[PF-1e] A Great and Terrible Burning

[CatCanCook]

Game Name A Great and Terrible Burning Open for backfill now, see this post: https://www.rpgcrossing.com/showthre...94#post9653694

Game System Pathfinder

Theme Post apocalyptic Southern California; human extinction has been halted, or maybe just delayed, by magic.

Flavour Some gritty survival, followed by kingdom-building. Varied fantasy themes as history's stories, myths and fantasy come alike.

Introduction: A Great and Terrible Burning A nuclear war raged across the earth. Amid the radioactive bomb blasts, a change occurred. Technology failed. Magic entered the world. The holocaust slowed, sparing humanity from complete annihilation. Mankind suffered through a great and terrible burning, then a generation of starvation and cannibalism. When the acute crisis was over, 95% of humanity had perished. All of civilization had fallen, leaving scattered survivors to slowly rebuild amid a world forever changed. Themes: gritty survival and colonization. Try to save your tribe, and if you can, re-establish it as a successful city-state and a beacon of hope in a dark world. Chapters are short, and level advancement between chapters is rapid. Inspiration: Fred Saberhagen's Empire of the East. S M Stirling's Dies the Fire, and Emberverse series. The game folder is here: https://www.rpgcrossing.com/forumdisplay.php?f=20248 The game rules and character build information is here: https://www.rpgcrossing.com/showthread.php?t=224556 (I have eliminated the duplicate copy here, so as to have a single source of truth that I only need to update in one location.)

[CatCanCook]

This is a placeholder for players expressing interest.

I'll look for about 10 applications, then close it for further applicants, then give about a week to wrap up applications and decide and start after that. Tentatively around New Years? But we shall see.

Player	Character	Campaign Trait	NPC Class(es)	Adventuring Class	Status
OneDarkness	Willow	Missionary (Wiccan ) / Living Geiger Counter	Adept	Druid	Accepted
17FromGreatness	Arcady Darell	Black Sheep	(pending)	Sorcerer	Accepted
mightymcnoneshot	Matias Haru	Orc Hater	Commoner	Hawkguard-Warder	Accepted
RasterFarian	Riddley Walker	Outlander's Child	Expert	Cleric	Accepted
HashtagBryn	Hope Romo	Canny Hunter	Warrior	Occultist	Accepted
Acathala	Siegfried	Fantasy Buff / Mentored by Trina	Aristocrat	AdventuringClass	Accepted
PsychicNomad	Dorita Gutiérrez	Detect Elder Darkness, Fantasy Buff ??	Adept	Zealot	Work in progress
Maghnuis	CharName	CampaignTrait	InitialClass	AdventuringClass	Expressed interest
BrainTitan	CharName	CampaignTrait	InitialClass	AdventuringClass	Expressed interest

Withdrawn: Dylan Scott


Please let me know if you have any questions.

---

If anyone wants some structure around your application you can use this. (Use the "Quote" button then strip away everything unneeded. This is optional.

Application Template (Optional) Name: Campaign Trait: (unique) Ability Scores: (15 point buy; think ahead to 25 point-buy at the end of Chapter 3.) Str: Dex: Con: Int: Wis: Cha: Ethnicity: Size: Medium (but optionally Small if Str < 10) Age: Alignment: Faith/Patron: Level 1 class: Traits: (2 in different categories, excludes campaign traints) Bonus feat: (if commoner) Level 1 feat: (Note that this may start your first Greater Stance) Description: (1 paragraph) Personality: (1 paragraph) Background: (1 paragraph)

The following are OK to defer to later: Fort: Refl: Will: BAB: HP: (maximized at 1st level) Skills: FCB: Spells: (if any) Gear: Feat tax fix or bonus feat?: (choose when you have an adventuring class) Planned level 2 class: Planned level 3 class: Planned level 3 feat: (Note that this may start your second Greater Stance: 2 + 2 feats) Planned level 5 feat: (Note that this may start your final Greater Stance: 3 + 3 +3

[OneDarkness]

Possible interest but admittedly I need to read through all of this another time or two there is a lot to digest.

[CatCanCook]

Yes, there is a lot to read. The actual story starts in the first Campaign Trait, describing the "Inspiring Advisor".

[OneDarkness]

When you gain a 5pt buy in latter levels what are the limitations of it, can you hold the poinst from chapter one till chapter two, i.e. lets say I started with a stat at 15 for 7 points, and then at end of chapter 1 I spent 3 to get it to 16, can I hold on to the remaining 2 points and combine with end of chapter 2 to bring the stat to 18?

I didn't see any mention of race for character creation, are we all human?

The greater stances, can you select the same feat in more than one stance if you wanted to?

At 3rd level when you pick between feat tax fix or a bonus feat, could the bonus feat along with teh normal feat gained at 3rd level be used to buy 2nd and 3rd greater stance, guess similar question but using teh commoner's 1st level bonus feat as welll?

Can Alternate multi-class ability be placed inside a greater stance?

Extra spell slots feat, are these selected once at feat taking and stay at that level, or can they be changed daily. i.e. at 1st level i take extra spell slots and gain 3 extra 1st level spell slots, at 3rd level when i can cast 2nd level spells can I move those extra slots to be 2nd level slots instead of 1st?

How long do the extraordinary chef bonuses last?

[CatCanCook]

When you gain a 5pt buy in latter levels what are the limitations of it, can you hold the poinst from chapter one till chapter two, i.e. lets say I started with a stat at 15 for 7 points, and then at end of chapter 1 I spent 3 to get it to 16, can I hold on to the remaining 2 points and combine with end of chapter 2 to bring the stat to 18?

Yes, you can hold unspent points over from one chapter to the next.

I didn't see any mention of race for character creation, are we all human?

Everyone of the Topangan tribe is human. The only other known race is orc, but they all appear to be hostile at this time.

You can be a Small human (if Str is low). You can be a human who takes nonhuman traits, feats, favored class bonuses, etc. (But not features humans lack.)

The greater stances, can you select the same feat in more than one stance if you wanted to?

Yes. It might be wasteful, but sometimes it could be cumulative and not wasteful. Example, assume 5th level:

Stance One: Extra spells (Create Treasure Map, Detect Thoughts, Clairaudience/Clairvoyance), Craft Wand, Craft Wondrous Device
Stance Two: Extra spells (Summon Monster I, II and III), Spell Focus (Conjuration), Augment Summons
Stance Three: Extra spells (Grease, Web, Stinking Cloud), Spell Penetration, Extra Spell Slots

In this example, the Extra Spells feat is take three times, but different choices are made each time. One Stance is utility, one is summoning, and one is crowd control.

Here is a degenerate example:

Stance One: Extra Channel, Extra Channel, Extra Channel
Stance Two: Extra Channel, Extra Channel, Extra Channel
Stance Three: Extra Channel, Extra Channel, Extra Channel

That's a lot of channels. Channel until you are blue in the face.

Here is another one, which might actually be pretty cool for a Summoner.

Stance One: Extra Evolution, Resilient Eidolon, Extra Evolution
Stance Two: Extra Evolution, Defending Eidolon, Extra Evolution
Stance Three: Extra Evolution, Share Healing, Extra Evolution

The Extra Evolution can be chosen at level 1 and 5, so I'm assuming that's when its chosen. So this summoner gets a few "lenses" of behavior -- a different batch of eidolon behaviors at different times. And if the summoner is knocked out, the fallback is Stance One which has Resilient Eidolon, which lets the Eidolon remain even when the Summoner falls.

At 3rd level when you pick between feat tax fix or a bonus feat, could the bonus feat along with teh normal feat gained at 3rd level be used to buy 2nd and 3rd greater stance, guess similar question but using teh commoner's 1st level bonus feat as welll?

Bonus feats cannot be used to buy Greater Stances.

Only the feats associated with level advancement (level 1, 3, 5, etc.) can be used to make up your Greater Stances.

For most characters, Greater Stances will be the best and most efficient use of feats; the only exception is if you absolutely must have something physical, external, or a key prerequisite for a must-have prestige class.

(Some of the campaign traits move that choice from 3rd level to 1st level; but that is a short-term vs long-term tradeoff.)

Can Alternate multi-class ability be placed inside a greater stance?

Yes - as long as it does not give something permanent and external, like an animal companion.

Extra spell slots feat, are these selected once at feat taking and stay at that level, or can they be changed daily. i.e. at 1st level i take extra spell slots and gain 3 extra 1st level spell slots, at 3rd level when i can cast 2nd level spells can I move those extra slots to be 2nd level slots instead of 1st?

They are fixed, unless you pay to retrain the feat. For example, suppose you reach 5th level and want to retrain an Extra Slots feat from 3/0/0 to 1/1/1.

10 × your level × the number of days required to retrain x 2 [game surcharge]
10 x 5 x 5 [x2, takes twice as long] x 2
= 1000gp

So the price is pretty steep considering you'll be cash limited in this game. So you can do it, it's just got to be a notable priority

How long do the extraordinary chef bonuses last?

A day. I had one other limitation in mind, which I'll add. Wait a sec ...

A character can benefit from only one Wasteland Chef meal at a time, the last consumed. The duration of benefit is 8 hours.

Also, thanks for the careful and attentive read, OneDarkness.

[PsychicNomad]

Spooky Psionic on the path to mind-linking warrior Campaign Trait: Detect Elder Darkness Starting NPC class: Adept, spells refluffed for spontaneously manifested psychic powers Adventuring Class: Zealot, that's adequately freaky for the setting Name: Dorita Gutiérrez Age: 23 Alignment: Lawful Good Appearance Dorita looks older than she is, the strange powers she sometimes manifests have taken their toll on her. She usually looks at least a little weary, often very tired, because it's not easy for her to emotionally cope with all this weirdness. She has long, dark brown hair flowing down her shoulders, usually unkempt and messy, her eyes are almost black, lending her a certain sinister aura. Her powerful figure usually outshines her beauty, which is there if one cares to look beyond first impressions. She sometimes makes jerky movements involuntarily, which she subconsciously tries to hide by pretending to actually do something. Sometimes she manages to fool even herself. She always wears practical clothes, no-one has seen her in skirts. She likes earth tones, though both light and dark are fine for her, but she avoids gray and black - these feel too depressive for her. There's enough darkness in life, why should wear it, too? Her desire for decoration is focused on bracelets and necklaces, mostly made of natural materials. When the story starts, she has a bronze circlet with thirteen chrysoprase drops on it around her neck, and a bracelet of overlapping oaken plates on her. Personality Dorita is prone to be glum and melancholy, but she jumps at the prospect of having fun. Although she does not hate people, she is usually uncomfortable around them, she is insecure with anything erratic, and people tend to be that. She can easily find comfort in objects, she likes making little trinkets (like her bracelet), and finds technology and arcane items fascinating. She desperately wants to understand others, to get into their minds and see the world as they see it. However, she rarely has the courage to ask, so she broods and conceptualizes a lot, with rare occasions when she plops open and asks a person directly. She has always been an outsider, and learned to fight early. She finds that useful, but she isn't proud of it, and frequently campaigns against violence as a ready solution. Background Dorita

 

Chapter 3: 25 point-buy Str 14, Dex 14, Con 10 Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 16 Chapter 2: 20 point-buy Str 13, Dex 12, Con 10 Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 16 Chapter 1: 15 point-buy Str 12, Dex 12, Con 10 Int 10, Wis 11, Cha 16 Trait 1: Practiced Initiator Pick an initiating class(Zealot): your initiator level in that class gains a +2 trait bonus as long as this bonus does not raise your initiator level above your current Hit Dice. Trait 2: Feat:

[CatCanCook]

Welcome, PsychicNomad.

For people's starting NPC classes, it's just the base NPC classes, not archetypes.

For actual adventuring classes, archetypes are welcome.

--

I updated the OP with a little basics about the culture: races, religions, npcs classes. I will add more as questions come up.

[OneDarkness]

Willow, A Great and Terrible Burning Willow 15 years old, Human, Femal, Neutral Good Missionary (Wiccan ) / Living Geiger Counter Adept on the path to becoming a Druid "At heart we are all powerful, beautiful, and capable of changing the world with our bare hands." Appearance A beautiful young woman with thick blonde curls that hang down around her mid back, eyes an enthralling shade of green and her skin barely marked by the passage of a dozen and three winters. She moves with a slow and purposeful stride, boldly meeting the eyes of others with the confidence of youth and something more. She favors earthier tones often of greens, browns and greys and carries little in the way of metal or weapons but has a collection of wood crafted accessories such as rings, bracelets and charms. Personality She is what you would consider an old soul, having understood young what many youths take far longer to understand, and is secure in her place in the world though certainly has ambitions to be even more. She is cautious where needed, bold when required and more importantly has learned that both have their place in the matter of things. She is not one to rush to judgement on something that she does not fully understand, but has a strong intuition about things as well should she be forced to make a decision and her natural impulse is to act in a way that helps others. She feels a deep connection with the natural world, often times more fully than within the people around her but she still prefers their company over being alone for long periods of time. She is distrustful of technology and trappings of the old world as they have all seen how that played out for the world before, but does not out right condemn it as its a choice that each soul must make on their own. She spends time each day in meditation, among her small garden, and has a particular fondness for mint especially the chocolate mint which she often uses to flavor her tea that she is fond of drinking in the mornings and at the end of the day or even added to her waterskin. Truthfully if you catch her in a moment of weakness she is having a hard time with the most recent of events as her parents died fighting the invaders and her best friend was captured and taken away. The valley is not the safe place it once was and she doesn't know if they will ever truly be safe again. Background Before recent events Willow was the only daughter of Cassia and Tom, Cassia had been a student of Estrella and was a talented dancer who had had a gift for seeing to the health of others and taught Willow much of what she knows in that area. Her father, Tom, was an artist as well though his talents were more in the workings of wood, he spent much of his days building fences and structures for the community but his passion was making small items that brought joy to others such as toys for children, bits of jewelry and other such decorative pieces when time allowed. Both were slain during the raid that swept through the canyon, her mother while trying to protect the patients under her care with her father at her side, Willow was only spared along with a few others as they were hidden in the root cellar below with those able enough to make it their in time. Her best friend, River, was the daughter of one of the tribes hunters has been missing ever since the attack and her body was never found among those who were slain so she assumes she was taken by the raiders and she hopes she still lives. Immediately following the raid she had little enough time to grieve as there were many in need of whatever healing could be provided, and the loss of her mother was one the community could ill afford. In a baptism by fire she quickly found herself moving from wounded to wounded doing the best she could, same with the others who had any type of training in the field, she learned quickly what she was capable of and what was beyond her talents and luckily she was able to save more than a few who might have not made it if not for her mother's training. Willow was one of the more outspoken on the need to find new and safer lands for the tribe to help prevent this from happening again as she feared the raiders would return now that they had been found. Her connection with nature has always been strong, and whether recent events triggered something or the talent had always been there sitting unused is unknown but lately she has discovered she is capable of magic. There had been times when the things her mother did seemed to defy expectations, and perhaps he had simply been adept at being subtle but she suspects the Wiccan traditions and words of wisdom her mother taught her were more than just faith but actual instructions in tapping into the natural world around her. Mechanical Notes

[CatCanCook]

@OneDarkness --

Good so far. As a 15 year old in an ignorant, isolated tribe, Willow would have no grand backstory. Nature has to be tended with care in the Canyon. There are a few deadly patches of radiation here and there. There are polluted ashen clouds that blow in from The Angels to the east. The land suffers from a drought, and the few sources of fresh water have to be treasured and protected. It has ben a hard life, with constant work keeping famine at bay, and treating people who fall victim to cancer and other hazards. But still, until the recent tragic invasion, the Canyon was peaceful and as close to idyllic as is possible post-apocalypse.

So ... fill in a bit of backstory and personality, and she'll be ready. There aren't a lot of choices at level 1, but traits, and what to do with the 1st feat.

[mightymconeshot]

Would we be able to create path of war societies through our development?

[OneDarkness]

Alright added personality and background just reviewing the mechanics of things

We still get the human bonus feat at first along with our 1st level character feat correct?

When I spend my 1st level character feat on a greater stance do I get it and a feat to put inside of it?

Can you change which is your default greater stance later on?

[CatCanCook]

Would we be able to create path of war societies through our development?

Yes. 5 years pass per chapter, and you get to grow old in this game (albeit with humanity having a shortened lifespan now due all the nukes, pollution, disease, etc.). So you get to influence the next generation of societies, and maybe in some ways redress problems facing the Southland. (If you survive....)

We still get the human bonus feat at first along with our 1st level character feat correct?

Only if your starting class is Commoner.

Your other source of bonus feats is: with your first adventuring class (usually level) you either get the Feat Tax Fix or 1 bonus feat.

When I spend my 1st level character feat on a greater stance do I get it and a feat to put inside of it?

Yes, so it costs you almost nothing at 1st level, so to speak. Then if you do that again at 3rd level, you are at 2+2 feats.

Can you change which is your default greater stance later on?

Only via retraining. Otherwise, plan on your 1st feat going into your 1st Greater Stance as being the backbone of your default stance.

[CatCanCook]

Read the "Many Things Are Hard" note.

Many things are hard. The following things are always +1 spell level higher (or reachable 2 levels later) than in base Pathfinder, and must always expend resource (spell slots, charges, etc.) -- they cannot be unlimited use when used by humans: creating or purifying food or water, invisibility, flight, burrowing, granting knowledge of languages or communicating without language, curing radiation damage, curing disease, teleporting more than medium distance, reversing death.

Create Water, Purify food and drink ==> these are actually 1st level spells.

This world is out to kill you, survival is not easy.

[OneDarkness]

Does human still start with the +2 to attribute and with skilled: +1 Skill point per level?