The advice in these blogs is a little bit of everything; each freelancer came to the table with advice for building balanced, sound game mechanics. No matter what you’re looking to create with the Infinite Program, you’ll learn something helpful and insightful by reading each article. Enjoy!

• Infinite Possibilities – What Is Infinite, And Why Do I Care? by Owen K.C. Stephens

• Infinite Possibilities: Building a Business by Alex Augunas

• Infinite Possibilities: Tools of the Trade by Alex Augunas 

• Infinite Possibilities: Becoming a Golarion Historian by Dustin Knight

• Infinite Possibilities: Hiring Freelancers by Alex Augunas and Ron Lundeen

• Infinite Possibilities: Infinite Freelancing for Fun and Maybe Profit by Vanessa Hoskins

• Infinite Possibilities: Under -Finder’s Hood By Jessica Redekop, Rigby Bendele, Kate Baker, Dennis Muldoon, Dave Nelson, and Isis Wozniakowska

Community Content Programs (CCPs) are opportunities for fans and creators to produce material using the trademarks and intellectual property of a game company. It’s different from the Open Game License (OGL) in lots of ways, not the least of which is not every CCP is for a game with OGL material available. (Also, the Infinite programs, like many CCP, only allows publication on a specific online venue run by OneBookShelf, the people behind DriveThruRPG, but we’ll get to that in a minute.)

But since Starfinder and both editions of Pathfinder do have OGL versions available for people to build from, modify, and ever re-release whole cloth, why should anyone be excited about a Paizo CCP?

In a word, Golarion. Well, and the Pact Worlds.

Product Identity

The OGL allows publishers to declare “Product Identity (PI), which cannot be referenced, derived from, or mentioned in OGL publications by other publishers. The OGL itself says any “product and product line names, logos and identifying marks including trade dress; artifacts; creatures characters; stories, storylines, plots, thematic elements, dialogue, incidents, language, artwork, symbols, designs, depictions, likenesses, formats, poses, concepts, themes and graphic, photographic and other visual or audio representations; names and descriptions of characters, spells, enchantments, personalities, teams, personas, likenesses and special abilities; places, locations, environments, creatures, equipment, magical or supernatural abilities or effects, logos, symbols, or graphic designs; and any other trademark or registered trademark” are automatically PI unless stated otherwise. Paizo, quite reasonably, has also declared all proper nouns and words derived from proper nouns are IP.

Now that doesn’t cover everything. For example, Paizo doesn’t capitalize “vesk,” the lizardlike species from Starfinder, so not only are the game rules for a vesk fair game for OGL products, so is the name of the species itself. But their homeworld, Vesk Prime, and their empire, the Veskarium? Those are off-limits.

So is Absalom, Golarion, the Pact Worlds, Aroden, Pharasma, the Reign of Winter adventure path, Cheliax, Druma, the Pathfinder Society, the Starfinder Society, Old Mage Jatembe, Lord Gyr of Gixx,  … basically every interesting person, place, and thing that makes up the campaign settings and adventures of Pathfinder and Starfinder. Someone outside Paizo can use the OGL to write an adventure about a megadungeon in a tower outside a big city, but they can’t have the adventure be in the mile-high Spire of Nex, a siege castle ten miles outside of Absalom.

And, of course, that means the OGL doesn’t cover fiction set in Paizo’s worlds at all.

That means that with just the OGL, there are stories, ideas, and expansions that just can’t be made by anyone other than Paizo. The Pathfinder Compatibility License and Starfinder Compatibility License ease restrictions a tiny but crucial bit, allowing some game books to be mentioned by name and compatibility the with core games to be indicated, but they do nothing to open up narrative elements.

Enter Pathfinder Infinite and Starfinder Infinite

As Community Content Programs, Pathfinder Infinite and Starfinder Infinite open up new possibilities. These allow fans and professional creators alike to use all the juicy proper nouns and the campaign content they represent in products released through the rules and agreements at pathfidnerinfinite.com, and starfinderinfinite.com. There are rules and restrictions, of course, but for you a consumer, those don’t really matter. What matters to you is that there is about to be a lot more material designed specifically for the worlds you are already playing in—including new fiction.

While it’s not going to be anymore “official” than material published under the OGL to work with Paizo’s games, the things produced for the Infinite programs will be set within the existing framework of Golarion and the Pact Worlds (and beyond). You won’t have to try to guess where to put an adventure written in a mile-high tower built by an ancient wizard when you buy a Spire of Nex product on infinite, because the creators will be allowed to actually use the specific elements of the campaign world to give location, context, and history of the new options they give you.

That means not only is there a new set of tools in the toolbox of independent creators, those additional tools let them do more of the work of placing their creations in the worlds you are already playing with. It also serves as an opportunity for people who have no interest in creating independent worlds for their game creations to place products firmly in well-established worlds without having to do all the worldbuilding themselves. That’s likely to bring in new creators we might otherwise never have gotten to hear from, and expand the diversity of offerings in ways that Paizo couldn’t even if they publish twice as many books, and OGL-only publishers can’t.

And, even if you do your own homebrew campaign and don’t care anything about Paizo’s IP, the Infinite programs give creators more opportunities for an expanded audience, new inspirations, and a reason to try new things. Innovation and new competition within the RPG space generally leads to more and better products, which increases the chances that exactly the product you want to buy will be made by someone.

No one knows yet what the big hits of the Infinite programs will be. But we know there will be some, and many of them would not exist without this new possibility.0

Owen K.C. Stephens
Publisher, Rogue Genius Games
Pathfinder/Starfinder freelance contributor

With that in mind, what makes a good freelancer? I have thoughts on this as I’m currently working on editing freelancer manuscripts for my recent Kickstarter project, Starfarer Species Reforged, but I also solicited the help of one of Know Direction’s podcast personality and Paizo’s Development Manager for Pathfinder, Ron Lundeen. We’ll show you the ropes so you can get to work as a freelancer during what could very well be a Washington State Goldrush of -Finder Freelancing Opportunities!

Freelancer Basics

So, you want to freelance all the things? Here’s a short list of stuff you’ll need and/or want.

• An e-mail address. You probably want something professional, like FirstInitialLastName@emailservice.com. However, there can be benefits to having something that sticks out; I will never forget that Jacob Blackmon’s contact e-mail is commissionprodigyduck@gmail.com, which probably works in his favor because I’m always like, “Who is this duck and why is he a prodigy?” This is likely less helpful when you’re working with full time people like Ron, though; I doubt Paizo developers have time to fawn over silly e-mails like I do.
• A Self-Employment Code. If you make more than $400 freelancing, you need to legally report it in most states in the US of A. As a result, you need to have a Self-Employment Code to note your earnings. Check with your state’s requirements and/or a lawyer to get this squared away.
• A GOOD WordProcessor. Listen, friends. If you’re gonna do work for someone, you need to have the tools for the job. Don’t try to do freelance work without having a good WordProcessor; it makes life a lot harder. Like, a TON harder. Also, I can speak from experience that Paizo uses a specialized document filled with preprogrammed styles, and if you can’t use that template I doubt they’ll want to use you twice.
• Access to Rules. Most publishers give free copies of stuff they’ve published if you ask, but do not expect someone like Everybody Games to give you a free copy of the Pathfinder Core Rulebook. That’s an essential part of the work you were hired for, and it needs to be something you have access to. It would be like an artist asking you to buy them Adobe Photoshop. Nah, friend. Nah.

Advanced Suggestions

• Closely review any and all documents your employer gives you. Try to match the cadence and style of the work you were given, and take any special considerations into account. For example, in the Starfarer Species Reforged work, I noted that we’re changing all references to “race” to “species,” so getting racial bonuses or new player races shows me that the freelancer didn’t take the time to review the requirements of the job I hired them to do. That’s REALLY frustrating!
• Ask questions as they arise and stay in touch. If your employer has time, they’ll reply, but no one was ever hurt by an e-mail they didn’t have time to respond to, and good communication skills show that you care about the project and the product.
• You don’t have to be perfect to get another job from me, but the better you are, the more likely I will think of you when I need work done. Basically, everyone messes up from time to time. I’ve had to go and rewrite entire turnovers I’ve gotten from freelancers before. I’ve given them feedback and some space to improve and in many cases, I work with them again later when they’ve had some space to grow. But the freelancers who were already good? Who were easy to edit and produced stuff I loved reading? Those are the people I go to fast when I need more stuff done!

The Paizo Perspective

By Ron Lundeen

I have a really good sense of how much I can handle with writing and developing a product, and I try to look ahead to see where the gaps are. With my work for Paizo, this is easy: all I have time for is development, so freelancers handle most words on most pages. With my 3PP work, I usually just scale back my offering to match my output, but I sometimes bring on a freelancer to either join me on writing a project I’m doing, or to do something I can’t do myself (such as art, which I’m terrible at).

I almost never hire a freelancer blind. Each freelancer is either someone I’ve worked with before or someone that a colleague of mine has worked with before. I’m interested in knowing what the person’s timeliness is, what the quality of their writing is like, and any special considerations (like, “this person doesn’t handle rules as well as narrative” or “this person really understands the architecture of medieval castles”). I’m aware that this focus on hiring people I already know or people who’ve already written for a colleague creates a closed system. It’s very, very difficult for a new writer (and many minority writers) to break into this system. I’ve therefore started to go out of my way to look for new writers who show promise in work they’ve done that’s not for anyone I know, and particularly people of marginalized groups who need more opportunities. This makes for greater development time on the back end, usually, but it’s worth it to give these new voices a chance to step into the industry alongside the old hands.

As far as traits and qualities I’m looking for, I’m most interested in communication and timeliness on the front end. That is, I want people who aren’t afraid to reach out to me with questions, and whom I can easily find to touch base or discuss how a project might be pivoting. People who aren’t responsive or communicative scare me, because I don’t have any reason to think they’re actually doing the work and I might end up with a lot of nothing. Hitting the deadlines I’ve set is important, because I don’t set those arbitrarily. There are lots of other moving pieces, like art orders and map orders and aligning text with other products. I usually build in a few days of lateness into the schedule, because life happens to everyone (including myself!), but timeliness is something that’s important to me. On the back end, my key interest is in quality. This isn’t just that a freelancer can write to the specifications I gave, like to give me 1,000 words of new wizard feats and 1,500 words of devil-themed magic items. Giving me what I asked for is the minimum bar. What really delights me is text that is crisp and focused, that shows understanding of and even some innovation of the rules, and which is overall pleasant to read. Those are the back-end qualities that make the final, lasting impression with me. That’s what determines whether I’ll hire a freelancer again, or recommend the freelancer to colleagues

I’d like to add one other key quality in a freelancer, and that’s the ability to take feedback and apply it. Whether it’s something at the milestone stage where I ask to drop X for Y, or whether it’s post-project feedback when I observe how the next product could go smoother with improved A or B, it’s a delight to see a freelancer that not only acknowledges the change but incorporates it the next time around. I know we all invest some of our feelings into our work, and being told that something you love needs to change is hard, but a professional freelancer can take that in stride without ego getting in the way. This makes me think more highly of a freelancer, and makes me more likely to recommend their work in the future.

Thanks for joining us! This has been Alexander Augunas and Ron Lundeen.

Before Infinite, your options for breaking into the TTRPG writing world were limited to a Paizo Open Call, getting your Wayfinder submission noticed, or working with 3rd party publishers on non-Golarion and non-Pact Worlds stuff. Even getting a 3rd party publisher could be difficult, which is how writer’s groups like Freelance Forge started.

Now you can strike out on your own and have a fairly visible marketplace for your work, or work with a 3rd party publisher to get your vision published on Infinite. Ok, but… where do I start?

Working With A Publisher

This is still a pretty good way to go, as they’ve already got the literal tools and professional staff lined up to make your work look amazing. If you’ve not written anything professional yet, you’ll likely be on a team of authors putting together a product.

To get started, reach out to a 3rd party publisher whose work you really like. Let them know who you are, what experience you have, and what sorts of things you’d want to write.

Dear Everybody Games,

I’m Vanessa Hoskins, a huge Pathfinder and Starfinder fan who has written
some monster-of-the week on a blog and thought it would be fun to expand
to other rules elements. I love anything fey, and have a soft spot for
skittermanders. If you’re considering publishing anything for Infinite, I’d
like to be included on the team!

Sincerely,

Vanessa

You can also try and join communities like Freelance Forge or look for folks on the Paizo forums. Once you have a group, decide what to make and start writing!

Self Publishing

If you want to venture out on your own and you’re confident with layout, you can try and publish your own stuff solo. One of the great parts of Infinite is that they give you templates to aid with your formatting, plus a bunch of artwork and maps you can use as part of the Infinite licensing agreement.

This is the trickier of the two paths, but you’ll be master of your own product. Just be sure to read and understand all of the rules for publishing on Infinite posted on their site, plus all of the FAQs. You can also check out the other blogs in this series for more in-depth information about how to design “inside the lines” so your product doesn’t get ban-hammered.

Why Infinite?

The best part about getting into professional writing for TTRPGs right now are the things Infinite has to offer you. You can use all of Paizo’s IP (intellectual property), a bunch of their assets like art and maps, and you have a dedicated marketplace to sell your products. Always wanted to write about Gray Corsairs, complete with a dedication, magic items, and more lore? Now you can!

And Maybe Profit?

Maybe! Here’s the secret about TTRPG books: they can be really expensive to make. Between paying editors, layout artists, character artists, cartographers, and authors, producing a book is a huge investment. But if you’re going in as a team and using free art, such as provided by Paizo as part of the Infinite agreement or Creative Commons attribution assets (just make sure to site them and know which license requires what), you can keep your costs down. This will allow you to sell your product and start making a profit right away.

Now go out there and help build on the Infinite world of the Finderverse!

So you want to write for Infinite, but you don’t know where to begin on balancing the mechanical aspects of your product? You’ve come to the right place. I’m Jessica Redekop and this is UnderFinder’s Hood.

I was hesitant to take on an article focused on mechanics, because it’s not exactly my specialty, either. I can share my strategy with you for how I write mechanics even when I’m not so great at them, though, and I’ve also brought in a crew of other Paizo freelancers to share their tips, too: Rigby Bendele, Kate Baker, Dennis Muldoon, Dave Nelson, Isis Wozniakowska each shared their tips, and Isabelle Thorne assisted us with consultation, feedback, and editing. Enjoy!

Trace, Copy, Remix

By Jessica Redekop

Whenever I create new content for Pathfinder or Starfinder, I always start by reading existing examples of whatever I’m going to create. When I’m getting ready to create a Pathfinder archetype, I look at existing archetypes; when creating ancestries, I look at existing ancestries. You’ll always find valuable information by looking for and dissecting the rules already at work in the system. For example, many ancestries have feats that grant weapon proficiencies. You can model a weapon proficiency feat for a new ancestry from the ample existing examples, and know your feat is balanced if it falls in line with the others. The same can be said for how many skill proficiencies an archetype dedication should give, how high a monster’s resistances should be, or how much damage an NPC should deal.

Always start by tracing an existing piece of work to practice and build your eye for good design. Pick an existing ancestry to reflavour; rename it, then make small changes to the feats it provides, switching out skill proficiencies and other features.

Next, you can move on from tracing to copying; instead of starting with an ancestry to use as a base and applying your changes to it, you can look through the existing ancestries in aggregate for inspiration, and take the parts you like. Model your ancestry feats off the ones already in the books, tweaking and combining existing feats to achieve the results you want.

Once you’ve built up your skill at tracing and copying, you’ll have created enough ancestry feats to know by feel when your new ideas are balanced against existing options.

You can apply this trace to copy to remix framework to all parts of the game, from ancestries to archetypes to items to even encounters and adventure writing. You can never go wrong by looking to existing material for inspiration and precedent.

Story-Focused Options (With a Point!)

By Rigby Bendele

Story is the heartbeat of any tabletop roleplaying game. Providing ways for players to act within those stories is at the core of my design philosophy. Narrative-driven design provides tools to make these story beats happen. Often, I start by identifying a specific experience that a player would want to act out with a character and to create ways to reward those experiences. However, it should still be an experience that comes up regularly enough that it’s worth the trade-off of another choice – often, story-focused character options fall flat due to limited usability. As a result you’ll want to support story beats that come up regularly, such as intimidating a humanoid enemy you have at sword point.

The abilities are often best done as linked class feats in Pathfinder 2E or as options within major class features in Starfinder (such as a mystic’s connection). PF2E’s 3-action system is a particular boon in writing abilities that create a story mid-combat. While these are commonly seen in creature stats, this is fertile ground for creating class feats that grant activities. With my earlier example, perhaps I would design a swashbuckler class feat that allows a PC within arm’s reach to attempt to Demoralize as part of a action that also allows a Strike, and then an additional feat that allows a PC to attempt the check with by flirting at swordpoint with Diplomacy.

Follow What Came Before

By Kate Baker

Communicating complex game rules through text is difficult. Noticing ambiguity in your own writing is almost impossible since, after all, you know what you meant, and it’s hard to think of every corner case that can arise. On top of all that, you still want your mechanics to read like part of a game, with elegance and flow. While it’s impossible to do all of that perfectly, it helps quite a bit not to reinvent the wheel. Look at what is already out there, and reference it whenever you can.

If you’ve written a custom ability for a monster, but what you’ve written is 95% like the fear spell, just reference fear instead. There’s less chance of getting interpreted wrong. If you create an archetype where the PC gets something much like an existing feat, reference the feat and explicitly call out the additions that your archetype adds. This makes it crystal clear if you’ve got the level wrong for your ability, as well. If you are giving a 12th level class feat to your archetype at 6th level, something is decidedly wrong.

This concept isn’t limited to referencing abilities in their entirety, either. Do you want a reaction that triggers when an opponent gets a crit against you? Go find another ability with the same condition and see how it is worded. Using consistent phrasing helps GMs and players understand how your content works. If you consistently find that existing content covers a smaller or larger scope than what you’re trying to write, that’s a good hint that your balance is off.

Altogether, paying attention to the content that came before yours aids in mechanical balance, clarity, and making life easier on yourself.

Make it Useful, Make it Fun!

By Dennis Muldoon

When creating player options in Pathfinder 2nd Edition, it’s important to keep two key questions in mind: (1) Is this useful? (2) Is this fun? While the answers are subjective, they can still serve as a guide during design and as a reality check when evaluating an option.

First, is this useful? Does this option add something meaningful to the character’s abilities? If the option provides a numerical bonus, does that bonus stack with common bonuses the character is likely to already have, given the limited set of bonus types in Pathfinder 2e? For example, if a feat provides a fighter a +1 status bonus to their attacks, that won’t stack with a bard’s inspire courage or a cleric’s bless. Similarly, if an option provides a +2 circumstance bonus to initiative rolls, that won’t stack with the Scout exploration activity or the Incredible Initiative feat. Also consider the action economy of the PC the option is designed for. A feat that allows a wizard to spend an action to boost their summoning spells isn’t very useful, since those spells take 3 actions to cast. Similarly, a feat that boosts the effective hardness of a shield as a reaction would prevent that PC from using their reaction to Shield Block, defeating the purpose.

Second, is this fun? Does it allow the character to do something fun or impressive they wouldn’t normally be able to do? Does it look cool? Does it allow the player to easily weave it into the narrative of their turn? Something that just provides a bonus without anything else is much less fun than something that allows the character to do something impressive or unusual.

Tips for Writing Pathfinder Second Edition Mechanics

By Dave Nelson

The two things to keep in mind when creating mechanics, for player or GM, in Pathfinder Second Edition is to keep things as simple as possible and be sure to keep the numbers conservative. A feat or other ability should only be a paragraph or so, two if it is a spell with multiple things going on. Bonuses and penalties to rolls should never be higher than + or – 3 and do not make new types of bonuses. Allowing for easier stacking of these will skew the game math very quickly. A bonus of +1 is meaningful, +2 is something players will always want to get, and a +3 is the apex of bonuses. This stays true from levels 1 to 20 since the math is so tight, even +1 bonuses don’t go out of style.

Another good thing to be aware of is the actions something takes, and what that says about how often that will allow the character or other actor to use it. Three-action abilities will only be used if it is worth to the spend a whole turn on it. One-action abilities can be used twice or more in a turn, so consider them accordingly. Most flashy and meaningful things worth doing will likely be two actions- enough time so that they can’t be done back to back, but less enough that the actor can still do one other smaller thing.

High Magic Setting with Low Magic

By Isis Wozniakowska

Starfinder is a science fantasy setting, but I once had a friend describe it to me as a “high magic setting with low magic”, and I think that significantly shapes my view of it. With that in mind, Starfinder monster and NPC design seems simple at its core; just follow the chart of numbers, double checking everything, and throw on some class grafts when you need them. However, there’s a lot of nuance to the system when it comes to adding spells and magical effects.

Spellcasters make fantastic NPCs and villains, and often interact well with the technomagical aspects of the setting, but there are some things I want to point out. With Starfinder being a lower-magic game, there are certain spells that are distinctly difficult to counter at the levels where they first become available. For example, greater invisibility is really only countered by see invisibility—which is a personal-only spell and something you cannot rely on a party to always have—or by a 10th-level armor upgrade which can be used a maximum of 5 minutes per day.

Likewise, when NPCs get their “at-will” spells per day, make sure to keep in mind what types of spells really would tear a party of PCs apart if a creature could easily use them every single round. While it might be thematic for your fire dragon to have at-will explosive blast, be mindful that if you expect the NPC to last several rounds, that is a lot of explosive blasts for players to have to dodge.

I greatly encourage anyone, whether producing content for home games or publication, to look into spellcasting grafts and try giving NPCs spells on top of special abilities. An extra bit of spellcasting works to remind us that Starfinder is the magical science fantasy setting that it deserves to be. But always be mindful that Starfinder is, mechanically, a lower magic setting, and what that means for parties that go through your adventures or encounter your creatures.

Thanks for joining us! This has been Jessica Redekop, Rigby Bendele, Kate Baker, Dennis Muldoon, Dave Nelson, and Isis Wozniakowska. Special thanks to Isabelle Thorne for assisting our article by providing thorough editing and feedback!

“Holy crow, I have to do this on Microsoft Words?”

“This art layout is super janky!”

“How do I make stuff?!”

Ah, yes. The clarion wail of folks wishing for access to better tools. While its certainly not impossible to build successful products using the template that Paizo provides in its Infinite access packages, Microsoft Word is far from specialized to handle that job. So, what types of software are specialized for making products? Well hypothetical disembodied voice of the audience, today I’m going to quickly go over some of the products that I feel are the most important tools in your utility belt for the creation of fantastic new Pathfinder Infinite and Starfinder Infinite products! LET’S GET IT GOING!

Publishing Design Software

So the first thing that you need, what I would consider the most essential piece of software, really, is some sort of Publishing Design Software. For most publishers, the most commonly used tool on the market right now is called Adobe Indesign; it’s kind of like the nerdy younger brother to the glamorous older sisters that are Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator; equally valid, but significantly less well-known. The big thing that a good publishing design software does that Microsoft Word does not is provide strong, programmable styles and better layering tools while also allowing text styles and options to run inside text boxes rather than in a preset field. For example, if you’ve ever tried to use Microsoft Word’s text boxes, you’ve probably noticed that they’re really janky and don’t play well with formatting of any sort, such as alternate colors or art. That’s not an issue with InDesign; once you master how InDesign functions, it’s a powerful tool that will provide you with complete fidelity over what your product looks like, and with as many potential fish in an Infinite sea as their are, having a strong visual brand is going to help your products stand out from among the rest.

Adobe InDesign

InDesign is the golden standard here; it’s by far the most widely used tool that’s available for several good reasons.

• Pro: Adobe is fully integrated with a Creative Suite; specifically Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. This allows you to do things like design something in Photoshop, upload it directly into InDesign, and automatically apply any further tweaks you make in Photoshop to InDesign without need for subsequent importing. Other useful integrations include access to Adobe Fonts and, if you pay an extra subscription cost, Adobe Stock, which is an online repository of stock art.
• Pro: As the industry standard, there are TONS of helpful articles and videos designed to teach beginners how to use the software.
• Con: Adobe products are notoriously expensive. A subscription including InDesign, Illustrator, and Photoshop costs just over $50 a month at the time of writing, and I specify time of writing because Adobe is infamous for increasing their prices without increasing the value of their product. And its worth noting that while you could certainly go Blackbeard on an Adobe product, you’ll be missing a lot of the most up-to-date features, since modern Adobe products are cloud-based rather than physical based. (Don’t quote me on this; I’m sure pirates have figured out ways to hack the system, but that ain’t my jam. Everybody Games is my hobby, but it’s also a business, and if I’m gonna run a business I’m gonna do it legit.)

Affinity Publisher

If you’re willing to pay but Adobe’s price point is too much for you, Affinity is a GREAT option!

• Pro: Affinity Publishing is a one-time purchase of about $50.00 USD. That’s less than a month of Adobe Creative Suite!
• Pro: Affinity Publishing is vector compatible, can open all InDesign files, and has a ton of features of its own. Affinity also has its own suite of products, so if you purchase the Photoshop and Illustrator equivalents, you can interface with those as easily as Indesign interfaces with Photoshop and Illustrator.
• Con: Unlike Adobe, Affinity products aren’t compatible with Linux systems.
• Con: If you’re planning on starting immediately, picking up Affinity Publisher, Photo, and Designer is a larger up-front investment. For Adobe, you’ll pay about $55 to $60 each month, so if you want to get started with all three apps you gotta pay about $150 upfront to get all the Affinity stuff but only about $55 to get all the Adobe stuff. Within three months, however, you’ll start saving money picking Affinity over Adobe, so which one is more cost-affordable is really determined by your long game.
• Con: You don’t get access to special Adobe resources like custom fonts and the like.

Scribus

If you’re looking for an alternative to Adobe products, Scribus is the best, free option. My personal experience with Scribus is limited, but from what I can tell, it has a ton of the same features.

• Pro: Scribus is Open Source and 100% free.
• Con: In addition to lacking Adobe integration, Scribus updates happen with the good will of the community, so Scribus can sometimes lag behind other options in terms of gaining new features.
• Con: If you are looking for a free option after using InDesign, you should know that Scribus can’t open InDesign files. This means that you won’t have access to any Adobe resources or templates. (This is a big deal if you plan on publishing physical books with DriveThruRPG, because they give you preset templates that you have to use for product covers. You basically won’t be able to make print copies of your books with Scribus.)

Graphics Editor Software

“Uh, Alex,” you say to me. “I’m a writer, not an artist, and Paizo is giving me tons of awesome art assets to use with the Infinite program. Why do I need graphic design software?”

Ah, my succulent little strawfolx, that’s where you’d be wrong! Let me tell you something—there are a LOT of writers out there. Most of them are going to be worse than you, but people don’t know the quality of your writing from your words, because your words are inside the PDF. And people typically don’t get to look inside of a PDF before they buy it unless they’re pirates or you’re offering a free sample. So now you’re left in a situation where you have your words, your sale’s pitch, and all the art Paizo gave you to use.

Just like everyone else.

Now, I’m not saying that no one will buy your stuff if you don’t work on snazzing up your work with some graphics editor software. But what I will say is that if you and I are equally good writers (maybe you’re even a little bit better than me), but I’m the one who made a custom cover and page borders for my product and I emphasize those features in my sales pitch, you better believe people will buy more of my product then yours. People often ask me, “Alex, why do you slap kitsune on the cover of all your products?” And my first answer is, “Because foxes are dope, fight me you plebian.” But my second answer? My second answer is a resounding, “When I put kitsune on my covers, I sell about 10% to 15% more product on average, depending on content and artist and other factors.”

Now, am I saying that YOU need to put kitsune on all your covers? Yes No. But what I am saying is that kitsune are my brand, people identify me by my brand, and custom covers featuring kitsune characters is part of my brand. Just like how Kobolds are part of Kobold Press’s brand, or Goblins are part of Paizo’s. Beholders are Wizard of the Coasts’ brand. Owen K.C. Stephens himself is Rogue Genius Games’s brand. Legendary Games is really fond of putting heroes doing cool things in front of a background that looks like their Moms took them to Fantasy Sears to get their photos done. Nearly all of the successful publishers have a visual look, a brand, and you will be more successful with one too.

So, what programs should you use to make your brand?

You basically got two major choices: a raster graphics editor and a vector graphics editor.

• A raster GE is essentially a program that’s designed to save your art as a bitmap image. They tend to have more fluid tools that mirror actual artistry movements, such as paint brush or pencil strokes. Digital painters favor this type of program for its insane fidelity; basically anything you can to a canvas, you can do in the right raster program.
• A vector GE is a program that’s designed to save your art as a vector image. They tend to have more click-and-drag tools that are designed for speed and precision of placement over artistry, and while they are usually less open ended and customizable than raster GE programs, vectors inherently have better scaling and snap-to features, so it’s a lot easier to measure to precise lengths. Another advantage of a vector is that you can scale a vector to literally any size and the computer will instantly adjust it so it works at the new size, whereas bitmap pixels tend to get distorted when they’re blown up or shrunk small.

Which program you choose is largely personal preference and ability. I use vector graphics editor programs because I don’t have strong digital art skills and the snap-to features are easier for me to manipulate on-screen using a mouse. You’d want something like an art tablet for a raster GE program to get full use of those artistic motions, and that’s an extra cost for a skill that you’d need to develop. If you already have the skill or are willing to practice and learn, raster GE programs tend to be the industry standard. Both Perram and Dustin Knight use raster GE programs to make our cool Know Direction Network banners, for instance. In contrast, I use a vector program to make the Know Direction: Beyond banners.

Dustin made this KD: Prime banner using Photoshop! Note that it has more whimsical angles for the word “with” and the Pathfinder Infinite logo. This is doable in a vector program, but the raster is better suited for something like this because the precision is better.

This banner, in contrast, was made by Alex Augunas (me) in a vector program. Note that cleaning up the ysoki image was kinda choppy and the angle on the Starfinder Galactic Exploration Manual is a little less precise. However, you can 100% TELL that is the GEM hardcover because I used the program’s vector tools to convert a photo of the book into a vector that I could then scale to whatever size I wanted. That means the color palette of the book is still very much recognizable; you can even make out the color of the Starfinder logo when a raster program would have pixelated it!

So, with that introduction out of the way, let’s talk briefly about the different types of Graphic Editing programs you can find out there!

Adobe Photoshop (Raster) / Illustrator (Vector)

Adobe Photoshop is like the Kleenex of art programs; everyone’s heard of it and the term Photoshop is synonymous with graphic editing. Illustrator is also great too, but it’s definitely less well-known than its cousin.

• Pros and Cons: Literally the same as with Adobe InDesign. It’s the industry standard and has state-of-the-art features, but it literally costs over $50 a month or about $600 a year.

Affinity Photo (Raster) / Designer (Vector)

If you’re willing to pay but Adobe’s price point is too much for you, Affinity is a GREAT option!

• Pros and Cons: Literally the same as with Affinity Publisher. You gotta pay more upfront, but buying all three is literally a quarter of the yearly price of Adobe, and you pay that price once.

 Gimp (Raster)

Gimp is kind of like the Scribus of raster graphics editing. It’s a free option that’s actually pretty popular.

• Pro: It’s free. AND DOESN’T HAVE ADS!
• Pro: It has many advanced layer options.
• Cons: The UI is pretty cluttered and outdated, and the system doesn’t differentiate brush presets well.
• Cons: GIMP Doesn’t have strong drawing capabilities. It’s photo editing exclusively.

Inkscape (Vector)

Inkscape is the Scribus of vector graphics editing. It’s a free option that’s actually pretty popular.

Lightning Round!

There are TONS of useful tools you might want, bot the two things we talked about are by far the most important. I’m going to finish this article by listing a few more things that “might” help you. Ready? Let’s go!

• A SSD (solid state drive). Your fancy new program take a ton of RAM and CPU, so you’re going to want a drive that can process the information fast. A good solid state drive with a good amount of disk space is gonna do that for you; definitely an investment that brought my publishing to the next level when I made it!
• A good, 24/7 office chair. Yes, don’t bother with a gamer chair. Those chairs aren’t built tough enough. If you plan on doing a lot of writing and spending a lot of time in your chair each day, like Owen K.C. Stephens levels of content creation, you need something that’s strong enough to handle your constant wait and presence. 24/7 chairs are designed for around-the-clock call centers, like for 911 emergencies. I totally recommend them (and I use this one in particular).
• A Stock Art subscription. It’s REALLY helpful to have licensed stock art you can use to make your products go faster. Pick something with a strong library in your budget and go to town!

Thanks for joining me! I’m Alexander Augunas, and this has been Infinite Possibilities with the Know Direction Network!

About Alex

But first, let me flash my credentials a bit. I’m the owner and publisher of Everybody Games, formerly known as Everyman Gaming LLC. I’ve operated Everybody Games since 2015, so about 6 years now, and I’ve published a TON of products under Everybody Games and Everyman Gaming; over several hundred. I’ve also personally run five publishing Kickstarters, all of them having successfully funded (Grimoire of Lost Souls, Dynastic Races Compendium, Advanced Skill Guide, Advanced Occult Guide, and most recently, Starfarer Species Reforged). So while I might not be Owen K.C. Stephens or Jason Nelson, I have plenty of wisdom I am ready to dispense!

Do I Form a Company?

This is the first question everyone asks me. Do I form a company? The answer to this question is pretty simple.

“Probably not for the Infinite program.”

Now, don’t get me wrong. There are plenty of great reasons to start a company. For one, branding. It’s really helpful for players to say things like, “Oh I recognize Everybody Games. They have a good reputation and I don’t feel like I need to worry about letting their quality at my table.” HOWEVER, the Infinite licenses are very specific in that you CANNOT put your company’s logo on the front of your Infinite products. Only your name, the Infinite program logo, and the title of your product (which cannot include your company name, as far as I know. I am not a lawyer, this is not legal advice.) You also can’t publish your Infinite products from a company account; I would have to publish my Infinite products as, say, Alexander Augunas rather than Everybody Games. Now, the rules don’t stop me from putting a company logo inside my product, but if I can’t have that content on the front cover or in the title, then kinda what’s the point, you know?

In general, I recommend founding a company if you plan to do OGL writing that isn’t Infinite, but if Infinite is your focus there’s no reason to go through the hassle. Setting up a company also takes more than simply saying, “This is my company name!” because if you don’t take the proper legal precautions, people can just take that name and make it theirs. Setting up a company in most states requires a lawyer; in Pennsylvania where Everybody Games is based, we have specialized practices for small businesses and I went to a family friend to get my work done. But even going to a family friend costs money; in total, it cost me about $700 to set up Everybody Games back when it was Everyman Gaming, and it cost me another couple hundred dollars to establish Everybody Games as a legal alias for Everyman Gaming when I decided that I wanted to switch the name to be more inclusive. So just keep in mind that to do anything right costs money.

Right, but what if I wanted to do this mysel—

No, get a lawyer.

But I don’t want to spend that much money when I’m not going to be making much money doing this as my side gig.

Then frankly, don’t form a company. But if you’re going to form a company, do it right and get a lawyer. If you don’t, you’ll regret it somewhere down the road. Guaranteed.

Makin’ Money

Ah yes. The great question. “How do I make money with Pathfinder Infinite?” Well, I just might have the answer you’re seeking below!”

Yeah. Sorry if this is bleak, but I don’t want to steer you wrong here. It is INCREDIBLY hard to make money in Tabletop RPGs; for a typical Third-Party publisher, you need to drop so much cash on assets like the stuff I talk about in the Tools of the Trade article or art assets or specialized layout assets that you’ll usually find yourself down a grand easy as your initial investment, and in general you’ll only be making a couple of bucks per sale. My absolute best sellers ever hit about 500 copies sold in their lifetimes, spread out over years. The best-selling 3PP product I have ever written sold about 2,600 copies on DriveThruRPG. Here are some more typical ones:

• Advanced Occult Guide: 251 over 2 years (or about a hundred more since the Kickstarter funded).
• Dynastic Races Compendium: 865 over 4 years.
• Everyman Unchained: Fighters: 780 over 5 years.
• Kitsune Compendium: 765 over 5 years.
• Paranormal Adventures: 861 over 5 years.
• Pop Culture Catalog: Vidgames: 413 over 3 years.
• Yuletide Terror: 151 over 3 years.

This, obviously, is not every product in by backlog, nor is this going to be indicative of every company’s experience. However, using this data as a baseline, I can give you some pretty decent pointers.

Play the Long Game

Making money in Tabletop RPGs isn’t about instant gratification, it’s about people stumbling upon your work months later and buying your book on a whim. It’s about getting big enough that you can do bundles and other sales. Have a backlog people can always buy from. This sort of adds to the big issue about doing 3PP I mentioned before, where you have to be prepared to put money down. When I made my first product, Psychological Combat (which later became part of Ultimate Charisma), I probably spent an extra $150 on art on top of the money I had already dropped. Now, five years later, some of my products have sold a thousand copies. Again, you’re playing the long game.

Find Something You’re Passionate About and Build a Reputation

If you look at my numbers, it’s pretty clear that some types of Everybody Games products have sold way better than others. I’ve hardly sold more than 100 copies of Yuletide Terror, the only published Adventure Everybody Games has ever done. But you compare that to Pop Culture Catalog: Vidgames, and you’ll see that I sold twice as many of those. Yes, Yuletide Terror definitely made me more money long-term even at those rates (a Yuletide Terror PDF sells for $15.00 compared to a Pop Culture Catalog’s $5.00 or so), but at the same time I spent a LOT more money and time on that adventure then I ever did for the Pop Culture Catalog. If I’m not in a mental funk, a Pop Culture Catalog takes me two or three weeks to put together, depending on the size. Yuletide Terror took six months, TONS more art, dedicated editing, all that jazz. I would say that I definitely lost money doing Yuletide Terror, which is why you never see me do adventures.

There are a couple of reasons this might have been. Maybe Yuletide Terror was too niche an idea. Maybe I’m awful at adventure writing. But if you asked me, it’s because Yuletide Terror is my ONLY adventure offering, and I am not known for adventures in general. I’m known for rules and a bit of setting flavor. My best sellers are always worldbuilding tools and player rules, so that’s primarily what I produce. You too should pick something you like to produce and focus on that. Hone your craft and hone it well!

Minimize Your Costs

Moneymaking isn’t really my goal with Everybody Gaming. I like producing content for the hobby that literally saved my life, and I want the product I produce to be top-notch as a result. This isn’t my job and I’m not always concerned about turning a profit. Yes, I am an AWFUL business person like this. I’m a perfect example of how you can know all the yeses and nos and still do it wrong because you simply don’t care. Maybe you’re like me and you just want to make something special. That’s legit. Maybe I’m awful because my willness to eat a financial loss in the pursuit of art perpetuates the lack of financial profitability of Tabletop RPGs as a whole. That’s probably legit too, but I’d argue we can’t see progress there until the industry leaders are prepared to charge consumers what their products are worth so the rest of us small fry can rise up with them. None of those philosophical points changes the fact that if you’re going to make a business out of Infinite, you need to keep your costs low while maximizing your gains. So download free fonts, use royalty free assets, buy cheap stock art. Do what you go to in order to stay affordable!

Why Infinite Is Great

I heard TONS of freelancer friends and friends who generally have never published before harp on the Infinite Program from a business perspective since it was announced. “Why does Paizo think that their IP is worth half of my royalties? This is ridiculous! I’ll publish this myself!”

Paizo’s IP might not be worth half your royalties, but their art assets are.

Let’s say you want to write a Pathfinder Society Scenario-style adventure for PFI. To do this to the same standards as Paizo, you’ll need 3 pieces of art and 3 battle maps. You need to either use Royalty Free content (such as stockart from a stock art subscription) or you’ll need to commission custom pieces. Let’s say you want to commission Jacob Blackmon.

Jacob is extremely popular in the 3PP industry because his rates are extremely affordable. Using this commission sheet (which is actually out of date; Jacob currently charges $100 per 1/2 page art and $200 to $250 per full page art; extra for cover quality), getting 3 character illustrations (say, one important NPC, your final boss, and one other piece of your choice) would cost you $150 USD. Each map would be a more complex piece costing about $200 each, so if you have three encounter areas like a typical PFS scenario, that’s $600. So using Jacob Blackmon to create custom art, you’re looking at about $750 USD. That means you need to sell 151 copies of your scenario to break even. If you sell your scenario for $4.99 per copy using standard 3PP venues instead of Infinite, DriveThru takes 30% of your sales however. That means you’re only making about $3.49 per sale, meaning you need to sell 214 copies of your product to break even.

Pathfinder Infinite and Starfinder Infinite allow you to bypass this by using community assets. You might only be getting $2.49 per sale, but you didn’t need to invest in custom art. That being said, if you are going to self-publish under Pathfinder Infinite, it is smarter to use Paizo’s assets unless you already have a lot of art lying around, because if you’re paying thousands of dollars to make a product AND you are only getting a fraction of that pay thanks to the Infinite price hike, then yeah, that’s bad.

In Short,

• Don’t bother making a company if you’re only going to publish for Infinite. You’ll want a company for publishing outside of the Infinite program, and do take a look at how your state wants you to report the money you make.
• Infinite won’t be under the table money, you have to report it on your taxes and that WILL cause you to reduce your tax return. I’ve had plenty of good years where I owed money because of Everybody Games.
• If you’re going to use Pathfinder Infinite, make sure that you’re getting the most out of Paizo’s art assets. That is the biggest cost savor and will be the thing that makes your work profitable as a new publisher. When you get more established or start to make bigger books, ABSOLUTELY get custom art because like I said in Tools of the Trade, that’ll help you stand out.
• Be prepared the start slow. Each product is a drop, and many raindrops form into mighty rivers. (Or at least a babbling brook; we don’t know how well this is gonna do yet.)
• Support your fellow content creators! Make sure to boost other people’s work so more people see it and support quality wherever you find it. As a community, we need to uplift 3PP for it to continue to be profitable to the people who work to make our games great.

Thanks for joining me! I’m Alexander Augunas, and this has been Infinite Possibilities with the Know Direction Network!

– Albert Szent-Györgyi 

One of the more valuable resources open to participants of the Pathfinder/Starfinder Infinite program is the vast trove of established lore. One of the most daunting challenges of writing in any established setting is acclimating to canon often so expansive that even the most experienced franchise veterans can feel overwhelmed.

No Research without Action, No Action without Research!

First, you need an idea. Maybe you have a piece of commissioned art that inspired you, or maybe you read a line in a Lost Omens book and you want more. If your product was inspired by something from outside of the Paizo-sphere, your first step is to see if the Lost Omens has an equivalent. Archives of Nethys (1e, 2e, and Starfinder), The Pathfinder Wikis (here and here), and even Paizo.com are all legitimate places to start. But often the best place to start is your favorite search engine; Looking for keywords (and related, broader keywords) can help you find what canon has already established for your idea. Often this means searching those sites using an external search engine (Google:”site:2e.aonprd.com”; see the Search Engine Cheat Sheet if you aren’t aware of operators) and using multiple search engines to do so!

Wiki Citations: Check those citations in your wiki article to get an idea of what books to look at that relates to your idea. Oftentimes this can be kind of vague; Are you trying to figure how the Ancient Azlant dealt with criminals? Start in Ancient Azlant. Look at the citations and try to decide for yourself whether or not they are likely to reference the everyday city life of citizens in Ancient Azlant. Lots of references to “Ruins of Azlant”? It’s probably a good idea to check the back-matter of all six books!

Searching PDFs: Download every PDF in your Paizo account (go on, the article will still be here). Move them into the same folder(s) (I recommend renaming them and sorting them by product type). I know, this is a drag, but trust me you are saving so much time in the long run. Now open Adobe Reader. Hit “Ctrl+Shift+F”. Click “all PDF Documents in…” and browse to that folder. Now, assuming you have an adequate collection of PDFs from Paizo, you can simultaneously search all your PDFs for keywords related to your project! The first time you do this it will be a total drag and I highly recommend you close any ongoing applications you have in the background, especially videos and video games (yes, even your AFK auction house).

Physical Books: Don’t underestimate the value of physical books! Whether it is the ability to get off your computer and feel the actual paper, or the ease of having an extra “monitor” on your lap in the form of a paper book, having physical copies of your books open while you scour your computer’s databanks is an awesome resource, for those of us privileged enough to afford it!

Non-Paizo Material: And there are more than just Paizo-published books available! Pathfinder Infinite writers can use Pathfinder infinite authors can use elements from other Pathfinder or Starfinder Infinite works, such as characters, locations, monsters, or events. You have to include a link to the original work within your PDF, such as with an internal citation. (Again, see “Rules of Infinite” and the Pathfinder Infinite FAQ for more information). You can even contact those authors about potential future collaborations, or just to thank them for inspiring your awesome creation! (Networking is critical! And of course, there are tons of non-Pathfinder-related content you can use to inspire your work: from Wikipedia to a paper Encyclopedia; from Anime to a live-action Play! Just be certain to be careful when using these works that your work isn’t derivative or culturally insensitive. See “A Note on Creative & Cultural Appropriation” below.

Networking: Other people also make a great resource, although you should be wary if you are working under an NDA (always ask the developer/team in advance if you are uncertain). Reddit groups (such as Pathfinder2e and Pathfinder_RPG), Facebook groups, and even Discords are great places to ask veterans of the game on Lore. There are a number of them on the Pathfinder RPG subreddit Discord in the #golarion_lore channel who are more than welcome to point you where you need to go, including notable Paizo authors who know enough about Golarion to fill out an encyclopedia. When asking others always remember that oftentimes less-is-more. Instead of going: “I’m trying to write a book on muffins to sell on Pathfinder Infinite; Does But there are dozens of other Pathfinder discord servers (such as the Know Direction Discord) that have just as many veteran fans and authors who can help you! (Seriously, I’m in like 50 servers now. Please send help.) Cheliax have any blueberries?” just go ahead and try “Does Cheliax have Blueberries?” Come back in an hour and you’ll be shocked to see people throwing page numbers at you to reference both whether or not Cheliax has blueberries and why Cheliaxan blueberries are inferior to Andoran! (Spoiler: It’s the sweet taste of freedom.)

Once you get your first couple of leads, you can really start cooking!

Documentation Will Set You Free

I get it. When you get on a roll and have three books, seventy-two tabs, and three discord DMs going you don’t want to stop the flow of thoughts just to write any of it down in your notepad/google doc. Many of us fall into this trap of believing that if an idea is good it doesn’t have to be documented. This is a Level 12 Hazard that you need to avoid at all costs! (And, no, it doesn’t have the incapacitation trait!) Documentation isn’t (just) about “remembering good ideas”. It’s about freeing your mind’s current train of thought in a way that doesn’t jeopardize your current ideas. It’s about remembering the route your research took so you have a point of reference in case you need to go back and try another route through the Forest of Knowledge. Keep your page counts. Use bookmarks! Save those URLs (preferably in a folder for your project). It’s also about keeping documentation so you can properly cite your sources when you reference them in your work (check “Rules of Infinite” for more information). This is especially important if you want to reference work (such as the work of other Pathfinder Infinite Authors), which can help your customers find related work that will help them integrate your ideas into their character/campaign!

Don’t Lose Focus… or Inspiration!

The forest of knowledge is a tangled briar of paths so twisted that it’s easy to get lost. And while you might find some inspiration that is tempting you to write a different book, my best advice for you is to simply document it as such as back up a little so you don’t completely lose your way! That isn’t to say you can’t go another way, and it’s up to each creative to realize their limit when its comes to topical digression. Being inspired and motivated is a wonderful gift that you should cherish, and documenting your research ensures you can more easily return to the same headspace at a later date when your current project is finished. Just remember that the strength of 3pp and Pathfinder Infinite is that your customers can key into exactly what’s on the cover. Are they looking for an archetype that wields spears? Awesome, they don’t need a 20-page micro-fiction, 4-pages of Runelord Metamagic, and a 2-page Bestiary that will quadruple the cost of the book. Just give them the archetype, and use the book to help market your other ideas. Documentation is key here: Knowing exactly where to find the information you need for your next book will dramatically cut down how much time you have to spend researching it!

A Note on Creative & Cultural Appropriation

Now Pathfinder Infinite doesn’t look like it has the same restrictions many developers have concerning how much or how little “real world lore” you can use, but to keep with the same high standards as Paizo I highly recommend you consider this advice. Golarion isn’t Earth. Avoid using real-world names. There are tons of fantasy name generators out there, and you can get an idea for the “feeling” of people’s names in Lost Omens looking over a curated list. Using historical names has unforeseen baggage that can permanently mar your product. Using modern names has that same problem, and can alienate players who happen to pick up your product in the future. The cultures in Golarion are inspired by real-world cultures, but they are not those cultures. Use the lore Lost Omens has! And if you find yourself being inspired by lore, especially of a foreign culture, your product will greatly benefit by hiring a cultural consultant (see “Hiring Freelancers”; Ask other industry professionals for recommendations). Using words from other cultures can also carry the same taboo; Golarion isn’t Earth, and our language isn’t present in the canon of Golarion. There are cases when a foreign word is undeniably the best choice to help describe an object (like a Fulu), or even a monster (like a Penanggalan), but you have to make sure without a shadow of a doubt that you are using the correct word! I once again highly recommend finding a sensitive reader and/or researching at least three credible and peer-reviewed sources that can confirm your hunches about the idea. Many otherwise would-be great products have found themselves mocked for using the wrong names, and you don’t want that to be what your product is remembered for! Even worse, you could completely ruin a game (or even a relationship) by including a word that evokes an awkward history that not everyone at the table completely understands. This, too, is part of doing responsible research.

Likewise, you don’t want people to be unable to separate your work from another piece of fiction. There are tons of great examples of game mechanics, even from Paizo-published books, that were probably inspired by pop culture. There’s nothing wrong with watching a film or reading a comic book and going “man, that spell would be so awesome on the Occult list”. But no one wants to cast “Thanos’ Gauntlet Snap”. It’s derivative, unevocative, and a slap to the face of any game’s verisimilitude. The advantage of Pathfinder Infinite is being able to expand on the Pathfinder Setting. In other words, keep Pathfinder in Lost Omens. This is not only a requirement of the Pathfinder Infinite program but a rare open invitation from the company to use their proper nouns. And when you have a vault of thousands of proper nouns and names, why would you limit your own custom content to something someone else already used?

That being said, yes, it does hurt when you google that perfect name for your new Ancestry to find it was already used in some game you’ve never heard of before. But nine-times-out-of-ten? You’ll come up with a much better name if you just give it a little bit more time. (Also, naming stuff is hard. Like super hard. Don’t let it get you down. Save it for last and keep working!)

Finally, Research should be Fun!

If you find yourself burning out on your research, take a step back and just remember that diving head-first into the history of TTRPGs and Pathfinder is supposed to be part of the fun. It can get frustrating, and maybe that’s just your brain’s way of telling you to take a break. Because, ultimately, research is one of the most fun steps of tabletop game design (and fiction writing). Diving head-first into the minds of your fellow creatives will help give you newfound insights into a world of fantastic products, and will inadvertently improve your skills as an author. You aren’t just looking for blueberry facts. You’re looking to see what formats, sentence structures, and mechanics-to-flavor ratios resonate with you. You are using an opportunity to get to know this fantastic franchise you’ve chosen to not just play in but to expand upon with your own creative vision! And if you aren’t having fun writing your work, it will often come out that way in the final product.

So if you start to stress out? Take a bath. Watch some TV. Or just enjoy a warm blueberry muffin.