ones are what categories yet though, since from the player's view, there's no difference between what they get as a cleric if they worship any sort of divinity.
Mr. James Jacobs,
Is Aklo as a mystery language public domain?
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Mr. James Jacobs,
Is Aklo as a mystery language public domain?
Yes, that's why we can use it in Pathfinder. Aklo was invented around 1899 by author Arthur Machen in his excellently creepy story, "The White People."
I recently gave an impromptu history lesson on Hellknights to some folks on Discord, and I stumbled across the history of the Order of the Thorn. Despite being one of the first five Orders founded, there is scant little information regarding their aims, purview and philosophy. If it's not too much to dig up, could I ask for a few tidbits about this long-gone Order?
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I recently gave an impromptu history lesson on Hellknights to some folks on Discord, and I stumbled across the history of the Order of the Thorn. Despite being one of the first five Orders founded, there is scant little information regarding their aims, purview and philosophy. If it's not too much to dig up, could I ask for a few tidbits about this long-gone Order?
As far as I know there are no unpublished tidbits out there. Wes Schneider might know but he's not been at Paizo for years.
Have you seen Peter Jackson's Dead Alive (AKA Braindead) and if so, what are your thoughts on it?
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Have you seen Peter Jackson's Dead Alive (AKA Braindead) and if so, what are your thoughts on it?
That was the first Peter Jackson movie I've ever seen, and it remains my favorite Peter Jackson movie. I was a huge fan of his for years before any whispers of Lord of the Rings came along—I remember marveling that he was doing a "big budget" movie when the Frighteners came along—and while I do adore Lord of the Rings, I've not been a big fan of most of anything he's done after that except for the island sequences of King Kong. I'm hoping he'll get back to doing gritty low-budget horror comedies some day.
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Are you excited for Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla?
Not really.
I've kinda lost interest in the whole Assassin's Creed franchise, overall. They REALLY lost me several years ago with their comments of "We can't do a female protagonist because it's harder to animate women" or the like. I came back to play the London one mostly as a show of voting with my wallet because they DID let you play a female protagonist there. I then bought the Egypt one since it was one of the few Xbox titles at the time that showed of HDR game play... but I got bored with the game and quit playing at about the point I reached Alexandria. Never bothered with any of them since then.
The big triple-A games I'm looking forward to most at this point this year would be The Last of Us 2, Cyberpunk 2077, Vampire: Bloodlines 2, and Elden Ring.
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Hey do you have a personal favorite class/concept in RPGs? Like, maybe something you identify with?
Can you tell when and why Haldmeer Grobaras died? Plese, tell please
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Hey do you have a personal favorite class/concept in RPGs? Like, maybe something you identify with?
If possible, I build a variant of my favorite character, Shensen. At the very least I'll name my character Shensen. These days, my preference is to play something of a diplomatic but snarky sneaky sniper if possible, since that not only helps me see as much of the story as possible, I feel. In that having high communication skills tends to unlock additional dialogue and quests and the like, and in that the slow, sneaky sniper approach lets me move deliberately through the world and gives me lots of opportunities to enjoy the scenery, as opposed to someone who's running around in melee.
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Can you tell when and why Haldmeer Grobaras died? Plese, tell please
He died very recently, around 4718 or 4719. We haven't said much more about his death yet, but we will; the time's not yet right to tell that story. I hope to do some more Magnimar/Varisia/Sandpoint stuff at some point in the near future, at which point that product might be the right place to say more.
That said, as a quick spoiler from the upcoming Legends book...
Can you tell when and why Haldmeer Grobaras died? Plese, tell pleaseHe died very recently, around 4718 or 4719. We haven't said much more about his death yet, but we will; the time's not yet right to tell that story. I hope to do some more Magnimar/Varisia/Sandpoint stuff at some point in the near future, at which point that product might be the right place to say more.
That said, as a quick spoiler from the upcoming Legends book...
** spoiler omitted **
Thank you, that's helpful!
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Lost Omens: Legends struck me as a bit if an "unusual" (for want of a better term) book for Paizo. Can you say anything about its genesis?
I've always wanted to do a rules-light, deep dive into the setting's famous NPCs beyond just featuring them in adventures or mentioning their names here and there in the text. So much of what we did in 1st edition focused on player character options that we never really had much of an opportunity to build up the fame and infamy of our NPCs outside of adventures. This book is our chance at last to correct that! Hope you all love it, 'cause there's a LOT more legendary NPCs to talk about than we cover in this one book.
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Can you tell when and why Haldmeer Grobaras died? Plese, tell pleaseHe died very recently, around 4718 or 4719. We haven't said much more about his death yet, but we will; the time's not yet right to tell that story. I hope to do some more Magnimar/Varisia/Sandpoint stuff at some point in the near future, at which point that product might be the right place to say more.
That said, as a quick spoiler from the upcoming Legends book...
** spoiler omitted **
Did the events of
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So it's rules-light? I figured from the blurb that it was probably going to include hard numbers for them. (Which is what I felt was unusual.)
Nope. No stat blocks for NPCs at all in this book. There'll be rules-associated stuff for them all, but not stat blocks for them. The unusual part is that there's a lot of in-world fiction in the book to present the NPCs rather than the standard "GM's NPC Capsule" type of presentation.