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What do you mean ECL is now a negative number?!

I think someone went overboard on the monsters as PCs rules and nearly made my head explode. You can read the rules I won't be using here: PRD Monsters as PCs
For the time being as we wait for an errata / some heavy play testing I'm going to suggest the following Monster as PC rules for one offs, secondary campaigns etc. It's my hope that these find a happy medium between the rather restrictive rules in Monster Manual and the far to liberal approach in the Pathfinder Bestiary.

• Base Monster Level is equal to CR or Hit Dice, whichever is higher. So a Minotaur PC is a level 6 character rather than a level 4 character (Pathfinder) or a level 8 Character (3.5)
• Monsters gain levels at the same rate as everyone else, not faster than everyone else.
• +¹/₃rd & -¹/₃rd Monsters who have a marked disadvantage after a few class levels may at the DMs discretion gain additional levels as described in the monsters as PCs rules. monsters with a marked advantage compared to the other PCs may miss every third level. These levels are adjudicated by the DM as the character progresses.
• Players may begin playing monsters at any level including first, the DM will create a monster level progression similar to that of an Ettin

I'm very glad everyone was willing to play a non-monstrous character in this game.

Check out my Psuedo-Pathfinder conversion of the Ettin.

Somewhere, somehow HräshHläng just gained 3 levels.

Pathfinder RPG Rules Published

Last week we saw the release of the impressive pathfinder RPG core rules. The rules are available as a $60 rulebook from many local gaming stores, as a $10 pdf download from Paizo, or free from paizo's own hyperlinked SRD equivalent the PRD. Words cannot express how much I love this company!

DENNIS has just purchased another Pathfinder Core Rulebook, and will give it to the next person to give him $50.

Addendum: Chris has just completed updating the pathfinder templates for the PC Profiler programme. Download the update here!

Recent Posts

• What's in a Name (Varden/Izzy/Saite)
• Lost (Tam/Kianna)
• The Invitation (Varden)
• The Weight of Vengeance (Taylar/Tamarack)
• Good Morning (Taylar/Tamarack)
• Prankster (Tamarack)
• Taylar's Lyndune Fantasy (Taylar)
• A Seed is Planted (Izûn-Zîn)
• Rebirth of a Scoundrel (NPC)
• Evolution (Tamarack/Kianna)
• Walking Away (Varden)

Dargos Group is named: The Amici Scopuli

Cast Spells with but a thought

Tired of those pesky verbal and somatic components, check out the Thought Magic Feat.

New "House" Rules (actually just preview rules from PFRPG)

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The PaizoCon banquet had some great preview material for Paizo
So preview banquet notes: lets share the goodness, took 4 pages of notes and I saw someone with a camera so there may be a video coming.

The pdf is 578 pages including covers.

Jason says the rulebook is considered a weapon in 30 states, I beleive him :P, it's the second largest RPG book I've ever seen

Races: Favored classes are picked by player, humans and half elves get two.
half elves, half orcs, humans get +2 to an ability score to reflect human heritage.

Classes, Barbarian rage points are gone in favor of a duration as indicated previously.
Cleric domains now include the spells from 3.5 and also offer a few powers.
Fireball is in the fire domain
Domains, schools, bloodlines are in the classes chapter

Paladin has heavy changes, detect evil is immediate, no waiting 3 rounds, smite evil lasts until opponent is dead, 2X damage to fiends, dragons, and undead, Ignore DR, Bonus to AC vs smited critter.
Paladins gain "Mercies" which allow them to remove conditions as part of lay on hands, lay on hands now handled with 1d6/2 lvls.
Pally CL is level -3

Skills
Perception is no longer broken down by sense so much, intended to simplify.
Concentration checks are now CL+relevant ability score, I think the DC was mentioned as 20.

Feats, the feat table is 4 pages, I'd guesstimate there are twice as many as in 3.5 core. lots of fighter only/high level feats such as vital strike which i believe was in the beta.

Medium and Heavy armor got better by +1 across the board as an incentive to use it. Mithral armor requires proficiency in regular armor of that type.

Combat, there is a combat defense Class BAB + Str + Dex + anything that gives an armor bonus to AC

Magic: spells are much cheeper to write into spellbook

100 pages of spells, darkness/light spells have been clairified 4 levels of darkness : Darkness/Dim Light/Light/Bright Light. spells modify the light area by one or more steps.

Assassins can kill people and they stay dead.
Shadowdancer will be changed extensively and will be perviewed in Kobold Quarterly #10.

Game mastering tips section includes exp chards and the wealth by level chart on p 399 to make it easy to find.

Environment: underwater combat has been revised a bit to clear up the chart (tail not bludgeoning)

Magic items:
Few changes, physical enhancement items are all belts, mental enhancements are all hats.

You make a craft check when you make an item if you fail your effort is wasted, if you fail badly you get a cursed item, each cursed item is listed as what the item may have been intended to be, before it got messed up.

it was also strongly indicated (by a pdf related accident) that monks may have full BAB progression (and a commensurate insane number of attacks with flurry)

That's it for the notes on the RPG core book. Hope to see many more of you at PaizoCon next year.

Group Notice Re DM clearance and open game policy

Hi folks,

Last meet two players announced that they were using materials from non-OGL books without clearing any items with the DM. Please remember that we are running an OGL/homebrew campaign so any rule you may wish to use needs to be both A) approved for reasons of game balance and B) adapted to our ruleset to satisfy my inner open-source greg. If it isn't on pfogc.com or www.d20srd.org you need my permission. If it isn't open game content it may also need to be adapted. When in doubt contact me.

If you don't clear stuff with me in future, I may be forced to shelve certain classes, feats, spells, items etc pending adaption and approval.

Rules and background updates:

Armavoc, the art of Auldelian sword magic is beginning to get detailed. If you have ideas for new armavoc spells and feats please post them to the wiki as drafts pending approval.

Major revision to the Auldelian language

Messages for the GM is where you (I hope) can leave messages for the GM to see. If you get great ideas and are either too late to call or want to ask a question, but will forget before you see Tim again.

Players are asked to create a character of first level and write a character history.