Pathfinder #4 preview: Wolfgang Baur must really hate me

This is a continuing series of short posts on Paizo’s Pathfinder adventure path magazine. The image is Copyright 2007 Paizo Publishings.

Yeah I haven’t done one of those in quite some time (Dec 7 to be more precise) for a very good reason, I never got my #4 issue of Pathfinder (written by none other than my Nemesis, Wolfgang Baur).

Last week I got #5 in the mail and still no sign of #4.

It was shipped shortly before the holidays and somehow got lost in the mail. I emailed Paizo’s customer service twice and was told to wait some more and that a new one would be shipped to me after the 7th issues (that is #1 of next campaign arc, ships in about 2 months)….

…What?

Look, dear American readers, I love you all but I’m losing faith in your Postal Service.  And I’m also dropping the gloves with Paizo’s shipping practices.  As good as the product and as awesome as the company are, having an untrustworthy shipping service leaches goodwill and appreciation.

I pay 20$ a month for that magazine, the least I can expect is to have it shipped between 1-2 weeks.

Amazon may have lost money for many years but Books arrive here in a flash.

Maybe it would be a good idea for Paizo to open up a warehouse in Mississauga (Canadian capital of warehouses) and ship all Canuck orders from there.

Or better yet, use UPS!

Here’s my final rantish argument:  It’s now a known fact that your shipping is less than stellar, I’ve seen it on your boards, I’ve read it from other non US based clients. Since you know it happens, you could afford to up the PR machine a bit and provide free replacement at a faster rate than 3 months after the original shipping.

Okay, I’m done now.

I will review Pathfinder #4 from the downloadable PDF I get with my subscription (the main reason why I keep the subscription, otherwise I’d have gone with buying it from my FLGS)

Pathfinder #4, Fortress of the Stone Giant is a tribute to the Gygaxian classic Against the Giants. The adventure contained therein is aimed at level 10 players and brings the to the 12th by the end.

The magazine is divided as such:

• Foreword by James Jacob where he waxed lyrical praise to Wolfgang and reminisces about DMing the original Against the Giants (Which, combined with Tomb of Horrors, are the only modules I ever played and DMed)
• Fortress of the Stone Giants by Wolfgang Baur, a 46 page adventure where the City of Sandpoint is attacked by a Stone Giant scouting party that foreshadows a Stone Giant Invasion. The party make their way to a Stone Giants’ Fortress and slay a ton of giants.  Said slaying that frees some hidden evil that is much much worse and must be dealt with… Features a lot of Dragon images (fun!!!)
• Born of Stone by Wolfgang Baur, an 8 page fluff historical and ecological guide on Stone Giants.
• Dragons of Golarion by Mike McArtor, a 12 page a similar discussion on Dragons in the World of the Runelords.
• The Pathfinder’s journal by Mike McArtor, a 6 page journal entry of prior adventurer’s in the world of Golarion (which I have yet to read in any issue I must confess)
• The Bestiary by Wolfgang Baur, featuring a Gargantuan Spider undead (cool!), a Redcap-wearing rather powerful (CR6) fey (Papa Smurf???), a Lovecraftian hound outsider, a savaged tattoo-covered giant, an Iron-Furnace earth-based outsider, a skeletal radiant evil outsider apparently made of light and finally a Template of Runeslave which is probably linked to the Sin Runemagic the adventure path is built around.

As always, top notch quality (for the little I’ve perused in the PDF… I much prefer leafing through this document in it’s original gloss paper form).  The editor even suggest that this adventure, if taken out of the context of the Adventure Path could be used in the Against that Giant Arc between the Hill Giant and Frost Giant scenarios.

I’ll tackle issue #5 soon.