[FGG] Dunes of Desolation (coming soon)


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So as promised in the "State of the Onion" thread, here's a place to chatter about Dunes of Desolation - the next in FGG's line of environment books, this time looking at deserts. The book is written by Tom Knauss. Currently, the book is about 98% or so done development, and the parts that are done are in layout. We're waiting on some small tweaks to the maps, and then it'll be a wrap from the development side.

I'll use the thread to keep everybody up to date on the progress, and maybe I'll sneak in some peeks as well. In the short term, here's the Table of Contents:

Table of Contents


  • Introduction
  • Chapter One: A Desert Primer
  • Chapter Two: Desert Travel
  • Chapter Three: Desert Hazards
  • Chapter Four: Skills and Feats
  • Chapter Five: Desert Equipment
  • Chapter Six: New Monsters
  • Chapter Seven: Spells
  • Chapter Eight: Archetypes
  • Chapter Nine: Faiths of the Desert
  • Chapter Ten: Child's Play
  • Chapter Eleven: King of Beasts
  • Chapter Twelve: My Blue Oasis
  • Appendix: Random Desert Events and Monster Encounter Tables

Chapters 10-12 are new desert-themed adventures.

It was asked in the other thread about whether it was "worthwhile" for a S&W player to pick up this book. As I said there, questions of "worth" are really up to each individual to decide. Hopefully between now and the release of the book, the discussion and sneak peeks excite the S&W crowd enough to make a lot of them say it is worthwhile.

More to come...

--John Ling
Lead Pathfinder Developer


Will there be any support for mythic content? If not in the book, as a web update (Perhaps similar to the old Necromancer expanded content pages)? If you do add the mythic content, would the two previous books that will not be republished also get a mythic update on the web?

How about location modifiers for Ultimate Campaign and Battle (because I would love to use fantastic locations for these expansive options)? (I have not had the opportunity to read these books yet, so if it is inclusive in them, I apologize for wasting everyone's time)

Publisher, Frog God Games

The adventures are pretty cool.

You have no idea how much fun I had sending Chuck the "Child's Play" adventure and calling him "Chuckey" in the email:)


Thedmstrikes wrote:

Will there be any support for mythic content? If not in the book, as a web update (Perhaps similar to the old Necromancer expanded content pages)? If you do add the mythic content, would the two previous books that will not be republished also get a mythic update on the web?

How about location modifiers for Ultimate Campaign and Battle (because I would love to use fantastic locations for these expansive options)? (I have not had the opportunity to read these books yet, so if it is inclusive in them, I apologize for wasting everyone's time)

Right now, there is no mythic content in the book. If that happens down the road, that's something likely out of my hands, as I'm a mere novice on mythic content. I would need to take an extreme crash course on the topic.

I'm not sure about the second question. I'm in the same boat as you are in regards to Ultimate Campaign. I have it, but I haven't read it yet.


I have not read mine either. Frankly I would have better have saved my money for more Frog God stuff.

Contributor

As mentioned elsewhere: we will use mythic at times. It's an interesting tool and allows for some fun twists. But we didn't use it here. We're most likely to use it in isolated products - for example, the upcoming short PDF line is likely to see it pop up.

I actually don't even own Ultimate Campaign, though I have had a flip through some of the stuff included in the PRD here and there. This product doesn't make use of UC.

Publisher, Frog God Games

Ok--I am fine with some short stuff for Mythic (we will have a ton of short pdfs coming soon--I had a very good idea yesterday).

What all would you guys like to see in a weekly "short and inexpensive" pdf in general? What "hot topics" need to be addressed?

I see many ideas I want to do--but would like to hear what else you all are interested in.


Expansions to the Fire As She Bears system that you mentioned the other day.

Also, expansions to the environs books might be cool. Stuff you might have had to cut for whatever reason.


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Wandering monster encounters.

(And fingers crossed there'll be an annual "print compilation" of these PDFs).


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Something akin to the old Dungeon Magazine Side Treks would be interesting. A short adventure scenario, something simple but with a quirk (random little things you can drop into an ongoing adventure that add versimilitude to the world...) a tomb, an old well with a secret door at the bottom, things like that would be cool.

Articles are good too, new magic items, spells, monsters.

I'd still like to see a Swords & Wizardry compilation of spells from the Complete book and those put in other supplements as well (RA, RC, SoA, SV)

Publisher, Frog God Games

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Steve--you will like the idea I came up with yesterday...so will Michael and Heine. I think its dead center on target

Contributor

Heine Stick wrote:
Expansions to the Fire As She Bears system that you mentioned the other day.

I would expect FaSB to receive expansions; I would expect those expansions to be PDF only (most likely). But I would also expect that they'd be different than what this line will typically run when it comes to page count.

Quote:
Also, expansions to the environs books might be cool. Stuff you might have had to cut for whatever reason.

There has been surprisingly little cut, actually. That said, there's room to expand for sure. For example, a piece that talked about integrating Mythic rules into desert adventures, just to tie back to conversations up-thread.

Steve Geddes wrote:
Wandering monster encounters.

On the list. ;)

Quote:
(And fingers crossed there'll be an annual "print compilation" of these PDFs).

Certainly possible, depending on a bunch of "stuff."

MichaelSandar wrote:
Something akin to the old Dungeon Magazine Side Treks would be interesting. A short adventure scenario, something simple but with a quirk (random little things you can drop into an ongoing adventure that add versimilitude to the world...) a tomb, an old well with a secret door at the bottom, things like that would be cool.

Yep, loved these in Dungeon. I always found them useful for when the players went left when I planned on them going right; they were just long enough to give me time to figure things out in my head while still having something to do. Stuff like this is on the list as well.

Quote:
Articles are good too, new magic items, spells, monsters.

Any specific themes or ideas you'd like to see? Would you prefer to not have a theme? ("Here's 30 new random magic items!")

On the tangent of old articles, how do people feel about articles akin to the old Ecology of... series? Where the focus is on one monster: creation myths, feats, spells, items, classes or prestige classes, archetypes, variants of the monster, tips for players, tips for GMs, etc. Each would be slightly different, depending on the author's ideas, but they'd all generally lump into an "ecology" series.

How do people generally feel about prestige classes, assuming it was actually tied to a campaign-building item such as an organization?

Scarab Sages

Definitely like smaller-scale things that are useful for DM's to drop into adventures, such as a specific encounter, a special location, inventive traps, puzzle rooms, legends, weird items, etc.


Themes are good. Perhaps even 'locational' themes would be interesting. Magic of Stoneheart Valley, Ancient Weapons of Tsar and Tsen, New monsters to terrorize the area around Rappan Athuk...

Publisher, Frog God Games

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Look for some VERY specific Lost Lands things like requested. Once I finish SOA (getting close), I think I have a highly useful idea in mind.

Contributor

This scares me more than you can know... ;)

Publisher, Frog God Games

Lots of inexpensive pdfs coming. May make a book eventually. But we decided to do supplements of the main books so folks could pick and choose when they need them and not bust the wallet.

News on this in a couple weeks with an example


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Don't forget about Razor Coast on that list please. New drop ins, deities and other stuff for it would also be good. All of the ideas so far are also good:) Maybe some pathfinder updates on magic items from old supplements like the gold coin from Aberrations! That coin still scares the heck out of my players!


Bill Webb wrote:
May make a book eventually. But we decided to do supplements of the main books so folks could pick and choose when they need them and not bust the wallet.

I can appreciate there may not be the demand, but even if you just released a combined annual PDF with every release for the year. I can get it printed myself and it makes it easier (to me anyway) to find stuff rather than hunting through dozens of PDFs.

Publisher, Frog God Games

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I will probably do them as compilations by region--example is: (from SOA). I took out (most) of the specific info--but this is what I was thinking. Each area is a mini-adventure or mini-dungeon. Each encounter area is 500-10,000 words. Most weigh in at 3k or so.I would need to do about 400 of them to totally get done w/ all the geographic features we are detailing. I left in a volcano and a portion of a farm encounter I wrote for SOA.

2>The Starcrag Mountains
<n>The Starcrag Range is relatively young, as evidenced by its razor sharp peaks and steep, sheer sides. Passes through the mountains are rare, and only those knowing their way have a reasonable chance of crossing them.
The mountain peaks rise to 12,000 feet above the plains below, with an average height of 8,000 feet. Everything is snowcapped for most of the year, with the tree line ending at the 6,000 foot mark. Glaciers cover the tops of these peaks. The peaks are interrupted by valleys and rivers, all flowing out and away from the mountains. The mountains are often covered with the same misty haze that fills the mountains to the east, and all fear the things found in this mist.
Encounters in these mountains are rare. Encounters occur on a 1/10 chance each day during both daylight hours and night (roll 1d12 to determine time, with midnight and noon being 1, 11 pm and 11 am being 12).
01-50 Common animal, non-aggressive
51-70 Common animal, aggressive
71-80 Humanoid
81-85 Yeti (1d4+1)
86-90 Giant or Dire species of a common, non-aggressive animal
91-93 Giant or Dire species of a common, aggressive animal
94-95 Trolls (1d6) or Ogres (1d6+4)
96-97 Avalanche!
98-99 Monster (GM’s choice, although Hill and Fire Giants are common)
00 Remorhaz
Common animal, non-aggressive: This encounter is with 1d6 small furry creatures such as deer, rabbits and squirrels. There is a 50% chance that the animal provides 1d6 days rations and a 10% chance it provides 3d6 days rations if slain.
Common animal, aggressive: This encounter is with 1d6 bears, wolves badgers or other nasty critters. There is a 50% chance the animals are hunting and a further 30% chance they are in their nest. The animals are subject to standard reaction tests to determine if they attack.
Humanoid: This encounter is with a group of humanoids (10% goblins, 70% hobgoblins, 10% orcs, 10% gnolls). This is a warband, numbering 2d10+6 individuals.
Yeti: This encounter is most likely near snow, although the Yeti do not require snow. They are highly aggressive.
Giant or Dire species of animal (both): This is the same as for regular animals, except with giant sized versions of them.
Trolls: This encounter is with 1d3 trolls. There is a 5% chance of a troll shaman (level 1d6 cleric).
Ogres: This encounter is with 1d10 Ogres. There is a 20% chance a roll of 1 results in a solitary Ogre Mage.
Avalanche: Avalanches are a danger, and have a 20% chance of hitting the player characters and a 50% chance of blocking either the way they came or the way they are going (GM’s choice). If anyone is hit by an avalanche, they take 4d6 damage and must save or be trapped and immobilized in the snow and ice (death in 1d2 hours unless rescued).
Monster: The GM gets to have fun and pick some random large beastie to terrorize his players with!

Remoraz: The ice worm cometh! Run and hide!

<2>Bone Hollow
<n>description follows

<2>Mount Moffat
<n>Mount Moffat is the highest peak in the Starcrags. It is also an active volcano. The peak of the cinder cone rises 13,000 feet above the lowlands below, and constantly spews forth ash, toxic gasses and occasionally a lava flow. Nothing lives within 20 miles of the volcano, and few other than mountain goats and small animals ever go near the area at all. Anyone getting within 20 miles runs the risk (10% chance per day) of an event as follows:
01-80 Scary minor eruption. The ground shakes, ash spews out, etc. No harm to anyone.
81-95 A random rock flies down in the area of the party. It has a 10% chance of hitting someone for 6d6 damage.
95-98 Ash, gas and rocks fly down where the players are located. All must save 1/10 minutes or take 1d6 damage. It takes 2 hours to reach a safe distance. Shelter (a cave, a spell) avoids this. The toxic fumes and cinders are gone in 2d6 hours. Caves can be found on a 20% chance per hour, with a druid or ranger doubling that chance. The mountain goats know where the caves are—following them is a wise idea.
99 Big Eruption hits the area, all must save 1/10 minutes or take 2d6 damage. It takes 2 hours to reach a safe distance, and flammable items and trees catch on fire. Shelter (a cave, a spell) avoids this. The toxic fumes and cinders are gone in 2d6 hours.
00 Boom! Volcano goes up in a huge fireball. All within 10 miles are incinerated and dead. All within 20 miles are affected by an earthquake spell and must make saves as per the 99 result. Outside of the 10 mile kill zone, shelter (a cave, a spell) avoids this. The toxic fumes and cinders are gone in 2d6 hours. Caves do not save anyone within 10 miles, as all the oxygen is sucked out of them and everything suffocates.

<1>Encounter Area SF-1: The Dark Heart of the Woods
<n> description follows

<1>Encounter Area SF-2: The Crystal Cave
<n description follows

<1>Encounter Area SF-3: Roc’n in the Free World
<n> description follows

<1>Encounter Area SF-4: “They have a cave troll!”
<n> description follows

<1>Encounter Area SF-5: Wormy
<n> description follows

<1>Encounter Area SF-6: The Adorable Snow Monster
<n> description follows

<1>Encounter Area SF-7: The Legend of Zelda, 1977
<n> description follows

<1>Encounter Area SF-8: They Mostly Come at Night, Mostly…
<n>The low lying plains south of the Black Forest contain rich farmland from the mineral rich soils flowing downriver from the Inland Sea. The bravest of the farmers from the towns of Glover have moved to this area to take advantage of the rich crops, and a series of homesteads has grown in both size and wealth.
The farmers are not stupid, as living here in the wilds has its disadvantages as well as its rich land. There are 22 different farmstead estates here. A typical farm consists of 50 or so adults, usually well-armed, and even includes several ex-adventurers or soldiers. The farmhouses are fortified estates, and often include palisades or rock walls, thick wooden walls on buildings, and other means of defense. Packs of trained dogs are common, and most farmers even maintain a cadre of men at arms to patrol their estates. The farm estates have a loose feudal government led by a council of the leaders of each house, and call themselves “Lords”, though the titles are self-imposed and have no lawful bearing.
No developed roads exist, though well-worn wagon trails and pathways are present connecting the estates with each other as well as with the ferry across the river to Glover.
Strangers are initially received with suspicion—a dozen or so armed men with a pack of ten war dogs investigate anyone trespassing on claimed land. Once a group of player characters is established as no threat, they are welcomed, fed and housed by these yeoman lords, and perhaps even asked to perform a mission or two.

description follows for adventure related to farms.

Note—these are all written—I killed specifics so that SOA spoilers would not occur!!

Scarab Sages

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Hurry up and take my money! I have NEED of this book. Not interest... NEED. :D

Dark Archive

Wow, looking forward to this!

Publisher, Frog God Games

What I was illustrating is the short pdf (and yes Steve, probably later on hardcovers) I will start on after I get done w/ SOA--the goal is to nail all named locations in the Lost Lands w/ a short write up, encounter tables, and 4-10 fixed encounter areas/features for each one.

I have a lot of glue to tie together after almost 40 years!

Contributor

So, getting back to Dunes...

All chapters are now completely through the Development process and turned over to Chuck so he can work his magic. I have rough proofs of everything up through Chapter 9 that I'm reviewing and hope to get back to him maybe tonight, probably tomorrow.

Later this evening I'll share a list of the new monsters in the book, and Friday or so I'll post a summary of the three adventures (spoilered, of course, in case it matters for folks).


I would like to thank the web crew at Paizo for the latest update which keeps turning off focus... otherwise I would have missed all these great FGG threads!

Sorry to sidetrack the thread again but to answer a question above, I loved the Ecology of articles. Some fiction and then awesome ideas, with maybe some crunch for a monster type is really useful. Look to the the 13th Age Bestiaries (official and Kobold) for a great way to give verisimilitude, depth and adventure hooks in a monster book. They've taken the ToHC extras and ran with it so well.


Though none of the monsters have an ecology of so to speak, the descriptions are a little more in depth than the typical monster entry. So they do discuss how the monsters came into being, where they're typically found, what they're often up to and so on.

Layout and Design, Frog God Games

I've worked my magic. The proofs are to you, Zherog.

(starts working on other projects in the layout mines).

Layout and Design, Frog God Games

Tom Knauss wrote:
Though none of the monsters have an ecology of so to speak, the descriptions are a little more in depth than the typical monster entry. So they do discuss how the monsters came into being, where they're typically found, what they're often up to and so on.

I've always loved that kind of stuff (I used to nerd-squee when I saw an "Ecology of..." article in Dragon.) Something that I hope we do with "Ecology"-esque articles would be to add 1 or 2 "unique specimens" of the monster in question . . . with a little fluff write-up to go with so that GMs can just drop them into their adventures as emergency NPCs.


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My answer was reference to what we would like to see in the mini-PDF range... hopefully with a later hardcopy The Frog God Ecologies collection! My dragon Ecologies collection is a favourite :)

Contributor

Yeah, we have two conversations going here. Later today, when I can get a half-hour or so to grab quotes, I'll start a new thread about the short PDFs.

I apologize for not getting the monster list up last night. I'll get it tonight.

Publisher, Frog God Games

Cool new critters btw. Tom did a great job on this!


Bill Webb wrote:

What I was illustrating is the short pdf (and yes Steve, probably later on hardcovers) I will start on after I get done w/ SOA--the goal is to nail all named locations in the Lost Lands w/ a short write up, encounter tables, and 4-10 fixed encounter areas/features for each one.

I have a lot of glue to tie together after almost 40 years!

Really, this is music to my ears. The one thing I was going to pitch and and ask for re short pdfs would be some Lost Lands specific locations, something to add some 'places of mystery' etc. Sounds perfect and I'll be buying these for sure.

Publisher, Frog God Games

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Fish, that is exactly the idea.


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What I really need, thanks to the deadliness of FGG adventures, is a PDF listing pre-made starting equipment packages for all levels and classes.

Layout and Design, Frog God Games

Technotrooper wrote:
What I really need, thanks to the deadliness of FGG adventures, is a PDF listing pre-made starting equipment packages for all levels and classes.

I think that's a pretty good idea. Nice GM and Player source at the same time.


Not a bad idea, but would kinda depend on class as well.

Pathfinder Lead Developer, Frog God Games

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Technotrooper wrote:
What I really need, thanks to the deadliness of FGG adventures, is a PDF listing pre-made starting equipment packages for all levels and classes.

It's funny now that you mention it. Whenever I want to run a really old-school campaign or run such a game at a con, I like to go to the foldout map of the old Basic adventure B4: The Lost City and make the players select one of the three pre-generated equipment packages for themselves. I don't know how well that translates to assisting vs. FGG deadliness, but I think it's really cool and prevents a lot of the Batman effect that can pop up with a PF game even at 1st-level.

Layout and Design, Frog God Games

Brvheart - He mentioned class :)


Chuck Wright wrote:
Brvheart - He mentioned class :)

Yeah, sorry I saw that after I posted. Sometimes I miss things when I try and read screen print. I have Sjogrens so my eyes are even worse than bad now:(

Contributor

So, hey, Dunes of Desolation sounds pretty fantastic, eh? ;)

Here's the new critters in the book, along with their CR.

Akbadia (CR 12 magical beast)
Alhajan (CR 5 monstrous humanoid)
Al-haloon (CR 3 animal)
Cacdine (CR 3 plant)
Demon, Rabassa (CR 11 outsider)
Dendan (CR 12 animal)
Desert Troll (CR 8 humanoid)
Desperado (+1 CR template)
Dire Camel (CR 3 animal)
El-aurens (CR 5 undead)
El-Halaj (CR 4 magical beast)
Falak (CR 10 magical beast)
Ghazak (CR 1/2 humanoid)
Golem, Sand (CR 6 construct)
Gugunda (CR 4 outsider)
Hallaraq (CR 8 vermin)
Karkadann (CR 8 magical beast)
Kharam (CR 8 monstrous humanoid)
Werehyena (CR 2 human [base] rogue 2)
Martuush (CR 15 vermin)
Necropolis Guardian (CR 9 construct)
Qarin (CR 6 outsider)
Rahada (CR 1/2 humanoid)
Razorweed (CR 2 plant)
Scarab Beetle Swarm (CR 3 vermin)
Shahardeen (CR 4 aberration)
Spectral Rider (CR +2 template)
Thirstmonger (CR 4 undead)
Wadira (CR 6 fey)
Wellwringer (CR 5 aberration)
Zibbine (CR 6 monstrous humanoid)

I'm sorry to say, that's all there is... ;)


One evening, half of our party of six was killed in Rappan Athuk. Making new characters for Pathfinder takes long enough without having to go shopping for starting equipment piece by piece, especially at mid to higher levels. Some pregenerated starting packages by level and class, perhaps with some random elements and cursed items just to mix things up, would truly be a huge timesaver and help both players and GMs get back to adventuring quickly. It would also help reduce the optimization that tends to occur when you can choose all of your equipment from a "catalog" rather than gaining it more organically. With the high body count of most FGG adventures, this seems like it would see a lot of use! Thanks for considering the idea.

Publisher, Frog God Games

Ok


Greg A. Vaughan wrote:
Technotrooper wrote:
What I really need, thanks to the deadliness of FGG adventures, is a PDF listing pre-made starting equipment packages for all levels and classes.
It's funny now that you mention it. Whenever I want to run a really old-school campaign or run such a game at a con, I like to go to the foldout map of the old Basic adventure B4: The Lost City and make the players select one of the three pre-generated equipment packages for themselves. I don't know how well that translates to assisting vs. FGG deadliness, but I think it's really cool and prevents a lot of the Batman effect that can pop up with a PF game even at 1st-level.

Glad to see I'm not the only one who still likes to pull pre-gen stuff from old 1st Ed., BECMI modules.

B2, B4, old Greyhawk and a few others are must haves when I need stuff in a pinch.

Contributor

Technotrooper wrote:
One evening, half of our party of six was killed in Rappan Athuk. Making new characters for Pathfinder takes long enough without having to go shopping for starting equipment piece by piece, especially at mid to higher levels. Some pregenerated starting packages by level and class, perhaps with some random elements and cursed items just to mix things up, would truly be a huge timesaver and help both players and GMs get back to adventuring quickly. It would also help reduce the optimization that tends to occur when you can choose all of your equipment from a "catalog" rather than gaining it more organically. With the high body count of most FGG adventures, this seems like it would see a lot of use! Thanks for considering the idea.

The idea is interesting, I think, but I worry it'd be too boring. (Also, I'll say up front - I don't have an issue with optimization; it's not a bad word in my vocabulary; like all things, it can be taken to extremes, of course.)

You would probably need several packages at each level, at least for some classes. For example, for fighter you'd want to cover 2-handed weapon vs sword and board; for ranger, you'd want ranged vs TWF; and a few others. (You could extend the idea and include "spells" for casters as part of their package, making it even more complex.)

So, without looking at what certain level PCs are supposed to have, money-wise, you might get something like this:

Fighter

1st Level

Weapons: longsword, dagger, shortbow, 20 arrows
Armor: scale mail, heavy wooden shield
Gear: backpack, bedroll, waterskin, 5 days of rations, 50' of rope, blah blah blah

...

10th Level:

Weapons: +1 flaming scythe, masterwork crossbow, 20 bolts
Armor: +2 full plate
Primary Magic Items: belt of giant strength +2, ring of protection +1
Other Magic Items: boots of speed, handy haversack
Potions: cure moderate wounds (x2), invisibility, remove disease
Gear: <fill in stuff here - bedroll, rope, pitons, etc>

(That's probably over-geared for 10th level; like I said, I didn't look at numbers.)

That's under 100 words so far. But of course, higher levels will need more word count than lower levels. But if we quickly assume an average of about 60 words per entry (totally a made-up number), doing our fighter in both styles would be 2,400 words. That's roughly 3 pages, give or take - probably about 2-1/2, since art would be light.

That would might make doing every class in one product too much - if you take the 11 core plus APG and Complete classes, that's a total of 21 classes - a bit over 50K for the whole thing, or around 58 or so pages. Of nothing but lists.

My instincts say that's a pretty boring product, especially given the price point for something of that size. Most likely, I'd say, you would end up with groups of classes: barbarian, fighter, monk, ranger, cavelier; bard, rogue, ninja; cleric, druid, paladin, oracle; sorcerer, wizard, alchemist, summoner, magus; and so on.

So, assume 4-5 classes per product; assume it's built with a bit of flexibility - so fighters would have 2-handed options and sword and board options, rangers have TWF and archery options, and so forth. How many folks would have interest in that, to the point where they'd be willing to drop a couple bucks for a PDF? Just as importantly (from my perspective), is there anything that could get added to something like this to increase the value a bit?

If this has legs, so to speak, we can make it happen.


The book title makes me reminisce about the desert of desolation adventure series. I would buy an adventure path conversion of that in a heartbeat.


Play Rappan Athuk in Swords & Wizardry and you can make up those replacement characters in a jiff! :P

Gear lists would be interesting, but it's not a lot of 'new' info. I'm not really up on my PF, but doesn't the NPC codex have pregens you could grab equipment from? Just my 2cp.

Any chance we will see S&W conversions of the PF monsters in DoD?


I for one agree on reducing optimization. A character played from 1st level is going to be quite different than one brought in at level 10, especially on their equipment. I mean how many +1 flaming scythes are you going to find adventuring? Now a long or great sword, yes. Also, a lot of items you end up with are useful but not the best items you could have for that level. It is for this reason I generally have new or replacement characters with a lot less gp value of starting equipment as they are going to optimize what they have. From there the party usually has leftover stuff they have lying around to fill them out. For instance in Tsar my new characters start with 32,000 GP at level 11, but the party usually gives them another 20,000 worth of stuff.


To your point Brvheart, I agree with your starting gold philosophy, but from a different angle. Typically, I reason with the players that if they bring in a new character at 10th level, that adventurer has a had a career already where they've spent around 20% of their gold on consumables, i.e., potions, single-use items, spell casting services, etc. Couple that with the rule (or widely used house rule)that new characters can't have a single item worth more than "X" percent of the character wealth and it helps me with the min-maxer problem immensely.

I also find that this serves to deter PC's that want to "retire" their character and come in as Batman as Greg put it.

YMMV.

{Sorry for the slight derailment}


As an aside, when I bring in new players they start one level below the party and have one level lower starting gold. For example, if the party is 8th the new PC is 7th with 6th level starting Gold. As was mentioned the party usually supplements what the PC has from gathered equipment. Also, I limit how they spend it. They can spend no more than 25% on any one item.

Sorry for the thread hijack.

Contributor

KaiserDM wrote:
Typically, I reason with the players that if they bring in a new character at 10th level, that adventurer has a had a career already ...

Exactly. Which, to me, means that if the character is a fighter who wants to focus on a scythe, he/she having a +1 flaming scythe isn't out of the ordinary. It doesn't matter if they found it on a prior adventure or commissioned it or it was a hand-me-down from Dear Ol' Grandpappy. Having a weapon of choice isn't that outlandish; how it's enchanted is certainly something to keep an eye on, yes. But the weapon itself? Nah - that's easily explained in backstory.

Quote:
where they've spent around 20% of their gold on consumables, i.e., potions, single-use items, spell casting services, etc. Couple that with the rule (or widely used house rule)that new characters can't have a single item worth more than "X" percent of the character wealth and it helps me with the min-maxer problem immensely.

So, if this were something we'd run as one of the shorts, it would follow the rules. The Pathfinder rules (here, scroll down to "Placing Treasure") assume PCs have roughly the amount listed in the table. They may have used potions, spent money on spellcasting services, etc in the past. But at that moment, an average PC has that amount of stuff. Even more to the point, the Pathfinder rules are actually balanced around those numbers - part of "behind the curtain" stuff on monsters and such is that PCs of a certain level have +1 or +2 weapons, Armor Class boosting items, stat boosts, and so on. If you opt to reduce gear, that's well and good; just understand the cascade effect that can have. (The opposite, of course, is also true - if you increase gear, things get easier for a reason.)

So let's use 10th level. The rules assume a 10th level characer has 62,000 gp of gear. That doesn't factor what they've spent or used previously - right now, they have a "net worth" of 62K. But... most people miss this rule:

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Characters should spend no more than half their total wealth on any single item. For a balanced approach, PCs that are built after 1st level should spend no more than 25% of their wealth on weapons, 25% on armor and protective devices, 25% on other magic items, 15% on disposable items like potions, scrolls, and wands, and 10% on ordinary gear and coins. Different character types might spend their wealth differently than these percentages suggest; for example, arcane casters might spend very little on weapons but a great deal more on other magic items and disposable items.

In other words, don't let your 10th level fighter come to the table with a +2 flaming keen greatsword (32,000* gp), +5 full plate (25,000 gp), and nothing else. Both of those are way over-budgeted; the suggested 25% would be about 15,500* gp. I'd allow a martial character to have a +3 equivelant weapon (18,000 gp); I think it's close enough and falls within the spirit of the rules given the exception at the end.

* These prices aren't exactly right; they leave out the cost of the "base" masterwork item. I was too lazy to look up the costs of a greatsword and full plate.

silverhair2008 wrote:
As an aside, when I bring in new players they start one level below the party and have one level lower starting gold. For example, if the party is 8th the new PC is 7th with 6th level starting Gold. As was mentioned the party usually supplements what the PC has from gathered equipment. Also, I limit how they spend it. They can spend no more than 25% on any one item.

I don't want to at all imply "you're doing it wrong" or anything like that. But... why? Do your 7th level PCs typically have 6th level gear? If so, your rule makes some sense. If you generally do a decent job of keeping your PCs properly equiped, then why would the new guy have less stuff?

If it works for your table, that's great. If you and your group have fun, you're doing it right(tm). But I've seen a lot of people in the past who use rules such as this as well as not letting new characters have items that make sense - no stat boosting items at 10th level, for example. Then they wonder why PCs can't survive encounters they should mop the floor with.

Anyway...

So, I'm interested in talking about gear packages and whether doing them makes any sense as a product line. But just be aware that if we were to do them, they'd follow the rules I quoted - a 10th level PC would get around 62K, with roughly 15.5K spernt on weapons, another 15.5K on armor, 15.5K spent on magic items (stat boosters, ring of protection, etc), 9.3K on disposable items, and 6.2K on gear and money. There'd be some leeway, certainly, as mentioned above. But that would be the estimate.

Is that something people would pay to acquire? Assume 3-5 related classes per product, like the groups I mentioned earlier. Or is that too bland and boring, even if it would be useful? (And I really should go and start a new thread for the shorts, so we can keep this thread about Dunes.)

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