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It's been a while since I've checked this thread, so if this has already been brought up, I apologize. I saw this on Yahoo! News today, and thought it might make an interesting monster: Anomalocaris.
EDIT: Sorry, I guess that's not a question. *AHEM* Do you think the Anomalocaris makes a good inspiration for a Golarion-type creature?
Creative Director
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I was just catching up on this thread and while reading a bit back about the Art Books and their not selling; I had an idea.
Say for instance you were to publish a 96 page book featuring full page art from various Paizo/Pathfinder sources, do you think it would sell better if perhaps you were to give Pathfinder stats for the focus of the picture itself, maybe on the facing page?
For instance: If one of the plates was Karzoug from the cover of the GMG, the facing page might have his stat-up as an NPC, or some detail about that blue dragon, or even just a bit about a handful of the magic items in the pic.
Whaddya think?
Sounds like a Bestiary or an NPC compilation. Which we do already. :-)
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Creative Director
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Do you know what your sin is, James?
(Linked on the infinitesimal chance that anyone reading this thread won't get the reference -- it's at 2:45 in that clip.)
I do know!
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Creative Director
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One more question: is it possible for someone who isn't a Paizo staffer, or personally acquainted with a Paizo staffer or with Nicholas Logue, to get hold of a digital copy of the unexpurgated "Hook Mountain Massacre?" Other posters (notably Gorbacz, IIRC) have alluded to having and even running it, but I haven't been able to find it anywhere on-line.
Not from Paizo. The "uncut" digital copy doesn't exist anymore. Other posters might or might not have it, but that's not something I'm interested in propagating across the internet.
Not because I think it's too violent or gross or nasty, though. Because I wouldn't want my unedited, raw text floating around on the Internet, and I'm not comfortable revealing raw text of an author to the public without that author's consent... even in a case like this where we COULD do so if we wanted, since we purchase all rights to game design work.
Turns out, raw, unedited, undeveloped text is not a great way to show off. It'd be like walking straight out of bed into public without cleaning yourself up first.
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Creative Director
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I can only wonder what kind of stuff that copy contains...
...then again, should I be surprised that it got censored? If you catch it from somewhere Kavren, do inform me what creepy stuff it's got, because you managed to get my morbid curiosity going. (Sadly enough for me)
It's not really that it got censored (there were SOME areas I did indeed tone down from x-rated to merely r-rated)... it's that Nick wrote 60,000 words when we asked for 40,000 words. A large amount of those extra 20,000 words went into "Edge of Anarchy," particularly the barge sequence in Edge of Anarchy, so there's really not all that much "hidden" from the public there.
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Creative Director
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I don't look the credits of the published material as much as I should. I would like to see a page in the Paizo site with the authors that have worked for your company and a list of their works (if it isn't to much work to do that).
If it already exist apologies for not seeing it and I would be very grateful for a link.While I base my purchase choices on the descriptions of the product a page like the one proposed would allow me to discover other material from authors I like.
You can make your own page like this by typing in an author's name into our Search window, and then clicking on the Products tab on the results lists. It's not always a complete list, especially since there's products that authors don't have for sale on Paizo.com, but it does generate a pretty solid list of the Paizo products themselves that author's worked on.
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Creative Director
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Having just read that whole nice reply about the Queen of Kyonin and Edasseril - were the elves spread across the whole Inner Sea Region? Any other continents?
Did they have about the same number of realms as the humans do today, or were they a more unified (as the whole evacuation before Starfall could suggest)?
Nope; the elves were never really spread across the Inner Sea Region. Mierani and Kyonin are pretty much it in Avistan. They never had nearly as many nations as humanity. That's one of humanity's big advantages... they are fecund and quick to colonize.
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Creative Director
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And something I have been wondering, do Dragons in Golarion play their version of 'The Great Game' with/amongst Mortals, or do they prefer to stay away from the 'Lesser Races', and thus keep the thieving little rats away from their Hoards?
They do not.
Evil dragons function more or less as giant monsters in the Inner Sea region.
Good dragons function as remote oracles/sages/enigmas in the Inner Sea region.
They have a quite different role over in Tian Xia though. They're not called the "Dragon Empires" on accident.
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Creative Director
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I have a question about the light sensitivity quality. If a creature with light sensitivity wears a wide brimmed hat or a pair of dark glasses could they avoid the dazzled condition if the keep those on in an area of bright light?
Such an item would work, but would have to be designed as an item first. Just any old pair of shades and wide hats won't do the job.
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Creative Director
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James,
Do you like James Bond movies? If so, which is your favorite Bond actor? Who is your favorite villain?
I quite like James Bond movies. A lot.
Sean Connery (Daniel Craig is a CLOSE second, and could have surpassed Sean Connery if MGM hadn't been such a lame company with their poor money management or whatever that kept Daniel Craig from being able to make more Bond movies.)
Goldfinger's my favorite Bond villain.
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Creative Director
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1)Is it safe to assume that the know direction spell would be useless in the first world?
2)I read that it is hard to get to the first world with magic so does that mean plane shift spell wouldn't work?
3)What are the plnar traits of the first world?
4)So the first world is as big as the prime material plane correct?
5)Does the First world have any planar effects that a human would need protection from, other then the changing environments?
1-5) You should check out Pathfinder #36, the final Kingmaker volume. There's a big article about the First World in that volume, as well as some adventure content there. Since I don't have that book handy here at home, I'll abstain from answering questions the answers to we may have already put in print but that I can't remember. Actaully... I can answer #3; the planar traits of the First World are "Erratic Time, Highly Morphic, Minor Positive Dominant, Mildly Neutral Aligned." For a bit more detail see page 239 of Inner Sea World Guide.
Actually, I can answer #4 as well. The First World is bigger than the Material Plane in the same sort of way that the Plane of Shadow is smaller.
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Creative Director
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Do you approve of this? I love it to death. It's creators are heroes to GMs everywhere.
It's pretty nifty... although I still prefer building monsters more by hand. It's more fun.
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Creative Director
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James, I am supposed to be starting a Tomb of Horrors campaign on this site soon, but I can't find my copy anywhere, and suspect it might have gotten mixed up in my sister's books when she moved out. I really want to GM this campaign, but I can't do that without the book. I can't replace it because originals will cost too much and Wizards pulled all the non-pirated pdfs available for download.
How do I explain this to my players? I've started up several PBPs here already and none took off, and I don't want to look like someone who never GMs when I promise to, but I can't run this campaign. The only way to get the rules is to pirate them, and I'd sooner not play at all than do that.
Just tell them the truth, and pick a different adventure. Give them more time to rebuild characters if they wish. Who knows? One of them might have a copy they can loan you!
That said... looks like e-bay actually has copies of the adventure for VERY inexpensive, if you're just looking for the 1st edition incarnation of the adventure.
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Creative Director
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James,
While using their quadruped eidolon as a mount, can a summoner have their eidolon use a run action and still be able to cast a spell at the end of the eidolon's run action? If so, would it require a Concentration check? What DC?
Thank you,
Justin
There's no difference between riding a running horse and riding a running eidolon. The fact that it's an eidolon doesn't matter.
As for the concentration check, I'd say Absolutely; riding something that's running would at the very least qualify as vigorous motion while casting, and might even qualify as violent motion. (see page 207 of the Core Rulebook for DCs)
James, I am supposed to be starting a Tomb of Horrors campaign on this site soon, but I can't find my copy anywhere, and suspect it might have gotten mixed up in my sister's books when she moved out. I really want to GM this campaign, but I can't do that without the book. I can't replace it because originals will cost too much and Wizards pulled all the non-pirated pdfs available for download.
How do I explain this to my players? I've started up several PBPs here already and none took off, and I don't want to look like someone who never GMs when I promise to, but I can't run this campaign. The only way to get the rules is to pirate them, and I'd sooner not play at all than do that.
Just tell them the truth, and pick a different adventure. Give them more time to rebuild characters if they wish. Who knows? One of them might have a copy they can loan you!
That said... looks like e-bay actually has copies of the adventure for VERY inexpensive, if you're just looking for the 1st edition incarnation of the adventure.
Really? I'd think it'd be a collectors item :/
Turns out, Wizards has the 3.5 version for free on their website, so I just downloaded that.
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Creative Director
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Ok, so I Got to ask you guys... Did they fix GODMODE yet? By God Mode i mean the ability to enchant 5 pieces of armor/jewelry with 20% Chameleon, giving you 100% Chameleon for a permanent invisibility. NOTHING can see you NOTHING can hurt you... it is... God mode. Been able to do it in both Morrowind and Oblivion.One of the things I am really enjoying in Skyrim is the crafting, being able to make better and better weapons and armor (and the ability to turn that terrible Flaming Burst Iron Sword into a [Epic] Flaming Burst Iron Sword to hand off to a follower) and potions, enchantments and the like. Do you also enjoy this facet of the game? Or are you too busy off shanking the Thalmor/Bandits/Guards/Dragons/EVERYTHING?I do indeed like that aspect of the game a lot. In fact, there's relatively little about Skyrim that I don't find completely compelling and awesome.
MAYBE chopping firewood. But only because lugging around a woodsman's axe is tiring.
The game system works a lot differently than it did in Oblivion, first of all. I haven't tried this stunt out yet, but even if it did work, I'd not bother, because it's cheating. If you don't like it because it makes the game too easy... just don't do it. Just because you CAN take advantage of a design element doesn't mean you have to.
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Creative Director
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Another magic question, if you please: Can an undead creature be (temporarily) turned into a living creature with a Polymorph Any Object spell? If so, and the now-living creature is subsequently killed, will the spell break and the end result be the undead creature, now destroyed, or will the end result be the previously living creature, now dead? How good of a diguise could this provide, for example, for a lich?
Polymorph effects cannot give you a soul. Therefore, it can't make an undead creature into a for-real living creature.
Killing an undead creature polymorphed into something that looks alive has the same effect as killing a normal creature polymorphed into something; it kills the monster. When killed, you revert to your normal form.
As for how good of a disguise? It'd grant you a +20 bonus on disguise checks; that's standard for polymorph effects (see page 211 of the Core Rulebook).
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Creative Director
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It's been a while since I've checked this thread, so if this has already been brought up, I apologize. I saw this on Yahoo! News today, and thought it might make an interesting monster: Anomalocaris.
EDIT: Sorry, I guess that's not a question. *AHEM* Do you think the Anomalocaris makes a good inspiration for a Golarion-type creature?
Woah... yeah. It would. Neat!
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Creative Director
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Really? I'd think it'd be a collectors item :/
Turns out, Wizards has the 3.5 version for free on their website, so I just downloaded that.
A mint, perfect condition copy of the original probably would be... but that adventure's one of the MOST reprinted D&D adventures everywhere. There are likely hundreds of thousands of copies of the adventure in print out there, in fact. Combining all the different incarnations over the years, I wouldn't be surprised at all to learn there are over a million copies of it in print, actually.
It's also one that WotC reprinted a few times fairly recently as part of various retrospectives on the game as well.
And all that's moot, of course, since they actually have the PDF online, which is nice.
I have an idea. I'm working on my steampunk campaign setting, but to avoid taking on too much I'm only doing two countries right now. They are loosely based off of real world nations, but I am doing plenty to make them my own. The first is Cromora, for which I pull from New England and Canada. The second is Minoka.
For Minoka, I'm pulling from Hawaii, but much, much bigger. It's an absolutely huge island group, kinda like Indonesia. However, Minoka also borrows heavily from Asia. The issue is, I want to pull from Japan, China, Southeast Asia, and Korea. This is a lot of countries, and I can only make two, one of which has already been determined. So, here is my idea. Make Minoka kind of like the US. The US is a former British colony, but we have Europeans of all sorts here. I want to do the same. Minoka is a former colony of the culture borrowing from Japan, but it has a great deal of Chinese, Korean, and Southeast Asian immigration. Plus, there are the native Hawaiians.
So, instead of having several different Asian countries, I have an amalgamation of a bunch of Asian countries into one, but with what I think is a reasonably plausible explanation for why all these different cultures have been mixed up into one country.
Do you like this idea?
Majority OR Minority, non evil orcs isn't a direction we're really interested in taking orcs. That direction is for half-orcs, after all.As for the other question... You could argue for or against it either way. Pick what works best for your game. If you're asking what I think is best, I've already more or less said — a non-human race regarding Aroden as their primary deity is, to me, pretty weird.
I would point at my earlier "don't give me a fake orc when I want the real thing" post but I'm not that pissed off about the issue anyway.
And yeah, on that issue of my race and some of them venerating Aroden, they aren't human, but they ARE closely related to humans. Kinda like the Dark Folk and Morlocks and other such beings. The only reasoning I threw was that they're close enough. I also forgot to mention that they DO have their own deity whom they worship, since I didn't want the Aroden-worship be universal among them.
Now to top this post with a pair of questions.
1) Do you like pineapple?
2) If Razmir did become a god, which portfolios would he have?
So I'm running Wake of the Watcher and I find...
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Creative Director
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I have an idea. I'm working on my steampunk campaign setting, but to avoid taking on too much I'm only doing two countries right now. They are loosely based off of real world nations, but I am doing plenty to make them my own. The first is Cromora, for which I pull from New England and Canada. The second is Minoka.
For Minoka, I'm pulling from Hawaii, but much, much bigger. It's an absolutely huge island group, kinda like Indonesia. However, Minoka also borrows heavily from Asia. The issue is, I want to pull from Japan, China, Southeast Asia, and Korea. This is a lot of countries, and I can only make two, one of which has already been determined. So, here is my idea. Make Minoka kind of like the US. The US is a former British colony, but we have Europeans of all sorts here. I want to do the same. Minoka is a former colony of the culture borrowing from Japan, but it has a great deal of Chinese, Korean, and Southeast Asian immigration. Plus, there are the native Hawaiians.
So, instead of having several different Asian countries, I have an amalgamation of a bunch of Asian countries into one, but with what I think is a reasonably plausible explanation for why all these different cultures have been mixed up into one country.
Do you like this idea?
I do... It's actually quite similar to what we've done with Dragon Empires, in fact—although on a larger scale than just one country.
Gah!! I meant to ask what DOMAINS he would have!!
Curse me for not getting enough sleep again...
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Just to make sure there isn't any misunderstanding, I've never really wanted all orcs in Golarion to be misunderstood noble savage-types. Just some, so that those of us that want those orcs would have a place for them without having to go play videogames for them.There is Eberron, after all. No video game required.
Spoilering because it's a tangent that shouldn't take up space in this thread:
Eberron never actually fully details their orcs. They don't give them the kind of rich, well-written background material Pathfinder has for its player races.
Eberron doesn't get the high-quality support Golarion does.
Everyone in the area has pretty much switched to Golarion for their PF/D&D games(and the irony there is that I'm the one that introduced a lot of them to it). The ones that do their own homebrew that I know of are largely loudly outspoken about being "old guard" "old school" "true to the roots of the game" "genocide yay!" types that usually balk at anyone trying to buck the Always Chaotic Evil trope. Or doing anything new with old races, ever.
And frankly, I really prefer Golarion for the most part. It gave me things I've long wanted out of D&D that WotC never gave. I prefer its cosmology, and I prefer the wider range of possibilities in the more varied setting. It's just the strict adherence to Always Chaotic Evil and Beauty Equals Goodness in that larger, more varied world that's frustrating.
Sure, I can change it, and I do, if I'm the GM. But I'd love to get to play in Golarion and actually have a cool, well developed culture to pull from for heroic orcs. I'd love to get to play a heroic orc without someone rolling their eyes and going "oh boy, hi Drizzt" and getting accused of wanting to be the special snowflake at the table. Having just a little bit of support to point towards to say "no, this is quite reasonable" would help there.
That and it would be nice to get to discuss anything involving non-evil ____ without the usual suspects hounding me and lecturing me about how I want to have badwrongfun.
I mean, hell, it's not enough that some posters are all too happy to shoot down any hopes of getting just a little bit of official support for such characters, I got 'em doing the same thing when I'm looking for third-party support.
If you ever move to Finland and gather a few pals, I could arrange something. But yeah, chances of that happening are slim at best.
Anyway, to remedy for that earlier question. If Razmir did somehow become a god (would be an interesting plot twist in a campaign), which domains would he have? I can imagine a few possible ones, but I'd rather hear your take on this first.
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Just to make sure there isn't any misunderstanding, I've never really wanted all orcs in Golarion to be misunderstood noble savage-types. Just some, so that those of us that want those orcs would have a place for them without having to go play videogames for them.There is Eberron, after all. No video game required.Spoilering because it's a tangent that shouldn't take up space in this thread:
** spoiler omitted **...
Hi Mikaze, I wish there was a private message function.
So you're not the only person out there who wants to see some kind of support for the non-evil orc. Gorum is chaotic neutral after all.
EDIT: Question for James, now that there are some South American mythological monsters will we get to see them in Skull & Shackles?
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Icyshadow & Dudemeister
And yeah, Finland's a bit too far to be likely. :) And I hear you on the "have to run the game you want yourself" bit. One can dream, at least. (of course getting official support makes getting that game a bit easier, but I digress) ;)
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You can make your own page like this by typing in an author's name into our Search window, and then clicking on the Products tab on the results lists. It's not always a complete list, especially since there's products that authors don't have for sale on Paizo.com, but it does generate a pretty solid list of the Paizo products themselves that author's worked on.I don't look the credits of the published material as much as I should. I would like to see a page in the Paizo site with the authors that have worked for your company and a list of their works (if it isn't to much work to do that).
If it already exist apologies for not seeing it and I would be very grateful for a link.While I base my purchase choices on the descriptions of the product a page like the one proposed would allow me to discover other material from authors I like.
Thanks, it was aimed primarily to Paizo products, so it will work nicely.
I do know!Do you know what your sin is, James?
(Linked on the infinitesimal chance that anyone reading this thread won't get the reference -- it's at 2:45 in that clip.)
Heh. I figured you'd answer that in a way that makes me chuckle. So, what is your sin? And as long as I'm asking Deep, Meaningful Questions from cult sci-fi shows --
Who are you?
What do you want?
Why are you here?
Where are you going?
Questions and jests aside, it strikes me that if any one of Thassilon's seven virtues of rulership characterizes Paizo more than the others, it would have to be eager striving. Not envy -- I don't believe for a minute that you and Lisa and Eric and Jason and the rest could have accomplished all that you have if the focus was on "beating WotC" -- but striving rather toward the abstract goal of creating the best fantasy role-playing game the RPG community has ever seen. So far, you're doing a fantastic job, in my humble opinion.
<Kavren wanders off, humming "The Impossible Dream" from Man of La Mancha>
Could you duel wield lances while mounted?NO
What about four armed races?
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1)Is it safe to assume that the know direction spell would be useless in the first world?
2)I read that it is hard to get to the first world with magic so does that mean plane shift spell wouldn't work?
3)What are the plnar traits of the first world?
4)So the first world is as big as the prime material plane correct?
5)Does the First world have any planar effects that a human would need protection from, other then the changing environments?
1-5) You should check out Pathfinder #36, the final Kingmaker volume. There's a big article about the First World in that volume, as well as some adventure content there. Since I don't have that book handy here at home, I'll abstain from answering questions the answers to we may have already put in print but that I can't remember. Actaully... I can answer #3; the planar traits of the First World are "Erratic Time, Highly Morphic, Minor Positive Dominant, Mildly Neutral Aligned." For a bit more detail see page 239 of Inner Sea World Guide.
Actually, I can answer #4 as well. The First World is bigger than the Material Plane in the same sort of way that the Plane of Shadow is smaller.
What?! You don't have all the Paizo PDF neatly stored in your PC? I am shocked!
;-)To be honest I have several of them on my PC, but that PZOXXX label Someday I should spend a couple of day renaming and reordering them in the right folders. The problem is that it is too similar to my RL job.
I suspect it is the same reason why you don't have everything in your t home PC.
James, can a lich create a new phylactery if it's original is destroyed?
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Another magic question, if you please: Can an undead creature be (temporarily) turned into a living creature with a Polymorph Any Object spell? If so, and the now-living creature is subsequently killed, will the spell break and the end result be the undead creature, now destroyed, or will the end result be the previously living creature, now dead? How good of a diguise could this provide, for example, for a lich?Polymorph effects cannot give you a soul. Therefore, it can't make an undead creature into a for-real living creature.
Killing an undead creature polymorphed into something that looks alive has the same effect as killing a normal creature polymorphed into something; it kills the monster. When killed, you revert to your normal form.
As for how good of a disguise? It'd grant you a +20 bonus on disguise checks; that's standard for polymorph effects (see page 211 of the Core Rulebook).
Sorry, but I failed my Will ST:
- 5th printing has changed the disguise modifier to +10;- AFAIK in Pathfinder the Polymorph effect don't end when the target die. At least I can't find any rules saying that.
It is something that hasn't been ported over from 3.x.
Another magic question, if you please: Can an undead creature be (temporarily) turned into a living creature with a Polymorph Any Object spell? (...)Polymorph effects cannot give you a soul. Therefore, it can't make an undead creature into a for-real living creature.
Thank you for your answer! It would still show up under undead detection spells, then, and be harmed by positive energy? But what of something like a ghoul or a vampire, though, who seems to have their souls more or less in place, or a lich that has a soul, only it is placed somewhere else? Would you say that biological life in Pathfinder is dependent on the presence of an untainted soul within the body, or is the distinction here something more subtle and metaphysical than whether biological processes occur or not?
Also, on the subject of polymorphs: "What can change the nature of a man?"
I just got another idea for a question from this line I seemed to have missed in the past. "Abadar is credited with guiding the advancement of the demihuman races towards the point where they could establish civilized societies of their own."
So, Abadar has followers among demihumans because of this, or do these "demihuman" races deny this claim that Abadar's clergy have? Because this is giving me more ideas for making that one race of mine seem more consistent ( while Aroden might have played a part in trying to turn them human, it's Abadar who they venerate for introducing civilization to them...or maybe they worshipped the two as a divine duo of some sort... *Brain overloading* )
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James,
Do you like James Bond movies? If so, which is your favorite Bond actor? Who is your favorite villain?
I quite like James Bond movies. A lot.
Sean Connery (Daniel Craig is a CLOSE second, and could have surpassed Sean Connery if MGM hadn't been such a lame company with their poor money management or whatever that kept Daniel Craig from being able to make more Bond movies.)
Goldfinger's my favorite Bond villain.
I've heard that the next Bond movie (#23) will still have Daniel Craig and will be a bit more like some of the older movies (even having a new Q). Javier Bardem is going to be the villain.
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One more question: is it possible for someone who isn't a Paizo staffer, or personally acquainted with a Paizo staffer or with Nicholas Logue, to get hold of a digital copy of the unexpurgated "Hook Mountain Massacre?" Other posters (notably Gorbacz, IIRC) have alluded to having and even running it, but I haven't been able to find it anywhere on-line.Not from Paizo. The "uncut" digital copy doesn't exist anymore. Other posters might or might not have it, but that's not something I'm interested in propagating across the internet.
Not because I think it's too violent or gross or nasty, though. Because I wouldn't want my unedited, raw text floating around on the Internet, and I'm not comfortable revealing raw text of an author to the public without that author's consent... even in a case like this where we COULD do so if we wanted, since we purchase all rights to game design work.
Turns out, raw, unedited, undeveloped text is not a great way to show off. It'd be like walking straight out of bed into public without cleaning yourself up first.
As someone who has written for far less edited formats than Paizo I can whole-heartedly agree. I've had some stuff go out that I wish had received more development work than it got. Everyone looks better when you get that polish. The result is that I do a lot more editing/developing work in the line that I've written for. (I really don't need that free time ;) )
That said, I'm also interested in what the differences in that AP were before they were edited for content.
Do you approve of this? I love it to death. It's creators are heroes to GMs everywhere.It's pretty nifty... although I still prefer building monsters more by hand. It's more fun.
I agree with the T-Rex.
Manual creating by hand a creature is more fun and you'll have a back-up.This is also good for when you create your own monsters from scratch.
Some questions;
Which do you like most (for the sake of creating monsters out of them):
Spider VS Scorpion VS Mantis VS Centipede VS Wasp
Can you place these insect/arachnids in order from best to most useless?
Did you ever create monsters out of a Chameleon? Or would you ever create a chameleon-based monster? Rock Reptile in the new Misfit-monsters manual for the win :P
Which do you like more:
Mountain Dwarf or Duergar
Drow or Wood Elf
Those new monsters are the only ones in that volume I didn't design. Nor have I actually read them; AKA: this is a Rob question. THAT SAID... If I remember tomorrow, I'll look into it.So I'm running Wake of the Watcher and I find...
** spoiler omitted **
Thanks for the answer. You don't have to go out of your way, it works fairly well when run as a hazard instead of a creature.
...I don't have a question but I do have tea. ::offers tea::