goblins – Nerds on Earth https://nerdsonearth.com The best place on earth for nerds. Wed, 13 Nov 2019 17:48:41 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://nerdsonearth.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/cropped-nerds_head_thumb2-100x100.png goblins – Nerds on Earth https://nerdsonearth.com 32 32 All the podcasts from NerdsonEarth.com, under one umbrella. We create short run podcasts for nerds, covering D&D, Marvel, Starfinder, and more! You vote for your favorite shows and they just might get a second season. goblins – Nerds on Earth false episodic goblins – Nerds on Earth jason.sansbury@nerdsonearth.com podcast All the podcasts from NerdsonEarth.com, the best place on Earth for nerds. goblins – Nerds on Earth https://nerdsonearth.com/wp-content/uploads/powerpress/noe-podcast-logo.png https://nerdsonearth.com/blog/ How to Create Great Pathfinder 2nd Edition Characters: Alchemist https://nerdsonearth.com/2019/08/pathfinder-2e-class-concepts-alchemist/ Tue, 27 Aug 2019 12:00:17 +0000 https://nerdsonearth.com/?p=25628

We're breaking down every class in Pathfinder 2e as well as providing some creative build suggestions. This time: The Alchemist!

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We’ve been fortunate to have Pathfinder Second Edition (PF2) in our lives for nearly a month now–it’s hard to believe that it’s already been that long! I’ve been doing a relatively deep dive into the Core Rulebook but, with the Lost Omens World Guide shipping out to subscribers, I wanted to get some PF2 Class Concepts in your hands. Otherwise, I’ll get lost in Golarion lore and never see the light of day again.

My goal for these guides is to go a similar route as my Starfinder Theme series; I’ll give a little blurb about the class and then offer some build suggestions to help kickstart the creative side of your brain.

If you’re looking for optimized character builds you’ll have to look elsewhere! After the initial brainstorm, I’m going to include a brief roadmap, or ‘Pathmap‘, to outline various mechanical choices I might make for such a character.

Taking these two at a pop, it would only take me six articles to finish all of the core PF2 classes in alphabetical order. Unfortunately, as I started to write this I realized that I’d be better off doing one class at a time. I’m incredibly sorry to all of the wizard-lovers out there!

Alright, let’s kick this off with a BANG by running through the Alchemist.

Pathfinder 2nd Edition Alchemist Class

Fumbus, the 2E Iconic Alchemist

The first Pathfinder character I ever made was a goblin alchemist. Inspired by the goblins in the Magic: the Gathering universe, I really wanted to tap into the inner workings of a chemist who reveled in making things go BOOM.

Pathfinder Second Edition Alchemists get that same sort of flavor. Using their formulas and reagents, they are able to mix up various spell-like effects each day. What’s even better, they can use Quick Alchemy to temporarily make a handy item that’ll expire at the beginning of their next turn.

Alchemists are usually smart, meticulous, and curious, using their skillsets in a variety of ways. Some specialize in the medical arts, while others are inclined to a more…explosive nature. No matter which way you slice it, you can be sure that alchemists will make a SPLASH at your table.

  DECORATED SURGEON

As a medical expert, you’ve performed countless surgeries–both restorative and experimental. People come to you looking for guidance on even the most mundane of ailments. You may not have a cure for the common cold, but you’re one major breakthrough away from solving that particular puzzle.

When you’re not giving the Golarion-equivalent of TED Talks, your focus lies mainly in research. How will you resolve the problems that plague the modern world? What can you do to help those in need of basic and advanced medical care? Did you spend most of your time in temples, or were your efforts distinctly separate from religion?

Have you published any noteworthy bits of research? Are you credited with specific discoveries of surgical techniques of alchemical antidotes? Do you perform tests on yourself or do you have a loyal following of willing subjects who would be more than happy to assist you?

Pathmap

  • Research Field: Chirurgeon
  • Ability Scores: Wisdom, Intelligence
  • Skills: Academia Lore, Medicine, Survival
  • Formulae: Quicksilver mutagen (lesser), Antiplague (lesser), Antidote (lesser), Acid Flask (lesser)
  • Alchemist Feats: Alchemical Savant, Poison Resistance (2nd), Enduring Alchemy (4th), Combine Elixers (6th), Powerful Alchemy (8th), Merciful Elixer (10th), Extend Elixer (12th), Greater Merciful Elixer (14th), Eternal Elixer (16th), Miracle Worker (18th), Craft Philosopher’s Stone (20th)

  STRUCTURAL ENGINEER

Explosives have been central to engineering since gunpower first went BOOM. When you need a plot of land cleared out quickly, or when you’re trying to reach some valuable minerals underground, everybody’s go-to is a hard-packed stack of dynamite.

You know how to find the weak spots of structures. In fact, you’ve come to realize that flesh-and-blood bodies aren’t much different than buildings; everything is a frame with stuff in and around it. Just swap out the wooden joints for bony ones and you’re well on your way to demolishing enemies.

When did you create your first bomb? In what clever ways have you experimented with gunpowder? Have you witnessed any nasty accidents in your career? Did you work in the mining industry, or have you been more architecturally-inclined? Do you find certain building styles abhorrent? Is there a specific set of safety equipment that you wear, or do you flirt with disaster?

Pathmap

  • Research Field: Bomber
  • Ability Scores: Constitution, Dexterity
  • Skills: Engineering Lore, Athletics, Nature
  • Formulae: Smokestick (lesser), Cognitive Mutagen (lesser), Alchemist’s Fire (lesser), Thunderstone (lesser)
  • Alchemist Feats: Quick Bomber, Smoke Bomb (2nd), Calculated Splash (4th), Directional Bombs (6th), Sticky Bomb (8th), Expanded Splash (10th), Extend Elixer (12th), Glib Mutagen (14th), Exploitive Bomb (16th), Perfect Debilitation (18th), Mega Bomb (20th)

  EVOLUTION THEORIST

Everybody’s looking for the next best thing. How can we improve the operation of the human (and non-human) body? Would people be better off with three arms instead of two? What about enhanced strength and uncanny memory? Your job isn’t necessarily to answer these questions; it’s to ask the questions that nobody’s even thought of yet!

You’re creative and always think outside the box. In fact, you don’t even understand why there has to be a box in the first place. Using your brilliant, twisted mind, you know that you can unlock the secrets of the past to better the future.

Are you trying to establish a new standard of living? Or are you more focused on improving yourself first? Are there any particular creatures or monsters that you identify with, on a spiritual level? Do you act with divine directive or is everything a machination of your own mind?

Were you ever a part of academia? Is your research sanctioned? And what about testing protocols? Are you performing dangerous testing on your own body? Is there a secret lab we should be worried about?

Pathmap

  • Research Field: Mutagenist
  • Ability Scores: Intelligence, Strength
  • Skills: Warfare Lore, Athletics, Occultism
  • Formulae: Cheetah’s Elixer (lesser), Bestial Mutagen (lesser), Juggernaut Mutagen (lesser), Tanglefoot Bag (lesser)
  • Alchemist Feats: Alchemical Familiar, Revivifying Mutagen (2nd), Efficient Alchemy (4th), Combine Elixers (6th), Feral Mutagen (8th), Elastic Mutagen (10th), Extend Elixer (12th), Glib Mutagen (14th), Eternal Elixer (16th), Mindblank Mutagen (18th), Perfect Mutagen (20th)

  PARTY ROCKER

Enough of all this smart stuff! Academics are SO last semester and you just want to use your delightful mind for something other than book-learning and concoction-brewing. It’s time to cut loose and show everybody how to have a great time!

You know how to put on an entertaining show. Whether you were raised among a traveling band of performers or spent some leftover coin on some razzle-dazzle, you can pump up a crowd with the best of them. Midsummer is a BLAST.

Do you perform in front of sold-out crowds or are you more like someone whose hobby has merely attracted the attention of passerby? Besides explosive ordinances, do you have anything else that keeps the party going? Do you have a script that you follow or are you impromptu and let the night take you where it may? Have you used any other magical means to punctuate your performances?

Pathmap

  • Research Field: Bomber
  • Ability Scores: Charisma, Intelligence
  • Skills: Circus Lore, Performance, Society
  • Formulae: Leaper’s Elixer (lesser), Bottled Lightning (lesser), Frost Vial (lesser), Cognitive Mutagen (lesser)
  • Alchemist Feats: Far Lobber, Smoke Bomb (2nd), Calculated Splash (4th), Debilitating Bomb (6th), Powerful Alchemy (8th), Expanded Splash (10th), Uncanny Bombs (12th), True Debilitating Bomb (14th), Genius Mutagen (16th), Perfect Debilitation (18th), Mega Bomb (20th)

  COVERT OPERATIVE

No more joking around. Sneaking around is serious business. When you’re behind enemy lines with nothing but the ingenuity in your head and the tools at your belt, a single mistake can mark the end of everything. Masters of stealth and surprise, covert operatives are one with the shadows. Every tool can make the difference. And you have A LOT of tools.

Your specialty lies in completing objectives to the highest degree of efficiency. Assassinations, thefts, heists – all of them are fair game. You revel in the cover of darkness, but you can blend well with a crowd if you have to. Impersonations are an everyday occurrence.

Who’s giving your orders? Do you rely heavily on your poisons to see missions through to completion? Are you a sweet-talker or do you punch first and ask questions later? Do you play well with others? What about recognition – is your name well-known throughout Golarion? Or, do you go by a moniker? How do you deal with your conscious? Is there any job that you won’t take?

Pathmap

  • Research Field: Chirurgeon
  • Ability Scores: Dexterity, Charisma
  • Skills: Genealogy Lore, Stealth, Deception
  • Formulae: Arsenic, Eagle-Eye Elixer (lesser), Acid Flask (lesser), Antidote (lesser)
  • Alchemist Feats: Quick Bomber, Smoke Bomb (2nd), Enduring Alchemy (4th), Combine Elixers (6th), Powerful Alchemy (8th), Potent Poisoner (10th), Extend Elixer (12th), Glib Mutagen (14th), Persistent Mutagen (16th), Mindblank Mutagen (18th), Perfect Mutagen (20th)

Pathfinder 2E Alchemist Class – Mix it Up!

And there you have it! Alchemists aren’t just about mixing up doses of random things and chucking bombs. I mean, they’re REALLY GOOD at doing those things, but they’re so much more than that.

Play around with the options in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook to see what interests you most. Keep in mind that a handful of the Alchemist Feats have prerequisites so have a potential endgame for your character in mind from the beginning. At the same time, don’t be afraid to change your ‘Pathmap’ depending on what happens in the story of your campaign.

Barbarian is going to be the next class I tackle. Bottle up your emotions until we get there!

How to Create Great Pathfinder Second Edition Characters

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How do you Make D&D Combat More Fun? Think Like a Cockroach. https://nerdsonearth.com/2019/07/dnd-combat-cockroach/ Mon, 08 Jul 2019 12:00:40 +0000 https://nerdsonearth.com/?p=24699

Let's see how a cockroach can help us bring a little variety to our D&D combat.

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I lived in Georgia for a few years so I can 100% confirm that Georgia has cockroaches. Flip on a light in a dark room and you might just see something scurry.

My point? No one would call a cockroach smart, but even a cockroach is smart enough to scatter when a light switch is flicked on. But in our D&D games? We simply have our monsters stand there like dummies while they are pelted with arrows until they die.

This is the first of three articles.

  1. This first one will explain how some very simple tactics learned from cockroaches can make our D&D combat so much more interesting.
  2. The second will explain what I call the “HASTE” method, which is a way to to examine a monster’s “feelings” in combat.
  3. The third article simply goes through some common monsters types and gives you some tips on tactics for that type.

Cockroach Tactics

Have your monsters scatter. The first thing a cockroach does when they sense danger is to scatter. It should be the same for your monsters.

A group of kobolds aren’t going to assemble into a West Point-like formation when they are startled by PCs. They will instead scatter about looking for cover or seeking safely.

Have monsters make a little screech when combat begins and then have them scatter. It’s not only a more apt response when a creature is startled, but it’s also more fun. A little chaos makes encounters memorable and having creatures scattered all about the battlefield makes the action more spirited.

Run for cover! It seems like next to no one remembers that you can break up your movement in D&D 5e. You don’t have to use your 30 ft or whatever all at once. Use 10 ft, attack, then use that last 20.

If you are a DM controlling a bugbear with a crossbow, make him use cover! Have him step out five feet from behind a pillar, fire a bolt, then use the rest of that movement to duck back to cover.

You’ll instantly have a more interesting combat because you’ll force the players to adjust to a combatant that is actually using their noodle by not standing out in the open when arrows or fireboat are flying.

Play possum. You won’t want to do this often, but occasionally have creatures play possum. If a goblin looks around and sees his friends being struck down all around him, have him suddenly drop to the ground and play dead.

Make a big show of it. Have him roll a bluff to see if players can perceive his ruse. If they don’t, let the little gerblin make a run for it when their attention is off him.

It’s a plausible survival tactic after all. And suddenly you have a little intrigue and a possible chase scene in the midst of what would otherwise be a ho-hum combat.

Do gross stuff. Part of the evolutionary survival of cockroaches is that they are just so darned icky, to use a scientific term. People don’t want to go near them and they certainly don’t want to stomp on them, only to have them ooze out everywhere.

If you are a DM controlling a monster and they have a gross ability, use it. I’m not saying you need to be that guy on the airplane who bites his own toenails, but don’t hesitate to use the abilities the monsters have. They are defense mechanisms after all.

Flee! Only a fanatic fights to the death and a monster looking for food isn’t going to stick around when they realize what they thought was an easy meal is actually pummeling them to death with a flail. So run.

Just like a cockroach, most D&D monsters are more than intelligent enough to flee for their life.


The above are some very basic thoughts to make D&D combats a little more interesting simply by utilizing natural survival instincts that most D&D monsters would possess. After all, there is a reason that cockroaches will outlive us all.

Next we’ll talk about HASTE, which will take these concepts much deeper. Then we’ll go through certain monster types and how they’d specifically use the above and HASTE concepts.

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Pathfinder 2.0: Erik Mona on if Golarion Will Suffer a Cataclysmic Event https://nerdsonearth.com/2018/05/golarion-gap/ Tue, 29 May 2018 15:58:27 +0000 https://nerdsonearth.com/?p=18268

As nerds prepare for the upcoming Pathfinder 2.0 playtest, we asked Paizo head honcho Erik Mona what that meant for the world of Golarion, the setting of Pathfinder. Plus, goblin news!

The post Pathfinder 2.0: Erik Mona on if Golarion Will Suffer a Cataclysmic Event appeared first on Nerds on Earth.

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Nerds on Earth burned a spell slot to cast Command on Erik Mona, Publisher at Paizo, maker of the Pathfinder RPG. Compelled to answer our questions, Erik was interrogated thoroughly, then released (mostly) unharmed.

What follows is part 2 of a three part interview that is in audio form here, as well as in written form below:

1. Leaning into Golarion

2. A Possible Cataclysmic Event

3. Future Adventures in Golarion

And, now, here is Erik Mona, speaking on Pathfinder Second Edition and what that means for the World of Golarion.

Pathfinder 2.0: A Cataclysmic Event

Clave: When you did Starfinder you created the “gap”, which was brilliant. It’s like, “There’s some kind of mysterious amnesia we all have.” And that allowed you to advance that space setting forward in time.

Erik: Right.

Clave: The “gap” was a great way to handle that sort of thing. When you go to the second edition of Pathfinder, is there going to be some sort of event? Doomsday Dawn: Does that point to something, some big catastrophe that’s happening in the setting?

Erik: Not if the player characters are successful. What Doomsday Dawn is all about is, in the very beginning of Pathfinder, in fact so early on that we were publishing our adventure modules under the Game Mastery brand, which actually started prior to the Pathfinder Adventure Path started in 2007. But we started doing Adventures in 2006 and one of those adventures was called Entombed With the Pharaohs. It was set in Osirion.

It was written by Michael Cortes, who’s a great and frequent freelancer of ours. He created this thing called the Aucturn Enigma. Aucturn is sort of a Neptunian style planet on the far stretches of the solar system. It is infused with powers of the dark tapestry, which is alien, the dark spaces between the stars. Kind of where our unknowable cosmic horrors come from in the Pathfinder world.

He created this countdown essentially. These countdown clocks that were counting down to the year 4718 in Pathfinder’s world. It was just as kind of an Easter egg. We put a couple of things like that into the setting that were pointers to things that we might, future versions of ourselves or whoever replaced us might be able to go back and say, “This was the plan all along”. The Aucturn Enigma was one of those.

As we got closer and closer to the idea of doing a second edition of Pathfinder, I think it started almost as a little bit of a joke or what. But we were like, “You know what? Let’s use that thread and let’s do it. Some people are going to be joking that second edition Pathfinder is the end of the world anyway, so let’s do it. Let’s sort of lean into it. The evil brain collectors are coming to steal everybody’s brain, unless the heroes can stop it.”

The idea in my head it’s always been like, they’re coming to install your worst nightmares about what we might do with second edition. By your characters being victorious in the adventure, and by you providing us with the feedback that’s important to you, we can make sure that the version of the world and of the game that we save is one that the players really want.

What that Doomsday Dawn thing is, is it’s seven short adventures. We’ll be doing play tests for it starting very shortly after GenCon in little quick bursts where everybody plays the adventure. We’re probably going to do some streaming out of the office of us playing the adventure. We’ll have surveys for all seven adventures, getting people’s feedback in terms of, “Did this power work the way that you wanted it to? How long did your character survive? Was it fun?”. All that kind of stuff. In addition to the feedback we’ve always taken which is kind of that message board based, “Tell us what you think”, there’s going to be a lot of surveys that are geared toward really getting into the nuts and bolts of how specific parts of the system work.

That whole Doomsday Dawn, Aucturn Enigma, “What are the clocks counting down to?”, that’s all going to be, I wouldn’t say 100% tied up because we’ll want to come back to those themes I think later. But all that Doomsday Dawn stuff is self contained within the 96 page Doomsday Dawn play test adventure. That kind of in some ways is our gap, if you will. But it’s what the players actually play through.

What we will do, I mentioned the countdown clock and 4707. Basically the way that we do things with our timeline is that the last two digits of the year in Golarion correspond to the last two digits of the year in Earth. When we started in 2007, the year in Golarion was 4707. Now that we’re in 2018, the year is 4718. We can track the passage of time. One of the things that will happen in the second edition era is, we will bring the timeline formally up to date with 4718. In doing that, we will be revisiting all of the first edition adventure paths, and trying to sort of say, “If the players completed these things successfully, what implications does that have on the world itself?”.

The best example is probably the Wrath of the Righteous adventure path, which is all about closing the World Wound. These gates to the abyss that are causing this looming terror to the north of the campaign setting. If we say that the adventurers’ activities in that adventure path are canonized, well then the world wound is closed by the time 4718 rolls around. If you haven’t been paying too much attention to the setting since, let’s say 2007, and you’ve come to the version that we’ll be publishing in the era of second edition, you might say, “Wow. An awful lot has changed”. But almost all of the major changes that we’re going to be implementing into the setting are the result of PC actions within the context of the adventure paths.

We’re having our time of troubles or our gap or whatever. But it’s simply codifying the successful activities of adventurers who have been with us since 2007.

Clave: I’m in. You’ve got me, so let’s switch gears. A good friend, one of the guys on the Called Shot Podcast, plays a goblin character actually. Technically goblins are playable now, but they’re not…core. In the second edition they’re going to be core…it’s not races, it’s ancestries, right?

Erik: Yep. We’ve changed race to ancestry.

Clave: What are going to be the differences in goblins that step them closer to the center of the playable ancestries? What are you going to do with that?

Erik: Well, we have added a whole bunch of abilities and things that goblins have to bring them kind of up to speed with the core options as well. Instead of just being like, “Elves have 20 options, but if you want to play a goblin here’s three”. We’re bringing them up to part in terms of what they can do. We’re also talking a little bit about, within the context of the goblin section of the playtest book, we’re talking a little bit about, “What does it mean to have a non evil goblin?”.

Clave: Yeah…

Erik: I think a lot of people’s impression of goblins right now is that they’re pyromaniacs, they hate dogs, and all that. I think that the book goes to some length to say, “Yes. That is true of goblins in general. But there are exceptions to that rule, and there are increasingly some goblins who are trying to interact with society a little bit more than just trying to light it on fire and eat their dogs and things like that”.

I will say that we are also working on some sort of in world stuff about, if there are now goblin adventurers, where do they come from? A lot of people have been really desirous for that. It’s not so much I think in many cases that they’re skeptical about the idea. They just kind of want, or maybe they are, but they want a little bit of guidance as to, “Wait, what do I do? How do I keep this player from not disrupting the entire group?” I think that’s good questions when it comes to evil characters in general. But I think that there are some folks who really, as much as we could help them on that, they would appreciate.

There’s going to be some things that are happening within the context of Pathfinder society. There are going to be some things happening in other vectors as well for folks kind of looking at, “Okay. My impression prior to this edition was maybe that if a goblin comes into town, they’d get arrested or killed on sight. Why is that not the case?” We have some thoughts there. Whether they’re going to live up to everyone’s expectations or not I think is going to be an individual question. I think some people just don’t seem to want goblins.

Clave: Yeah.

Erik: They are definitely in the playtest, and we’re going to be listening to what people have to say, and try and figure out how to do it. I mean, it’s an interesting question because whenever we do goblin oriented stuff at GenCon or Free RPG Day, or really whenever, people are very enthusiastic. They love playing that stuff. We’re just going to have to figure out how to make it work, and if it’s worth it.

Clave: Yeah, absolutely.

Erik: I think it is, but we’ll see. All part of the playtest.


All three parts of our three part interview, as well the entire interview in audio form here.

1. Leaning into Golarion

2. A Possible Cataclysmic Event

3. Future Adventures in Golarion

The post Pathfinder 2.0: Erik Mona on if Golarion Will Suffer a Cataclysmic Event appeared first on Nerds on Earth.

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