Devereux swears that from his vantage point it looked like they were running from the bigger fish in the pond. For that he opened fire with an empowered Orb of Force…75 hps later the dragon breathed Negative energy upon the party. Wow were they a bit surprised as they had rolled poorly on their knowledge checks and mistaken its black coloration to mean it was a black dragon and were waiting for a line of acid. The Cone of Negative energy was pretty brutal.

I was overwhelmingly pleased with my attempt at dragon negotiations. 75 out of 90 points of damage makes Devereux a happy sorcerer. It was also my last 6th level spell for the day. I'm having difficulties holding on to those even though I have 4 of them a day, they're just too darn juicy to not use... empowered orb of force(4th +2) or chain lightning (6th AoE).

Hey now... Just cuz we rolled poorly doesn't mean I was wrong, it WAS a "black dragon", I don't think I rolled high enough to even say whether it was going to breath acid or not, pretty sure I never got an answer when I asked. Just that it was definitely black... yea, definitely. :D

The brutal part about the breath weapon was the fact that no one saved. 48 damage later I was at half health and poor Trinia was nearly dead being a cohort.

I gleefully said, "Black dragons breathe a line of Acid, this you know." I showed you the picture and never mentioned the actual color...

Now IMHO the negotiating team needs work...

Ace, "The divinations said the dragon may be able to be persuaded to help"

DM, "Devereux's action."

Devereux, "Empowered Orb of Force to the Face!!!"

DM, "Any other actions? talking anything like that?

Devereux, "Yea...I rolled a hit and its 75 points of damage! Take that for negotiations!"

Ok it didn't go exactly like that but it was close...

I did what I thought was the right thing to do. I'm betting Krim would've done the same.

Devereux has made a point in the past of not caring much for divination back when we first met Zellara, but I have already explained my reasoning above with the "fish" example.

In a party that shouts "Initiative!" whenever someone speaks to them, I'm not going to second guess my actions.

Wasn't criticizing, merely sharing my amusement. It was what I like to call a teehee moment.

There are no flowery speakers or Diplomatic wunderkinds in this party. We are very much about the "shotgun" diplomacy.

Tell you what next campaign I will make a social butterfly...but Altair isn't likey to start wearing tye dye and Lennon classes anytime soon.

...they found a magic sword and a staff. They started laughing loudly as they realized they had wormed their way all around Castle Scarwall looking for a magic bastard sword, avoided all of the legendary bad and ickiness and managed to find a magic bastard sword.

Ah. Yes. A mysterious weapon who's magical properties we are unable to determine.

.
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Not it!

=-=-=-=-=

More seriously, next level I'll have a choice between Legend Lore and Invisibility, Mass for my Domain Spells. I think I can crack it.

Some how I knew being forced to leave the deck outside would bite us in the ass....lol

Some how I knew being forced to leave the deck outside would bite us in the ass....lol

Just to clarify.

...they found a magic sword and a staff. They started laughing loudly as they realized they had wormed their way all around Castle Scarwall looking for a magic bastard sword, avoided all of the legendary bad and ickiness and managed to find a magic bastard sword.

The Cleric’s Favorite Weapon this campaign has been a Silver Dagger he got waaaaay back in the first mod...

I assure you sir...this body is an Ace free zone, despite his whole "your body is a temple and we came to pray" theology.

Just to clarify.

Brutesquad07 wrote:

...they found a magic sword and a staff. They started laughing loudly as they realized they had wormed their way all around Castle Scarwall looking for a magic bastard sword, avoided all of the legendary bad and ickiness and managed to find a magic bastard sword.

Brutesquad07 wrote:

The Cleric’s Favorite Weapon this campaign has been a Silver Dagger he got waaaaay back in the first mod...

So I'm thinking ... python?

The game resumed this past Sunday in the room they had rested (albeit fitfully) in. The party rushed out the door and then popped open another one. This is where the conversation about the method of searching the castle came up. They finally decided (now that they had wandered their way aimlessly to the third floor of the place) to clear level by level. Sadly the level they started on was rather small and had few truly epic encounters in it.

They did find a pair of Barbed Devils. That was exciting for a while, though the Sorcerer brought a tactic I have never seen this group use. Magic Circle against Evil. Very helpful, since they dropped another barbed devil in the room and that one was unable to advance so was forced to use its Scorching ray (Truly not as impressive as its full on I beat you and then grab you and impale you and then say really nasty things about your shoes attacks) Let’s just say that I needed more hitpoints to make this truly a remarkable fight. The Shear amount of damage this party can put up is pretty awe inspiring. The one advantage the bad boys had was DR 10/Good which was never fixed. That all but Eliminated Danni the Ranger/Rogue from the fight as she would miss with her Bastard sword (That was the dice nothing else) and then hit with the Rapier and not beat the DR. Altair and Khrim were not having nearly the frustration on that fight. Give one to the Sorcerer for the Magic Circle take one from the spell casters as this is certainly not the first time they have found DR/Good to be an issue. You can’t expect Laori (L/E Cleric of Zon-Kuthon to provide a Good effect to weapons) But that being said the 2nd easiest way to deal with it is to just drop such large numbers that removing 10 is no big deal.

There were a couple of minor encounters with some Gargoyle Brutes. Since there were never more than 2 I will only mention that this party can not be threatened by anything less than a dozen of these. That’s probably about the way it should be.

They then popped open a tower and discovered a Tall tower that was open to the roof. Inside were an impressive, if deteriorated bed and throne, annnnnnnnd a little something something that Paizo found for them. An Ashmede Devil, she was a bit nasty and quite a fight. Mostly because she dropped a chain devil and called for some assistance from a pair of Bone Devils (who also brought a summoned Bone Devil).

Krihm, using the brand new Celestial Plate mail he found a couple sessions ago and Altair with his flying Carpet were tasked with taking on the boss while the rest of the party got bogged down by all the buggers that she called or summoned. Trinia failed a fear spell (with +6 ish in bonuses mind you) and was pretty much out for the duration of the fight.

Danni drew the luck of the bad dice and was bogged down with the Chain Devil which would have only taken her a round or two normally but since her dice were set on Massive Fail that day she spent 3 or 4 rounds and still needed help finishing it off. Ace, Laori and Devereux combined to hold and eventually demolish the 2 Bone Devils (Magic Circle left the Summoned one a frustrating situation so it flew off and tried to help the Boss against Krihm and Altair. It may have bought her an extra round at best, and I am not sure it really even did that.
Devereux’s Magic Circle’s and his Chain Lightnings and Whirling Blades were such consistant damage and disruption that he was probably the most consistant threat on the board from the party that day.

Altair had one of those days, a failed save here and a couple of places where if the dice or the circumstances had been slightly better he would have looked quite a bit cooler. At the same time he still did pretty well. The vexing flanker has drastically increased the places and times he can flank, which has ramped up his damage quite a bit over all. Sunday it could have been better but I could also see where some different choices or dice rolls and it could have been so much worse.

Danni…she had a day. She rolled more 1’s than the rest of the party rolled hits I think.

Ace was stuck in a few places but his uber AC still makes him something to deal with even if he isn’t that effective melee wise back. Course his dumping in several d6 of healing for everyone every other round or so more than makes up for his low melee ability and that isn’t even counting when he pulls up his spell sheet and says, oh wait I have this…

Khrim. 2000 Str…what else to say. If he hits (which he usually does) he does some insane number of damage.

A note on damage. Everyone in this party, except for Ace and the NPC’s, Does an insane amount of damage if given the right circumstances. Danni needs her opponents to be human and to get a sneak attack off. Altair needs some semblance of a Flank (ie get his sneak attack off) Devereux needs the right line or area of mooks for his AoE’s, Krhim has the easiest requirement he has to be able to reach it. On average I believe everyone of those folks with their best setup can drop 90ish Hps a round. Ace really is a fix it and his thing is to keep those others going so they do that 90ish a round.

The game was wrapped up as the party searched the room. We’ll pick up again in a couple of weeks and see whose dice are hot, whose dice are cold and what monsters we can scratch off the list.

Magic Circle vs. Evil is one of my bloodline spells, if it weren't for that you likely would never see it, at least not from me. BTW, I wasn't considering the cloaks of resistance our party has, so the spell provides most of us with nothing numbers-wise. It does still give anti-enchantment and protection from summoned evil though.

A silence spell grounded Altair's flying carpet for 3 rounds... I'm pretty sure the first round should've just been a do-over after discovering all the "oh btw" rules... silence being a full round to cast now and useless for a counterspell, flying carpets needing spoken commands, etc. I wouldn't have bothered if I had went into it with... Don't bother, she is done by the time you cast it and you're just going to screw Altair's movement for 3 rounds. Also, by the time we discovered a flying carpet is needy and has to be spoken to, I was knee deep in 3 bone devils and flanked by a kyton... I took 2 AoOs(attempted) just to get out of that mess, so I was unable to dismiss it and effectively defend myself.

Give one to the Sorcerer for the Magic Circle take one from the spell casters as this is certainly not the first time they have found DR/Good to be an issue. You can’t expect Laori (L/E Cleric of Zon-Kuthon to provide a Good effect to weapons).

Align Weapon and Restoration, Lesser are both Second Level spells.

Calistria's Ace wrote:

Align Weapon and Restoration, Lesser are both Second Level spells.

Details

Highlight of my day...pulling a bane dagger from my gauntlet of infinite blades and surprising the hell out of the soon to be deceased devil that thought me finished once I was neatly in its grapple.

Sunday 11/15/09

We need to speak to the dragon I was told previously...

I was the only one who speaks Draconic, not that anyone tried anything else, like maybe common. I proceeded to stumble through negotiations. The conversation went as follows(not verbatim, but close enough)...

Devereux - "Hello there! Sorry about that whole Orb of Force thing, we'd like to talk."

Dragon - "You attack me in my home, now you want to talk?! About what?"

Devereux - "We need to find a special sword named "Blah" and perhaps we can help you with something, maybe a particular undead pest?"

**crRRRUUNNNNccchh... SPLAT**

Krim decides to negotiate with a critical hit to the dragon's skull... as I predicted. So much for negotiations.

Here is the update on our game from this past Sunday.

The game started in the tower where Devil’s had been put down the previous game. The group rested, They then moved out of the tower, realizing they had completely explored the area they were in they went back down with the intent of a little more thorough exploration. They headed back towards the front of the castle. They found several small encounters; a Minotaur skeleton here a pack of wraiths there they still able to proceed with little interference. After some wandering around they found themselves in the gate house. They put down the four Minotaur Skeletons here and found a way up.

Going up into the top of the gate house they came upon a Skeletal fighter who demanded his circlet back and tried to hack his way through the rogue to get to the Orc who was carrying the item. After some back and forth it became clear that he wasn’t taking no for an answer so the Orc rolled a 20 with his earthbreaker and auto confirmed his crit with his rage power ending the fight pretty quickly. This caused the castle to shudder in a way that indicated to the party that they had found another of the chained spirits anchors.

They looted quickly then proceeded to explore the rest of the second floor of the castle. Avoiding the chained spirit (other than Ace used his domain power to clairvoy on the spirit to see that it was indeed down to 2 chains). They found their way out onto another roof and then popped through a door down some stairs and into the guest wing of the castle. Popping open a door they found the big courtyard in the center of the castle again. They decided to make sure that they had cleared behind themselves and rushed off that way. Before they could go back into the main keep, however, Devereux spotted something eyeing them through some large double doors at the other end of the courtyard.

Quickly the party hit on the idea that it was the dragon they had fought earlier. Devereux approached calling out in Draconic they only wanted to talk. As you can tell from the post above, that ended a few moments later when the Orc reopened negotiations by charging the dragon with his earthbreaker. Needless to say a fully healed party, with the orc in play this time as he had missed the session with the dragon previously, and a Dragon only 2/3rds healed ended pretty darn quckly. He didn’t even breathe. He got hammered pretty much right out of the gate (pun intended) and survived only 1 round. Have I mentioned that this party throws up some outrageous numbers damage wise?

They searched the stables that the dragon was in and found a room with what seemed to be a dragons horde. Scooping all that up they moved on finding little of interest. Thinking it over they ran back across the courtyard and reentered the guest wing of the castle. Exploring it methodically they found several empty guest rooms and some empty torture chambers. Then they came upon a statue with a bag over its head. They laughed and left it there. They were checking out a pair of mahogany doors when we called it for the evening. Wonder what fun could be behind those double doors…we’ll see in a couple of weeks.

Then they came upon a statue with a bag over its head. They laughed and left it there.

We did check it for magic as well and I believe it was Necromancy(like everything else in the huge undead infested castle), so my thought was that we decided the bag was likely there for a reason and moved on.

We did check it for magic as well and I believe it was Necromancy...

Suppose it's the last Chain Spirit anchor. Now that'd be an "What do you know about the werewolf" moment.

Suppose it's the last Chain Spirit anchor. Now that'd be an "What do you know about the werewolf" moment.

The party confronted the councilman and the first thing the Bard said to this councilman wasn't anything to do with the bandits but rather "What do you know about the werewolf" Well turns out he knew a lot about it as he was the werewolf and the man knew the party was going to interrogate him about the bandits but didn't have any clue they were on to him (which they absolutely were not) about the werewolf. The Sensemotive check after that was pretty good so they dropped gauntlets with him.

Now whenever someone says something with no contextual basis we call it a werewolf moment.