Creative Director
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Mr. James
Does the time controlling Phane (from D&D's epic levels book) and the dragon-slaying Sirrush make a chance of being paizonized?
Or are they gonna be on the Ravid, Ethereal Filcher/Marauder and Arrowhawk list of doom?
A fair number of the epic level things are just not appropriate for Pathfinder or Golarion, and some of them are just too powerful even to include in Mythic. We'll see...
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James, in our next homebrew campaign the party's healer is going to be an oracle with the tongues curse and he wants to have Protean as his cursed language. While I know this isn't a legal option according to the APG, I'm still thinking it's fine, but I'm curious...
1) What does Protean sound like?
2) Does it sound mostly the same when two Protean speakers are talking to each other or simply in each others vicinity?
3) Can you use any sort of read lips skills on Protean speakers?
4) Is this even a language mortals (the oracle is a female lashunta, in this case) can comprehend and speak, or is Tongues / Comprehend Languages necessary?
5) How often does protean change and how quickly does that knowledge / proficiency in the change spread to all Protean speakers in the multi-verse?
6) Does anything else speak Protean besides the langauge's namesake?
7) Is Protean at all related to any other languages, like maybe the elemental ones?
Protean should absolutely be legal and fine for an oracle.
1) Hissing and growling and surging water and thunder and wind and crumbling rocks and explosions and shrieks and murmurs and whispers and hoots and more.
2) I don't understand this question. It always sounds like Protean when spoken. It's a language like any other language. It doesn't have special rules.
3) If they use lips to speak the language, then yes. Otherwise, not really.
4) They can comprehend and speak it well enough, although it'll never sound right to a protean.
5) When the protean language changes, those who speak it change to match so they can still speak it, otherwise it's not a language. It's just sounds.
6) Probably. Not a lot of things though.
7) Protean is likely a precursor to a lot of other languages, since it's one of the first languages ever spoken. Possibly THE first language... the only one I could think that could be older would maybe be Abyssal, but even then, I think the qlippoth probably communicated just by telepathy before they started talking. Unknown for sure, in any case.
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James, with the Mythic book coming out this year, is this something that might be prevalent for Season 5 of Pathfinder Society? Or was this book specifically meant for home games that wanted a god-like feel to them?
That's a question we're still answering in-house.
And remember, the book is also meant for GMs who want tools to create memorable NPCs and villains for their games that don't feature mythic PCs, remember... the book isn't only for players. A GM can use this book to build things for his normal game without having "god-like PCs."
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Now THAT is interesting. Are all mortals ascended to deity-hood, like Nethys and Irori and Iomedae, similarly less powerful gods like Aroden was and therefore more vulnerable to whatever lethal element X is in this case?
Also, James, I'm curious...has Rovagug ALWAYS been a force of crazy, ultimate, universe ending annihilation? Or is it possible that something, waaaay long ago, changed him?
The relative power level of deities varies, and it's not something we've quantified. And until we decide to make rules for deities, we'll likely NOT quantify it. At this point, the best metric to use is "the older the deity, the more powerful the deity." That's not always 100% accurate, but it's usually close enough.
That would mean Nethys, who became a deity long before Aroden was even born, is more powerful than Aorden was when he died, for example.
Rovagug has indeed always been a chaotic evil destroyer god. The "this evil god was once something else and then something changed him" trope is for Zon-Kuthon, pretty much. And MAYBE for one of the demon lords and some of the arch devils.
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"Giants have racial Hit Dice and never substitute such Hit Dice for class levels like some humanoids."
What does this mean? Giants can still take class levels to improve themselves, it says right in their organization line that they often do. Is there some kind of thing I'm not aware of that allows humanoids or other monsters to have hit dice subtracted from them and replaced with class levels?
I just spoke to Jason about this, and the upshot is that the sentance is just really poorly and awkwardly written. What it SHOULD say is this:
"Giants always have racial Hit Dice."
That is all. It's only trying to say that a humanoid with the giant subtype NEVER is a zero HD race.
Is it possible to be a lycanthrope and remain lucid while transformed?
(related, I hate vampires unless their name is Alucard or Dio)
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Creative Director
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A few more things to ask
1. To clarify an earlier question, is the being trapped in The Spheres on the Elemental Plane of Air a nod to Cryonax? I ask because it says it might be an Elemental Paragon, and one of the mentions of what kind it might be is ice, so it makes me wonder.
2. What do you think of Rusty and Co.?
3. If the creator of Rusty and Co asked you folks permission at Paizo, would you (or the person who is in charge of such things) let him use some of your copyrighted yet open content (Like the Gorzragh, the Seugathi, the Proteans and so on) creatures in his comic?
I ask because he got in a bit of trouble for using WotC-owned creatures in his comic, despite being a parody, and he's not sure about the legality of such things, and since you at Paizo are more relaxed/fan-friendly about these sort of things I was wondering what you think. Plus, I'd really love to see some of the Pathfinder creatures in the strip.
4. Just for funzies and/or adventure hooks, I must ask, what is Golarion's stage-play equivalent of The Rocky Horror Picture Show in terms of its cult following and strange transgressiveness?
5. For an insectoid race that doesn't have overpowered extra attacks, why not make them 4-legged and just give them a speed bonus? Or maybe make that other pair of arms non-dexterous but instead evolved for stuff like burrowing or webbing-production?
6. What do you think of my concept of The Handyman as a substitute for the Beholder that also tries to do its own thing:
Quote:
It looks like an 8-armed humanoid in Monkish (As in the D&D eastern-style monk) dress with a giant hand for a head. Curiously, all the creature's hands look like left hands.It'd have a few monk-like Special abillities, as well as a different special effect upon a hit for each of its 8 arms (So far I'm thinking one poisons, one blinds; deafens and dumbs, one traps you in a Forcecage, one sets you on fire, one freezes you solid, one causes the hitee to erupt in ally-hitting lightning, one causes bad luck, and one sends you flying). In addition, any spell fired at it has a 50% chance of being "caught" by the creature's hand-head and thrown back at the user.
Society-wise, they're basically a bunch of Lawful Evil monks, following their own personal philosophy. Of course, given that they are aberrant creatures, said personal philosophies are often nonsensical, contradictory and often downright insane. They despise all those who don't follow their own warped personal philosophies. And since no two Handymen's personal philosophies are the same, they all pretty much despise each other.
It's supposed to be the rough equivalent of the Beholder in that it's a weird looking anatomy-themed monster with lots of different ways to hurt you and with an insane xenophobia and hatred of others. But I do hope it does enough new that it works as its own creature as well.
7. On a quick scanthrough (Since I know you're busy) what do you think of my setting, Dungeonworld,, which is set in a world-sized dungeon, has monster races treated as normal races, and is overall very gonzo .I'm nowhere near done with it, but on a quick lookthrough, you can kinda get an idea of it.
1) It's not a nod to anything as far as I know.
2) Never seen it before. I wish they didn't self-censor the profanity... if you're gonna use profanity, use it. Don't use it and then black it out.
3) I'm unfamiliar with the web comic, but if it wants to use the community use license it can do that without having to contact Paizo directly, as long as it abides by the rules in that license. Using the community use license of course means you can't make money on your project... it's got to stay at the level of fan content. I don't make the actual licensing decisions for Paizo, but we tend to be pretty picky about who we do licenses with and often prefer to do licenses with folks and companies who have reputations we know about and the like. Since I've never heard of this web comic until your post, to me, that would mean I would not license Pathfinder content to the web comic. At least not immediately. Maybe after I'd come to know the creator and more about the comic and so on... maybe. That said, I don't read a lot of web comics at all, so I'm not the right person to ask that of anyway.
The community use license is really our number one way to let folks use Golarion content in their projects, but it's not a license for people who want to make money on those projects. That type of project is in fact a job, and if someone wants to incorporate Pathfinder/Golarion content that is our intellectual property, we'd ABSOLUTELY prefer they contact us and try to work out a license with us rather than just try to use the "parody" shield. If only because parody can be insulting, and seeing someone make money off of something we put a lot of work into building by making fun of what we built without our permission to do so is a good way to annoy us. Or ANY company, for that matter.
4) Probably the Six Trials of Larazod (see Pathfinder #26).
5) That's certainly a solution... but i'm still not all that keen on adding bug people to a world that's intended to be mostly humanocentric.
6) I avoid providing feedback on design work that I'm not paying someone to do for legal reasons and for time management reasons... sorry!
7) Same as #6 above. The best place to go for feedback on game design would be other forums here on these boards, to seek peer feedback from other gamers. It's not a service I can provide.
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Is it possible to be a lycanthrope and remain lucid while transformed?
(related, I hate vampires unless their name is Alucard or Dio)
Yes. Unless the GM says no. It's absolutely possible for a NPC one to remain lucid; we do this all the time in our adventures. Since the template doesn't really have a downside to it if you allow PCs to remain lucid and in control of their actions while transformed (there's no alignment change associated with the disease), that removes the only reason why not all PCs run out to become lycanthropes just for the free stat boosts. That's fine if you want to run a game where all the PCs are lycanthorpes, but not all games want that.
(And I don't see how that's related, but that's okay.)
Can werebeasts be made from any creature of the Animal type?
Such as, I dunno, a wereroc or were-goblin dog?
(LET ME DREAM TT_TT)
What was the inspiration for Numeria? I really love the setting and I would like to know of similar settings and stories.
The only ones I could think of are the Thundarr the Barbarian cartoon and (sort of) Heavy Metal.
James, thanks for your answers so far. Got some follow-ups on two of them from different posts which I'll condense to make it easier:
5) When the protean language changes, those who speak it change to match so they can still speak it, otherwise it's not a language. It's just sounds.
Regarding this 'change' the speakers undergo...
1) Are there any physical manifestations or is it all mental?2) Are those affected aware the change has taken place?
3) Do they still remember the old syntax, grammar, vocabulary, etc?
4) Does the language itself update simultaneously across the multi-verse in minds of all those who can understand it or are there delays based on various factors?
Rovagug has indeed always been a chaotic evil destroyer god. The "this evil god was once something else and then something changed him" trope is for Zon-Kuthon, pretty much. And MAYBE for one of the demon lords and some of the arch devils.
Basing these questions on Zun-Kuthon's entry in the Pathfinder wiki...
5) Is the alien force which corrupted him in any way related to the Dark Tapestry?6) If not, can we have a clue as to the nature of this mysterious power that drove a god insane?
7) Outside of it's involvement with Zun-Kuthon, is there any chance this alien being has affected Golarion in the past in some ways?
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Can werebeasts be made from any creature of the Animal type?
Such as, I dunno, a wereroc or were-goblin dog?
(LET ME DREAM TT_TT)
Yes. In fact, one of the Skull & Shackles adventures has stats for werecrocodiles.
The only limit is your imagination and your GM's permission.
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Creative Director
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What was the inspiration for Numeria? I really love the setting and I would like to know of similar settings and stories.
The only ones I could think of are the Thundarr the Barbarian cartoon and (sort of) Heavy Metal.
Those are absolutely part of the inspiration. I would add to that the old D&D adventure "Expedition to the Barrier Peaks," as well as all of the sword and laser pulp fiction (such as the John Carter stories) from the pulps.
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Creative Director
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James, thanks for your answers so far. Got some follow-ups on two of them from different posts which I'll condense to make it easier:
5) When the protean language changes, those who speak it change to match so they can still speak it, otherwise it's not a language. It's just sounds.Regarding this 'change' the speakers undergo...
1) Are there any physical manifestations or is it all mental?
2) Are those affected aware the change has taken place?
3) Do they still remember the old syntax, grammar, vocabulary, etc?
4) Does the language itself update simultaneously across the multi-verse in minds of all those who can understand it or are there delays based on various factors?
1) All linguistic; there's no actual physical OR mental change.
2) No.3) No.
4) Yes. If it didn't, it wouldn't function as a language and we wouldn't have made it a language, but instead some sort of variant of Truespeech.
Rovagug has indeed always been a chaotic evil destroyer god. The "this evil god was once something else and then something changed him" trope is for Zon-Kuthon, pretty much. And MAYBE for one of the demon lords and some of the arch devils.Basing these questions on Zun-Kuthon's entry in the Pathfinder wiki...
5) Is the alien force which corrupted him in any way related to the Dark Tapestry?
6) If not, can we have a clue as to the nature of this mysterious power that drove a god insane?
7) Outside of it's involvement with Zun-Kuthon, is there any chance this alien being has affected Golarion in the past in some ways?
5) We have not revealed that yet.
6) Not beyond the clues we may have dropped in Zon-Kuthon's article in Pathfinder #11.
7) Yes.
Was this mysterious alien entity's goal with "creating" Zon-Kuthon related to Golarion?
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How many roads must a man walk down?
Does my roc animal companion really need to possess 3 intelligence before being able to pick up the Flyby Attack feat EVEN THOUGH normal rocks with 2 intelligence possess the feat naturally?
Why on earth isn't Flyby Attack on the animal companion feat list?
That just doesn't make any sense to me.
Long before Earthfall. And calling him Desna's mentor is actually not exactly right... he was more like the one who helped Desna acclimate to humanity. She was far older and more powerful than he was.Mr. James Jacobs,
Where did the death of Desna's mentor take place? Also, which part Golarion is it most coterminous with?
That's interesting. Did it happen in the Abyss, in some other plane, on Golarion, or maybe in space?
Long before Earthfall. And calling him Desna's mentor is actually not exactly right... he was more like the one who helped Desna acclimate to humanity. She was far older and more powerful than he was.Mr. James Jacobs,
Where did the death of Desna's mentor take place? Also, which part Golarion is it most coterminous with?
There so needs to be a book that goes through the history of the Gods and thier relationships.
I never read any horror genre books before. Do you recommend any classic or modern horror books?
"Giants have racial Hit Dice and never substitute such Hit Dice for class levels like some humanoids."
What does this mean? Giants can still take class levels to improve themselves, it says right in their organization line that they often do. Is there some kind of thing I'm not aware of that allows humanoids or other monsters to have hit dice subtracted from them and replaced with class levels?
I just spoke to Jason about this, and the upshot is that the sentance is just really poorly and awkwardly written. What it SHOULD say is this:
"Giants always have racial Hit Dice."
That is all. It's only trying to say that a humanoid with the giant subtype NEVER is a zero HD race.
Ah, OK, that makes sense. It is a really awkward sentence, the simpler version is better.
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James, thanks for your answers so far. Got some follow-ups on two of them from different posts which I'll condense to make it easier:
5) When the protean language changes, those who speak it change to match so they can still speak it, otherwise it's not a language. It's just sounds.Regarding this 'change' the speakers undergo...
1) Are there any physical manifestations or is it all mental?
2) Are those affected aware the change has taken place?
3) Do they still remember the old syntax, grammar, vocabulary, etc?
4) Does the language itself update simultaneously across the multi-verse in minds of all those who can understand it or are there delays based on various factors?1) All linguistic; there's no actual physical OR mental change.
2) No.
3) No.
4) Yes. If it didn't, it wouldn't function as a language and we wouldn't have made it a language, but instead some sort of variant of Truespeech.Rovagug has indeed always been a chaotic evil destroyer god. The "this evil god was once something else and then something changed him" trope is for Zon-Kuthon, pretty much. And MAYBE for one of the demon lords and some of the arch devils.Basing these questions on Zun-Kuthon's entry in the Pathfinder wiki...
5) Is the alien force which corrupted him in any way related to the Dark Tapestry?
6) If not, can we have a clue as to the nature of this mysterious power that drove a god insane?
7) Outside of it's involvement with Zun-Kuthon, is there any chance this alien being has affected Golarion in the past in some ways?5) We have not revealed that yet.
6) Not beyond the clues we may have dropped in Zon-Kuthon's article in Pathfinder #11.
7) Yes.
Calling it here, it's the Dominion of the Black.
Zon-Kuthon's whole story is so Hellraiser/Event Horizon. It only makes sense given what we know of the Dominion.
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Creative Director
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Does my roc animal companion really need to possess 3 intelligence before being able to pick up the Flyby Attack feat EVEN THOUGH normal rocks with 2 intelligence possess the feat naturally?
Why on earth isn't Flyby Attack on the animal companion feat list?
That just doesn't make any sense to me.
Probably because when the animal companion feat list was compiled, the additional feats in the Bestiary weren't solidified yet. I did argue for all the Bestiary feats to be included in the Core Rulebook, but alas, it was decided that since those are "monster feats" (seems nonsensical to me for lots of reasons) that they shouldn't be in the core rulebook. As a result, those feats got kinda forgotten or ignored.
Adding Flyby Attack to the list of feats for an animal companion seems, to me, to be 100% fine.
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Creative Director
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That's interesting. Did it happen in the Abyss, in some other plane, on Golarion, or maybe in space?Long before Earthfall. And calling him Desna's mentor is actually not exactly right... he was more like the one who helped Desna acclimate to humanity. She was far older and more powerful than he was.Mr. James Jacobs,
Where did the death of Desna's mentor take place? Also, which part Golarion is it most coterminous with?
Unrevealed... but my preference is somewhere on the Outer Planes. Likely Elysium, or wherever he was visiting when Lamashtu snuck in and ganked him.
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I never read any horror genre books before. Do you recommend any classic or modern horror books?
Depends on what sorts of horror you're looking for. My favorite horror authors are:
H. P. Lovecraft
Clark Ashton Smith
Algernon Blackwood
Robert E. Howard
Dan Simmons
Clive Barker
Ramsey Campbell
Stephen King
William Hope Hodgson
T.E.D. Klein
F. Paul Wilson
Thomas Ligotti
Robert Bloch
Poppy Z. Brite
Ambrose Bierce
Tim Lebbon
Fritz Leiber
Justin Cronin
Jeff Long
Richard Matheson
Edgar Allen Poe
M.R. James
Several of those writers do more than just horror, but if you search at Amazon by their names, you'll get big lists and you'll be able to sift through them to pick topics that sounds good. All of the above authors have, by and large, done well by me as far as horror.
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Creative Director
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Calling it here, it's the Dominion of the Black.
Zon-Kuthon's whole story is so Hellraiser/Event Horizon. It only makes sense given what we know of the Dominion.
Just to head that off at the proverbial pass...
I've been doing a LOT of thinking about the Dominion of the Black lately, and I've got pretty solid in my head what they are and what they're about.
And that doesn't fit in well at all with Zon-Kuthon.
It's not the Lovecraft mythos. It's not the Dominion of the Black. It's something else.
Does it annoy you when people ask a laundry list of questions (with separate bullet points / numbers for each)?
What XP path are the APs expected to use?Near the beginning of the first of each AP, there's a section (or supposed to be a section) stating that XP Advancement is "is designed for four characters and uses the medium XP track."
Never seen that before...
Also the reason for Rusty and Co self censoring is the host he uses wwouldn't allow him to post the images with it in.
If you actually get the prints it supposedly isn't censored.
I have been enjoying the pathfinder tales so far, I read about seven of them. Death heritic and winter wich being my favorites so far.
Can we expect some that are bit more epic? perhaps some where a deity or two make an apperance? i probably enjoyed death's heretic so much because of the "epicness" of it.
and get we more heros, i know some people find them pase but i like my heros to be people i would actually respect in real life. I think the two in the above mention books are the only ones, i can really say that about. I'm not saying stop with the anti-heros because lots of people love them, just some more heroic/unabashedly good characters.
Did you have any connections with People Of The North?
Would it be unheard of for Ulfen to idolize storm giants, or worship their pantheon at all?
Hey James, do you or anyone you know celebrate GM's Day on March 4th?
GM's Day?
Sorry to interrupt this thread but I have never heard of this day...if somebody could PM me the details...I would be appreciative.
So this post is not completely off topic for this thread a question for James.
I have read in numerous souces that jealousy is often tied to Calistria. This does not make sense to me as Calistria is all about not commiting and open relationships...This would indicate to me atleast that she and her whorshippers would not be the jealous type. As they would not be that commited to anyone. What are your thoughts on the matter?
I never read any horror genre books before. Do you recommend any classic or modern horror books?Depends on what sorts of horror you're looking for. My favorite horror authors are:
[snip]
Several of those writers do more than just horror, but if you search at Amazon by their names, you'll get big lists and you'll be able to sift through them to pick topics that sounds good. All of the above authors have, by and large, done well by me as far as horror.
No love for Arthur Conan Doyle? He wrote some creepy stuff when he wasn't writing Sherlock Holmes or chasing fairies. And even if you stick to the Holmes-stories, The Speckled Band is pretty darn frightening, to make one example.
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Hey James, do you or anyone you know celebrate GM's Day on March 4th?GM's Day?
Sorry to interrupt this thread but I have never heard of this day...if somebody could PM me the details...I would be appreciative.
GM's Day is this. Be sure to click on the "2013 Participants" to see who's giving us discounted items.
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Does it annoy you when people ask a laundry list of questions (with separate bullet points / numbers for each)?
ONLY if the laundry list consists of more than 10 questions, and/or the questions are super complicated.
I actually really enjoy the list of questions that are all grouped together quite a lot; they're fun to answer.
But when those questions get super complicated so that each question is a paragraph, and thus when I hit "reply" I have to manually scroll back up and copy/paste things into this window in order to be able to reference them, and then have to scroll the window bigger to see the questions and reply to them without having to scroll back and forth (since my computer at work isn't powerful enough to run at a full 1920x1200 I essentially have less "real estate" on my screen to be able to see the longer questions all at once)... THAT can get annoying.
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What XP path are the APs expected to use?Near the beginning of the first of each AP, there's a section (or supposed to be a section) stating that XP Advancement is "is designed for four characters and uses the medium XP track."Never seen that before...
Also the reason for Rusty and Co self censoring is the host he uses wwouldn't allow him to post the images with it in.
If you actually get the prints it supposedly isn't censored.
Still... it's been there.
And if you're posting on a host who doesn't let you swear... then write around that and don't have your characters swear. Or do the classic $@%$&(*$@ type thing. I don't like the look of the black bar. It's a personal thing, I guess, but still. It's offputting.
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I have been enjoying the pathfinder tales so far, I read about seven of them. Death heritic and winter wich being my favorites so far.
Can we expect some that are bit more epic? perhaps some where a deity or two make an apperance? i probably enjoyed death's heretic so much because of the "epicness" of it.
and get we more heros, i know some people find them pase but i like my heros to be people i would actually respect in real life. I think the two in the above mention books are the only ones, i can really say that about. I'm not saying stop with the anti-heros because lots of people love them, just some more heroic/unabashedly good characters.
We deliberately do novels that aren't major world-changing world-shaking events. The goal of the novel line is to tell "small stories" rather than enormous ones. Because we DON'T want to change the world with each novel.
As for "more heroes," you'll have to pass that request on to James Sutter, the fiction editor... but to be honest, Golarion is a darker and grittier place than the typical D&D setting, and so that's part of the nature of fiction and stories there.
Hey, cut me some slack. This is the first time I looked into an AP for more than inspiration.
And the Black Bar bugs the @$%& out of me as well. But I can deal with it do to how much I like Rusty and the Crew.
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The Land of Black Blood is claimed by several factions, all vying for control of the titular stuff. Yet there's a 150-mile-wide lake called the Caltherium filled with black blood, and it's smack dab in the middle of the vault. Given how plentiful black blood seems to be, why all the fighting over it? Or am I misreading it, and the Caltherium is mostly water with just traces of black blood?
Greed. If these various races just decided to all stake out their own spots on the shores to harvest the stuff, it'd be fine. But the races in question are not the types to truck with that method; they want it all to themselves, even if there's no way they can ever HAVE all of it. The idea of sharing does not sit well with drow or ghouls or derro or the like.
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I have read in numerous souces that jealousy is often tied to Calistria. This does not make sense to me as Calistria is all about not commiting and open relationships...This would indicate to me atleast that she and her whorshippers would not be the jealous type. As they would not be that commited to anyone. What are your thoughts on the matter?
I would say that the thing that comes up often with jealousy regarding the Calistrian faith is that a LOT of those who come to her for aid in revenge are motivated by jealousy... and likewise a lot of those who come to worship her might turn to her as a result of some type of jealousy.
That said, she is a pretty fickle goddess, and she doesn't take well to being spurned or ignored or the like. She's far from being immune to jealousy. You can absolutely have an open relationship and jealousy.