Pathfinder in the Mists

[Mangrum]

Question though: would the feats Iron will and Improved Iron will apply to Fear/Horror/Madness saves?

Yes; they're just specific types of Will saves. Specifically, for example, a Fear save is a Will save against a fear effect; a Horror save is a Will save against a horror effect. We just used the shorter terms for brevity's sake.

[Zilfer]

Ryan did you ever finish your draft PDF yet? Was wondering if it was open to the public yet.

[Ryan Naylor]

It's at the printers.

By which I mean, it should be yours in less than 24 hours.

[The Giamarga]

Did you fix the Assassin class TWF typo ?

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

It's at the printers.

By which I mean, it should be yours in less than 24 hours.

Will try my darndest to get it up today, but today is a beast. Worst-case, monday. (sorry, Ryan)

[Zilfer]

Sounds good, I still have the copy I have from the DRAFT Nemesio shared with us. I just wanted to put out a little reminder so this little Gem didn't get lost and forgotten....

[Ryan Naylor]

So there you all have it: sometime soon.

Did you fix the Assassin class TWF typo ?

I have altered the Ba'al Verzi again. Whether anyone is happy with it or not, we will have to see

[Joël of the FoS]

Out there!

You can get the three netbooks from the announcement post on this board. You'll see the quality level of the whole is just, wow.

I'll let Ron put the announcement on the FoS home page, when he has the time (If I do try, there won't be any home page left )

Joël

[Ryan Naylor]

Thanks Joel!

I am, as always, eager to hear what people think. Possibly after you've finished digesting the 560-odd pages I've just dumped on you, though.

[Nemesio]

GREAT JOB RYAN! STELLAR WORK, AS ALWAYS!

[Ryan Naylor]

Thank you!

[Jimsolo]

I'm not normally one for fangirling. But...



I'm so so so using these. This is amazing. Thank you Ryan! Your professional dedication to the setting is awe-inspiring, sir!

[A G Thing]

Wow... Great job! I always liked your Pathfinder thread... Inspired me to start one of my own... Just so I don't crowd yours too much... Thanks for this and keep up the good work!

[Gonzoron of the FoS]

I realize that this post is a bit late, since the netbooks are already out, and this discussion took place 3 months ago, but I did say I'd respond to Ryan's post on the Scattered Lotus archipelago, and it's been sitting here in an open Chrome tab waiting for me to follow through, so I'll try to be brief, but still respond.

I'Cath and Rokushima are problematic because, for a long time, they were all there was for Asian cultures in Ravenloft. One had very few opportunities for roleplay and adventure; the other was mentioned once and then never really detailed. I can understand and fully support that the implicit political statement there is that Asia isn't as important to Ravenloft (which can theoretically steal domains from anywhere) as Europe. And that is *obviously* problematic. The tokenism of having I'Cath and Rokushima doesn't help.

Agreed, an unworkable token is IMHO worse than no representation at all. No representation can mean, "we haven't touched on it, but it's out there. Do as you want." while something like I'Cath says, "here, we've ticked the box." If either I'Cath or Rokushima had been fleshed out to the point of usefulness, it would have been different. But as is, they aren't as inclusive as they think they are.

With that said, I'm not sure that the statement, "Asia isn't as important to Ravenloft ... as Europe" is untrue or a necessarily a bad thing. If we are to accept that Ravenloft is focused on a particular type of horror, which we usually call Gothic Horror, rightly or wrongly, and not all horror, that style of horror is based in the traditions of European and European-descended cultures. Asian cultures have fundamentally different styles of horror (a fact which Rucht did an excellent job of highlighting in his Gothic Earth Eternal, I might add). The fact that Ravenloft can grab stuff from the whole multiverse is just an excuse, as we all know, to mash together all the tropes of Gothic Horror into a single setting. That conceit has the unfortunate side-effect of forcing us to ask why Powers that can grab anything will grab only these things, and RL fans have spent decades trying to sort that bit out. What I'm getting at here is that no one expects Deadlands to include Asia, or L5R to include Europe. (Note that I'm not well versed in either of those games. I'm speaking as an outsider to both. I expect Deadlands to be based on Westerns, hence North America, and L5R to be based on Japan (perhaps with other neighboring lands mixed in) Maybe Deadlands does have an Asian analogue (I guess it would have to in order to have somewhere for the "Chinese" immigrants to come from). Maybe L5R does have a European analogue. But I bet it's not as interesting or as detailed as the main setting in either case. And I don't think it's problematic to say that "Asia (or Africa, or South America, or Australia...) isn't as important to Deadlands as the Western U.S.").

So I'm perfectly OK with a non-inclusive Ravenloft, if it focuses on the central themes/tropes of the setting. I'd prefer it to be non-inclusive than to make a half-assed attempt at inclusion. (**I'm referring to I'Cath and Rokushima as written here when I say half-assed. NOT Ryan's stuff, Dion's, etc.) I commend you for trying to open Ravenloft's world up in a more thorough fashion, and my comments were meant more as a caution not to fall in the same traps that previous attempts have done.

I do think it's interesting that we're concerned about respect and accuracy in Asian domains, but not for any others (including, say, Australian Aboriginals, or native Central and South Americans). I understand why, given the power dynamics and sensitivity to accusations of racism, but it's still interesting. You dismiss it as saying "That's just what Universal did anyway" - how is that an excuse if you're worried about this sort of thing for one group of domains, but not another? I'm willing to bet most people skimmed straight over the idea of a generic Europe in the paragraph above without blinking, but would have been quite taken aback by the same statement about Asia.

Exactly. I can't really put into words why "generic Asia" has more potential for offense than "generic Europe". But I feel that it does. Copying what Universal did is a valid excuse, I think, if the goal is to let players play in the world that they know from the Universal films, which is a good part of what Ravenloft is about, I think. If you're playing a Star Trek RPG, you don't worry about the psuedo-science behind warp drives and transporters not making sense. You accept that as part of the backdrop of the world. To the layman, "D&D meets Frankenstein" is a pretty good summary of Ravenloft, IMHO. And when that layman hears Frankenstein, you can bet he's thinking of Boris Karloff with bolts in his neck, not Mary Shelley's version. So if you want to play in that world, you expect the trappings of the burgomeisters in lederhosen, etc.

If you have ninjas who wear black facemasks and kabuki costumes, you are a poster for what I'm talking about. And if you took Japan, which is reasonably well known and carries cultural weight, and replaced it with Tibet, or Bhutan, how accurate will that be?

This is an excellent point. I have nothing to add to it. Just thought it bore repeating. To be quite honest, this very reason is why I personally am likely to never use any Asian domain, no matter how well done.

Since you mention respect, I am trying to be respectful in the creation of those domains. I am not, at any point, saying that I have created a general Asian domain based on the general Asian culture. I have created an intentional pastiche, adopting specific aspects from specific cultures to create a new one that is an appropriate background to run fun games in. ...All I'm trying to do is round out Ravenloft with a few more domains that people might be interested in using in their games.

And I applaud this effort. I hope I didn't offend with my critique, or perhaps more accurately, caution. This intentional pastiche matches "the Ravenloft way" with respect to Europe. I just wanted to make sure that's what you'd done (and to encourage that it be made clear that it's what you'd done), and point out that it's easy to mistake that for "general Asian domain" which I think we both agree would not help matters.

[Ryan Naylor]

No problems at all, Ron. There's nothing in your post that offends, or that I even disagree with strenuously.

Thanks for coming back to add your thoughts to the discussion.