Creative Director
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Do you like Sid Meier's Civilization franchise? If so have you had a chance to look at Civ 5?
My favorite in the franchise was Civ 2. I played the HELL out of that game, but haven't played any of the installments after—they got increasingly away from the basis of what I felt Civ 2 did so well.
I don't use PCs anymore, and get most of my gaming in on the Mac, the Xbox360, or the PS3; if Civ 5 is available for one of those platforms I haven't noticed yet and I'm probably glad I didn't notice yet...
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Creative Director
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Do you like the Vancian magic system?
I have found that the non Vancian systems tend to give up choice for flexibility...
How do you explain (justify) the Vancian for people who think it is limiting and inflexible?
I very much like the Vancian magic system. If folks think it's too limiting and inflexible, I dare them to play a non-vancian system in a game and NOT grind the game to a standstill while they try to figure out what their magic is going to do.
The huge bonus of the Vancian system is that it basically treats spells as quantified ammo. You know what those spells do and you know how many you have at any given time. MUCH easier to track, and much harder to cheat with than a point based system.
If someone thinks it's too limiting, I suggest they try a spontaneous caster like bard, sorcerer, or oracle. If they think THAT'S too limiting, I suggest they play a fighter or a rogue. If they STILL squawk, I ask them why they want to play Pathfinder in the first place.
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Creative Director
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What thing, when done in your childhood, upset your parents the most?
Probably let some friends smuggle in some beer to drink during a game session that was occurring at my house. This was in high school, and since my dad was a high school teacher, that type of thing could have done a lot of damage to his professional reputation had word of "Mr. Jacobs lets kids drink beer!" had gotten out.
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Creative Director
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Why do the subsequent movies in a trilogy always fail to live up (with rare exceptions) to the bar of an awesome first movie?
Because the movie's ideas were never large enough to fill 3 movies.
OR
Because the studio makes stupid demands on the movie.
OR
Because the director/writer/whoever runs out of ideas or gets burnt out.
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Creative Director
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What was your favorite job prior to Paizo?
Probably a tie between working with my dad in the summer as a commercial salmon fisherman OR working with Steve Oliff at Olyoptics coloring comic books. Those are the only two other jobs I've had where I seriously consider I could have taken up as careers. Instead, I went to college, got an English degree, and ended up (eventually) here at Paizo.
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Creative Director
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What's your least favorite convention?
Gen Con, because it's too crowded, I have to travel to get there, it's too crowded, the weather is miserable, it's too crowded, it's a lot of exhausting work, it's too crowded, the food is generally pretty gross, it's too crowded, the water tastes and feels nasty, it's too crowded, and it's too crowded.
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Creative Director
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How many pairs of sunglasses have you found during your move? My ex-roommate from the Pac Northwest claims that everyone who lives there owns a number of pairs, always buying a new one on a day where it's sunny because it's so rarely sunny.
None. I wear prescription glasses, and therefore don't wear sunglasses. And despite your ex-roommate's claim, I haven't noticed an overdose of sunglasses at all—sounds like anti-northwest propaganda.
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Creative Director
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In primary school, what do you feel was your greatest achievement?
Writing a 10 page short story called "The Tenth Planet."
Either that, or being the one who actually found the famed Power Sword in King Skoorb's dungeon during the D&D game my 5th grade teacher ran for us during lunch recess at school.
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Creative Director
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In Australia if you turn 100 years old our Queen sends the lucky person a letter of congratulations.
Do you think that for every 1000 posts or so somebody makes on the forum that they could be sent an email of congratulations from a ruler of Golarion....?
10000 Posts: Eiseth, the Erinyes Queen...sends an email urging you to go on rampage in the upper realm
5000 Posts: Queen Telandia Edasseril sends an arty farty tree hugging email.
2500 Posts: Queen Elvanna sends an email informing you that she will remove any blight hexes on your village and not feed you to the wolves for a year.
1000 Posts: Queen Ileosa Arabasti invites you to her coronation which can be found in the excellent Curse of the Crimson Throne AP.
HA! Awesome.
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Creative Director
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Where do you see Paizo products placing in a Quality/On Deadline/Volume of Different Products triangle? For that matter, are there two noticeably different triangles, one for GenCon products (where I assume products will place with a high focus on the on deadline axis), and one for all others?
Roughly how much of Paizo's editting time (in percentage of total work hours a year, say) goes on GenCon products every twelve months, and how much on other products?
Paizo's products would end up on the "Quality" point of a triangle. While we all would LOVE to skew that toward "On Deadline," we always seem to skew toward "Volume of Different Products." Hopefully that can start skewing toward "On Deadline" some day.
Last Gen Con, we sent EVERYONE on the editorial staff to Gen Con. Of course, the time spent editing products that come out at Gen Con is already over 2 to 3 months before Gen Con. And we don't always playtest only Gen Con products; we just started playtesting the magus, after all, and that book's coming out in the Spring.
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Hello James,
I hope this post finds you and paizo staff doing very well. I need a quick favor. Do you have any info on the city of Westpool. I am GMing CoT and having a blast with it. I have several players going above and beyond the call of duty and I need a little extra to dangle in front of their noses. Any and all info would greatly appreciated. I am also confused about giving xp in adventure paths. My first time running and playing pathfinder. It seems that I have been giving to little xp in C of T. What is the "correct" way of giving xp in a AP. Example My party fights the Sisters of Eisith in What Lies in Dust. I take each sister and the fire elemental in the AP add the xp for them and divide by number of players. Total 8,400/5. I think I am missing something... Thanks for taking my FAVORITE GAME a notch higher. I think Gary and company would be proud. HUZZAH!!!!!
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Creative Director
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There may be a little bitt of info about Westpool in the Player's Guide to Council of Thieves...but I'm pretty sure there's not. It's not a location we've pretty much done anything at all with, so there's not much I can give you but a recommendation to have fun developing it into your own town in your game!
HAH! Just had to share this with our Scottish Dwarf-hating CD: I was listening to Tolkien's BBC 4 interview, and he identified his dwarves "quiet obviously" with the Jews. "All their words are Semitic."
Question about content in Bestiary 2, or any monster stats coming out. Is there a good chance we will see more Oni types than just ogre magi? Asking because they may figure heavily in my own homebrew setting. Thinking of having a sort of teifling race that comes from Oni rather than demons/devils.
Why?
Why not?
Why?
If that was directed at me, the answer is that devils & demons have been done to death.
No, it was directed at Jacobs. Just trying to gauge how ambiguous a question has to be before he won't answer it.Why?If that was directed at me, the answer is that devils & demons have been done to death.
That is what I thought.
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Creative Director
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Question about content in Bestiary 2, or any monster stats coming out. Is there a good chance we will see more Oni types than just ogre magi? Asking because they may figure heavily in my own homebrew setting. Thinking of having a sort of teifling race that comes from Oni rather than demons/devils.
Oni will play a MAJOR role in the Jade Regent adventure path, which begins next August. There'll be lots of new oni to play with during that AP's run. There are no new oni in Bestiry 2.
If you're interested in having tieflings descended from oni, check out Pathfinder #25. There's a tiefling article in that one that talks (among other things) about oni-descended tieflings.
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Creative Director
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No, it was directed at Jacobs. Just trying to gauge how ambiguous a question has to be before he won't answer it.Why?If that was directed at me, the answer is that devils & demons have been done to death.
You found your answer, I suspect.
And while devils might have been done to death, I'll fight anyone who says demons have been done to death in a duel to the pain in the pit of the fire-breathing lizards. (narrows eyes at xorial)
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Creative Director
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Have you seen Chicken Run or any of Aardman's wallace and gromit stuff (though I know some of the humour doesn't translate well to the american market)?
I suspect plasticine stop motion filming is the very epitome of what many would call 'dated', but the craftsmanship and attention to detail in the animation is (in my opinion) fantastic, and as far as I'm concerned outclasses most of the CGI effects that I've seen in other films.
I have indeed seen Chicken Run and most of the Wallace and Gromit stuff—it's VERY well done. And a great example of how "dated" effects work can still be beautiful and artistic and more enjoyable than "cutting edge" effects work.
Basically, special effects are like any other medium, such as acrylics or clay or oils or colored pencils. If you have a talented artist working with the special effects, they'll look awesome no matter WHAT technique is being used, but if you lack artists, they'll look bad.
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Question about content in Bestiary 2, or any monster stats coming out. Is there a good chance we will see more Oni types than just ogre magi? Asking because they may figure heavily in my own homebrew setting. Thinking of having a sort of teifling race that comes from Oni rather than demons/devils.
There's actually rules for Oni spawn tieflings in one of the Council of Thieves AP books. There's tons of variant tieflings and they ROCK.
I'm pretty sure it's Bastards of Erebus.
EDIT: Ninja'd by the man.
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Okay this is a touchy question...and I'm nervous to ask it due to its modern political nature...
How is abortion viewed in Golorion?
The books are very clever on not confirming or denying the subject.
I ask this because over at Pathfinderchronicler.net (those fanboy fiction authors)this topic has been brought up. I did my own research in the books and came across references to Night Tea (Adventurer's Armory)purportedly working as a "morning after pill", that Pharasma's portfolio's include Birth and Death (Core rulebook), and Calistra's clerics dispense contraceptives and are "believed" to terminate unwanted pregnancies (gods and Magic).
Night Tea is a black market item that only costs 1 sp. Are the herbs used to brew it commonly found? Are they native to a certain zone? would these be the same herbs that Calistra clerics dispense?
Does Pharasma, a neutral deity, have feelings on the subject? Does Norgorbor?
What's the "legality" of such a practice in Golorion? Is it more acceptable in Taldor vs Cheliax? Do the Andorans consider it a fundamental right?
Ps, again I'm a tad sorry for posting those question because the subject treads on tricky ground...It will help the editors at Pathfinderchronicler.net tackle a possible Wayfinder 4 submission's subject matter before it goes to presses there and Paizo reps it on their site...
{hops into thread} Whew! Maybe I'll be safe here. I'll just hide under... this... T-Rex?! AUGH! {flees in terror}
Has there been any discussion about a community participation rewards program??
Something like for every 20 posts in the non-off topic forums, gain 1 Community Participation point, and for every five product reviews gain 1. And then when you get 100, earn $5.00 in store credit??
I have two cats. One is a great, American-loving, patriotic kitty, named Stripes.
the other however, is an evil, anti-American, Communist kitty. She is sneaky in an "I hate America" kinda way(as opposed to normal kitty sneakyness). I once caught her trying to steal state secrets and had to punish her by not giving her kitty treats for a week.
Do you love evil, anti-American, Communist kitties??
Why is it so damned hot?!
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Creative Director
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Has there been any discussion about a community participation rewards program??
Something like for every 20 posts in the non-off topic forums, gain 1 Community Participation point, and for every five product reviews gain 1. And then when you get 100, earn $5.00 in store credit??
There has not been discussion about this... as far as I know. But that's also upstairs-talk and I wouldn't know about that kinda talk anyway...
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Creative Director
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I have two cats. One is a great, American-loving, patriotic kitty, named Stripes.
the other however, is an evil, anti-American, Communist kitty. She is sneaky in an "I hate America" kinda way(as opposed to normal kitty sneakyness). I once caught her trying to steal state secrets and had to punish her by not giving her kitty treats for a week.
Do you love evil, anti-American, Communist kitties??
I do!