If you can get a DM involved, I'd be willing to jump on this. Only difference I would change is the 'can't change evolutions per level' part. Getting level 4 evolutions level by level would suck. Maybe can only trade a limited number of points as you 'evolve'.

I didn't think much about that, that sounds reasonable.

I was beginning to think nobody's interested in this idea...

So it's two of you interested so far? This has potential.

What are we thinking for actual rules? Would you just want to do straight Eidolon as every one's class?

That seems like it would get boring to me. I think it would make more sense if it was basically Gestalt with one side Eidolon and the other being a class. Then it is more similar to a member of an evolving race taking levels in a class rather than everyone being the same thing.

Perhaps a version of Gestalt, with Eidolon being one side of it?

Sounds like a fun idea.

You could limit the classes we could take, or make them progress at half the rate of the Eidolon HD.

This sounds really neat, but it also would lead to monstrous PCs, which can be a bit of a pain for a GM.  Or a Persona-styled game for someone wanting to use PF rules too.

Sounds pretty awesome. I like the idea of running it Gestalt/Eidolon, too.

That's more like it, so there is interest.

1. On the one hand, I don't think it would be 'everybody the same thing'. Form, limbs, skills, abilities, attacks, appearance would all be different. And there is a thing called 'Basic magic', which is an obvious target for expansion, like taking it several times for more spells / spell-like abilities, and also for more evolution points, higher level spells.

2. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind playing it in gestalt, if it's better for the GM or the players. Or all.


That's one of the points  :)
This message was last edited by the user at 16:28, Fri 14 Nov 2014.

Was that a sign of interest as a GM?

So, I got inspired by this thread and have come up with a basic game idea that involves a lot of exploration at the start with some intrigue and such a little later in the game.  Let me know what you think, and if there's some interest, I'll make a game.

~~~~

The twilight city of Lusilux rises high above the surrounding land, the only bastion of humanity left that people know.  Many spires in the city reach high into the air, as if trying to escape the dark that surrounds the city.  It was not always the case that Lusilux was the only safe place for people.  There used to be many cities and countries, but the dark arrived and consumed the land.  Only the city of Lusilux was saved due to a noble man, named Logan Wallis, that developed a way to protect the citizens of the land.  After protecting the citizens and becoming leader of the city, he found an order of knights to help protect the city and to go out and find other remnants of civilization that are holed up against the dark and bring them back to Lusilux.

Thus the city of Lusilux grew, and as the city grew, the need for knights to protect the city grew.  Only stalwart souls of the city, chosen by Mr. Wallis himself (in theory, even though the new members of the knights don't meet him), are allowed into the order of the knights.  There are many advantages of joining the knights: better living accomidations for the knight and family, money, and other such blessings.

The downside, of course, is joining the order of the knights.  The knights are the primary defense against the dark, and the holders of the great secret that keeps the city running.  The city is slowly dying, being consumed by the dark.  The knights go out of the city to scavenge any sources of light, as the knights call it, to bring back to the city to keep the city lit.  These sources of light are not light per se, but actually just relics from the previous age of light that have gained some sort of signifigance.  Sometimes it's actually something that everyone would have considered valuable, like a crown of a long dead king, but sometimes it's also something like a family portrait.  The highest ranked sorcerers within the ranks of the knights have a ritual that can use the relics to increase the light of the city and keep the dark away.

The other secret of the knights is that the knights use the power of the dark itself to protect themselves from it.  After becoming a fully acknowledged knight of the city, the knight is implanted with a Seed of the Dark.  A knight can call upon the power of the Seed to manifest a great power, should the need arise, as it frequently does outside of the city.  The power twists the knight into a strange visage which most townspeople find terrifying, given that it's a representation of what is slowly destroying the city.  The more time that the knights spend in this form, though, the more likely they are to succumb to the dark, becoming a permanent denizen of the dark, forever unable to return human (or elf or dwarf or whatever).  Most see it as a required evil when it comes to saving the city.

~

Mechanically, the Seed of the Dark would give the ability to transform into something akin to the Eidolon form of the Synthesist summoner (but not any of the other class-specific stuff a Synthesist summoner gets) as a full round action.  It's also a full transformation, and not a second skin that coats the PC, like is normally the case for a Synthesist summoner.  PCs will be immune to the permanent monsterosity that could come from a Seed of the Dark unless they take Extra Evolution.  Extra Evolution also comes with a free evolution point chosen by me, the GM.

As for an RTJ, I'd require a basic concept from the prospective player that includes the basics like name, race, class, and such as well as what your character's eidolon from looks like.  They don't have to look like horryfing monsters, but they have to look very distincly non-human (or elf or dwarf or whatever).  I would also like to know how your character came to be in Lusilux, whether that be by being rescued by a knight from some small enclave of humanity out in the dark, or just being a native citizen of the city.  The rest of the details you wish to come up with are up to you.

It's not as weird as I had it in mind originally, but definitely creative and appealing.
Count me in.

I'm in too! Looks like good fun.

This message was deleted by a moderator, as it was against the forum rules, at 15:11, Tue 20 Jan 2015.

bump

If a GM is found I would be interested.

This game sounds intriguing, and I remember being in a short lived game of a similar vein, though it was using the Race Builder from the Pathfinder book Advanced Race Guide instead of the Eidolon progression. The Eidolon route is more likely to make more non-humanoid type builds (especially considering biped is only one of some four options I believe), but that could make a great springboard for RP. A point of warning to players would be that, without spending evolution points, only the biped forms has hands with which to hold or manipulate things. Could make for fun RP, but also some complications as the lack of hands throws the assumptions of most systems out the window.

Though I am interested first as a player, I will give some serious consideration to attempting to be the DM of such a game to see it happen, if those interested are willing to follow a rookie DM who will be learning as he goes, with a focus on having a fun atmosphere.

only the biped forms has hands with which to hold or manipulate things
Good point. We can limit the basic form to biped to avoid that pitfall.

No need to be hasty and set restrictions. That's just something that will need to be brought to player attention when this goes live. If they want to play a serpentine or quadruped form, they should be free to do so, but need to acknowledge the limitations the base form possesses. Either they will not possess hands, or they will need to spend evolution points to add them to their form (I think it's only a 1 point evolution for limbs, would need to double check). If we're using Eidolon progression, people are already going to be more monstrous in physiology than humanoid, so let them run wild.

Another question for you greenvoid; is it your preference that all players have a similar base thematic like the examples in the original post? I could see that being a semi-limiting factor and a sticky point at the start of the game, as either the entire group has to come to a consensus as to the base form, or the DM has to arbitrarily determine it, and with only a couple evolution points each level, there seems to be little leeway to customization, the crux of the evolutions, if they're all supposed to be of a similar base.

I think a game like this would be more open and inviting if the players had full control over what they were, so that each individual is unique, with perhaps a few extra Evolution Points per level. My preference would likely be to run it like a gestalt game, as mentioned before, in Pathfinder. The Eidolon half would use the Eidolon rules straight (barring Feats, which would instead go off of normal player acquisition, being the better progression by default) and the other being a class. Defining players with gestalt Race/Class should also help define player roles in the party, as well as providing equipment proficiency that base Eidolons lack. This would certainly make for some much higher than average power level heroes (or perhaps villains in the right framework), but you're already looking for something well outside the norm of play with this game anyway.

Though using the Pathfinder rules, I'd also likely run it in a homebrew setting as opposed to Pathfinder's Golarian, to better allow for the diversity of players. That is, of course, unless what you're really looking for is a game based around more "natural" evolution than player customization. The former would mean that the players would need to explain why they evolved they way they did for it to make sense (making many evolutions likely contextually off limits from the get-go), while the latter would give players much more freedom but need a touch more fantasical explanation to explain the diversity.

Preference, yes, but neither of my examples make any of the four base forms necessary, each of them allows for all four forms. The emphasis was on theme, not form.
But you used the correct word, this is just a preference, not a requirement.
And since the Eidolon progression was designed for summoned companions, I don't see why we couldn't boost the amount of evolution points at each level, to allow for more diverse PCs.  ... OK, I found the same idea in your post :)

I don't mind the setting, as long as it is engaging.


That's fine for me, but as you can see above, there was an idea of regular PCs having an alternate form of an Eidolon (The twilight city of Lusilux). Aside from the fact that the game died off, I don't want that half-Eidolon again. The natural and only form of the Eidolon is the focus for me, so as long as the PCs have the abilities by gestalt rules, but are not from regular races, I'm in.

Gestalt again:
Since the Eidolon rules are for NPCs that don't have a class, PCs with a class render all evolutions about skills, ability scores, feats and casting abilities unnecessary. If we discard those, the original amount of evolution points can only be spent on developing the form.
This message was last edited by the user at 08:50, Sun 25 Jan 2015.

And something that was so natural for me I've forgotten to mention so far:
And if we are going weird, let's do it properly. With such extraordinary PCs, I don't want to play in the same old fantasy medieval setting. I'd rather play, for example,

• in an asteroid belt with a greenish atmosphere, where ships use propellers to move about
• in an underground setting, where the ground lives, each cavern being an individual, with personality, desires, motivations, goals, and the ability to communicate
• on a gas giant, where every settlement is fully artificial and can travel around, people diving in the dense gas to find mythic monsters, secrets and treasures

bump

This game actually did happen for a second.

Still interested in being a player for this, so I hope a gm can be found.