Pg. 85 of the GameMastery Guide:
Adjusting for Limitations
Before a game even begins, players have the opportunity to work with the GM to create the characters that they want to play and that best serve the game. Occasionally, though, a group’s particular mix of character classes leaves it with limiting weaknesses in need of reconciliation. Below are several options to help you address such issues.
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Hirelings: In many fantasy settings, it’s wholly plausible that a group of adventurers might hire porters, guides, mercenaries, or even other adventurers to fulfill any number of needs. Page 159 of the Core Rulebook presents costs for a number of typical services, and you can use these prices to suggest salaries for other professionals, whether they be sages or swordsmen.
Pg. 254 of the GameMastery Guide:
The following pages present more than 80 NPCs common to the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game. ... Alternatively, this chapter might also serve as a shopping list of NPCs characters might employ as hirelings, henchmen, even temporary PCs should they find themselves in a pinch.
Pg. 256 of the GameMastery Guide:
These NPCs can serve as allies for a PC party or even as hirelings for a day or a single dungeon crawl.
So we have a section that directly names hirelings as a means of addressing PC shortfalls, a section that further qualifies their utility in that regard, and a section that even provides statistics for NPC hirelings to assist in an adventure.
Beyond that, there at least five NPC templates from the NPC Codex that are explicitly qualified as available for hire by the PCs, three of whom have roles that are specifically tied to either melee or missile combat. Additionally, Ultimate Equipment qualifies that the Dragonslayer Kit provides "provides supplemental equipment for outfitting hirelings to hunt dragons," which I would say kind of puts this debate to rest.
The alternative is to argue that armed mercenaries are to be hired not actually serve as mercenaries (which is to say, professional soldiers who enter into conflicts for profit) or to do so to an arbitrarily limited extent (only fighting defensively, etc.). But the former would be counterintuitive both to the very concept of private, professional warriors, while the latter should be dependent on the context of the specific NPC.
Really what all this comes down to is what's right for a given table, and a lot of that comes down to what the GM is comfortable dealing with (in terms of game balance) and how much the players are willing to invest (in terms of wages or even shares of treasure).
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I posted this in the other thread, not realizing this one had been created:
Some companions are exceptions, such as an intelligent companion who doesn’t bear exceptional loyalty toward you (for example, a hired guard), a weaker minion who is loyal to you but lacks the abilities or resources to assist in adventuring tasks, and a called outsider (such as from planar ally) who agrees to a specific service but still has a sense of self-preservation. You can use Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate to influence such companions, but the GM is the final arbiter of their actions. For example, a PC might use threats to convince a caravan guard to hold back an ogre for a few rounds or to prevent her zealous followers from attacking a rival adventurer, but the GM makes the decision whether the guard runs away after getting hit once or the followers attack when provoked.
Surprising no one, the final answer is "it's up to the GM."
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The alternative is to argue that armed mercenaries are to be hired not actually serve as mercenaries (which is to say, professional soldiers who enter into conflicts for profit) or to do so to an arbitrarily limited extent (only fighting defensively, etc.). But the former would be counterintuitive both to the very concept of private, professional warriors, while the latter should be dependent on the context of the specific NPC.
"You get what you pay for."
If you pay a hireling 3 sp/day and have him buy and bring his own gear, you get 3 sp worth of loyalty. Even less after the other hirelings see you loot the dead body to take back your money, as you suggested in the other thread.If you pay a hireling 3 sp/day, plus food and lodging, plus giving him appropriate gear, plus some healing and loot, you get way more loyalty.
Your argument that the Dragonslayer's Kit "puts this debate to rest" falls flat on its face.
"A 485 gp equipment kit proves that mercenaries hired for 3 sp/day will fight to the death for you." will convince very few people.
DRAGONSLAYER’S KIT PRICE 485 GP WEIGHT 64 lbs.
Aimed more at hired blades than seasoned adventurers, this kit provides supplemental equipment for outfitting hirelings to hunt dragons. It includes a potion of cure moderate wounds, oil of bless weapon (1 application), a longspear, a backpack, three large sacks, a sunrod, a tower shield, and 5 vials of alchemist’s fire. For hunting dragons that are immune to fire, the alchemist’s fire can be replaced with acid at the time of purchase, for a savings of 50 gp.
A PC paying for that will not give it to a 1st-level Warrior (that probably will flee as soon as he is affected by the dragon's fear aura, BTW), he will give it to a seasoned hiregling with a few levels under his belt, one that will take way more than the basic pay.
"You get what you pay for."
If you pay a hireling 3 sp/day and have him buy and bring his own gear, you get 3 sp worth of loyalty. Even less after the other hirelings see you loot the dead body to take back your money, as you suggested in the other thread.If you pay a hireling 3 sp/day, plus food and lodging, plus giving him appropriate gear, plus some healing and loot, you get way more loyalty.
I'm not trying to be rude, Diego, but that's just spelling out the patently obvious. None of the above is up for dispute, other than that there can be (and ideally should be) additional meaningful context to a given NPC than just this entry-level approach.
Are the mercenaries desperate for work, for example? Are they desperate to impress the PCs? Are they motivated to hire on with them for reasons beyond the 3 silver pieces a day? The GM will ideally fill in those blanks, and the PC will try to discern whether the mercenaries available to hire are worth bringing along at that cost for the task at hand.
And guess what, maybe the answer is that a reliable mercenary hireling in that given area, at that given time, for that given situation might cost ten times the Core Rulebook's advertised minimum per day--or even a hundred! That may still be a phenomenal investment depending on the character and the task at hand.
Your argument that the Dragonslayer's Kit "puts this debate to rest" falls flat on its face.
No, not really. Well, not unless you entered this discussion assuming that it started and ended with hirelings in the Core Rulebook's Lodging/Services section.
But if you had read this topic (which in turn is tied to a different, linked topic) for content, you would see that the point of discussion was not simply about Core Rulebook hirelings might do. It's whether hirelings in general adventured, with the specific context of "adventuring" in this case being whether hirelings will enter into combat--and if so, in what capacity. Which, respectfully, makes the points you were arguing to me rather moot.
Hence, me citing the sections of the GameMastery Guide that indicate they do so. Hence me also citing NPC templates of higher levels to go with my citation of equipment clearly meant for a higher-level hireling.
Hope that clears things up!
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I'm not trying to be rude, Diego, but that's just spelling out the patently obvious. None of the above is up for dispute, other than that there can be (and ideally should be) additional meaningful context to a given NPC than just this entry-level approach."You get what you pay for."
If you pay a hireling 3 sp/day and have him buy and bring his own gear, you get 3 sp worth of loyalty. Even less after the other hirelings see you loot the dead body to take back your money, as you suggested in the other thread.If you pay a hireling 3 sp/day, plus food and lodging, plus giving him appropriate gear, plus some healing and loot, you get way more loyalty.
Everything that everyone else said about wands (and, later, staves).
I wouldn't recommend you strap weapons on your 1st-3rd level wizard, though. Hire hirelings, instead. A mercenary warrior costs 3 silver pieces a day. He comes equipped with studded leather armor and a club, shortsword, or shortspear. Order 2-3 of them into combat whether you have spells left or not. Take their silver pieces off their corpses if they die.
By 4th-5th level, consider Monster Summoning spells for emergency fodder (unless your GM is a fan of the NPC Codex, in which case hiring increasingly better bodyguards may be viable). As with the hirelings, it's not a matter of summoned creatures being as good as your best offensive spell for that level. It's a matter of them being a better alternative to getting into melee or ranged combat if your spell economy fails or crafting wands gets too expensive.
You started this discussion in the other thread with these words.
Yes? And how is that contradictory to what I’m saying here? The Core Rulebook hireling is likely the most affordable and available option for a level 1-3 PC, hence I used that as an example. In my very next paragraph I qualify higher-level hirelings for higher-level PCs. Two posts later, I dropped the blasé tone about hirelings being killed in favor of being more serious toward the topic.
1. I'm not expecting anything of the sort. I made a recommendation, given what's available in the Core Rulebook. The GM under no obligation to make hirelings available in a given time or place in their campaign than any other equipment, service, of magic item.
Certain posters feel that the service in question should be limited in terms of what it provides--or not allowed at all. That's their (and yours, perhaps) prerogative, but there is absolutely nothing that says "these mercenaries will not fight for you" or "these mercenaries will only fight in this way for you." Point of fact, if there were a qualifier in that entry along the lines of "these mercenaries will fight for you" as an utter waste of space.
And yes, of course a player would have to ask, and I would expect any GM worth their salt to not give an answer arbitrarily, but to consider what's right for the game they're trying to run and what's appropriate for their campaign setting.
Or, in fewer words, "what Belafon said, above."
2. I'm sorry you thought I ignored you. That was not the case, and certainly not my intention. I read the examples you gave, and provided my counterexamples. Perhaps I should have qualified that I don't think absence of evidence should be construed as evidence of absence.
I have no problem with this thread, nor do I disagree that nuance and GM involvement are a key part of this topic. That said, nuance and GM involvement are a key part of most of this game. More to the point, my recommendation by no means contradicts RAW. If anything, you're heavily relying on RAI in the absence of an explicit limiter or disqualifier in the RAW.
Whether you consider RAI a fallacy or not is neither here nor there, Azothath. The issue at hand is that you're trying to find a limitation other than what exists in the RAW.
Again, there are only two qualifiers to the hirelings service where mercenaries are concerned:
1. Their specific equipment
2. Their listed cost being a minimum
That's it. Those are the RAW. From there, the GM deems how the RAW fit within their game. The sections I cited aren't "cautionary statements"; nove of them say anything like "actually, these mercenaries shouldn't normally be hired by the PCs, and if they are then they shouldn't normally serve as mercenaries." They simply expand on the context that would lead a player to consider, in this case, hiring a mercenary. If you want an example of the game designers including limits to a service beyond the normal cost for the product wanted, look no further than the Spellcasting service--which is described in the very same page as hirelings.
If your players plan on employing lots of hirelings, it might be a good idea to work up a rule set to cover morale.
Things like the employer’s charisma and the nature of the opponent that is being engaged. For instance, typical humans would probably be extremely reluctant to battle undead.