If Brumir tries to get up in the first watch stand, maybe Guillame should sneak up with him and try and give covering fire from the ground? That way, if the lookout's buddies try running over to climb up after Brumir, there is someone to shoot at them.
I'm thinking we could stick with the plan we talked about. Colin can be speaking to them in plain sight while the two groups sneak around to get into a position to attack the platforms.
I updated the map with three lines. A big fat blue line to represent Colin's approach and fainter red and green lines for the two sneaky groups.
That sounds good with Brumir and Colin on one side and Crytalis and Muadhnait on the other. You'll notice that would put Crytalis and Muadhnait on the camp-side, where there it is likely that the other (at least) two bandits would be, though.
Once we're all divided up, those of you on the flanks (everyone but Colin) can give me a stealth check. Unless anyone wants to change the plan, you'll all just approach from the flanks on foot, while Colin walks down the path on his Horse and draws their attention.
If the enemies perception checks beat your stealth checks, you'll be spotted. It's likely they will attack if they see that there are potential enemies in the forest. Bandit types like these tend to get jumpy when their armed folks sneaking up to their camp. Just so you are aware.
Mike, what was it you wanted to do before anyone tried to sneak up. Brumir is going to move in, but I can have the bandit respond first, if that's what you're waiting for.
Check out this flow chart. Maybe it will help make some more sense of combat, which is a bit complicated:
Combat Flow Chart
Here's some general combat advice from me:
1. There is no right answer. There's always a kind of pressure, I think, for newer players to want to pick the "right thing" like if a fight in D&D/Pathfinder is one of those old puzzle-solving games like King's Quest. Use the wand on the 3-headed dog, get the sword, use the sword on the dragon, etc. But D&D/Pathfinder battles are generally not solved like that, because so much depends on the random elements of rolls -- the best plan in the world goes awry based on a single 20-sided die. Instead they are more like.. a pile of paperwork. You work through it a bit at a time and it's almost always over quicker than you think it will go. In my kids D&D game the party had a 5-on-1 against a monster. When it was the cleric's turn, he wanted to "do something" even though he wasn't close enough to attack, because, that's why you play right? You don't want to "waste your turn!" So he cast his True Strike spell on himself which means that in the next round he gets to attack with an additional +20! So, what happened? Before it got to his turn, the raging barbarian with 3 attacks in the round (each of which did more than twice what the cleric could do with his attack) had killed the thing. And that spell, which he only had a couple spells per the whole day, was wasted in the first encounter.
That leads to two other points:
2. You don't have to act just because it is your turn. "Wasting a turn" means, in reality, often just waiting 6 seconds for a better opportunity. You can even just say you'll delay your action until later in the round when someone comes close enough to hit or something like that.
3. Guard your limited resources well.
Spellcasters seem to always, ALWAYS, use up their spells as fast as they possibly can. Like, they'll cast all their spells against a room of goblins whom they could just as easily swat with a quarterstaff, and then they won't have their good spell against the tougher bosses where spellcasters are more needed. That being said, it may be in wilderness encounters like we're having, we may not be piling up 3-4 encounters per day so this may not be as big of an issue. But still, blowing spells meaninglessly, especially if they might be useful later, is foolish but all too commonly done.
As far as the not wanting to waste a turn, even experienced players do this. The first time I ever played with Wren and his friends, one prominent player's turn came up at the end of the fight. There was one wounded enemy left and he was surrounded by other characters. Not wanting to do the boring thing, this player risked an opportunity attack by the enemy so that he could hit it one last time. Well he got hit and he got dropped and was bleeding to death. Then the other characters killed the enemy easily before it got its regular turn. Just because of this pressure to "do something". That's one of my other rules...
4. If possible, never give the enemies extra opportunities. Opportunity attacks are provoked most often by moving past armed foes to get to a different position. It gives that foe a chance at an extra attack, which basically amounts to doubling their forces. Don't do it unless there is a good reason. The corollary rule is 4A. If you can take away opportunities from enemies, even for just one round, that is great. Your enemies in a fight will exist in your character's life for usually at most 30 seconds or less. The most powerful ones will get 4 or 5 actions against you. Taking even just one away is huge.
5. Sometimes playing a role is boring. The game is designed so that fighter-types deal and receive the most straightforward damage. Let them. The game is designed so that wizard-types hang back and buff allies, annoy foes, or do big powerful things a couple times a day, like winning an entire fight on their own with a fireball. Let them. The game is designed so that rogue-types work best with a little bit of separation and doing isolated strategic strikes and also do well with a lot of the in-between encounters times like searching, scouting, opening. Let them. The game is designed so that cleric-types work best before and after fights, buffing people and healing people, or doing social interactions with strangers. Let them.
Everyone is the hero of their own story in this game so you want to be there to take part in everything. It's boring not to! But sometimes you just have to be bored and let other people have the spotlight, especially when it strategically makes sense. In the kids D&D game the rogue got annoyed that he didn't get to attack in the first fight so he insisted on going first and got cut the heck up by the next encounter. Then he was mad about that. But him being bored as a player meant that the monk spent time not punching the heck out of a monster but trying to stop the rogue's bleeding and the cleric had to use up two spells healing the rogue, spells that they will probably need later. But anyway...
6. Be in character. This supercedes all my other advice. We're not playing a board game, even though it is kind of a board game.
Wren, what's Kressel's condition? She's still just noted as "dazed"... I'm assuming unconscious, dying?
Guys, Colin's going to want to stabilize the fallen. Two of them are already stabilized on their own so we'd already have a dilemma. Might as well take it all the way.
I guess what we'd have to do is truss them all up and force march them back with us to the Trading Post. We were going to go back there anyway (after searching for radishes, maybe).
Cutting people up in the heat of battle is one thing but Colin won't execute them in cold blood, even if that is the letter of the charter.
Yes. I updated it on the battlemap, but Kressel is unconscious and dying.
Once you get them stabilized, they'll only regain consciousness after making another DC 10 Con check, which they can make each hour until they succeed. Then they are disabled and still at negative hit points, so they can each make only movement actions, or standard at the risk of losing more hit points and falling unconscious again.
I can't find a precise ruling on overland travel while disabled, so I'm going to rule that you can move at normal speed to take them back to Oleg's.
The rules lawyer in me is often silent (also distracted, and not very good at his job), but in this case...
I think disabled folk only get one move action per turn without risk of further injury. So if we herd the captives back to Oleg's, I reckon it should take at least twice as long.
The text for disabled also says they move at half speed. If that's right, and they only get one move action, then it might even take four times as long.
I guess it would be different if we loaded them onto horses. But Guillame for one would be against this...
I think it will be slow whatever we do. Theoretically, we could waste healing on them enough that they could walk. Muadhnait can do a few heal spells a day.
Or, we just heal three of them to non-disabled and make them carry the disabled ones.
Or we could make a travois and just heal two of them to non-disabled and make them drag the others.
Bigger question. Are we all ok with not cutting their throats and taking them to the Trading Post? I know we could hash this out in character.
I'm fine with whatever. Cry will only slit their throats if she can find a way to hide the act from Colin. She would though! ;)
Listening to a Kingmaker podcast (I'll not listen to spoilers)... two conclusions have come to mind... One, people play very different than I do -- their paladin just coup de gras'd all the fallen bandits at Oleg's -- and Two, I am glad to play with you guys and not "regular" roleplayers. There's no personality in this game at all.
Yeah I read the disabled status description as the half speed being because of the single move action restriction. But your ruling is definitely right.
But doesn't normal traveling speed imply you aren't jogging a double movement every round? Wouldn't that be more like a hustle?
Either way: Let's say that having a disabled bandit walk back would have you overland travel at half speed. Do you think making a travois and having the bandits pull it would be faster than half speed?
It's funny how down people get on paladins for their moral code and how that makes them not fun to play, and then it never seems to be a thing that people talk about in game (on podcasts and stuff). It seems to be either dick-ishly held over the paladin's head, or just not considered at all. I think coup de gras-ing a bunch of regular humanoids is not very "good" even if they are bandits. Maybe if they were demons or devils or some other inherently evil subtype.
You can also spend the rest of the day exploring that hex to see if there is anything else there. Or look for the rest of the bandits, apparently nine in number.
Also: I removed the links for the Obsidian Portal. As much as I like trying to use it, it hasn't really been doing much for us. And it wouldn't let me put up anymore maps since I cancelled my Ascendant subscription. I'll just be using all Google Drive images instead.
If you want to flesh out the profile for your character, do it on the forums. I put a link for the exploration map below my name. If you guys get maps in game (Oleg's, treasure maps, etc), I'll provide links for them.
I think the Obsidian Portal is going to be a lot more useful once we start collecting NPCs that we've met. We don't have to use it for maps. We can also use it as a wiki for keeping track of clues towards solving problems... I don't know? I was going to make use of it too with journal entries. It's just that the speed of the game means we haven't had too much interaction.
That's true. I'll put the link to it in the campaign description and try to find a way to fit it into the description under my name. I'll just leave up Oleg's map on there for now, since I put stuff on that one.
I made all the updates on the inventory tracking sheet, distributing and splitting up taken gear. I spread the gold from the bandits and Kressel to the party members (25gp each, including Brumir who is not on the sheet). I kept the other money and trade goods separate, thinking that maybe that was Oleg's and we should return it. Then we'd sell him the extra weapons and such and just get it back, haha. It would be great if Cry would try to identify that potion. (Detect Magic plus Spellcraft roll.)
Before we waste any healing on bandits, let's see if one wakes up on his or her own while we're retrieving horses, binding them, searching the camp, distributing gear, looking for tracks of any other bandits, etc.
Can Muadhnait's Brain Drain power be used in more of a roleplaying-y way where it might be used in interrogation rather than just, say, being able to use Kressel's superior Knowledge: Nature or what have you to learn that we found beaver tracks? So it isn't just a good power against scholars? I'm wondering if it could be ruled that knowing there are five bandits in a cave a half mile away could be construed as a Knowledge: Local?
Yeah, Brain Drain can be used like that. It will also give a knowledge check. I'll reveal which knowledge skills Kressel has and can be used by Muadhnait if/when she uses it.
I reckon the same plan probably makes sense: go get the stuff from the mites, maybe get help from the Sootscales, then go bandit hunting again.
*OR* we could regroup at the trading post to let them know what's going on, and see if any more allies from Restov have arrived... (I guess that depends if Zoe is ready to go and thinks that's an easy quick to introduce her character to the group).
Cry would care far more for the broken afterlife of the Sootscales at this moment than any other person's ACTUAL life...except Colin and Guillame of course. However, I am worried the bandits will head to Oleg's to free the others and seek revenge.
I would think we should go right after the bandits as they're on foot and injured (unless they have a cleric) and we should be able to chase them down quick enough.
If we can't track them, then we go for the mites.