Hello,
I'm pretty familiar with the Pathfinder rules but have very little exposure to the actual back story. There seems to be a lot of material out there and I don't know where to start. I've flipped through "The Inner Sea World Guide" and it is just dense. Is there a better way to get into the material other than just plowing through this book? Are the novels a good place to start? If so, I would appreciate recommendations. Are the comics important? Are there regional guide books that would provide an easier introduction to the material? I'm floundering a bit here and would be more than happy for any advice you all might be able to offer.
Context helps. When you play a character, decide where it is from and read up on that area. When you adventure in an area, pay attention to the details and/or read up on it if the GM allows. Obviously, playing with a GM who is familiar with the campaign world and uses details in the game helps too.
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Golarion 101: North of the Inner Sea is Avistan, where many kingdoms are based on European countries. South of the Inner Sea is Garund, where many of the kingdoms are based on Africa. Cheliax used to be a big empire, but it degenerated into a devil-worshiping kingdom, and now there are, once again, many frontiers to push.
What first got me hooked on Golarion was the 2008 Gazetteer. As I read it, I laughed at the familiarity of so much of it, e.g. "What's Irresen? Oh, it's based on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe! Hah!"
Much of it, of course, is loosely based on the real world. Galt is revolutionary France, Taldor is Rome, Osirion is Egypt, Tian Xia is China, Druma is based on the Jews, the Ulfen are the Norse, and the Varisians are gypsies (and Varisia, the frontier land with the diverse population, is a good default home location for a campaign). Katapesh and Qadira are like Arab lands. The Mwangi Expanse is based on African jungles. The Lands of the Linnorm Kings and the Realm of the Mammoth Lords are based on Norse lands. Andoran is the US (although if you want pre-colonial America, that's Arcadia), and Andoran is another good place to start a campaign. And so on.
Much of the setting is clearly written by Greyhawk fans. Lastwall is clearly the result of someone saying "What if Iuz hadn't escaped Castle Greyhawk?" Instead of the Bandit Kingdoms, there are the River Kingdoms. Numeria is for adventures with science fiction elements like Expedition to the Barrier Peaks or Temple of the Frog.
On that note, much of the setting is clearly for a specific purpose. Want to run a pirate campaign? There are the Shackles. A Gothic horror campaign? There's Ustalav. And so on.
And of course, you have your obligatory Elven land (Kyonin) and Dwarven land (the Five Kings Mountains).
I know little about this stuff compared to other fans here - and I'm sure some people will correct me on some points - but that's it in a nutshell.
Golarion Illuminated Episode 1
This is something I saw a few years ago. I thought it was well done, however I haven't watched in a while and can't say how accurate it is from memory but I think it should give anyone a good idea what the general background is.
There are 3 other parts. :)
I've been playing and running Pathfinder for nearly 4 years now, but prefer building my own worlds, so I never had much reason to read up on Golarion until I joined PFS last year.
What first got me hooked on Golarion was the 2008 Gazetteer.
This was the first--and for a long time, only--PF setting book that I purchased. It's an excellent, concise primer for the world, without the sheer density that can make the ISWG a bit of a slog to read. (I own that in PDF but still have yet to read more than bits and pieces of it.) I keep the Gazetteer in my PFS binder so that I can pull out the world map during the opening infodump for that week's module.
Personally, my favorite part of the Gazetteer is the Religion chapter, which gives a few paragraphs of flavor text on each of the primary gods of Golarion. The bare-bones table of deities in the Core Rulebook makes so much more sense after you've read that!
I would also recommend the pathfinder wiki. While it isn't perfect (but really, what wiki is?), it's pretty good, and has more concise info on all the same stuff as the Inner Sea World Guide. I would also recommend taking it in pieces, focusing on those parts that are important to your character first, and going from there.
I don't agree that Taldor is clearly Spain rather than Rome. Heck, you might even be able to argue that Cheliax is Spain (replacing Catholicism with devil worship would be kind of an interesting twist, and I think that they have some colonies in Arcadia)
Anyhow, Cheliax and the sadomasochist place to the north are pretty interesting. Just poking around a bit on one of the various Golarion related wikis should give you some good basic knowledge in a summarized form.
Taldor is RomeSpain, not Rome.
Part Spain, part Eastern Roman Empire/Byzantine Empire.
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Heck, you might even be able to argue that Cheliax is Spain (replacing Catholicism with devil worship would be kind of an interesting twist, and I think that they have some colonies in Arcadia)
Cheliax has clear Italian influences, if we go by the names (plus some Balkans thrown in for good measure), and that does include some classic Roman names. That probably is the influence. Westcrown does remind me of Rome itself to a fair degree.
The devil worship does offer some interesting parallels to Borgia-era Papacy.
Golarion 101: North of the Inner Sea is Avistan, where many kingdoms are based on European countries. South of the Inner Sea is Garund, where many of the kingdoms are based on Africa. Cheliax used to be a big empire, but it degenerated into a devil-worshiping kingdom, and now there are, once again, many frontiers to push.
What first got me hooked on Golarion was the 2008 Gazetteer. As I read it, I laughed at the familiarity of so much of it, e.g. "What's Irresen? Oh, it's based on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe! Hah!"
Much of it, of course, is loosely based on the real world. Galt is revolutionary France, Taldor is Rome, Osirion is Egypt, Tian Xia is China, Druma is based on the Jews, the Ulfen are the Norse, and the Varisians are gypsies (and Varisia, the frontier land with the diverse population, is a good default home location for a campaign). Katapesh and Qadira are like Arab lands. The Mwangi Expanse is based on African jungles. The Lands of the Linnorm Kings and the Realm of the Mammoth Lords are based on Norse lands. Andoran is the US (although if you want pre-colonial America, that's Arcadia), and Andoran is another good place to start a campaign. And so on.
Much of the setting is clearly written by Greyhawk fans. Lastwall is clearly the result of someone saying "What if Iuz hadn't escaped Castle Greyhawk?" Instead of the Bandit Kingdoms, there are the River Kingdoms. Numeria is for adventures with science fiction elements like Expedition to the Barrier Peaks or Temple of the Frog.
On that note, much of the setting is clearly for a specific purpose. Want to run a pirate campaign? There are the Shackles. A Gothic horror campaign? There's Ustalav. And so on.
And of course, you have your obligatory Elven land (Kyonin) and Dwarven land (the Five Kings Mountains).
I know little about this stuff compared to other fans here - and I'm sure some people will correct me on some points - but that's it in a nutshell.
Druma is anti-Semitic. I doubt that the designers and developers intend(ed) it that way but the Drumans are cap-wearing merchants obsessed with wealth and deal-making, and they have a bunch of religious purity laws governing diet and sex. I realize it's not a one-to-one correspondence but it's close enough to be the Space Jews trope.
My vote would be to start with the Inner Sea Primer as well--it's a concise but flavourful overview. Once you know where an adventure is set, you can then do a "deep dive" using a book from the Campaign Setting line that covers that region.
I really like the comics and novels just to get a feel for the flavour of Pathfinder as a whole, and if you happen to find one set in the particular area you're already interested in, then they're even better.