Talented Classes for PF1: Worth Returning To? (Patreon)

I'm trying to decide if I should make a big push to get ready for a 'Talented classes' project for Pathfinder 1e rules.

In 2012, I had a vision for a “Talented” version of Pathfinder 1st edition. Every class would be modular, monsters easy to construct, and encounters easily built from modular pieces that would make CR-balancing simple even when mixing creatures, traps, hazards, afflictions, skill challenges, social encounters, environmental conditions, and so on. The essential idea was to stick with 1e Pathfinder RPG’s core rules, but to create new rulebooks to allow GMs and players to use the modular, Talented versions of anything that needed a statblock or character sheet. I envisioned a ‘Talented Class Manual,’ ‘Talented Game Moderator Guide,’ and ‘Talented Bestiary.’

The Talented Bestiary actually happened, since some other amazing designers pitched it as a Rogue Genius Game project, so all I had to do was publish it. The Talented Game Moderator’s Guide exists only as a ton of notes on my hard drive, and some ideas that have since popped up in other RPGs and projects I have worked on. Which doesn’t mean I couldn’t still create it.

The Talented Class Manual…

In March of 2013, I published “The Genius Guide to the Talented Fighter,” which reimagined the fighter class on a much more modular framework, with “talents” (similar to rogue talents) filling most class feature slots, and abilities taken from a ton of archetypes (and my own game design vision) becoming selectable abilities. It could be used with the existing Pathfinder rules, but it was also my first strike at a ‘Talented Path’ version of the game. My plan was for it to be the backbone of Rogue Genius Games’ offerings for the next few years.

Then I got hired by Green Ronin. Then I got hired by Paizo and moved to Seattle, which was so expensive regular freelance became a necessity. Then I got cancer (though I didn’t know it at the time). Then I found myself helping run yet another game company. And so while I kept working on the talented class designs, the concept of Talented Path simply never got the momentum I’d hoped for.

Over the years I've published Genius Guides to "Talented" classes for the Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, and Rogue. (Also Cavalier and Witch, but those are APG classes, and I really ought to have waited to do them until after I was done with the core classes). That means I only need Talented versions of the Sorcerer and Wizard to complete ALL the 1st edition Pathfinder classes.

These are COMPLEX books to build, and they take a lot of time and effort, and a couple haven't sold well enough to justify the effort. We managed to fund the Talented Bestiary with a Kickstarter. My plan was to do the same for the Talented Player’s Manual and Talented Game Moderator’s Guide… but only after those books were largely complete. Such as having ALL the core classes for the Talented Class Manual finished—a goal I couldn’t manage while running one company, working for 3-4 more, and fighting (at the time undiagnosed) cancer.

Now, I’m learning that my fight with cancer may not “end.” I may have this little unwelcome visitor sitting inside me for the rest of my life, mindfully monitoring it to see if it stays subdued and trapped in a prison of scar tissue and hardened flesh… or not. And that “or not” could come at any time. Or, maybe I already beat it, and it’s just going to be 9 more months before I have recovered however much of my old energy and focus as I am going to. I counted recently, and no less than 7 times over the past 16 months my medical team has told me my fight with cancer would most likely be done within 6 weeks. (Though to be fair, they gave up saying that about February of this month.)

So, I can’t wait for complications from cancer to be “over” if I want to accomplish something. My recovery from chemoradiation is slower than I hoped (possibly in part because I still have a hateflesh blob, shrunk and weakened those it is, parasitically living inside me… and possibly not), and my medical team thinks it won’t be until April of 2025 at the earliest that I’ll have regained my ‘full strength.’ Worse, ‘full strength’ likely won’t mean what it did in 2013. I can’t expect to ever have the same level of energy and focus as I used to. I must adapt to my new normal, whatever that turns out to be.

So, I need to make plans, build a schedule around them, and do my best to execute them regardless of what is going on with my health. I have projects that were supposed to be done in 2020 that have been delayed by Covid, moving twice in 2 months, pneumonia, a pulmonary embolism, and then cancer, chemo, and radiation. Those are obviously one line I must pick up. But, cancer being so &%@!% expensive, I also need to try to do something bigger. Something like the long-delayed Talented Class Manual. And, that would take a Kickstarter, and some help. And help takes money.

So, I have a Kickstarter going right now (“Damn it Owen! Cartoons That Refused To NOT Be Drawn”), which might get me resources to keep creditors at bay while I get the help I need for a Talented Kickstarter. Thus. how much money my current KS makes may decide if I can afford to launch another one once Damn It, Owen! Is fulfilled. The more money THIS crowdfunding campaign makes, the more I can risk tackling another one, and the Talented Class Manual would be my preferred next crowdfunding project. (Alternatively, I could do Starfarer’s Companion II, which also has a lot of work done on it already, and has also been delayed by illness, pandemic, and cancer. Or a version of Shadowfinder that I can release under the OGL, rather than on Starfinder Infinite, though that would be losing all references to the Gap and Golarion, which I’d hate to do. Or a post-apocalypse game and setting. Or…)

The primary goal of a Talented Class Manual crowdfunding Kickstarter would be to compile talented versions of all the core classes in a single book (barbarian, bard, cleric, druid, fighter, monk, paladin, ranger, rogue, sorcerer, and wizard) updated and expanded with material that’s come out since I did each class, and creating three alternate class frames (Heroic Adept, Heroic Expert, and Heroic Warrior) which could be used to select talents from a wide range of classes. I already did one draft of such a class for the combatant classes, the “heroic warrior” in The Genius Guide to the Talented Barbarian, though that would need revision and expansion.

And, most of the additional work for those primary goals would need to be done before I launched the Kickstarter. As most of my crowdfunding campaigns are, this would >have< to be a campaign were the regards are a pdf and a link to order your own print-on-demand version through DriveThruRPG “at cost,” (meaning you’d just pay the minimum DriveThruRPG would charge for the printing and shipping, and I wouldn’t make any additional margin on those PODs). Because, unless someone else wants to offer to be in charge of print copies, I cannot risk having to worry about the rising costs of paper, or how much shipping from China or Lithuania will run me some time after I raise funds to pay for it.

If that campaign managed to unlock stretch goals, they'd start with ACG classes – cavalier and witch together for the first goal (since basic talented versions of them are done, so I’d only need to do the revised and expanded work on them), then alchemist, inquisitor, oracle, summoner (not necessarily in that order). Then, the remaining hardback base classes -- gunslinger, magus, shifter. Then the unique class features of all the hybrid classes (arcanist, bloodrager, brawler, hunter, investigator, shaman, slayer, skald, swashbuckler, warpriest). Then occult classes (kineticist, medium, mesmerist, occultist, psychic, spiritualist).

After that there are a lot of different directions I could go. Prestige talents (taking class features of prestige classes and turning them into talents with prerequisites you can take using your talented class talent slots). Psionic classes (from Dreamscarred Press’s psionic rules). Rogue Genius Classes (likely starting with dragonrider, godlings, and time thief/time warden, our most popular classes, and maybe warlock). Honestly, I’d likely poll backers to see what they’d want to see next if we got through ALL the Pazo core (and alternate), base, hybrid, and occult classes.

There’s no way I could have all those stretch goals written in advance, so I’d need to do two rounds of reward dates. The revised core classes would be released in their own book within a couple of months of the Kickstarter ending. Whatever stretch goals we hit would need a year to be written, developed, edited, and laid out.  Could add them to the core class book, or compile them all not their own book. Or, actually, I could offer both since it’d be pdf and POD, and backers could use whichever they prefer.

If that went really, really well, the Talented Game Moderator’s Guide could launch after the Talented Class Manual is finished.

The real question is, are there still people who want to see a finished Talented Class line? Are there enough of them to justify crowdfunding it? My Pathfinder 1st edition sales remain robust through Rogue Genius Games… but do people want my Talented capstone systems for that game?

Thoughts? (Seriously, this is a great time to express even a very short opinion on this topic, even if it's "I wouldn't back that KS" or "Sure, if it looked interesting.")

Support 

I hate to harp on it, but am fighting cancer, and that's expensive. Becoming a paying member of this Patreon is a huge help. So are direct donations of any size at https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-owen-kc-stephens-fight-cancer