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Knight, this is the General Discussion forum, where we refer to the hard and fast written rules.
It is not the Rule 0/House Rules forum, where you alter things willy nilly to fit your way. And 'not allowing' something permitted in the base rules IS House Rules.
Ugh, I hope no one takes this statement as true because it would really limit the variety of discussions people might have in this area (including the current discussion.)
From my perspective - I go two ways in my campaigns as DM:
1) The campaign world may be on the verge of a technological explosion. Given the length of any campaign, we may not see much of it though. I personally find an affinity with the aforementioned LotR arc, where the ways of magic are fading and an era of mankind is dawning.
2) in contrast, I like the idea that Wizards / Outsiders etc would kill any huge attempts at world-changing techonology if it didn't serve their purposes. I could see some great story arcs coming out of that, actually.
My most honest answer to a PC that asked that kind of question would be: "I don't know if it will be an issue in this campaign, and if it is I don't want to tell you to give it away. It could also be something that emerges in the campaign and that we discover together through the plot."
(Note the OP recently clarified that he's not looking for Golarian-specific answers here either..)
Technology, even when available, won't always spread.
Creeks had steam power and clockwork engines at 2000 years ago, which was used only toys and curiosites.
Egyptians had electricity about 4-5000 years ago and it was used to galvanize jewels and (with bit disbelief) maybe used to create light.
Yes, but those are notable because they are exceptions, not the rule, Bunny.
In general, technology (magic) advances over time, without extreme means/events to stop it.
==Aelryinth
Actually technology didn't advance until communication got to the point where technology would spread before the civilisation that invented it snuffed out. That's why we don't know the full extent of the engineering techniques used in the Pyramids or by the Incans at Macchu Piccu. Over the 40-75,000 years of human history, the bulk of advancement was done in the last two centuries.
There's also the idiosyncratic factor. Where would be today if Vincent Cerf hadn't invented the tcp/ip protocol and a certain Senator didn't push Congress to throw money at developing a network that would use it? A reset that wipes out both technology and the memory of it, could wind up with history that takes a far different path.
Given the remorseless advance of tech, we'd probably have a more advanced system in place today, like other nations do. :o
Legacy systems also hold back wide adoption of tech. (What? You still use Magic missile instead of snowball? really?)
--Aelryinth
Go look at the retraining rules.
All the NPC has to do is decide to retrain, find a teacher, and done. if the PC's are pushing them to do that and will be the teacher or find one for them...done!As for NPC's leveling up...
Every NPC is level 1. We only need them to BE level 1.
And, sheesh, the NPC/possible cohorts in every AP automatically advance with every book. You seem to infer they can't without the GM making each and every one a 'special case'...which is part of the logic fail that started this whole thing, because people do get better and smarter over time, even if they don't level to 15.
We're intersecting this with 'realism' at times, too, you know?
Eesh.
Find a citation where it says the PC's can't retrain willing NPC's. Hint: You won't find it.
==Aelryinth
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Go look at the retraining rules.
All the NPC has to do is decide to retrain, find a teacher, and done. if the PC's are pushing them to do that and will be the teacher or find one for them...done!As for NPC's leveling up...
Every NPC is level 1. We only need them to BE level 1.
And, sheesh, the NPC/possible cohorts in every AP automatically advance with every book. You seem to infer they can't without the GM making each and every one a 'special case'...which is part of the logic fail that started this whole thing, because people do get better and smarter over time, even if they don't level to 15.
We're intersecting this with 'realism' at times, too, you know?
Eesh.
Find a citation where it says the PC's can't retrain willing NPC's. Hint: You won't find it.
==Aelryinth
I hate to be that guy, but seriously, you've made your point emphatically and repeatedly. Some people agree, some do not. Belaboring the same argument isn't likely to convince anyone either way, and isn't actually helpful to the original purpose of the thread.
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Oh. So you're talking pure mechanics. Or, rather, you're rules-lawyering.
In which case, Aelryinth, why are you involved in this conversation? This isn't a conversation about mechanics, it's a conversation about worldbuilding, which by definition only partially involves the written game system rules.
This is the General Discussion forum, where we refer to the hard and fast written rules.
But not only the hard and fast written rules. If it was a conversation only about mechanics, it'd be in the Rules Questions subsection, not the General Discussion subsection. Take your overly-retentive 'going only by exactly what the rules state' self and go away; the discussion isn't for you. Stick to the Rules Questions sub-forum.
Otherwise, every single one of your answers is only a potentially useful tool - but otherwise the whinging of a pedant who, by his own admission, is going ONLY by what the rules say, and NOT AT ALL by what is either asked or implied, whether by the fact that it's fantasy world building, or by using actual sequential requirements, etc.
I just looked up Retraining on www.d20pfsrdcom (originally from Ultimate Campaign), and although admittedly I did speed-read, it does not seem to have anything barring NPCs from retraining, and even explicitly allows NPC soldiers to retrain from Warrior to Fighter. Other retraining combinations from NPC classes to PC classes are not mentioned specifically for NPCs either for or against. So by default, it seems safest to conclude that such retraining is at least available to NPCs by the rules, even if not necessarily available or achievable in-world, which could still prevent most NPCs from undergoing such retraining (hence keeping the fraction of the population having PC class levels down to that seen in-world -- the extent to which this occurs is by default left up to the campaign setting).
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So by default, it seems safest to conclude that such retraining is at least available to NPCs by the rules, even if not necessarily available or achievable in-world, which could still prevent most NPCs from undergoing such retraining (hence keeping the fraction of the population having PC class levels down to that seen in-world -- the extent to which this occurs is by default left up to the campaign setting).
Sort of - the key thing to keep in mind is that Non-Player Characters are... just that: Non-Player Characters, thus what they do is exclusively the purview of the GM, with suggestions made from the system and setting.
Thus, a GM could decide that he wants a world where there simply are no "NPC Classes" and everyone, no matter what role they fulfill in society, has a PC class. Or classes, should said GM also decide that they want to have NPCs level up (say, by age?). But whether they do, or do not, is entirely a choice on the part of the GM and the author of the setting (who may be one and the same).
A similar, if simpler and more profound, comparison is to that of skill points:
- An untrained hirelings (i.e. those without ranks in a profession) earns 1sp per day.
- A trained hireling earns at least 3sp/day, with hire prices for certain skill sets.
- An NPC with 1 rank in any profession with Wisdom 10 and taking-10 on the check earns 7gp per week. Assuming 5 working days, that's 1.4gp per day.
From the above, you could argue, based on the mechanics, that no NPC should ever be without ranks in Profession - the ability for a single skill rank to raise your income by 200% to 900% is simply too good to pass up, yes?
So the question is raised, "Why are there people without a rank in a profession skill?" (or at least "not using their rank in Profession to earn an income")... I could guess a couple of answers, but I suspect your local gas station attendant or 7-Eleven cashier operator could give you a more insightful one.
Edit: Okay, that last line was a little facetious of me. More seriously, the topic of education, culture, location, social-connections, individual motivation and self-discipline etc that lead to the various skill sets and life decisions people make is a complex one, and not something that any RPG rules set is ever going to fully encapsulate... at least not an system I'd want to play in, anyway.
The best we can do is simply admit that a lot of people don't necessarily make decisions based on what is objectively better for them. If they did a lot of things wouldn't exist in our world; smoking, drinking, drug abuse, domestic abuse, vandalism, reckless/drunk driving, most violent crime and so on and so forth.
People ain't perfect, and thus, neither are the worlds we play games in.
If a PC wizard wants to use all his second level spell slots to cast continual flame for days on end and provide a settlement with gaslight era equivalent streetlights, I'm not going to stop him (Hell, I'll probably make him a local hero, with all the plot hooks that entails) but I'm not going to waste any time worrying about how to keep the NPCs in my setting from doing it.
But the question is, why don't any NPC's do things like that? I mean, all they need to do is make a a few command word items of continual flame and they can hand that item to the local government and they are greatly improving peoples quality of life. Give the government a command word item of create water and you are improving your societies quality of life. Give the government a command word item of prestidigitation and you are improving your societies quality of life.
Sure, not every mage or person with Master Craftsman would be interested. But I'd be sincerely amazed if no mage ever though "hmm... I could easily help tonnes of people without having to go into battle or kill things".
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Actually had an interesting tid bit come up in Iron Gods:
Player: Can I make an Advanced Firearm? Specifically a rifle?
Me: Hmmm. No. There are no advanced firearms on Golarion.
Player: Well, I can construct a laser rifle, I should obviously be able to figure out rifling.
Me: The problem is, you have no reason to nor inspiration to. You as a player know of rifling because you've seen it. However, your character has never stumbled across that piece of technology. The concept of rifling a gun barrel has yet to exist in Golarion. Laser rifles came from beyond the stars and filled a niche that rifling does- shooting things farther away. The understanding of technology has skipped over several steps, at least as our real world would view it. If you *really* wanted to develop rifling, it would take years of experimentation, relying on your Gunsmithing feat over your Craft Technological Arms and Armor feat.
Player: You know what? I'll just make a sonic rifle instead.
Thing is, magic bypasses a ton of mundane tech.
So what purpose do people have to go back and invent the parts in between?
That 12th level wizard the OP is worried about? Available in fine Large Cities everywhere (barring GM fiat).
Herein lies an interesting quirk of Pathfinder, in that it has inherited some hard numbers from 3.5, such as the Spellcasting Services table, while at the same point discarding a lot of the crunch of 3.5 in favor of a more narrative approach to world-building.
Seriously, just compare the 3.5 and Pathfinder DMG sections and you'll see what I mean: 3.5 gave you hard numbers for every class level and number per settlement, where Pathfinder instead gives you advice and guidance on building an environment you can roleplay in.
But getting back to your point, let's take Andoren, for example. It has;
- 1 Metropolis (Augustana)
- 2 Large cities (Oregent, Carpenden)
- 0 Small cities
- 5 Large towns (Bellis, Olfden, Sauerton, Steyr, Triela)
- 9 Small towns
Noting that half of those small towns would be villages in 3.5 (where a village was up to 900 people, rather than 200 in Pathfinder - not sure of the reasoning for the change).
Pathfinder says little about numbers of casters, only when spellcasting services are available... and has different things to say in different places: Under the settlement table they suggest a small town has 4th level spellcasting services, whereas under spellcasting services they suggest a small town has only 1st level spellcasting...
If you want to shoehorn in 3.5 material: It did have very specific things to say about numbers and levels of NPCs, indicating that in the metropolis alone there would be 4 x (1d6+12)th level adepts, bards, clerics and druids and 4 x (1d4+12)th level sorcerers and wizards, then each has twice that number of NPCs half their level, and so on and so forth.
The two large cities have a +9 to the level, and x3 of each.
Taking average of these major settlements you get:
Adept: 2x16th, 2x15th, 1x13th, 2x12th, 8x8th, 2x7th, 4x6th, 20x4th, 8x3rd, 56x2nd, 112x1st
Bard: 2x16th, 2x15th, 1x13th, 2x12th, 8x8th, 2x7th, 4x6th, 20x4th, 8x3rd, 56x2nd, 112x1st
Cleric: 2x16th, 2x15th, 1x13th, 2x12th, 8x8th, 2x7th, 4x6th, 20x4th, 8x3rd, 56x2nd, 112x1st
Druid: 2x16th, 2x15th, 1x13th, 2x12th, 8x8th, 2x7th, 4x6th, 20x4th, 8x3rd, 56x2nd, 112x1st
Sorcerer: 2x15th, 2x14th, 1x12th, 2x11th, 4x8th, 4x7th, 6x6th, 20x4th, 12x3rd, 56x2nd, 112x1st
Wizard: 2x15th, 2x14th, 1x12th, 2x11th, 4x8th, 4x7th, 6x6th, 20x4th, 12x3rd, 56x2nd, 112x1st
... if you want to shoehorn in some 3.5 stuff.
And with those numbers, certain choices of spells, such as wall of stone, wall of iron (noting that it would still need to be worked, and the spell makes no commentary on the quality) and so on could do some incredible things.
But if we're talking numbers, then we have to factor something else in: Those NPCs aren't martyrs and expect fair pay for their magical efforts, and here both Pathfinder and 3.5 have something very specific to say. In Pathfinder it is Spell Level x Caster Level x 10gp. Plus material costs and 10% of spell focii cost.
So a 12th level wall of iron costs 12 x 6 x 10gp = 720gp, and generates a slab of iron 3" thick, 15ft wide and 20ft long, which is a lot of iron. About 16.7 tonnes according to the OP.
But is it worth 720gp? Maybe. Pathfinder doesn't give a gp/tonne value for iron. One can try and extrapolate using something cheap (e.g. an iron spike) and the crafting rules, to get 5cp per 3lbs of iron, which would give the aforementioned iron wall a market value of 612gp... which suggests that... sure it's instantaneous, but more expensive than just getting some peasants to dig it up and smelt it.
If one wants to talk about what magic can do, one should also look at what magic will cost, and not assume the most powerful and exceptional individuals from a nation of millions will, in fact, work for free.
We totally do have numbers for iron. It's a trade good in Ultimate Equipment, 1 sp/1 lb. At 16.7 tons, that's 3,340 gp.
So a 1lb iron spike is worth half as much as 1lb of iron? Weird.
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The problem with costing magic is simple: players. Players don't get paid for the magic they cast, but there's nothing stopping them from casting those spells that are poor ROI at service price but are great at free. Well, or highly reduced cost. Even the ones that aren't a great ROI the player might choose for entirely personal, emotional, or sentimental reasons. If a player decides they're going to blow ridiculous amounts of gold on making sure everyone in the world gets fed, you can't really stop them. They get to choose how they spend their gold (and pathfinder is very bad at modeling the economy).
It is true: You can't stop players from jumping in and doing such things, but that doesn't mean there aren't consequences, particularly if they invent a magical charity system that requires their continued effort to operate. How long will it run? Months? Years? Decades? What happens when it eventually ends? Will the world have taken their charity and used it to try and make themselves self-sufficient without it, or swiftly taken it for granted and become reliant upon it? Will providing plentiful food end hunger, or will people just eat more and have more children survive to adulthood? Will the hero being dragged off by the GM to continue the campaign cause an economic crash as food shortages abound due to the sudden absence of magical intervention? Will the heroes' beloved city become yet another ruin they adventured through in their youth because of a TPK?
And that's not even getting into the power struggles as the PCs start throwing around their magical weight and reshaping the economy and undermining (however good their intentions) the authority of the established powers, who might not oppose the PCs intentions, but most certainly would want to control/moderate them to ensure that they maintain their power base and do not become excessively reliant/beholden to the PC. Or a wealthy and powerful guild of mages who really, really do not like this 'attack' by the PC on their power base with their 'free spellcasting'.
And then there's the socio-economic impact of them flexing their arcane might on a mass scale: Just because it's free, doesn't mean everyone will like it. Casting wall of stone for free to erect stone walls around the town rather than having to pay the masons may seem generous, but the masons are unlikely to appreciate it, as you devalue their skills and cause unemployment/redundancy issues.
And then there's the numbers game. Putting aside wish and miracle (which have GM fiat on their most potent effects anyway), a PC can work great magic... but compared to the millions of people living in these nations - Again looking at Andoran, by the area, terrain and settlements, it should be rocking a population between 3 and 7 million, depending on the intended urbanization and unoccupied land. As a 16th level cleric, a PC can heal entire groups of 16 people at a time, create demiplanes, summon earthquakes, control the weather (within a 2 mile radius), cure diseases (in a single target) and similar amazing works. And it is amazing, but even control weather isn't enough; Andoran has at least 50,000 square miles of farmland, so in the end of a drought the PC can help, but he can't just make it go away, as even getting 1 good storm across the land would take over four thousand castings of the spell and about 3 years of dedicated work, during which hundreds of thousands will have already died.
It's not that the PCs can't make a difference, but they can't simply magic away the world's problems (unless the GM decides they can, naturally).
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A simulacrim, bound, or allied bronze dragon (juvenile) will feed 168K civilians, more if they work more then 8 hours a day. Traps of create food and water cost 16500 GP and can feed 400K civilians.
A juvenile bronze dragon... lets assume a simulacrum as it actually gives absolute control over it (and no bronze dragon is going to willingly agree to be a vending machine for all time, Good alignment doesn't mean it's a martyr), that's 3000gp and although the resulting simulacrum has only 6HD (half the original) we'll assume it keeps the spell-like ability.
Create food and water has a 10-minute cast time, and at caster level 12 can feed 36 people per casting, 216 per hour, or 1,728 per day if working 8 hours. Now, that's a lot, but not 168,000 which you quoted.
Indeed, to feed a decent kingdom of a few million people, you'd only need around a thousand of them (created at a cost of 300,000gp over a 3 year period of dedicated effort and a very patient dragon), and everyone could live on Soylent Yellow.
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4. Because Thomas Edison was a dick and tortured an elephant with AC to prove the evils of AC at a worlds fair
Yes and no.
Edison tortured many dogs, cats, horses, and cattle to death that way... but never an elephant.
The elephant cited in stories to the contrary, Topsy, was killed long after Edison had won his war against alternating current... and indeed after he had been forced out of the 'Edison electric company' (now ConEd) which actually performed the execution... at the request of the circus that owned the elephant... after they had tortured and mis-used the elephant for years (actually encouraging it to threaten guests and even police to draw crowds to see the 'killer elephant'). The event WAS filmed by a crew from Edison's company, but there is no evidence that Edison himself was present.
That said... yeah, he was still a dick.
If a PC wizard wants to use all his second level spell slots to cast continual flame for days on end and provide a settlement with gaslight era equivalent streetlights, I'm not going to stop him (Hell, I'll probably make him a local hero, with all the plot hooks that entails) but I'm not going to waste any time worrying about how to keep the NPCs in my setting from doing it.
But the question is, why don't any NPC's do things like that? I mean, all they need to do is make a a few command word items of continual flame and they can hand that item to the local government and they are greatly improving peoples quality of life. Give the government a command word item of create water and you are improving your societies quality of life. Give the government a command word item of prestidigitation and you are improving your societies quality of life.
Sure, not every mage or person with Master Craftsman would be interested. But I'd be sincerely amazed if no mage ever though "hmm... I could easily help tonnes of people without having to go into battle or kill things".
I don't know what to tell you; that's a setting specific question. In my own setting, the only government that's magocratic enough to achieve that level of magitek is a made up of an elven ruling class and an orcish working class; humans only colonized the world within the last few centuries.
Speaking specifically on the subject of streetlights, the elven rulers are magically proficient enough to cast light spells when they can't see with their low light vision, and their orc servants just have darkvision; they're both of the opinion that needing lighting to see is just weird and icky, and much lower class than just walking around in the dark like an honest, true-hearted orc would. This prejudice has only increased since I switched to 5E, where elves have darkvision.
Of course, that's completely irrelevant to anything but the setting I've dreamed up. If anyone wants to invent a setting that has lamps on every road just like World of Warcraft, or a steampunk setting that has gone through an industrial revolution, I say go for it, but once you do that, you're the one who runs the setting, not one of the ones who runs around and has fun in it.
Edit: I guess that's my long-winded way of saying I find it much more gratifying to have the rules serve the setting than having the setting serve the rules, but if anyone wants to play that it only takes 3 days for an NPC to learn anything and everything because that's what the retraining rules for NPC classes say, then be my guest.
Oh. So you're talking pure mechanics. Or, rather, you're rules-lawyering.
In which case, Aelryinth, why are you involved in this conversation? This isn't a conversation about mechanics, it's a conversation about worldbuilding, which by definition only partially involves the written game system rules.
This is the General Discussion forum, where we refer to the hard and fast written rules.But not only the hard and fast written rules. If it was a conversation only about mechanics, it'd be in the Rules Questions subsection, not the General Discussion subsection. Take your overly-retentive 'going only by exactly what the rules state' self and go away; the discussion isn't for you. Stick to the Rules Questions sub-forum.
Otherwise, every single one of your answers is only a potentially useful tool - but otherwise the whinging of a pedant who, by his own admission, is going ONLY by what the rules say, and NOT AT ALL by what is either asked or implied, whether by the fact that it's fantasy world building, or by using actual sequential requirements, etc.
Ah, personal insults. The ultimate end to a bad argument. Happens right after arguing English nuances. (sighs)
Rules lawyering is negatively biased to indicate you are trying to find loopholes and exploits. I've pointed those out when I've seen them.
Everything has been about mechanics, and the mechanics indicate that making a 'magical' explosion is far more likely then a tech explosion. The original question was how to stop tech from erupting. It has segued into the fact that you keep trying to argue that a magical version could NOT erupt, because of the rules, and because GM Fiat.
The rules say otherwise. GM Fiat/House rules/setting flavor is IRRELEVANT to what the rules say, since we are operating on one standard.
Your point with NPC's is 'GM approval'. My point with NPC's is, how would you and I react? Because 'we' are the NPC's. How would normal people react? We look at history. History indicates that we could have a magical eruption just like we had a tech one, and the nature of the magical universe makes this more likely, not less. And the Rules permit it, and by their structure, make it fairly easy to happen.
Flat GM ruling that this isn't going to happen is not part of the argument. If that's the case, there's NEVER going to be a rules/campaign question, because Rule 0 trumps all. These discussions happen because we don't WANT to invoke rule 0 all the time.
I understand you're frustrated with all your points being disproven, and that I actually might have people who agree with me, but that is not an excuse for personal insults.
==Aelryinth
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To be fair Ael, the thread's only 'segued into' that subject because you keep harping on the point.
Eh, I didn't bring it up first. And it IS the best way to stop a techno explosion!
heh, heh.
==Aelryinth
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To be exact, Golarian is an agrarian world that hasn't realized that if everyone knew some magic, they wouldn't be subsistence level farmers and could greatly ease their workload hugely with just cantrip-level magic.
It takes years to learn how to be a level 1 farmer, too. The same amount of time it takes to activate your bloodline. So Golarion is basically based on a reality which exists in defiance of what real circumstances would drive people to do.
*snip*
==Aelryinth
This lands in the fuzzy area between mechanics and world building, but given the young character rules in Ultimate Campaign, A human can start as a level 1 Commoner (read as, farmer) between the ages of 9 and 14, whereas a Sorcerer starts between 16 and 19 and a Wizard starts between 17 and 27; I'm not saying PF does better than the historical record, but I think Golarion is based on a reality where real circumstance drive people to employ child labor in a preindustrial setting, rather than lose between 7 and 18 years of productivity.
Yes, I just said Paizo endorses child labor, someone flag my post. :P
In much of the real world, 9-14 year old children work the farm, and fight and die in wars.
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In much of the real world, 9-14 year old children work the farm, and fight and die in wars.
They do fight in wars - but they're not skilled warriors. The only reason that they're at all viable is due to modern firearms/explosives.
If you want to see how effective they were in a medieval world - look how effective The Children's Crusade was. (Answer: Not at all.)
Cheap labor is cheap labor, in war and peace. :P When life is cheap, children take the hit as well.
==Aelryinth
In much of the real world, 9-14 year old children work the farm, and fight and die in wars.To be exact, Golarian is an agrarian world that hasn't realized that if everyone knew some magic, they wouldn't be subsistence level farmers and could greatly ease their workload hugely with just cantrip-level magic.
It takes years to learn how to be a level 1 farmer, too. The same amount of time it takes to activate your bloodline. So Golarion is basically based on a reality which exists in defiance of what real circumstances would drive people to do.
*snip*
==Aelryinth
This lands in the fuzzy area between mechanics and world building, but given the young character rules in Ultimate Campaign, A human can start as a level 1 Commoner (read as, farmer) between the ages of 9 and 14, whereas a Sorcerer starts between 16 and 19 and a Wizard starts between 17 and 27; I'm not saying PF does better than the historical record, but I think Golarion is based on a reality where real circumstance drive people to employ child labor in a preindustrial setting, rather than lose between 7 and 18 years of productivity.
Yes, I just said Paizo endorses child labor, someone flag my post. :P
Agreed; I wasn't endorsing the situation, or seriously suggesting that Paizo does, but I find it very hard to imagine a preindustrial setting that doesn't rely on child labor.
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Your point with NPC's is 'GM approval'. My point with NPC's is, how would you and I react? Because 'we' are the NPC's. How would normal people react? We look at history. History indicates that we could have a magical eruption just like we had a tech one, and the nature of the magical universe makes this more likely, not less. And the Rules permit it, and by their structure, make it fairly easy to happen.
There are infinite ways that people and the world might react. Make it compelling, story-wise, first, then retroactively explain how it happened. We are telling stories in RPGs.
Referencing the rules as though it definitively leads to certain conclusions realky restricts the possible stories a DM could come up with. As a professional writer, story editor and filmmaker, and 30-year DM, I really don't agree with that way of looking at things. In my experience, thinking big and wild first is better. Then look to the rules to validate your world. Adjust the rules (Rule 0) if something doesn't fit the logic of your world.
Similarly, I don't think it's fair for others to get too worried about the improper cost of iron per tonne in the game. That's not the focus of the RPG, and certainly not where I want to see Paizo spending their man-hours. If your campaign turns into mining enterprise, it takes all of 3 seconds to adjust the price of an ore.
The rigidity that I see people adhering to the rules on these forums is unlike I've seen in any other RPG. I guess because there are so many rules, that people assume they should define everything. In my experience, that rigidity to rules leads to less enjoyable RP experiences. I realize everyone has their preferred ways of Roleplaying, but I think it's important (especially for newbies) not to assume that roleplaying means following the rulebook to a tee.
Actually had an interesting tid bit come up in Iron Gods:
Player: Can I make an Advanced Firearm? Specifically a rifle?
Me: Hmmm. No. There are no advanced firearms on Golarion.
Player: Well, I can construct a laser rifle, I should obviously be able to figure out rifling.
Me: The problem is, you have no reason to nor inspiration to. You as a player know of rifling because you've seen it. However, your character has never stumbled across that piece of technology. The concept of rifling a gun barrel has yet to exist in Golarion. Laser rifles came from beyond the stars and filled a niche that rifling does- shooting things farther away. The understanding of technology has skipped over several steps, at least as our real world would view it. If you *really* wanted to develop rifling, it would take years of experimentation, relying on your Gunsmithing feat over your Craft Technological Arms and Armor feat.
Player: You know what? I'll just make a sonic rifle instead.Thing is, magic bypasses a ton of mundane tech.
So what purpose do people have to go back and invent the parts in between?
Technically, I believe the term is: You can tell that superscience lab/forge thing you found to make a sonic rifle for you, and follow its schematics for supplying raw materials.
You can't actually make one from scratch. :)And I'm pretty sure there are rifles in Golarion. DOesn't the sniper at the end of Skull and SHackles use one?
==Aelryinth
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Agreed; I wasn't endorsing the situation, or seriously suggesting that Paizo does, but I find it very heard to imagine a preindustrial setting that doesn't rely on child labor.
Or an early industrial one for that matter. It's still around today in many developing countries for a reason. (And we SHOULD NOT try to force developing countries to ban it. The US did that in Bangladesh by strong-arming their government. The biggest result? A large increase in child prostitution there. Child labor isn't a good thing - but it's often better than the alternatives.)
Your point with NPC's is 'GM approval'. My point with NPC's is, how would you and I react? Because 'we' are the NPC's. How would normal people react? We look at history. History indicates that we could have a magical eruption just like we had a tech one, and the nature of the magical universe makes this more likely, not less. And the Rules permit it, and by their structure, make it fairly easy to happen.There are infinite ways that people and the world might react. Make it compelling, story-wise, first, then retroactively explain how it happened. We are telling stories in RPGs.
Referencing the rules as though it definitively leads to certain conclusions realky restricts the possible stories a DM could come up with. As a professional writer, story editor and filmmaker, and 30-year DM, I really don't agree with that way of looking at things. In my experience, thinking big and wild first is better. Then look to the rules to validate your world. Adjust the rules (Rule 0) if something doesn't fit the logic of your world.
Similarly, I don't think it's fair for others to get too worried about the improper cost of iron per tonne in the game. That's not the focus of the RPG, and certainly not where I want to see Paizo spending their man-hours. If your campaign turns into mining enterprise, it takes all of 3 seconds to adjust the price of an ore.
The rigidity that I see people adhering to the rules on these forums is unlike I've seen in any other RPG. I guess because there are so many rules, that people assume they should define everything. In my experience, that rigidity to rules leads to less enjoyable RP experiences. I realize everyone has their preferred ways of Roleplaying, but I think it's important (especially for newbies) not to assume that roleplaying means following the rulebook to a tee.
The adherence to rules are a basis for talking about, nothing more.
YOur setting is always going to deviate, and it should. I am not saying it should not. You can Rule 0 everything!
But then, we wouldn't be talking about the rules, we'd be talking about your home campaign, and our standard goes out the window.
So, if we are talking about the rules, we have to stick to the rules.
If we are talking about people (on the macro level), our best guide is history (and isn't it what most of the game is based on, anyways?). Again, gives a common basis.
If we are talking about your setting...then you make the rules, there's no basis.
==Aelryinth
To reference Endless Legend again, I think you can have your fantasy and tech at the same time.
The end product does not have to be AK-47, but better magic and better sword. For example of D&D/Golarion, there are so many special materials that you can use as basis for technological evolution. Mixture of magic and tech does not have to product magical AK-47 or gas lamp, but what if you try to find a way to harvest special materials quicker, more efficiently and safer?
In Endless Legend all nations initial knowledge of 2 strategic resources that can be used to make better equipment or other useful things. Increased knowledge of the world reveals more resources to be exploited. Tools might become stronger, more delicate, intuitive to extract more from the world.
The idea that what is in the book is ONLY WHAT CAN BE KNOWN is the most boring decision one can make. Rules are not the setting!
Agreed; I wasn't endorsing the situation, or seriously suggesting that Paizo does, but I find it very heard to imagine a preindustrial setting that doesn't rely on child labor.Or an early industrial one for that matter. It's still around today in many developing countries for a reason. (And we SHOULD NOT try to force developing countries to ban it. The US did that in Bangladesh by strong-arming their government. The biggest result? A large increase in child prostitution there. Child labor isn't a good thing - but it's often better than the alternatives.)
so basically you're blaming poor law enforcement and a horrible moral code on anti-child labor? Because I doubt child prost is legal, either.
It had the desired effect of raising wages for bangladesh's workers, because it shrank the labor pool. People actually are slightly better off.
==Aelryinth
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Your point with NPC's is 'GM approval'. My point with NPC's is, how would you and I react? Because 'we' are the NPC's. How would normal people react? We look at history. History indicates that we could have a magical eruption just like we had a tech one, and the nature of the magical universe makes this more likely, not less. And the Rules permit it, and by their structure, make it fairly easy to happen.There are infinite ways that people and the world might react. Make it compelling, story-wise, first, then retroactively explain how it happened. We are telling stories in RPGs.
Referencing the rules as though it definitively leads to certain conclusions realky restricts the possible stories a DM could come up with. As a professional writer, story editor and filmmaker, and 30-year DM, I really don't agree with that way of looking at things. In my experience, thinking big and wild first is better. Then look to the rules to validate your world. Adjust the rules (Rule 0) if something doesn't fit the logic of your world.
Similarly, I don't think it's fair for others to get too worried about the improper cost of iron per tonne in the game. That's not the focus of the RPG, and certainly not where I want to see Paizo spending their man-hours. If your campaign turns into mining enterprise, it takes all of 3 seconds to adjust the price of an ore.
The rigidity that I see people adhering to the rules on these forums is unlike I've seen in any other RPG. I guess because there are so many rules, that people assume they should define everything. In my experience, that rigidity to rules leads to less enjoyable RP experiences. I realize everyone has their preferred ways of Roleplaying, but I think it's important (especially for newbies) not to assume that roleplaying means following the rulebook to a tee.
What you're seeing is the cognitive dissonance that you get when you bolt role-playing rules onto a game that's still basically a wargame. You have to remember that while Pathfinder itself is relatively new, it's cultural roots date back to the first attempt at making wargames into roleplaying games which means that much of a wargaming focus still haunts these halls, and the only way to move away from that focus would be to abandon it altogether as many did when they ditched D+D for games like Storyteller or Cubicle 7, which are comparatively rules light.
The most important advice I give to newbies is to just play. There are no real consequences, nothing precious to break by "doing it wrong". And to stay the hell away from message boards during the first year. Or at least take every post with a huge helping of salt.
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What you're seeing is the cognitive dissonance that you get when you bolt role-playing rules onto a game that's still basically a wargame. You have to remember that while Pathfinder itself is relatively new, it's cultural roots date back to the first attempt at making wargames into roleplaying games which means that much of a wargaming focus still haunts these halls, and the only way to move away from that focus would be to abandon it altogether as many did when they ditched D+D for games like Storyteller or Cubicle 7, which are comparatively rules light.
I agree that the roots of Pathfinder come from other wargame-derived systems, and I've played most of its ancestors.
I disagree with the notion that groups need to abandon the rules system to get away from rules-focussed role-play. I never have problems with my players focussing on minutae because I don't run my games that way. (Maybe I did when I played Basic D&D and 1st Edition, many years ago.)
I think your suggestions below are good ones:
The most important advice I give to newbies is to just play. There are no real consequences, nothing precious to break by "doing it wrong". And to stay the hell away from message boards during the first year. Or at least take every post with a huge helping of salt.
My original post (that you responded to) was considering a newbie audience. I don't like thinking about a new role-player (especially an aspiring DM) coming on here and reading a thread like this and hearing that Rule 0 leads to "House Rules" as though it is a bad thing. I want to speak up to those fresh RPplayers that did come here, and say this:
Part of DMing is knowing the published rules of the game. That part is easy - all you have to do is read and interpret. The never-ending challenge and art of the game is Rule 0 - how do you change the rules to make your stories work? What stories do you write? A lot of the message boards are focussed on the first part of DM-ing (the written rules) but there is a lot to talk about in terms of Rule 0. That's where a big part of the game lies. I think newbie DM's and players can use as much (or more) advice there as with the rules themselves.
Thanks for the insightful response!
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The adherence to rules are a basis for talking about, nothing more.
YOur setting is always going to deviate, and it should. I am not saying it should not. You can Rule 0 everything!
But then, we wouldn't be talking about the rules, we'd be talking about your home campaign, and our standard goes out the window.
So, if we are talking about the rules, we have to stick to the rules.
If we are talking about people (on the macro level), our best guide is history (and isn't it what most of the game is based on, anyways?). Again, gives a common basis.
==Aelryinth
The original post asked for possible ways that a fantasy setting might not have a technological explosion.
It seems to me that the entirety of the thread is about postulating various settings.
It seems counterproductive, contradictory, and confusing to state (as you did) that we should not be talking about Rule 0 and 'House Rules' here.
If we are talking about your setting...then you make the rules, there's no basis.
We can talk about our settings (which many people are doing), then ground them in the rules, and decide which rules should be adjusted for that setting. As we've already determined, the rules themselves aren't going to lay a consistent groundwork for a world. There are inconsistencies in the PF rules, and there will be in any RP system that is this expansive.* You have to make the world, then get into details.
Many people have suggested specific worlds they have created, then said how that affected their use of Continual Light spells, for example. The PC's shouldn't care too much about the economy of wizards creating Continual Light. If they are starting to care too much about that sort of thing, then you either need to assess whether you're holding PC's attention in the story, or start developing more interesting plot around the Lighting Guild in the city or whatever.
Starting out by working out the number of Create Water spells you need to irrigate an acre of onions is an interesting thought experiment, and might lead to some world-building ideas. But I don't think thats the most interesting place to start when developing a story. (Although it might be interesting to have cantrip-trained Create Water savants in a desert region...)
*I'd argue that contradictions in the rules (say, between the price of iron) are actually good things because they force you to house-rule. If everything had perfect internal logic, it would be too easy to take the rules as the absolute answer. The original D&D versions were so full of holes and inconsistencies that it was impossible to play without house-ruling. DM Fiat was inherent in the gameplay because it was obvious that playing meant filling in the holes. Maybe that's what I see here on the PF boards, is a new generation of role-players who weren't exposed to that openness (which is resurgent in D&D5e), and want the rules to say everything. I don't think that's possible, or fun, and to me, it's not really what roleplaying is about.
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I disagree with the notion that groups need to abandon the rules system to get away from rules-focussed role-play. I never have problems with my players focussing on minutae because I don't run my games that way. (Maybe I did when I played Basic D&D and 1st Edition, many years ago.)
I never said that people HAD to break away from D20 to experience good roleplay. But I do think it can help. Also keep in mind that when you had that great exodus, AD+D was still stuck in the very rigid character styles of First Edition which made it very hard not to make cookie-cutter characters. Even though the game is far more flexible now, I think everyone would be better served if they took on a sufficiently different system for awhile.
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I think it (the expectation that the rules say everything) may have to do with the speed of communication; older players such as myself got comfortable with house ruling and DM judgement calls because you had to be in order to play during the snail mail ages. Otherwise you'd be left waiting for months to find out if they even selected your letter for the Sage Advice column in Dragon.
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I never said that people HAD to break away from D20 to experience good roleplay. But I do think it can help. Also keep in mind that when you had that great exodus, AD+D was still stuck in the very rigid character styles of First Edition which made it very hard not to make cookie-cutter characters. Even though the game is far more flexible now, I think everyone would be better served if they took on a sufficiently different system for awhile.
Yeah, especially for DM's, I think it can be really helpful to check out other rule systems.
Another thing I now recommend to players and DM's is watching / listening to certain Actual Play podcasts / Youtube channels. Critical Role on Youtube is great. Close the Airlock and Downfall DnD (podcasts) are also pretty good. Like any creative endeavour, I think DM's can really benefit from learning other styles and techniques.
Getting totally off-topic. Sorry.
...
On-topic, it might be apt to also state that 'technology' can also include magic. For instance, developing a quick way to teach Create Water to the unlearned could be considered a technology.
On a desert planet, the 'technology' of that teaching knowledge could be prized and fought over as much as solar panels.
To respond to the inevitable rule response: One could argue whether it is possible to teach Create Water quickly, but:
(1) Whether it is possible to do it or not is as simple as a DM snapping their finger. Might this 'technology' be a cool macguffin for your campaign? Then make it so.
(2) In keeping with the OP, it might be just as interesting to wonder at the plot possibilities in this sort of situation, rather than to say "That can't be done in under 2D6 years".
In other words: if someone developed a way to teach a spell quickly, how might the world respond?
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Did that someone attend the arcane college in Not-Venice, or do they belong to one of the established mages' guilds? 'Cause that's fine, but vulgar magic performed by the uninitiated is, y'know, vulgar. Just, ew.
Agreed; I wasn't endorsing the situation, or seriously suggesting that Paizo does, but I find it very hard to imagine a preindustrial setting that doesn't rely on child labor.
In much of the real world, 9-14 year old children work the farm, and fight and die in wars.
Actually, their approach was a bit different: You were considered an adult a lot earlier. Generally around 12, if I remember correctly.
The "16 to be an adult" thing is comparatively recent, and a result of having the comparative luxury we possess to decide such, rather than have grim reality force the decision upon us.
I don't know what to tell you; that's a setting specific question. In my own setting, the only government that's magocratic enough to achieve that level of magitek is a made up of an elven ruling class and an orcish working class; humans only colonized the world within the last few centuries.
Considering that what I mentioned doesn't need to magocratic at all, this is a strange statement. It just requires a one or two mages with craft wondrous item for a society to improve, and the game assumes that casters exist in each settlement in the rules for the purposes of spell services and purchasing magic items. So either, your playing at a level of Low-Magic contrary to the base assumptions of the game when it comes to things like availability of magic items or you have well over the amount of magic in your settlements to provide an improvement to peoples lives.
Speaking specifically on the subject of streetlights, the elven rulers are magically proficient enough to cast light spells when they can't see with their low light vision, and their orc servants just have darkvision; they're both of the opinion that needing lighting to see is just weird and icky, and much lower class than just walking around in the dark like an honest, true-hearted orc would. This prejudice has only increased since I switched to 5E, where elves have darkvision.
Of course, that's completely irrelevant to anything but the setting I've dreamed up. If anyone wants to invent a setting that has lamps on every road just like World of Warcraft, or a steampunk setting that has gone through an industrial revolution, I say go for it, but once you do that, you're the one who runs the setting, not one of the ones who runs around and has fun in it.
Streetlights is definitely the easiest one to explain away since nearly all the races have some form of super-sight beyond that of a human.
Edit: I guess that's my long-winded way of saying I find it much more gratifying to have the rules serve the setting than having the setting serve the rules, but if anyone wants to play that it only takes 3 days for an NPC to learn anything and everything because that's what the retraining rules for NPC classes say, then be my guest.
I wasn't talking about retraining at all....? My issue is more than you are more ignoring the realities of the situation to help have your setting follow themes that you desire, which is not a bad thing, having settings follow non-conflicting themes is immensely important when it comes to setting crafting and the idea of magic items improving peoples lives is not one that fits in all (or even necessarily most) settings. But regardless, if you have mages in cities doing things like crafting items and providing spell services (which the game assumes you are, and is the default of the game), then those mages are pretty jerky and idiotic if none of them ever think "Hmm... I could easily make one of the cheapest magic items and improve peoples lives greatly without having to make a magical weapon or armour or rocket propelled glove or instant stronghold just add command word"
Agreed; I wasn't endorsing the situation, or seriously suggesting that Paizo does, but I find it very hard to imagine a preindustrial setting that doesn't rely on child labor.
In much of the real world, 9-14 year old children work the farm, and fight and die in wars.Actually, their approach was a bit different: You were considered an adult a lot earlier. Generally around 12, if I remember correctly.
The "16 to be an adult" thing is comparatively recent, and a result of having the comparative luxury we possess to decide such, rather than have grim reality force the decision upon us.
Age has nothing to do with it.
Child labor is ALWAYS underpaid. that's why it's differentiated from Adult labor. A child doing half the work of an adult will get paid a quarter what the adult will.
Child labor is good on the micro standpoint - one more person earning money for one family. It's horrid on the macro level - it drives down wages by hugely inflating the labor pool for unskilled labor. If I'm the only one sending my kid off to work, no problem. If everyone does it, everyone suffers.
And yes, you DO have to find out other stuff for those kids to do, and school is by far the best.
==Aelryinth
Which "cheapest magic items" are you thinking of?
Per the magic item guidelines, the command word Continual Flame item runs you 15,800 gp. (2(spell level)x 3(caster level)x1800(command word)+50*100(material cost). Twice that if it's slotless (and slotting it is a cheap trick, since it's not a combat item and slots are irrelevant). You could bring that down by giving it charges per day, I suppose, but since the point is mass production, that quickly diminishes the use.
Unless there's some specific item that you're basing this on.Even a item of create water should be, per the magic item design rules, based on the decanter rather than just built off the calculated costs. With a discount, I'd say, since you wouldn't get the geyser effect. But the decanter's 9000 gp. Even a discounted version isn't going to be cheap.
Except I'm not talking about mass production (though mass produced prestidigitation items would be very useful). Also, thinking of slots is easy for something like continual flame, hands. As for create water, have you seen how much water comes out of a decanter + the fact it's variable + it's caster level + the spell it uses + the water is permanent with the decanter over create water + the fact it uses a command word to provide unlimited amount of water rather than command word Per use?