Pathfinder/RPing Tutorial/Guides.

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Shivor
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Sun Dec 22, 2013 12:00 pm

Well there's 2 series by this one very experienced and fun DM one is a tutorial about pathfinder : http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4A1E3A8F7AB89CD5
and another very very usefull one is a series about RPing and creating character and stuff like that : http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL ... 32lh--LX9d from which I esp recommend this one : [media=youtube]DvYKy-L9USI[/media] I feel like if you watch these you're gonna get a better grasp about how to RP and play pathfinder.

For more resources on the games :
- http://www.d20pfsrd.com/
-http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/

Depending on how much free time I have I will try to extract some tables with quick reference stuff.
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NivinyaFate
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Sun Dec 22, 2013 4:32 pm

Thanks for the links, I've only watched a few of the RP ones so far, but they've been really helpful. Since there is so many hours worth of videos on those links, do you think it'd be best to start with ones relating to character creation and the character we plan to make or is it worth watching them all in order?

Also, would it be ok if I (and others) post questions relating to D&D/Pathfinder and character sheets to be looked over to make sure they're filled out properly here or should a new thread be made for that?
Shivor
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Sun Dec 22, 2013 6:19 pm

I'm glad that you found the videos useful what I can say about them is that it's good to watch the RP ones whether or not you read the Core Book / Website stuff, I find the books more enjoyable with all the pictures and novelty, so maybe first watch some of the RP ones like character creations alignments maybe some of the class ones, and then watch the tutorial ones in combination with the book / website if you haven't played before. The main thing I can stress out is that the game is max 33% combat or so.

In terms of character sheets, sure I can look over there but it's not like you can really gimp your character, you don't need an overpowered gimmicky character. I think the initial character sheet is about 5-10% percent of the character even including the backstory what matters most is how you develop and RP the character in question. You can be an intelligent Fighter if you want don't let anyone put you down because it's not cut edge and best ever, and a good DM while being fair will try to put you in a situation that screw you over, for example 7 int 7 cha 10 wis on a barbarian and one hit everything with ur high str and high hp but then you come across a riddle or a situation you'd need to use ur brains and you'll be like DAHHHHH BARBARIAN.
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NivinyaFate
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Sun Dec 22, 2013 9:51 pm

Thanks, I'll stick to watching the RP ones for now then.

Sorry for not being clearer, but I didn't mean I want my character sheet to be min/maxed or anything, just that it's not missing anything that it is supposed to have and is filled in correctly since there's so many fields and not all of it is too straight forward for newer players. I got a lot further along thanks to ChriZZZzzzz' stream today and I think I'm done unless I'm supposed to have starting gear, which I'm not sure if I'm supposed to select ahead of time or see what the DM decides at the start of the game.

My character sheet is http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.p ... tid=741315 if you or anyone else would like to take a look. The backstory I might try rewriting, I wanted to keep it as short as possible while getting the important information across but it doesn't seem to read well to me, although maybe that's not important. I'm also not sure if the eidolon information is done correctly or not as there doesn't seem to be a section for it. I did confirm the backstory with 0bolus in ChriZZZzzzz' chat, just in case anyone is curious as it does cause my character to be a bit different from a standard Kitsune.
Shivor
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Mon Dec 23, 2013 11:07 am

For some reason I can't see your character sheet.
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NivinyaFate
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Mon Dec 23, 2013 2:07 pm

[Edit]I posted my character sheet in ChriZZZzzzz' channel and Shiaar helped me with it. I'll leave the link up in case anyone see it, but I shouldn't need any more help with it currently. Thanks for offering though Shivor. :) [/Edit]

Sorry about that, I think my sheet was set to private, but I've changed it to public. I opened it in a second browser that wasn't logged into the site and it's showing for me now. If there's still problems viewing it I'll do some screenshots of it and post them.
Shivor
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Tue Dec 24, 2013 7:44 am

It's a decent character , and could tie in as a personal quest in the campaign to remove the curse from her family, but i would elaborate the story some more also if i'm not mistaken in pathfinder you get a bonus misc mod for the class skills you rank at first level, also idk if the race starts with those languages but languages aren't free :D . Maybe also tie her skills into the story for example the sorcerer i just made has bluff and knowledge nature but that makes sence because he was forced to live in the wild untill a band of halflings found him and then lived as a con man and general scoundrel with them (just an example), lets say spellcraft and UMD ties into her family history but it would be preffered to elaborate on how she gained those skills. You have to allways think about the character in a RP way and make choices that make sense like it says in the videos you wouldn't want to become a dwarven defender(prestige DnD class) if a band of dwarven defenders slaughtered your family lets say unless you want to infiltrate their ranks and get revenge ( but then you'd become more of a rogue) ofc that's an extreme example maybe elaborate on her relationship with the eidolon and unless you plan that as character development during the RP part of the game where you'd talk with the other characters about ur history and how ur eidolon saved you and stuff, as i was saying not even your whole backstory has to be on the char sheet it's interesting to reveal stuff during play for example lets say you want to play a demon bloodline Sorc but your character doesn't know he's a demon bloodline Sorc ofc you know but the character so you RP acordingly maybe you hear voices each time you tap into ur powers whispers from the darkness, you feel the heat of the abyss stuff like that and at some point you realise your powers are demonic and you can either embrace them or fight against them maybe the character is conflicted because this power helps him do good but it comes from evil.
Shivor
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Tue Dec 24, 2013 7:48 am

Also I don't know if i would go for that low wisdom your character would be pretty dull in terms of perception and stuff also weak willed. It doesn't make sense for someone that decided to find a cure for their cursed family and go into the wilds to be that weak willed unless you make a story that someone sugested this maybe her eidolon or something like that.
Shivor
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Tue Dec 24, 2013 7:51 am

Also as a suggestion for new players, try to stick to the base classes and races, a bit easier to roleplay and make , esp since if you want to go into summoning you could just go for a Wizard and be into elementals and summon monster and lets say with a spell focus on conjuring maybe enhancement as well.

I'm personally a very big fan of the core classes and races. And as i mentioned a bigger fan of anti-heros and conflicted characters as you can see from my posts. Lets say ur character was lawfull but had to do terible things in the name of the law and now drifted more towards neutral or even chaotic and something is eating him up inside because he killed that entire village of elves or something along those lines, ofc these characters have to fit with the campaign if the campaign is filled with shades of grey then that makes sense but if you make a character like that in a very standard lets say newer game you run the risk of ur characters personality and story overpowering the other characters and take away from the fun of the players. Heck if the DM isn't that good it could even overpower the campaign and then you'd be the one driving the story.
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NivinyaFate
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Tue Dec 24, 2013 11:00 am

Thanks for going so in depth on the RP stuff since that is an area I'm still a bit unsure of. I'll try to explain why I went with my choices and maybe it'll make more sense or maybe I should rethink some things. :)

The impression I got from chat was that backstory should be kept brief and only have the most important points in the character sheet with more coming out through RP potentially, but I could easily elaborate more on it if I should. The story could tie into a campaign, although I wasn't creating it specifically for that, it's mainly for her motivation to be an adventurer and to help shape her personality. I haven't really decided how I want to RP her explaining the curse, such as if she would openly say what happened to the other adventurers or if it was a subject she'd talk around the subject, at least until something happens where her true motives might come under question or similar. For language, Kitsune start with Common and Sylvan and get a choice of certain free languages based on Int modifier.

If I expand her backstory more it does make sense with her skills. I haven't worked out 100% of the details yet although I have the overall story worked out. Her father was a mage and taught her magic and how to use magical devices and she learned to bluff from having to survive on her own with nearly nothing. It probably would be good for me to elaborate at least a bit more on her Eidolon as I intend for them to have a very strong bond with each other.

I went with a somewhat low wisdom as while she is strong willed, although stubborn might describe her better, she can be impulsive and not what I'd consider wise. It's likely something that didn't show well since I went so brief with her backstory, but here are some ideas I had for her wisdom being that low was that while she has a goal that she is obsessed with. She likely didn't go about it in the best way, at least when she decided on it. Her family was very close and they didn't want her to go off on her own, so she ran away in the night so they couldn't try to stop her or easily go after her. She thought she'd easily be able to make it in the world on her own with the skills she had, but was unprepared for life on her own and with her focus on her goal she ended up making some bad/stupid choices that put her and sometimes others lives in danger. She could easily fall for a trap in the right situation even if it was obvious to others due to her single mindedness and if it wasn't for her eidolon would have likely died multiple times in her travels so far. Not having much to live off of, she learned to use her words and looks to get things, which is why she her charisma is as high as it is.

I know going for a Kitsune Summoner as my first character may not be the best idea due to my inexperience, but it's a combination that as soon as I saw it I knew it was what I wanted to play. Maybe if I expected to play D&D more it'd be different, but if I only end up playing 1 campaign I'd like to play this character. I have no idea at this point if I'll play more or not, but once I start streaming some time next year I probably won't have time for long sessions and I know there's a good amount of others interested in playing. Summoner is actually a class I've wanted to play for the longest time in a MMO or other online/social type game as its the first time I've seen a summoner class that fit my idea of what one should be.

One of the reasons I made her personality mostly reserved was so her story wouldn't really come into focus. She'd have her goals on her mind and it'd drive her decisions, but to others she would try to appear to have different motives. I don't know how good I'll be at RPing her since I'm fairly inexperienced, but I think I could keep her story away from the main campaign but still have it feel like it has influenced her.
Shivor
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Tue Dec 24, 2013 1:21 pm

The campaigns I usually play have at least 33% RP time so you'll surely have to go more in depth with your characters story and relations to the other players. Also you should know high charisma doesn't have to mean your character is extremely beautiful, it could mean strength of personality or a trustworthy character it's not a must, you can imagine even though most sorcs have their cha high not all of them have to be incredibly beautiful, actually most aren't they're rather more weird and unique, exotic with an overpowering personality, take for example the Abberant bloodline.

On the story I don't agree that it has to be as short as possible, there are people that like to read that we could have links to the character sheets on the stream so people can see the story and all that, I myself like keeping track of it and adding as I play through the campaign. What you could do if the DM requests a small story then you could have a small resume for it while still having the background that you could present to the other players. The story should reflect your characters personality and traits. Maybe I'm a bit too much into the RP and some not but I consider that to be the strong point of DnD. Since you can always find min-maxing and combat in various computer games. I actually don't consider myself a strong RP player, but I try.

What you are missing from your character sheet is the gear, for that you have to talk to the DM to see what's allowed and what not ( even if each character starts with a certain gear value the DM may forbid any magical stuff or give you extra magical stuff based on your backstory, lets say you request that you have a cursed dagger that does bla and bla and is tied to you in some way, you'd need a good reason for it though, there's also some feats that may be excluded because they're OP ( *cough* Leadership *cough* ).

You could also add a small 3/day next to your dancing lights for example , maybe keep the feats on the first column and the abilities on the second same for the rest.

Also your character doesn't seem in my opinion like it would overpower any campaign unless you RP it towards that goal :D . I actually think it could add stuff lets say you finish your main quest and the DM could extend the campaign or start the next with the goal to remove the curse from your family with the help of your adventuring friends from the first one.
Also keep in mind if the campaign leads to the adventurers remaining in a static place for a long time ( lets say they settle in a town) then your character may have to retire from the campaign because as she's looking to remove the curse she may have to move on.
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NivinyaFate
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Tue Dec 24, 2013 2:28 pm

I figured high charisma could mean a few different things, although for my character it's supposed to represent her beauty and charm.

It seems like back stories haven't really been emphasized much in ChriZZZzzzz' stream when they've been talking about character creation, I'm can't even remember seeing another sheet with some backstory filled out although I could have missed some. I mainly wanted to do it since my character is somewhat unique in appearance so I wanted to explain why, and writing backstories is the one area I have some RP experience in as most of my City of Heroes characters had a backstory, not to mention I just enjoy thinking them up. :) The RP is the main reason I want to participate as I've wanted to get into RPing for a long time but most games it's either been difficult or intimidating to get into as a new player, or it just doesn't seem that interesting because they confine it to single place like a tavern and don't actually go out into the world in character.

I figured gear would be best handled when preparing for a game, but coming up with some idea of magical/cursed things due to my backstory to run by the DM is a good idea. Once I think up some I can find ways to work them into my backstory, maybe writing a few variations, so that it makes sense for my character to have them if the DM does let me start with something magical.

Writing a small #/day note is a good idea, keeping track of all these numbers seems like it's going to be the most difficult part of playing. I'll likely try to organize things a bit better as well to make it a bit easier to reference.

I'm glad you don't think my character would overpower a campaign unless I RP towards it. That's a really good point about staying in a static place too long, I hadn't thought of that. That could add some interesting opportunities to RP to try to "nudge" the others to move on or to see if I could find reason to stay or possibly even move on temporarily and meet up with them again in the future.
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xBalut_Ninjax
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Wed Dec 25, 2013 11:26 pm

I like playing ranged characters, but the ranger is kinda meh for me since I don't like animal companions and the divine spells rangers get, so I rolled up a rogue with the Sniper archetype. Haven't ported it to Myth-Weavers yet, I think Cohh said he was working on a way to get them on this site or something? But maybe if I get time I'll put it up on the weave..
Watch your back.
Shoot straight.
Conserve ammo.
And never, ever, cut a deal with a dragon.
Shivor
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Thu Dec 26, 2013 5:35 pm

You could even be a ranged paladin if you go into the advanced books.

My personal opinion is that a rogue sniper is pretty limited in what it does.
As to rogue vs ranger i think rogue COULD provide more fun in a city env while ranger could provide more fun in an outdoors env.

I suggest also looking and the fighter archer and the paladin archer or the paladin divine hunter, BUT if i were the DM for the first campaign i would proly stick to core and then all these characters will have to be redone for it.
People in my opinion should try playing core for their first few games and then go into the advanced books, but if you played a bunch of DnD before sure feel free to run wild :D .

The main thing i gotta mention here is that a characters uniqueness and originality doesn't come from the build/class it comes mostly from the characters personality and well character his story and how you develop that character, the choices he makes and all that.
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xBalut_Ninjax
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Sat Dec 28, 2013 6:53 am

I don't like Paladins.. Multiclass fighter might be ok, but Paladins are not what I like to play.. Lawful Stupid isn't very fun and ruins it for others..
I was thinking maybe Ninja/Rogue or Ninja/Fighter specializing in Bows or maybe even go melee and have ranged as a back up.. I doubt Ninja would be available since it's an advanced class, but as soon as we get a DM we'll be able to hash out what's accepted and what isn't..

I'd really like to play a Ratfolk since my Warhammer army of choice is Skaven with Wood Elves in a close second.. :D
Watch your back.
Shoot straight.
Conserve ammo.
And never, ever, cut a deal with a dragon.
Shivor
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Sat Dec 28, 2013 11:32 am

Don't listen to people that tell you paladins will ruin it for others i suggest watching this video :[media=youtube]XDVl8XO9Q7U[/media] you will understand what paladins are about and how they're not really white knights goody princesses. Lawful doesn't have to mean follow the law but your own code, as for paladins if you want me to sum up the video they strive to be the incarnation of their god and follow those rules, where as clerics seek to be serve their god.

Also you don't need to multiclass a fighter to be an archer the problem with a fighter archer is that you don't fully take advantage of your armor class because heavy armor has low max dex modifier. That's the only problem in my opinion with a fighter archer.

As for me I'll proly choose to play a generic (more or less) human sorcerer, just to show people that you don't need to play a crazy race and class to be able to give personality and uniqueness to your character.
silverfoxytail
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Wed Feb 26, 2014 2:39 am

I love pathfinder, I started with D&D 3.5 so it was a easy switch. The only real problem I have found with it is there wording in the books. Some things are just not explained well.

I myself love playing unique races because it can add a real challenge. You tend to be feared, hated, and just generally not trusted. It can change a game on how you play that race.

I almost always play an archer. Multiclassing between ranger and fighter. Ranger(just till you get 1st lvl spells) only to get some skill points since you get almost none as a fighter. This has always worked the best for me because the only prestige for a archer taking ranger is Arcane Archer, were as fighter has a little more options.
Shivor
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Mon Mar 10, 2014 10:43 pm

I don't find fun in min-maxing the game and playing it like a video-game , I like to take skills/ feats that make sense for the character not for the class or the build, for example lets say I play the most basic of character a fighter who comes from a small village lived there until now, so i'd proly get profesion farmer, maybe climb. It's the DMs job to balance the encounters by providing a challenge in battle/ skill checks no matter the amount of min maxing you do , while also keeping them fair, when I DM i actually prefer rewarding RP players while punishing min-maxing ones. In my perfect world no character should be planned when you go into the campaign aside from the backstory and starting stats. I would even go as far as lets say you just lvled up and through the previous session your character did some incredible feat or acted a certain way , talk to your DM about gaining a unique feat instead of one from the list that better fits your characters person rather than his stats.
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