Hello Everyone,
I want to capture the feel the Forgotten Realms but put it into the Pathfinder universe. What novels (and order) would you suggest would help me get a feel for Golarion?
I will be picking up The Inner Sea World Guide soon, but I wanted some fiction to go along with it.
Thanks!
Braxon
I love Elaine Cunningham's novels, and if you're familiar with the Realms, then Winter Witch would be a good transition novel for you. I think you can start with anything that Dave Gross as written, too, though to follow his main characters of Varian and Radovan from the beginning, then step into Prince of Wolves first. Two novels that take the characters into different places in Golarian are Liar's Blade and City of the Fallen Sky. Don't overlook the free fiction available on the tab on this websites main page. That might be the first place to begin.
Yeah, most of them are stand alones, even a series like David Gross can be read as a stand alone because he gives enough background information about the characters but leaves enough mystery so that you can reread the other books without major spoilers other than the main characters live.
Liar's Blade or City of the Fallen Sky by Tim Pratt both cover a lot of ground, and are beautifully written.
Dave Gross does cover a good bit of the world, and is the only one of us to step outside of the Inner Sea region with Master of Devils. If you're going to read Dave, however, read from the beginning...
If you want a wonderful picture of Magnamar, Blood of the City is very good.
At the risk of being self serving, if you want a nautical tale, or a taste of something south of the Inner Sea, you might try Pirate's Honor... once again, at the risk of being self-serving...
Note that I pimped my fellow authors first! ;-)
So, to resurrect an old thread, it really does not matter which book that you start? But the exception is books by Dave Gross, where I want to start at the beginning? Is there a list so I know what order they are in? I guess I could just look at the Pathfinder Tales novel page and put it in "Oldest first" order.
Also, I did read some of the Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms books as a teenager. Dragonlance (I only read the first two trilogies) seemed to be the novelization of a gaming group's sessions. What bugged me the most about Forgotten Realms is that I often felt like I was reading the DM's novelization of his own campaigns where he loved his NPCs too much.
Given that, how do the Pathfinder novels compare? Are they just novelizations of a gaming group? Or are they actual novels? There is a difference.
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So, to resurrect an old thread, it really does not matter which book that you start? But the exception is books by Dave Gross, where I want to start at the beginning? Is there a list so I know what order they are in? I guess I could just look at the Pathfinder Tales novel page and put it in "Oldest first" order.
It really doesn't matter where you start. You can start with any book, even one of the ones in a "series" out of order and you'll be fine. Essentially, the authors are directed not to change the "big stuff" of Golarion. At this time, Paizo doesn't want to have a Forgotten Realms or Star Wars EU situation where a new reader gets lost starting in the middle or feels required to pick up all the previous books in the line so that they have a clue about what is going on.
If you REALLY feel the need to read things in order, here is an Unofficial Pathfinder Tales Chronology that I have been attempting to maintain here on the boards.
I have been stalled on maintaining the Pathfinder Wiki Chronology, but I'm planning to start getting more up there again soon.
Regarding your second question: They are novels, not novelizations of a gaming group's campaign. I have been loaning them out to friends at work, not to introduce them to gaming, but to give them a chance to enjoy a good swords and sorcery story. When I started rereading the Dragonlance Chonicles this spring, I decided that the majority of the Pathfinder Tales are better written stories than the DL Chronicles. I have not read Forgotten Realms, so I can not speak to them.