Golarion becoming too genre inclusive?

[Abraham spalding]

Alex Smith 908 wrote:

Tangent101 wrote:

There is also no economies of scale for magic items such as scrolls, potions, or other items.

Why don't you see lots of level 0 and level 1 potions for everyday use? Because a level 0 potion costs 12.5 gold to make, while a level 1 potion costs 25 gold to make... and are sold for twice that. This price doesn't go down whether you are making one potion or 1,000. It remains the same.

So a Potion of Cure Light Wounds costs two months wages, assuming the person has a salary of 30 gold a month (ie, 1 gold a day). A potion of Cure Disease? 750 gold, or basically two years salary assuming that person saved every single penny.

Magic is only for the rich and adventurers, really, with some squirreled away by religious groups. The "potions" that are given to ordinary people are cheap booze, coloring, and a few "special ingredients" and often sold for 5 or so gold (depending on how good a con artist the seller is). And heaven help if you have something that requires a wide-scale magical use, like a town full of folk who stupidly had a tattoo added that will be used by a villain to harvest power from them at a specific time (no spoilers for those aware of what I speak!).

The D&D economy is something that has never made sense and trying to justify a setting point with it leads to even more silly things to consider. The cost of a magic sword can equal that of several thousand weeks wages of normal soldiers. The diamonds required to ressurect someone increase whenever the price of diamonds goes down relative to the price of gold.

So basically what's being said is that either the prices of needed materials are constant with respect to gold period, in which case you just need to crash the gold economy with inflation to make everything affordable. The other possibility is that these prices are an abstraction and could be lowered in theory with higher volume/more developed infrastructure. Either way one would think that after a few thousand years of these spells existing most unchanged...

Meh Since people brought it up again...

[Set]

MMCJawa wrote:

Ghouls and Vampires can resist, but it's extraordinarily difficult to them, especially when you consider that they are effectively immortal, and the longer the live the greater the chance they have of slipping up.

I would imagine that many vampire has tried the "feed off of ruffians" routine. But that can be a slippery slope, and allowing your hunger to subconsciously decide who lives or dies is a pretty good way to look for any excuse to kill.

Both standard AD&D and Vampire the Masquerade were a bit too generous, IMO, with vampire feeding requirements. I played Vampire for years, and found the notion that a vampire could subsist on a single blood point per day (which healed within 24 hours for the average person), and there being no distinction at all between people blood and animal blood, to be too generous. A *perfectly* managed vampire with no blood-fueled disciplines (say, one that didn't use Thaumaturgy or Celerity) could have theoretically subsist off of a single dog for eternity, draining 1 BP from it (which counted as one health level of damage, which he dog would heal overday) each night. We house ruled that animal blood worked in a sort of hierarchy. Herbivore blood was 'weak tea' and it might take gallons of it to provide a blood point. Mammalian predator (wolf, etc.) blood was better, but still not as nourishing as human blood.

AD&D didn't even have any mechanical requirements (despite a metric buttload of super-restrictive weaknesses), and even a house rule that they have to drain a Con point worth of blood every day doesn't matter if the fed-upon target can recover a Con point each day.

And so, for me, the *real* reasons that most vampires were just awful evil verybadnogood people is that they *couldn't be bothered* to exist like this, with a 'blood-buddy' or a herd of actual pigs and sheep and cattle that they supped lightly from (and occasionally completely drained and sold the meat, leather, etc. from to others, etc.) They've got a choice, by the rules, to leave *much less* of a feeding footprint than a wolf (who literally can't avoid killing to survive), or even a human (who has to kill at least plants to survive, if not animals, unlike a vampire or ghoul, who, even if they *had* to feed, still don't have to *kill anything,* since vampire can drink blood from living cretaures, and ghouls not only can survive on ancient carrion, but often are described as *preferring* it!).

That's what makes so many evil, IMO, that they are, mechanically, less required to kill than humans, and their negative-energy-charged 'metabolisms' are static and eternal, unlike the constant state of decay a living creature endures (almost as if the natural world gets along fine with undead, and is constantly eating away at and hostile towards living things...), and yet they *choose not to.*

[DM Beckett]

In VtM it took mortals 2 days to recover a bp, but taking any more than 3 had the risk of something major happening to them, (body too weak to fight off disease for example). Animal blood also only gave a portion of the benefit, basically requiring you to kill them for a minimum return, but it also did not count towards staving off the Beast as it was the bare minimum.

And if you add in that kindred might need to use bp for things like Breath of Life, your idea sounds like it would be an issue, but in practice its really not. There is also the fact that they dont always control when and how they use their bp, sometimes things happen (you walk by someone lighting a cigar and freak out and start bumping Stamina reflexively) or that circumstances just kind of happen (random drive by) , its really not an issue.

I think you also sort of missed the point, in that the game focuses on playing a monster from the monster's perspective, where things are stacked against you. Its sort of intentional inVtM that the harder you try to resist the downward spiral (which yoh should do), the harder your going to be hit when you inevitably fail. As was mentioned, being immortal, they have forever to fail and then forever after to live with it.

[TanithT]

Genre crossovers, unless handled exceptionally well, generally read like bad fanfiction to me. There are some rare exceptions, but generally speaking my first impression of such mashups is not a positive one. They remind me painfully of those web sites where people post stories about Harry Potter having a love triangle with Captain Jack Sparrow and Mr. Spock. There are certainly merits to modular worldbuilding, but my suspension of disbelief suffers considerably when the components appear to be randomly rather than thoughtfully matched.

It might be a really cool idea to imagine tyrannosaurs flying bomber planes, as Calvin and Hobbes pointed out. The problem is that if you don't happen to be five years old, sustaining your suspension of disbelief with these plot elements mashed together becomes a problem very quickly. It's kind of like a peanut butter and pepperoni sandwich. Even if you like peanut butter and you like pepperoni, you either need a really good chef or an exceptionally rarefied and unusual palate to make those things taste good together in the same bite.

Walking that tightrope between "hey, wouldn't it be cool if..." and "oh, come on, that's just silly" is a line that authors and readers (and gamers) will generally have to determine for themselves. Writing a genre crossover is a very significant challenge. This isn't to say that it can't be done well, only that it is awfully easy to trip, and very difficult to do without taking a few falls somewhere.

[SAMAS]

TanithT wrote:

Genre crossovers, unless handled exceptionally well, generally read like bad fanfiction to me. There are some rare exceptions, but generally speaking my first impression of such mashups is not a positive one. They remind me painfully of those web sites where people post stories about Harry Potter having a love triangle with Captain Jack Sparrow and Mr. Spock. There are certainly merits to modular worldbuilding, but my suspension of disbelief suffers considerably when the components appear to be randomly rather than thoughtfully matched.

But those fanfics are bad because the author is simply telling a stroke story about their favorite characters making out. A far cry from stories like Gate: Thus the JSDF Fought There, which actually goes into personal and political effects of a fantasy world invading a modern one (and the modern world invading right back). (NOTE: the story's actually pretty good, if you can get around the author's occasional Right-Wing pontificating)

Quote:

It might be a really cool idea to imagine tyrannosaurs flying bomber planes, as Calvin and Hobbes pointed out. The problem is that if you don't happen to be five years old, sustaining your suspension of disbelief with these plot elements mashed together becomes a problem very quickly. It's kind of like a peanut butter and pepperoni sandwich. Even if you like peanut butter and you like pepperoni, you either need a really good chef or an exceptionally rarefied and unusual palate to make those things taste good together in the same bite.

Your analogy's a little off. You're giving examples of peanut butter and pepperoni as reasons to not try chocolate.

[DM Beckett]

Nah, if you like peanut butter (dinosaurs) and also like pepperoni (bomber planes) mixing them together does make chocolate, it makes peanut butter pepperoni sandwiches. A person might like peanut butter pepperoni sandwiches, which is fine, and might even like them better than something else entirely (chocolate).

Some people have tried it and want more, others have tried a taste and know enough from that to want to avoid it at all costs. The thing is really where you stand (you general, not specifically you). Do you want to force other people to scrape off what they dont like or do you want to force others to put on the extras after the communal sandwich is made?

Personally, without much of a horse in this, Id rather people add their pepperoni on to their sandwiches, as I dont really want it. Just as its been said "you dont like it, dont use it", I think its better all around to instead say "you want it, make it up and add it into your game".

From a PFS perspective, I find Tien Xia focused material very unappealing. Im not really interested in running most of those scenarios, or playing them, but if its between playing that or nothing, Ill generally go ahead and play. Same with Numeria, though actually with Numeria Ill probably sit it out, depending on how much focus is on those themes and location. One, its just not really fun or interesting to me. And two, there are so many other cool things we have only barely touched on, in and out of PFS, and Im much more interested in those. There are like 2 Scenarios in Ustalav. I think only 1 in Galt. A handful in other planes (not countimg the Hoa Jin Tapestry). A few in the Lands of the Linormkings. Id much rather see more of these than, and this is just my preference, things like Numeria.

[Neongelion]

TanithT wrote:

Genre crossovers, unless handled exceptionally well, generally read like bad fanfiction to me. There are some rare exceptions, but generally speaking my first impression of such mashups is not a positive one. They remind me painfully of those web sites where people post stories about Harry Potter having a love triangle with Captain Jack Sparrow and Mr. Spock. There are certainly merits to modular worldbuilding, but my suspension of disbelief suffers considerably when the components appear to be randomly rather than thoughtfully matched.

It might be a really cool idea to imagine tyrannosaurs flying bomber planes, as Calvin and Hobbes pointed out. The problem is that if you don't happen to be five years old, sustaining your suspension of disbelief with these plot elements mashed together becomes a problem very quickly. It's kind of like a peanut butter and pepperoni sandwich. Even if you like peanut butter and you like pepperoni, you either need a really good chef or an exceptionally rarefied and unusual palate to make those things taste good together in the same bite.

Walking that tightrope between "hey, wouldn't it be cool if..." and "oh, come on, that's just silly" is a line that authors and readers (and gamers) will generally have to determine for themselves. Writing a genre crossover is a very significant challenge. This isn't to say that it can't be done well, only that it is awfully easy to trip, and very difficult to do without taking a few falls somewhere.

While I agree that it's very easy to mess up stuff like this, if Paizo can write a module where the PCs have to go to 1918 Earth to save Baba Yaga from the clutches of her son Rasputin in his magical dimensional monastery protected by Russian soldiers and WWI-era tanks animated by human brains and not jump the shark, then I'm pretty sure they're not going to jump the Megalodon with Iron Gods.

[Squeakmaan]

DM Beckett wrote:

Nah, if you like peanut butter (dinosaurs) and also like pepperoni (bomber planes) mixing them together does make chocolate, it makes peanut butter pepperoni sandwiches. A person might like peanut butter pepperoni sandwiches, which is fine, and might even like them better than something else entirely (chocolate).

Some people have tried it and want more, others have tried a taste and know enough from that to want to avoid it at all costs. The thing is really where you stand (you general, not specifically you). Do you want to force other people to scrape off what they dont like or do you want to force others to put on the extras after the communal sandwich is made?

Personally, without much of a horse in this, Id rather people add their pepperoni on to their sandwiches, as I dont really want it. Just as its been said "you dont like it, dont use it", I think its better all around to instead say "you want it, make it up and add it into your game".

From a PFS perspective, I find Tien Xia focused material very unappealing. Im not really interested in running most of those scenarios, or playing them, but if its between playing that or nothing, Ill generally go ahead and play. Same with Numeria, though actually with Numeria Ill probably sit it out, depending on how much focus is on those themes and location. One, its just not really fun or interesting to me. And two, there are so many other cool things we have only barely touched on, in and out of PFS, and Im much more interested in those. There are like 2 Scenarios in Ustalav. I think only 1 in Galt. A handful in other planes (not countimg the Hoa Jin Tapestry). A few in the Lands of the Linormkings. Id much rather see more of these than, and this is just my preference, things like Numeria.

I have to disagree with your analogy a bit, do you want your peanut butter, your chocolate, and your pepperoni at the table with all your bread. Or does the guy who likes peanut butter and pepperoni have to drive to the store to get pepperoni because you decided since you didn't like it, it wasn't going to be there.

It's far easier to not use rules that exist, than it is to invent them.

[DM Beckett]

Wasnt my analogy, I was just giving my personal preference with the one given. More for the sake of arguement than anything as Im enjoying the conversation and its off topic jumps.

:)

But I guess thats the kicker. Especially in PFS like games, its either all or nothing. That is, if only one person wants pepperoni, the way it works is everyone has to eat it so that one can get pepperoni. Great for the guy/gal that wants peanut butter pepperoni, but but detracts from those that dont.

My understanding, which may be wrong, but especially with Numeria, is that there is a very vocal but very minority group that keeps talking about it, while the majority of fans would rather it and the technology level sort of fade away and not be expanded upon. Thats also a big reason that its taken so long for it to happen (this has been going on since 3.5 days), is that its so much of a love/hate topic.

[Alex Smith 908]

Except every time sword and planet or anachronistic tech levels come up in products those products sell exceedingly well. Distant Worlds and Rasputin Must Die were both among the best sellers of their respective lines.

[Squeakmaan]

As far as I can see, there's a very vocal minority who have been begging for it for years, a large silent group who are interested but don't post on forums (personal experience only), and a very very vocal minority who demand that it never happen.

[TanithT]

Crossovers with jarringly disparate elements have amazing creative potential to soar high as well as to crash and burn. They certainly can be done well, and sometimes they really are.

Robert J. Sawyer's Quintaglio Ascension trilogy pretty much amounts to the Calvin and Hobbes concept of tyrannosaurs in fighter jets, and it works really, really well. He is a damn good writer, and he actually makes it fly.

Monte Cook is also a damn good writer. The Numenera material is well drawn and compelling. What I'm less confident about is whether someone who is perhaps not quite as good a writer as Sawyer or Cook can take those improbable elements and make them live and breathe believably. Because it really is harder to do a concept like that and make it work smoothly, and because not every home GM is Robert J. Sawyer or Monte Cook.

Cheesy is easy. Good is a lot harder. This is true for any genre, but I think even more so for crossovers.

[thejeff]

TanithT wrote:

Crossovers with jarringly disparate elements have amazing creative potential to soar high as well as to crash and burn. They certainly can be done well, and sometimes they really are.

Robert J. Sawyer's Quintaglio Ascension trilogy pretty much amounts to the Calvin and Hobbes concept of tyrannosaurs in fighter jets, and it works really, really well. He is a damn good writer, and he actually makes it fly.

Monte Cook is also a damn good writer. The Numenera material is well drawn and compelling. What I'm less confident about is whether someone who is perhaps not quite as good a writer as Sawyer or Cook can take those improbable elements and make them live and breathe believably. Because it really is harder to do a concept like that and make it work smoothly, and because not every home GM is Robert J. Sawyer or Monte Cook.

Cheesy is easy. Good is a lot harder. This is true for any genre, but I think even more so for crossovers.

It also gets harder the more disparate elements you try to bring in.

Most of the classic fantasy books that have science fiction elements have them function as the "magic" of the setting. The high tech is the source of the mysterious powers or places and items.

[14 sided die]

DM Beckett wrote:

Wasnt my analogy, I was just giving my personal preference with the one given. More for the sake of arguement than anything as Im enjoying the conversation and its off topic jumps.

:)

But I guess thats the kicker. Especially in PFS like games, its either all or nothing. That is, if only one person wants pepperoni, the way it works is everyone has to eat it so that one can get pepperoni. Great for the guy/gal that wants peanut butter pepperoni, but but detracts from those that dont.

My understanding, which may be wrong, but especially with Numeria, is that there is a very vocal but very minority group that keeps talking about it, while the majority of fans would rather it and the technology level sort of fade away and not be expanded upon. Thats also a big reason that its taken so long for it to happen (this has been going on since 3.5 days), is that its so much of a love/hate topic.

If one person is trying to force their likes/dislikes on a game, get out. Decide as a group first what is and is not part of the game, instead of saying I like this y'all accept it, or I don't like this no body use it

[Auren "Rin" Cloudstrider]

in a savage worlds game, i play a genetically altered cybornetically augmented nanite infused nymph that abandoned her noble title to escape an arranged marriage, became a scientist and overcame her sterility by producing a bunch of children using alchemy. she is basically a non-evil hybrid of the Terminator, Dr. Frankenstein, the Greek Goddess Echidna, and a highly perverse variation of a Nonmagical Patchouli Knowledge. in basically a fantasy science fiction hybrid campaign.

[SAMAS]

DM Beckett wrote:

Wasnt my analogy, I was just giving my personal preference with the one given. More for the sake of arguement than anything as Im enjoying the conversation and its off topic jumps.

:)

But I guess thats the kicker. Especially in PFS like games, its either all or nothing. That is, if only one person wants pepperoni, the way it works is everyone has to eat it so that one can get pepperoni. Great for the guy/gal that wants peanut butter pepperoni, but but detracts from those that dont.

My understanding, which may be wrong, but especially with Numeria, is that there is a very vocal but very minority group that keeps talking about it, while the majority of fans would rather it and the technology level sort of fade away and not be expanded upon. Thats also a big reason that its taken so long for it to happen (this has been going on since 3.5 days), is that its so much of a love/hate topic.

your analogy is still bad, because your words are still trying to paint one side as a disgusting anomaly that you have to be weird to like.

Fact is, the mixture of Fantasy and Sci-Fi (or just technological) is nothing new. Masters of the Universe, Thundercats, Krull, freakin' Star Wars, Warhammer Fantasy, Warhammer 40K, Final Fantasy, Phantasy Star, Tales series, Shining Force, Vision of Escaflowne, Panzer World Galient..., I think you get the picture.

[DM Beckett]

I never said it was something new, nor am I painting any sort of picture about other people's preferences. What I did say is that, based on what I have heard various Paizo devs say on the subject, specifically on Numeria and sci-fi technology elements, (currently and going back to the 3.5 days), is that it seems the fans of those in PF are the vocal minority, and its clearly one of those things that most people either love or hate. Tends to be one or the other with fewer people in the middle.

If you feel its a bad analogy, please feel to explain why, and once again, note that it wasn't my analogy. I think its better than the peanut butter & chocolate as that implies that most people like the two things they represent (classic fantasy and sci-fi), which is probably not correct, and also implies that by mixing them, we get something that many/most find even better than the individual parts, again probably not so true with fantasy and sci-fi. Not really sure from that how you took away that your personal preference is bad/wrong/disgusting/anomalous?

However, if your interested in people bashing others views and preferences, try rereading this thread a few pages back. Its filled with it against those that didn't like things like Tian Xia, 'cause all those people are just stupid and stuff. How dare they not like what you (general) do, or even worse, actively not like what you (again general you) like and feel it ruins their game to some degree.

[MrTsFloatinghead]

DM Beckett wrote:

However, if your interested in people bashing others views and preferences, try rereading this thread a few pages back. Its filled with it against those that didn't like things like Tian Xia, 'cause all those people are just stupid and stuff. How dare they not like what you (general) do, or even worse, actively not like what you (again general you) like and feel it ruins their game to some degree.

Yes - how dare someone tell me that the things I like ruin "their" game, because it's not "their" game at all. It's OUR game. "They" have no business deciding that "their" preferences should be the default, and despite the fact that "they" might not be comfortable with some tropes and elements, asking "them" to sit at a table with a character who explores some of those tropes is, on balance, far more reasonable than asserting that people who want to explore those tropes should be excluded from the game on the grounds that it erodes "their" sense of privilege.

Essentially, the biggest reason why your argument (and analogy) is wrong is that it assumes that being forced to tolerate a character concept you don't like is a roughly equivalent "hardship" to not being allowed to explore those concepts at all. To attempt to salvage your analogy, you assert that you feel that you are being forced to "eat the pepperoni too", when, in fact, it would be far more accurate to say that you are being asked to sit at a table and eat your peanut butter while other people at the table order food you don't like. You are not wrong to not like their food, but you ARE wrong to act like they should be forced to eat "normal" food just to appease your sensibilities, and you are especially wrong to believe that asking them to change their diet to suit you is as reasonable as them asking you to tolerate their different food at the table you all collectively share.

[DM Beckett]

MrTsFloatinghead wrote:

DM Beckett wrote:

However, if your interested in people bashing others views and preferences, try rereading this thread a few pages back. Its filled with it against those that didn't like things like Tian Xia, 'cause all those people are just stupid and stuff. How dare they not like what you (general) do, or even worse, actively not like what you (again general you) like and feel it ruins their game to some degree.

Yes - how dare someone tell me that the things I like ruin "their" game, because it's not "their" game at all. It's OUR game. "They" have no business deciding that "their" preferences should be the default, and despite the fact that "they" might not be comfortable with some tropes and elements, asking "them" to sit at a table with a character who explores some of those tropes is, on balance, far more reasonable than asserting that people who want to explore those tropes should be excluded from the game on the grounds that it erodes "their" sense of privilege.

Essentially, the biggest reason why your argument (and analogy) is wrong is that it assumes that being forced to tolerate a character concept you don't like is a roughly equivalent "hardship" to not being allowed to explore those concepts at all. To attempt to salvage your analogy, you assert that you feel that you are being forced to "eat the pepperoni too", when, in fact, it would be far more accurate to say that you are being asked to sit at a table and eat your peanut butter while other people at the table order food you don't like. You are not wrong to not like their food, but you ARE wrong to act like they should be forced to eat "normal" food just to appease your sensibilities, and you are especially wrong to believe that asking them to change their diet to suit you is as reasonable as them asking you to tolerate their different food at the table you all collectively share.

Except that either way, everyone is eating the same thing. It is not the case at all that those that like them mixed get both while everyone else just gets either peanut butter or pepperoni as they like. Its all or nothing. So I guess your just not seeing the point is that in trying to say you don't want others to mandate what you can play, you are instead mandating what is played. Your acting like other people are stepping stopping your personal game, rather than it being everyone's game. But I'm starting to get the feeling this is going nowhere.

[DM Beckett]

On second though, I want to clarify. Are you talking about some group of people that sits and watches your game, but doesnt play? If so, I guess that might make sense. Im referring to the group of people that all play Pathfinder, which all have different tastes.

[MMCJawa]

DM Beckett wrote:

What I did say is that, based on what I have heard various Paizo devs say on the subject, specifically on Numeria and sci-fi technology elements, (currently and going back to the 3.5 days), is that it seems the fans of those in PF are the vocal minority, and its clearly one of those things that most people either love or hate. Tends to be one or the other with fewer people in the middle.

I'd like to talk about this point briefly. I wonder the date of these developers comments, as more recent comments have pointed out that Reign of Winter (which visits Earth and another alien planet) and Distant Worlds (which is about as "Science-fictiony" as Pathfinder gets) have all been huge hits that have been profitable for the company. That seems to suggest that while the hardcore science fantasy fans may be a minority, there are enough casual fans that dig material to make it profitable.

In fact Devs have said that the success of those products in large part is what has given them the confidence to pursue Iron Gods. Obviously there is still some caution in the mix, otherwise we might be getting a hardcover technology book this fall, but the devs must not be as concerned as they were 5 years ago or so.

[MrTsFloatinghead]

DM Beckett wrote:

Except that either way, everyone is eating the same thing. It is not the case at all that those that like them mixed get both while everyone else just gets either peanut butter or pepperoni as they like. Its all or nothing. So I guess your just not seeing the point is that in trying to say you don't want others to mandate what you can play, you are instead mandating what is played. Your acting like other people are stepping stopping your personal game, rather than it being everyone's game. But I'm starting to get the feeling this is going nowhere.

Let me put it in very direct terms - you are saying that if someone sits down at a PFS table with you, and that person has an android gunslinger character, that the level of inconvenience you feel at being forced to "hold your nose" and tolerate those tropes is at least comparable to the inconvenience you would cause someone else by saying they cannot play that character around you, because it upsets your sensibilities.

You aren't, in your parlance, being forced to "eat the same thing". Your traditional sword and sorcery hero is not suddenly transformed into a nanite infused cyborg laser ninja. You are still able to tell a story you like, with a character you like, and the android player is able to tell a story he/she likes too! The fact that you are both telling different stories at the same time, at the same table might be a little uncomfortable, but it's better than a world in which only your story gets told.

Note, too, that this above all assumes you are really concerned about PFS and the like. If you really don't care too much about that, and you're only concerned about your home game, your analogy is even further off. You are basically saying that even having things you don't like on the menu is the same as forcing you to eat something you don't like, and that's clearly not the case. Having support for tropes you don't like isn't forcing you to use them, anymore than having pepperoni on the menu forces you to order it.

Again, I understand fully and completely what you are saying. You are just wrong. It's the old "if you are so tolerant, why can't you tolerate my intolerance" schtick, this time mercifully applied to the relatively unimportant world of tabletop RPGs.

[captain yesterday]

you cant have Androids in PFS so your argument is invalid

[MrTsFloatinghead]

captain yesterday wrote:

you cant have Androids in PFS so your argument is invalid

Sure I can. I might not be able to get the race mechanics, but I can absolutely choose to describe my character as an android, or as a time traveler, or as a sentient banana riding in a human-shaped bio-husk. The argument here is about themes and stories, not really about mechanics.

Essentially, one side is saying that having to sit at a table with character concepts they don't like is such an onerous burden that those characters should be banned entirely, and the other side is saying that the minor inconvenience of having to tolerate things you don't like is, on balance, outweighed by the greater good of not excluding perfectly valid tropes from the game simply because some notional plurality of players got it into their heads that their preferences were "standard" and "normal", and should thus be privileged.

Edit: To drive the point home, let me put it like this - there is no difference between the irritation some people feel at having sci-fi tropes at the table, and the irritation I feel when someone shows up with "Vance Swiftshadow" with his trusty sword "Umbralwrath" or the like. The difference here is that because over-the-top sword and sorcery is part of the assumed "normal", I'm supposed to bite my tongue and suck it up, but if I try to do something different, I'm suddenly "damaging the game" and causing a problem. That's what privilege is all about - using the assumption of "normal" to exclude things that are different, and then acting like the loss of that privilege is the same as not being allowed to play at all.

[Alex Smith 908]

MMCJawa wrote:

I'd like to talk about this point briefly. I wonder the date of these developers comments, as more recent comments have pointed out that Reign of Winter (which visits Earth and another alien planet) and Distant Worlds (which is about as "Science-fictiony" as Pathfinder gets) have all been huge hits that have been profitable for the company. That seems to suggest that while the hardcore science fantasy fans may be a minority, there are enough casual fans that dig material to make it profitable.

In fact Devs have said that the success of those products in large part is what has given them the confidence to pursue Iron Gods. Obviously there is still some caution in the mix, otherwise we might be getting a hardcover technology book this fall, but the devs must not be as concerned as they were 5 years ago or so.

When I made the same point he ignored it and continued his fiction of fans only being a "vocal minority". Presumably copies of Distant Worlds were just purchased in bulk by corporations for pulping.

[Mystic_Snowfang]

captain yesterday wrote:

you cant have Androids in PFS so your argument is invalid

you also can't have catfolk or grippli without a boon...

And a grippli appears in a modual as an enemy so they exisit.

Maybe there will be an andriod boon up for bid at a con one day.

[Gorbacz]

DM Beckett wrote:

What I did say is that, based on what I have heard various Paizo devs say on the subject, specifically on Numeria and sci-fi technology elements, (currently and going back to the 3.5 days), is that it seems the fans of those in PF are the vocal minority, and its clearly one of those things that most people either love or hate. Tends to be one or the other with fewer people in the middle.

Actually, with the success of Rasputin Must Die and Distant Worlds, I'm afraid that science-fantasy mix is now mainstream. So it's not vocal minority, it's the silent majority.

But you should be just fine - you're not new to sitting and grudging about how the world around you refuses to stop changing, aren't you? :)

[Neongelion]

DM Beckett wrote:

I never said it was something new, nor am I painting any sort of picture about other people's preferences. What I did say is that, based on what I have heard various Paizo devs say on the subject, specifically on Numeria and sci-fi technology elements, (currently and going back to the 3.5 days), is that it seems the fans of those in PF are the vocal minority, and its clearly one of those things that most people either love or hate. Tends to be one or the other with fewer people in the middle.

As people have pointed out in this very thread: how on earth did this vocal minority manage to make Distant Worlds and Rasputin Must Die such big hits?

[Jeven]

Neongelion wrote:

As people have pointed out in this very thread: how on earth did this vocal minority manage to make Distant Worlds and Rasputin Must Die such big hits?

I bought and liked both of those but won't be buying Iron Gods.

RoW5 was 5 of 6 part series, so I only bought it for that reason, but did enjoy it all the same, especially because it was very well written by a talented author/adventure writer.
I suppose it sold extra well because in addition to those people buying the 6 volume set of the RoW AP, it also attracted a lot of one-off buyers who otherwise ignored the rest of that AP. If it had been a separate module and not embedded in a larger AP perhaps it would not have done so well.
Iron Gods will be a good test to see how much support there is, as it requires a large investment in a lot of dedicated product.

[DM Beckett]

First off, your assuming I have an issue with it when I don't. I'm merely saying that those that do probably feel the same way on the other side of the coin. Secondly, on the Rasputin must Die & Distant Worlds, gain, from what I have heard from the devs is, yes, it sold better than they expected, but that is not the same thing as it sold so well that it became mainstream or almost universally loved, and in the case of Distant Worlds, (which I have and like by the way), seemed more fantasy than sci-fi. It was more like planer travel than space ships.

Anyway, if you want to continue to assume Im being antagonistic, go ahead, but Im not.

[MMCJawa]

Paizo is really cautious however (which they have to be, since they are still a pretty small company). We don't really have access to the sales data, but it seems like they would not even try Iron Gods unless they could be confident that doing a 6 volume science fantasy would be profitable.

And there are many vocal minorities out for different rules elements, so it's not like being loud is all you need to get a product made. See mythic instead of Epic, Dreamscarred Press's entire product line, various rules discussion threads, etc.

[Gorbacz]

The "Make all martials into Bo9S magical warriors" vocal minority, which is pretty much the vocalest minority ever, still haven't has had its way.

[Necromancer]

Gorbacz wrote:

The "Make all martials into Bo9S magical warriors" vocal minority, which is pretty much the vocalest minority ever, still haven't has had its way.

thinks

Book of Nine Swords?

[Gorbacz]

Necromancer wrote:

Gorbacz wrote:

The "Make all martials into Bo9S magical warriors" vocal minority, which is pretty much the vocalest minority ever, still haven't has had its way.

thinks

Book of Nine Swords?

Ayup.

[SAMAS]

DM Beckett wrote:

First off, your assuming I have an issue with it when I don't. I'm merely saying that those that do probably feel the same way on the other side of the coin.

Dude, if you're gonna play the Mouthpiece, you gotta play the Earpiece too. Suck it up and take it like a man (and on the off chance you're not a man, then take it like a woman).

MMCJawa wrote:

Paizo is really cautious however (which they have to be, since they are still a pretty small company). We don't really have access to the sales data, but it seems like they would not even try Iron Gods unless they could be confident that doing a 6 volume science fantasy would be profitable.

That' no guess. The carnosaur has actually stated on record that the success and popularity of Distant Worlds and Frozen Stars/Rasputin Must Die convinced them to go ahead with Iron Gods and related material.

[Alex Smith 908]

Gorbacz wrote:

The "Make all martials into Bo9S magical warriors" vocal minority, which is pretty much the vocalest minority ever, still haven't has had its way.

Last I heard Path of War was doing pretty well.

[Irnk, Dead-Eye's Prodigal]

Alex Smith 908 wrote:

Gorbacz wrote:

The "Make all martials into Bo9S magical warriors" vocal minority, which is pretty much the vocalest minority ever, still haven't has had its way.

Last I heard Path of War was doing pretty well.

Path of War is a 3rd Party Product. I suspect the bag's point is that Paizo has not 'made all martials into Bo9S magical warriors'...

[Alex Smith 908]

It just seemed weird that it was a followup to a post citing dreamscarred press doing psionics as a success.

[DM Beckett]

SAMAS wrote:

DM Beckett wrote:

First off, your assuming I have an issue with it when I don't. I'm merely saying that those that do probably feel the same way on the other side of the coin.

Dude, if you're gonna play the Mouthpiece, you gotta play the Earpiece too. Suck it up and take it like a man (and on the off chance you're not a man, then take it like a woman).

Suck what up, exactly? What are you even talking about?

[Guang]

DM - Voice of the Voiceless wrote:

thejeff wrote:

Especially when players have a strong tendency to glom onto the weird bits from one part of the setting and drag them off to use in other parts where they don't fit so well.

I'd argue that makes the world more realistic rather than less. And I say that as a western expatriate living in SE Asia. I am a weird bit from another part of the setting... and I don't fit so well... which is awesome.

Contrast makes a world shine.

I second this.

Partially because my own situation is extremely similar. Our own world is full of contradictions and unbelievable, unimaginable things. Societies borrowing little pieces from each other while remaining distinct.

[Cyrad]

I still welcome the Numeria content, even though I am not entirely interested to add science fiction to my fantasy in a way it does. Why? Because I can reflavor anything from Numeria as fantasy.

I homebrewed a race with highly technological cities with commonplace constructs, elevators, and automatic doors. However, all their devices are just enchanted slabs of stone and their constructs are nothing more than animated abstract sculptures. The race itself largely exists as religious artificers and potato farmers. For Numerian content, who's to say that rocket launcher isn't just some staff that shoots exploding stones enchanted iwth fireball? That graviton reactor could be some massive artifact capable of altering planar properties that looks like the Eye of Magnus from Skyrim.

[Shain Edge]

DM Beckett wrote:

They probably mean from the vampire's perspective, and in the sense where they are no longer human (or elf or whatever), and where tigers hunt other animals and (and rarely humans) for food, and humans hunt other animals for food, vampires have gone up the chain and hunt things at a higher bracket. However, unlike all those other things, there are two big difference. Vampires do not need to eat/drink etc. . . So if you locked a vampire away for 5 years straight, they would not starve to death or die of thirst. It's not required for them to survive in the physical sense, though they do have a constant need to. The other big difference is that vampires do not need to kill in order to eat or survive, outside of losing control of themselves.

I would say that a Vampire is a predator of need. They hunger. They may not starve to death, but overall they are indefinitely psychologically dependent on the blood of sapient beings.

Just because the hunger isn't biologically required for their continuation, doesn't mean there isn't actually a 'need' for them to hunt. It can be defined the same way humans eat meat, when they can get their proteins from alternate sources. Meat is delicious, especially bacon and steak.

Let us look at it from a cow's point of view: Humans can be thought of as evil, simply because they prefer to eat dad and mom, then a mixture of beans and other vegetable proteins, that are perfectly sustainable for life. It is only selfishness that humans prefer to eat proteins from livestock rather then plants.

Now, if you look at a vampire, is is much the same way, in that Vampires don't need blood, but it is tasty, and that rush you get when you take it from a living sentient being is all the better, for flavor. It is like a drug, but is also a lot like humans and desire for flesh, when you actually look at it completely objectively.

[Alex Smith 908]

Given the vampire's ability to talk to and usually have once been human it's cognitively much different than humans eating cows. To think otherwise is to diminish humans and to anthropomorphize cows. It'd be closer to humans eating other great apes, specifically chimpanzees. They are notably less intelligent than us but still very close in appearance and personality. They can even communicate in sign language if taught at an early age. Picking to eat those chimps instead of say a cow is what a vampire does when they choose drink a human's blood over a rat's.

[Shain Edge]

Alex Smith 908 wrote:

Given the vampire's ability to talk to and usually have once been human it's cognitively much different than humans eating cows. To think otherwise is to diminish humans and to anthropomorphize cows.

Not being a vegan or vegetarian, I'm looking it objectively.

First, animals do have feelings. Whether or not they can build a car or not, or write a novel or not is completely irrelevant. They feel sadness at a loss of a 'friend' or 'family member', at least what I have detected in domestic pets. This is probably the best way to describe how they are similarly.

Example is if a dog killed your favorite cat. Is the dog evil? You could think so, because that cat has meaning to 'you'. It's amazing how we are ok with a mountain lion killing a fawn, but if the same killed a child? It's a 'man killer(!!!)' and must be put down as dangerous (if not evil).

[Abraham Van Helsing]

Shain Edge wrote:

Alex Smith 908 wrote:

Given the vampire's ability to talk to and usually have once been human it's cognitively much different than humans eating cows. To think otherwise is to diminish humans and to anthropomorphize cows.

Not being a vegan or vegetarian, I'm looking it objectively.

First, animals do have feelings. Whether or not they can build a car or not, or write a novel or not is completely irrelevant. They feel sadness at a loss of a 'friend' or 'family member', at least what I have detected in domestic pets. This is probably the best way to describe how they are similarly.

Example is if a dog killed your favorite cat. Is the dog evil? You could think so, because that cat has meaning to 'you'. It's amazing how we are ok with a mountain lion killing a fawn, but if the same killed a child? It's a 'man killer(!!!)' and must be put down as dangerous (if not evil).

That isn't the case with the Vampire.

A Vampire kills just for the sheer joy of killing, of denying life, hope and future to those alive. They are in a state of stasis - hence all the things that weaken them - wooden (life) stake through the heart, running (flowing) water, holy symbols (afterlife). All those things have a tie in with life, hope or movement. A Vampire has none of these things - just envy and hatred for those who do.

So a better comparison would be a person killing other people (and animals) because it can, because it wants to. An not just to "get by", in some cases Vampires will just be stuck with that for their own survival but that is not their ideal situation.

And the reason I say a person/human is because we need a self-aware component to the formula. I'm not downgrading animals here or saying they are without emotions or capable of feeling sadness - we just need an better example of something that is self-aware and has the capacity to know right from wrong.

Vampires want to kill and corrupt life because it's their desire to do so - because they are forever removed from life and even the prospects of an afterlife. The original myths were associated with plague, disease and fear of death (with some crossovers to fear of starvation/cannibalism). A vampire is those fears made manifested in (un)dead flesh and motivation.

[Sub-Creator]

Shain Edge wrote:

Example is if a dog killed your favorite cat. Is the dog evil? You could think so, because that cat has meaning to 'you'. It's amazing how we are ok with a mountain lion killing a fawn, but if the same killed a child? It's a 'man killer(!!!)' and must be put down as dangerous (if not evil).

Because it is a man killer . . . it killed a man (using the term as encompassing all mankind here, should said child have been a girl). Are you saying that this animal should not be held responsible for its actions?

Perhaps the people in the area where this child was killed should seek to make a treaty with said mountain lion. Maybe ask it not to kill children, or anyone, anymore. Surely, if these people simply communicated rationally with this mountain lion, explaining to it that killing people is wrong, it will understand and quit doing it. Such is how any purely rational, intelligent being should react, I would think.

[Mystic_Snowfang]

Vampires, in a way, are better for a society than say, plague of bodaks. A vampire doesn't need to kill to feed, and the smart ones would have it in their best interest to have the humanoids in the area they live in remain healthy and unmolested. Not sYing they are good, but they can be useful if they're smart enough.

[Set]

One difference between vampires and predatory animals is that animals have to kill to survive. There's no way for a lion to bite a meal off of a gazelle without killing it. A vampire, even in systems where they have some sort of mechanical penalty for not feeding, can choose to feed from animals, or feed so lightly from charmed / dominated / friendly humans that they can recover blood lost overnight. They don't *have* to kill. (Same with ghouls, who explicitly prefer long-dead flesh, and aren't motivated by their 'biology' or 'necrology' or whatever to kill.)

What makes so many vampires, ghouls, etc., unlike tigers, evil, is that, despite not having to kill to feed (and quite possibly not having to feed at all, just wanting to), is that they *choose* to kill.

[Alex Smith 908]

Shain Edge wrote:

Not being a vegan or vegetarian, I'm looking it objectively.

First, animals do have feelings. Whether or not they can build a car or not, or write a novel or not is completely irrelevant. They feel sadness at a loss of a 'friend' or 'family member', at least what I have detected in domestic pets. This is probably the best way to describe how they are similarly.

Example is if a dog killed your favorite cat. Is the dog evil? You could think so, because that cat has meaning to 'you'. It's amazing how we are ok with a mountain lion killing a fawn, but if the same killed a child? It's a 'man killer(!!!)' and must be put down as dangerous (if not evil).

You're dangerously anthropomorphizing and generalizing animals here. Domestic pets have been selectively breed for having emotions recognizable to and compatible with humans. Animals vary a great deal in awareness and emotional expression. Where one draws a line with sapients vs sentience and such is difficult to always ascertain, but to ascribe too human-like emotions is a fundamental misunderstanding of animals. For instance I view it as immoral to each several high functioning animals such as cetaceans, octopi, elephants, and most apes, but the degree to which my belief in their higher intelligence is valid is difficult to know without the ability to directly communicate.

None of this applies for vampires. They can speak to people, understand people, and once were people. In fact let me revise what I said earlier. A vampire killing a humanoid for sustanence is not the same as a human killing a great ape, because for any similarities shared no human alive has ever physically been a chimpanzee and then grown into a human. A vmapire killing a human is the same morally as an adult killing and eating a prepubescent child. They are the same species the only difference is that one had a hormone/magic surge that made them stronger and more intelligent in the long run.