Hail, fellow Pathfinders!
One of our favourite parts of developing the game is translating Pathfinder 2E’s rich lore and crunchy mechanics from “Tabletop format” to “Action RPG viable”.
We want to take you along this journey to show just how we’re staying true to the beloved source material. Today, we’re starting with the strange and mysterious inhabitants of the Darklands: the Caligni.
- Wyatt, Creative Director at BKOM
Immersion and Understanding
We began by digging into the Caligni's tragic history. Once people of the mighty Azlanti empire who reigned over Golarion, they fled underground millennia ago to survive the cataclysmic Earthfall.
In desperation, they made a pact with malevolent demigods known as the Forsaken, who transformed them into resilient and merciless subterranean dwellers capable of surviving the Darklands.
As part of the deal, when a Caligni dies, they combust in a burst of light and flame, with their soul energy feeding the Forsaken… a cruel irony, as the Forsaken vanished long ago and no longer watch over them, meaning their souls feed no-one!
Caligni combatants are split into distinct societal and battlefield roles, such as Stalkers, Callers, and Vanguards, and many other roles.
The last piece of the Caligni puzzle is the Owbs, strange ancient beings from the Shadow Plane who the Caligni have come to worship and obey. These powerful creatures guide and manipulate the Caligni to their bidding. Whether the Owbs are manifestations of the ancient Forsaken, or simply imposters, is shrouded in mystery.
Building out Battlefield Roles
Once we had a handle on who they were, we started dreaming up how different Caligni types would play out on the battlefield. We didn’t want Caligni to fight like normal foes - we wanted a cohesive but unusual fighting force that will challenge players in new ways.
Caligni Skulkers: We envision Skulkers as meat-and-potatoes minions of the Caligni. They fight like rogues, zipping in and out of combat and whittling away at the heroes. The heroes will need agility, precision, and teamwork to corner the Skulkers and take them out efficiently.
Caligni Vanguard: We designed the Vanguard to be slow, powerful juggernauts who shake the battlefield with their heavy great sword strikes. Their presence forces heroes to manoeuvre around the battlefield to avoid devastating blows.
Caligni Callers: These are the “support types” of the Caligni forces: deadly glass-cannon priests who cripple the heroes with dark magics borrowed from their Owb masters, while empowering their Caligni allies to greater heights of ferocity.
Owbs: We envision Owbs as powerful elite ranged enemies who use their shadowy “Curse of Darkness” to obliterate heroes from afar. Owbs will reposition when approached, hiding behind Caligni servants. When an Owb is on the battlefield, the heroes must pay attention to its attacks, or be wiped out by its shadow magic instantly.
These designs are certain to evolve as we move forward with implementation and testing, so we look forward to letting you see the final implementation once we’ve tested everything out on the battlefield!
An Explosive Finale
One of the most defining aspects of the Caligni is how they die. Thanks to a nasty pact made ages ago, when a Caligni falls, they explode in a burst of flame and light. This was fun to translate over into gameplay: When a Caligni is defeated, a small AoE preview is displayed which heroes must escape (usually with a dodge) to avoid suffering a burst of damage and crowd control.
But after playtesting, we soon realized that we had totally overdone it with our death blasts! They were constantly stunning, killing, debuffing, and displacing the heroes: there were too many Caligni and, in the cramped corridors of the Darklands, not enough space to escape easily. It felt that we ended up spending more time avoiding death blasts than fighting the Caligni!
However, this element of the Caligni is too important to their identity to simply abandon! Instead, we carefully dialled down the severity of the various death blasts until they provided the right balance of punishment and player agency. Now, taking out a Caligni still means being ready to roll out, but hopefully won’t lead to being pinballed around into five different explosions while your HP bar empties out.
Ultimately, we want the “combined arms” dynamic and unusual mechanics of the Caligni forces to offer a new and unique challenge for heroes arriving in the Darklands. Their unusual fighting style should push Pathfinders to try new strategies and master the Caligni’s strengths and weaknesses.
We’ll value your insights and feedback for getting the design of the Caligni right, so I look forward to reading all your thoughts and suggestions.
Art Vision and Pipeline
Now let’s look at how designs like these are re-created visually in-game. Art Director, Jonathan Dufresne described the process:
Getting the visual design right always starts by looking at the source material. We take great inspiration from the books themselves and other art pieces from Paizo.
At our current stage of production, our pipeline is well defined. It starts with reference gathering then moves to a front-and-back-view sketch. We try to keep all the key elements of the original design but adapt them to our vision.
Normally only one or two sketches are needed since the artwork provided by Paizo already provides so much to work with.
Then it’s review time. We check the proportions and ensure they’re exaggerated enough to read well from a top-down perspective. Each enemy and character must feel unique in their silhouette so we can recognize them quickly. We also minimise the number of small details in the design so the visual stays easy to read. Consulting the game design team to check the enemy visually matches in-game behaviour is also crucial.
When we’re ready, we move to the 3D blocking. At this stage the main goal is to validate the proportions directly in-game with proper camera angles. We make sure it reads well in the context of our game first before moving to polish. At this stage we can even start animation using the 3D blocking, before we even get the final models.
The last step is the detailed, textured enemy. At this point, we don’t really have any big surprises — there might be some small feedback regarding materials, but most of it has already been approved in previous steps.
Caligni Skulker Design
Now we can use the Caligni Skulker as an example of our pipeline, going from concept all the way to final. You can also see the references used on the concept art. We tried to match the original intent quite closely, mostly playing with proportions to better match our other enemies and overall art direction.
We obviously kept the tattered dark cloth and all the bandage wrapping since it’s core to the Caligni’s image, making them unique.
Weapons are often deliberately oversized as well. Even though the original design has a dagger, we made the 3D model much bigger so it’s easy to see in-game. From a top-down perspective, it reads much smaller, making this change necessary for gameplay.
As for animation and VFX, we tried to make him look quick and nimble with effects that support gameplay, like the smoke grenade. It’s at this stage that all the pieces come together and bring the character to life.
Wrapping Up
Thanks for taking the time to check out our break down of the Caligni! For more sneak-peaks throughout development, follow us on social media and join the official Discord server.
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~ The Pathfinder: Abomination Vaults Team