The homebrew sections of these forums far, far less active then anywhere else.
Is there any interest in homebrew?
Or is it something most people would prefer to just make themselves?
Are you saying that no one in that forum is home brewing? I can assure you that there are new things there daily. Is this a serious question?
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Actually, I could see why some avoid using the boards for this purpose... or just post links to their own google documents.
Are you saying that no one in that forum is home brewing? I can assure you that there are new things there daily. Is this a serious question?
No, I mean...
Arg. Just... Nevermind. I'll just go back to my corner.
I only homebrew, but I generally have no need to ask questions, nor post anything in that forum. Once any of my homebrews are clearly defined, then I publish them so that they go in the 3PP forum, not the homebrew forum, as I did for my Kaidan setting of Japanese horror (PFRPG). Otherwise I keep my homebrews private - no need to share.
That said, Paizo noticed my feudal Japanese expertise and I was recruited to be a contributing author for the City of Kasai gazetteer and city map designer for the Empty Throne module of the Jade Regent AP.
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Oh there's plenty of interest in Homebrew there's just little interest in "your" homebrew.
and no that not a "your" directed at you, it directed at everyone.
for the most part unless your going to benefit or use somthing most people could care less about it. hence commenting on homebrew you'll probably never be able to use yourself is probably a waste of time for most people.
plus there's only so many times you can say "that will break your game" before you get bored and move on.
unfortunately home brew forums are up against human nature and are losing
No, I mean...
Arg. Just... Nevermind. I'll just go back to my corner.
Sorry. Too strong. :)
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yeah, I don't like posting homebrew stuff because once you post it, you lose control of it. Someday I would like to use the setting I have been developing either in a novel, or at the very least publish it as as 3pp rpg product. I don't want any actually novel ideas I develop to be borrowed by random people on the internet and then published.
Thats why many people post a link to material that is stored elsewhere.
Thats why many people post a link to material that is stored elsewhere.
But what prevents people from stealing that as well?
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Nothing.
So don't worry. The chances that someone would steal it are pretty minuscule. At any rate, it's far less likely than you trying to publish an idea you had and discovering that someone else already published that idea independently of you. My suggestion is to either put it here so others can see what you did and maybe build further on it, or don't put it anywhere on the net and work only on it yourself.
It's just the nature of the beast.
Homebrewing is a pretty individualistic pursuit, and different gamers do it for different reasons. For example, back in the 3.5 days I was a frequent homebrew forum-goer, but there were a lot of threads I didn't comment on because I just wasn't interested in that particular idea or because I had already solved that particular issue from a different angle. Some people homebrew to exercise their creativity; those are usually the people writing new races, classes, and whatnot. Others homebrew to solve problems they have with the game rules; those are usually the people writing 'innate bonus' hacks, spell nerfs, and whatnot.
As a specific example, quite a few DMs like to homebrew variant paladin and monk classes in order to offer players more options, while preserving those class' traditional restrictions. This is an exercise in creativity, and while I might be interested in those variant classes as a player at one of those DMs' tables, I have very little interest in discussing them in an online thread. Because as a DM myself, I solved the problem by simply changing or dropping the traditional restrictions.
I've only homebrewed for nearly 30 years, now. Granted, I cherry pick things from published settings (spells and creatures, mostly).
I've always done it a bit, but I was without a gaming group for 11 straight months this past year and kind of went crazy. Homebrewing and posting stuff helped fill the gap. The criticism improves the quality of what you write. Even if it never gets used, the process is still fun for some people.
Well when I stated that I only homebrew in my previous post, I meant that I never purchase APs, so when I intend to run a campaign long or short, I build it myself from the ground up. Add to this, I almost always design a custom setting to run that homebrew AP within, since I also do not use Golarian as a base setting (and I never design entire worlds, only regions). It very well might include custom races, classes, feats, spells, magic items and monsters, as well, but not always.
While I agree with theJeff that homebrew might also apply to new systems, since this thread is on the PF message board, to me, "homebrewing" in a thread here would have to apply to the context of using Pathfinder rules as a base. To me a "homebrew system" wouldn't belong on this board, at any time, so I wasn't applying "new system" to the concept in my definition. If I were to homebrew a new system and had questions regarding that I would post such on a more system neutral forum, like ENWorld, not here. Personally I am not interested in developing a homebrew system, as that is not my thing. New subsystems for PF I would do, however.
Over the past year, I've been considering building and running a PF based Arcane Old West setting and AP where everyone used rifles and revolvers as their primary weapons and far less emphasis on melee weapons aside from brawling. I've already created a custom magus archetype I call the Shootist who rely on a pair of revolvers with ranged spellstrike, and no melee spellstrike at all. If I finish such a setting, I'll probably publish that along with an accompanying AP designed for it. So I wouldn't post such on this board until it was ready for publication - and then it would go into the 3PP forum. If I have questions on its design, since I work with many Rite Publishing freelancers, I would recruit one of them for help, rather than ask here.
Custom settings and homemade adventures were the default with nearly everyone I'd ever played with, so there wasn't a term for them.
Same here, but short of publishing any homebrew material so that its now 3PP, the Homebrew/House Rule/Suggestions forum is really the only place that anything not officially Pathfinder belongs - at least that's the response I get whenever I make suggestions using 3PP or homebrew on any other forum on this board. I constantly get beat over the head by other posters in non-homebrew threads telling me to get that 3PP/homebrew crap out of their offical Pathfinder question thread...
I get alot of use out of it.I read most of what's posted there,looking for good ideas for my home game.
I rarely post anything because tastes vary so much,unless someone is gaming with you they have no real stake in the matter.
The homebrew forum helps remind me that I'm not completely insane,and that there are others like me out there :)
As they say - there's nothing new under the sun. Don't worry about it too much.
I use to think that myself, and not that new ideas haven't been thought up by someone else previously, but unless those ideas have been published somewhere that people can find (or in a forum thead somewhere), they really don't count. While my Kaidan setting (for example) is just my take on OA Pathfinder, many of the ideas seem unique, or at least I've haven't found anything previously published that closely matches. So I tend to now think there are endless possibilities of coming up with something new under the sun...
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The whole "paizo owns everything you post" clause kind of puts me off posting my homebrew here.
If that's the problem, just post it in googledoc or something, then provide the link here.
Personally, I doubt I'll ever be a a designer for Pathfinder (or any other game, it's really not in my carrier plan), so I don't really care if Paizo (or anyone else) uses one of my ideas... If I did, I wouldn't be sharing them on the internet.
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The whole "paizo owns everything you post" clause kind of puts me off posting my homebrew here.
By virtue of the "paizo owns everything you post" clause, Paizo now owns the rights to your opinion on the "paizo owns everything you post" clause.
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This whole thing does remind of where I'm pretty sure Paizo came up with their ideas for fixing sorceror.
On the 3.5 message boards there were two competing ideas for how to fix the sorceror class to be comparable to wizard. The first was a series of various bloodlines based upon where one's magical blood came from. (sound familiar?) And the 2nd was simply a spell-like ability and a focus on metamagics. (Similar to the current arcane bloodline.)
I'm not saying that Paizo just copied those ideas directly, but I would be surprised if they weren't inspired by them.
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To Charon's Little Helper above, I say that that is a positive thing, because whoever made those forum posts probably didn't have a publishing arm and probably dropped off the face of the Internet when he switched to another username or stopped playing 3E.
You other people—except the dude immediately above me, you magnificent ninja bastard you ;)—are missing the whole point.
This is a community who all come together to share ideas and benefit from each other's expertise, not flypaper for Paizo to attract stray revenue sources.
Imagine how sh*tty the Iliad would be if the first guy to sing it had taken out a copyright and prevented anyone else from changing it, rather than have the story evolve organically as part of an oral—and later written—tradition to create the masterpiece we have today.
And if it weren't for the ability for anybody to come along and take things for inspiration, we would never have gotten the Aeneid, which is like the Quarantine to the Iliad's [REC], but still an excellent mov–I mean book.
Imagine if the Anglican church had copyrighted their translation of the King James Bible. John Milton would have been sued for infringement trying to write Paradise Lost (though I suppose he could have added MLA citations next to each and every direct quote or paraphrase from the Bible, which I am sure would in no way detract from the poetic effect).
And if you've ever read Paradise Lost, you know that there is an incredible amount of material there that was borrowed to create the D&D corpus. For instance, the scene of Satan waking up in Hell and creating a Palace out of a barren plain is referenced in Fiendish Codex II. Also the notion that Heaven and Hell, rather than a places above and below the surface of the earth, are in fact different planes of existence entirely. And the name "Pandaemonium" was originally invented by John Milton for this poem, and went on to become an entire plane of existence in the Planescape setting.
Good artists borrow. Great artists steal. And every time you sing "Happy Birthday" in public without paying royalties to Warner Music Group, you are technically stealing.
The myths that inspire human culture the most... are anonymous. Stop trying to make money doing this, because you will miss out on the joy the hobby can bring by stressing out over the kind of crap mentioned above.
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And I must point out that, while yes, they do seem to take an alarmingly broad claim of ownership over your comments, Paizo is a small enough company that their chief creative officer took time out of his day to let me know he laughed at one of my jokes.
Paizo is not Comcast. They have ethics and a standard of moral behavior and they would never hurt their fan community by doing something as blatant as stealing ideas (ESPECIALLY anything involving proper names) without credit and then suing their fans when they try to publish their own brainchildren. Paizo, DESPITE WHAT THEIR INFURIATING TARDINESS IN ADDRESSING THE FAQ BACKLOG WOULD SUGGEST *COUGH* *COUGH* cares too much about their fans to do that to them.
So stop worrying and have fun.
Unless Bank of America is about to repossess your house or vehicle, in which case I understand your professed level of concern.
You other people—except the dude immediately above me, you magnificent ninja bastard you ;)—are missing the whole point.
This is a community who all come together to share ideas and benefit from each other's expertise, not flypaper for Paizo to attract stray revenue sources.
Just to clarify my position, I personally don't believe nor fear Paizo might steal ideas I present on these boards nor any forum, and have posted some class archetype and subsystem ideas for my games here at one time or another. However, I don't do so extensively, because I am comfortable with my presentation and design skills, and have my own reliable sources of experts to help me with any questions I have regarding homebrew rules and representations. I have developed a published setting for Pathfinder, and there is always a possibility that I would publish other settings and supplements that I dream up, as I am a budding game publisher myself.
Not only hasn't Paizo stolen my ideas, I am sure that those ideas I've presented as well as publications I helped create greatly influenced Paizo's decision to commission me to be a contributing author for the Empty Throne module of the Jade Regent Adventure Path, regarding the design of the City of Kasai map and writing portions of the City of Kasai gazetteer. They recognize my expertise and rather than stealing ideas, I've actually created content to help fulfill the design of their AP - and got paid for it.
I don't post a lot of questions and concerns about homebrew ideas out of fear of plagerism, rather I am comfortable with my own developments I do privately for my home game or potential publishing goals and needs.
My response above asking about using Google docs being any more safe than a posted thread with the threat of being stolen wasn't to imply Paizo would do this, rather some possible unscrupulous publisher reading the thread and stealing ideas for their products. While I don't really believe that likelihood is probable, I was searching for clarification by the poster I was responding to with his point made. It wasn't to accomodate my actual feelings regarding this, rather the point in general (as a point in this discussion) - with "is posting a link to an offsite location any safer than posting here?" Not to imply that it would be stolen at all, or that it was a risk to do so.
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To Charon's Little Helper above, I say that that is a positive thing, because whoever made those forum posts probably didn't have a publishing arm and probably dropped off the face of the Internet when he switched to another username or stopped playing 3E.
Oh - I totally agree. As one of the people who helped to expand non-bloodline fix (with no pretentions of trying to make money off of it), I totally agree that it's a good thing. I was just bringing it up as an interesting point of note.
I hide the homebrew forum from my view
mainly because I really do not care what you are doing in your games with your players and your circumstances
because they are not my games with my players and my circumstances
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I posted a monster with a full stat block, flavor, and description, and Paizo has yet to print it in one of their resources. I'm getting kind of impatient, really.
I generally only use the term "homebrew" to refer to home campaigns that have changed some of the basic rules of the game. To me, the norm is for campaigns to be "homebrewed" in the sense that many use that term these days - as a designator for campaigns that don't take part in shared worlds like Golarion. That's probably because I started playing way, way back in the early days of RPGs, when you pretty much had to do that.
When it comes to the worlds I create for my campaigns, I don't really post much about them because I don't want to risk letting something slip that my players may dig up (if they ever figure out what handle I use on here).
Back under the days of 3.X D&D the internet was crowded with peoples own homebrew campaign settings. They were always a good read and a source of inspiration. But these days there is nothing. It's all dried up which is a real shame.
Thelemic_Noun: Just to be technical, if you are singing Happy birthday in public without compensating Warner Music Group, you are infringing on their copyright. Much as they'd like it to be the case, copyright infringement is not theft.
You other people—except the dude immediately above me, you magnificent ninja bastard you ;)—are missing the whole point.
This is a community who all come together to share ideas and benefit from each other's expertise, not flypaper for Paizo to attract stray revenue sources.
Just to clarify my position, I personally don't believe nor fear Paizo might steal ideas I present on these boards nor any forum, and have posted some class archetype and subsystem ideas for my games here at one time or another. However, I don't do so extensively, because I am comfortable with my presentation and design skills, and have my own reliable sources of experts to help me with any questions I have regarding homebrew rules and representations. I have developed a published setting for Pathfinder, and there is always a possibility that I would publish other settings and supplements that I dream up, as I am a budding game publisher myself.
Not only hasn't Paizo stolen my ideas, I am sure that those ideas I've presented as well as publications I helped create greatly influenced Paizo's decision to commission me to be a contributing author for the Empty Throne module of the Jade Regent Adventure Path, regarding the design of the City of Kasai map and writing portions of the City of Kasai gazetteer. They recognize my expertise and rather than stealing ideas, I've actually created content to help fulfill the design of their AP - and got paid for it.
I don't post a lot of questions and concerns about homebrew ideas out of fear of plagerism, rather I am comfortable with my own developments I do privately for my home game or potential publishing goals and needs.
My response above asking about using Google docs being any more safe than a posted thread with the threat of being stolen wasn't to imply Paizo would do this, rather some possible unscrupulous publisher reading the thread and stealing ideas for their products. While I don't really believe that likelihood is probable, I was searching for...
Online and Offline communities thrive because the people within those communities share and help each other.
Academic research communities (like Academia.edu) improves research.
Art communities improves the quality of art.
Online and offline roleplaying communities are no different. From helping beginner players with some rules clarifications to homebrew fighter fixes.
If everyone built an iron wall around their creative ideas and didn't care to help out other people in their community, the community would no longer be a community, rather a small exclusive group.
Without inclusiveness, roleplaying games would lose 75% of their fan base.
And the notion that for someone to share their ideas you have to pay a monetary fee is selfish and mean spirited, and not how the digital age we are all living in works.
Lets keep sharing