[PFS] Deussu's #37 The Beggar's Pearl (Inactive)

Game Master Deussu

Hopefully, it'll be OK by tomorrow. First time it happened though.

On a separate note, I'll be heading off to the UK and Spain for a bit under 3 weeks tomorrow. I will try my hardest to post at least every 24 hours, but it may be tricky - especially on days I'm flying.

Please feel free to take over my character (whether by GM or player suggestion of his actions) at any time I'm not posting promptly enough. I think we've been playing for long enough now that you know what Lort will do.

I will just ask that if it's a choice between obviously risking death and fleeing for his life (or the equivalent) that you please send me a quick email to wilmann_at_gmailcom (you know how to fix that email address if you're a human) to ask what I'd do. I should be checking email more often than the forums. Again, though, if I'm not posting quick enough - have at it. I'm fairly easy about character death.

I'm about to go on vacation myself; to be honest I thought six weeks was plenty of time to crank through a Season 1 scenario. I can try to keep up via tablet & phone but that may be difficult given our map situation.

The fastest I've seen a PbP game run was 3 months (12 weeks). That was 0-season too. The longest I've spectated lasted almost a year (Temple of Empyreal Enlightement).

I too have my vacation starting soon, but that won't hinder my updating abilities much.

I like it how Gunari's the obligatory AA-member...

Every successful Pathfinder expedition group needs an AA-member. In addition every true pathfinder agent should sport a mental illness, minor or major. :)

Hey guys, having a great holiday. Only issue is that Orange suck big, fat, hairy, sweaty... well... anyway...

I can't get data enabled on the prepaid card I bought. Rather than bang my head against the wall of Orange Mobile customer support, or spend another £10 on a prepaid card that may or may not work, I'm restricted to hotel Internet. That also means I'm restricted to posting when I have nothing else on in the evening. Shouldn't be a big issue, but expect posts every 48-72 hours rather than my usual 24 or less (much less sometimes).

It'll all be over in a week and a half (dammit!) and I'll be back to normal after that.

Also, classic double entendre on the AA-member, intended or not. AA: Automotive Association (fixes you up). AA: Alcoholics Anonymous (fixes you up with booze).

No sweat. I bet most are having their vacations now, meaning they won't be updating as frequently. :)

Dungeon map updated.

I now realized I forgot to add a scale (ABC & 123) to the tactical map. D'OH! Oh well, I'll add it to the next tactical map.

Sorry for the delays. My vacation's starting next week so there's hope in the horizon.

Also, I rolled the initiatives once, but then tried to be clever and edited the order, which of course rerolled the initiatives. I figured I want to keep the originals, and that's why the erroneous rolls are not visible.

Also also, the tactical map is going to updated around 22:00 GMT+2 (that's 10pm GMT+2).

I'm not going to be able to post as often maybe for one week. A typhoon just hit our area and we don't have power at home. FYI

The fastest I've seen a PbP game run was 3 months (12 weeks). That was 0-season too. The longest I've spectated lasted almost a year (Temple of Empyreal Enlightement).

I too have my vacation starting soon, but that won't hinder my updating abilities much.

Twelve weeks is on the long end for me...most of my PbP PFS games finish up in 6 to 8 weeks. But a year for Temple of Empyreal Enlightenment? That's absurd!

As it is I'm most likely going to step away from this table. With updates as few and far between as they have been before people (myself included) head out on vacation there's no chance of this one finishing anytime in the near future.

Deussu wrote:

The fastest I've seen a PbP game run was 3 months (12 weeks). That was 0-season too. The longest I've spectated lasted almost a year (Temple of Empyreal Enlightement).

I too have my vacation starting soon, but that won't hinder my updating abilities much.

Twelve weeks is on the long end for me...most of my PbP PFS games finish up in 6 to 8 weeks. But a year for Temple of Empyreal Enlightenment? That's absurd!

As it is I'm most likely going to step away from this table. With updates as few and far between as they have been before people (myself included) head out on vacation there's no chance of this one finishing anytime in the near future.

Aight, with experiences of far faster PbPs I can understand that.

I can slide the notion of giving you a blank chronicle sheet and just assume your character wasn't part of this. That way you have the chance of playing this again at some other table, perhaps with more haste. :)

I'm not going to be able to post as often maybe for one week. A typhoon just hit our area and we don't have power at home. FYI

Philippines were hit hard by a typhoon just yesterday. Are you in Taiwan?

Nope, I'm in the Philippines itself.

Dude, Khalos, hope it all goes well in the end for you, your family and friends. Best of luck!

I must say I'm sorry the game pace has been a lot slower than you all anticipated. I've had some time issues at home, having to take care of the baby immediately after getting home from work due to unspecified reasons, and the few hours I have to spare I've used for other recreational activities.

Also all your update speed has stunned me. This I suspect to be a result of different gaming culture. Here in Finland we started playing PbP games about two and a half years ago, and all of them have been slow compared to the start of this game. People know PbP games will take a long time, and they don't want to rush them. I don't think you want to rush them either, but some people check the game once per day or two days.

I won't penaltize you if more of you wish to step away from the game to free your character to some other scenario.

I'm playing in another PbP with a bunch of people from the US, 3 of them friends in real life. The update speed there is slower than here. That game and this one are my entire PbP experience, but the update speed is fine by me. I'm happier with a faster pace, but I'm perfectly satisfied with taking a bit more time on the scenario also.

Just a heads up. Ropecon (largest RPG convention in Finland/Nordic countries) will start tomorrow, and I will be unable to update the game while I'm there. Be back on Monday.

Completely forgot to mention I'm away in the countryside at the moment. I left on 30th of July and I'm here till at least 6th of August. Until my vacation ends there will be fewer posts.

I attempt to get behind a screen at least once a day. Before this moment it just wasn't physically possible.

FYI - I will be leaving for Gen Con on Wednesday, Aug 13, returning home the following Monday evening. As such, my access online will be extremely limited, so if you need to "bot" Gunari, please do so rather than slowing down the game.

I'll be at GenCon also, but from Friday Aug 15 until the following Monday. Same deal. Hey, if you can't take a break from PbP for GenCon, when can you take a break? ;-)

Lort, we'll have to meet up in Indy some time. I'll be spending what little off-time I have at Scotty's, with some of the other folks from the Twin Cities.

I'm there with friends, and we've got a full schedule of gaming... but we can totally try to slot something in. I'll PM you my cell.

I expect a break during Gen Con, so no sweat. :P

Both maps updated accordingly.

Cursed be my 12 hour days (8 hours of work followed by 4 hours of babysitting thanks to wife's "chores"...) and lack of free time.

No worries. I think we're almost done anyway :)

There are a crapload of areas to scavenge, yes, but I can fastforward most of the stuff if people wish so.

My service provider has been extra s%!@ty the past few days. Expect delays.

As you might have noticed, this fight is tiresome and repetitive. I offer you to give me automated control to speed things up. I refrained from moving the elf because it would have resulted in nothing but a lot of 5ft-steps.

What say you?

Automate away! Sounds great. So long as one of those automations is for Lort to ask for some healing. :-)

Also please note that Lort is no longer using power attack (so +9 total from +6 attack bonus, +1 bless, +2 flank). Damage in this mode is 2d6+6.

I'm so glad we're done with that fight. Without a power attacking heavy hitter that fight has dragged on for minutes (game time!).

Funny story: a group didn't have a heavy hitter, and were struggling to damage it. Once they finally got her below 0 hp, they kept hitting her while trying various damaging methods. Their only source of silver was... wait for it... the silver trade bars found at the beginning of the gallery.

LOL
How did they use it? Shove it down her throat?

So, now that she is defeated, what was she?

An elf with an odd template. And cleric levels, hence the channeling. I remember rolling knowledge (local) for Gunari, who failed at it.

An upcoming local event will delay responses. Except an update Sunday evening... GMT+2, of course.

I hit 'automate' switch on and carried on all the investigative stuff to the best of my ability to portray the characters as they have been, well, portrayed. Lort, being the loudest, stole the spotlight. Sorry.

Deussu, is there anything left?

If not, could we just get the closing summation, and our chrons?

Thanks!

It was merely to check that you have every prisoner healed and such.

I'm going to devise your chronicles tomorrow (expect them in within, uh 12 hours?)

Thanks for the game, Deussu! It was fun, even if a little slow at times.

Thanks also to Gunari, Khalos, Edgar and Ozren. It was great playing with you guys and I hope to see you around on PbP again soon.

Yes, thanks to all that were involved. I had a good time, and was really able to find the voice of Gunari through this scenario. Evidently, he's a bit of a lush (go figure), and definitely a "positive" influence on some adventurers.

Looking forward to the chronicles.

In case it is needed:
74294-9 Gunari Maximoff (Sczarni at the time we started)
Starting Fame: 6, Starting PP 4
Starting xp: 4
Jack Brown

Day Job (none)

Yeah I'll take the blame for the seldom slowness.

I also felt that this forum is not a suitable platform to run games, at least not for me. I'm used to a wiki site which is a lot more customisable, and gives me an easy way to correct past mistakes or give more details to a description.

Thanks goes to the players for keeping each other company, and not just wait for the GM to run his next cue card.

The scenario might be more atmospheric if the fights wouldn't be so dull. I've said this times before, but this scenarios subtier 3-4 could easily be beaten with a 1-2 crowd.

Lort has no day job. Scenario #3, Player Name: Damien Wilmann, character 135100-2. My other scenarios are pre-gen credit so don't worry about filling in any of the "initial" stuff unless you really want to: 4 PP, 4 Fame, 2 XP.

I'm very lazy when it comes to auditing characters. I strongly rely to the honor system, as it is so easy to cheat I just simply trust players to have some sort of sense of justice.

Also, I have an uncanny feeling this PbP went somewhat sub-par. I welcome constructive criticism (in addition to the notion the game pace was slower than most expected; to me this was average), although it is unlikely I'll run another PbP on Paizo's messageboards another time. That means that I stick to PbP on wikisites using my native language.

Language, that's one issue. At times I was very unsure about my grammar and had to check words constantly. There are a few things I'd like to hear about:

a) Did I provide enough details describing the areas? How could have I done better?
b) The combats in the scenario are, unfortunately, very weak. Even the boss, the elf with an odd template, was merely very tough but had absolutely no way of dealing damage to you, other than those 4/day channels.
c) Did you feel I could have used Torvic a lot more? I left him out of combats on purpose, as it would have been too much of a burden for me to run as well.

Hey there, happy to take the survey. ;-)

a) Mostly, yes, you provided enough detail when describing areas. There were some occasions where I was confused as to what was going on. Mostly, though, this was filled in on the next post. I think if we're going into a room that has a description provided by the scenario, it would be good to get the pro-forma description from the scenario as well as a tactical layout description from you upon first entering the room (all in one post). That will allow maximum "moving on" potential for our posts.

b) The combats were weak, but it is fairly typical of a low level PFS scenario. They don't want to kill the characters too early in their careers. I have found scenarios to be generally quite a bit easier to "beat" than modules and adventure paths. However, I have heard hushed whispers about bone keep... but I think I'll keep my characters alive, thank you.

c) Torvic, I feel, could have been more informative. I understand, however, that you are restricted somewhat in how much you're allowed to reveal by the scenario - and also want us to experience everything anew. I don't think he needed to be involved in combat at all, though.

Great scenario, thanks for running Dessu. Fun game everyone, great job by all.

As for the survey:

a)I think descriptions were mostly fine. One thing that would aid you immensely is a better mapping solution. I highly suggest using google draw. It allows you to post maps and use moveable tokens and would aid you greatly in setting the scene.

b) Don't worry about the combat, frankly. Its been my (somewhat limited) experience that folks that play PbP are just as happy RPing their characters then itching for tons of combat. In my opinion, the combat in the scenario was fun and run well.

c)I find that running NPCs can be a mixed bag. I feel they should be left out of combat whenever possible, especially in larger groups but try to get them to interact with the party as much as possible. One way to do that is to treat the npc like a character you are running and try to have him mor her say or do something to spur action or RP every time you post. Even if it is something small or insignificant, just having the npc do something makes him feel more alive and invovled.

I had a great time with the scenario, thanks again for running it.

When describing areas I probably should have followed the rule of three senses (describing the location based on three senses chosen from sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch).

E.g. "The room was dark, shadows moving constantly in the corner of your eyes. A repetative dripping of water echoed through the massive halls underground. A constant chilling breeze brushes the bruised faces of courageous adventurers."

I have to say the scenario had absolutely nothing to guide a GM about what Torvic could and couldn't do. I'm not sure if he knew who the elf really was, the terrors of extremely limited word count.

a) The places were described thoroughly enough for me. Going much more into detail would be demanding more from the GM than I'm comfortable with, especially since my imagination fills in the others easily.
b) Combat is very caster friendly for this one. I barely had to worry about running to cover so a modified challenge could help.
c) Torvic out of combat is fine, especially since there's a summoner in a party that could fill his blank. Good job roleplaying him though.

It has been fun playing with you guys!

I'm rolling day job for Khalos, he's doing sculptures. No one else appeared to have a day job.

Khalos day job: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (12) + 7 = 19

Khalos creates a relatively nice sculpture of a spelunking dwarf, which is bought off by a haggling dwarf. Thus the profit isn't as exuberant as Khalos might have wished.