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I admittedly never played a real session with either the 1E mythic rules or the D&D 3E epic rules, so my main experience with them is through their respective CRPG adaptations. That said, the thing I liked about the mythic paths in WotR was the opportunity to get a little silly with it.
The myths of our world about beings who acquire these levels of power get pretty ridiculous - wrestling suns, moons, and various other celestial objects, doing everything in your power to prevent your parents (the sky and earth) from making more babies, changing the very terrain of the earth through seemingly mundane actions, etc. So being able to do stuff like going
There's a place for very grave and serious mythic campaigns and shorter stories of course, but I think acknowledging the silliness of the source material is valuable, too. When players have spent a long time building up to this point in the first place in anticipation of being able to make big, cosmic changes, sometimes it's nice to just let them. You've earned the power fantasy, have at 'em.
One mythic idea i've had for awhile is.(to help bring it back to the original subject)
Cayden Cailean and Abadar have made a bet. You(the players) have been chosen to represent Cayden. The goal...Successfully pull off a heist in abadars vault.
and Low-level mythic to me, is about progress and potential. Mentors recognizing that one day you might surpass them. Or having unique abilities that make you excel in one way(incredible healing factor or durability but only average strength). Low level mythic would be like street level heroes in comic books. They are capable of incredible feats, sometimes in a very specific way stronger than someone who is overall more powerful. (I hope this makes sense)
Divine heist sounds like a ton of fun.
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Just to close off what was brought up before about a different system: I think there have been a few unnecessarily flippant answers, but I think the real answer is "because this thread is a thought exercise about what stories a possible Mythic PF2e rule system could be fun to play". In general, taking a step back and asking if there's a better system to play the type of campaign you want can be reasonable, just not what this thread is for.
/subthread, for real, let's move on.
@pixierose: Oooh, I also love the idea of a divine heist.
In general I'm a sucker for a setting/story that involves stakes at such a high level that there's solid reason to be interacting a lot with entire pantheons worth of deities and other cosmic-level entities.
For another story more on the whimsical side: What if you're a party of poppets just trying to save your kid/owner from an unnecessarily large threat from the First World? Like you're a level one party, but then secretly it turns out your kid is a big "chosen one" or otherwise catches the attention of shockingly obscene fey powers, and the Power of Friendship (TM) gives you the Mythic powers you need to face off against it.
One mythic idea i've had for awhile is.(to help bring it back to the original subject)
Cayden Cailean and Abadar have made a bet. You(the players) have been chosen to represent Cayden. The goal...Successfully pull off a heist in abadars vault.
and Low-level mythic to me, is about progress and potential. Mentors recognizing that one day you might surpass them. Or having unique abilities that make you excel in one way(incredible healing factor or durability but only average strength). Low level mythic would be like street level heroes in comic books. They are capable of incredible feats, sometimes in a very specific way stronger than someone who is overall more powerful. (I hope this makes sense)
TBH, that doesn't really differentiate "low-level" mythic from just plain old "low level". As someone who has played quite a bit of MnM, I can confidently say that "low-level" mythic doesn't really translate to "street level hero" at all. The assumptions are entirely different, for one.
This brings us back to the difference between the "normal" level system (including the expectations of "epic level/super-high level" etc.) and "mythic."
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There have been quite a few comments about "what is the difference between a low-level mythic character and a mid-level standard character", which is a reasonable question when one is considering mythic as a power boost. I'm aware keftiu doesn't want this thread to devolve into specific discussion of the mechanics of mythic, so I'm going to try and provide my perspective on this without drifting too far into mechanical comparisons.
I've really enjoyed some of the things Mythic can do to a campaign in pf1 - I modified Serpent's Skull to include a substantial amount of mythic tiers, played Carrion Crown with the addition of a couple of mythic tiers, and had planned for my Hell's Rebels table to get a mythic tier before the direction of the campaign changed. Suffice to say, I've got a bit of experience with the system in PF1! There are a lot of power increases in the system, but the bits that I enjoy most from mythic aren't related to that. I'm going to list a few examples of the sorts of abilities that you could get in low-level mythic on the full-speed track (under level 7 - mythic tier 3 and below) that aren't purely power boosts and that I enjoyed the narrative of:
- Longevity (tier 1/ level 2), where you continue to age but take no penalties from it and cannot die of old age. There's less mechanics around this in PF2, but it's a fun one to have regardless.
- Legendary Item (tier 1/ level 2), where you have something close to a PF2 relic that you got to design that is bonded to you specifically, and is part of your mythic deeds. It's fun to take your signature weapon to a much more personalized place!
- Mythic Sustenance (tier 1/level 2), where you no longer need to eat, breathe, or drink to live.
- Beyond Morality (tier 3/ level 6), where you no longer have an alignment - always counting as whatever the most favourable alignment is for requirements/effects. I'm a little conflicted on alignment in general, but if it exists in a setting, it's definitely fun to mess around with it by having a character outside the box!
- Divine Source (tier 3/ level 6), where you become capable of granting spells to those who worship you. It's certainly narratively interesting to be able to be a demigod of sorts!
- Sleepless (tier 3/ level 6), where you no longer need to sleep and can simply relax for an hour to meditate and get your daily abilities.
Those are all universal - they can be taken by any mythic character. The more specific ones are often a little more mechanically/power focused, though there are certainly fun ones in those lists too (like the ability to take on a Disguise Self at-will). All of the above are technically power increases, but not in the way that a bonus to a number would be, and they enable interesting stories that are different in tone to the typical stories we see in PF2. They give everyone an area of specialisation too, and they don't do so by breaking the maths, which I do find fun.
In terms of the sorts of stories they lead to, I think a good example is a character with Sleepless and Mythic Sustenance. Without mythic, you could have a situation where a character shows off their endurance by holding a door closed as monsters tried to push it open. You could have a higher level character push it open more easily, and maybe last a little longer. But the mythic character I mentioned above could hold the door closed for two days as the rest of the party evacuates the entire town from the danger within. A low-level non-mythic character could inspire the townsfolk to protect themselves from the undead with a good speech, a mid-level non-mythic character could inspire them with a better speech, a mid-level mythic character could let them cast Heal to protect themselves through their faith in the character. Technically there could be archetypes that push you in these sorts of directions, but the advantage of mythic is that it is explicitly designed to tell higher-powered stories for these specific abilities, and can do so without needing to break the maths or any of the other excellent reasons to play PF2. These stories work well in the base framework of PF2, they just need abilities of the appropriate flavour to be able to be performed!
More story ideas after chatting with my roommate (seriously the two of us have a blast riffing ideas off each other):
* Rovagug is returning, Pharasma is ready to hit the nope button on the universe, and the party must fight not only Rovagug but also Pharasma's agents from just calling it. Definitely a great opportunity for an appearance from Groteus as well, even if it's just a post-campaign "I guess it's not my time yet thanks to you. Well, good luck with what you saved. Hope it's worth it."
* Aroden has returned, except he seems.... off. Outright demanding the mantle back from Iomadae, but also appearing to lay the groundworks for bad plans.
* Cheliax is desperate. They WILL return to their former glory. No, even more powerful! They will make any new contract, any new covenant, even if it means unleashing threats beyond even the Worldwound.
* Similar to how domains were split between Lamashtu and Desna after a god died, there is a new power struggle to take the domains from an existing god, by any means necessary.
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I’d like to take a shot at this!
My Mythic storythot would include the following:
• One of Asmodeus’ early contracts that is not as ironclad as his later ones
• Grandmother Spider’s discovery and exploitation of this contract to embarrass him (always punch up!) in order to…
• …aid a divinity (Cayden Caylean is my vote) who wishes to reverse their divine nature and become mortal again
A mythic story about a god shucking their power has good mouthfeel to me.
Cayden Cailean and Abadar have made a bet. You(the players) have been chosen to represent Cayden. The goal...Successfully pull off a heist in abadars vault.
Ohhhh. That sounds super fun.
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I've never really understood the concept of Mythic in PF1. It's just a layer of power over normal levelling. It was working ok because the game was not tightly balanced so it was just breaking everything like most of the game options, but in PF2... I really don't see how to make it work.
I'd prefer Mythic to tell stories that can't be told with the normal system. For that, the Mythic layer needs to bring something else than just more power.
That is basically where I'm at. Just having leveling past 20 makes more sense to me.
To pitch another "mythic campaign" idea, set in a planned campaign on Exandria of Crit Role fame, a group of villains breaking the Divine Gate and the heroes needing to stop them from completely reshaping the cosmology.
That is basically where I'm at. Just having leveling past 20 makes more sense to me.I've never really understood the concept of Mythic in PF1. It's just a layer of power over normal levelling. It was working ok because the game was not tightly balanced so it was just breaking everything like most of the game options, but in PF2... I really don't see how to make it work.
I'd prefer Mythic to tell stories that can't be told with the normal system. For that, the Mythic layer needs to bring something else than just more power.
Yeah, but that runs into the separate problem of "not being able to build what you want,"
This is still dealing with the dichotomy between "high level" and "mythic" anyways.
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It's deeply weird to say "pick another system" for something for which first edition literally had rules for.I don't think it's weird to say first edition had too much going on. Controversial, but not weird.
I don't think "too much going on" even touches on "there's lots of different stories you can tell." Like rules for a horror campaign, or a hexploration campaign, or an intrigue campaign don't generate bloat because you're probably not doing all three at once.
So the question of this thread is essentially "what stories are would Mythic rules enable you to tell that you are not currently able to tell."
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It always annoyed me that none of the demi-god level bosses statted up for pf1e were actual demigods. Well, they were, but they all fit into a subcategory; archfiends, empyreal lords, great old ones, elemental lords.
I believe the only unaffiliated demigod to ever get statted up properly was Achaekek back in the 3.5 days. I'd have liked to have seen characters like Apsu, Dahak, Ghlaunder, Kurgess, and Zyphus statted and fight-able as well.
It always annoyed me that none of the demi-god level bosses statted up for pf1e were actual demigods. Well, they were, but they all fit into a subcategory; archfiends, empyreal lords, great old ones, elemental lords.
I believe the only unaffiliated demigod to ever get statted up properly was Achaekek back in the 3.5 days. I'd have liked to have seen characters like Apsu, Dahak, Ghlaunder, Kurgess, and Zyphus statted and fight-able as well.
To add on to this wonkiness-- these dudes who have been around for practically (sometimes literally) forever fail out to people who have touched a rock in a church.
That is to say, despite lacking literally thousands if not orders of magnitude more years of experience compared to the above, normal mortals (especially painfully ridiculous in Cayden's case) touched the Starstone and instantly attained God status.
We honestly need an explanation why all those "demigods" aren't lining up to take shots at the Starstone.
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It always annoyed me that none of the demi-god level bosses statted up for pf1e were actual demigods. Well, they were, but they all fit into a subcategory; archfiends, empyreal lords, great old ones, elemental lords.
I believe the only unaffiliated demigod to ever get statted up properly was Achaekek back in the 3.5 days. I'd have liked to have seen characters like Apsu, Dahak, Ghlaunder, Kurgess, and Zyphus statted and fight-able as well.
To add on to this wonkiness-- these dudes who have been around for practically (sometimes literally) forever fail out to people who have touched a rock in a church.
That is to say, despite lacking literally thousands if not orders of magnitude more years of experience compared to the above, normal mortals (especially painfully ridiculous in Cayden's case) touched the Starstone and instantly attained God status.
We honestly need an explanation why all those "demigods" aren't lining up to take shots at the Starstone.
I mean, if we go by old "1e gods with four domains are demigods" then none of them count. I've also never heard anywhere in lore about Apsu, Dahak, Ghaulander or Zyphus being demigods. (tbf I don't think I've heard Kurgess being confirmed to be demigod either, but I don't remember exact story of his ascension and details about it so I don't include him there x'D)
That said, there IS actually reason why god can't power up by touching starstone :P
(its that completing starstone test successfully ascends you into demigod with potential to become true god. It on otherwords grants a divine spark, which demigods already have)
It always annoyed me that none of the demi-god level bosses statted up for pf1e were actual demigods. Well, they were, but they all fit into a subcategory; archfiends, empyreal lords, great old ones, elemental lords.
I believe the only unaffiliated demigod to ever get statted up properly was Achaekek back in the 3.5 days. I'd have liked to have seen characters like Apsu, Dahak, Ghlaunder, Kurgess, and Zyphus statted and fight-able as well.
To add on to this wonkiness-- these dudes who have been around for practically (sometimes literally) forever fail out to people who have touched a rock in a church.
That is to say, despite lacking literally thousands if not orders of magnitude more years of experience compared to the above, normal mortals (especially painfully ridiculous in Cayden's case) touched the Starstone and instantly attained God status.
We honestly need an explanation why all those "demigods" aren't lining up to take shots at the Starstone.
I mean, if we go by old "1e gods with four domains are demigods" then none of them count. I've also never heard anywhere in lore about Apsu, Dahak, Ghaulander or Zyphus being demigods. (tbf I don't think I've heard Kurgess being confirmed to be demigod either, but I don't remember exact story of his ascension and details about it so I don't include him there x'D)
That said, there IS actually reason why god can't power up by touching starstone :P
(its that completing starstone test successfully ascends you into demigod with potential to become true god. It in other words grants a divine spark, which demigods already have)
Uh, sources? Afaik the likes of Cayden and Iomedae instantly became two of the preeminent deities in the setting by touching that rock. There is no mention of just becoming a "demigod."
Also, personally, I really detest the divine bloat that PF and D&D can have sometimes. It's not on the level of IRL "god of a door hinge" but it's hard to take the setting seriously when it goes out of its way to insist that "the Gods are like SO SO SUPER DUPER IMPORTANT YOU GUYS" when Zyphus exists. Just cheapens the whole thing.
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It always annoyed me that none of the demi-god level bosses statted up for pf1e were actual demigods. Well, they were, but they all fit into a subcategory; archfiends, empyreal lords, great old ones, elemental lords.
I believe the only unaffiliated demigod to ever get statted up properly was Achaekek back in the 3.5 days. I'd have liked to have seen characters like Apsu, Dahak, Ghlaunder, Kurgess, and Zyphus statted and fight-able as well.
To add on to this wonkiness-- these dudes who have been around for practically (sometimes literally) forever fail out to people who have touched a rock in a church.
That is to say, despite lacking literally thousands if not orders of magnitude more years of experience compared to the above, normal mortals (especially painfully ridiculous in Cayden's case) touched the Starstone and instantly attained God status.
We honestly need an explanation why all those "demigods" aren't lining up to take shots at the Starstone.
I mean, if we go by old "1e gods with four domains are demigods" then none of them count. I've also never heard anywhere in lore about Apsu, Dahak, Ghaulander or Zyphus being demigods. (tbf I don't think I've heard Kurgess being confirmed to be demigod either, but I don't remember exact story of his ascension and details about it so I don't include him there x'D)
That said, there IS actually reason why god can't power up by touching starstone :P
(its that completing starstone test successfully ascends you into demigod with potential to become true god. It in other words grants a divine spark, which demigods already have)
Uh, sources? Afaik the likes of Cayden and Iomedae instantly became two of the preeminent deities in the setting by touching that rock. There is no mention of just becoming a "demigod."
Also, personally, I really detest the divine bloat that PF and D&D can have sometimes. It's not on the level of IRL "god of a door hinge" but...
Mythic Realms has a section on the Starstone, which does mention this:
The Starstone: Perhaps the most famous source of mythic power in the Inner Sea region, the Starstone has brought about the ascension of four mortals to godhood. By reaching the stone and petitioning to the gods, mortals can gain the favor of the existing pantheon and claim a place among the gods as they advance along their mythic paths.
...
Aroden was the first to use this Starstone to gain the attention of gods, and in return for setting a guard against its misuse, he was elevated among the divine.
...
When you ascend to mythic power with the Starstone, you most likely gain tiers of the hierophant path and can entreat a deity for aid, swearing to further her goals in return for a measure of her power. The deity might immediately accept or reject you.
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My understanding is that when you undertake the test of the Starstone and you survive your reward can be anything from "you get to walk away with your life" to "fabulous riches" to "full godhood." A significant part of the test takes place *after* you touch the rock.
If you take the test as someone who is worthy of being a God, and pass it, then you are one.
My personal issue with “mythic” = assent to divinity as an adventure narrative is that it is just not multi-player and it doesn’t work well with creating a stable lore for the setting. I can understand the appeal of writing such stories for yourself, but playing them out in an existing RPG with out essentially turning the whole game into a story about the rise of 4 new gods in the setting, and how much that breaks that game from really ever re-entering the Golarion Universe.
Maybe eventual it exists as a supplement for people to homebrew their very own campaigns, but even Wrath of the Righteous has to canonically end with these heroes completely disappearing from the setting. So the campaign is you get to be a new group of gods who exist maybe for a month to a year of two, maybe, and disappear forever from the setting? It is really hard to see that as a fun collaborative adventure and not just an individual exercise in world building.
I can understand folks looking for it as a post script send off, past the end of another AP, but that feels way more like something that fits in the “Beyond the campaign” section of an AP to me. Maybe someone could write post script, level 20+ send offs for existing APs that give players world shaping endings to their stories, but I don’t think that could ever really work into official cannon. It would be here’s your spin off ending for a “what if” universe.
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My personal issue with “mythic” = assent to divinity as an adventure narrative is that it is just not multi-player and it doesn’t work well with creating a stable lore for the setting. I can understand the appeal of writing such stories for yourself, but playing them out in an existing RPG with out essentially turning the whole game into a story about the rise of 4 new gods in the setting, and how much that breaks that game from really ever re-entering the Golarion Universe.
Maybe eventual it exists as a supplement for people to homebrew their very own campaigns, but even Wrath of the Righteous has to canonically end with these heroes completely disappearing from the setting. So the campaign is you get to be a new group of gods who exist maybe for a month to a year of two, maybe, and disappear forever from the setting? It is really hard to see that as a fun collaborative adventure and not just an individual exercise in world building.
I can understand folks looking for it as a post script send off, past the end of another AP, but that feels way more like something that fits in the “Beyond the campaign” section of an AP to me. Maybe someone could write post script, level 20+ send offs for existing APs that give players world shaping endings to their stories, but I don’t think that could ever really work into official cannon. It would be here’s your spin off ending for a “what if” universe.
How do you feel about Hero-Gods, who we've heard word of in Arcadia, Iblydos, and Vudra? They're mortals imbued with some degree of godlike power in life, including granting spells to followers, but most of them pass on normally after dying - only a small few have become true, enduring deities.
It's felt to me like the concept clearly exists to be emulated by PCs eventually, and at least to me is a satisfying middle ground between "regular heroes" and "literal demigods."
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I'm sorry, but in a thread about what we want from mythic (yes, it says stories, but I consider it more general), saying 'why not just start at higher level' is pretty danged insulting from my point of view.explain to me the difference between a level 1 character with mithic powers, and a level 5 character? like, "I am mythic but there are hundreds of normal people better than me in every way" does not seem like something that makes sense. And The Raven Black was saying that they would like to have low level mythic to utilize incredible abilities from the start of the game... which is doable by just starting at a higher level. if mythic is at all related to power, having it start anywhere but end game doesn't make any sense to me because the powerlevel you are looking for... already exists.
Easy. As others already stated and what I tried to say with my NPC rules bit :
a low-level character that has just a few, maybe only one, ability that is extraordinary for their level.
The kind of stories about otherwise ordinary (low-level) people who rub elbows with extraordinary creatures (high-level, even deities and beyond) and deal with incredible situations.
Where you can do things usually reserved to high-level adventurers (say hit and damage a Demon lord) without being more than Trained.
Authors often use specific circumstances (the proper place and time) or items (the exact proper weapon) to write stories like this. Why not make it a part of the specific PCs rather than something external ? I believe it would often feel less contrived.
Mea-culpa, I did pull the specific names I used in that previous post by pulling from the list of deities covered in Inner Sea Faiths because I couldn't remember specific demigods off the top of my head & at the time I made the post I didn't have the time to go through and specifically check which ones were demigods in the power sense and which were just minor deities in the "not widely worshipped" sense.
My overall point stands, however; that I would have liked to have had a no strings attached, not a demon lord, not an archdevil, not a horseman, not an empyreal lord, not a great old one, just a plain, unattached, demigod or two to fight. I think that would have been fun.
Also on the Starstone point, I do believe with Iomedae specifically she spent a while as a secondary god to Aroden & only really reached her current importance after his death.
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My understanding is that when you undertake the test of the Starstone and you survive your reward can be anything from "you get to walk away with your life" to "fabulous riches" to "full godhood." A significant part of the test takes place *after* you touch the rock.
If you take the test as someone who is worthy of being a God, and pass it, then you are one.
See, I always understood it as, "walk away with your life" and "fabulous riches" were the consolation prize for getting into the temple & out alive without actually reaching the stone itself - with the fabulous riches specifically implied to be from looting the corpses of all the people who didn't make it out alive.
But getting to the rock & not dying - if we're to take the cover art of Gods & Magic literally, apparently there's something in that room that just kills you - gives you the divine spark, it's just that only three people have got that far.
Video games are single player experiences that can handle the full world changing godlike power well.
Sequential APs that are not just about 1 really powerful character, but around 4 become more challenging with the lore when the end result is gaining power to the level of taking on domains and granting powers. Pretty much their entire story, including what happens to these god-beings after the AP needs to be pretty well contained in the adventure or with a couple paragraphs post script.
Yes every AP has this to a minor extent, but killing gods and replacing them in the lore is a very big deal. In parts of the setting left very open ended it is certainly possible, but probably at the cost of not going back to those settings again afterwards, at least not anytime soon.
Sure being bloodlords of Geb feels like a big deal in the campaign, but the campaign ends and Geb is till there with various blood lords and factions of blood lords that are very powerful. When APs return near the river kingdoms for example, THE kingmaker kingdom is pretty much a never return site. There is just too many open ended questions for that to be satisfying. They can go close, but not into the heart of it again. When Age of Ashes does it with Kintargo, for example, it works because the heroes are gone and they were more of a shadowy group to begin with, not making big fundamental choices about the future direction of the city.
Mythic campaigns in a setting are either completely destroy the foundation of that setting and have the characters disappear, or never go back adventures. Maybe the island of Iblydos works for that, but I’d rather not see that happen to any large part of Vudra or Arcadia, not before we really get to spend some time there.
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Mythic campaigns in a setting are either completely destroy the foundation of that setting and have the characters disappear, or never go back adventures. Maybe the island of Iblydos works for that, but I’d rather not see that happen to any large part of Vudra or Arcadia, not before we really get to spend some time there.
I mean, did the Argonauts really change the status quo of legendary Greece at all?
You can have a Mythic quest that feels relatively contained, especially if it culminates in something like acquiring a relic or slaying a singular being (an especially nasty hydra, an infernal duke, a demon lord, a Spawn of Rovagug, etc).
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Mythic campaigns in a setting are either completely destroy the foundation of that setting and have the characters disappear, or never go back adventures. Maybe the island of Iblydos works for that, but I’d rather not see that happen to any large part of Vudra or Arcadia, not before we really get to spend some time there.I mean, did the Argonauts really change the status quo of legendary Greece at all?
You can have a Mythic quest that feels relatively contained, especially if it culminates in something like acquiring a relic or slaying a singular being (an especially nasty hydra, an infernal duke, a demon lord, a Spawn of Rovagug, etc).
I feel that's something of a false equivalence in that greek mythology didn't have a status quo in the same way that a modern tabletop setting does.
But I'm also of the opinion with Kasper that concerns about the status quo are irrelevant because what happens at one table has no bearing on what happens at another table. My wrath of the righteous game ended with Nocticula being very, permanently, dead, for instance.
Now, maybe there's some valid concerns in so far as what published adventure paths do & don't consider canon, but that doesn't mean that paizo shouldn't provide us with the tools to tell our own stories. I prefer tabletop games as sandboxes where the develops give us the toys to play with & we make our own stories with what they provide, rather than them dictating stories to us.
snip about the starstone
From that specific wording, it seems to me that the Starstone actually merely grants you the "attention" of the pantheon, who then do things like give you godhood. That is, it's certainly not the be-all end-all of the mythic trials, which is weird since the writers sometimes seem to think it is.
Also, Zyphus just has this ridiculous little non-domain of "accidental death." I had him to be a demoted god since starting off with such a useless portfolio makes no sense. It's on the level of "rules over door hinges."
How do you feel about Hero-Gods, who we've heard word of in Arcadia, Iblydos, and Vudra? They're mortals imbued with some degree of godlike power in life, including granting spells to followers, but most of them pass on normally after dying - only a small few have become true, enduring deities.It's felt to me like the concept clearly exists to be emulated by PCs eventually, and at least to me is a satisfying middle ground between "regular heroes" and "literal demigods."
TBH, I feel as if we still need a clearer division between "normal" level progression and "low-level mythic." I mean, certainly "normal" medieval people would never be able to take on troops worth of modernized soldiers empowered with magic and undead and so on.
I am of course not saying that "we must eradicate this" but I am saying we need a way to differentiate between different "tiers" for players and GMs alike.
I did have a Mythic idea (dating back to Epic rules) where the PCs' efforts remade the cosmos. It'd involve all the high-level PCs (and NPCs, including fantasy heroes "away until needed" like King Arthur). This would let the players choose their favorite PC from all of our campaigns for this monumental capstone campaign.
In brief, they'd awaken in a place storing said heroes (and which if my rusty recollection is correct is hinted at in Planescape material in one of the Good planes). Except of course, we can't have all these contenders so there'd be havoc ASAP, i.e. the Tarrasque being sent to tear through the heroes in stasis. (So yeah, new campaign, first encounter: Tarrasque!)
The heroes would collect macguffins from throughout the planes, vying against the Beholder god w/ their Gibbering Orbs and all manner of aberrant Elder One abominations that have unleashed the maelstrom beyond Limbo & the Abyss, including Tharizdun. While the actual gods engaged in all out warfare (most teaming together), the heroes would become the deciding factor, with the players having to choose when to hunt macguffins and when to buy more time aiding staving off the dissolution of the stable cosmos.
Said macguffins would include the three keys of Law (a DnD concept though hints of similar concepts occur elsewhere).
If and when all said macguffins (including some rites) were acquired, the heroes wouldn't so much save the cosmos as recreate it in a primal state (mirroring Golarion's First World in fact). The players would contribute their ideas to its construction and their PCs would be the core pantheon of a new campaign world (perhaps alongside survivors).
Yes, grognards might recognize that the Gord novels by Gygax have a similar climax, albeit written more in a "I created Greyhawk, I can destroy it" kind of way leading to a new RPG campaign world (with characters carried over to go play there). My idea wasn't to copy, rather as an excuse to delve into all these horrific realms those Planescape maps dangled in front of me. :-)
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I mean, did the Argonauts really change the status quo of legendary Greece at all?
But, on the other hand, is there anything Jason and the Argonauts really did that you could not see a non-mythic Pathfinder party doing? A lot of like the "Greek mythological Heroes" seem like non mythic people- Jason, Perseus, Theseus, Odysseus, etc. were normal dudes who did big things- like most Pathfinder characters who succeed.
The only ones that really felt "Mythic" in the Pathfinder sense were Heracles and Achilles, and those were both children of a God.
Like "fight a sea serpent" or "navigate a labyrinth" are just things that normal characters do at the appropriate level. So even though in the real world we tell stories about those guys, is anything gained from framing them as Mythic in Pathfinder? It seems like "these are the heroes that people tell stories about" is a way to think of Mythic characters from the top down, but it really doesn't work from the bottom up- which is normally how characters are built. In reality we tell stories of people in myths when they do really impressive things, but "really impressive things" is normal for an elfgame- the PCs save the darn world every couple of years and we can't frame the PCs as "they have done really impressive things" before they've actually done them.
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Speaking of Planescape, and to a degree of Ravenloft and some other DnD 2nd ed. adventures, there was a style that captured "Mythic" without necessarily going into Epic power levels. Low level parties would interact with settings & creatures traditionally reserved for higher ones, even the highest like the throne room of a deity for example*. So much atmosphere, yet not from mechanics, rather narrative choices, often including walking a treacherous path both socially and environmentally.
That narration's possible in PF2/Golarion, and to be fair I think has occurred many times outside WotR, i.e. racing ships through the Eye of Abendego or PFS season finales. Compared to most planet-based campaign worlds, Golarion has lots of ongoing active mythic sites of grand scale available.
Discuss. :-)
One difference to note is that in Planescape & Ravenloft PCs regularly interacted with insurmountable powers-that-be (albeit indirectly for the most part). Meanwhile, the PFS non-Mythic scenarios (especially guarding that city from invasion!) around the Worldwound were damn mythic without those rules, while the PFS scenarios with Mythic rules were mediocre (and to me so disappointing they nixed my interest). Reminds me that Odysseus had been outmatched, though "struggling to survive" might not suit Golarion's heroic "struggle thereby thrive" sensibilities. How many players would settle for "fleeing Cyclops in functional ship" as a win condition?
*said deity (I believe an iconic Titan?) wasn't present, yet in many ways he was since ya' know, deity's realm & resonance. Very intimidating. Reminds me of another one where a deity's avatar passing by (and not that close, not even seen) causes an unnerving ripple. I forget if there was a mechanical effect i.e. confusion effect or simply an emotional one, but yeah, pretty mythic for a mid-level PC to experience.
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I'm wondering if a better comparison for the difference between normal play & mythic might not be the difference between the events & capacity of the characters in the Hobbit & Lord of the Rings vs the events & capacity of the characters in the Silmarillion, as opposed to discussions of greek mythology.
I think that might be a more useful framing when we look at a normal campaign as saving the world from the dark lord & a powerful wizard & having a boss fight against a high level fiend & destroying the evil artifact, vs the mythic campaign of forging items of such beauty they captivate the gods, dueling demigods in single combat, fighting dragons so massive that they ruin three mountains when they crash to the earth, slaying so many trolls that your weapons literally melt to slag in your hands from the effort, so on and so forth.
I don't know that that answers the question of, what separates a low level mythic character from a mid level character & I don't know that this framing doesn't just become, Hobbit= low level campaign, LotR= mid level campaign, Silmarillion= high level campaign.
Then again, I suppose I'm not sold on mythic as a parallel system. Might be that I'm willing to write it off as an interesting experiment that didn't really work out. But in any event I am interested in a progression system that gives us something more powerful than Treerazer to fight because I really don't like Treerazer.
Then again, I suppose I'm not sold on mythic as a parallel system. Might be that I'm willing to write it off as an interesting experiment that didn't really work out. But in any event I am interested in a progression system that gives us something more powerful than Treerazer to fight because I really don't like Treerazer.
So then that's shifts the question to whether just doing away with the "parallel progression" and shifting everything into the "normal" progression is the best way.
Personally I feel like it is, but if so we are really going to need to make clear divisions between the different "tiers."
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snip about the starstoneFrom that specific wording, it seems to me that the Starstone actually merely grants you the "attention" of the pantheon, who then do things like give you godhood. That is, it's certainly not the be-all end-all of the mythic trials, which is weird since the writers sometimes seem to think it is.
Also, Zyphus just has this ridiculous little non-domain of "accidental death." I had him to be a demoted god since starting off with such a useless portfolio makes no sense. It's on the level of "rules over door hinges."
I've never really seen Zyphus as too too niche. Like, whilst he is going by purely going by "yeah he's the god of accidental death", but really that title just feels like a way of helping to describe his "idea" in the most simple way. If they just said "he's a god of death" that'll tell you pretty much nothing about what outlook on death he actually has, his view on death focusing on a nihilistic take on the pointlessness, unreasonableness of it. That does not feel like some small insignificant idea--it's just another take on how a god of death can work.
If you wanted to go against some overly niche deities, I'm not going to deny they exist, I'd suggest looking at some Empyreal Lords / Archdemons / whatever for examples (though they are admittedly demigods) or perhaps the more general issue of the setting simply allowing lots of gods of the same thing. I just feel writing Zyphus off entirely as overly niche feels wrong.
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Obviously, Tar-Baphon needs to get smacked down, likely as the climactic end to the edition - which opens the door to other storylines!
didn't happen for 1st edition, unfortunately, unlikely to happen for the 2nd.
But I've obviously heard my ideas - tell me about yours!
There's a hook at the end of GIANTSLAYER about a dream gigas who might begin intruding into the world of mortal dreams.
That might be pretty cool. But probably not high level enough.
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didn't happen for 1st edition, unfortunately, unlikely to happen for the 2nd.Obviously, Tar-Baphon needs to get smacked down, likely as the climactic end to the edition - which opens the door to other storylines!
I mean, Tar-Baphon wasn't even a thread on the board until the final Adventure Path of 1e; I figure you finish one edition by getting him out, let him be big and scary for an entire edition, the knock his head off as the glorious finale... until the next iteration of this thing, anyway.
Not that I'm in any rush :)
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Like think of this as professional wrestling. The big bad needs to be taken seriously, but they will always lose in the end because that's the most satisfying story. Once you take out that guy, there's always going to be the next one, but the chase (to take down the bad guy on top) in in some sense more interesting than "good has triumphed, now try to keep everything together."
Tar-Baphon's going to go down right when it's going to be satisfying and when they have the next "serious problem facing Golarion" figured out and foreshadowed.
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Like think of this as professional wrestling. The big bad needs to be taken seriously, but they will always lose in the end because that's the most satisfying story. Once you take out that guy, there's always going to be the next one, but the chase (to take down the bad guy on top) in in some sense more interesting than "good has triumphed, now try to keep everything together."
Tar-Baphon's going to go down right when it's going to be satisfying and when they have the next "serious problem facing Golarion" figured out and foreshadowed.
Now you're talking my language.
Of course, as the Original Sheik learned the hard way in Detroit, if you drag the story out too long, you risk burning your audience.
For context, the Sheik was a top wrestling bad guy during the 60s & 70s, he'd bring in a different wrestling hero for each show who he'd beat with dastardly tactics. This went on for *years* before he brought in Andre the Giant, whom everyone assumed would finally defeat him. The Sheik hit him with a fire ball and knocked Andre out of the ring, winning the match by count-out in about three minutes, and it killed the town with audiences not going back for the better part of a decade. Point being, you can only milk something for so long before you need to strike, and missing that mark can cause a considerable backlash.
Which isn't to say that Paizo's at any real risk of doing that.
Having said that, let's look at options for who the next big bad is, & tying that into discussions on where I'd like to see a mythic/epic level ap take place, honestly I'm not sure.
If we take a step back, all the way back to the original campaign setting book from back in 2008, what can we say was set up then that would have been as big or bigger than Tar-Baphon?
Not much as he was slotted in as the big bad from the start. The return of other Runelords beyond Karzoug, maybe, but we dealt with that & short of Shorshan making another heel turn to continue with the wrestling analogy, I don't see that as a well they're going back to.
The World-Wound? I'd say that's one of two things that's unquestionably bigger than Tar-Baphon but that's also probably why it was dealt with first as the introduction to mythic, and while there's still adventures to be had in the region, they aren't necessarily mythic in nature.
Which, I'm going to take a detour for a moment to talk about an issue with the mythic system as a parallel power system that Wrath kind of high lights; an actual, honest to god, full scale demonic invasion of the prime material plane, was not - in and of itself - enough to qualify as a mythic problem. It necessitated the invention of the Nahyndrian Crystals as a (imo) rather clumsy Applied Phlebotinum to explain where the mythic powers of the lower level enemies were coming from. I personally found that to be a bit trite, and it high lights a structural issue with putting mythic threats throughout the campaign, is that there isn't really a linear progression from fighting the CR 20-25 stuff into fighting the CR 26-30 stuff. There either needs to be a contrivance as to there being lesser mythic creatures along the path of this story progression or there needs to be a plot device explaining them which doesn't land with much more grace. But, I've digressed long enough.
So, after that, you've got the Pit of Gormuz as the other thing that I'd call "unquestionably bigger than Tar-Baphon". Like, the hole the Tarrasque crawled out of, that leads down to the prison of the god of destruction, is about as big as it gets. I know Jacobs once said that he considered Rovagug, rather than Tar-Baphon, the true final boss of Pathfinder, not that I imagine we'll ever get to fight Rovagug. I'll also say that the Pit was my personal pitch for next mythic path after Wrath came out, but that was quite a few years ago now. And while I would still like to have a Pit of Gormuz AP, I don't think you could make anything associated with the Pit *the* big bad after Tar-Baphon, for a few reasons. Firstly being that the Spawn of Rovagug are quite lacking in personality, and a good villain needs personality. Sure, you've got Multh, Raskineya, Hathriss, & Kohal down there(I have Mythic Realms open right now) but I don't think any of them are going to be gracing the covers of major 3e Lost Omens books. There's also the issue of, you can get away with Tar-Baphon kind of building strength & biding time for a while before he needs to start conquering places again, and you could get away with the World Wound being a problem that was being held at bay just barely until the time to actually tackle it was upon us, but if the Pit of Gormuz is the focus, anything coming out of that is going to be wreaking untold & immediate destruction in a way that either needs to be immediately stopped or is going to cause major issues for the setting. That's something that can be dealt with over the course of a contained AP but not as *the* threat to the setting that we're waiting to tackle.
After that, what do we got. Geb? I haven't been paying a lot of attention to Blood Lords but a quick skim of it's description implies that the AP won't be dethroning Geb in the here & now, so he's an option. I don't know that he's a good option; going from Sorcerous Lich overlord Big Bad who rules over a kingdom of undeath to Sorcerous Ghost overlord Big Bad who rules over a kingdom of undeath is the progression I'd want to make in a story. Nex coming back might actually be a better option.
Kortash Khain kind of has that same issue of, is "undead overlord the well you want to go back to", so I'm gonna write him off as yes a mythic threat to beat but not the next big bad of the setting.
I suspect that Jarl Gnargorak is not going to be the next big bad of the Lost Omens setting, though again, ap to take him down could be fun. Something that could be a logical follow up to Giantslayer if nothing else.
Baba Yaga, certainly an option & a mythic threat, though I get the feeling that Paizo doesn't want to position her as the big bad. She's there to be a wild card who we have to be wary of & occasionally play to the tune of, not someone we're supposed to be actively opposing or have ambitions of taking down.
Arazni, similar thing, still evil but in a sympathetic way, clearly not meant to be or being set up to be the main antagonist of the story & is most likely going to be a recurring ally against Tar-Baphon, probably with an ultimate redemption arch. And, again, if she were being set up to replace him as big bad once he dies, is another powerful undead really the way you want to go?
After that, I don't know. You could pick a demon lord out of the hat, I suppose, to take over Deskari's place, but that could also fall into "haven't we danced this tango before' territory.
Daralathyxl? Maybe. I don't know that he needs to be a mythic level threat but he's on that line.
In summation from these ramblings, I think there's no shortage of threats above 25th level that you could fight & build campaigns around & I'd like to see. I don't know how many there are that can take over as the primary villain for the setting.
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Speaking of "mythic opponents and challenges," and this is more of a general thing than specific, but what would be examples of non-combat mythic challenges? This is important because rn I fear there is too much focus on combat for this stuff, and PF in general.
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didn't happen for 1st edition, unfortunately, unlikely to happen for the 2nd.Obviously, Tar-Baphon needs to get smacked down, likely as the climactic end to the edition - which opens the door to other storylines!
I mean, Tar-Baphon wasn't even a thread on the board until the final Adventure Path of 1e; I figure you finish one edition by getting him out, let him be big and scary for an entire edition, the knock his head off as the glorious finale... until the next iteration of this thing, anyway.
Not that I'm in any rush :)
respectfully disagree.
1 - TB was the archenemy of Aroden, who is even in his absence, the central figure of the setting
2 - TB was the center of an entire AP - Carrion Crown - before he was the BBEG of the final AP of 1E
3 - 2 entire countries were basically written around him - Ustalav and Lastwall.
4 - are we supposed to have a third TB AP?
I think it was a poor decision not to finish him off at the end of 1E. Keeping him around doesn't advance anything... heck, in the LO World Guide, he's explicitly not doing anything. His lieutenants are diverse, powerful, and interesting, and they are still around. There's plenty of other threats, as the amazing diversity of 2E APs have made clear, for heroes to tangle with.
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It seems unlikely that the PCs are going to be able to put TB away for good forever. After all, it's canonical that Urgathoa is protecting his soul cage. You can probably put him away long enough that you and several generations don't need to worry about him though. Not every story that's intrinsically linked with Aroden needs to be strung along indefinitely. Like the Eye of Abednego opened up on the day of his disappearance and that feels like a problem/mystery we could (re)solve.
I feel like the natural next "big threat" after TB though is "the algollthu are up to something."
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It seems unlikely that the PCs are going to be able to put TB away for good forever. After all, it's canonical that Urgathoa is protecting his soul cage. You can probably put him away long enough that you and several generations don't need to worry about him though.
This is explicitly the 'mythic' thread. What you've described is a 'mythic' undertaking.
Not every story that's intrinsically linked with Aroden needs to be strung along indefinitely. Like the Eye of Abednego opened up on the day of his disappearance and that feels like a problem/mystery we could (re)solve.
oh yeah, i agree. heck, extinction curse has big Aroden energy.
I feel like the natural next "big threat" after TB though is "the algollthu are up to something."
there's plenty of them out there - new, insurgent runelords... innumerable ancient threats... dangers from the Darklands... dunno if there's a need for a replacement 'big threat'... although the Dominion of the Black might be fun.
I think if the plan for Paizo was to have a 'big bad' for 2E, then Jacobs or Mona would have been sprinkling hints through the published APs, and at least in my cursory reads through, they haven't been.
long, short: i just want the second Azlant AP where the players meet the fossilized ammonite god.
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The Mythic AP might be to find and destroy TB's soul cage which would absolutely prevent Tar-Baphon from menacing the countryside as he has more pressing issues (finding his soul and putting it back in the box). It's "wherever Urgathoa put it" so it's probably not anywhere safe for less than mythic people. Plus, I imagine they have a fun answer to "nobody even knows what it is" that they'd like to make public eventually.