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[Let's Read] Nidal, Land of Shadows
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<blockquote data-quote="Tristissima" data-source="post: 8087068" data-attributes="member: 6162"><p>Ah, Pangolais! The city which hides away even from Nidal’s dimmed sun beneath the black leaves of the Uskwood! Where every sound’s reverberations are swallowed by those leaves til they whisper and that whisper can almost be heard above the hush! Glittering in a thousand grays, interrupted only by streets like captured moons glowing dimmed while the cathedrals watch with their rose-shaped eyes and academies glower miserly over the ancient laments of those whom Earthfall saved.</p><p></p><p>I imagine that some overwrought Edgar Allen Poe look-alike among the Nidalese here has written of this city like that. It does sound romantically beautiful. Here, explorations into the Dark Tapestry and the Shadow Plane which would be the defining pursuit of any other town pale in comparison to the Cathedral of Exquisite Agony, Zon-Kuthon’s greatest temple. It’s described in Inner Sea Temples, so at least it doesn’t distract from the gothic dream home that is Pangolais.</p><p></p><p>Elegance rules the day ~ night? ~ no, day ~ right? ~ anyway . . . ~ in Pangolais, where Kuthite bladed harps drift weavingly among the fragrance of moonflowers in the cafes where vampires and caligni chat and chuckle among those races who could handle the sun if they ever saw it.</p><p></p><p>We’re given a statblock for Pangolais, and it’s pretty much what you would expect, honestly. In a vast improvement over its mother-game, Pathfinder has finely tuned its city statblocks to convey useful information (rules can be found in the GameMastery Guide). For example, the third line down (after the name of the city, its completely unshocking alignment, and its general size category) tells me that bribery attempts, Bluff checks against guards and officials, and Stealth checks outside will all get a +3 bonus, as will (coincidentally) Diplomacy checks to gather information and Knowledge checks when researching in libraries. That’s rather a lower Lore rating (the latter bonus) then I would have guessed, considering Nidal’s unique stores of texts twice as old as Earthly civilization. I’d probably play that as the Nidalese keeping quite a stringent grip on this national treasure of theirs, as well as a myriad very specific specializations among its sages that makes finding the exact thing you’re looking for harder to find than it would seem at first.</p><p></p><p>Crime is kept relatively low here, giving only a +1 bonus to Sense Motive checks to avoid being bluffed and Sleight of Hand checks to pick pockets. This is a weirdness in Pathfinder’s rules, actually ~ these bonuses seem at odds. Crime +1 means that not much crime happens in Pangolais, enough to be a worry (it’s not negative, after all) but not a big worry. Why does that make pickpocketing easier while also making it harder to bluff people? Surely the first represents people being suspicious while the second represents them letting down their guard?</p><p></p><p>Checks to make money get a +2 bonus, reflecting the wealth of the large city. Again, lower than I might have expected for such an important place, but it makes sense in a society so driven by patronage. People don’t necessarily go shopping in such cultures, they have their usual providers from whom they always purchase whatever particular good or service that person produces. Personal relationships are very important here, which is something I do which this book stressed more. The strictness of Nidalese law can result in a whopping +6 bonus to Intimidate checks (if you invoke the threat of the law to force friendliness), Diplomacy checks against government officials, or Diplomacy checks made to call on the city guard. On the other hand, Diplomacy checks to alter the attitude of non-governmental officials get a +4 bonus due to the town’s cosmopolitan openness to unusual visitors. Disguise checks, as well.</p><p></p><p>A list of qualities follow, letting us know that the city is both academic and insular (the latter of which increases Law slightly and decreases Crime, but weirdly has no effect on Society, which reflects the society’s openness to the new and unusual), as well as three new qualities described right here in the stat block. Religiously intolerant is the same as racially intolerant from the GameMastery Guide, only it forces non-Kuthites rather than any particular race to pay half-again for everything and to get harassed in various ways. It seems that its dominance by the cruel and literally dark faith of Zon-Kuthon DOES effect the city’s Society rating negatively, as well as upping its Law rating and greatly increasing its Danger. As the seat of Zon-Kuthon’s worship, its Corruption is increased, as is the maximum spellcasting available here (by a whole two levels, which stacks with the benefit from the academic quality, maxing out the available spellcasting at 9th-level spells).</p><p></p><p>That Danger rating I mentioned? It’s a whopping 30, which is intended as an addition to percentile CR-ranked encounter tables. Using the samples given in the GameMastery Guide, this means that in many urban environments, nothing easier than a CR 3 will show up randomly.</p><p></p><p>Pangolais has 18,900 people in it. That’s on the lower side of Rome’s size in 1300, and just about 1100 people smaller than Cahokia was a century earlier (on the bottom range of possible sizes for Cahokia at the time) or Paris was three centuries earlier. Of those, 11,000 are humans (about 58%, almost 3 in 5 people), 3500 are caligni (18.5%, a little more than 1 in 6 people), 2400 are fetchlings/kayal (12.7% or about 1 in 8), and 2000 are members of various other races (a tiny bit more than 1 in 10). This is certainly a very integrated city!</p><p></p><p>Most of the NPCs described in this statblock will be discussed later, but I’m gonna guess that the Hierarch of the Cathedral, a LE male vampire (of what race originally? Grrr!) cleric of the Midnight Lord 13 named Chartaigne, is described in Inner Sea Temples, because the statblock is his only mention.</p><p></p><p>Finally, the statblock informs us that it’s fairly easy to find mundane items of a value up to 8000 g, which is rather impressive considering that any given shopkeeper can only afford to pay about 6 times that for anything the party has to sell. Magical items, on the other hand, well . . . n average, you’ll find 10 (anywhere from 4 to 16) minor items, 7 or 8 medium items (3-12), and 5 major items (2-8) for sale here. That’s quite the magic shop! It’s probably 3 or 4, to be honest.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Tristissima, post: 8087068, member: 6162"] Ah, Pangolais! The city which hides away even from Nidal’s dimmed sun beneath the black leaves of the Uskwood! Where every sound’s reverberations are swallowed by those leaves til they whisper and that whisper can almost be heard above the hush! Glittering in a thousand grays, interrupted only by streets like captured moons glowing dimmed while the cathedrals watch with their rose-shaped eyes and academies glower miserly over the ancient laments of those whom Earthfall saved. I imagine that some overwrought Edgar Allen Poe look-alike among the Nidalese here has written of this city like that. It does sound romantically beautiful. Here, explorations into the Dark Tapestry and the Shadow Plane which would be the defining pursuit of any other town pale in comparison to the Cathedral of Exquisite Agony, Zon-Kuthon’s greatest temple. It’s described in Inner Sea Temples, so at least it doesn’t distract from the gothic dream home that is Pangolais. Elegance rules the day ~ night? ~ no, day ~ right? ~ anyway . . . ~ in Pangolais, where Kuthite bladed harps drift weavingly among the fragrance of moonflowers in the cafes where vampires and caligni chat and chuckle among those races who could handle the sun if they ever saw it. We’re given a statblock for Pangolais, and it’s pretty much what you would expect, honestly. In a vast improvement over its mother-game, Pathfinder has finely tuned its city statblocks to convey useful information (rules can be found in the GameMastery Guide). For example, the third line down (after the name of the city, its completely unshocking alignment, and its general size category) tells me that bribery attempts, Bluff checks against guards and officials, and Stealth checks outside will all get a +3 bonus, as will (coincidentally) Diplomacy checks to gather information and Knowledge checks when researching in libraries. That’s rather a lower Lore rating (the latter bonus) then I would have guessed, considering Nidal’s unique stores of texts twice as old as Earthly civilization. I’d probably play that as the Nidalese keeping quite a stringent grip on this national treasure of theirs, as well as a myriad very specific specializations among its sages that makes finding the exact thing you’re looking for harder to find than it would seem at first. Crime is kept relatively low here, giving only a +1 bonus to Sense Motive checks to avoid being bluffed and Sleight of Hand checks to pick pockets. This is a weirdness in Pathfinder’s rules, actually ~ these bonuses seem at odds. Crime +1 means that not much crime happens in Pangolais, enough to be a worry (it’s not negative, after all) but not a big worry. Why does that make pickpocketing easier while also making it harder to bluff people? Surely the first represents people being suspicious while the second represents them letting down their guard? Checks to make money get a +2 bonus, reflecting the wealth of the large city. Again, lower than I might have expected for such an important place, but it makes sense in a society so driven by patronage. People don’t necessarily go shopping in such cultures, they have their usual providers from whom they always purchase whatever particular good or service that person produces. Personal relationships are very important here, which is something I do which this book stressed more. The strictness of Nidalese law can result in a whopping +6 bonus to Intimidate checks (if you invoke the threat of the law to force friendliness), Diplomacy checks against government officials, or Diplomacy checks made to call on the city guard. On the other hand, Diplomacy checks to alter the attitude of non-governmental officials get a +4 bonus due to the town’s cosmopolitan openness to unusual visitors. Disguise checks, as well. A list of qualities follow, letting us know that the city is both academic and insular (the latter of which increases Law slightly and decreases Crime, but weirdly has no effect on Society, which reflects the society’s openness to the new and unusual), as well as three new qualities described right here in the stat block. Religiously intolerant is the same as racially intolerant from the GameMastery Guide, only it forces non-Kuthites rather than any particular race to pay half-again for everything and to get harassed in various ways. It seems that its dominance by the cruel and literally dark faith of Zon-Kuthon DOES effect the city’s Society rating negatively, as well as upping its Law rating and greatly increasing its Danger. As the seat of Zon-Kuthon’s worship, its Corruption is increased, as is the maximum spellcasting available here (by a whole two levels, which stacks with the benefit from the academic quality, maxing out the available spellcasting at 9th-level spells). That Danger rating I mentioned? It’s a whopping 30, which is intended as an addition to percentile CR-ranked encounter tables. Using the samples given in the GameMastery Guide, this means that in many urban environments, nothing easier than a CR 3 will show up randomly. Pangolais has 18,900 people in it. That’s on the lower side of Rome’s size in 1300, and just about 1100 people smaller than Cahokia was a century earlier (on the bottom range of possible sizes for Cahokia at the time) or Paris was three centuries earlier. Of those, 11,000 are humans (about 58%, almost 3 in 5 people), 3500 are caligni (18.5%, a little more than 1 in 6 people), 2400 are fetchlings/kayal (12.7% or about 1 in 8), and 2000 are members of various other races (a tiny bit more than 1 in 10). This is certainly a very integrated city! Most of the NPCs described in this statblock will be discussed later, but I’m gonna guess that the Hierarch of the Cathedral, a LE male vampire (of what race originally? Grrr!) cleric of the Midnight Lord 13 named Chartaigne, is described in Inner Sea Temples, because the statblock is his only mention. Finally, the statblock informs us that it’s fairly easy to find mundane items of a value up to 8000 g, which is rather impressive considering that any given shopkeeper can only afford to pay about 6 times that for anything the party has to sell. Magical items, on the other hand, well . . . n average, you’ll find 10 (anywhere from 4 to 16) minor items, 7 or 8 medium items (3-12), and 5 major items (2-8) for sale here. That’s quite the magic shop! It’s probably 3 or 4, to be honest. [/QUOTE]
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[Let's Read] Nidal, Land of Shadows
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