Pathfinder Character Creation Rules

Character Creation Rules

Materials by book

==General rules==

Ability score generation is 25-point buy.

Alignment: Evil characters are not permitted, due to an unfortunate tendency toward Stupid Evil.

Characters begin play with 200 gp.

Characters receive maximum hit points per level.

Traits are permitted; you begin play with two.

==Core==

Leadership is permitted, but with heavy modifications. The modifications are in-depth enough to require a section of their own at the end of this document.

Wizards add Spell Focus, Spell Penetration and the Greater versions of those feats to the list of their class bonus feats.

Clerics whose deity’s favored weapon is the unarmed strike gain Improved Unarmed Strike as a bonus feat.

Item crafting is permitted.

The assassin prestige class is banned. For one thing, the “must be evil” requirement makes me a bit edgy, and for another, the ACG’s slayer does his job better.

==Bestiaries==

All animal companions are permitted.

The Craft Construct feat is permitted. The Multiweapon Fighting feat is permitted for alchemists with the vestigial arm discovery and for kasatha.

Certain templates may be applied to characters either at creation or over the course of the game, subject to GM approval.

All playable races from Bestiary 5 (android, astomoi, caligni, deep one hybrid, ghoran, orang-pendak, reptoid, shabti, skinwalker) are permitted, provided you have a good story for them. Players with skinwalker characters may choose any of the alternate heritages presented in Blood of the Moon.

==Advanced Player’s Guide==

The following grand discovery is available to alchemists of 20th level.
—True Cognatogen: The alchemist’s cognatogen now grants a +8 natural armor bonus and a +8 alchemical bonus to Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma. The alchemist takes a -2 penalty to his Strength, Dexterity and Constitution as long as the cognatogen persists. An alchemist must possess the grand cognatogen discovery before selecting this grand discovery.

The antipaladin is not permitted. It’s impossible to make this class work with an adventuring party.

Pack lord druids and beastmaster rangers are permitted, but may have no more than two animal companions.

The monk of the healing hand archetype is not permitted. This is just a horrible, horrible archetype.

==Ultimate Magic==

Variant channeling is permitted.

The spellblade magus is not permitted. This archetype is just awful.

Crossblooded sorcerers may choose the wildblooded version of one of their sorcerer bloodlines.

The synthesist summoner is permitted, subject to GM approval. The broodmaster summoner is permitted, but may have no more than two eidolons.

The opposition research arcane discovery may be taken twice.

You may choose wildblooded and bloodrager bloodlines for Eldritch Heritage.

Words of Power are permitted. Try not to slow the game down, okay?

==Ultimate Combat==

Ninja and samurai are subject to GM approval, and you’d better have a good backstory that explains what Tien characters are doing in the Inner Sea region; this changes to “permitted” in Jade Regent.

The wild rager and true primitive barbarian archetypes are not permitted. These archetypes are ill-suited to an adventuring party.

Aside from the spellslinger wizard archetype and the gunslinger itself, archetypes and class features that grant firearm proficiency (black powder inquisition, musketeer cavalier, holy gun paladin, trophy hunter ranger, firearm training rogue talent, musketeer and picaroon swashbuckler, and steel hound investigator) are not permitted. Let the slinger be good at their thing, and you be good at yours.

The unarmed fighter archetype deals unarmed strike damage as a monk or brawler of half his level. At first level, his unarmed strikes deal 1d3 damage as normal.

The arcane bomber and spellslinger wizard archetypes are permitted, with modifications. Instead of losing cantrips, the spellblast bombs and mage bullets class feature replaces the wizard's first bonus feat. These archetypes can also choose one arcane school and two opposition schools as normal.

The siege mage wizard is not permitted. You're going to be crawling in dungeons, not leveling castles... at least, I hope not.

Eastern weapons cost 1.5x as much as the listed price in Ultimate Combat, and all are considered exotic weapons.

Advanced firearms are not permitted.

The called shot rules are permitted, as are the feats Improved Called Shot and Greater Called Shot. These are combat feats, and can be chosen as bonus feats by fighters, cavaliers, magi, gunslingers, samurai, brawlers, swashbucklers, and warpriests.

==Advanced Race Guide==

All alternate racial traits, feats, and archetypes are legal for the core races. Half-elves and half-orcs qualify for human feats and archetypes, as well as their other parent race.

Unless the archetype modifies or depends on a racial trait, racial archetypes may be chosen by members of any race.

The following archetypes are subject to GM approval: scarred witch doctor, fiendish vessel cleric, and airborne ambusher. The scarred witch doctor in particular has been errata’d by Paizo; please let me know which version of the class you’re interested in playing.

The following archetypes are not permitted: cavern sniper fighter, demonic apostle cleric, and gray disciple monk.

All other archetypes are legal.

The following featured races are permitted: aasimars, catfolk, dhampirs, fetchlings, ifrits, oreads, ratfolk, sylphs, tengu, tieflings, and undines. In addition, aasimars, dhampirs and tieflings can choose any heritage from Blood of Angels, Blood of the Night, or Blood of Fiends respectively.

The following featured races are subject to GM approval: goblins, hobgoblins, kobolds, and orcs.

Drow are not permitted.

The Goblin Gunslinger feat is reworded, and may be taken by non-goblin characters if their BAB is +5 or higher.
-You do not take penalties from using an inappropriately sized firearm, provided the weapon is intended for creatures one size category larger.

The following uncommon races are permitted: changelings, gripplis, and sulis.

The following uncommon races are subject to GM approval: gillmen, kitsune, merfolk, nagaji, samsarans, vanaras, vishkanyas and wayangs.

The following uncommon races are not permitted: duergar, strix, and svirfneblin.

The following custom races are permitted: lizardfolk, kasatha and wyrwoods.

The following custom races are subject to GM approval: centaurs and gnolls.

The following custom races are not permitted: driders, gargoyles, ogres, gathlains, trox, and wyvarans.

Players are not permitted to use the Race Builder.

==Ultimate Equipment==

Everything’s permitted, subject to the same rules as Ultimate Combat.

==Mythic Adventures==

In adventures other than Wrath of the Righteous or Fire Over Blackcrag, the only thing permitted in this book is the Ascendant Spell metamagic feat.

In Wrath of the Righteous and Fire Over Blackcrag, the following rules are in place.

The following universal path abilities are not permitted: Beyond Morality, Ultimate Versatility, Farwalker.

Like their normal counterparts, the Improved Combat Maneuver feats are consolidated into Mythic Powerful Maneuvers and Mythic Deft Maneuvers. These mythic feats also add the effects of Mythic Power Attack and Mythic Combat Expertise, respectively.

Mythic Weapon Finesse must be taken as a mythic feat to gain its effects.

==Monster Codex==

The following archetypes are permitted: pack rager barbarian, grenadier alchemist, dragon yapper bard, alchemical trapper alchemist, and ancient guardian druid.

The winged marauder archetype is subject to GM approval.

The bouda and troll fury archetypes are not permitted.

All animal companions presented in this book are permitted.

All feats in this book are permitted, so long as they do not name a specific race as a prerequisite. Shadow Shroud may only be taken by standard tieflings, and sniper’s lantern may likewise only be taken by kitsune.

The following class features are permitted: blackstar bomb and void bomb alchemist discoveries, apocalypse oracle mystery, ghoul sorcerer bloodline, infested oracle curse, and cold-blooded oracle curse.

Subject to GM approval, a player may add a class template to their character.

==Advanced Class Guide==

The Packmaster hunter archetype is permitted, but may have no more than two animal companions.

The exploiter wizard archetype is not permitted. Cut the poor arcanist a break.

==Occult Adventures==

The Instigate Psychic Duel spell and the psychic duel mechanics are not permitted; that’s a can of purple worms I’m not willing to open.

==Pathfinder Unchained==

Unchained versions of base classes may be chosen.

Skill unlocks and the Signature Skill feat are permitted.

I use a variant of innate scaling bonuses; so long as you have an item in the appropriate slot, your bonuses increase accordingly.

==Ultimate Intrigue==

The vigilante class is only permitted in Council of Thieves, and Curse of the Crimson Throne. The class isn’t well-suited to wilderness adventures, and those are the only urban adventures.

==Campaign Setting/Player Companion==

Kobolds of Golarion: All archetypes and feats are permitted.

Blood of Fiends: The following variant tiefling abilities are not permitted: 1, 2, 18, 33, 41, 42, 48, 54 62, 68, 70, 75, 88, 91, 100. All others are subject to GM approval. Variant tiefling ability 24 can be used three times a day. All heritages, feats, class features and traits are permitted.

Blood of Angels: The following variant aasimar abilities are not permitted: 7, 72, 72 98, 99, 100. Variant aasimar ability 71 is permitted if you promise to yell PRAISE THE SUN at least once. All other variant aasimar abilities are subject to GM approval. Variant aasimar ability 74 may be used three times a day. All heritages, feats, class features and traits are permitted.

Blood of the Moon: The skinwalker race and all of its heritages are permitted. All feats and class features are permitted.

Orcs of Golarion: The orc sorcerer bloodline and all feats are permitted.

Nothing in Mythic Realms or Mythic Origins is permitted, except under the stipulations noted in Mythic Adventures.

Inner Sea Races: Lashunta and monkey goblins are subject to GM approval.

All other books are subject to GM approval.

==House Rules==

My games use the Feat Taxes in Pathfinder variant rules (source: http://theworldissquare.com/feat-taxes-in-pathfinder/ ).

Gestalt characters are permitted, subject to GM approval. However, gestalt characters suffer drawbacks similar to those of a crossblooded sorcerer; their mixed training is mentally taxing, and gestalt characters take a -2 gestalt penalty to their Will save. Gestalt characters also cannot multiclass or take prestige classes.

You may also gestalt a base class with one of its archetypes. An archetype gestalt gains all the features of the archetype, without losing any class features. Archetype gestalts take a -2 gestalt penalty to Will saves from the mental strain, and three ability scores of the player’s choice are reduced by 1.

==Leadership==

I don’t want to be “that GM” and ban Leadership out of hand; however, I know that it can be done very badly. Thus, I’ve taken matters into my own hands. Here are my Leadership rules.

Leadership as a feat is not permitted. Instead, it’s a quality gained by the party as a whole once they reach 7th level. Effectively, the party is one entity in regards to Leadership. This means that the party can only have one cohort between them.

To calculate the party’s Leadership score, we add the highest level in the party to the highest Charisma modifier. For instance, a party whose highest-level character is a Lv10 fighter adds his level to the highest Charisma; let’s say the party sorcerer, with a Charisma score of 21. In this instance, the party has a Leadership score of 15.

Players are not permitted to build or control cohorts and followers. Since they’re NPCs, that duty falls to me, as the GM. Followers typically will not join the party on their adventures; players attempting to force followers into dangerous situations will find themselves losing followers and damaging the party’s reputation.

At 15th and 20th level, the party can choose to add one additional cohort.

==Third Party==

=In the Company of Dragons=

The white worm apostate archetype is not permitted.

The following draconic essences are not permitted: destructive, devious, greedy, imperious, militant, paranoid, sadistic, and wrathful.

All other materials in this book are permitted, at the risk of turning the game into a zoo.