cynarion |
What's meant to happen is that every living creature (except stirges) is meant to attempt a DC 14 Will save every round at the beginning of their turn to avoid 'being shaken by the effect' of the Piper's dirge. The text of the Piper's haunt is silent on how long the effect lasts for, but since they have to attempt a new save every round, it follows that the effect probably only lasts a single round.
Countersong allows them to use your check result, should theirs fail.
I am shortcutting the middle man and telling everyone not to bother with attempting the save in the first place.
To answer your actual question, the people who failed the dirge roll are no longer shaken (as Theron demonstrated), as effectively they get to use your Perform check result as their saving roll. If you stop the countersong, they have to save on their own at the beginning of the following turn, without the benefit of countersong to back them up (although having never played a bard, I have a suspicion that there's something in there about a Performance lasting to the end of the Performance itself +1 round, or some such).
Does that help? : )
Lem Longbarrow |
Just because I'm an undead abomination doesn't mean I don't have feelings. <sniff>
Shh, you're dead! ;-)
Not sure why, but when all these guys shoot the "positive energy" disrupt undead rays at the haunt/piper, I picture the Care Bears Stare shooting beams of sunshine and rainbows at him, vanquishing him, hehe.
Lem Longbarrow |
Even that won't do it permanently with a persistent haunt. We have to find whatever it is that "puts them to rest", which we have to research. While everyone is resting off their Con Damage I'm going to go to the church and research who this Varisian woman could potentially be. We'll probably have to get a ruby choker for Rose to wear or something to dispel the Piper. :-)
Rose Springdawn |
I'll be the bait for the piper, but I get to decide who's bait for the next haunt ;p
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The convention wasn't bad. While I do watch a little anime (used to watch quite abit), I'm not really into anime conventions themselves. I don't do the dress up for example, and not really into character matchups and all that.
My sister had a blast though. She ended up getting a body pillow of some guy named Zero from Vampire Knight (merciless taunting follow of course). And cat ears/tail. I learned she has a crush on Johnny Yong Bosch as well (The black power ranger from the movies).
Also, an old man dressed as Supergirl, it's creepy. I don't care if it's politically correct or not to say that, it's just plain creepy.
Belle Mythix |
My sister had a blast though. She ended up getting a body pillow of some guy named Zero from Vampire Knight (merciless taunting follow of course). And cat ears/tail. I learned she has a crush on Johnny Yong Bosch as well (The black power ranger from the movies).
Well JYB isn't bad looking, and his roles aren't bad either.
cynarion |
The Piper of Illmarsh wrote:Just because I'm an undead abomination doesn't mean I don't have feelings. <sniff>Shh, you're dead! ;-)
Not sure why, but when all these guys shoot the "positive energy" disrupt undead rays at the haunt/piper, I picture the Care Bears Stare shooting beams of sunshine and rainbows at him, vanquishing him, hehe.
Heh! I've found this whole thing a little weird because my daughter's name is Piper. I kept picturing a three-year-old turning up, saying "you can't catch me!" and running off around a corner. ; )
###
On the topic of putting the haunt to rest permanently, you're all right to some extent: haunt siphons do make it harder for haunts to manifest again after their reset time passes, but the siphon has to neutralise the haunt (i.e. reduce it to 0 or fewer hit points) for that to apply. It doesn't in this case.
The 'tubes' Theron is talking about refers (I think) to the spirit planchette you picked up. You don't need to absorb spirits to make that work, you just sit down and close your eyes and the planchette makes contact with whatever spirits exist in the local area. IIRC, the version you have allows only one question per day.
Belle Mythix |
cynarion |
If you happen to be looking at the map and wondering what's going on, don't mind me, I am altering it to include the whole of the top floor of Harrowstone. It occurred to me that I could use separate sheets to show each of the floors--and actually have them layer one on top of the other. So bear with me--some cell references may change, but I'll have it sorted out within a few hours. : )
Dragomir Vuk |
Never split the party... ever.
But there is always someone who wants to look over the next hill, next room etc. I've seen that end messily too many times.
Thank goodness this isn't Call of Cthulhu.
In any case, praying that this little scouting trip won't end badly.
Rajuna Two-Fangs |
Raj's max distance from the party proper on the course I've chosen is 25'. He is always in sight and has Slim for backup. Moreover, I'm covering terrain we've been over... I think it's reasonably unlikely I'll scare up more skeletons and highly unlikely that I'll trip a new ghost so close to the Piper's. Any corporeal baddies that I stir up can be run from or handled. We've got more than enough sword-arms to bash them down.
The biggest 'risk' I see is the floor giving way.
If we don't do a little recon now and have to enter the prison in the same way again a few days from now... we may have to deal with the Piper all over again. I'd rather avoid that if possible - particularly given the sheer number of resources our casties had to use to dispel him. From a risk/reward point of view, I think a quick exploration is worth it.
Walter Vheist |
If anyone has a good idea for a question, go ahead and let me know. My default is 'Hey how are you guys doing tonight' which is probably extremely bad.
I was thinking of going with asking the location of the next ghost or asking if the Piper will rejuvenate and if they know when.
Rajuna Two-Fangs |
Rose's question is a good one. You might also consider one like "how do we put the Piper's spirit to rest once and for all?"
If you get a snarky "By destroying him, dummy, whaddaya think?" We will know the spirits aren't friendly. :)
Septimus Smythe |
I like the flute question. It seems as likely a way to destroy the Piper as any - plus there's bound to be useful information wherever the prisoners' effects are stored. If we want to be nice, it might be good to preface the question with an assurance that we wish to help the local spirits by putting those who are malevolent among them to rest so that they can move on.
Helaman |
I had a great experience Sunday night before the Aussie Long weekend.
Finally got my wife gaming with a game of powergrid with the kids... we played til 1am and she finally acknowledged that games CAN be fun *she is not a gamer* and that they can be good for kids.
My daughters surprised me, particularly my youngest who has borderline learning issues. Both played well but the youngest planned out her own money, did economic planning, tight budgeting AND spotted a move in advance that she was in a bad position and needed to expand but didn't have the budget to do so.
Walter Vheist |
Friday - 5:30-2am I was running Jade Regent (level 16 group).
Saturday - 5:00-2am I was running a chronicle of Scion for my other group.
Sunday I was prepping the game for Monday
and on Monday - 12:30 - 12:00am I was prepping and then running a game for my Monday group.
So, lots of gaming. Almost too much gaming!
Theron Adrezi |
I have my ARG pdf as well. I haven't read everything in it, but it looks really good. Sorry Lem, haven't looked too much into the Halfling section ;)
The main thing that I saw that could be useful for Theron was some vampire hunting equipment from the Dampire section that he is probably going to try and acquire at some point, haha.
Aside from that... I'm kind of tempted to go for the Focused Study racial trait. Give up your starting bonus feat to get THREE skill focus feats over several levels? That's kind of amazing. And you thought my perception was high before...muahaha. Though I'm worried about the fact I'll be losing precise shot, and that the game will probably end before I get the 3rd skill focus feat at level 16.
Walter Vheist |
Some cool stuff, some lame stuff. I hate how all tiefling racial traits are like for stupid stuff like "+4 bonus to diplomacy when making checks to convince someone you're evil" which will never come up except for once.
Hobgoblins can get stupid stuff, including a draught that makes them immune to fatigue so they can rage on/off for infinite rage powers.
Theron Adrezi |
I am totally looking forward to creating a Kitsune Sorcerer... who will have a +6 bonus to all enchantment spell DCs by level 20 thanks to his racial bonus combined with the new Kitsune Sorcerer favored class bonus: add +1/4 to enchantment spell DCs. Tack on a few spell focus feats and the proper bloodlines and you're looking at like a DC 40 saving throw vs Dominate Monster.
He will totally be able to take over the world with his enchantment spells... until he runs into something that's immune to both mind affecting spells and paralysis. Then he'll die a painful death.
Dragomir Vuk |
Meh - power creep.
I hate Power Creep.
I know why they do it, and I confess to have used some of the traits, feats and archetypes to my advantage but I think when I run games I'll stick to the feats/race features from core and APG (which I consider to be a fine book) with the rare exception by approval.
cynarion |
While I respect it as an opinion, I have to say I've never really understood the concept of power creep applied to RPGs. If everyone is working from the same rulebook(s), then the playing field is even, is it not?
The only way I can fit the concept of power creep into RPGs is if everyone works to min-max their characters, which is not my experience.
If the problem is option bloat then I certainly understand that; it can be vey difficult for a GM to be across all the potential options that players might consider, which is why, when I GM, I don't bother trying. I let my players have free rein on whatever options hey fancy so long as I get a look at it before it goes into play.
Then I can build suitable encounters to counter any specific strengths. I built an inquisitor and retinue for a game once that disarmed the two-handed fighter, netted the rest of the melee combatants, and grappled the casters from ambush in a bog. The PCs barely escaped with their lives, but the encounter was only APL+1 by the numbers.
Fun times. : )
Walter Vheist |
The problem is that monsters usually don't "work from the same rulebook" unless the DM puts a lot of work into each specific one. Players get more and more powerful and it's possible to just one or two-shot (APs specifically) boss monsters with melee attacks.
I'd prefer it if PCs were less powerful, actually, or if monsters all had a lot more hit points.