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I'm thinking of taking the following languages, but I thought I would throw the list up here to see if I have a bunch of overlapping languages before I lock them in. (I'm taking my free rebuild right before leveling up to level 2)
Race
gnome
Sylvan
Common
Intelligence
Akwan
Auron
Linguistics + Gift of tongues
Ancient Osirian
Azlanti
Thassilonian
Varissian (not cause I think it will be useful, but because I can use it to make obscure and deniable insults.)
I've never heard of Akwan. Do you mean Aklo? Even so, your starting languages must be chosen from Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Giant, Goblin, and Orc.
Also, Varisian isn't that rare of a language; season 4 of PFS was focused on Varisia, so a lot of the NPCs speak it, and a lot of PCs learned it for that reason. If you want an obscure language, go for something ancient like Tekritanin or Cyclops.
I think he's talking about Aquan (he just spelled it phonetically).
Jitska is also a rather obscure language that shows up a couple times.
Sasquatch is the most obscure language you can take though.
IIRC, Jistka is still used as the lingua franca of some noble courts, so it's not quite dead.
But now I want to take Sasquatch for my language specialist. I bet they have some good battle cries and insults.
She's not a bard. She's an Aasimar Cavalier 1/ Nature Oracle 5, riding an Axe Beak. But when I take that level in Mammoth Rider and get my huge Celestial Megaloceros, that will be truly terrifying.
By then, I should be speaking 25 languages, so I need to start planning.
Well, my current mount does know Abyssal and Ignan. I bet that sounds pretty terrifying coming from an animal.
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Usually my character just insults people in Tengu. I've never played a game with another tengu character, so it usually works.
Then again he knows about 17 languages now...and never the right one for the job!
THIS is exactly what my Tengu went through. He just reached level 12, knows 26 languages, and it rarely ever came up. It was an ongoing joke.
At least I had a phat Linguistics check. Used it to forge lots of documents =)
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So to get back to the original question...
As RainyDayNinja pointed out, your bonus languages from intelligence are limited to those on the gnome list (Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Giant, Goblin, and Orc). I can honestly say that I've seen every one of those languages come in handy in at least one PFS scenario. Yes, there are occasionally times when you'll deal with dwarves or elves who can't (or just refuse to) speak Common. But if you've got a player with one of those races at the table, then it doesn't matter if you know it. Of those 6, I'd say Goblin and Draconic will probably be the two most useful, but it always depends on what scenarios you play.
Those ancient languages you chose with your linguistics skill are actually good choices, if you want to translate ancient writings that sometimes come up as part of your tomb raiding in PFS. I have a character that took those same languages for that reason.
On the other hand, I have a gnome prankster bard with the same gift of tongues racial trait to get 2 languages per level, and he'd never take those dead languages. He only takes languages that are actively spoken, so he can insult as many people as possible in their own native languages. I once failed a knowledge (arcana) check to realize that a living statue wasn't some sort of earth elemental and wouldn't understand me, so I told it in Terran that it's mother was a cubic zurconia.
My point is that it depends on what you're trying to accomplish, and the personality of your character. Like I said, if you're going the tomb raider route, then those ancient languages you picked are good choices.
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I can't remember the specific scenarios, but I've forged bills of sale at least twice to purchase slaves that we were sent to rescue, and once to gain access to a ship by saying that our cargo was on board. Being Sczarni, I think Linguistics came up a few times for faction missions, too. I have a Scrivener's kit, and purchased several different colors of ink and every type of paper there's a reference to.
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I find that there's a roughly inverse relationship between the likelihood of a language coming up during play and the player's excitement when the language comes in handy. As a result, from one perspective there is no "wrong" choice.
My first character learned Tekritanin very early on, and even after reaching 16th level, she has never had need to use it—partly a result of the scenarios she played in. That said, I've always braced myself for the opportunity to use the language and then run a victory lap in celebration.
There will be multiple scenarios that involve mono-lingual treants who treat with sasquatches, d'ziriaks, and aboleths (likewise limited in all but their namesake languages). Due to a strange fluctuation in the Worldwound's energies, tongues and comprehend languages cannot function within 250 feet of them.
I say this in jest, but now I'm itching to include one or more of these. Hmmm...
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Sigh. It was a long day, it looks like my lists got mixed up at some point. I could have sworn Aquan and Auron were on the gnome list.
As far as overlaping languages: For purposes of talking to living people, if you know sylvan, you don't need to know gnome because all but the stupidest gnomes will know sylvan, likewise common will let you speak to most humans.
My character is more party face than tomb raider. (diplomacy 13, which isn't that useful unless I can make myself understood)
That said ancient tongues seem to be useful for recovering artifacts, and so far out of three adventures I have played, all three the main mission has had to do with recovering artifacts. (and so far, it has always been human artifacts.) Also, I'm sure it will eventually be useful to know that the doorway up ahead says "Traps ahead" not "Welcome guest"
So, revised list:
Race
gnome
Sylvan
Common
Intelligence
Draconic
Goblin
Linguistics + Gift of tongues
Akwan
Auron
?Ancient Osirian
?Thassilonian
still thinking about those last two. Especially since I probably won't have enough skill points to put in any more points into it till I hit level 5, ~3 months from now.
Just a thought: talk to the players in your area who have characters at similar levels, and come up with a rare language you can use as a "secret" language. There are a few characters in my area who took Catfolk in order to use it as a combat language.
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Just a thought: talk to the players in your area who have characters at similar levels, and come up with a rare language you can use as a "secret" language. There are a few characters in my area who took Catfolk in order to use it as a combat language.
In our home campaign we use drow sign language. Works great with silence. Can't remember if it is allowed in society play or not and I'm a little too lazy to go and look it up right now.
It's not legal, but players in my home campaign do the same!
How hard could that be?
*two fingers up , brought together and swung forward*
"Right, we kill them and loot the bodies for treasure"
One finger swirled around in the air
"Right, we kill them and loot the bodies for treasure"
Right hand to left elbow, right hand up to ear, left hand to right wrist
"Right, we kill them, hid the bodies and then loot them for treasure"
Even so, your starting languages must be chosen from Draconic, Dwarven, Elven, Giant, Goblin, and Orc.
Or from the Modern Human Languages list.