#pathfinder

[castorrel]

Sketch of my character for an upcoming campaign.

What can I say, I love masked characters so much that I created a whole civilization of masked characters for his backstory. The mask is like the Ordinators from Morrowind if you need a good reference point.

[silver-gm]

A piece of Pathfinder lore that's only ever mentioned, let alone used, in a single book of a single adventure path that I nonetheless find darkly hilarious: In Cheliax, there's a popular form of play called the Theater Mortrescci, or more commonly the murderplay, wherein which characters live or die is decided by trying to kill the actors.

(It's mentioned in the AP that the players have no trouble getting roles, because the only people going for roles are "desperate actors that can't fight or desperate adventurers that can't act")

[embercute]

Leshy Summoner for one of my players!

[maistarberries]

Re: that time I said Pathfinder is a weirdly kinky game if you've been on the internet long enough

What do you mean that this is a spell?

[probablyfunrpgideas]

Setting Idea: The Regent of Droyle is True Neutral. This is magically confirmed each year in the Act of Balance, in accordance with the kingdom’s constitution. All monarchs are raised to see the benefits of harmonious conduct and moderation.

The Droylish cabinet is composed of the following individuals, each of whom has their own faction in the palace. The Lord Justice, Lawful Neutral magistrate and legal expert. The Lord Bishop, Chaotic Neutral head of the state religion and spiritual advisor. The Lord Marshal, Neutral Good commander of the kingdom’s armies. And the Lord Treasurer, Neutral Evil manager of finances and tax collection.

Upon the succession of a new monarch, new advisors can be appointed, and the alignments rotated (the divine patron of Droyle is a Neutral god, so there are clerics of all sorts available to replace the Lord Bishop). All the alignments must be represented and confirmed in the Act of Balance, and the appointment is for life unless the minister is proven to be working against the monarch or to have an unauthorized alignment.

Finally, an alignment question we can have fun with! Who would you appoint to keep the kingdom running smoothly? What kind of intrigues would you run in a “balanced” court like this? And what kind of fallout could result from players meddling with the system?

[thenightgaunt]

I gotta share Tony's world-building advice. He's done a bunch of videos on every simple yet powerful economic factors that shape the formation of civilizations and cities and nations. Things that are often forgotten by D&D writers and Fantasy authors.

They're elements that make a world feel REAL, and don't need a ton of detail or work to implement.

His recent video here is on the Water Trap.

He talks about Karl Wittfogel's now much weakened theory about Hydrolic Empires, where water control creates tyranny, and about why it's not accurate and what factors ACTUALLY shape such civilizations according to other Anthropologists. Things like if water comes from rain or a single source like a river, can people just walk away or are they trapped because the only viable survival option IS staying in that area, are local bodies organizing together to manage the resource or is one ruler taking power over all local bodies?

One of his previous videos was about the Ox Paradox. Grin can be transported by Ox over a road, but the Ox needs feeding. So there's going to be a point where the food cost of the Ox is MORE than the amount of grain you can bring from your farm or community to a larger collection point/city/town/etc. So that's the limit of how far away food production can be from towns. That range is increased if the food being transported changes as well as if there's a river that can extend it. But that itself creates a power dynamic and conflict between those upriver and those downriver.

It's great stuff and a fantastic resource for anyone doing some world building. Because every source of conflict is a place where drama and adventure happens.

A perfectly balanced world with no conflict might be nice to live in, but it is a boring one for adventurers and stories to take place in.

Worldbuilding Insights

In this playlist I go through my insights on worldbuilding gathered over the years.

[boardgametoday]

Hope to your next adventure with the Pathfinder Second Edition Bundle of Frogs! Humble Bundle #ttrpg #pathfinder https://graphicpolicy.com/2026/08/02/hope-to-your-next-adventure-with-the-pathfinder-second-edition-bundle-of-frogs-humble-bundle/

Hope to your next adventure with the Pathfinder Second Edition Bundle of Frogs! Humble Bundle