Immortals Handbook Epic Bestiary (now available)

[Upper_Krust]

Hey U_K!

Hiya mate!

If I had a silver bullet I would give it freely

Keep it for Lycanthropes.

but unfortunately I have no experience in RPG marketing. It appears that you have the web channels pretty well saturated. Would it be possible to offer the pdf versions on Amazon or another equivalent?

I don't know. I'll look into it.

Additional pdfs can be generated with virtually nothing in terms of marginal cost. Were it me I don't think I would hesitate to broadcast them over any channel that offers direct sales to consumers.

Part of this will also likely be influenced by your agreement with Mongoose who I am sure will do a fine job promoting the hard copy.

I think the hard copy will only help matters because it will bring the books more into the public eye.

In all candor I hate that you're having to do that on your own. I like your art, but if this compromises your products' release by any material length of time then that not only compromises your economics but it also doesn't do Mongoose any favors. It's made that much worse by the fact that, not only will it delay the release of the print versions of the Bestiary and Ascension but will have a domino effect on subsequent product releases.

You might well be the best crafter of epic and immortal gaming materials in the world; seriously.

HOLD IT! What do you mean "might well be the best crafter of epic and immortal gaming materials in the world". Of course I'm the best!

To paraphrase a certain comic you might well be familiar with:

"I'm the GOD-DAMN UPPER KRUST!"

To me that's the value you bring to the dance. I think folks should let you do what you do best and subcontract that which could be more easily replicated. IMO, that makes more sense for you and your publisher.

Well me knowing I'm the best is one thing, them knowing I'm the best is another.

Please understand that the foregoing is not at all a complaint over a release date. I just don't want to see you as a starving artist.

Don't worry about it - I'll be okay. Already wheels are in motion.

Perhaps there is a way to collect an advance from Mongoose based on anticipated sales revenue? Certainly they should be interested in the most expeditious release date possible.

Not an option.

There are also several financial types (of one I am not) like venture capitalists or private equity type groups that operate on a smaller scale. I'm sure they could provide some near-term help in exchange for an interest in your business.

The problem there is they may actually want an arm and a leg. You tend to have to negotiate very hard with them.

I don't think thats feasible.

I have your alignment as lawful good with chaotic tendencies when it comes to release dates. Don't beat yourself up over it any more than you already have. It's what you do forward that counts.

If I beat myself up over it I am liable to get things done quicker.

I would just have the reviewers note that it's a beta pending completion.

I'm not worried about reviewers. The Bestiary has been out 8 months and I have only seen one online review - and that was from Alzrius!

Hopefully I'll see a few more reviews when the print version is released.

Alzrius seems to love it so far, and from what I've seen it looks great

Well lets hope you think the same after seeing it...

Good luck man and as always feel free to get in touch here or by e-mail if I can help. In the interest of full disclosure you have my assurances that anything I can do will be pro bono (and of course not legal advice as I don't have a license to advise you).

I appreciate the offer mate. But I'll be fine.

 

[Upper_Krust]

U_K!

Hey Ltheb dude!

Well, this is true. But inspirational material isn't too dificult to find on such topics. I don't know how many pictures of Zeus there are, but I am sure we have seen a few of them, and I don't think a picture of a Giant in a Toga throwing Lightning Bolts is too out there.

(Compared to the nexus dragon. I am still trying to figure out which end is the "head." I think it the part encircled by the 6 wings? That does kindof look like an eye or maw)

Its meant to be confusing.

Oh, perhaps a minor question, since Grimoir is next, and no doubt you have been thinking of such related things. Are artifacts like the Robes of the Almight (Nimrod) or the Ram Headed-Throne (Sandalphon) unique, or are those powers duplicatable at a certain level of divinity?

The items would be unique (in terms of their history) but the powers are almost always going to be duplicable.

That said I have a lot of items and ideas in Grimoire that are item specific.

Just curious, as I think they are so awsome. (The line about it being foolish to attack Sandalphon on his home plane is an instant classic).

Sadly, with the Enworld board "hiccup" your post reguarding Deity artifact ratings based on ECL is no longer here. It came out to having a bonus equal to ~1/3 ECL, right? All I remember is an example of an ECL 800 deity being able to have Omnific-level artifacts.

I have that detailed in the Ascension beta.

I think you listed some sort of equivalent Artifact-feat-equivalency that lead to that number. Also, does having an Infinity-power grant other, lesser benifits? Like if you had infinite Intellect, would you just know everything, even what the DM has planned?

Indeed. I just hope I don't have to list them all.

I am sure a couple of these will be answered tomorrow, but since Grimoir is like 4-6 months away, I dunno.

I'd like to have Grimoire done before December.

DOH! Did I just give a release date. More fool me.

Just a random estimate. I remember trying to price Epic Magic item powers myself. This was back in 3.0, where weapon "Plus" mattered, so my reasoning is that having a power with an equivallency of +10 would cripple your ability to injure things, and so gave those levels of weapon power amazing abilities. I remember I had a "Legendary" enhancement, that did 3 things, for a +10 equivallency: Natural 19's counted as 20's (on attacks for weapons, saves for armors), Criticals were automatically confirmed (minor, but Icing on the cake) and any kind of smite damage done with such a weapon was doubled.
Your never-miss-except-on-a-one power sure blows that out of the water!
Well, its late here, and If I stay up too terribly late, I will end up waking up at 1:01, thus robbing myself of sixty whole seconds of *Cue Palpatine Scream* "Unlimited Power!"

Just as well they changed that version of Damage Reduction.

EDIT: WOW I missed a whole page?!?!
All of those abilities seem nice and merit inclusion, however, Superior Cleave and Power Attack are both class features of a certain Frenzied Berserker PrC. (At least in name I believe, though I think its Power Attack ability is better than yours)
The feint power seems the most powerful, I might have to say even broken, since, without a bit of common sense on part of the DM, it allows the rogue to sunder walls very well. "Forget disarming traps! Ill just destroy them!" Though it does help said rogue stand a chance, should they ever be forced into a Knife Fight with a Neutronium Golem.
Other than that, they sound totally awesome. And it sounds to me they are the basic feats! Oh boy, If those are indeed the basic epic feats, then I cant wait to get to ultra-mindblowingly-blinding speed!

Some of those vanilla feats are needed as prerequisites to more powerful divine abilities.

Although trying to keep track of 475 abilities and how they all tie into one another is a tad tricky. Now that I have the feats 'down' (for want of a better word) if not exactly finished, I can concentrate on the divine abilities. I think I have about 230, so I'll cut out the weak ones and get that a bit closer to 200.

EDIT, MARK II: It seems my insomnia has returned... *Yawn* I think Underwalker sounds much more appropo, though earthwalker could be the name of some rediculously high-prereq feat that like grants X10 overland travel. "So you say you walked 240 miles yesterday? Who do you think you are, Forest Gump?"

I prefer Underwalker too.

As for bard stuff, with a dozen or so feats in there, plus I know of a few from other supplements that are surprisingly good, Epic bards should be in good shape. I wonder, would granting a bard the ability to invoke the "brown noise" be an epic feat, or a divine ability?

Improved Flatulence, I'm saving that one for a later book.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey thundershot!

I've been lurking for quite a bit, (with a couple replies here and there) and I can't wait until I see these books in print. I apoligize for not supporting PDF, but in my home, they just never get used.... ever.

No apologies necessary dude!

Except for the Riding Hare from "In the Saddle"... Yeah. As soon as the first volume of the Immortals Handbook is out, I'm on it. My only fear is that the other books don't make it to print.... I'm tempted to just preorder it from Mongoose... I wonder though... why didn't they like the cover? Is it because there's too much black? Or the art in general?

Mongoose liked the cover, the distributors didn't like the cover. Basically they want a full page illustration cover and a stand out logo on the front (thats the format they know from experience sells best).

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey lade!

If you have higher dimensions such as the tenth dimension which the mezzarath guard, will there exist elements that possess unique properties or powers unique to the plane they come from like zardazik , darksteel, thinuan ,hizagkuur , mithril ,cold iron e.t.c.and if by chance they are brought back to the lower 3D realms would they develop impressive and devastating powers as well.

I'm working on a few ideas for Grimoire.

I got this idea from a metal from the rpg book synnibar hell iron , little more than a mundane weapon in it's dimension but outside of it , anything forged of it will slay any mortal being regardless of strength or power and ignore the protections any material can offer, and all it takes to kill a foe is to nick them and they have their souls sucked no save, do or will similar elements exist in further books?

I generally try to make things as unspecific as possible:

Obvious substances earmarked for the bestiary include: Anti-Matter, Dark Matter, Living Stone (aka. Philosopher's Stone) and Strange Matter. Although those are only some of the ones I plan to adapt. I hope to have at least ten new materials as well as ideas for taking the hide of any creature (A solar's skin for instance) and turning it into armour and so forth.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hey Fieari mate!

Thanks for the feedback and help with errata. I knew there would be a lot of mistakes since I didn't even have ime to spellcheck quite a few of the pages (espacially in the feats/metamartial maneouvers).

Furthermore, this feat is incredibly broken. The only time the exact wording of a wish is important is if you seek to exceed the boundaries set out by the description of the wish spell. This feat would enable a 9th level spell to grant the caster omnipotence, or to destroy all universes, or do... quite frankly... ANYTHING. For lesser usages of wish, the feat is redundant.

I don't know, I was more concerned with removing the idea of having your words corrupted.

I mean deities make wishes all the time and they don't backfire.

Not every gamer is a supra genius, so its harsh to punish them for the exact wording.

So it isn't taking away the boundaries of the spells power, just not letting them backfire.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Krust,

Hey cw mate!

great work thus far!

Thanks, although early days yet.

I realize this is a beta, but when can we expect the other 155 pages of material?

I plan to update every ten days until I have the document finished. The fact that this is version 0.6 should give a clue as to when I expect to have things finished.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hello again!

Suggestion: for Anoxia, instead of just saying that dying for the purpose of gaining feats doesn't work, why not make it so that the feat is only gained if the character suffers permanent level loss from the death? In that way, the feat is actually "purchased" at the cost of a level and the price of having him raised.

Looking at it that way, you could also state that this happens only for every two levels lost, or for every three... when death is only an inconvenience, such as at those high levels, gaining permanent benefits from it looks like a bad idea to me. But basically "buying" the permanent benefits sounds reasonable enough...

Yes, I was considering the -1 Con as sufficient 'payment'. But I just didn't have time to go back and amend the feat.

The Eclectic series is awesome.

Glad you and Servitor like them.

Personally I think Sideways Stealing might be my favourite.

I did a quick analysis of the PP gaining method, by the way. Assuming a party of 4 and exactly 13 equal CR monsters per level, each member of the party will have 546 PP by the time they reach level 21. Smaller groups with only 3 party members will gain 728, and if you're simply partnered with another (I'd bet you're using gestalt rules too, in order to survive this long!) both of you will have accumulated 1092, just enough to ascend to hero-deity level.

Cool, although I assume that is the result if you are fighting nothing but Outsiders?

..and remember, just having enough Quintessence doesn't mean you will pass the three tests.

Sounds fair enough so far. Of course, if you're facing fewer equal CR critters, with the occasional higher CR BBEG, this would probably change. Wish there was an easy formula for #of monsters at each relative CR to level up...

I think its going to be too specific to each campaign to have an exact formula.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Nosodic could use some revision, as I think it's too weak. The charisma thing in particular doesn't make sense... charisma has nothing to do with appearance, it's everything to do with force of personality.

Let's compare Nosodic with the Cancer Mage from the Book of Vile Darkness. This is what the cancer mage gets:

Disease Host (Ex): The cancer mage becomes a permanent carrier of every disease he encounters, but remains immune to their effects (aside from purely cosmetic effects). He takes 1d6 damage per caster level if someone casts a cure disease spell or effect on him (he can make a Fort save to avoid this damage).

This ability basically gives the CM a disease attack that he can collect.

Interesting. Although I have the BoVD I have never studied that particular Prestige Class. But with a bit of tweaking the two could work well together.

You'll note that the "cosmetic effects" still happen, which you could note for Nosodic as well.

That was my idea about the Charisma. It was just a snap idea that I didn't have time to go back and check.

I'd also change the prereq from "Perfect Health" to "Disease Immunity", as there are other ways to get immunity to disease than the epic feat-- particularly the Cancer Mage! I mean, this feat would fit that sort of build perfectly, except that it'd require a feat that would kill the CM, and it doesn't work for Charisma for some reason.

Okay.

Venomous Wildshape should specify whether you can take it multiple times. I don't see why you couldn't... each time, either taking a new stat to damage, or an additional d6 of damage... it is an epic feat after all. An SDA (or feat package) could have a venom that deals damage to all 6 stats, or 3d6 to 2...

Indeed, I was planning something along those lines.

 

[Upper_Krust]

Hiya dude!

Since macrobes have 1,024x the HD of the base creature and only creatures that encompass entire universes can break the 1,000-HD limit, does that mean that nearly all macrobes are either time lords or inflated to the Xona-scale?

I assumed Macrobes would indeed be extra-universal and thus not really bound by that limit. Even the Devastation Vermin entry notes they are from an alternate multiverse.

While I think my Size rules in the Bestiary 'work', I am not convinced as to their practicality when you go into the Mega and higher scalings.

 

[historian]

Hey U_K!

Keep it for Lycanthropes.

HOLD IT! What do you mean "might well be the best crafter of epic and immortal gaming materials in the world". Of course I'm the best!

To paraphrase a certain comic you might well be familiar with:

"I'm the GOD-DAMN UPPER KRUST!"

After seeing the Ascension beta there is no question!

You're the peta-man!

I think the hard copy will only help matters because it will bring the books more into the public eye.

Unquestionably.

Well lets hope you think the same after seeing it...

I do. Hard to believe but it exceeded even my lofy expectations. It's fantastic.

Don't worry about it - I'll be okay. Already wheels are in motion.

I appreciate the offer mate. But I'll be fine.

Good deal. If anything changes I'd be thrilled to help in any way that I can.

By the way, a few people on dicefreaks have commented that they have been unable to download. Has anyone else been experiencing similar problems? If so I suggest first contacting ENWorld Gamestore and if that doesn't help I will of course email you the document (I have all the email addresses on file).

I haven't had any problems.


Three quick questions:

1. Page 26 Table 2-12 -- Do the ability scores reflected in the displacement table reflect the divine bonus added to ability scores? I read the language "it should be noted that this is before factoring size or feats/divine abilities" to mean that it doesn't but I wanted to confirm.

2. Have you settled on a CR multiplier/metric for the addition of transcendental/omnific abilities at this point?

3. I have assumed that the ECL/CR bonuses provided by each template take into account any transcendental abilities afforded that template but I'm not sure. For example, the Stage 1 Demiurge has one fixed transdimensional ability and gets to choose two from a list of 5 others. Are either the fixed ability or the optional abilities factored into the ECL/CR bonus?


Thanks man, I absolutely love it.