Thanks Storm Dragon and PaleDim for a bit more about the lore. I'm looking forward to learning more; it often helps me settle on a concept.
Storm, I'll vote +1 for being good guys with a plot too. I find it makes it easier for PBP to hold together, though I'm open to other options too.
As for gestalt vs trisalt, I might lean a *touch* toward gestalt, but mostly because I like the idea of folks having niches and needing to work together. I'm sure that's possible with trisalt, but it'll be harder not to all be excellent at everything. (e.g., will we have some characters who're "squishier", such that a tank is useful? Or will we all be at the top of our AC/HP benchpress?
I think that's a better way for me to phrase it: it's not about 1/2/3 classes, it's that I want to think about--and encourage everyone to think about--designing and describing their character in terms of what they will be High, Med, and Low in regarding our agreed upon [url]Benchpress[/url] (and maybe just in general what we guess our character will do really well, and where they'll need support).
How does that sound to folks?
Does anyone want to propose a Benchpress level to use? I'll throw out that since this is high-powered maybe we're comparing to L+2 on the chart (e.g. at L6 hitting L8's Green for most things, with a few at L8's Blue and Orange). Does that sound right?
Wow, this sounds like an amazing game! I played in one rather brief Dark Sun game ages ago back in 2nd edition, but remember it being a cool setting, definitely different from the "standard medieval fantasy". It looks like you have really made the setting your own - I am super interested in the "necropunk" concept.
I want to make sure I understand the design rules around tristalt + prestige class along one theme. Would something like this make sense: a wandering mystic able to summon the fury of the storm in battle (druid+ranger+barbarian, with horizon walker for prestige class)?
Does anyone want to propose a Benchpress level to use? I'll throw out that since this is high-powered maybe we're comparing to L+2 on the chart (e.g. at L6 hitting L8's Green for most things, with a few at L8's Blue and Orange). Does that sound right?
I'm just going to wait to see what rules Seb comes out with and formulate my character from there. Then we'll maybe discuss the "benchpress" of my build. I need to see how it works with magical items I can find, how he sets up the laws governing character building, and what that will look like for the archetypes/classes/PrC's I come up with. I will say, I was thinking of something connected to nature (although I'm sure there isn't much of it). I'm not sure if Geomancy would involve both earthen magic and magic connected to animals, or if it would be like naturomancy, but something fairly druidic-like in flavor, but far from it in mechanics. A kind of support spellcaster, but with the capability of hopping into melee if needed. We'll see.
Hi Seb, my sincerest apologies. The last thing I would want to do is offend anyone in our gaming community, especially a GM whose game I am interested in. I wrote that post quick on my cell phone, and clearly it did not convey my tone or direction appropriately. I played a little Dark Sun back in the day, so when I saw your recruitment, I got really excited. Launching into the many files you linked and finding your old recruitment details, I was doubly excited for the opportunity to mix third party with paizo material, and even work in a little third edition as was listed prior. I started wondering what cool things I may have forgot from way back in the days of 3.5.
In your posts to that point, you had referenced spheres casters but no other specifics, so I assumed the open options from your old recruitment would stand. When Cuan and monkeygod were pushing for third party with the limitation of paizo material, I was trying to inquire as to why (I have since looked and found your other recent recruitment that was referenced). Clearly my quick response and its intended casual/playful manner was lost entirely in translation and came across instead as me questioning what you want to do with your game. Absolutely not. I think one of the most important things for any game master is to run a game they're excited about, including using the rules they desire. Once again, I would like to offer my apologies.
Having already offered offence, I believe it would be in poor form for me to apply for your game. It seems like you already have a core crew returning, and multiple other people interested (let me throw a couple stars at both SmooshieBanana and Tara Ravenheart, they are both a blast to play with), so I wish you only the best of luck in your storytelling endeavor!
With all respect,
O.S.
Hi Seb, my sincerest apologies. The last thing I would want to do is offend anyone in our gaming community, especially a GM whose game I am interested in. I wrote that post quick on my cell phone, and clearly it did not convey my tone or direction appropriately. I played a little Dark Sun back in the day, so when I saw your recruitment, I got really excited. Launching into the many files you linked and finding your old recruitment details, I was doubly excited for the opportunity to mix third party with paizo material, and even work in a little third edition as was listed prior. I started wondering what cool things I may have forgot from way back in the days of 3.5.
In your posts to that point, you had referenced spheres casters but no other specifics, so I assumed the open options from your old recruitment would stand. When Cuan and monkeygod were pushing for third party with the limitation of paizo material, I was trying to inquire as to why (I have since looked and found your other recent recruitment that was referenced). Clearly my quick response and its intended casual/playful manner was lost entirely in translation and came across instead as me questioning what you want to do with your game. Absolutely not. I think one of the most important things for any game master is to run a game they're excited about, including using the rules they desire. Once again, I would like to offer my apologies.
Having already offered offence, I believe it would be in poor form for me to apply for your game. It seems like you already have a core crew returning, and multiple other people interested (let me throw a couple stars at both SmooshieBanana and Tara Ravenheart, they are both a blast to play with), so I wish you only the best of luck in your storytelling endeavor!
With all respect,
O.S.
I obviously can't speak for Seb, but I don't you were offensive. You merely asked a question, which was then answered.
Again, not speaking for Seb, but I *think* his reply about 'lulz can I do something else' was more in reference to his 3pp interest check thread, and not this one.
At least in my book, you're totally good, and you shouldn't bow out.
Hi Seb, my sincerest apologies. The last thing I would want to do is offend anyone in our gaming community, especially a GM whose game I am interested in. I wrote that post quick on my cell phone, and clearly it did not convey my tone or direction appropriately. I played a little Dark Sun back in the day, so when I saw your recruitment, I got really excited. Launching into the many files you linked and finding your old recruitment details, I was doubly excited for the opportunity to mix third party with paizo material, and even work in a little third edition as was listed prior. I started wondering what cool things I may have forgot from way back in the days of 3.5.
In your posts to that point, you had referenced spheres casters but no other specifics, so I assumed the open options from your old recruitment would stand. When Cuan and monkeygod were pushing for third party with the limitation of paizo material, I was trying to inquire as to why (I have since looked and found your other recent recruitment that was referenced). Clearly my quick response and its intended casual/playful manner was lost entirely in translation and came across instead as me questioning what you want to do with your game. Absolutely not. I think one of the most important things for any game master is to run a game they're excited about, including using the rules they desire. Once again, I would like to offer my apologies.
Having already offered offence, I believe it would be in poor form for me to apply for your game. It seems like you already have a core crew returning, and multiple other people interested (let me throw a couple stars at both SmooshieBanana and Tara Ravenheart, they are both a blast to play with), so I wish you only the best of luck in your storytelling endeavor!
With all respect,
O.S.
I obviously can't speak for Seb, but I don't you were offensive. You merely asked a question, which was then answered.
Again, not speaking for Seb, but I *think* his reply about...
I wasn't offended, and I try to be easy going on these forums, though clearly stuff is sometimes lost in an electronic medium few of us have a real personal relationship. Please feel free to apply.
As for gestalt vs trisalt, I might lean a *touch* toward gestalt, but mostly because I like the idea of folks having niches and needing to work together. I'm sure that's possible with trisalt, but it'll be harder not to all be excellent at everything. (e.g., will we have some characters who're "squishier", such that a tank is useful? Or will we all be at the top of our AC/HP benchpress?
I think that's a better way for me to phrase it: it's not about 1/2/3 classes, it's that I want to think about--and encourage everyone to think about--designing and describing their character in terms of what they will be High, Med, and Low in regarding our agreed upon [url]Benchpress[/url] (and maybe just in general what we guess our character will do really well, and where they'll need support).
While you can easily make a PC that can 'do all the things!' via tristalt/morestalt, you're still vastly limited via action economy.
Sure, you can hit the enemy with you sword for 2d10+24 damage, and cast a Cone of Cold, and maybe teleport around the battlefield all by your onsie, but if it's just you vs a small army of minions, and 3 BBEGs, you're gonna get walloped, lol
Meaning, tristalt isn't gonna really invalidate other people. This is doubly true if we all build to a specific theme, as opposed to trying to build to accomplish everything.
Wow, this sounds like an amazing game! I played in one rather brief Dark Sun game ages ago back in 2nd edition, but remember it being a cool setting, definitely different from the "standard medieval fantasy". It looks like you have really made the setting your own - I am super interested in the "necropunk" concept.
I want to make sure I understand the design rules around tristalt + prestige class along one theme. Would something like this make sense: a wandering mystic able to summon the fury of the storm in battle (druid+ranger+barbarian, with horizon walker for prestige class)?
The necropunk idea came out of my speculation about the 'planetary adventure' angle of the 2e material. You may remember that the naturemasters and benders were scheduled to return on an asteroid as part of the 2e metaplot (the introductory adventure with the 2e set references this concept and is about a cache of rhulistic biotech). I sort of went down a rabbit hole with the idea of what if the halflings themselves were extra terrestrials, and the thri kreen were actually the original species of Athas (the canon has them existing in the Blue Age in a winged form, but what if the base form of life on Athas is insectoid?). I connected that to some concepts from the Alternity Star Drive setting and Babylon 5 regarding precursor alien civilizations and the Destiny MMO -- which has a concept of 'paracausal powers' of light and darkness. My idea in this cosmology is that psionics is native to Athas and defiling and preserving are alien arts taught by these precursor alien civilizations, who are agents of the paracausal powers of destruction/darkness/chaos and light/order/creation. The haflings were agents of some of these entities who arrived on the planet to terriform it.
The 'darkness'/'defiling' concept is linked to the canon concepts of obsidian as a dragon-related concept and the 'dragon seeds' of Monte Cook's Arcana Evolved Setting, as well as the black oil in X files. Defiling involves channeling a mutagenic black paracausal property that can assume the form of smoke, magma, obsidian, or oil, and is able to 'evolve'/'deform' things that come into contact with it by leeching the life out of its surroundings. A lot of the products of this kind of 'magic'/'alien' science look like a Giger painting or have similarities to xenomorphs or tyrannids. The 'light' property -- i.e., preserving, is more like radiance than just defiling lite as it was presented in 2e.
Late 2e threw some monkeys into the system by imagining grey casters/necromants that drew on the power of grey instead of the earth, as well as shadowcasters and those that used cerulean energy. It was kind of a mess in that you could also be a defiler or preserver that used these alternative energy sources. I sort of tried to reconcile these ideas by making defiling and preserving alien arts, and imagined other casting systems related to other power sources besides 'preserving' and 'defiling' like shadow, the grey, the cerulean storms, but also mana crystals, blood/the sun, the planets. I had the notion each would have a similarly bad draw back as defiling -- like shadow magic risked having your own shadow eat you, or something similar.
But, in any event, I imagine the necropunk defiling tech to consist of stuff like sorcerer king constables with six shooters made out of bone that fire caustic venomous biopellets from chambers that look like organs, or 'mecha' made out of repurposed or deformed bugdead that spew toxic defiler smog, or vessels with hulls made out of bones, scales, or chitin that leak noxious excretions as the ply the silt.
Fun to hear a bit more of your image! I like the idea that thri kreen are native and halflings are extraterrestrial.
And MG, I agree, it's possible to have characters with strengths and weaknesses, even with trisalt. Either works fine for me.
We should definitely all try to coordinate a bit, and maybe nail down a bit of a theme for our characters so we don't clash too hard in terms of role. My first thought was some kind of transhumanist warrior, or trans...kreenist? perhaps. I always liked the spacefaring version of the Thri-Kreen that were super into body mods as self-expression.
We should definitely all try to coordinate a bit, and maybe nail down a bit of a theme for our characters so we don't clash too hard in terms of role. My first thought was some kind of transhumanist warrior, or trans...kreenist? perhaps. I always liked the spacefaring version of the Thri-Kreen that were super into body mods as self-expression.
Fully agree, but let's wait till Seb posts full creation rules, and/or possibly a separate official recruitment.
Surprisingly i like that idea.
Thri-Kreen as native species, etc.
You should probably not spoiler us on that though Seb, rather let us learn ingame :D
Bit more micro lore would be better atm, like:
-Where are we all from? All from the same city state?
-Which one is that?
-how does it look?
-Who rules and how is society organized there?
-Different castes, democratic, sorcerer-king, religion?
Knowing Dark Sun, we all would have been slaves, beggars or something close, even as templar.
Level 6 we could and should be a bit above that, but still not the rulers or high above. So everyone might be in some sort of organization or service, or predicament.
I'm most likely playing a half-elf or elf, most likely tied to an elven house or tribe, but at least partly city dwelling or having some business there to get into contact with the rest.
Something like that would tie us all together i think.
The necropunk idea came out of my speculation about the 'planetary adventure' angle of the 2e material. You may remember that the naturemasters and benders were scheduled to return on an asteroid as part of the 2e metaplot (the introductory adventure with the 2e set references this concept and is about a cache of rhulistic biotech). I sort of went down a rabbit hole with the idea of what if the halflings themselves were extra terrestrials, and the thri kreen were actually the original species of Athas (the canon has them existing in the Blue Age in a winged form, but what if the base form of life on Athas is insectoid?). I connected that to some concepts from the Alternity Star Drive setting and Babylon 5 regarding precursor alien civilizations and the Destiny MMO -- which has a concept of 'paracausal powers' of light and darkness. My idea in this cosmology is that psionics is native to Athas and defiling and preserving are alien arts taught by these precursor alien civilizations, who are agents of the paracausal powers of destruction/darkness/chaos and light/order/creation. The haflings were agents of some of these entities who arrived on the planet to terriform it....Wow, this sounds like an amazing game! I played in one rather brief Dark Sun game ages ago back in 2nd edition, but remember it being a cool setting, definitely different from the "standard medieval fantasy". It looks like you have really made the setting your own - I am super interested in the "necropunk" concept.
I want to make sure I understand the design rules around tristalt + prestige class along one theme. Would something like this make sense: a wandering mystic able to summon the fury of the storm in battle (druid+ranger+barbarian, with horizon walker for prestige class)?
sweeeeet
Hey, I had an idea on ability score generation. It seems like there are two camps: Dice Pool (24d6, reroll up to 6 1's, arrange to taste), and 3d6+6 (with multiple sets). I know Cuan mentioned how dice pool allowed for more control over your scores, and it definitely does, though it mathematically generates a lower average than the alternative. So, what if we merged the two methods?
My first thought was 18d6 + six 6's, with up to six 1's rerolled, but then I said, why not just build it in? So, I propose 24d6 + six 6's, drop the lowest twelve rolls. Thus, you get the flexibility that 24d6 offers, with the added security of a base 6 in each ability score to start your math from. .
Just an idea for people to consider.
Seb, thank you for your understanding and welcoming nature. Text-based communication can be interpretted in different ways, so I was worried I had caused offense. I will definitely still apply.
Obviously, it's all up to Seb, but I like Tara's compromise proposal on ability scores. Just my 2 copper.
TBH my experience with Seb's dice pool method is that it effectively boils down to saying "pick your stats" but makes things a lot more cumbersome and tedious. I don't think I've ever come out without a stat lower than 14.
Why not cut out the middle man and say "pick your stats", or just go with a high powered array (eg. 18 18 16 16 14 14)?
TBH my experience with Seb's dice pool method is that it effectively boils down to saying "pick your stats" but makes things a lot more cumbersome and tedious. I don't think I've ever come out without a stat lower than 14.
Why not cut out the middle man and say "pick your stats", or just go with a high powered array (eg. 18 18 16 16 14 14)?
That's interesting I got a 10 as Mithuth in FF in Eberron, lol
I'm fine with any stat of the methods suggested...and I like Hayato Ken's lore questions. Those would help me to!
Everyone plays a warrior/expert/adept - you get casting, skills, and good base attack. For stats, 14/13/12/12/10/8 OR 14/14/12/10/10/8 - both viable 10 point sets. Hell, a tristalt NPC class character might not be a bad PC build after all (in comparison to normal characters, that is).
Ah, the amusement of it all!
Just so I have an idea, I'm asking previous players who have had this free prestige class in Seb's games or Seb himself, how does this work? Do you just get the class features of a prestige class for 1st-6th level? Do you have to qualify for the prestige class (including feats/abilities/etc.) at the current starting level (in this case 6th)? Do you automatically qualify for it at lvl 1 regardless of requirements? What happens when you obtain all the class features? There are some that only have 3 or 5 levels. Some have more. Is this strictly a 1 free prestige class, and than any others later we obtain must meet those requirements like normal?
Just so I have an idea, I'm asking previous players who have had this free prestige class in Seb's games or Seb himself, how does this work? Do you just get the class features of a prestige class for 1st-6th level? Do you have to qualify for the prestige class (including feats/abilities/etc.) at the current starting level (in this case 6th)? Do you automatically qualify for it at lvl 1 regardless of requirements? What happens when you obtain all the class features? There are some that only have 3 or 5 levels. Some have more. Is this strictly a 1 free prestige class, and than any others later we obtain must meet those requirements like normal?
As far as I know, he's never run a game with a free PrC specifically. He had first offered it in the 3pp only interest check, and I copied the relevant info above.
Since the 3pp game was going to be set in his homebrew(I think), I figured most of the rules(albeit adjusted as I've suggested earlier) could be ported over to this game as well.
Ie, trying to let Seb and those of us who are in both that interest check and this one, have our cake and eat it too, lol.
Sounds all good to me and i pretty much decided what i'm going to play, finding a good balance between my old character and the 3PP stuff.
Still figuring out what I'd want to play as it would not be the same as my idea in the previous interest thread. I'm now thinking of going for a Ssuran, just need to figure out what race would be best to build that (or perhaps a custom race approved by Seb).
With the suggestion of the insectoid races being native to Athas and the mammalian races being alien in origin it does make me wonder where the reptilian races come from. Perhaps they have a relation to the origin of the dragons.
Don't forget, that is all Aeons ago and lots of it might be knowledge lost in time. Or only a few select and dubious beings know.
Don't forget, that is all Aeons ago and lots of it might be knowledge lost in time. Or only a few select and dubious beings know.
I know, but while my character wouldn't have a clue I, as a player, would like to be among those dubious beings. Let's call it ciuriosity.
Well, i think it's nice to find out some stuff ingame, as PC and player^^
That said, micro is probably more important than macro at first.
And the build rules, so that we are all on the same page and can start building the actual characters, which probably takes a while.
My current plan is to continue the Serpent Singers Elf tribe, going with the slight serpent and vampire thing given to them last game.
So not Amunet-Ra, because she did not use 3PP at all.
Instead i'm giving you Lalali-Re, one of her "sisters".
Thinking Gonzo magical girl, uc scaled fist psychic fist monk, thoughtsinger bard, maybe phantom thief, sparkle princess and succubus on an elf chassis.
I think that really brings about the spirit of the Serpent Singer elves, who have sacred traditions, but still are sleazy, lazy no-gooder elves after all at the end of the day.
Need to see how exactly i bring all of that together.
And as Monkeygod can see, i heeded the call for 3PP.
Whereas i have to say, i'm a bit disappointed by DSP Psionics there, which stays vastly behind somehow.
WIlder just doesn't really bring it i think and why are there no options to have (the lagging behind) cryptic and psion work from CHA?
Anyways, it would be really good to have a word from Sebecloki on magic, the use of magic and defiling etc, because that is after all pretty essential in character building decisions.
Is magic still outlawed and defiling makes you an evil abomination eventually becoming an NPC?
Is psychic magic (aka Paizo psionics) different from that?
DSP Psionics are natural to Athas, so should be fine and the more common and normal thing? In halflings and others - most of which are derived from halflings? as well?
Thri-Kreen are the only native species? How about Aracokra?
And how does spheres casting come in there?
I would like to know if there is a magic that restores the world instead of defiles it. I am looking at a ranger-type build and there is magic, but it uses nature and I think her focus would be to restore the world to some degree...if that's possible.
Alternatively, if that isn't something feasible I was considering a lucky cardshark character, but I'm not sure if those exist. I'd imagine there is gambling of some kind. I don't know what good that will do in the wilderness, but we'll see how it works out first with the ranger-like build.
Cities have gambling for sure, cards i don't know, but you should be safe with dice.
Rangers could work similar to druids, i would have to look that up in the original setting, they worked different from arcane magic.
Just like clerics etc. could draw their magic from the elements and elemental planes instead of gods.
But of course Seb has to weigh in on all this.
I'm curious how alchemy fits into the way magic works too. Is Paizo alchemy defiling? Howabout Sphere's martial alchemy?
EDIT: I have a few concepts I'm playing with:
1) [most likely] An irreverent, hard drinking genius doctor who would wield both a crossbow and various traps. He's somewhat inspired by the real world dentist-outlaw-gunfighter Doc Holiday.
Mechanically, would be a Spheres Scholar at least. Might see what it's like to go triple-spheres, with Conscript, Prodigy, and or Technician thrown in. Could also veer toward Marksman and/or Harbinger (Omen Rider). Race TBD (maybe human, ratfolk, something else). Would be good at stealth, scouting, setting/disarming traps, ranged combat, and nonmagical healing.
SmooshieBanana, If I go this route and you make your Lucky Gambler, perhaps the two are gambling buddies?
2) A somewhat Toph-inspired Dwarven earthbender (Legendary Kineticist (elemental scion? kinetic knight? kinetic lancer?), Spheres Striker, ??)
3) A highly mobile/stealthy halfling skirmisher (maybe any of Legendary Kineticist (kinetic lancer), Voyager, Soulknife (Epoch-Walker), Prodigy, and/or Sage)
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A bossy thri-kreen who was (passive aggressively) pushed out of his hive due to his over-bearing nature. On the other hand, that gets him out of the pairing with that gossipy bug from the nearby hive. Nobody really liked it when he practiced his magic anyway. Exploding boulders near the young braves tended to bring physical trouble that he... had to get use to dealing with.
Pik-ik-cha has now met many warm-bloods in his travels. Some of them are even okay, and listen to him or even know magic of their own! People keep telling him he can't eat the ones who aren't useful. Bother.
I would like to know if there is a magic that restores the world instead of defiles it. I am looking at a ranger-type build and there is magic, but it uses nature and I think her focus would be to restore the world to some degree...if that's possible.
Alternatively, if that isn't something feasible I was considering a lucky cardshark character, but I'm not sure if those exist. I'd imagine there is gambling of some kind. I don't know what good that will do in the wilderness, but we'll see how it works out first with the ranger-like build.
From my recollections, Divine magic doesn't defile at all, only Arcane magic. And there is a "preserver" tradition of Arcane magic users who can use arcane magic in such a way that they don't make things (much) worse, though don't make things better. They basically draw JUST ENOUGH energy to power the spell, and no more.
'Divine' magic is elemental magic. The paralements aren't exactly defiling, but they're inimical to the rest of life on the planet.
Preservers are depicted as 'defiling lite', which I think is sort of crazy -- my concept is more of restorative energies based on radiance, light, and the positive energy plane.
Defiling is going to be very close to the canon presentation with the exception of the mutagenic qualities I outlined above -- the life, sapping element can also be seen as a form of vampirism or parasitism. The dragonblight from Iron Kingdoms is another source of inspiration.
I'm curious how alchemy fits into the way magic works too. Is Paizo alchemy defiling? Howabout Sphere's martial alchemy?
EDIT: I have a few concepts I'm playing with:
1) [most likely] An irreverent, hard drinking genius doctor who would wield both a crossbow and various traps. He's somewhat inspired by the real world dentist-outlaw-gunfighter Doc Holiday.
Mechanically, would be a Spheres Scholar at least. Might see what it's like to go triple-spheres, with Conscript, Prodigy, and or Technician thrown in. Could also veer toward Marksman and/or Harbinger (Omen Rider). Race TBD (maybe human, ratfolk, something else). Would be good at stealth, scouting, setting/disarming traps, ranged combat, and nonmagical healing.
SmooshieBanana, If I go this route and you make your Lucky Gambler, perhaps the two are gambling buddies?2) A somewhat Toph-inspired Dwarven earthbender (Legendary Kineticist (elemental scion? kinetic knight? kinetic lancer?), Spheres Striker, ??)
3) A highly mobile/stealthy halfling skirmisher (maybe any of Legendary Kineticist (kinetic lancer), Voyager, Soulknife (Epoch-Walker), Prodigy, and/or Sage)
I've always thought you could build a fluff concept with more than one mechanical set of options. A defiler could be an alchemist with some weird templates, or a sorcerer with certain spell choices, or some kind of sphere caster, or a weird form of veilweaving. As long as the end product has the right 'feel', I don't particularly care what mechanics are used to model the concept.
SmooshieBanana, If I go this route and you make your Lucky Gambler, perhaps the two are gambling buddies?
I could take a look at it for sure. It kind of depends on the build rules as well as what I roll, but I have no problems with that!
Thanks, Sebecloki. I'm curious about the other side. I assume that The martial alchemy sphere is technology, and so not defiling. Is that right?
Is it possible to have, say, an Investigator with paizo extracts and have it not be defiling?
Less pertinent to my current ideas, but can paizo occult/psychic magic be treated as a form of psionics (and so non-defiling)?
occult can be a form of psionics if you want. 'Psionics are different' is the default for psionic/magic interface in Dark Sun, and so you'd have to be okay with, for example, defiling interacting with occult magic as if it were psionics, not another form of magic.
You can also make a non-defiling alchemist, I was just trying to give an example of different ways I could imagine modeling the concept. I was just trying to emphasize you don't have to be a wizard or sorcerer to be a defiler or preserver -- you could be an oracle with a archetype that grants access to arcane magic or a veilweaver or some kind of spherecaster or other options. I just want the 'feel' of the build to be close to what I outlined above, but I don't particularly care what class, feats, templates, etc. you use to get to that point.
Thanks, that helps! Do you have a sense of when you'll settle on build rules? (No rush, just having fun considering.)
...and SmooshieBanana, agreed, too early to make any plans. We should wait til we have a real party first. I was just noticing a potential connection, and find it's sometimes interesting to have some established relationships / history in a party.
Definitely excited to see what Seb's finalized character creation details are! I have a few ideas flying around, hoping to make one a reality.
I'm still thinking about it; I have a busy week coming up, and I'm intending this to be like a month-long recruitment, so I hope everyone can be patient -- I came up with some more fluff that may be significant for character building ideas, so here is what I'm thinking --
I absolutely love the cosmology and fluff of Numenera and the rest of the cypher system verse, I just have no interest in really learning the mechanics of a new system. I'm placing this setting within that cosmology -- that means you should think about an 'Beyond Countless Doors' cosmology instead of the Great Wheel -- basically its a cosmology where there are infinite planes, and there is no 1 plane of elemental earth, for example, just an earth primary plane which is thought of as such by the inhabitants of the planet.
How this is significant for our purposes is I'm going to incorporate the concept of planeshifting and timetravel from the Strange, Numenera, and Predation. The world of Serinba'al has planar connections to a version of the Ninth World, and there are humans, abhumans, aliens, and artificial life from that setting running around in various locations. One example would be the interplanetary living city called the 'Bloom', which will be a point of contact between the Ninth World and the Tablelands.
I don't mind being patient, particularly if you are busy. I think making a 3rd party character will take a bit more time for some people, so the sooner we have the rules the better (so we can kind of start piecing things together), but do what you feel comfortable with doing. You could put out the rules and have a 3-month recruitment or however long it takes until you are not busy if you want. Then characters would only get more solid as they went along. That's just my thoughts on it. Of course, I may be biased as I really want to build this character lol.
As for the fluff, that's cool. I've heard some things about Numenera before. I've never played in it. I am not sure how much more that will influence my character build mechanically at this level, as cosmology might be out of their realm of understanding at 6th. I'd imagine we are still concerned more with bandits, slave traders, and monsters than elemental planes and what the world is made of. However, for backstory, with Numenera, it does certainly give us a lot of stranger options to have connected to our past.
I second SmooshieBanana, knowing the basic build rules would be really helpfull.
I'm looking into a lot of 3PP stuff for the first time and it really is a lot^^
-Tristalt
-Ability Points creation method
-Allowed Sources
-Feats per level
-Traits
-Free PrC?
-Races, templates etc.`?
-Level? We said level 6 so far.
-How does magic with defiling/preserving work? Same or different from psionics? 2 skills to identify needed? etc.?
-Mythic levels?
Knowing those things would make it a lot easier to plan ahead.
If you then want to introduce planar travel, that is cool and very interesting.
The only thing i would like to know then is, are players supposed to be able to do that on their own already?
On level 6 that would be a bit early i guess, so having other means of travel would be good. Like Patrons, highways, portals, etc.
That's more on the fluff side then.
While I find the concept of Numenara intriguing, I do wonder how this will interact with Dark Sun's specific cosmology, specifically on how The Grey forms a barrier between Athas and the rest of the outer planes. In this the elemental planes and the plane of shadows all have a part inside the Grey, which is accessible from Athas, and the rest outside, which isn't. The part of the plane of shadows that's inside is what's known as The Black.
I guess the easiest way to integrate this is that recently a passage through the Grey has been opened and that pre-existing extra-planar things date from a time before the Grey was put in place.
A big reason behind my interest here is that at the moment I'm looking at tying my character to the Grey as a source of my character's powers.
EDIT: After looking through the "Beyond countless doorways" (yay for friends with extensive RPG book collections) I do wonder how you will approach it all. Are we bound on Athas or will we be walking the planes? The latter really gives me strong MtG planeswalker vibes (which I'm not at all opposed to).
I read up on The Bloom. That is a really cool city and that is so in line with the Numenera I've heard about! It's like a twisted reality, and that city seems to exemplify that quality about it. I love how people live in it and just toss their trash through portals because why not?
This made me realize how much i would love a Dark Sun game again.
The crunch isn't as important there, can be PF1, PF2 or even D&D5, as long as it's not AD&D and sufficiently reasonable^^
So, I don't want to keep anyone in suspense -- I'm honestly ending up crushed by the amount of work for nursing school and I'm going to have to regretfully take a break from the boards for now. If you want to keep your profiles active I may be able to pick up this game again in a few months, but after a solid week of having no time to look at my games, I need to just go ahead and call it how I see it. I wish everyone good gaming and hope to see you around later.
I am interested in restarting this game at some point, and I may have some time to do prep in the interim before I come back to the boards, but for right now I unfortunately don't seem to have time to do it justice.
I myself went through prenursing and such. It can take some effort. If you have any questions, feel free to ask and I'll answer if I can. I've also worked in a hospital for 12+ years, so I can give insight into that too.
As for the game, that's unfortunate. I hope things work out and you get some free time eventually.