Pathfinder RPG

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Blackhawk
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Blackhawk »

Get the Combat Manager. A hundred times over, get the combat manager. It can halve the bookeeping and combat times (which are already pretty long in Pathfinder.)
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hentzau
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by hentzau »

IMO, the big thing that Pathfinder has going for it are the Adventure Paths. I wish that WotC could do half as good a job as Paizo does with their Adventure Paths. I loved their first one, Rise of the Runelords (which is the first set of adventures in the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game) but it is currently out of print and only available as PDF downloads. I did see that the RotR Player Guide is a free download on their site, maybe download that and take a look to give you an idea about the quality of the adventure product.
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Holman
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Holman »

Thanks for the good advice, all! It's nice to see so much material available.

This should be fun. I can see it will take some prep time, though. These are some thick rulebooks.
Much prefer my Nazis Nuremberged.
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Blackhawk
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Blackhawk »

hentzau wrote:I loved their first one, Rise of the Runelords (which is the first set of adventures in the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game) but it is currently out of print and only available as PDF downloads. I did see that the RotR Player Guide is a free download on their site, maybe download that and take a look to give you an idea about the quality of the adventure product.
I'm playing in a RotRL campaign right now. It is great, but it may be a little dark in places for a 7 and 10 year old, depending on the kids (and on what kind of content you want to avoid with them.)
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hentzau
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by hentzau »

Blackhawk wrote:
hentzau wrote:I loved their first one, Rise of the Runelords (which is the first set of adventures in the Pathfinder Adventure Card Game) but it is currently out of print and only available as PDF downloads. I did see that the RotR Player Guide is a free download on their site, maybe download that and take a look to give you an idea about the quality of the adventure product.
I'm playing in a RotRL campaign right now. It is great, but it may be a little dark in places for a 7 and 10 year old, depending on the kids (and on what kind of content you want to avoid with them.)
Oh yeah...I didn't spot the ages mentioned. There's some gross stuff in there.
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Blackhawk
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Blackhawk »

So, the Rise of the Runelords campaign ended after the mansion in the second module. We were all pecked to death.

The GM decided to scrap it and go back to his previous campaign, which puts us in Eberron, but using Pathfinder rules. I have been playing Pathfinder for a few months, but I'm not really well versed on all the character options, and could use some advice on a character.

We have four players (including myself.) Although the other characters aren't set in stone, it looks like we'll have an healer paladin/oracle who uses archery, an inquisitor (unknown build), and either a ranger or alchemist.

This gives us healing and plenty of ranged damage (although it has the potential for three archers.) The healer has a massive charisma, so we're set on having a party face. Depending on the inquisitor build, we may not have any frontline melee characters, and we likely won't have any rogues.

That's where I fit in, it seems. I'm trying to plug the holes in this party. My thought is to run either a rogue (to give us the skills) or a clanky front-line melee character (to stand in the doorway and keep the baddies off of all the squishy folk.)

I'd like to play rogue, but without another melee character, I'd never have a flank, and would be the only character in reach of all those nasties. That makes the melee fighter/? more likely.

The problem is, I have no desire to play a 'stand on X, roll to hit every round' fighter. I want a degree of decision making in how I approach fights so as to keep the game from becoming an endless repetition of a single action, over and over.

Here are some limitations:

~Rules are Pathfinder, but the GM is running it in Eberron.

~This is a very casual group. There is little to no role-playing, unfortunately. That means I can't compensate for a character with dull mechanics by giving him an interesting personality.

~Stats were rolled. I have either:
17, 13, 13, 13, 12, 8
or
17, 15, 13, 13, 10, 8

~Core Rulebook and Advanced Players Guide are available, and I may be able to take options from other Paizo products.
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Zurai
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Zurai »

A Summoner would work. You get the up front clanky melee character and you still have a spellcaster with plenty of choices to make.

If you don't want to deal with the complexity of a Summoner, you could go with an Arcane Duelist (APG) Bard, a Cleric with combat-focused abilities, an Armored Hulk (Ultimate Combat) or Invulnerable Rager (APG) Barbarian, or a Druid with a tank-focused pet (like an ankylosaur from Bestiary 1--and Eberron actually has halflings that ride dinosaurs, too). All of those have a variety of choices to make in combat, and everything but the Cleric gets a decent amount of skills, too.

That second rolled stat set is good enough to play any class in the game, so you're fine there.
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gbasden
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by gbasden »

You could even play a straight class fighter. While it initially sounds boring, you get eighty bajillion feats to customize yourself with. You can end up and armored tank that uses a flail to trip opponents, a warrior that uses a two-handed maul to smash enemies' equipment to dust, or a two weapon lightly armored fighter that gets many attacks in one round with short swords. you could further customize with tactical feats like Step Up or Disruptive to become a nightmare for enemy spellcasters.

Alternatively, if the ranger isn't taken, you could go that route. You can specialize in multiple different fighting styles now, not just two handed and bow. You also gain very useful tracking and wilderness abilities. Barbarian is a really fun choice, but it's hard to pull off without a dedicated healer. The Barbarian is a giant damage sponge.

To me, there's a lot of really interesting choices in there.
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Blackhawk
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Blackhawk »

Zurai wrote:Invulnerable Rager (APG) Barbarian
That was what I ended up going with, and I was really happy with the character after I made him. Thanks for all of the input, everyone.

In the end, though, I ended up not needing him. On a whim, I offered to run the next campaign, and our current GM decided to step aside and l ended up GMing now rather than later.

So, now I'm knee deep in running a game of Savage Worlds: Deadlands. We had our first session last night.
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Peacedog
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Peacedog »

And we're done with Legacy of Fire. Final party was:

"NPC" cleric (as the player became a no show)
Melee Ranger (me; terrible idea for a 15 point buy game but I didn't care)

Barbarian

Ranged Inquisitor

A sort of hybridish druid - spell slinging and some wild shaping. This sort of cost him; he didn't take either spell penetration feat and suffered a bit in the end game. Also, he took elemental spell (cold), but this wound up with most fight over the last two chapters including monsters with cold resist (30). The DM allowed him to include the spell quench, which is amazing for anyone who needs to deal with fire type creatures.

Rogue, played by the Barbarian's son (and practically afk the entire time; sadly he's joining us in the next game).

At the end of the fight - BBEG + cohorts dead - only the Druid and Inquisitor were standing (and I had already wishd the Inquisitor back to life). We had 1 wish left on the table, and a talisman we could have uses to summon a Marid princess. The BBEG's cohort teleported out (she was a very high level spell caster).

The Barb was half orc, and had the orc ferocity trait. Which is how we was able to do 71 points of damage on the boss while at -97 (he immediately blood splattered after). That didn't actually matter; the Inquisitor for his final act full attacked and did 300 damage (this being a bit less than the 350+ he did to something two fights prior; he only rolled one crit this time). His problem was that he couldn't stay up to get shots in (the battle field being strewn with foes). The actual MVP was probably the Barbarian. He was mind blanked (a scroll we have recovered) and I was given spell resistance. But the Barb got mazed and had to make a DC20 int check where his only chance was to roll 20. Which he did, on the third try. He showed back and and did enough damage to the BBEG to distract him for two rounds. Allowing the inquisitor to attempt to do the [thing to at least foil the evil plans], and then the druid to do the actual thing (and the inquisitor to then unload next round).

It was very fun. We might do a little more post campaign adventuring once we secure a new play location.

Inquisitor's are simply amazing. If I wanted to play a bow user I would probably select an Inquisitor over any other class. Great spell list for buffing and versatility, and banes + judgements just make them unholy terrors (greater bane + divine power/haste + rapid shot + many shot is 5 arrows that each do +4d6 damage, + another 2d6 as it was a holy bow);.

I would never play a melee ranger in less than a 20 point buy again; your points are spread too thin or else you go without spells (the ranger spell list is lackluster, granted; it has a few good spells and he does get FoM, which served me in the last few encounters). I was actually having trouble hitting high AC things more than once (which is why I changed my plan 5 levels prior and wound up with vital strike + improved vital strike). Unless they were efreet (+6 favored enemy bonus against evil outsiders). And yet I still had trouble against the BBEG, such that there was no point in attacking more than once.

So we'll get wished back to life and live out our days in the drug capital of Golarion (between the priests of sarinrae blessing the crops at the dawn and our high level druid, Khelmarane's pesh production is really thriving currently). And maybe go on adventures.

It's a solid campaign for groups considering that sort of thing.
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hentzau
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by hentzau »

My 18 year old and her friends from school have been asking me for a couple of years now to play some D&D with them. Due to tons of scheduling issues, we've never gotten a chance to do it but now we are finally going to sit down and play this afternoon. We arranged this a couple of weeks ago, and my plan was to use the D&D Next ruleset to play, me being fairly familiar with the rules. I was going to put together a nice compact starting adventure for them, it was all going to be great. They gave me their character classes and races, and I was going to build out the party in advance so we could get right into playing.

Until work blew up on me last week and I put in an 85 hour work week Monday - Sunday. And I've already put in 45 hours at work this week. So I have had ZERO time to prepare.

I was in a bit of a panic Tuesday. So much so that I actually decided to shift gears and not run D&D but instead run Pathfinder. Went out and bought the Beginner Box, just to be able to play and get right into the game. That all looks good, but the adventure looks like it won't take more than about an hour, maybe 2 to finish, and we have slotted six hours to play. Plus, only 4 characters, 5 if you go with the free download barbarian...and we have six kids playing. Damn again. So I spent the day yesterday while waiting on hold with Citrix looking through the Pathfinder SRD and found a decent character generator and last night with my daughter's help I cobbled together six characters that match up with what the kids want. Next, an adventure. Some searching found the Introductory adventures to the Pathfinder Society and a quick scan seemed like a good way to get them into the game.

So. I have characters. I have an adventure (which I haven't completely read yet.) I have a ruleset that I am kinda familiar with. It's liable to be a weird Pathfinder/4E/Next cobbled together ruleset, but it should work. I hope.

We start in 7 hours. Hopefully I can finish reading the adventure before then. :horse:
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Peacedog
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Peacedog »

The PFS pregens will serve in a pinch FWIW. Being PFS they are 20 point buy which might crimp your style. There are leveled versions in the bundle (1, 4, 7)

I would steer people away from the Dwarven Ranger (he uses light xbows and his feats are kinda screwey since he's a switch hitter). Valeros the fighter can be sucky at low levels; Two Weapon Fighting needs time to mature and unfortunately he's a Longsword/Shortsword guy (TWF should generally be dualing a single type of weapon). But you can fix that by tweaking him a bit or just magically give him a shield and have the player go Sword & Board (this is actually how people typically do it when they need to sub Valeros in at a short table in PFS; well the group pools funds to buy him a shield but same basic idea).

The wizard is not suited for high level play but he rocks low level play (he's a generalist; they get Hand of the Apprentice which means he can basically use the force to wack people with his cane at range, attacking at +7 to hit. No character will hit a modified attack bonus that high without active buffs/flanking). Kyra is a solid cleric. Seoni is a solid sorceror (but replace Lightning Bolt with Fireball if you have to bust out the level 7 one). The paladin is decent too.

You can download them for free here (it's a link on the GM toolbox page).
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hentzau
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by hentzau »

Man, I wish I would have known about that. Would have saved me a lot of hassle trying to set up optimized characters with a rule system I barely know.

But the kids all had a ball. It was all of their first time playing (except for Peggy) and when I finally called an end after six hours, they were still raring to go.
“We can never allow Murania to become desecrated by the presence of surface people. Our lives are serene, our minds are superior, our accomplishments greater. Gene Autry must be captured!!!” - Queen Tika, The Phantom Empire
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Peacedog
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Peacedog »

hentzau wrote:Man, I wish I would have known about that. Would have saved me a lot of hassle trying to set up optimized characters with a rule system I barely know.

But the kids all had a ball. It was all of their first time playing (except for Peggy) and when I finally called an end after six hours, they were still raring to go.
Awesome to hear. Remember that all of the rules are online: Pathfinder SRD. Plenty of people here can answer questions and offer advice, to boot.
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Isgrimnur
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Isgrimnur »

It's almost as if people are the problem.
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hepcat
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by hepcat »

Nice catch!
Covfefe!
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baelthazar
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by baelthazar »

This is not about Pathfinder, but I consistently keep my eye out for these Humble book deals. I got a phenomenal deal on a boatload of Star Trek Adventures RPG content a few weeks ago there.

Also, they have a bundle for Campaign Cartographer content going again. That is an unbelievable discount from buying those things piecemeal on the website.
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Isgrimnur
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Re: Pathfinder RPG

Post by Isgrimnur »

It's almost as if people are the problem.
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