It is less like "pick one guy only" and more like ... every nation has handful of gods that fit their culture and they venerate them.
And there might be that one which has the most presence by being closest to the culture's ideals.
It is almost ... market-like. There is certain pragmatism to it, where you know which god gives you the blessing that fit this situation and you go ask for it.
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Polytheism is fine on Golarion, it might not be widespread but it is there. Think of people who worship pantheons, like some Dwarves or Elves. Or those Order of the Godclaw Hellknights who venerate several Lawful deities.
I love the setting linked with rules as it happens. File the serial numbers off if you wish
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This doesn't encourage roleplay. This doesn't encourage people to make interesting characters. This is the system trying to micromanage its players and that is not the system's job.
Well, yeah it kind of does, in that it defines what exists in a setting. And no, it isn't the system's job, but it's the setting's job and if you followed recent discussions of this topic you might be aware that I'm a not a big believer in separating those two from another. So to say the setting is not allowed to influence rules is a train of thought I wouldn't subscribe too.
Also, as has been said numerous times, those rules we're talking here about are, in fact, setting rules, so the system as such has nothing to do with it.
If we're playing a different setting than Galorion, what all such strange prerequisites can we throw out?
What else would you do with them? In my own world, there is no Shelyn, so a requirement that binds a feat to her followers obviously makes no sense for my world. Now I can decide to bind it to another organization, order or deity, but as it is my setting, I can also decide to just throw it out of the window.
And I do such things all the time: stealing things I like from different sources and integrate them into my own setting, one way or another. And yeah, should I decide that there is a region where fighters adopt the fighting style of Valeros, and everywhere else, they fight with 2h-weapons or with weapons and shields: then yeah, if you want to play a fighter with a TWF fighting style, you probably have to play a character from said region.
Paizo's been doing this crap since the game came out [and before it, if my memory of Dragon Magazine content is correct.
It completely violates my perspective on how the game should be, a creative environment for players to realize their concepts according to their own vision.
See and to me, that they did it already in Dragon Magazine was a very big reason I liked them so much that I followed them with basically blind trust into the Pathfinder adventure.
So what you call crap is something very valuable to me.
Maybe it comes down to this: Paizo puts out all those great generic rulesbooks, but it also wants to support those people who like a bit more of connection between the rules and the setting, so they do support this via their various setting outlets (mainly throught the Companion line). But they are also a business and from a business standpoint, it wouldn't make much sense to publish every rule twice, so they kinda expect (and as we know from them saying, are very fine with it), that people make the stuff their own, including deciding if they want to put restrictions into the game or not, and also including them adding/removing restrictions they want to have or not like.
Basically they expect their customers to be mature enough to decide for themselves how to go about those different approaches they have in their different product lines.
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This would work if the things being locked off weren't so powerful.Well, maybe that's intentional to encourage roleplaying. Like with the traits (at least at the beginning). Those weren't introduced to give the PCs even more power, they were introduced to give you an incentive to think about your character background.
Maybe it's just me, but if true I find that philosophy insultingly patronizing. This is a roleplaying game. Creating options to force people to roleplay if they want certain benefits is basically an insult that assumes that people can't be trusted to create interesting characters with real depth unless you don't give them a choice. It's silly regardless; if someone's set on powergaming using a particular ability, they're just going write the name of the deity who gives them the option they want on their character sheet and then carry on as normal. It's not like the deity you worship even matters that much unless you're a cleric, and even then saying "you must worship X" isn't particularly restrictive.
Add to that that the Player companions are very much setting specific and it suddenly make sense to bind flavor to those rules because it's exactly what makes them different than just being another book full of generic rules.
Much better argument here. The main hardcover line is where all the "core" rules are to be found. Most of the companion books are specifically tied to Golarion, and that's where all of the "you must worship deity X" feats come from. In Golarion, you have to be associated with that deity to reap this benefit. Maybe the ability to do that is something that only that god can enable. If you're not playing in Golarion, then deity requirements don't matter anyways.
It's easy enough to ignore for those players who don't like it, but it's important for those players like me who want to have the setting have an actual expression in the rules material.
Totally fair statement, particularly in the context of the feats being setting specific.
The issue from the latter approach is that if your idea for a person who uses a specific fighting style starts requiring you to be from certain places, be a certain race, and worship a certain god it sort of seems like the game is making your character for you and not letting you do what you want.Well, to be perfectly honest, when playing in a setting, it's only natural that the setting defines such things. And I'm actually fine by it restricting players' choices insofar as I want the players to play characters that actually fit the setting. And if you feel that this doesn't let you do what you want, then that's a very good sign that you don't want to do that.
There's also the possibility that there are some mechanical reasons to hide these feats behind fluff restrictions. A lot of the deity locked feats are extremely powerful, so maybe the designers don't want you to be able to combine a Gorum feat with a Shelyn feat because the resulting combination stretches the math too far in a particular manner. By deity-locking the feats, you don't need to introduce a new feat descriptor or add in a paragraph of additional text to separate these abilities and make them incompatible, you just need one little "must worship X" line; then you can create feats that are maybe more powerful than the norm without them allowing a character to stack up too many potent abilities into unintended combos.
@PK, it's a feat, not a Prestige Class :3
And to my knowledge, no.
"It's more like, you need to be able to do ~ 10+ damage consistently around level 4 or so (which is when DR 10 creatures start showing up)."?!?!
Do you play published adventures or home games, cause I don't tend to see those till later.
Regarding your group, I would seriously suggest you talk with them about this or even find another group if their first response towards someone with an alternate or "subpar" build is outright mockery and jokes at their expense. That doesn't sound like a pleasant group, not does it sound like it's good for your mental health.
Sorry, I meant for boss creatures, so creatures that could be as high as CR 7. They're really rare at level 4, but I have seen it before, and I do like to be prepared. More often it happens at level 5 and 6, which still can result in low damage if I'm not careful (especially in low wealth games, like the one I'm currently playing in). As a note, I tend to run published adventures and play in home games.
I'll admit, I don't play with the group that did this the most anymore, partially for that reason. Another group, it happened once without me noticing until it was too late, I intend to step in if it happens again. Minor giggling about missed attacks is inevitable, but I really need to remind people that they are fighting creatures that most normal people couldn't handle, so a missed attack (or low damage) is not a statement of incompetence, it's a statement of the enemy's competence.
Thanks for setting me straight on the feat thing, all I knew is that there was a way to get DEX to Damage on Glaives and you needed to be a Shelyn worshipper, and it came from a book full of divine prestige classes. That does make it trickier to make the idea of a dex based glaive user work without that feat, though.
I'd like to note that the longer this discussion goes on, the less I'm arguing in theory based on my feelings from the old days when divine scimitars were the main way to get DEX to Damage, and the more I actually want to play a DEX based Glaive user. That's just such a super neat concept! And if I have to worship Shelyn to do so, well, I guess I'll have to go to the golarion wiki and look up what she actually does, lol.
(Sorry for the delayed response, but since you were nice enough to respond to me again I didn't want to just leave the discussion hanging!)
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FWIW, now I'm totally planning an NPC antagonist now who uses scrying to spy so as to steal the various secret combat techniques of the world so that he or she can combine them into the ultimate fighting style.
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How would people feel about being able to pick between a fluff cost or a mechanical cost?
Something like, you either need to have, say, skill focus (something), or worship X god.
While I'm sure you'd have people grumbling about feat taxes, for me that would create proper incentive to create a character that followed the god, but if you wanted to tell an alternative story you'd have the mechanical justification to do so... you'd just need to suffer a feat tax.
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A feat prereq in place of worshiping a god is too extreme. A payment of gold makes sense, with a value attached to the feat for sake of monitoring WBL.
Deific Indulgence - Religion Trait (Mammon)
No faith is beyond Mammon's reach. In the end, their principles and their teachings will always bend to the allure of glittering gold. You may conduct a ritual costing 1,000 gp to attune yourself to any one deity. Thereafter, you count as a worshiper of that deity for the purpose of prerequisites. You may conduct this ritual as many times as you like, choosing a different deity each time.
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Thanks for setting me straight on the feat thing, all I knew is that there was a way to get DEX to Damage on Glaives and you needed to be a Shelyn worshipper, and it came from a book full of divine prestige classes. That does make it trickier to make the idea of a dex based glaive user work without that feat, though.
I'd like to note that the longer this discussion goes on, the less I'm arguing in theory based on my feelings from the old days when divine scimitars were the main way to get DEX to Damage, and the more I actually want to play a DEX based Glaive user. That's just such a super neat concept! And if I have to worship Shelyn to do so, well, I guess I'll have to go to the golarion wiki and look up what she actually does, lol.
It's a seriously cool feat. I was ecstatic when it came out, as it was perfect for my immensely flamboyant Swashadin in service to Shelyn.
My fear with feats like this is that their power level is so high that other kinds of Swashbucklers stop showing up. The scimitar conundrum with Magi is painful, and I don't want to see more of that.
I feel like Paizo tries to push some of the crazier options like Bladed Brush and Desna's Shooting Stars using setting dependency as a (really flavourful and inspiring) drawback, but naturally such options are going to draw everyone's eye.
For me, the Shelyn requirement works. I'd like to tack on a Strength requirement if it were made available to non-followers (one that Shelyn's followers could ignore), but I think a 15 Str requirement would upset people just as much.
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A feat prereq in place of worshiping a god is too extreme. A payment of gold makes sense, with a value attached to the feat for sake of monitoring WBL.Deific Indulgence - Religion Trait (Mammon)
No faith is beyond Mammon's reach. In the end, their principles and their teachings will always bend to the allure of glittering gold. You may conduct a ritual costing 1,000 gp to attune yourself to any one deity. Thereafter, you count as a worshiper of that deity for the purpose of prerequisites. You may conduct this ritual as many times as you like, choosing a different deity each time.
So now you're gating freedom from religious restrictions behind a religious restriction? That's totally unfair!
:) :) :) :) :)
By which I mean, unfairly awesome, of course. You could also make a Rahadoum-based faith trait, returning the secrets of the gods back to the secular world, and requiring you to worship no one.
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I could totally dig a Strength 10 requirement
Ability score requirements for feats should basically always be odd numbers.
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Maybe it's just me, but if true I find that philosophy insultingly patronizing. This is a roleplaying game. Creating options to force people to roleplay
Except that "giving an incentive to roleplay" is a very different thing than "to force you to roleplay". And there are a lot of reasons why someone can benefit from those incentives (the basic reason being that we aren't born as awesome roleplayers so we might need any help we get to get there).
No one forces you to do anything with the traits. You can chose them for the benefit you take from them and simply ignore the rest. But they might give you an idea for the development of your character and they also might put a flag for the GM to use during gameplay. I know for a fact that some of my characters had story and character benefit for the existence of those traits, and I consider myself very able to create my own characters without outside help. So no I don't feel insulted at all but appreciate the help.
Same with this feat: I guess that there are quite some Shelynites out there who don't fight with her sacred weapon for whatever reason. This feat gives you an incentive to think about doing this, and if you do it, it gives you a certain benefit and even adds a little bit of story to it. But the existence of this feat doesn't force you to do anything.
So I don't see anything patronizing about it. I get that people might not like those restrictions, and as a GM, I tend to be more about empowering players than about restricting them, so I generally insert a "usually" into all those restrictions anyway. But I don't think that the product suffers for the existence of those restrictions but that it would suffer if there were none. And as far as jerk GMs (or players) are concerned, my personal rule zero is: Don't play with idiots.
Meaning that if a player joins my game and (preferably nicely) asks if his character can use this feat without being bound to the Shelyn background, we'll certainly find a solution. Which will most probably be a very personalized solution, making the player's character even more unique than he would be if everyone else had restrictionless access to this feat
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A trait is its own cost. I might be cool with a trait opening access to all faith-restricted feats at no further cost.A feat prereq in place of worshiping a god is too extreme. A payment of gold makes sense, with a value attached to the feat for sake of monitoring WBL.Deific Indulgence - Religion Trait (Mammon)
No faith is beyond Mammon's reach. In the end, their principles and their teachings will always bend to the allure of glittering gold. You may conduct a ritual costing 1,000 gp to attune yourself to any one deity. Thereafter, you count as a worshiper of that deity for the purpose of prerequisites. You may conduct this ritual as many times as you like, choosing a different deity each time.
Isa and I were actually both writing things along the same lines here:
Diverse Theist - Religion Trait
You gain a +1 trait bonus on Knowledge (religion) checks, and that skill is a class skill for you. You can also select a single deity, being treated as a worshiper of that deity for the purpose of prerequisites and effects.
Respectfully disagree.I could totally dig a Strength 10 requirementAbility score requirements for feats should basically always be odd numbers.
You can, but that's the standard for design; it's supposed to make odd numbers have greater value. I can't think of a 1p feat which has an odd ability score prereq.
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I am kind of amused that for all these years there was no way to do this thing at all. Scimitars were pretty much the only way to do Dex to damage at all, or an Agile weapon.
Now we've got a bunch of different ways to do it and finally this book comes out and suddenly Dex to damage glaives is this thing that everyone's always wanted to do but didn't realize it and now it's this huge deal that it's restricted to one religion.
It's more that it brings the premise of why the option wasn't available for so long into question. "Using Dexterity with glaives is too powerful" is a reasonable design statement. Maybe some people disagree with it, but it's fair. "Using Dexterity with glaives is too powerful unless you worship Shelyn" is something completely different though. There's very little (possibly no) mechanical impact of worshipping Shelyn for many characters, which means that the feat is either-
a) mechanically unbalanced and hiding it behind the thin veneer of being deity locked
or
b) acceptably balanced but deity-locked for no real mechanical reason at all
It's not weird that this would become a source of contention for someone who might really like a feat like that but doesn't want to be thematically hobbled by being restricted to a particular deity. You've basically got a situation where the fluff and mechanics of the game appear to be mutually restrictive for little to no reason at all. As I mentioned earlier, the fluff could be hiding some mechanical relevance, like the feats being somewhat more powerful than the norm and thus intended to be mutually exclusive with each other, but someone not trying to combine the feats isn't going to see that, and the fact that not all of the deity-locked feats would be stackable even if they weren't locked, combined with the fact that the deity-locked feats vary pretty widely in how powerful they actually are, makes that reasoning both questionable and hard to realize in the first place.
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So you have to be a worshipper of Mammon?
I was kind of waiting to see if someone would pick up on that. ^_^
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How would people feel about being able to pick between a fluff cost or a mechanical cost?
Not sure. A mechanical cost seems only to make sense if the rules option would be overpowered otherweise. But as a way to balance things, it seems more as a band aid than a real solution.
And if the rules option in question is already balanced, it would weaken the character compared to any other character that doesn't relay on restricted rules options. And suddenly instead of the incentive I talked above, you actually have a punishment for those players chosing this option without paying the fluff cost.
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This is supposed to be worth half a good feat?
Yes, which is why I wrote it. You disagree, which is fine with me.
It is the standard. A poor standard that seeks to artificially inject value into filler ability score levels.
Probably, it doesn't really bother me, but it's design standard. At least it has a mechanical purpose, which I appreciate.
Yeah, my original idea (feats) was too restrictive and punishing to people who aren't, well, humans. I'm glad it inspired some really good ideas, though.
I'm going to say 13 STR would be my sweet spot for a STR requirement. Requires you to spend some points on what could otherwise be a dump stat, but isn't a significant hassle to work into most point buy builds. But that's just me.
I'd totally take that trait (not the Mammon one : P). Heck, I'd take that without the Knowledge (Religion) bonuses. Don't mind burning a trait slot to ensure my cool idea can happen the way I want to make it work.
So now you're gating freedom from religious restrictions behind a religious restriction? That's totally unfair!
All power has a price. I'm surprised you aren't more impressed by my master's generosity. Shelyn? Desna? Sarenrae? All prostitutes to the Argent Prince.
Principles and convictions are meaningless... all that matters is getting what you want, and whether you can afford it.
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Yeah, my original idea (feats) was too restrictive and punishing to people who aren't, well, humans. I'm glad it inspired some really good ideas, though.
I'm going to say 13 STR would be my sweet spot for a STR requirement. Requires you to spend some points on what could otherwise be a dump stat, but isn't a significant hassle to work into most point buy builds. But that's just me.
I'd totally take that trait (not the Mammon one : P). Heck, I'd take that without the Knowledge (Religion) bonuses. Don't mind burning a trait slot to ensure my cool idea can happen the way I want to make it work.
My trait is based off of a combination of Isa's and the Zealot trait, since Zealot gives the same mechanical bonuses with an RP benefit along with it, which is the same thing that Diverse Theist gives. To me, the balancing point is the same for both of them, although Isa's trait gives freedom to take a TON of different religions and combine them which would honestly make a cool character design.
"So Mike, he starts by charging with a greatsword, drops it, then chops you with the starknife because of how pretty he is, lets it go, and then smashes you with a beer mug in the same round. That dude is DIVINE!"
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Yeah, my original idea (feats) was too restrictive and punishing to people who aren't, well, humans. I'm glad it inspired some really good ideas, though.
I'm going to say 13 STR would be my sweet spot for a STR requirement. Requires you to spend some points on what could otherwise be a dump stat, but isn't a significant hassle to work into most point buy builds. But that's just me.
I'd totally take that trait (not the Mammon one : P). Heck, I'd take that without the Knowledge (Religion) bonuses. Don't mind burning a trait slot to ensure my cool idea can happen the way I want to make it work.
My trait is based off of a combination of Isa's and the Zealot trait, since Zealot gives the same mechanical bonuses with an RP benefit along with it, which is the same thing that Diverse Theist gives. To me, the balancing point is the same for both of them, although Isa's trait gives freedom to take a TON of different religions and combine them which would honestly make a cool character design.
"So Mike, he starts by charging with a greatsword, drops it, then chops you with the starknife because of how pretty he is, lets it go, and then smashes you with a beer mug in the same round. That dude is DIVINE!"
"It all started in his childhood, when he ran away from 500 bullies every day..."
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I'm perfectly okay with deity specific options.
There are actually quite a few things restricted in that way. But you only hear complaining about it when it's a particularly strong option and people don't want to have to take that helping of flavor it comes it with.
I'm unsympathetic to this problem.
Hm, in a vacuum I'm sympathetic to the idea of attaching arbitrary flavor requirements to certain options. Different cultures, institutions, and even mentors have different ways of doing things, and granting different little options to different groups can be a nice touch. Making them hard-coded restrictions is a bit game-y...but hey, it is a game right? So in a vacuum I don't see anything outright offensive about a few arbitrary requirement in the name of setting fluff.
But in practice, you always end up with a wide quality range -- up to and including these sort of OP/tax options. Which, as mentioned upthread, are better off either non-existent or baked right into the game. (See Weapon Finesse becoming a weapon property in 4e and 5e.) And it's these OP/tax options that create problems, especially when you start attaching arbitrary restrictions to them. As a DM, I don't like the resulting tension between character building for personalization/story/setting vs. building for survival/power. As a player, I certainly don't seek out games where this sort of thing comes up often, as I don't like making pre-chargen requests or negotiations with the GM just to play a fun character.
I understand that some players are able to build for p/s/s without feeling this tension, but I've experienced this tension myself, and I've known too many gamers who do as well. So I'm not willing to dismiss the issue as 'a difference in playstyle,' or any such -- getting a steady group together is hard enough without yet another tension caused by the ruleset.
So long story short, in theory I have sympathy for certain arbitrary restrictions. But in practice I have sympathy for those who object to them.
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Maybe it's just me, but if true I find that philosophy insultingly patronizing. This is a roleplaying game. Creating options to force people to roleplayExcept that "giving an incentive to roleplay" is a very different thing than "to force you to roleplay". And there are a lot of reasons why someone can benefit from those incentives (the basic reason being that we aren't born as awesome roleplayers so we might need any help we get to get there).
Except that's absolutely not what a restriction like this does. If I want to write "Shelyn" in the deity section of my character sheet so I can use Dex with a glaive, I can. I don't have to say one word about Shelyn the entire game. These feats do not give incentive to roleplay. A feat that gives incentive to roleplay would be something more like:
Prerequisite: Must worship Shelyn
Benefit: Whenever you donate a piece of art worth at least 1,000 gp to a church of Shelyn, you gain a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls made with a glaive for 1 week. This bonus increases to +2 if you created the piece of art yourself.
That would be a feat that gives an incentive to roleplay, because the mechanical benefit is specifically contingent on your character taking actions in world, not the player scribbling a deity name on their character sheet. See the difference?
No one forces you to do anything with the traits. You can chose them for the benefit you take from them and simply ignore the rest. But they might give you an idea for the development of your character and they also might put a flag for the GM to use during gameplay. I know for a fact that some of my characters had story and character benefit for the existence of those traits, and I consider myself very able to create my own characters without outside help.
I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here, since no trait I'm aware of gates an entire character concept behind an arbitrary restriction.
So no I don't feel insulted at all but appreciate the help.
That's nice, but they could have "helped" by simply including a tag that notes that certain feats are common to worshippers of certain faiths rather than gating them behind hard restrictions. To many people, the hard restrictions come off as a lack of trust in their player base. "People can't be trusted not to abuse these unless we tie them to deities!" ...Ummm, maybe write feats that aren't so subject to abuse to begin with? Don't introduce options you think are too strong and then create arbitrary restrictions that have no mechanical impact on game balance?
Same with this feat: I guess that there are quite some Shelynites out there who don't fight with her sacred weapon for whatever reason. This feat gives you an incentive to think about doing this, and if you do it, it gives you a certain benefit and even adds a little bit of story to it. But the existence of this feat doesn't force you to do anything.
No one said its existence forced you to do anything. However, if you want to play a Dexterous combatant who fights with a glaive, your only options are to worship Shelyn or be ridiculously MAD. If anything, deity-locked feats like this do the opposite of encouraging roleplaying; they encourage you to pick a deity because it enables a certain fighting style, not because you genuinely want to play a character who follows or supports that particular faith.
So I don't see anything patronizing about it.
I disagree.
I get that people might not like those restrictions, and as a GM, I tend to be more about empowering players than about restricting them, so I generally insert a "usually" into all those restrictions anyway. But I don't think that the product suffers for the existence of those restrictions but that it would suffer if there were none.
Good for you, but I disagree. When you create feats with arbitrary restrictions, you bring your entire design and balance philosophy into question. Is using Dexterity with a glaive too strong, or not? If it is, then you just published an obviously unbalanced feat while using "roleplay" as your pretend balance, which calls into question your skill and common sense as a designer or a design team, bringing the quality and consistency of your entire product line into question. If it isn't too strong, then you've created an arbitrary restriction "because reasons" which has the exact same results.
And as far as jerk GMs (or players) are concerned, my personal rule zero is: Don't play with idiots.
That's a nice rule, but not everyone has the luxury of picking and choosing who they play with. Some people may only have PFS, or there may only be 4 other people nearby who play their game, and they have to take what they can get. The odds of people in that situation having a positive experience are greatly improved if they don't have to rely on GM fiat and hope they get a decent GM to begin with.
Meaning that if a player joins my game and (preferably nicely) asks if his character can use this feat without being bound to the Shelyn background, we'll certainly find a solution. Which...
Yeah, I get what you mean, but the game is quite clearly better overall if you don't have to lean on having the privilege of a choice of GMs or groups to be able to play the character you want to play in the first place. Whether intentional or not, what you're saying amounts to "The rules are fine because I break them all the time anyways and I only play with people who are cool with me breaking them", while I'm saying "The rules would be better if they weren't reliant on people breaking them to begin with".
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Take the Bladed Brush feat from Paths of Righteousness, for example. It requires the character to be a worshipper of Shelyn.
Why?
What is preventing my dextrous assassin from kidnapping a worshipper of Shelyn with this specific kind of training, and then forcing her to teach me the fighting style?
Thematics: Because as a near mystical ability, physical form isn't enough to make it work. Without the mindset, the complete and total joy one takes in the art for art's sake that only a shelynite can have you can't achieve the proper form. You're not in the zone.
Mechanics: It also serves to keep people from combining the best fighting styles because they're the best. Its an additional layer of protection against unforseen combinations.
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I think this is very relevant. The player companion line is (clearly, based on the above) a supplement concerning golarion, rather than an avenue for developing generic rules intended to be used in any setting.
It may have mechanical options alongside it's flavor and they may be usable elsewhere with a little work. Nonetheless, it's an error to evaluate it as if it's an extension of the PFRPG line - it's more an extension of the campaign setting line.
Paizo are producing for many different markets, albeit with a lot of crossover. By necessity, their products will involve compromise when it comes to issues such as this.
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I think this is very relevant. The player companion line is (clearly, based on the above) a supplement concerning golarion, rather than an avenue for developing generic rules intended to be used in any setting.
It may have mechanical options alongside it's flavor and they may be usable elsewhere with a little work. Nonetheless, it's an error to evaluate it as if it's an extension of the PFRPG line - it's more an extension of the campaign setting line.
Paizo are producing for many different markets, albeit with a lot of crossover. By necessity, their products will involve compromise when it comes to issues such as this.
That is actually a clear factor in where much of the root of the problem lies. The core design team very obviously has some different philosophies and standards than the companion line team. Things that would never get printed in a core book frequently get printed in companion books, but there's not really any distinction between the validity or setting appropriateness of the options. In 3.5 (and I want to preface this with the fact that I greatly prefer how Paizo has done things overall compared to WotC) you knew clearly what was a Forgotten Realms specific option compared to a core line option, because all the Forgotten Realms options were in books with "Forgotten Realms" printed in multiple places across the cover. The player companion lines on the other hand don't really specify that they're supposed to be Golarion specific, so the options presented therein are generally treated exactly like any other option Paizo puts out, which is a big part of where these discussions come from. For most players, if Paizo printed it, it's got the exact same stamp of approval for general use regardless of whether it was part of the monthly softcover releases or the larger hardcover books, despite the fact that the differing design strictures have frequently led to situations where feats in player companion books are absolutely and undeniably strictly stronger than most feats and options found in core line products (Thunder and Fang, Dirty Trick Master, Sacred Geometry, Dervish Dance, etc.). There's also the added factor of people using the pfsrd to obtain much of their information, which pre-strips all the setting specific fluff out of the options and makes it more difficult for people to determine the context a feat or option was meant to be presented in, but there's not a lot of getting around that.