So what is the Creative Director James Jacobs currently up to?
Correct me if I am wrong, but I always figured that you would be in charge of the more experimental or out-of-the-ordinary releases at paizo. And since the current experiment is probably Starfinder and you are not involved in it (as far as I can tell), I was wondering what secret projects you might be cooking up under the radar.
So are there any crazy/experimental/unusual things currently on your desk? Anything you would care to vaporously hint at?
It was flavor (not fluff... that word's gross)
My apoligies. In portuguese, all flavor is normally called "fluff", but not with the same meaning of the word that you got in english.
Creative Director
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So what is the Creative Director James Jacobs currently up to?
Correct me if I am wrong, but I always figured that you would be in charge of the more experimental or out-of-the-ordinary releases at paizo. And since the current experiment is probably Starfinder and you are not involved in it (as far as I can tell), I was wondering what secret projects you might be cooking up under the radar.
So are there any crazy/experimental/unusual things currently on your desk? Anything you would care to vaporously hint at?
As I have been for the past year or two... working on products that I can't talk about yet because they haven't been announced yet. If the track record continues (see Bestiary 6, Adventurer's Guide, Curse of the Crimson Throne, and Book of the Damned), I'll be able to talk about them after they're announced, but I can't tell you WHEN they're going to be announced because that isn't information I'm privy to.
My title, as Creative Director, does not imply that I'm in charge of "experimental" or "Out of the ordinary" releases at Paizo, in any event, as the four books (which are to a certain extent expansions on reprinted seed material) I've mentioned above as the things I've been working on over the past few years are hardly experiments. Other than having more world content appear in the hardcover line... but I view that less as an experiment and more as a relief. :-P
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there is a line in detect magic that says elemental and outsiders don't automaticaly detect as magic unless they were summoned or something to that effect, would that be different if they had always on supernatural abilities?James, this came up in a Play-by-Post game that I'm GMing, and I'm looking for your take.
The PCs face a couple of shapechangers—with the Change Shape supernatural ability—who are disguised as humans. The players get suspicious because the two shapechangers are acting kind of funny.
One of the PCs casts detect magic. Would this spell allow the caster to detect the presence of a magical disguise (assuming the Knowledge [arcana] check succeeds)?
I was inclined to say that since it is a (Su) ability, detect magic would not discern the disguise, but I'm not sure. Luckily for me as GM, Merisiel's high Perception check was sufficient to see through the ruse before it came up.
Detect magic would detect a supernatural ability's aura—it IS magic, after all. The DC to identify the school of magic involved for something like a supernatural ability that's active and ongoing is 15 + 1/2 caster level.
Unfortunatley, that really doesn't help much at all for supernatural abilities, which almost never have specific caster levels listed. In place of a caster level, in this case, I would say the DC is 15 + 1/2 the HD of the creature from which the supernatural ability came from. I'd then say it was a transmutation effect, but nothing else—it's not a spell, so it doesn't have sub-schools like "polymorph".
No. If they had constant spell-like abilities, then yes... but you'd detect those spells, not the creature itself.
A klar counts as a light shield for the purpose of using it as a shield (for instance, it grants a +1 shield bonus to AC, has a –1 armor check penalty, and has a 5% arcane spell failure chance). For the purpose of using it as a weapon, it is a one-handed weapon that deals 1d6 slashing damage, but it is otherwise similar to using a spiked shield (for instance, the damage doesn’t stack with the bashing ability, you lose the shield bonus to AC when attacking with the klar unless you have Improved Shield Bash, and so on). As a side note, anywhere that lists klars as counting as shields with “armor spikes” is a typo that will be handled in the next errata.
I think I now understand how a klar works in all ways except for making one from special materials. There are a few different ways you could interpret it and I am not sure which one is correct.
If I treat a klar as a weapon made of mithral then it would cost 3000 gp because it weighs 6 lbs but since that is the entire weight, it would make sense that the shield part is then also mithral and therefore masterwork. This option seems pretty simple but not very flexible. Also very few materials affect both weapons and shields.
The FAQ says that in most ways to treat a klar as a spiked shield which makes sense for a lot of materials but fails for anything priced by weight because a light steel spiked shield is 6 lbs + 5 lbs for shield spikes while the whole klar is 6 lbs so it is unclear how much of the klar is spike and how much is shield.
You could instead treat the klar a double weapon and use the appropriate rules for special materials that have them (silver, cold iron). So for example, if I wanted to make a klar with a cold iron spike and a living steel shield with both parts being masterwork then the cost would be 12gp (base cost) + 6gp (+50% for cold iron) + 300gp (masterwork weapon) + 100gp (living steel shield) + 150gp (masterwork shield) = 568gp. This makes the most sense to me but is also more complicated.
On a somewhat related note, if I made one end of the double weapon out of mithral which you pay for by the pound, would I only use half the weapons weight to calculate the cost? And since mithral halves the weight, I assume it would only halve the half that is mithral making the whole weapon weigh 25% less?
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A klar counts as a light shield for the purpose of using it as a shield (for instance, it grants a +1 shield bonus to AC, has a –1 armor check penalty, and has a 5% arcane spell failure chance). For the purpose of using it as a weapon, it is a one-handed weapon that deals 1d6 slashing damage, but it is otherwise similar to using a spiked shield (for instance, the damage doesn’t stack with the bashing ability, you lose the shield bonus to AC when attacking with the klar unless you have Improved Shield Bash, and so on). As a side note, anywhere that lists klars as counting as shields with “armor spikes” is a typo that will be handled in the next errata.I think I now understand how a klar works in all ways except for making one from special materials. There are a few different ways you could interpret it and I am not sure which one is correct.
If I treat a klar as a weapon made of mithral then it would cost 3000 gp because it weighs 6 lbs but since that is the entire weight, it would make sense that the shield part is then also mithral and therefore masterwork. This option seems pretty simple but not very flexible. Also very few materials affect both weapons and shields.
The FAQ says that in most ways to treat a klar as a spiked shield which makes sense for a lot of materials but fails for anything priced by weight because a light steel spiked shield is 6 lbs + 5 lbs for shield spikes while the whole klar is 6 lbs so it is unclear how much of the klar is spike and how much is shield.
You could instead treat the klar a double weapon and use the appropriate rules for special materials that have them (silver, cold iron). So for example, if I wanted to make a klar with a cold iron spike and a living steel shield with both parts being masterwork then the cost would be 12gp (base cost) + 6gp (+50% for cold iron) + 300gp (masterwork weapon) + 100gp (living steel shield) + 150gp (masterwork shield) = 568gp. This makes the most sense to me but is also more...
Please keep it to non-rules questions on this thread.
Which Archdevil did you most enjoy statting up?
Which empyreal lord did you most enjoy statting up?
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Hey James have you started playing mass effect Andromeda yet?
If so, what do you think of it?
What are you playing as?
And who might you romance?
Yes.
It's a mediocre Mass Effect game so far, but even a mediocre Mass Effect game is better than most other games.
A tech/combat combo.
Peebee.
Which empyreal lord did you most enjoy statting up?I didn't stat up any of them; I hired a freelancer to do them. Of the three in Bestiary 6, Black Butterfly is my favorite.
Wait, weren't you were in charge of statting them this time?
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Wait, weren't you were in charge of statting them this time?Which empyreal lord did you most enjoy statting up?I didn't stat up any of them; I hired a freelancer to do them. Of the three in Bestiary 6, Black Butterfly is my favorite.
Nope. I was in charge of developing the whole book though, which is different than doing the initial builds of the stats. But it did involve rebuilding all the stats as a way of checking math and balance and all that.
Did one freelancer do all the archdevils, one do all the empyreal lords, etcetera?
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Did one freelancer do all the archdevils, one do all the empyreal lords, etcetera?
Whenever there was a like group of creatures, such as archdevils or qlippoth lords or the Wild Hunt, I made sure that all of the creatures in that category went to the same freelancer. To do otherwise is madness and lunacy and poor planning, I think! :P
Nope. I was in charge of developing the whole book though, which is different than doing the initial builds of the stats. But it did involve rebuilding all the stats as a way of checking math and balance and all that.Wait, weren't you were in charge of statting them this time?Which empyreal lord did you most enjoy statting up?I didn't stat up any of them; I hired a freelancer to do them. Of the three in Bestiary 6, Black Butterfly is my favorite.
And making sure they didn't have gimpy mental stats, or otherwise seemed underpowered?
Did one freelancer do all the archdevils, one do all the empyreal lords, etcetera?Whenever there was a like group of creatures, such as archdevils or qlippoth lords or the Wild Hunt, I made sure that all of the creatures in that category went to the same freelancer. To do otherwise is madness and lunacy and poor planning, I think! :P
Makes sense to me, but the behind the scenes stuff is always interesting (and not always intuitive to me).
Cheers, James. :)|
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And making sure they didn't have gimpy mental stats, or otherwise seemed underpowered?Nope. I was in charge of developing the whole book though, which is different than doing the initial builds of the stats. But it did involve rebuilding all the stats as a way of checking math and balance and all that.Wait, weren't you were in charge of statting them this time?Which empyreal lord did you most enjoy statting up?I didn't stat up any of them; I hired a freelancer to do them. Of the three in Bestiary 6, Black Butterfly is my favorite.
Whether or not they seem underpowered to you depends on you.
So, about the incoming Great Old Ones in the Bestiary... are any of them Paizo/James Jacobs Originals like Xhamen-Dor, or will all three of them be immediately familiar to Mythos fans?
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So, about the incoming Great Old Ones in the Bestiary... are any of them Paizo/James Jacobs Originals like Xhamen-Dor, or will all three of them be immediately familiar to Mythos fans?
All three are Great Old Ones from Lovecraft. They've been waiting a LOT longer to see print in the game than any chump of an upstart I've come up with.
How would you feel about a Pathfinder/Dragonlance crossover?Uninterested.
What about Planescape/Pathfinder?
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What about Planescape/Pathfinder?How would you feel about a Pathfinder/Dragonlance crossover?Uninterested.
Also uninterested, but even MORE so, since we already have a wealth of extraplanar material for Pathfinder that's approaching the amount of lore TSR put out for Planescape, but has still only barely scratched the surface of what we can do to explore the planes of the Great Beyond.
I'd rather build something new, in other words, than build something for someone else.
Well, Mr. Jacobs, people are asking you what was your favorite creatures in Bestiary 6, so I have to ask: which is your favorite kaiju in the book?
What about Planescape/Pathfinder?How would you feel about a Pathfinder/Dragonlance crossover?Uninterested.Also uninterested, but even MORE so, since we already have a wealth of extraplanar material for Pathfinder that's approaching the amount of lore TSR put out for Planescape, but has still only barely scratched the surface of what we can do to explore the planes of the Great Beyond.
I'd rather build something new, in other words, than build something for someone else.
I totally get why you'd feel that way. I blend the two setting frequently and love it, but then again, neither of them are mine. Totally love what you guys have done with the Planes and am always excited to see more.
One more for you: I don't recall if Oni are getting any coverage in Book of the Damned. My gut says yes, but part of me thinks no since they aren't extraplaner and don't have the [Evil] subtype. Are Oni a yes, no, or unrevealed?
Thanks as always for the time you take putting up with us and answering our questions!
Well, Mr. Jacobs, people are asking you what were your favorite creatures in Bestiary 6, so I have to ask: which is your favorite kaiju in the book?Until we announce what kaiju are in the book, I'm not gonna say.
I thought you did tell us their names in the Bestiary 6 product discussion, didn't you? It wasn't an "official announcement", but we did get their names here.
I will be patient and wait for further information and official announcements, as I really appreciate knowing your opinion.
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One more for you: I don't recall if Oni are getting any coverage in Book of the Damned. My gut says yes, but part of me thinks no since they aren't extraplaner and don't have the [Evil] subtype. Are Oni a yes, no, or unrevealed?
Yes. Oni are fiends, so we're covering them and the oni daimyo. It's not a huge section, but they're there.
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Well, Mr. Jacobs, people are asking you what were your favorite creatures in Bestiary 6, so I have to ask: which is your favorite kaiju in the book?Until we announce what kaiju are in the book, I'm not gonna say.I thought you did tell us their names in the Bestiary 6 product discussion, didn't you? It wasn't an "official announcement", but we did get their names here.
I will be patient and wait for further information and official announcements, as I really appreciate knowing your opinion.
I guess I did. I'm not sure which one is my favorite though; they all ended up pretty cool.
Keeping it Kaiju:
Which of Godzilla's enemies across all of the continuities is your favorite?
Which kaiju or robot that's teamed up with him do you like the most?
Thoughts on Gorgo?
Which of the three recognized "eras" (Showa, Heisei, Millennium) of Toho kaiju flicks prior to Shin Gojira do you most enjoy?
Favorite non-Toho kaiju film?
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Keeping it Kaiju:
Which of Godzilla's enemies across all of the continuities is your favorite?
Which kaiju or robot that's teamed up with him do you like the most?
Thoughts on Gorgo?
Which of the three recognized "eras" (Showa, Heisei, Millennium) of Toho kaiju flicks prior to Shin Gojira do you most enjoy?
Favorite non-Toho kaiju film?
Biollante.
Mothra.
Gorgo is a fun movie but not nearly as good as Godzilla.
Cloverfield.
I just wrapped up Iron Gods after two years. It's been a blast and I think everyone has enjoyed it immensely. Will we be seeing more of the Dominion of the Black in Starfinder?
Whether or not they seem underpowered to you depends on you.And making sure they didn't have gimpy mental stats, or otherwise seemed underpowered?Nope. I was in charge of developing the whole book though, which is different than doing the initial builds of the stats. But it did involve rebuilding all the stats as a way of checking math and balance and all that.Wait, weren't you were in charge of statting them this time?Which empyreal lord did you most enjoy statting up?I didn't stat up any of them; I hired a freelancer to do them. Of the three in Bestiary 6, Black Butterfly is my favorite.
I'm pretty sure the problems in Bestiary 4, which I don't want a repeat of, aren't just in my head. I recall reading that empyreal lords are supposed to be "cool good," so seeing them get as much love in the design process as demon lords and great old ones would go a long way in establishing that.
And now an actual question (and something completely different):
You've compared Magnimar and Kintargo to San Francisco before, something this San Franciscian finds interesting. What exactly does "like San Francisco" mean to you?
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You've compared Magnimar and Kintargo to San Francisco before, something this San Franciscian finds interesting. What exactly does "like San Francisco" mean to you?
San Francisco is one of my favorite cities. I've always admired its topography, its iconic bridges, its liberal bent, the variety of its food, and its diversity. And so there's a big bridge in Magnimar, and it's very diverse, and it's quite the opposite of more traditional/conservative Korvosa.