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[Gentlefish]

Hey guys, if you had, theoretically, a 3-level racial class with full BAB that ends up with the ability to shape into a size large wolf (trip on bite included) with type magical beast, what class would you pick?

I decided to go hunter with boon companion. I lose out on BAB but sharing teamwork feats like tandem trip with another thing that can trip means I can mess up some folks pretty bad.

We also have access to Path of War, so a Broken Blade Warder might be another deliciously viable choice.

[Neonivek]

One of the big things about any kind of 'fantasy' Africa, is the low population density tends to prevent the formation of large political entities (yes, there have been large entities in Africa's past, but most of them failed rather quickly.)  This would probably make it difficult to define anything other than generalized 'cultural regions'.  It also makes 'higher learning' and 'developed industry' extremely rare, Dark Sun might have some useful pointers for you.

Well... some more famous Ancient African civilizations included
-Egypt
-Carthage
-Ghana
-Zulu

And those are just the well known ones.

[kilakan]

Hey guys, if you had, theoretically, a 3-level racial class with full BAB that ends up with the ability to shape into a size large wolf (trip on bite included) with type magical beast, what class would you pick?

I decided to go hunter with boon companion. I lose out on BAB but sharing teamwork feats like tandem trip with another thing that can trip means I can mess up some folks pretty bad.

We also have access to Path of War, so a Broken Blade Warder might be another deliciously viable choice.

You could also be a monk, that way your natural weapons will eventually end up with all the abilities to overcome damage resistance.  It would probably be the best way you could scale as a large wolf in terms of damage efficiency.

[NullForceOmega]

Carthage is far more of a Mediterranean civ than an African one, and Zulu was a coalition of tribal peoples, Egypt is an outgrowth of Nubia, which may have been the largest ancient African nation, and I will admit to not actually being up on Ghana's history.

Taking all that into account you still run into the same hurdle, low population density and lack of organized nations leads to 'low-tech' and probably 'low-magic' (not intended as the current fantasy trope, but instead to indicate that magic is unlikely to have a large degree of sophistication, and would probably be dominated by divine spellcasting/shamanism.)

[Gentlefish]

Yeah, I was worried about that - I was planning on investing in an Amulet of Mighty Fists but hot dang those get expensive. We're also playing in a campaign where some monsters will have dr/+3 and stuff.

[MrWiggles]

Egypt and Carthage, are more Mediterranean and Mesopotamian then Africa.
If you're going to talk about awesome long lasting African empires. There is Mali Empire. Ethiopia. Well, may not that one. There been lots of countries mostly in the same region called Ethiopia but I am not sure how much continuity exists between them.

[kilakan]

Yeah without getting 'lucky' for very specific magic items monk would be pretty much the only way to do it.  If you knew you were going to get those items, a rogue-wolf, barbarian wolf and hunter/ranger all become pretty reliable.  Keep in mind of course that tripping things with more than two legs becomes incredibly hard to bordering on impossible once you hit mid-late game.

[MrWiggles]

So last session in our Pathfinder Game with the Carrion Crown. We finally went into the basement. Oh, and we got new player, who died in this session. Though the GM deiced to let that slide. So we had five level 3 characters, went up against 8 cr1 skellingtons. And it was nearly a tpk. Our Paladin, our Fighter, and our new fresh out of the box, Druid all down. I got knocked down to just 1hp left. Though myself the lowly rogue manage to take out half of them. And our investigator, mostly stayed out of the fight and failed to heal anyone as he this book that literally removes, or at least, the character things, will literally remove their ability to cast spells.

[Criptfeind]

Re: Giant wolf dude; I might look into Totemist for some number of levels, they can get a lot of natural attacks (including a ranged option I think) that will gain benefit from an Amulet of Mighty Fists and also probably stack with your wolf natural attacks, and soul melds will probably play nicer with shapeshifting then most magic items unless your gm is making druid clasps rain. They are also (in my opinion at least) a pretty cool class.

[Neonivek]

Egypt and Carthage, are more Mediterranean and Mesopotamian then Africa.
If you're going to talk about awesome long lasting African empires. There is Mali Empire. Ethiopia. Well, may not that one. There been lots of countries mostly in the same region called Ethiopia but I am not sure how much continuity exists between them.

Egypt is firmly on the African Continent so I am counting it.

It isn't like people discount Turkey as part of Europe because it is part of the middle eastern sphere of influence.

Any division is usually arbitrary anyway.

[highmax28]

Carthage is far more of a Mediterranean civ than an African one, and Zulu was a coalition of tribal peoples, Egypt is an outgrowth of Nubia, which may have been the largest ancient African nation, and I will admit to not actually being up on Ghana's history.

Taking all that into account you still run into the same hurdle, low population density and lack of organized nations leads to 'low-tech' and probably 'low-magic' (not intended as the current fantasy trope, but instead to indicate that magic is unlikely to have a large degree of sophistication, and would probably be dominated by divine spellcasting/shamanism.)

The Zulu are several tribes conquered by Shaka. That's like saying Greece isn't Greece because Athens and Sparta are two different peoples, even though Alexander conquered them and unified them

Unless you count it under Rome or Greece's rule (because if I recall, Alexander also comquered Egypt), I agree the biggest African nation was Egypt

[Neonivek]

It depends on the period of time... Some African Nations rose to serious prominence at specific periods of time. Sometimes even being a World Power when Egypt wasn't.

Egypt's main impressiveness is it has remained a civilization in Africa from pretty much as long as civilization has been a thing with only a few civilizations hinting at being even older.

It has an impressive lasting power.

Taking all that into account you still run into the same hurdle, low population density and lack of organized nations leads to 'low-tech' and probably 'low-magic' (not intended as the current fantasy trope, but instead to indicate that magic is unlikely to have a large degree of sophistication, and would probably be dominated by divine spellcasting/shamanism.)

Not really a problem... Though there was an African Civilization that discovered Iron working long before anyone else. Is there anything wrong with small towns that aren't intricate masonry?

As well several of them actually had things like... an education system, schools, libraries, irrigation, their own reading and writing systems...

I am starting to think that the idea of Africa is "Cave Man" with like... Egypt being like... the crucible of African civilization... a sort of oasis of technology amidst a desert of poop shacks.

Plus fudging a few details isn't an issue. If I wanted to outright copy Africa... I'd just make it Africa. I still want it to be more than "Based on" though.

[NullForceOmega]

Oldest know ruins of a city are in South America and are over twenty thousand years old, so while Egypt has some serious clout as an ancient civ, it isn't even close to being THE oldest.  Hell Nubia is closer, with some data indicating it being upwards of fifteen thousand years old.

My point about the lack of large actors is that it creates a substantial power imbalance, with a few nations that are well developed and technologically/magically more advanced that their neighbors by a tremendous amount.  It isn't a inherently bad thing, just something that would have serious impact on the setting.  It was more of a 'players from outside of the big nations are going to be disadvantaged compared to those from within' than any kind of criticism.

[Neonivek]

Oldest know ruins of a city are in South America and are over twenty thousand years old, so while Egypt has some serious clout as an ancient civ, it isn't even close to being THE oldest.  Hell Nubia is closer, with some data indicating it being upwards of fifteen thousand years old.

To my knowledge they found some evidence that SUGGESTS Egypt may have been around for far longer then it indicates. Though... This evidence isn't the remains of a city.

Though I thought Scara Brae or whatever was the oldest known city.

[NullForceOmega]

Most of the evidence for Egypt being older than current data indicates is from Nubia, which many anthropologists and historians believe to have given rise to Egypt in the first place.  And the ancient city in South America is pretty impressive, they have actual structures, along with pottery and other artifacts that definitely date to greater than twenty thousand years of age.