Pathfinder Lost Omens Highhelm, an upcoming setting book dedicated to everything dwarven, will include 12 playable dwarven clans, Wargamer can exclusively reveal. Senior Paizo developer Luis Loza shared details from the sourcebook in an interview on October 25.
The Pathfinder Lost Omens series is dedicated to giving details on the game’s setting. The Highhelm announcement is something of a surprise as it wasn’t included in any recent Paizo roadmaps.
Pathfinder Lost Omens: Highhelm provides a gazetteer of the titular city, which dwarves built inside a mountain after emerging from the ground beneath Golarion. New equipment, ancestry feats, and animal companions are offered alongside the 12 dwarven clan options.
“One thing that we’ve been doing with Pathfinder second edition is trying to make all of our ancestries, which is our word for races or playable species in Pathfinder, feel a bit more distinct”, Loza tells Wargamer. “To make our dwarves feel a bit more distinct, we decided to break down their culture into something unique for Pathfinder – this is where we came up with the idea for clans.”
“Your clan is very important”, Loza adds. “Every dwarf that is born is given a special little clan dagger, one with a gem that represents their clan and has a very distinct shape. It’s meant to serve them for their entire lifetime; you’re given your clan dagger at birth and you hold on to that thing forever.” “This is our first chance to really dive into dwarven culture since the launch of Pathfinder second edition”, he says. “We’ve mentioned clan daggers, but we haven’t shown who these clans are.”
According to Loza, the 12 major clans featured in Highhelm are each focused on a task, job, or hobby. “There’s a clan that’s based on keeping track of dwarven history, and there’s a clan that’s all about smithing”, he says. “One clan’s all about magic, while another focuses on general labour, doing menial tasks around Highhelm other clans won’t do because they’re proud to be the backbone of the city.”
Exclusive images shared with Wargamer also reveal the themes for other clans. We know the magic-based dwarves are part of the Runebinder clan, while the smithing clan are the Molgrade dwarves. The Stonefist clan seem to be Highhelm’s military forces. The Breakiron clan are known as ‘innovation clan dwarves’, so we can expect them to do plenty of tinkering. There’s even a clan that brews beers known as the Firecask clan.
“There’s a couple of other clans scattered throughout, but these are the 12 main ones we focus on”, Loza tells Wargamer. It’s not yet clear how a clan might shape your Pathfinder character mechanically.
What we do know Lost Omens: Highhelm includes is details on the clan’s important figures, as well as how clans are joined. “Even if you’re playing non-dwarves, you can join a clan”, Loza notes, “though it might take a little more work”.
You’ll be able to find more details on Paizo’s Pathfinder Lost Omens Highhelm product page – which is coming soon.
If you want more details on Pathfinder Lost Omens: Highhelm, Wargamer has a mountain of exclusive content to share in our Pathfinder Lost Omens: Highhelm preview. Or, if you’re after the basics of Paizo’s TTRPG, here’s our guide to Pathfinder classes.
Source: Wargamer
