Currently, we know that ghouls, vampires and absolutely not skeletons are going to be available as PC options, I'm personally hoping for wights, mummies, revenants, liches and graveknights, what are you hoping to see appear as a PC option once the book comes out?
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Revenants are a big one. Mortics are also a semi-obvious pick, they're pretty funky.
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Ghosts, as Ghostwalk was one of my favorite campaign settings D&D ever did and would love to remake it in PF. Mummies a solid second choice just cause I really like their design
Ghosts, as Ghostwalk was one of my favorite campaign settings D&D ever did and would love to remake it in PF. Mummies a solid second choice just cause I really like their design
Hard to do ghosts as a PC ancestry if only because their standard incorporeal nature takes away so much that a standard PC starts with. The impact of your ancestry is supposed to be meaningful, but not anything like that severe.
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The already not-confirmed skeletons are actually the big one in terms of ancestries.
But I'd love to see Lich stuff, as a ritual it would be neat, but personally, I would love to see it be an archetype so that we can pick up lich oriented archetype feats.
I'd handle it by dropping the ritual into the dedication feat, and having it function like the Scion Transformation Lizardfolk feat where its a one way transformation into a Lich, and then have the feats after demand that the ritual/transformation have been undertaken. That way the ritual exists in the abstract for NPCs and Monsters.
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I’d love some way to get a little ghost flavor somehow, but mummies would be an especially fun choice, IMO.
I'd kinda like to see zombies. I have an idea for a Night of the Living Dead style adventure where the PCs are the undead.
Ghosts, as Ghostwalk was one of my favorite campaign settings D&D ever did and would love to remake it in PF. Mummies a solid second choice just cause I really like their design
I also love Ghostwalk but I was a huge fan of the more experimental stuff that was done in 3.5 that now seems to be missing from current design trends. I would probably Ghostwalk as a free ghost archetype based on class, you get access to those abilities (and all the other incorporeal changes) when you are 'dead.'
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I know they aren't undead but I would love to see playable Worm that Walks as an archetype, I love those things.
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Ghosts, as Ghostwalk was one of my favorite campaign settings D&D ever did and would love to remake it in PF. Mummies a solid second choice just cause I really like their designI also love Ghostwalk but I was a huge fan of the more experimental stuff that was done in 3.5 that now seems to be missing from current design trends. I would probably Ghostwalk as a free ghost archetype based on class, you get access to those abilities (and all the other incorporeal changes) when you are 'dead.'
By ‘current design trends,’ do you mean in the d20 space? Because the indie scene has been wildly experimental for a decade plus at this point.
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As stated in another thread, I would really like to see dullahan, they have potentially interesting options and feats especially for them
By ‘current design trends,’ do you mean in the d20 space? Because the indie scene has been wildly experimental for a decade plus at this point.Ghosts, as Ghostwalk was one of my favorite campaign settings D&D ever did and would love to remake it in PF. Mummies a solid second choice just cause I really like their designI also love Ghostwalk but I was a huge fan of the more experimental stuff that was done in 3.5 that now seems to be missing from current design trends. I would probably Ghostwalk as a free ghost archetype based on class, you get access to those abilities (and all the other incorporeal changes) when you are 'dead.'
Yes I mean in D20 and 3.5 successor systems.
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I like the Lich/Graveknight idea above and second the Dullahan (that is my favorite and hits the top of my list). But, skeletons and zombies, in addition to the vampires and ghouls, would be a solid pick, too. I also crave a way to play as a ghost.
I wouldn't mind the basic foundation being by body type: skeletal, meaty, or incorporeal and then having the other powers spin off of that.
Then we could get DIY undead, hopefully yes having the ability to craft most of the classic monsters, but not beholden to them.
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Dullahans!
And maybe and this is a long shot maybe an Ectoplasmic entity, that way we can get something ghost related(and maybe get a few ghost abilities) without having to deal with always on intangibility.
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Ghouls and vamps I'm happy with, and I'd like to see a somewhat generic "fleshy" undead ala zombies, and similarly for a "bony" undead for skeletons.
Speaking of vampires, I hope we will see more than just the Moroi, for example I'd love to see playable Vetalarans and Nosferatu, although I guess that will also depend on how they choose to implement them, since it was mentioned that they will not be an ancestry
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It's not an undead PC option per se, but more necromantic player options like Fleshgrafts from 1E would be cool to see. Duct taping undead bits to a living character to make them more powerful but having a glaring downside (the most obvious being magical healing either working less but just straight up not at all). I'm curious how vampire options will work, since we have confirmation those are in, and would like more than just basic Moroi things to use.
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I’d love some way to get a little ghost flavor somehow, but mummies would be an especially fun choice, IMO.
Yeah, I'd want both fleshy undead, and ghostly/manifested spirit-type undead (perhaps unable to go fully incorporeal for more than a few moments at a time at 1st level, because of whatever process they used to 'manifest' a corporeal ectoplasmic ghost-body in the first place, for balance reasons).
And both 'hungry' (ghoul / vampire) and not-hungry (mummy / lich) options for the fleshy undead.
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Something that I am really hoping for in this book is an essay or treatise written by a lich that helps contextualize why creating undead is inherently evil in the Golarion setting, and how the undead have strong compulsions to evil, but how individual undead can overcome that compulsion.
I think seeing this explained from an in game perspective could really help set the whole tone for establishing in world expectations for players of obviously undead ancestries.
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Geb already does that. Use mindless undead for labor, I mean. It's one reason why other nations don't bother them as much as they'd like to; Geb is too valuable a bread basket to go trying to tip over.Yeah moving undead to not evil opens a whole can of worms on why necromancy isn't used everywhere for free labor, immortal life, etc. It's why even the simplest construct requires high level magic and is expensive to create. I get the squick but humans (and I assume other races by extension) are practical creatures in the end. Animating corpses to do field labor instead of having to do it yourself is something everyone would support if it wasn't an inherently evil act to the point pretty much every non-evil church comes in and smashes them.Something that I am really hoping for in this book is an essay or treatise written by a lich that helps contextualize why creating undead is inherently evil in the Golarion setting, and how the undead have strong compulsions to evil, but how individual undead can overcome that compulsion.
I think seeing this explained from an in game perspective could really help set the whole tone for establishing in world expectations for players of obviously undead ancestries.
Also using undead for labor on large scales probably also requires large-scale measures to prevent the spread of disease, especially for food. Geb can manage this because they have a massive centralized body of knowledge for necromancy which is useful for preserving food (among other things), but other nations would have to develop ways to prevent or remove disease spreading from zombies to crops pretty quickly and on a large scale.
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I am hoping for an explanation that talks more specifically about how creating undead is evil in the world, but sometimes creatures who become undead are able to resist the pull to evil (allowing for some good and neutral undead heroes, without changing the whole balance of the game world.)
I am hoping for an explanation that talks more specifically about how creating undead is evil in the world, but sometimes creatures who become undead are able to resist the pull to evil (allowing for some good and neutral undead heroes, without changing the whole balance of the game world.)
This reminds me that, in the first Bestiary, there's a snippet talking about neutral or even good vampires, and even in the template itself it states that the creature only "usually" becomes evil, so I think that could be a hint towards what you're mentioning
I know people have stated ghosts a few times, but I would like a particular “ghost”… the banshee. Either as an ancestry or as a sorcerer bloodline, versatile heritage, or something.
That would be an interesting one to include, and speaking of how it could be implemented, I'm also curious about how the book itself will work when it comes to stuff that aren't exactly ancestries, so stuff like ghouls, vampires and liches. At first I thought they could be a type of special "heritage", but I don't think they would have enough of a mechanical impact to justify the choice, so perhaps they will be something more akin to a template of sorts?
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I am thinking that a fair number of people are getting tropes mixed up between fantasy and modern fiction... I'm not really aware of any common Golarian Undead that need to eat the living in order to survive... sure they have instincts to attack, eat, and spread their affliction across a whole bunch of different creatures but in terms of them actually starving... I don't actually think that's a thing at all and if ANYONE in lore would have found a good way to keep his undead of all types from "eating the help" it would most certainly have been Geb who runs an entire nation on the backs of the untold tens or hundreds of thousands of mindless and intelligent Undead.
Am I missing something written somewhere that indicates that Undead need to eat or risk starvation?
Incorporeal PCs would be a real challenge to game balance and adventure design. Ghosts inhabiting physical forms seems pretty doable though.
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I'd kind of like them to include something in the book that is basically a big flashy sign that says "these options are potentially powerful options and all may not be appropriate in a wide variety of games". Disclaim the incorporeal rules and let the designers lean in a little harder.
PFS can always ban things that are problematic for their campaign.
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I'd love to see some kind of skeletal option, just so you can play a character like Skulduggery Pleasant or Brook from One Piece.
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I'd kind of like them to include something in the book that is basically a big flashy sign that says "these options are potentially powerful options and all may not be appropriate in a wide variety of games". Disclaim the incorporeal rules and let the designers lean in a little harder.
PFS can always ban things that are problematic for their campaign.
You mean the "rare" tag?
The problem with lvl 1 incorporeal is that it breaks so, so many adventures. If you have one or more incorporeal characters, you basically have to write the adventure around them. In some ways, it's worse than permafly.
Now, if you want to run a campaign that is built that way, based otherwise on PF2 rules you can totally do that, but I'd see it as better suited to an Adventure Path (similar to the Strength of Thousands rule that gives you a free caster archetype) than to something like Book of the Dead that people might assume was for more general use. Doing it as an AP would also mean that you... had an adventure path already that you could play that with, rather than requiring the DM to write one of their own if they want to play with that rule.
Actually, an AP predicated on being a party that's either all undead or mostly undead, doing what they can to serve and protect the people of Geb could be pretty cool. It's not like Geb doesn't have problems that need solving just like everywhere else... and it would finally give people a reason to start building those harm-font clerics. Maybe *that* one could get us the Divine-source "zombie troop" Eidolon for Summoners that I feel like we've been missing.
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You mean the "rare" tag?I'd kind of like them to include something in the book that is basically a big flashy sign that says "these options are potentially powerful options and all may not be appropriate in a wide variety of games". Disclaim the incorporeal rules and let the designers lean in a little harder.
PFS can always ban things that are problematic for their campaign.
The correlation between the rarity system and rarer options disrupting the game or being more powerful is incidental. Rarity only really means that something is more or less common in a certain place or in general. Nothing more. Therefore the tag won't be used to denote power or disruptiveness.
We may see a new tag, but I think that is more likely for mythic stuff than "regular" content. In the latter case - like in the Ancestry Guide for example - a sidebar or paragraph in the intro section is fine.
The problem with lvl 1 incorporeal is that it breaks so, so many adventures. If you have one or more incorporeal characters, you basically have to write the adventure around them. In some ways, it's worse than permafly.
Now, if you want to run a campaign that is built that way, based otherwise on PF2 rules you can totally do that, but I'd see it as better suited to an Adventure Path (similar to the Strength of Thousands rule that gives you a free caster archetype) than to something like Book of the Dead that people might assume was for more general use. Doing it as an AP would also mean that you... had an adventure path already that you could play that with, rather than requiring the DM to write one of their own if they want to play with that rule.
Actually, an AP predicated on being a party that's either all undead or mostly undead, doing what they can to serve and protect the people of Geb could be pretty cool. It's not like Geb doesn't have problems that need solving just like everywhere else... and it would finally give people a reason to start building those harm-font clerics. Maybe *that* one could get us the Divine-source "zombie troop" Eidolon for Summoners that I feel like we've been missing.
I can definitely see this. A PC being a ghoul, ghast, vampire or something like that has the potential to break the game and be very disruptive. The good old "create an undead horde" thing and the urge to eat/kill people come to mind in particular. But incorporeal things mess up design just by existing. Therefore I doubt they will be in this "first" book.
Not sure if they will lock this behind an AP or module, but the idea is rather interesting. I mean, people that want to play ghost would also want a story that explores the topic. My first thought would have been that they could make a book of stuff that is really disruptive but so cool that they still wanted to do it. But your idea is way more interesting. And there is also the fact that most of those things will already be integrated into books like the Book of The Dead.
You could possibly apply that to liches too. From the bestiary,
After its metamorphosis, a lich often finds some quiet place to dwell, typically protected by a variety of guardians and traps, for two primary purposes. First, a lich requires solitude in order to plan its elaborate schemes, and second, few mortals (if any) deign to interact with these legendarily corrupt necromancers. One reason begets the other, as the self-imposed isolation of a lich often drives the lich insane, further solidifying its separation from civilization. The longer a lich lives, the more meticulous a planner it becomes, secreting itself within a labyrinth of deadly puzzles, misdirection, and monsters.This suggests that, for liches at least, being evil isn't a foregone conclusion, just a likely one, and is as dependent on social factors as the lich's genesis.
Doesn’t the ritual to become a lich involve human sacrifice multiple times? It probably isn’t that lichee are inherently evil, rather that only the most depraved people have no compunctions about becoming a lich.
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Doesn’t the ritual to become a lich involve human sacrifice multiple times? It probably isn’t that lichee are inherently evil, rather that only the most depraved people have no compunctions about becoming a lich.You could possibly apply that to liches too. From the bestiary,
After its metamorphosis, a lich often finds some quiet place to dwell, typically protected by a variety of guardians and traps, for two primary purposes. First, a lich requires solitude in order to plan its elaborate schemes, and second, few mortals (if any) deign to interact with these legendarily corrupt necromancers. One reason begets the other, as the self-imposed isolation of a lich often drives the lich insane, further solidifying its separation from civilization. The longer a lich lives, the more meticulous a planner it becomes, secreting itself within a labyrinth of deadly puzzles, misdirection, and monsters.This suggests that, for liches at least, being evil isn't a foregone conclusion, just a likely one, and is as dependent on social factors as the lich's genesis.
All lich rituals are different and seem to be quite personal. There is probably some older source, but as far as I am aware of that is about the only thing we know about the ritual itself.
I would also like to play the Asmodeus priest here - would sacrificing people necessarily make you evil? In most cases, absolutely. But there could be situations or even whole societies that would allow for something different. Just as an example, take a nation that is going through a war or other catastrophe. A person that is instrumental to the nation's survival is dying. Ten citizens offer their life to save that person in the hope that they save the nation. The hero grudgingly accepts and becomes an undead.
To expand that, imagine this happening a couple of times and in a society that practices ancestral worship or the like. Now you have the origin story for an interesting partially undead society that is not necessarily evil. I hope that happens, even if it is not on the material plane.
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The correlation between the rarity system and rarer options disrupting the game or being more powerful is incidental. Rarity only really means that something is more or less common in a certain place or in general. Nothing more. Therefore the tag won't be used to denote power or disruptiveness.
This isn't true at all. It's used for both actual scarcity but also what type of things it's blocking,
Rarity isn't used to warn against power in the increasing +s mindset, but it is absolutely used against options that drastically change the game and how it can be played such as Zone of Truth or Teleport. Incorporeality would definitely fall under a Rare tag, not because it's scarce, but by how easily it can break the game.
The correlation between the rarity system and rarer options disrupting the game or being more powerful is incidental. Rarity only really means that something is more or less common in a certain place or in general. Nothing more. Therefore the tag won't be used to denote power or disruptiveness.
This isn't true at all. It's used for both actual scarcity but also what type of things it's blocking,
Rarity isn't used to warn against power in the increasing +s mindset, but it is absolutely used against options that drastically change the game and how it can be played such as Zone of Truth or Teleport. Incorporeality would definitely fall under a Rare tag, not because it's scarce, but by how easily it can break the game.
Except there is - to my knowledge - no direct basis for that assumption. All the descritpion of the general system and the tags only talk about rarity being a descriptor of, well, rarity. There is no text that links rarity to anything else.
Yes, it works out that way that some of the more potentially impactful options are uncommon or higher, but correlation is still not causation. If they would have wanted rarity to be an indicator of disruptiveness, they would have said so. Instead, whenever they publish something that is potentially very disruptive - such as evil champions and level 1 flying - they just tell us.
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Except there is - to my knowledge - no direct basis for that assumption. All the descritpion of the general system and the tags only talk about rarity being a descriptor of, well, rarity. There is no text that links rarity to anything else.
Yes, it works out that way that some of the more potentially impactful options are uncommon or higher, but correlation is still not causation. If they would have wanted rarity to be an indicator of disruptiveness, they would have said so. Instead, whenever they publish something that is potentially very disruptive - such as evil champions and level 1 flying - they just tell us.
Devs have said numerous times that this is why several spells with divination and teleportation effects are uncommon in the CRB.
Rarity in Your Game
Source Gamemastery Guide pg. 35
The rarity system is a powerful tool that helps you and your group customize your story, your characters, and your world to better match your game’s themes and setting. You can also use it to keep the complexity of your game low by limiting access to unusual options.
This section supplements the Using Rarity and Access sidebar on page 488 of the Core Rulebook.
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The correlation between the rarity system and rarer options disrupting the game or being more powerful is incidental. Rarity only really means that something is more or less common in a certain place or in general. Nothing more. Therefore the tag won't be used to denote power or disruptiveness.
This isn't true at all. It's used for both actual scarcity but also what type of things it's blocking,
Rarity isn't used to warn against power in the increasing +s mindset, but it is absolutely used against options that drastically change the game and how it can be played such as Zone of Truth or Teleport. Incorporeality would definitely fall under a Rare tag, not because it's scarce, but by how easily it can break the game.
Except there is - to my knowledge - no direct basis for that assumption. All the descritpion of the general system and the tags only talk about rarity being a descriptor of, well, rarity. There is no text that links rarity to anything else.
Yes, it works out that way that some of the more potentially impactful options are uncommon or higher, but correlation is still not causation. If they would have wanted rarity to be an indicator of disruptiveness, they would have said so. Instead, whenever they publish something that is potentially very disruptive - such as evil champions and level 1 flying - they just tell us.
They Designers have said so.
Rarity serves two purposes, limiting something because it might not be from the area, and because it drastically changes the game, such as teleport.
Edit: ninjaed, forgot to refresh the page before posting, by Winkie_Phace