Pathfinder 1E Amethyst Renaissance (Pathfinder edition) Progress

I started the Amethyst Pathfinder edition, dubbed Renaissance two weeks ago. It is still in the alpha phase, but progress has been extremely rapid. Not even two weeks into production and Renaissance is now passed 188 pages. Races, lifepaths, classes, skills, and feats are ALL done. After this, we got prestige classes, equipment, setting, and monsters. At this rate, first draft will be done by the end of November. It could come out before Ultramodern4 is this pace keeps up.

I am still hoping to maintain the freedom of character creation we had begun with the D20 Amethyst in 2008 and perfected with our recent Amethyst Evolution book. For now, I wanted to leak a few of our "alpha" phase classes. These are still being tested.

LAUDENIANS
RACIAL TRAITS
Average Height: 5’10” – 6’7”
Average Weight: 40-55 lbs.
Average Starting Age: 150 years
Estimated Life Expectancy: Unknown (10,000 years?)

Ability Scores: +2 Wisdom; +2 Intelligence or +2 Dexterity; -2 Constitution or -2 Strength
Size: Medium. As a Medium creature, you have no special bonuses or penalties due to your size.
Speed: 35 feet
Vision: Normal
Languages: Laudenian, one human language, and one additional fae language. If you have a high Intelligence score, you can choose any additional languages you want.
Racial Skill Bonuses: +2 Acrobatics, +2 Spellcraft

Adept User: You receive a +2 racial bonus to saving throws against enchantment spells and effects.
Emergence: You know where and when to be to strike the critical blow. You know where and when to be to strike the critical blow. When wielding a light melee weapon, you can use Wisdom in place of Strength as your primary melee attack/damage attribute. If you are wielding two weapons, both must be light weapons for this ability to apply.
Equilibrium: If you have 4 or more ranks in Acrobatics, you gain a +4 dodge bonus to AC when fighting defensively instead of +3, and a +7 dodge bonus to AC when taking total defense actions instead of +6.
Light Body: Reduce all fall distances by 10 feet (2 squares). If bull rushed, you are pushed back 10 feet; for every 5 by which the attack exceeds your CMD, you are pushed an additional 10 feet.
Special Ability -- Slide Waltz: Your body can move like water, swaying around an opponent with ease.
Ability Type: Extraordinary
Action: Swift
Attack of Opportunity: No
Uses Per Day: As many times as your Wisdom or Intelligence modifier.
Effect: Select one Medium or smaller creature within 5 feet (adjacent square). You can move to any location that is within 5 feet of the target (effectively any unoccupied square adjacent to the target).

NARROS
RACIAL TRAITS
Average Height: 4’ – 4’9”
Average Weight: 195-395 lbs.
Average Starting Age: 75 years
Estimated Life Expectancy: 1,000 years

Ability Scores: +2 Constitution; +2 Charisma or +2 Wisdom; -2 Dexterity or -2 Intelligence
Size: Medium. As a Medium creature, you have no special bonuses or penalties due to your size.
Speed: 25 feet. Your speed is never modified by armor or encumbrance.
Vision: Darkvision. You can see in the dark up to 60 feet.
Languages: Narroni and one human language. If you have a high Intelligence score, you can choose any additional languages you want.
Racial Skill Bonuses: +2 Intimidate, +2 Survival

Big Boned: You suffer s -3 penalty to all Swim checks.
Iron Roots: You have a +4 racial bonus to your CMD against a bull rush or trip. You are treated as a Large creature when dealing with wind effects.
Militaristic: You are proficient in any two melee weapons of your choice (even if techan).
Stone Blood: You gain a +2 racial bonus to Fort saves but suffer a -1 penalty to Ref saves. You also gain a +2 racial bonus on saving throws against poison.
Final Word: If you are reduced to 0 or less hit points, you do not fall unconscious until the end of your next turn (regardless of damage taken). On your next turn, you can take only a single standard action. If you use that action to attack the enemy that reduced you to 0 hit points or lower, you automatically hit (you still roll).

I will continue to update this thread if you guys want to know more about our progress…

43,000 words. That's how big the Equipment chapter is for Amethyst: Renaissance, our new upcoming Pathfinder book. Every gun, missile, grenade, and powered armor we ever made has been squeezed into this book. Characters can spend their hard earned UC on regular armor, nano-injections, and a really pretty gun, or blow it all on one really big mecha. Unlike Foundations or even our old D20 book, players using the Pathfinder rules will now be able to upgrade their powered armor with more hit points, increased armor, jump jets, and/or bonuses to physical attributes. Like a fast car? You can buy and modify those as well.

Nawz!: Your customized vehicle has a slight modification you haven’t told anyone else about. Once a day, as a swift action, the speed of your vehicle increases by +10 ft (+2 squares) for 1 minute.

Don't like cars? Want a blimp? Yup, we got those to.

What's next? Prestige classes, we got about 30 of them. No stone unturned.

Sounds very cool, looking forward to the finished product.

I just reached page 318 with Amethyst Renaissance.

That leaves artifacts, setting, and monsters left to be completed. I expect the monsters to be a profound pain in the ass. I never enjoyed designing monsters for 3.5; I hope Pathfinder's process will be easier. Meanwhile, Ultramodern is still slogged with delays out of my control. Obviously, plans to have it released by Christmas have been scrapped.

One of the new additions to Renaissance sure to be folded into our 4th Edition game is an enhanced set of rules dealing with negative corruption and magic saturation. Previously, these rules only applied to humans and pagus. By introducing corruption into the setting, all creatures become vulnerable.

I didn’t bother inserting these rules into Foundations but they're being introduced with Renaissance. If DEM continues Amethyst into Factions (the next book, possibly for Pathfinder AND 4th Edition), you'll find these same rules. However, since I don't want to leave out the 4th Edition players, you can read and enjoy them now.

Note: With the PATHFINDER version, corruption changes your alignment in a more "realistic" way, drifting from one side of the alignment diagram to the other. The transition makes more sense (one instance where Pathfinder rules handle this better).

CORRUPTION
Because of Ixindar's power of influence, there can never be a good spellcaster bound to Ixindar casting corrupt spells (at least not for very long). Eventually, the corruption seeps into the soul, distorting its view, and rendering the caster wicked.
Characters with any alignment save for Lawful Evil cannot cast negative spells (those with the Death or Evil descriptors) without the risk of corruption.
Attricana is no guarantee for good and every creature born of magic, save for pagus and shemjaza, are tied to it. On the flipside, the majority of those souls born or bound to Ixindar are evil. Those that are corrupted nearly always remain that way. Those born to the darkness have been known to move away from that skewed path, but this seldom occurs with those corrupted. Casting Attricana spells or using Attricana magic can turn someone into an echan, but it won’t affect alignment like Ixindar does.
Corruption Point: When you use magic tied to Ixindar, you will fall under the influence corruption. This occurs the moment you wield a corrupted weapon, cast a negative spell, or study the language saeqaar. You start at level 1 with a corruption value of 0. These rules work the same as echan saturation points but are recording separately. You gain corruption points under the following circumstances:
+2: You wield an Ixindar weapon (per minute).
+2: You wear Ixindar magic armor (per hour).
+2: You benefit from Ixindar magic items in your possession (per hour).
+2: You study the arcane arts of the corrupted tongue of saeqaar (per day).
+1: You drink an Ixindar potion.
+4: You cast a spell bound to Ixindar.
The moment you reach a corruption point of 20, you run the risk of changing alignments. At the beginning of each day, you receive the following corruption attack: +10+ (your corruption value – 20) vs. Will. If you are hit, your alignment changes
Good to Lawful Good to Evil
Lawful Good to Evil
Unaligned to Evil
Chaotic Evil to Evil
Effectively you shift one step close to Evil. Even if already evil, corruption still takes place. The only alignment that doesn’t full under corruption is Evil itself.
The moment your alignment shifts into Evil, your soul is bound to Ixindar. You no longer generate EDF, even if you had before. Your saturation point is set to zero (if you had it). If you acquire saturation points, you can revert to being an echan, but this does not affect your alignment. If you gain enough saturation points to switch to being echan, you corruption value is unaffected, and switching back to Ixindar is thus quite easy.
The only way to expunge corruption points is with time. You will lose 1 corruption point each week as long as you don’t accrue any in that time. The moment you do, the time period resets. If your alignment changes before your value falls below 20, the alignment change remains. This is also true if you tie your soul to Ixindar.

ENCHANTMENT
Some contest the claim that Attricana is less a source of magic and more a source of chaos. As the famous quote passed among wizards goes, “Anything you can think of thinks for itself.” Attricana is about life in every possible combination, breaking rules nature declares incontrovertible. A creature or force derived from these broken rules emanates that same chaos. Since most technology requires irrefutable laws of the universe to function, machines and magic cannot co-mingle. The confusion arises as to how can Ixindar succeed at this. Where Ixindar encourages control and order, even at the expense of intelligent life—which is itself a factor of chaos—Attricana encourages nothing other than the perseverance of intelligence, even at the expense of normal reality. This reality can stain a creature as much as Ixindar can, but where corruption can affect one's outlook on life, all Attricana can do is turn something into another catalyst of chaos, radiating the same aura of magic as the gate itself. This created a chain reaction 500 years ago forcing all remaining fragments of working technology into the bastions. Although all fae are slaves to magic, humans have a choice, being born via the normal rules of biology. They can choose to accept the world of magic or remain disciplines of science. There is no good or evil in this conflict. There is only opinion, and there is no wrong answer.
However, the choice is often permanent. By wielding that magic sword, by casting that spell, a human ties his soul to Attricana, become one with the world of magic, and disrupting technology just as an elf would.

SATURATION POINT
Saturation Point: If you are not a “radiant”—a creature tied to Attricana which radiates magic—then you are able to use technology without disruption. Only humans, pagus, and shemjaza fall into this category. However, if you use magic enough, eventually, you’ll become one with the world of enchantment, becoming a true echan in the same grade as even the fae. You gain no additional benefits but now generate EDF. You lose your capacity to use technology. The critical saturation point is 20. You start at level 1 with a saturation point of 0. You gain saturation points under the following circumstances:
+1: You wield a magic weapon (per minute).
+1: You wear magic armor (per hour).
+1: You benefit from magic items in your possession (per hour).
+1: You study the arcane arts (per day).
+1: A beneficial magical effect (including magical healing) is placed upon you.
+1: You drink a potion.
+10: You are brought back from the dead via a spell or spell-life effect.
+20: You bond with a non-human.
+20: You select a supernatural lifepath
The moment you reach a saturation point of 20, you now generate an EDF. Points do not immediately go away. If you do not accrue any additional points, you remove 1 from your saturation point total every week (unless bonded or selecting a supernatural lifepath; if so, you total can never drop below 20).


BY THE WAY, I said the Pathfinder version of corrupted makes more sense…

The moment you reach a corruption point of 20, you run the risk of changing alignments. At the beginning of each day, you must make DC20 Will save. This DC is increased by your corruption value – 20. If you fail, you alignment shifts one step using the Alignment Step diagram in the PATHFINDER CORE RULEBOOK. You shift one step close to Lawful Evil. You do not step diagonally, only down or left, as long as it is one step closer to Lawful Evil. You can choose which direction you take (for example, if Neutral Good and you fail a Will save, you can decide to become Neutral or Lawful Good. Even if already evil, corruption still takes place. The only alignment that doesn’t full under corruption is Lawful Evil itself.
The moment your alignment shifts into Lawful Evil, your soul is bound to Ixindar. You no longer generate EDF, even if you had before. Your saturation point is set to zero (if you had it). If you acquire saturation points, you can revert to being an echan, but this does not affect your alignment. If you gain enough saturation points to switch to being echan, you corruption value is unaffected, and switching back to Ixindar is thus quite easy.
The only way to expunge corruption points is with time (or in rare occurrences, an Atonement spell). You will lose 1 corruption point each week as long as you don’t accrue any in that time. The moment you do, the time period resets. If your alignment changes before your value falls below 20, the alignment change remains. This is also true if you tie your soul to Ixindar.

I (sadly) only found out about Amethyst for 3e once the d20 license expired and it was no longer available.

Is this a pathfinder version of that same thing, or something else?


Either way, good luck, and I'll be looking into it.

Aberzanzorax said:

I (sadly) only found out about Amethyst for 3e once the d20 license expired and it was no longer available.

Is this a pathfinder version of that same thing, or something else?


Either way, good luck, and I'll be looking into it.

Click to expand...

The old 3rd Edition game is actually for sale again.

Amethyst D20 - Dias Ex Machina Games | RPGNow.com

Amethyst Renaissance, our Pathfinder edition, is NOT an update of this book. Rather it's a complete adaptation of both Amethyst Foundations AND Amethyst Evolution. It will be a more faithful adaptation and work with the core rules more without changing as much as the old 2008 book did.

Playtesting is still open...

The old 3rd Edition game is actually for sale again.

Click to expand...

Oh awesome!