Just realized I typed the 16th above, I meant the 19th. Back home now, I will be catching up on stuff today.
Probably mainly me, Dragoncat. Difficult schedules, a difficult set of encounters, and a newly non-portable laptop have really hampered my posting rate over this term. The good news is there's a light at the end of the tunnel—I have three final projects left (two art projects and a screenplay) and then I'm free once again! I'm hoping to finish this sidequest before then, so we can have a fully clean slate after Paizocon.
Speaking of which, I'm going to be gone for Paizocon from the 26th to the 30th. I may be able to post somewhat irregularly during the con, but no promises!
Wow. Full plate there.
I don't envy you--thanks for letting me know. Best of luck! :)
I'll be at Paizocon too!
I'll be in the corner quietly crying because I'm not at Paizocon.
Stop being on the other side of the globe!
Feelin' more than a bit salty right now--the Ultimate Equipment errata just came out.
My poor free thinker cap...
Uh oh.....my PFS has one. -goes to look what happened-
Edit:Once per day!? Bah.
Check out what they did to the f*$%ing Jingasa.
At this point I think Paizo should step away from their game before they screw it up any more than they already have.
I think the game will survive. It was fine before the conical Asian hate preferred by 9/10 adventurers, I'm sure it'll be fine without it again.
It was better before their Errata started essentially ripping out large swathes of pages from books I paid for. Glad I stopped doing that.
Even disregarding that it makes 1st printings worthless, the game would be of overall quality without this horrible cycle of:
1.) Rush a release so it drops in time for <Insert major event>
2.) Wait several years for everyone to get used to the book.
3.) Nerf the options people actually use, leave the worthless ones, maybe fix some actual mistakes.
4.) Repeat.
Sigh, I suppose the nerfing of my bracers was inevitable- even dedicated powergamers admit they gave way too much for the price- but, as is often the case in times like this, it's scaled back WAY too much. I could literally replace them with a CL 1 wand and get as much or more benefit from it, now.
Gods damn it, they nerfed those too!? How do they work now?
Edit: Bah! I'm with Farrukh on this one. Wtf. Thanks for making items my characters spent thousands of hard earned gold on basically useless now, Paizo.
Alright, could I get some summaries of the nerfs? We'll look at what to keep and what not to keep. I always take these erratas with a grain of salt—I've increasingly been getting the sense that Paizo's strength is more in creation than maintenance.
The most pertinent ones (at least, the ones that apply to this party) are:
--The jingasa of the fortunate soldier has had its luck bonus to AC changed to a Deflection bonus. Also, its crit negation ability only works once ever, instead of 1/day. The deflection bonus still remains once the crit negation is used up.
--The cap of the free thinker has had its Will Save rerolls limited to 1/day.
--The quick runner's shirt allows you to gain an additional move action as a swift action, but you aren't allowed to take any other actions on your turn.
These are the ones I think are the most relevant right now. Anything I missed, guys?
The big ones in my games:
Jingasa is now a deflection bonus instead of a luck bonus and the crit negation power is once ever.
Brawling armor is now a +3 armor bump instead of +1.
Mistmail is now a once per day power that lasts 3 minutes.
Focusing on the stuff that directly affects us:
Bracers of falcon's aim get changed from continuously granting aspect of the falcon on the wearer to now being able to cast it on the wearer, once per day, for one minute.
The Jingasa of the fortunate soldier has its AC bonus changed from Luck to Deflection, and its crit-negating ability is downgraded from 1/day to 1/ever. (Seriously, this is one of the worst changes in the whole book.)
The quick runner's shirt still gives you the 1/day extra move action, but now your turn ends after taking said move action. (No attacking, etc.)
The cap of the free thinker's 'roll twice on mind-affecting saving throws and take the better of the two' gets changed to 'once per day when you fail a save vs. a mind-affectng effect, you can reroll and take the better result.'
I miss anything, folks?
Heh. We were ON that nerf reporting!
The most pertinent ones (at least, the ones that apply to this party) are:
--The jingasa of the fortunate soldier has had its luck bonus to AC changed to a Deflection bonus. Also, its crit negation ability only works once ever, instead of 1/day. The deflection bonus still remains once the crit negation is used up.
The bonus type change seems reasonable to me, if a bit silly considering the flavor—I've always got the sense designers try to keep luck bonuses fairly rare on items. We can waive the changes, since in this case Tanith would have no reason to have it if it didn't offer a bonus he doesn't have yet. The crit nerf is certainly absurd. I can support the bonus change, but the crit bit seems pointlessly harsh to me.
--The cap of the free thinker has had its Will Save rerolls limited to 1/day.
I hate to say it, but this doesn't seem that unreasonable. A bit harsh, but also a fair target for change. We could certainly up it to 3/day.
--The quick runner's shirt allows you to gain an additional move action as a swift action, but you aren't allowed to take any other actions on your turn.
Yeah, the quick runner's shirt was always a bit overpowered. This just essentially means "no more half-move pounce". It's a really cheap item for what it did before. I'm unsure.
Mistmail doesn't seem like that big a deal. What was it before?
Pre-errata mistmail didn't have a time limit on its cloud power. (Though it was still a 1/day thing.)
The 3/day change sounds alright to me.
Mistmail's change seems okay to me, honestly—I could see a middle ground where you get to spend the minutes like a Rage. I don't think it was really that broken to begin with, of course. Whatever you guys prefer.
We can leave the Quick Runner's Shirt the same, too. Honestly, I think it would have been better to up the price than hit the item. It's still pretty good (it still lets you move after full attacking, and extra movement is always useful) but Farrukh's been pretty reliant on it in the past.
As an item, the QRS was never very good design, since it's basically a must-have for any martial who can't get Pounce. But far be it from me to take bad design out on martials.
What's your ruling on the bracers of falcon's aim, KC? (I've got a bit of a workaround planned, if needed, so don't be afraid to be harsh.)
I would say, like Carina's cap, make the bracers a 3/day thing. The "constant" thing was sort of wonky—just the keen equivalent alone makes it half the price it ought to be. But it being 1/day makes it a little bit absurd. It exactly matches the guidelines, but I think this is one of those cases where the guidelines didn't quite hold up, like the old use-activated true strike trope.
The thing about the item creation rules that folks always seem to forget is that you're supposed to compare your custom item to established items that are already available. If your custom item is drastically under-priced by comparison, it's probably overpowered.
I'm okay with wiping the jingasa from existence if you'd prefer KC.
The 3/day adjustment should be fine for now, KC. The minute duration still bugs a bit, since I can't set it up as a buff in advance, but we'll get through this adventure and I'll look into an alternative when we're back in Magepoint or the like. (I'm thinking of taking the Arrowsong's Lament masterpiece next level, which will ultimately allow me to cast some off-list spells, and this would be a prime candidate.)
There's no question the bracers were undercosted; an item like this that basically offers three feats in one item should cost in the high teens to mid twenties. I would have preferred to see the PTB change the price rather than do an insane hamstringing, or else do a more reasoned hamstringing. (One thing I always thought could have been done was tweak them so that they're still continuous, but you only get one benefit of the spell at a time and have to spend a standard action to alter it. Maybe limit how often per day you can do so, too, so you can't just freely switch back and forth between attack bonus, crit multiplier, and perception bonus at will.)
Hey, ha, ha, ha, Astraden. So it turns out the witchfire ability actually allows for a save, which I neglected to allow. Go ahead and just keep the spells and scrolls you expended curing people. We'll say Olidammara is a, uh, whimsical and prank-happy god!
Anyways, when you guys get back to town, we can consider a "retroactive tax" to fix the price without changing the items.
Aw, you guys posted so fast! Makes me feel bad because I'm not going to be able to post much at all for the next few days (I know, big change). I need to get lots of last-minute con game work done for Paizocon. Grimm is a nice simple system, but the story preparation is actually really tricky!
Wait, you're running a Grimm game at Paizocon? Why didn't you tell me?!
I feel like I posted something! Not addressed to you, though. Sorry, I didn't know anybody here was into Grimm. Frankly, these days, I barely know anybody anywhere's into Grimm. :(
I may run a Grimm pickup if I'm able to gore out a bit of time. We'll see how it goes.
Grimm's the one where you play as little kids, right?
Yup.
I'll be keeping one extra character sheet on hand for any extra players who stumble by, so if you or anyone else pops up at 6:00 pm this Friday, there's a single vacancy.
So, two things I've been wondering:
First, I'm more experienced with Roll20 these days. Would you guys like to move from Google Drive to there? It's free, but some have had trouble loading it.
Second, Age of Worms by its definition needs to read some pretty high levels to properly conclude. Do you guys have any ideas on how to simplify when things start to get ridiculously complicated with actions and buffs? I was thinking creating a set list of buff bonuses might be good—instead of "Haste +1 attacks and damage and an extra attack/Good Hope morale +2 on saves, attack, weapon damage, skills, ability checks/Moment of Greatness double one morale bonus before rolling", it could just be "Eben's Package". Sort of a streamlined set of buffs where we generally assume they're in place unless there's a reason for them not to be. But I'm not sure that would really make any meaningful difference.
If it gets to be unbearably tedious, I'd even be willing to switch systems or RPGs, as long as the story could reach its conclusion. Now, that's pretty drastic. But I do feel like some changes will be necessary if high-level play is as insufferable as I hear.
I use Roll20 for all the games I run, so I’d be fine with that.
I have yet to play in a high level game that wasn’t tedious as hell (especially as DM), but to be honest I don’t have time/the desire to learn a new system right now. Especially if we transition immediately into a high level version of some new rules.
Roll20 has equivalent line drawing options (tool bar on top left side), and I’m pretty sure you can reverse at least your own token’s actions with a ctrl+z.
IMO the best thing about roll20 is the dynamic lighting but you have to subscribe to get that AFAIK.
I'm fine with either Roll20 or Google Drive.
Can't say I'm inclined to learn a new system at this point...
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Eben doesn't work for the Emporium anymore, there should be no discussion about his package!
I'm unfamiliar with Roll20, but I'm confident I could pick it up, so have no issues moving over to it.
So, two things I've been wondering:
First, I'm more experienced with Roll20 these days. Would you guys like to move from Google Drive to there? It's free, but some have had trouble loading it.
Pretty sure you know my vote, since I've suggested it from the start. =)
Second, Age of Worms by its definition needs to read some pretty high levels to properly conclude. Do you guys have any ideas on how to simplify when things start to get ridiculously complicated with actions and buffs? I was thinking creating a set list of buff bonuses might be good—instead of "Haste +1 attacks and damage and an extra attack/Good Hope morale +2 on saves, attack, weapon damage, skills, ability checks/Moment of Greatness double one morale bonus before rolling", it could just be "Eben's Package". Sort of a streamlined set of buffs where we generally assume they're in place unless there's a reason for them not to be. But I'm not sure that would really make any meaningful difference.
Having a buff list put up in the Campaign Info where we can see it up top might help, and on Roll20 too.
If it gets to be unbearably tedious, I'd even be willing to switch systems or RPGs, as long as the story could reach its conclusion. Now, that's pretty drastic. But I do feel like some changes will be necessary if high-level play is as insufferable as I hear.
High level play is better in PbP at least time-wise. The main issue in real-time is taking a literal hour to complete a round because of all the fiddly bits. As long as all the fiddly bits are in a row in each post, should be fine.
Besides which, swapping systems mid-campaign is gonna be clunky at best, and would require major changes to most characters even for fairly similar systems (other d20 systems, namely).
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Roll20 has equivalent line drawing options (tool bar on top left side), and I’m pretty sure you can reverse at least your own token’s actions with a ctrl+z.
IMO the best thing about roll20 is the dynamic lighting but you have to subscribe to get that AFAIK.
What I mean about the line drawing is that you can't edit individual points like in Google Drawings. It's also more difficult to select those line drawings when you're zoomed out. Not a dealbreaker, just one of my gripes with it.
(Unfortunately ctrl-z only works for GMs!)
I'm not fond of roll20 at all but if everyone else is on board I'll tag along. Just prepared for a lot of 'I can't see the map can someone else move me' requests.
Roll20 has serious failings with regards to drawing—limited shapes, extremely limited shape editing, and a tedious system of adjusting existing drawings. That said, Drive isn't much better. Roll20 is definitely better at enabling squiggles.
The free draw and point to point drawing cover 90% of what we as players do anyway.
Colors are a pain, though. But hey, when everybody gets a default color, it's not as big a deal.
The earliest I'll be able to post again is tonight, amid working frantically on adding values to something glass for tomorrow. It's Deadline Time and Paizocon ate up a lot, so I'm going to be trying to set very specific times I can post so people know by when I need their actions.
Cyan is usually mine.
I lied! But for the PbP's benefit, for a change—I decided to skip class today. Not for you guys's benefit—this class is pretty primarily focused on the final product (the script), and I decided my time would be better spent working on that than on biking an hour uphill in 89° weather.
But it does mean I'll be more available for posting throughout the day.
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Since this thread has actually dropped off the page with my focused threads, I'm posting to bump it back up. And also to let y'all know that KC is working hard on finals and projects this week, and is probably still gonna be busy for at least another day. Then, maybe, we'll finally get to kill Cueatheomichoc.
Best of luck, KC!