[Pathfinder] Kaiju Adventurer Ideas for all levels.

[Callos_DeTerran]

I'm not going to lie, this is mostly prompted by the fact the new Godzilla movie has just come out and is still very fresh in my mind but this is an idea that I've actually had for a long time and it's one that I've struggled quite a bit with. Kaiju (daikaiju) are a personal favorite of mine when it comes to monsters...they're big, they leave a HUGE impact on their environment, and are practically the definition of a destructive force of nature with enough bestial cunning to come off as just a bit eerie. Plus, eventually, you're bound to see two kaiju slug it out and such a thing is simply the stuff of awesome. So I want to run a game that heavily involves Kaiju and the City of the Tarrasque idea (the basic idea being that the Tarrasque was captured and harvested for everything that a largish city would need with terrible physiological reaction on the land and citizens but leads to a cool backstory for an expansionistic empire) but the thing is...kaiju and the City of the Tarrasque just kind of...naturally lend themselves to higher level play but I want to start off at a lower level so that I can establish an entire world that has these creatures within it but keep the kaiju an ever present part of the picture through out.

So I figure this is a good place to ask for any and all ideas people might have for Kaiju adventure ideas for all levels of play.

[Winds]

Simple enough-at low-to-mid levels, the PCs are helping with cleanup, or as part of a mass military action. Lending their skills to cleaning up (literally), setting up and running mini-cities for the refugees, or suppressing monster infestations in the newly-abandons places of the area. Less moral parties may also prey on the devastation caused in some way.

[jguy]

Have you seen the Kaiju from the Bestiary 4?

[Callos_DeTerran]

Simple enough-at low-to-mid levels, the PCs are helping with cleanup, or as part of a mass military action. Lending their skills to cleaning up (literally), setting up and running mini-cities for the refugees, or suppressing monster infestations in the newly-abandons places of the area. Less moral parties may also prey on the devastation caused in some way.

I was thinking of something similar for the most part, except also expanding that to include preparing or evacuating a hamlet/town/city before the monster arrives in the first place as well. I also hadn't considered the suppressing monster infestations in the newly abandoned places angle either!


Have you seen the Kaiju from the Bestiary 4?

I have and they are plenty awesome, so I'm debating including them or just using them as a jumping off point for kaiju of my own. I'm also curious if anyone has seen any more kaiju made for pathfinder...

[QuidEst]

Your title made me think of something slightly different, and I was going to suggest Synthesist Summoner. That said, if you ever need something for Jaeger, they seem pretty good. At least until somebody could cast Possess Object (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/p/possess-object) with a high enough CL to possess a gargantuan object. Necromancy spell For colossal, maybe you could do a custom feat that would allow two caster to combine their CL in order to jointly possess the object without an individual CL of 32…

Ahem. Recreating Pacific Rim aside, Eidolons provide a fantastic kaiju-building system for lower-level spawn. Stepping down just a little from the official kaiju, Pathfinder has behemoths that might do.

Thoughts on low-level adventures: As mentioned, clearing other monsters out. It could be clearing them out of the kaiju's wake. Humanoidanity is forced to clear out of the way of the oncoming kaiju and try to move back into the wreckage, knowing that they rarely retread the same area. Or the PCs might have to help defend their settlement from monsters that have been displaced by the kaiju's movements far off. Kaiju-wake search and rescue? Maybe the PCs are criminals or looters that got caught and have been press-ganged into some kind of service in exchange for freedom.

Hmm. What else. Cultists! You know, I have yet to play a game where I fought a single cultist. It makes me a little sad. Kaiju cultists would be awesome. If it's a setting with Pathfinder deities, you know the regular Lamashtu crowd would be all over that. Lamashtu aside, they could be worshipping it, working it into some doomsday calendar, using the massive body count it's racking up to fuel dark magic, or endangering innocents performing rituals in an attempt to control it or weaken it. If you want to make an arc out of it, Pathfinder recently added an awesome spell, Call the Godspawn (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/c/spawn-calling) that lets you summon an uncontrolled CR 18 gotta-wish/miracle-it-dead monster. (The spell neglects to note that it's immune to mind-affecting effects.) That gives the cultists a rules-legal kaiju-calling option at high levels.

There's always the classic guarding-of-the-trade-caravan. It might include goods, of course, but also a bunch of NPC adepts (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/npc-classes/adept) to go around casting Create Water and Purify Food and Drink. It also provides a bit of low-level healing and buffing during the journey so that you can throw some tougher opponents at them and make the situation seem a little more dire.

You can always start them off at something like level 2 or 3 so they can be facing slightly more interesting monsters from the get-go.

The local oracle (or any divination specialist) freaking the heck out over something coming might be a good start to things if you want the first kaiju attack to happen near the start. You can even do bait-and-switch, starting with one session of a more conventional campaign.

By the way, if you're ever up for running this as a play-by-post, I would love to throw a cowardly criminal character in it.