[ACG] [OutPost I] Cartmanbeck's Season of the Runelords Adventure 1: Dark Waters Rising (Inactive)

Game Master cartmanbeck

This thread is for out-of-character discussions such as strategy or about food or anything else. :)

Mmmm...food!

Happy to play a character from any of the decks that I have (about half a dozen atm). Will see if anyone else has stronger preferences before narrowing it down a bit more.

Hello! I'm jumping into this game if I may. I'm still relatively new to PACG in general, and haven't done it in OP or PBP format yet at all, but I've read the rules and a few of the previous games on these forums so I think I get the general idea.

For class decks, I have druid, magus, and hunter, as well as the S&S characters for the first two. I'm happy to play any of them, so let me know if you have any recommendations for a newbie that would help me narrow it down.

As for food, I ate a blackberry scone for breakfast this morning and it was delicious! nom nom

Yay newbie!!

Have you looked yet at the Deck Handler sheet that I made to see if it might be useful to you? I also wrote up some instructions for using it.

As far as newbie-friendliness, I would not go with the Magus deck, as the characters are a bit complex and there are several weirdo spells in the deck as well. I would say the Druid is super safe and fun and awesome, and the Hunter has the additional cohort mechanic but otherwise those characters are straightforward. If you DO go with the Hunter deck, I would recommend not Adowyn, only because she and Leryn are pretty strongly focused on examining cards, and if you're not familiar with Mummy's Mask yet, you can run into cards with the TRIGGER trait which do bad, bad things to you if you examine them.

I made a copy of the deck handler and poked around a bit. It definitely looks useful, since I tend to log in from multiple different locations. I'll send along my deck ownership picture too, probably this weekend.

I've played as Lini in S&S, so I have a bit of experience with druid-ishness. Gronk and Maznar also look like fun, but I guess it would depend on what characters the other players go with. And yeah, I haven't played Mummy's Mask but I've read its rules, and the trigger mechanism sounds quite alarming. o.o

I'm new to PACG and I'm in one other PACG going off during Outpost. I only have the Druid deck, and I cobbled together a Maznar after building a Gronk for the other table.

For food today I made the mistake of having Li'l Squeezers for lunch then had Italian beef sandwiches for dinner, and a paczki with white fluff insides for desert, washed down with chocolate milk. I am currently sipping on a glass of water to settle things before bed.

LOL you guys are awesome. I'm really looking forward to playing with you all!

Aha, druids are popular I see! I know it's possible to have two druids play together, but it seems more interesting to have variety, so I guess I'll go for one of the hunters instead. Either Korundo or Ukuja, so I have a melee and a ranged option. I'd like to try them both eventually.

Hey just dropping by to check in. Excited to actually put these decks to use since I don't have any local players. Bringing Oloch if that is okay.

Sent the verification photo for all of my guys to ya just now.

Excellent, great to have you! Don't forget to post something in the Gameplay thread to get the campaign listed on your My Campaigns tab. You can delete it after if you'd like.

Given all the Divine characters, I would recommend that Greenclaw grab an Arcane of some sort. :)

Sounds good. I was leaning towards taking someone from the recent Occult adventurers deck anyway. I'll pick someone from either the 1st or 2nd deck (if it arrives in the mail before the GameDay).

Thinking I'll most likely will go with Rivani, unless I have a late change of heart.

Rivani looks super cool as an Arcane/Int character. Should be fun. I eventually want to play the arcanist but the decks I don't have are the Ultimates.

Oh and Nyctessa was Hell's Vengeance 2, Cartmanbeck.

Rivani is super fun. I'll make a suggestion that you not even worry about the weapon that goes in her deck, as she's much better at combat using spells, and you don't have to recharge a card every time you want to use a spell that has Arcane. :-D

Yep, I'm looking forward to trying her out. She does look pretty cool. Can't believe it is still almost three weeks until we kick off. The suspense!!!

Yeah I'm getting a bit antsy about getting started, myself. LOL.

About a week before the beginning, I'll post the starting locations and ask you all for your locations and initiative rolls. I normally assume that people are okay with random turn order, but if you all would prefer to choose the turn order, that's also perfectly fine.

Note that I'll be on a work trip to Las Vegas from March 5-9, so I'll be updating a little less frequently during that first week than I will normally be doing so during the rest of the convention. I will update at least once a day during that time regardless.

I'm completely lost. I need to do a walk-through or two because the deck didn't have any instructions I could see in it and my brain is parsing the rules as boilerplate.

Haha no problem at all.

So, for your initial deck, you're going to look at the back of the character card at the card list, and that will tell you how many of each card type should be in your deck (which will add up to 15). Then, you get to choose cards to add to your deck according to the card heirerchy in the guild guide. For a brand-new character, that means you're going to be looking for cards with the "B" deck number at the top right corner, and the "Basic" trait on the left side of the card's art field.

Once you've chosen your Basic cards, you can put those card names into the deck handler on the "DON'T LOOK" sheet, and from there follow the other instructions I linked on the Campaign tab.

Oh and if you're not familiar with the Card Guild Guide, There it is.

Okay, so if I have a Gronk built for someone else's table, I'm going to have to use some 1's for Maznar... or do I need to go pull them out of the Gronk deck?

Or is it only allowed to play one deck at a time?

You still have to follow the same rules for the second character, ie. basic B cards first, then non-basic B's etc. So, yes you'll most likely need to pull some cards out of the Gronk deck as it is unlikely you'll be able to build both characters from the same deck without sharing some cards between both.

You can't just use what's left over from the first one, though as that would be breaking the deck construction rules.

I assume it is legal to play two characters simultaneously like that from the class deck. I can't see anything specific against it, but you'll just have to keep accurate records of which cards are used in each deck.

Cartmanbeck will no doubt clarify if I've left something out or misunderstood it.

I'm actually thinking to bring Adowyn now, since this season seems like a good one to use her for.

I haven't looked into the occult decks much yet, but Rivani seems interesting. :)

Quick question: are we supposed to look at the villain/henchman before starting, or not?

@Wei Ji: You can essentially treat the games as if you had two separate Druid decks. It would be no different than someone registering two characters from the deck, and between each session, writing down the contents of their deck, then splitting and rebuilding for different gaming groups. Totally legit. You would NOT be able to say "okay, I'm using this card for Gronk, so I don't have to use it to build Maznar." That would be against the rules.

@Elinnea: It's fine to look at the villain/henchmen before starting if you like. There are a handful of scenarios/adventures that I know of that specifically bar you from doing so, but most of the time it's assumed that you can see those cards before they're shuffled in for the sake of strategy.

Looks like I have everyone checked in here on this thread, so if you could all post your beginning character deck if you haven't done so, I'll be posting the possible starting locations very soon.

I'd also like to know what timezones everyone is in, because planning turn order by timezone can be helpful to moving things along at a reasonable pace.

Do we post here or in the gameplay thread? And do we draw a hand?

My timezone is Central and I typically post after work between 2-10PM. I can usually post from phone at work during busy segments but that might be difficult in ACG.

Here it is just in case.

I'm in the US Central time zone, and I am usually able to post in the mornings (8-11) and evenings (5-11pm). That's my pattern for RPG play by post though - I'll have to see how the rhythm goes for PACG.

And my deck handler is here

Don't worry about drawing a hand yet, I just wanted to look at the decks. I'm going to post the locations now, and you can go over to gameplay to roll 1d1000 on initiative. The highest roll will go first, and then we'll pick the rest of the order to maximize turns per day.

I'm in Central Standard Time but work in retail and can only post from home at random times, but I try to post two to three times per day if the action moves fast enough for it.

I'm from Sydney, Australia, so converting that to US EST, I am active from around 4pm onwards and all through your night, but as you guys are likely getting up in the morning it is approaching midnight and bedtime in my neck of the woods. Changes a little when daylight savings ends over here and starts in the US, though.

Okay, looks like everyone has checked in in this thread, which is great! I'm going to go ahead and post the locations in the Gameplay thread, so you all can draw you starting hands (in that thread), and I'm going to propose that Greenclaw be last in turn order just to encourage the maximum number of posts per day. For the other three of you, I'll use your 1d1000 rolls you already posted.

However, if you all have a different turn order in mind, it's totally up to you, so feel free to ignore my suggestion on that one! :)

Please also indicate your starting location.

Adowyn's best to not go first so I can get Leryn out before my turn, but I rolled low so that works out anyway. Is there a preferred opening formation? Group up 2-by-2 until we get two locations closed? Everybody spread out?

I'm normally a big fan, strategy-wise, of spreading out unless you're a support character like Lem or something. Also reduces the likelihood that you'll deal damage to your fellow adventurers from traps and such. :)

I'm totally lost.

My brain is failing to wrap around the concepts here, and I am getting a little bit frustrated.

Should I opt out and make it easier on the team?

I made an alias, but not sure it will help?

I am sure we can help you through it. I will be learning the specifics of it myself.

I made an alias so I can have all my posts in one place for future games.

The most important part is making a deck handler for your character. If you haven't done that we can help you get one up and running before the start date.

Link got garbled but posted below

There is the helpful document I have been using to guide me that Cartmanbeck provided.

Fixed the link for you

Don't stress, Wei Ji! Everything's cool.

So once you make yourself a copy of that deck handler, share it to me by PMing me the sharing link, and I can help you get it set up.

As far as things that are happening right now, all you'll need to do is look at the locations that I posted on the Gameplay thread to try to determine where your character might want to start the game. Usually you'll want to pick a location that your character has a decent chance of fulfilling the "When Closing" condition, so for Maznar that could be, say, the Woods or the Treacherous Cave, since both have Wisdom as an option.

Feel free to PM or email me with any specific questions, and if you'd like to chat I'm happy to do so on hangouts or something like that.

Hawkmoon made a FANTASTIC post explaining how turns work, so I thought I'd just LINK THAT HERE for the newbies in the group.

Reminder that we'll get started on Monday, so please let me know if you're having any issues at all!

Yes, we still want you Wei Ji! Personally I don't mind if we go a bit slowly while we're all figuring out how to work together.

I was going to suggest that Adowyn can start in the Woods and Maznar begin at the Treacherous Cove, since he has a better Wisdom. But would it be a bad idea to potentially get him trapped there from the Fortitude check?

Also a random question, but is there a reason the skills & powers are outside the quote formatting in the spreadsheet? I moved it inside on my post since it felt more natural to have it all together.

No specific reason, feel free to adjust the formatting to your liking in the deck manager sheet. :)

Alrighty, we're two days away! Looks like we've got everyone here, which is great. Has everyone gotten their deck all set up at this point? I'm happy to help you out if needed!

The game will start on Sunday night, since I'll be traveling Monday morning to Las Vegas for a work trip. I will be posting a bit less often than normal for that first week, but will post AT LEAST once per day.

Okay, got my Deck Handler in here, but haven't figured out how to draw cards from it.

Hi Wei Ji:
To draw cards, scroll over to the right side of the sheet and type a "1" or "TRUE" into the yellow box next to the Draw section. It will then generate a random card that is not used in the box below. You can then type the name of that card into the "Hand" section on the left, and it will generate another random card under "Draw".

Once you've drawn enough cards, scroll down below the draw section to where there is a while bunch of generated text. This is the section that you can copy and paste into the forums to do a hand update. You will want to replace the skills and powers that are listed there will Maznar's skills and powers instead, and then those will be under a spoiler when you copy that whole section and paste it in.

If you find you need help figuring out what goes where, please let me know and I'll do some editing in the sheet for you. I tried to make it as intuitive as possible, but I'm fully open to suggestions on ways to make it easier to understand. :)

I think I broke it. It's giving me garbage information and trying to give me cards I've already drawn but I don't have any duplicates.

I fixed it for you, Wei Ji. You had an extra bit of whitespace in your yellow box after the word True. I think you also need "TRUE" to be all-caps for it to work, so I recommend you just use the number 1 instead.

I'm going to fill out your powers and skills for you down in the bottom section as well.

Thank you very much for the patience and consideration. This is a far cry from sitting down with a handful of dice and a piece of paper and 'Go'.

What does it take to close a location?

What does it take to close a location permanently?

I didn't see any instructions in my deck or in the Guide about this, and I'm trying to figure it out, as I don't have a Box handy to refer to?

So basically, if you defeat a card that says "you may attempt to close the location this henchman came from" you can then fulfill whatever requirements are listed under "when closing" on that location card, and if you can do it, you close the location. You also get the chance to temporarily close the location, also by fulfilling that condition, if someone else encounters the villain at another location.

When a location permanently closes, all the cards are banished from that location except for any Villains that might still be in the location pile.

Does that help?

You can download a PDF copy of the rulebook here. That makes it easy to find things quickly, since it is searchable. The most recent rulebook (the one at the bottom of the list) is the most up to date.

For your reading pleasure:

Closing a Location

You may earn the opportunity to close a location in a number of ways. Usually you get to attempt to close a location after defeating a henchman from that location deck (the henchman card will indicate if this is the case) or after that location deck runs out of cards (see Your Turn on page 7). You can never attempt to close a location that is temporarily or permanently closed, or that your character isn’t at.

When you have the opportunity and want to close a location, do whatever the location’s When Closing section says. Locations often require specific checks to close them; otherwise, they list specific tasks you must perform. (If a location says you may close it automatically, you don’t need to do anything else.) If the When Closing text offers multiple options separated by “or,” you must choose an option before you use any powers, play any cards, or roll any dice. If you succeed at meeting the When Closing requirement, search the location deck for villains. If you find any, banish all non-villain cards from the location deck. The location is not closed but at least you know where the villains are! If you would banish any cohorts this way, you may encounter them instead.

If you didn’t find any villains, perform the When Permanently Closed effect: First, apply any effects that say “before closing.” Then banish all of the cards from the location deck; it is now closed. Finally, apply any effects that say “on closing” and flip the location card over. The location stays closed for the rest of the scenario, so villains may not escape to that location (see Encountering a Villain on page 16). Characters may move to closed locations, and if there are cards there, they may explore and encounter those cards as normal. (Most closed locations don’t have cards to explore, but some effects can put cards there.)

Conveniently enough, I just closed one so you can see how it worked. I defeated the henchman in the location, and his card said that I could immediately attempt to close the location. So I made the closing check listed for the location (Wisdom or Survival 6) and since I succeeded, it was closed permanently. If I had failed the check, we would have to go through all the cards until the location deck is completely empty before I could try to close it again.