So, by that logic Player's Guides in general are purely meta-gaming. They provide all sorts of information about making an appropriate character. They suggest classes, archetypes, and at times class feature guidance... even Ranger favored enemies. They even typically offer traits to tie the character to the story. Not one bit of that information needs to be applied in a "my character is like this because" scenario. I would bet that a fair amount of people that create AP characters don't offer up background explaining those choices. Are we really going to call this meta-gaming in the negative sense and discourage it?
That's a pretty harsh stance, particularly if you game or ever hope to game with new players.
Some of those concepts/ideas are kinda metagamey (might be proven wrong when the Player Guide comes out).
I thought the Player's Guide was supposed to be a compilation of legitimate metagaming information. To this, add introductory information added by the GM, and sometimes posts by the developers.
I believe the concept of meta gaming is being conflated with the concept of narrative or possibly meta narrative--using knowledge of the story to influence character design so characters make sense (and can contribute) rather than using outside information to influence character decisions (like re-rolling PER checks because you rolled low and your GM didn't do a good job of hiding the 'S' on the wall for secret door).
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Well, it was a good thread while it lasted.
Thanks everyone who posted Charatcer Concepts.
Now, let's argue about who "plays the game right"...
To get it a little bit back on track...
This seems like a good place for figment archetype familiars.
Different strokes for different folks. There's room for everyone at the Paizo gaming table, so can't we all be brothers?
Of course not!
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Don't be such a killjo-- oh, i see.
Viking raider from the Land of the Linnorn Kings: Human Bloodrager Id Rager who worships Bokrug
My mind has been abuzz with possibilities lately. I'm now considering:
1.) A Tome Eater Occultist from Osirion (my original concept.) This character will die or turn into something horrible when he invariably eats the Necronimicon.
2.) A Spellslinger Wizard/Varisian Pilgrim Cleric of Black Butterfly/Mystic Theurge (dependent largely on access to Esoteric and Eclectic Training.)
3.) A Spellslinger Wizard (what can I say, a gunslinging mage just sounds appropriate for the Cthulhu mythos.)
4.) A Chosen One/Hospitaler Paladin/Oracle of Sheylyn with full ranks in Handle Animal and Perform (Sing) for the full "Disney Princess" theme (a pure innocent blessed with holy powers to turn the tide against darkness is another excellent theme for a character.)
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I plan to make a young man who is a psychic. I am going to Earthbound this adventure path!
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It is my profound belief that the crocodile thrower is universally applicable for all campaigns.
I'm wanting to make a Haunted Oracle of the Dark Tapestries character for this one.
I'm wanting to make a Haunted Oracle of the Dark Tapestries character for this one.
I had a similar thought; a dual-cursed Oracle with Dark Tapestry, Shattered Psyche (primary curse) and Tongues (Aklo) (secondary curse.) I asked James Jacobs about it in the Ask James Jacobs thread, and he pretty firmly and clearly steered me away from the idea as inappropriate.
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I've already started working on an Oracle with the blind curse. The idea being that she has read things that man was not meant to know and clawed her own eyes out. She was then incarcerated in the asylum by concerned family and while screaming in the dark something gifted her with the powers she has started developing.
Vendor - Fantasiapelit Tampere
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Other ideas:
Druid who instead of getting her powers from the Green gets them from Barbatos. Bastard daughter of a noble's son, her grandmother the countess hide her from public eye as a maid in the kitchens. After she grew and people started to notice how she resembled the young noble, grandmother commanded her to be taken to the forest and abandoned there. Instead of dying surely in the wilds she met Barbatos who, intrigued by her fate, gave her knowledge of the wilds and powers to control it. Barbatos saw something in her future, something about chaos and madness and that she could stall it. Now a she wanders around in the wilds, waiting for this supposed chaos and madness that so scared Barbatos to raise it's ugly head so she could put it down.
Ex-cultist Slayer with scraps of knowledge about the Old Ones. Once a born initiate to the cult, she left it in her teens after witnessing the high priest of said cult being devoured by...a thing. Now she is bounty hunter and mercenary who specializes in finding lost persons and bringing them back to authorities, be they fugitives or kidnapped children. Specializes in crossbows. Gonna leave the details about the cult in shadows for me as well, so GM can decide about that stuff.
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Vendor - Fantasiapelit Tampere
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Cleric of Asmodeus from Cheliax who suffers basically the same initial fate of the protagonist in Shadows Over Innsmouth. Goes to remote village, village has a secret, he kinda pokes around little too much, raises the ire of the towns dark overlord's and is haunted by them.
I'm thinking either a Kineticist, most likely fire or earth, or a bard or alchemist painter, who paints what he sees in his dreams.
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I've really enjoyed seeing all of the cool character concepts that people have come up with, but I want to say–without spoiling too much of the story—that the reason the PCs have lost their memories and how they ended up in the asylum to begin with is addressed in the Adventure Path. That said, the PCs in this Adventure Path likely had full and exciting lives prior to this event, they just won't remember the full details of those experiences for a few adventures.
I plan on elaborating on this in the Player's Guide so that players come into the story on the best footing, but I'm not ready to reveal too much right now.
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I'm cooking up a Qlippoth Ectoplasmatist. I'm trying to avoid particularly fine details until the Player's Guide is out, but the more work I do on her the more pumped I get about this AP.
I'm thinking True Neutral, with a kind of Boromir angle: One of the good guys, but a bit too eager to try and harness the very dark powers they're fighting against in order to gain an edge. Also, really want to play up the trope of "Looks like she's doing something suspicious/evil/traitorous, but it turns out she is actually helping you", given that she's gonna look a whole lot like some sort of shoggoth herself.
Also, depending on how much work I want to make for myself, she might speak entirely in iambic pentameter... >_>
Recently read a comic called Wierd Detective and now I'm thinking I might yoink their idea for the Main Character
A Psychic Detective who is actually one of the Great Race of Yith inhabiting a human body.
I have a feeling that you're close to the mark on why the PCs have amnesia at the start of the adventure, Greylurker.
Oh....that's a whole different kettel of wax isn't it
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Human Barbarian with a greataxe.
I cannot bring myself to meta-game along with the quirks of a campaign.
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Human Barbarian with a greataxe.
I cannot bring myself to meta-game along with the quirks of a campaign.
Did you play a good character in Hell's Vengeance? A lawful evil in Hell's Rebels? A character with no interest in being a pirate in Skulls and Shackles?
It's not meta gaming to play along with the theme of the campaign.
But to each their own.
Actually, that is meta gaming.
Responding in any way other than "this is what I want to be" is meta gaming.
My point is that simply because this is the "spooky asylum cthulhu horror" game, I see no reason to dive into some of the absurdities seen in this thread.
I'm not saying anyone is having badwrongfun, but some of these are cringeworthy.
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I'm not saying anyone is having badwrongfun, but some of these are cringeworthy.
Really? Because it seems that you are. Even in that very sentence.
You could have said, "I'm going to bring a fairly standard Power Attacking Barbarian and then see where the events take him." Instead I read you misusing the term meta-gaming and telling people they have cringe-worthy character concepts.
Meta-gaming is using OOC knowledge to influence IC decisions.
Meta-gaming: "This will be a Cthulu-esque game, so probably lots of aberrations, and Cthulu hides the obscene within the mundane, so my character casts Detect Aberration on every person he meets."
Not meta-gaming: "This will be a Cthulu-esque game, so this is my opportunity to play a Dark Tapestry Oracle."
You might not enjoy it when your players do that, but it is not meta-gaming.
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Before things get too heated, I'd like to ask folks to be cool to each other.
While putting the finishing touches on the Player's Guide, one of the things that I've put a lot of thought into is the consideration of playing this Adventure Path as a character who has some insight into the Elder Mythos and one who has stumbled into this darker realm of supposed reality with no preparation. While occult themes and dark magic make a ton of sense in regards to themes of this AP, I truly think it would be more fun to play the accidental tourist. And since I've been thinking about it as much as I have, this is something that I'm going to address in the Player's Guide.
Something else that I've been concerned with is giving too much away about how and why the PCs end up like they do. Part of me wants to give the reason so that people can work their characters into it, but the bigger part of me thinks that that spoils the reveal and weakens the campaign. This AP ranks up there with Skull & Shackles (actually surpasses) as far as unconventional beginnings go.
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Something else that I've been concerned with is giving too much away about how and why the PCs end up like they do. Part of me wants to give the reason so that people can work their characters into it, but the bigger part of me thinks that that spoils the reveal and weakens the campaign. This AP ranks up there with Skull & Shackles (actually surpasses) as far as unconventional beginnings go.
For some reason, I have this mental image of you putting together a companion piece for the Player's Guide to help the GM shape character creation without giving too much away.
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A medium who is actually an empty vessel and the spirits he channels are actually six different yithians.
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I like the idea of playing a character who was one thing before the "event" and another afterwards. Barbarian becomes Id Rager. Not-a-Occult Class becomes a Fractured Mind. Investigator becomes a Psychic Detective. Etc.
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Vendor - Fantasiapelit Tampere
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I like the idea of playing a character who was one thing before the "event" and another afterwards. Barbarian becomes Id Rager. Not-a-Occult Class becomes a Fractured Mind. Investigator becomes a Psychic Detective. Etc.
Not a bad idea. Our group did something similiar in Jade Regent. One PC was a cavalier at the start until he found some books and guides of samurais and he became samurai as well.
One thing to consider on the "meta-gaming" aspect.
What if your character ends up one of the people in the Asylum... because of the very fact you were researching these things, gazing into the abyss... and the Abyss gazed back and saw you?
It is not meta-gaming to have someone who isn't Joe Innocent Random Generic Hero. One of those sorts has a slightly LESS chance of stumbling across all this than a character built with the Black Tapestry in mind.
This is not to say Joe Innocent isn't a character concept to consider. Some of the people in Lovecraft's stories who found things had no idea of what they were coming across. But others sought it out or had a heritage in which they too were connected to the Other.
I think I'll be building a nihilistic sylph slayer occultist who simply wants to be left alone.
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I want to, with ONLY the tag line from the 1st book and the released volume names from a while back (I'm avoiding spoilers as much as possible since I get to be a player.) Play a Holy Gun Paladin OR Mysterious Stranger gunslinger based on Roland from the Dark Tower Series. Just saying. "I have forgotten the face of my father, and I do not know how I know that."
A medium who is actually an empty vessel and the spirits he channels are actually six different yithians.
I like it! I was just thinking the other day about a reanimated medium that doesn't remember dying and thusly acquiring the archetype.
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FLUMPH VIGILANTE!! Because we're no longer just WARNING about the Apocalypse...
We're fighting SLIME, in the END TIMES!
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After reading that the amnesia is just five years or so the idea I have forming is for big strapping brawler who before the amnesia was a happy tavern owner with a wife and two kids.
Dealing with the anguish of waking up somewhere and not knowing what happened to his family would make for interesting character moments I think.
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Or, depending on the ages of the kids, he may have no memories at all of his family, which would be good for some angst if he ever meets them. Unfortunately, it is unlikely that a standardized AP would have something like that in it.
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After reading that the amnesia is just five years or so the idea I have forming is for big strapping brawler who before the amnesia was a happy tavern owner with a wife and two kids.
Dealing with the anguish of waking up somewhere and not knowing what happened to his family would make for interesting character moments I think.
How would you justify not immediately trying to get home rather than following the rest of the AP? Why did a happy tavern owner with a family take a typical adventuring job in the first place?