Tian Xia is a land for everyone, so immense and filled with diverse cultures that some ancient scholars believed nothing more could exist under the heavens. Both native and visiting adventurers will find places where everything feels different, yet the types of people and the motivations they have remain constant wherever one goes. Tian Xia births both heroes and villains. Customs might change, but hopes and dreams stay the same. Whether the nearby faces resemble your family or belong to entirely different peoples, the person behind each one has applicable lessons to teach.¹

I love the opening to the Character Options. There’s remarkable differences in the cultures of the peoples of our world, and that’s true in Golarion as well. Events unfolded differently, terrain and animals were different, even the stars above might look different leading to different tales. But we all gather as a family. We celebrate holidays with friends and family alike. We honor birthdays. We build homes, honor our dead, and more. So yes, we may marvel at the differences, the wonders we see when visiting a new place, but we have to remember our similarities as much as we must respect our differences, and the peoples and their cultures. I feel behooved to directly embed a sidebar actually.

I’m by no means a world traveler. I’ve sadly yet to get to Europe or Asia, despite having friends and coworkers on both continents. I need to. But you don’t need to visit a place or know some of its people to respect them. We’re all human in the end, though that’s not true on Golarion. And yet, they make it work. Most of the world knows there are bigger problems than the differences of their cultures or appearance. Oh sure, the bad guys still exist who would turn you against one another for power and profit – just like we do – but ultimately the common person understands the respect that should be given to others. An open mind, an open home. I hope we can have more of that, and if exploring games like Pathfinder helps others see that, then even better. I do love a good sidebar in these books…

Also before I begin, I should apologize. I meant for this article to be out while I was away on some very much needed vacation, but I got asked last minute to attend a work conference the moment I returned and so things got a little crazy. Of course, there’s no way I could skip out on detailing the rest of this amazing tome. Oh yes, I’m very excited for Godsrain and what’s coming next, but there’s a lot to celebrate and explore for our characters, PCs and NPCs alike. I think we’ve all seen the increasingly exciting featuring of other cultures, non-white peoples, and I don’t want it to stop, so we have to keep cheering for them as we learn and see them featured.

A number of archetypes and feats are included as we get into various character options. The Five-Breath Vanguard is for those who learn some of the elemental stances, focusing on the flow from one form to another. You learn to Cycle Elemental Stance as a single action, allowing you to Stride or Step and yet enter a new form. I love the practicality but also the visual I imagine, which feels very much in line with martial arts experts. The Strategist Marshal meanwhile expands the Marshal archetype. I had mentioned the marshal’s aura wouldn’t expand in my original breakdown of Player Core 2, but now with Strategist Stance it can go up to 20’ with a critical success. I worry few will want to give up two actions for Form Up!, where your allies then get to use a reaction to get into a particular formation of line, wedge, or cluster, but it could be suddenly helpful before an attack or to allow buff spells.

The new Spirit Warrior archetype channel spiritual energy through a blend of weapon and martial form. The dedication feat calls out that you’ve trained to the point of perfect harmony between spirit and body and that results in a single action ability called Overwhelming Combination. You get two Strikes against a target, one unarmed and one weapon strike. This allows you to combine damage for resistances and weaknesses. From there we get additional feats to represent oaths and other combo attacks. I love the oath to defend others from kaiju. That’s level 4 and grants you some bonus damage to larger creatures and a +2 circumstance bonus to saving throws and DCs against kaiju. At level 10, you can take Transcendent Deflection. It’s a reaction that you can use once every 10 minutes, and it’s triggered by you or an ally taking damage from an attack. Bad news, you deflect with a one-handed weapon that becomes broken. Good news, no one takes damage! Love the cinematic imagery of that.

Speaking of cinematic, the Starlit Sentinel is giving sailor scout / magical girl transformation and I am here for it! A friend of mine is moving back to town and is thrilled to be joining into our Kingmaker game. He was very tempted to use this archetype because it’s just so much fun in representation but in cultural terms, this represents an individual chosen by one of the constellations of the Tian Xia zodiac. You get a small item to be your transformation seal and when activated your outfit changes, after your transformation sequence of course. Your weapon also get a bonus to damage and you can fire starlight bolts as well! What’s really interesting is that the bolts get the benefit of your weapon runes, counting as arcane and force. At 8th level you can take Majestic Proclamation, announcing your name and causing your constellation to shine brilliantly around you. There are a couple focus spells you can get with a 4th level Special Sentinel Technique feat. You choose one, but can take the feat again for another. One does healing, but the other is an attack that varies depending on the constellation you choose. By 14th level you can gain a fly speed whenever you’re transformed. There’s a lot of opportunity with this one… Vigilante Starlight Sentinel maybe?

 

We get a couple pages detailing the Dance and Art styles of Tian Xia, including sword and fan dancing. I’ve long wanted to make a Bard Fan Dancer, and now you can with the Fan Dancer archetype! It increases your Performance skill making you an expert at level 2 (when you take the dedication), then again at 7th and 15th. As part of your Feint actions, you can Stride 10 feet before or after. Keep on dancing! At 8th level you create a Pushing Wind. You and allies within 30’ gain a 5’ circumstance bonus (not status!) to land speed as long as you are holding your fan. Meanwhile your enemies within 10’ treat the area as difficult terrain. It can get quite easy for you to gang up, distract, and overwhelm your foes with this archetype. At 14th level there’s a couple feat choices to choose from, and Peony’s Flourish is one that takes 3 actions. You get to Stride twice and then make a performance check against the enemies Will DC. If you succeed they are stunned 1 and dazzled for a round. But critical success is stunned 3 and dazzled for as long as they are stunned! A fan dancer is truly a terrifying foe for warriors in melee, who typically have low Will DCs! If I don’t make a PC Fan Dancer soon, then I’ll have to make an enemy NPC one!

Maybe it’s all the cooking in Kingmaker, but the Cooking section got me very excited too. Every culture has traditions in food, especially gatherings around doing so. The Wandering Chef archetype builds upon this with a training in crafting, the Quick Alchemy feature to create alchemical food, and even some versatile vials. Later feats let you prepare more versatile vials, but the 14th level Cosmic Cocktail interested me. You create a drink that inspires the starry universe and gives you truesight. If you need to make a counteract check, you get to use Crafting or Cooking Lore! Beyond these feats, there are some cooking rituals symbolizing many traditions of gathering like the Bonding Meal to unify and connect those with the place of your meal’s origin, likely something the chef learned from a family member or some event in your past, like serving in a war. We get additional Alchemical items too like ingredients and foods, though there’s references to still using the Treasure Vault as well. I’d like Cloud Buns please, and I love that they give you a fly speed for a short time!

The Medicinal studies of Tian Xia are discussed next, calling out the herbalism of Pei Zing and The Five Elements. The base concept is that all aspects of life are tied to at least one element, of which there are five as wood is counted amongst them rather than the western/hermetic philosophy of four, though that gets into the concept of ether and well that’s for another time. Anyway, we get an informative table tying seasons, tastes, dragons, emotions, even organs to the various elements. It’s also suggested what elements might be used to treat excess or deficiencies of an element. These are useful starting with the 1st level feat Prepare Elemental Medicine. Ultimately the treatment the medic provides leads to a +1 (or +2 for a critical success) circumstance bonus to saves against the affliction after the medic has treated the patient in accordance to the associations table. This has been taken further by other cultures like Chu Ye developing acupuncture, which has a related 1st level feat. A 14th level feat let’s you meditate as an action and then until the start of your next turn, if you hit a creature with an unarmed Strike, or an adjacent creature harms you, they make a save or become frightened. It’s called Meditate On This! And I love the concept of considering your anger, resentment and channeling it into your qi to the point of weaponing it. It flows into the target and scares them!

The Tian Innovation section focuses on inventors and their creations like the Oil Fire feat. It’s a single action for an armor innovation that lets you possibly ignite your grabbed target with persistent fire damage. Meanwhile the 12th level Celestial Cacophony is a weapon innovation that takes 3 actions. You have a small chamber in your weapon that can launch black powder, fireworks, etc. It causes fire and sonic damage in a cone and improves every two levels. The unstable function? It becomes a 30’ cone and does d8s instead of d4s for damage. Some brilliant inventors creating elemental weapons over there! I want to see them create something with the Arcadian beast guns. They could make a truly wondrous star gun that’s for sure.

I’ll encourage you to do some research into the classical fantasy literature of Wuxia. It’s the next section, classifying various mechanics that mix martial arts and often a romanticized or operatic story involving a hero of wandering/vigilante/chivalrous nature depending on the interpretation. First, we get a variant of the Magus called the Qinggong Magi. I remember when in first edition all of a sudden Monks were spitting out spells as my brother adopted the variant for his monk. This is a more inspired, practical example as the Qinggong Magus blends martial arts and their spellcasting. The first type is the Aloof Firmament blending lightness of the body with philosophies between morality and immortality. They get to fly with their Conflux spell Sky Laughs at Waves. But the Unfurling Brocade uses fabric to attack, wielding it with deadly precision. Both of these have clear inspirations to Wuxia movies, the one most recognized by western cultures being Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. It came out 24 years ago, can you believe that? Also, remember to honor the spirit of these tales and their lessons, as well as their importance in Chinese culture. Like I said, do some research.

Meanwhile, the Cultivator turns their ki toward refinement of the self through occult means, all while seeking immortality. This archetype invites planar energies into themselves, all while meditating and reflecting on their spiritual self. The dedication feat requires training in Occultism and automatically makes you an expert. You also get adapt self (linking to the legacy version until we get the updated form in Divine Mysteries) as a focus spell and it counts as a qi spell, allowing you to take things that require the use of qi. The higher level feats require you to become holy or unholy as you align yourself with those sanctifications. At 16th level you’re either becoming an undead creature (if unholy) or a living creature (if holy), though both are immortal. Thus, undead creatures could become alive again following this path. That feat is called The Immortal Attains The Summit. I love the story implications of this, though I’m not sure ceasing aging and the rituals for control weather and plant growth (even using Occultism instead of Nature) is quite enough for a 16th level feat. Well, I guess it only reads as you being sensed/detected as undead/living so it’s not like you get undead resistances and the like. I’m hoping there’s some benefit I’m not understanding mechanically, but it could have incredible story implications for some spirit, undead, dhampir who’ve been on the path to enlightenment.

Leaving Wuxia behind, Familiar Sage is an expansion of the Familiar Master. They know that these familiars are spirits that represent aspects of life or other concepts. They develop their bond even more so, finding magic in that connection. The dedication feat (4th level) grants you the Enhanced Familiar feat and what’s most important is you can take it even if you haven’t taken 3 Familiar Master feats yet! You learn through later feats to channel various spiritual powers like the ability to control elemental air with the 6th level Tempest Cloud’s Speed, allowing you to move with a 10’ status bonus and Stride without triggering reactions. By 16th level, it’s channeling elemental fire with Phoenix’s Flight. You can now transform into a Phoenix, merging with your familiar and gaining a 3-action Blazing Conflagration spell that does 16d6 damage to all creatures within a 10’ burst while granting you temporary hit points. I appreciate it improves automatically at 18th and 20th level too.

The Martial Arts section details numerous feats that embody the various monastic traditions within Tian Xia. We get some great lore and in-world detail about various philosophies and studies around martial arts, ever useful for developing backstories and progression details for characters. I appreciate the Kaiju Stance 8th level feat. You have to have encountered a kaiju in the past and be unarmored, but it makes you Large and gives you the ability to make shattering earth attacks, while only shattering earth attacks. Ignoring difficult terrain is great too! The 20th level Wake of Devastation requires Kaiju Stance and makes your shattering earth attacks have the razing trait. Never fear a door again! You create difficult terrain around your strikes and can immobilize your targets with critical hits. The Martial Artist archetype of course has some further detail here, noting additional feats they can take from the section as well as a couple new feats including the 8th level Adamantine Body. Gotta level resistance to attack as a reaction!

The Companions and Familiars section gives us creatures appropriate for the area like Durian Crabs and Tikar Urchinpads. I love the Lantern Wisps, with hand-made lanterns embodying a spirit to float with you. The Shikigami are paper familiars who gain an ability to flatten, allowing them to easily squeeze even under doors! Plus they’re easy to replace should it be damaged, allowing you to rebind the spirit at daily prep. Yes, they take 6 familiar abilities to get but they can play dead and count as constructs. What I love is the visual of them. I’d want to have a number of them at the ready, and a crafter could fashion all sorts of spells in that style since you can describe your spellcasting however you wish. A number of new pieces of equipment, including magical items are then detailed in Tian Equipment. I can’t give all the details of course but I do love the Wand of Purification that lets you cast cleanse affliction, clear mind or sound body as necessary at the related level. Expensive? Yes, but the versatility is important considering the counteract level. Additionally consider period and culturally appropriate weapons for the domain of your character. Yes, the katana is printed but let’s not all race out to have a katana please. Consider the temple sword, sai, tonfa, wakizachi, the bladed scarf, katar, and of course the fighting fan!

I hope you’ve already Invested In the Tian Xia Character Guide, but if not, I can’t imagine you won’t want to make use of it’s ancestries and character options either for a Tian Xia focused campaign or one inspired by such. There’s many ways to bring those characters to other campaigns but remember to consider the cultural implications and do the research of what you’re drawing from creatively. Another shout out to the artist, designers, and developers who’ve brought another cultural touchstone book to us: James Case, Eleanor Ferron, Joshua Birdsong, Logan Bonner, Michael Sayre, Jason Keely, Luis Loza, Landon Winkler, Ianara Natividad, Avi Kool, Ekaterina Gordeeva, Vira Linevych, Sammy Khalid, and more! Thank you!

Investing In:

I wasn’t quite sure what to name my article series when I first started but the idea of showcasing or discussing things that make me excited, that I find new and interesting, or maybe I’m otherwise passionate about seemed to fit with the idea of Investing In something like the Pathfinder 2E mechanic. To use some magic items you have to give that little bit of yourself, which helps make these things even better. I like the metaphor of the community growing and being strengthened in the same way!

I also want to hear what you’re Investing In! Leave me a comment below about what games, modules, systems, products, people, live streams, etc you enjoy! You can also hit me up on social media as silentinfinity. I want to hear what excites you and what you’re passionate about. There’s so much wonderful content, people, groups (I could go on) in this community of ours that the more we invest in and share, the better it becomes!

Sources

Banner – Character Options chapter art, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo

1. Character Options excerpt, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
2. Adaptation Is Universal, Character Options opening sidebar, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
3. Spirit Warrior, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
4. Starlit Sentinel, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo, art by Vira Linevych
5. Fan Dancer, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo, art by Vira Linevych
6. Cloud Buns, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
7. Acupuncturist, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
8. Unfurling Brocade, Wuxia, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
9. Familiar Sage, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
10. Cyclone’s Path, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo
11. Paper Familiars, Tian Xia Character Guide, Paizo