That’s good to hear - serves me right for half-listening to the stream :p
Here’s hoping the final version can do something more interesting.
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None of the art we showed off while talking about Stolen Fate is for Stolen Fate. None of the Stolen Fate art is completed yet in a place where we CAN show it of, but it's not going to be three volumes stereotyped fortune teller women. There's a lot more to it than that, but one panel where we had to talk about all sorts of adventures didn't leave much room to go into more detail.
I'm hoping we'll have a chance to share more about Stolen Fate before next year's Paizo Con. Dunno where or how, yet, though.
Whether or not the final version is interesting is up to me and the authors, and we'll be doing the best we can.
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I'm going to say it again. I absolutely love how Paizo (obviously!) pays attention to customer feedback.
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None of the art we showed off while talking about Stolen Fate is for Stolen Fate. None of the Stolen Fate art is completed yet in a place where we CAN show it of, but it's not going to be three volumes stereotyped fortune teller women. There's a lot more to it than that, but one panel where we had to talk about all sorts of adventures didn't leave much room to go into more detail.
I'm hoping we'll have a chance to share more about Stolen Fate before next year's Paizo Con. Dunno where or how, yet, though.
Whether or not the final version is interesting is up to me and the authors, and we'll be doing the best we can.
Appreciate your reply, James! Today’s panel already turned me around on Stolen Fate a fair bit - I’m excited to see the final shape of it.
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Appreciate your reply, James! Today’s panel already turned me around on Stolen Fate a fair bit - I’m excited to see the final shape of it.None of the art we showed off while talking about Stolen Fate is for Stolen Fate. None of the Stolen Fate art is completed yet in a place where we CAN show it of, but it's not going to be three volumes stereotyped fortune teller women. There's a lot more to it than that, but one panel where we had to talk about all sorts of adventures didn't leave much room to go into more detail.
I'm hoping we'll have a chance to share more about Stolen Fate before next year's Paizo Con. Dunno where or how, yet, though.
Whether or not the final version is interesting is up to me and the authors, and we'll be doing the best we can.
No problem!
But... Just to manage expectations, there WILL be fortune tellers doing their thing at certain points in this Adventure Path, including at least one fortune teller woman (the campaign's plot builds on previous Harrow-themed stories we've done before while also building for the future). But there's a lot more going on overall with the story than that.
It's firmly got one foot in the past/in nostalgia, but also one foot in the future/the new direction for the setting. It can be tricky to bring forward some elements that are canonical in ways that, if we were to publish them today, would have been handled differently, but I feel like we've gotten pretty good at covering those sorts of transitions over the past decade.
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I mean, having fortune telling deck themed adventure without anybody doing fortune telling sounds weird.
Though yeah it doesn't really need to be performed by stereotypical depictions though, male fortune tellers also tend to be bit rare in fiction for some reason. I like performing harrow readings in general though
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Appreciate your reply, James! Today’s panel already turned me around on Stolen Fate a fair bit - I’m excited to see the final shape of it.None of the art we showed off while talking about Stolen Fate is for Stolen Fate. None of the Stolen Fate art is completed yet in a place where we CAN show it of, but it's not going to be three volumes stereotyped fortune teller women. There's a lot more to it than that, but one panel where we had to talk about all sorts of adventures didn't leave much room to go into more detail.
I'm hoping we'll have a chance to share more about Stolen Fate before next year's Paizo Con. Dunno where or how, yet, though.
Whether or not the final version is interesting is up to me and the authors, and we'll be doing the best we can.
No problem!
But... Just to manage expectations, there WILL be fortune tellers doing their thing at certain points in this Adventure Path, including at least one fortune teller woman (the campaign's plot builds on previous Harrow-themed stories we've done before while also building for the future). But there's a lot more going on overall with the story than that.
It's firmly got one foot in the past/in nostalgia, but also one foot in the future/the new direction for the setting. It can be tricky to bring forward some elements that are canonical in ways that, if we were to publish them today, would have been handled differently, but I feel like we've gotten pretty good at covering those sorts of transitions over the past decade.
Sounds like the Harrow is trying to become the new source of true prophecies.
I mean, having fortune telling deck themed adventure without anybody doing fortune telling sounds weird.
Though yeah it doesn't really need to be performed by stereotypical depictions though, male fortune tellers also tend to be bit rare in fiction for some reason. I like performing harrow readings in general though
I’m not opposed to fortune-tellers existing, and like the Harrow plenty. It’s when we primarily see it done by headscarf-wearing, dark-skinned women straight out of the old penny arcade fortune machines that my hackles get up.
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I’m not opposed to fortune-tellers existing, and like the Harrow plenty. It’s when we primarily see it done by headscarf-wearing, dark-skinned women straight out of the old penny arcade fortune machines that my hackles get up.I mean, having fortune telling deck themed adventure without anybody doing fortune telling sounds weird.
Though yeah it doesn't really need to be performed by stereotypical depictions though, male fortune tellers also tend to be bit rare in fiction for some reason. I like performing harrow readings in general though
Yeah, I understand. There will likely be some of that imagery in the Adventure Path, is what I'm saying, but I'm hoping to be able to contextualize it more responsibly during development. It's not the ONLY thing going on, but it's a PART of what's going on.
Whether or not that ends up being a deal-breaker or not... I guess we'll see in about a year. By that point, I'm pretty sure that something that will have come along as an announcement since then will be distracting enough to soften the disappointment though!
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Sounds like the Harrow is trying to become the new source of true prophecies.
Maybe!
To me, the whole reason we scrubbed prophecy from the setting is 100% because it's a cliched fantasy trope that Just Doesn't Work for interactive fiction like an RPG. Nothing's more of a railroad than being told at the start of an adventure what the plot is, and then no matter what your PCs do during the campaign that follows, that plot is how things turned out.
To me, that element of prophecy doesn't work when the people telling the story (the players and the GM) aren't the ones creating the story (the adventure author).
Prophecy stuff can work fine in a novel because the writer's the only one making decisions. It's still, I think, a cliche and a bit on-the-nose.
But the idea of playing through an adventure and getting to the end and realizing that the end result for the world would have been the same had I not played at all is demoralizing and frustrating to me. So I've whole-heartedly embraced the idea that prophecy is not a functional part of the Lost Omens setting.
That said, there being villains in the setting who WANT prophecy, because the WANT to railroad everyone else into falling into line with THEIR vision for the future? That's very much a great plot for a group of high-level PCs to fight against! Hence, the Stolen Fate Adventure Path!
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Yeah, I understand. There will likely be some of that imagery in the Adventure Path, is what I'm saying, but I'm hoping to be able to contextualize it more responsibly during development. It's not the ONLY thing going on, but it's a PART of what's going on.
Whether or not that ends up being a deal-breaker or not... I guess we'll see in about a year. By that point, I'm pretty sure that something that will have come along as an announcement since then will be distracting enough to soften the disappointment though!
I appreciate you always taking time for my thoughts and concerns, James - thank you for these replies! Excited to see Gatewalkers and Stolen Fate both come together, and for whatever distracting surprises Paizo has in store :)
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Sounds like the Harrow is trying to become the new source of true prophecies.Maybe!
To me, the whole reason we scrubbed prophecy from the setting is 100% because it's a cliched fantasy trope that Just Doesn't Work for interactive fiction like an RPG. Nothing's more of a railroad than being told at the start of an adventure what the plot is, and then no matter what your PCs do during the campaign that follows, that plot is how things turned out.
To me, that element of prophecy doesn't work when the people telling the story (the players and the GM) aren't the ones creating the story (the adventure author).
Prophecy stuff can work fine in a novel because the writer's the only one making decisions. It's still, I think, a cliche and a bit on-the-nose.
But the idea of playing through an adventure and getting to the end and realizing that the end result for the world would have been the same had I not played at all is demoralizing and frustrating to me. So I've whole-heartedly embraced the idea that prophecy is not a functional part of the Lost Omens setting.
That said, there being villains in the setting who WANT prophecy, because the WANT to railroad everyone else into falling into line with THEIR vision for the future? That's very much a great plot for a group of high-level PCs to fight against! Hence, the Stolen Fate Adventure Path!
Thanks a lot for all this info and clarification. I really appreciate it tremendously.
I feel any Lawful person would be delighted to have the reliable structure of Fate back. How they would be going about it and what they would be willing to do to achieve it would be the Good-Evil part of their alignment.
With the lack of a clear geographic theme for either of 2023’s front-half Adventure Paths (Gatewalkers and Stolen Fate both bounce around a lot), I’m increasingly wondering if we might not be skipping an Inner Sea meta-region next year for somewhere further afield…
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I'm just going to make a wild guess: the next AP will be a spiritual sequel to Legacy of Fire. Perhaps Nefeshti is interested in the new Wood and Metal genies, and wants the players to be a new incarnation of the Templars of the Five Winds.
Edit: Actually, I think I recall Eleanor mentioning that Metal and Wood planes were either inaccessible or just a lot harder to reach for Golarian, but now are more accessible for some reason.
What could that reason be? Someone mentioned upthread a Drift Crisis in Pathfinder, would a fundamental reordering of the elemental planes qualify? Perhaps its just because I played WoW for so long, but the title "Rage of the Elements" sounds like something Blizzard would call one of their limited time events with elementals everywhere causing havoc.
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One more too, mind the adventure path spoilers
Reading this...I have Medium thoughts.
The party gets Harrow Cards with weird magic powers that they receive without knowing how. The AP is a treasure hunt where you’re tracking them down, and using them to build “The Harrow Court” to customize a Demiplane and get special powers.... Each of the cards has their own powers, passive and active, you build a hand of five, and it becomes an invested ite– like a customized artifact deckbuilding mechanic.
Anyone else having flashbacks to the playtest medium?
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Sounds like the Harrow is trying to become the new source of true prophecies.Maybe!
To me, the whole reason we scrubbed prophecy from the setting is 100% because it's a cliched fantasy trope that Just Doesn't Work for interactive fiction like an RPG. Nothing's more of a railroad than being told at the start of an adventure what the plot is, and then no matter what your PCs do during the campaign that follows, that plot is how things turned out.
To me, that element of prophecy doesn't work when the people telling the story (the players and the GM) aren't the ones creating the story (the adventure author).
Prophecy stuff can work fine in a novel because the writer's the only one making decisions. It's still, I think, a cliche and a bit on-the-nose.
But the idea of playing through an adventure and getting to the end and realizing that the end result for the world would have been the same had I not played at all is demoralizing and frustrating to me. So I've whole-heartedly embraced the idea that prophecy is not a functional part of the Lost Omens setting.
That said, there being villains in the setting who WANT prophecy, because the WANT to railroad everyone else into falling into line with THEIR vision for the future? That's very much a great plot for a group of high-level PCs to fight against! Hence, the Stolen Fate Adventure Path!
I just want to state that I love this so much.
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One more too, mind the adventure path spoilersReading this...I have Medium thoughts.
The party gets Harrow Cards with weird magic powers that they receive without knowing how. The AP is a treasure hunt where you’re tracking them down, and using them to build “The Harrow Court” to customize a Demiplane and get special powers.... Each of the cards has their own powers, passive and active, you build a hand of five, and it becomes an invested ite– like a customized artifact deckbuilding mechanic.Anyone else having flashbacks to the playtest medium?
I don't know why, but the idea of having to build your own Harrow Deck gives me this weird desire to have a card battle with them.
It's time to d-d-d-dddddddd-DUEL!
Edit: Actually, I think I recall Eleanor mentioning that Metal and Wood planes were either inaccessible or just a lot harder to reach for Golarian, but now are more accessible for some reason.
What could that reason be? Someone mentioned upthread a Drift Crisis in Pathfinder, would a fundamental reordering of the elemental planes qualify? Perhaps its just because I played WoW for so long, but the title "Rage of the Elements" sounds like something Blizzard would call one of their limited time events with elementals everywhere causing havoc.
The reason was given on stream: Ranginori being freed by the Pathfinder Society and trying to release his fellow Good elemental lords.
The reason was given on stream: Ranginori being freed by the Pathfinder Society and trying to release his fellow Good elemental lords.Edit: Actually, I think I recall Eleanor mentioning that Metal and Wood planes were either inaccessible or just a lot harder to reach for Golarian, but now are more accessible for some reason.
What could that reason be? Someone mentioned upthread a Drift Crisis in Pathfinder, would a fundamental reordering of the elemental planes qualify? Perhaps its just because I played WoW for so long, but the title "Rage of the Elements" sounds like something Blizzard would call one of their limited time events with elementals everywhere causing havoc.
Him trying to do so affected the imbalance of the Elemental Planes of Air, and subsequently "unsquished" the Planes of Wood and the Planes of Metal. Since it's been so long since those Planes were around prominently, no one knows how to deal with these new Planes. And thus, the need for this book was born!
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Yes, so I've since found out. Someone called me during that part, interrupting my watch of the feed.
Still, the rest of my post holds. Nefeshti is still around as of Inner Sea Magic, so no reason she couldn't guide the heroes to deal with escalating series of crisis while trying to contain the machinations of either a wood or metal genie.
Edit: You know, an elemental plane road trip might be interesting as well. 6 planes. 6 AP issues. Just putting that out there.
Edit Edit: Probably too soon after the previous two APs though; after two 3 part travel APs I'd prefer one that is centered on a single region, but arguably we are in the middle of a full 2 years of APs whose impact does not rise above the regional level. So a year of road trip APs might balance that out, and would certainly tie into "Lost Omens: Travel Guide".
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Edit: You know, an elemental plane road trip might be interesting as well. 6 planes. 6 AP issues. Just putting that out there.
Edit Edit: Probably too soon after the previous two APs though; after two 3 part travel APs I'd prefer one that is centered on a single region, but arguably we are in the middle of a full 2 years of APs whose impact does not rise above the regional level. So a year of road trip APs might balance that out, and would certainly tie into "Lost Omens: Travel Guide".
Seeing the two new planes and allying with Ranginori to free his Goodly pals is kind of a perfect "classic" adventuring campaign, something I still think PF2 is in some need of. We've had some incredible APs, but the best of them have erred towards the idiosyncratic (which I prefer, to be clear) - a romp across the cosmos as Big Damn Heroes against literal incarnate Evil would do quite well for itself.
My preference for a planar AP is still one centered on Basrakal, if we can only get one, but hopefully each major plane is considered its own distinct AP theme in Paizo's mind.
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Michael's closing words on yesterday's panel are just so true even from a customer perspective. Sure, we might not agree with every decision that was made, but at the end of the day all of this is just so cool. The close tie of mechanical support and freedom of choice this system offers is nothing short of excellent.
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One more too, mind the adventure path spoilersReading this...I have Medium thoughts.
The party gets Harrow Cards with weird magic powers that they receive without knowing how. The AP is a treasure hunt where you’re tracking them down, and using them to build “The Harrow Court” to customize a Demiplane and get special powers.... Each of the cards has their own powers, passive and active, you build a hand of five, and it becomes an invested ite– like a customized artifact deckbuilding mechanic.Anyone else having flashbacks to the playtest medium?
It makes me think of Pokemon actually.
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disappointed another year without mythic :(
Honestly? I'll be shocked if we see see a mythic book before at least 2025. I know that's the main thing left in PF2e that you're waiting for, but it might be good to temper your expectations.
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disappointed another year without mythic :(Honestly? I'll be shocked if we see see a mythic book before at least 2025. I know that's the main thing left in PF2e that you're waiting for, but it might be good to temper your expectations.
Mythic feels like a "victory lap" kind of product - something they make once the rest of PF2 is well in hand, and when they narratively feel like making another move as big as closing the Worldwound. It'll likely be years yet, IMO.
But as someone who is playing cheerleader for her own beloved mechanical option (the Inquisitor class), you have my sympathies. Here's hoping we get to go trounce Tar-Baphon soon enough.
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The big problem they have to solve with Mythic is that Mythic was just not very popular in PF1. How much of that was "everybody understood the rules were not well balanced" versus how much was "high power in PF1 play took too long to play and devolved into rocket tag very quickly" and how much of it was "people just prefer lower power characters" is a tricky thing to separate. Since the first problem is solvable, the second problem is kind of solved, and the third problem isn't solvable.
So I wouldn't expect it soon, but there are some stories you probably want to tell about people who get more powerful than PF2 characters normally do.
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I think they're going to announce a kineticist class playtest.
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The big problem they have to solve with Mythic is that Mythic was just not very popular in PF1. How much of that was "everybody understood the rules were not well balanced" versus how much was "high power in PF1 play took too long to play and devolved into rocket tag very quickly" and how much of it was "people just prefer lower power characters" is a tricky thing to separate. Since the first problem is solvable, the second problem is kind of solved, and the third problem isn't solvable.
So I wouldn't expect it soon, but there are some stories you probably want to tell about people who get more powerful than PF2 characters normally do.
Mythic in PF2 is problematic because, in a way, it's already there.
Want to play uber-powerful adventurers ? Get 2 free levels. That's it.
Going past level 20 is something else. But it's not the scope of PF1 Mythic. It's the scope of DnD Epic.
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I can easily imagine Mythic being its own Archetype Slot that lets you bend the rules of the system. You might only be a level 3 Cleric, but your Mythic Archetype lets you refresh spell slots or Focus Points without resting once per day - that sort of thing. Martials might get to ignore their MAP or gain some extraordinary movement.
This approach even fits for the Owlcat Mythic approach of specific, flavored Mythic Paths. Who could resist buying a book that adds the Angel or Fey Noble Mythic Archetypes? There’d be a ton of room for expansion; “Oh, this Ravounel AP has a Silver Raven Mythic Archetype!” Treat them like 4e Epic Destinies, with a place in the world.
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I think they're going to announce a kineticist class playtest.
Ha, called it!