Brainiac's page

The Kokogiak entry is amazing

Its dead black eyes are small but infinite
pits of malice.

Kokogiaks are very scary.

I'm starting the campaign off in Numeria. One of the players is going to be a barbarian chieftain, while the other players will be his three wives, each one representing an aspect of the Triple Goddess. The maiden is a fiery-tempered sorceress, the mother is an exiled winter witch, and the crone is an oracle of bones. The fifth player is either going to be the clan's wise man (a bear druid), or an android rogue who is the barbarian's "brother." :D

Reading the stats for the cleric of Zon Kuthon, who is LN, with apparently the ability to channel Positive Energy -- is this a mistake? According to the CRB, neutral clerics of an evil deity still have to channel negative energy.

Yeah, just reached that part of the adventure and wondered the same thing myself, especially since one of my PCs wants to take Gein Kafog as a cohort. Perhaps he can channel positive energy since he's a heretic of Zon-Kuthon's faith instead of a true cleric of the Midnight Lord?

Jeez, your'e fast! wasn't Beyond the Doomsday Door only released like a week ago? your'e blazing through this AP!

Yeah, we generally burn through APs very quickly, keeping pace as they are released (or sometimes outpacing them). We play every week for 6 hours or so with a group of players who have been through every AP from Rise of the Runelords on.

I'm currently running two different groups through this AP. So far, we've had 5 total deaths in one group and 3 in the other. The first group is midway through "Beyond the Doomsday Door," while the second group is in the Black Keep in "The Asylum Stone." I don't have time to go into too much detail, but here are brief summaries of the deaths so far:

"Curse of the Lady's Light:"
Group 1:
Dhampir rogue, killed by sneak attacking babaus.
Human cleric, killed by a confused Oriana in the fight with Ashamintallu.

Group 2:
Human rogue, killed by the fiendish seugathi
Elf druid, killed by giant moray eels while scouting ahead alone
Kobold sorcerer, killed by Ashamantillu's phantasmal killer spell

"The Asylum Stone:"
Group 1:
Dhampir rogue (again), killed by the Dark Rider

"Beyond the Doomsday Door:"
Group 1:
Human wizard, killed by two consecutive traps (exploding headdress and spiked pit)
Human fighter, killed by a redcap's coup de grace while paralyzed by a mummy's despair aura
Human wizard (twice in the same adventure), killed by a critical sneak attack from Roy Flaxbeater

James Sutter wrote:

After chatting with Jacobs (the developer for the adventure), the basic idea behind making the seugathi fight a "high 9" challenge rating is that it's probably the only fight you've got that day, plus you've got Abra with you, and you likely fought a seugathi in the previous adventure and thus have an idea of what they can do.

Putting a melee NPC with Will as his lowest save with the group for an encounter where you have to repeatedly save vs. confusion just makes it more difficult (IMO), since he's as likely to attack a party member as a bad guy. :P

Yeah, when I ran it, Abra immediately blew his Will save against the mind fog, which means the only way he could have possibly acted normally would have been to roll 3 natural 20's in a row--a situation the party samurai found himself in as well.

And speaking of mind fog, I'm pretty sure these seugathi should be rated as a higher CR. They've got comparable HP, AC, and saves for a CR 6, but then you add in the fast healing, madness aura, powerful spell-like abilities with high DCs (mind fog, phantasmal killer, oh, and they can cast confusion just in case you make those saves against their madness aura), and the confusion command ability, and they become rather impressive adversaries, especially when fighting more than one at a time.

I actually like the design there. It tells the players right away, "This adventure is going to have some nasty fights. Be careful." I think by the third chapter of an AP, we can start assuming that the players are fairly experienced and skilled, and it's time to up the difficulty a bit.

True, but there's a fine line between "very difficult" and "Total Party Killer." My second group lost their rogue to the lone seugathi under the Lady's Light, and there was much griping about how ridiculously powerful the monster is already. I think I'll replace this encounter with three cloakers instead so my group doesn't walk out on my game in protest. :)

I do like a brutal encounter right off the bat to set the mood, just be warned that this one is very deadly!

So, the encounter with the three seugathi along the Halflight Path is brutal. I ran it for my gaming group today, and the party barely made it through in one piece. The party consists of a cleric, and abjurer, an Aldori swordlord, and a samurai. The only reason they survived was because the swordlord made his Will save against mind fog. The rest of the party was confused for pretty much the whole fight, and the swordlord was still confused for about 80% of it. They ended up killing poor Abra Lopati and nearly killing each other, as well. As it was, three of four PCs were left with permanent insanities. Three DC 20 Will saves each round versus the madness auras, a 15-foot-wide hallway so there's no room to get away from them...was this early encounter meant to be so brutal?

One thing I wish we'd seen was beyond Mike's control.

** spoiler omitted **
And it would likely have been Valeros, since he seems to be the art butt monkey.

Fan art, anybody? :D

Shasazar wrote:

Best. Adventure. Ever!

Please.Post.A.Review.

Seriously, I love the kind words, but it's even better when people give products formal ratings. This goes for both positive and negative reviews.

I've posted my own review of this excellent product. Kudos to you, Mr. Shel! I look forward to more great adventures from you in the future! :)

Olaf was robbed! :)

4. Russel Torres (sp?) - Quest for Perfection, Part 3 (Kept everything going at a good clip, without sacrificing any of the fun, during the noisiest session we had. Best crow-beastie battle cry).

Two "L's", actually. Russell. :)

"SQRAWWWWK!" -Advanced Giant Owlbear

I would like to temporarily cancel my subscription to the Pathfinder RPG line of products. I will re-subscribe at a later date. Thank you for your assistance in this matter!

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Real life has kept me busy the past several weeks. I'll try to get back to things as soon as I can--there's still a ways to go before this journal is complete!

Rugger has said he wants to pop in with another guest post at this point in the story, so I'm waiting for him before I continue on with my own journal entries. It might be a bit though since I know he's busy with work this week.

Sorry to interrupt but I just wanted to let you know this Journal has inspired me to run my own Jade Regent campaign for a group of real life friends. I hope that their game runs with half as much dedication and fun that I see presented here.

I'm glad to hear that, mathpro! If I've inspired only one person to play in this excellent adventure path, then I've done my job. I hope you and your friends enjoy it as much as my group! :D

@Hardplay: I would not mind sharing a room with you. Please send me an e-mail if you're interested and we can work out the logistics.

The dwarf fighter taught Kelda how to properly braid her hair.

The kensai gave Shalelu his first horse as a gift, and constantly has drinking contests with the elven ranger (he usually loses them).

The priestess of Shelyn flirts heavily with Sandru, though now she's secretly engaged to the party's naive monk (which he hasn't fully realized yet). It became even more complicated when Prince Bakrasahn of Ordu-Aganhei took a keen interest in trying to make the priestess his wife!

My character is a half-elf bard who had a childhood crush on Ameiko. Her feelings and relationship with Ameiko have been her main focus all campaign long, and they have been developing further as the game progresses. I've been chronicling Thalia's thoughts in my campaign journal, located here. I'm a bit behind where we're currently at in the campaign, but we're not able to play for the next few weeks, so hopefully I'll have some time to catch up before our next session.

Something like this, perhaps? ;)

This may be a little early, but it was suggested in the old room sharing thread that a new one be created for this year's PaizoCon, so as not to confuse people. I figured I'd make the first post since I'm getting ready to book a room and wouldn't mind having some roommates to split the cost.

I'm going to be booking a room at the Redmond Town Center Marriott with the PaizoCon rate. It'll be for Thursday through Sunday night, at $85 a night, so it comes out to $340 total. I am male, but I don't mind having either male or female roommates. I am flying in from Orlando, FL, and will probably be arriving some time Thursday afternoon. If you're interested in sharing a room, post a reply here or send me an e-mail at ltclnlbrain@hotmail.com

That was a beautiful description of the events unfolding around Crystalhue and the relationships between the PCs and NPCs involved.

I hope that this journal really gets the attention it deserves!

Thanks, Monrail. I mainly write for my own enjoyment and for the other players in my gaming group, but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy words of praise from other readers. :)

The last few weeks have been pretty busy so I haven't had a lot of time to catch up on the journal, and I'm going on vacation next week so that won't help matters, either. At least we won't be playing for the next couple weeks. I'm still about four-and-a-half gaming sessions behind, so there's a lot of fun stuff coming up. Wait until we get to Hongal! ;)

Gearbox Looking for Real-Life Version of Borderlands' Lilith

Perhaps you'd be interested in applying? :)

Upon reflection my questions could have come off as over aggressive and for that I apologize.

It's no problem. I just wasn't sure where you were coming from.

With that in mind the reason I was going "Hmmm..." is because the women are all very saintly (for lack of a better term at the time of writing) or are that empathetic kind of misunderstood while all of the males (or at least main cast males) are jerks. Even the quite one (The monk) is just a smug quiet jerk. So over all to my perceptions this was starting to look as if Lifetime made a fantasy movie. So it threw me off.

That's part of the way the characters are being role-played. Roga and Yuto both have a Charisma of 8 and Rugger has a Charisma of 6, which is reflected in their personalities and their interactions with the other PCs and NPCs. Roga and Rugger are good people and well-meaning, but have very abrasive personalities. Yuto started out as simply naive, but the influence of the other male characters in the party has slowly corrupted him into, yes, kind of a smug jerk. He resents the relationship Thalia has with his sister because it's stronger than their familial ties, since he spent nearly all of his life in the monastery away from her. Yoska has a Charisma of 12, which isn't bad, but he's definitely an antihero, what with being a Szcarni bloatmage with a chip on his shoulder regarding his brother. The female characters definitely have their flaws as well, but since these writings are from the perspective of Thalia, these are downplayed. She looks up to Aurora as a role model and, of course, has deep feelings for Ameiko which blind her a bit to their shortcomings, not to mention she's averse to admitting to her own foibles.

That's how I see it, any rate. Perhaps the other players in the group might want to comment about their own characters?

At any rate, I'm glad you're reading the journal and I thank you for taking the time to comment as well. I like to hear people taking an interest in my writing. I hope to have another content update soon, though with Thanksgiving coming up, it may be put off till next week.

It's well written but I don't know entirely how to process this. Two questions:

When is Sandru going to start beating or threatening to beat one of the Lady-folk?

Or

Could your describe your gaming group? Including who plays who.

As to the first question, I'm not quite sure how to respond. There's never been any indication that Sandru is a misogynist or would have any reason to assault any of the women in the party. I don't think the character is written to be that way, either: perhaps you or your DM has a different interpretration of him?

As for the second question, or group consists of six males and one female, with ages ranging from 23 to 32. We are all close friends and have gamed as a group for over 6 years. The female player is bisexual and plays Aurora, the priestess of Shelyn, while the male player who plays Roga is homosexual. Everybody else is heterosexual, including myself.

Our gaming sessions are frequently infused with mature content that others may find offensive, but we understand that it is all just a game and we are very comfortable with ourselves and each other. For this journal, I've been challenging myself to explore the thoughts and relationships of a homosexual female character, including mature themes and situations, which I understand may be off-putting for some people. I would never force anybody to read something that makes them uncomfortable, however.

Brainiac wrote:

Our party's caravan is pretty well-rounded, consisting of an armored wagon, two supply wagons, two horse trains, a fortune-teller's wagon, and a royal carriage. With all the wagons, a party of 6 PCs, and a dozen NPCS (Ameiko, Koya, Sandru, Shalelu, Ulf, Kelda, 5 extra drivers, and a cook), our consumption is in the low 30s, so all of the scouts are set on hunting duty just to make sure we have enough food to get from settlement to settlement, which are few and far between in the Crown of the World.

How much of that was free, and how much was the party's own investment? It looks like you've spent at least double what you can automatically get in the first two modules.

The party has invested about 4,000-5,000 gp of its own money in the caravan. I know the party cleric bought the royal carriage straight up out of her own personal funds.

We started playing through "The Hungry Storm" this past Sunday. Our party's caravan is pretty well-rounded, consisting of an armored wagon, two supply wagons, two horse trains, a fortune-teller's wagon, and a royal carriage. With all the wagons, a party of 6 PCs, and a dozen NPCS (Ameiko, Koya, Sandru, Shalelu, Ulf, Kelda, 5 extra drivers, and a cook), our consumption is in the low 30s, so all of the scouts are set on hunting duty just to make sure we have enough food to get from settlement to settlement, which are few and far between in the Crown of the World.

The level 7 caravan has Attack +10, AC 16, Security +10, Resolve +13, HP 160, and does 1d6+7 damage. Besides Enhanced Caravan several times, we have taken Extra Wagons, Merchant Mastery, Lucky Caravan, and First Strike for our feats.

Our first random encounter was with a polar pudding, a CR 7 caravan encounter. The pudding has AC 20, HP 85, Attack +13 and does a whopping 6d8+3 points of damage with each attack. Our caravan has a 55% chance to hit the pudding, and assuming average damage, does 11 damage a round (15 on the first round due to First Strike). By contrast, the pudding has a 90% chance of hitting the caravan, doing an average of 30 points of damage a round. Worse, if the pudding hits the caravan, it has to make a DC 22 Security check (our caravan has a 45% chance of success) or become mired, taking a -2 penalty to AC and attack rolls and becoming unable to move (i.e., flee the encounter).

Assuming the caravan and the pudding hit each other every round for average damage, the pudding will wipe out the caravan in 6 rounds, long before it is able to get through the pudding's 85 HP. It takes 2 DC 17 Security checks to flee the encounter, which our caravan has a 65% chance to make--assuming, of course, it hasn't failed the previous Security check when it was hit. Our GM did some hand-waving to allow us to escape even though we had been mired, but if he hadn't, that would have been the end of our caravan. Of course, had it been a straight up fight between our PCs and a white pudding, we would have decimated the ooze without taking much harm to ourselves.

Several days later, we encounter a band of ice trolls, a CR 8 caravan encounter. The trolls have AC 21, HP 100, Attack +15 and do a stupidly high 10d6 points of damage with each attack. Our caravan has a 50% chance to hit the trolls, while the trolls have a 95% chance of hitting us (only because they miss on a natural 1), doing an average of 35 points of damage a round. We only have to reduce them to 40 HP to get them to flee, but that takes 5 rounds of combat assuming we hit them every turn (a poor assumption with only a 50% chance of hitting), during which our caravan would take an average of 175 damage and be destroyed.

When we actually played it out, there were a lot of nat 20's and high damage on our side and a couple really low damage rolls on their side, which allowed us to force them to flee with just over half our HP left. Of course, we track them down to prevent further attacks, re-engaging in combat. We somehow manage to defeat the trolls, but survive with somewhere around 35 HP remaining.

Based on our experiences, it seems that the enemies scale up way too fast for an average caravan to keep up. Both these encounters are allegedly on CR for our caravan's level. Their attack bonuses are high enough to basically hit every time they attack, so the only way to survive is to focus completely on offense to take Extra Damage as much as possible. Even then, they have enough HP that the caravan is going to get trashed every fight. Perhaps the best strategy then is to focus on mobility and just run from every caravan combat?

I have cancelled your subscription as requested.

-Erik

Thank you!

Alright then, please cancel my subscription then. I will re-subscribe with the Bestiary 3. Thanks for your help. :)

I received my confirmation e-mail for this month's shipment. I didn't realize the Pathfinder Beginner Box was included in the RPG subscription, however. I don't really want the box--is there any way to cancel that part of the order and just get the new issue of Adventure Path or is it too late now that the e-mail has gone out?

Thank you in advance for your assistance.

These are great updates!

I really like your writing style - compact and entertaining at the same time, with the focus rather being on the emotions experienced by the PCS and their interaction with the other members of the caravan than on verbose descriptions of the individual combat encounters (even though I like those from time to time, as well).

Looking forward to the next instalment!

Thanks again for the kind words, Monrail. If anybody else wants to leave comments or critiques, feel free to do so! I've got two more posts before I'm caught up on last week's session. Hopefully I'll get them done today since we play again on Sunday.

Add me to the list of gamers interested in such a product.

Hey, I just wanted to chime in and say that this is very interesting stuff, well-written and with great focus on the characters' and NPCs' personalities and interaction.

Keep up the good work!

Thanks for the kind words, Monrail. I've got one more post before I'm caught up to where we currently are in-game, but we play again on Saturday, so I'll have a few new posts to make next week as well. :)

Our party consists of the following:

Female half-elf bard (geisha)
Female aasimar cleric of Shelyn
Male Shoanti monk (sohei)/magus (kensai)
Male dwarf fighter (brawler)
Male Tian monk (flowing monk)
Male Varisian illusionist (going for bloatmage later)

We've played several sessions already and are almost through the first book. I've been keeping a campaign journal here for those interested in checking it out. It contains spoilers, naturally, so use caution if you're playing in the game. :)

Well, perhaps he can ask one of his friends to make the test in his place. You know, like we used to do in High School...

Dear Shalelu,

Do you like me? Please mark yes or no.

Love, Seltyiel

Okay Lem, now let me know what she says...

I'm really excited about these rules as well, although I do have one concern.

In honor of Free RPG Day, we recorded our gaming group singing the Licktoad goblin song from "We Be Goblins!" Check out the video!

The stats for the Vollensag Stalkers seem to be off as well. Their attack bonus with their masterwork greatswords should be at +12, not +10. (BA 5 + 7 Str + 1 masterwork - 1 size)

"my notes wrote:

Interesting story, yes the names are a bit Warcraft or Warhammer, but they are the only examples we have mostly of orc characters.

I haven’t read Orcs gf Golarion but this format of orc tribes doesn’t sound so strange, nor their names (if we accept dwarven defining names I can’t see why orc can have more brutish names)

Good story, but not excellent.

besides that its nice to see the animal companion to have its own personality, the villain was decent but a bit too black hat, its interesting to see an orc with some sort of honor, its an interesting way to see their side.

as most stories an edit pass would have helped it improve, which is what I can see from the judge's scores.

Besides that, I think some saw a bit too much of wow or warcraft in it... and yes we need to make it feel more Golarionlike... which in my case is hard to check without the mentioned book... as many other races I am sure orcs have their own uniqueness.

anyway I hope this serves you :)

Yes, thanks for the comments. I will be the first to admit that I was a bit rushed in my submission, and there a couple errors that could have been corrected with a few more editing passes. I actually referred to Orcs of Golarion quite a bit while writing the story. I had hoped to do the orcs of this world justice, though I'm sure influences from too much Warhammer and Warcraft crept in regardless as I struggled to find a unique voice for Torgran. My idea for Torgran was "orc cavalier," and I hoped that image came out in the writing in his bond with his mount, his honor and his oaths.

All in all, I had fun writing the story, which is the most important thing. Thanks for putting on the contest and giving me an opportunity to flex my creativity a bit. :)

I wouldn't mind seeing my score and feedback for "Banners of Belkzen." You can either e-mail it to me or post it here. Thanks. :)

Brainiac wrote:

It has been two months now and I have still not received the print copy of Prince of Wolves that I ordered. I would like to see if a replacement is still in the works. Again, I appreciate your attention to this matter.

I am very sorry for the delay! It appears that there was a bug in the replacement order preventing it from being shipped. I have fixed the bug and I will ensure that the order is shipped out today.

Thanks,
cos

I got the shipping confirmation in my e-mail box. Thank you! :)

It has been two months now and I have still not received the print copy of Prince of Wolves that I ordered. I would like to see if a replacement is still in the works. Again, I appreciate your attention to this matter.

Way back when our group ran through Savage Tide, one of our players decided to help manage the many NPCs by making popsicle stick puppets of all of them so that I, being the GM, could hold them up to display who was talking at the time. That player is none other than the illustrious Lora Massey, she who won the GenCon costume contest for her awesome Feiya outfit. Today we started our Serpent's Skull game, the first adventure path in a while that Lora has actually been able to play with us. So in honor of the occasion and a new host of NPC shipwreck survivors, she has made new popsicle stick puppets for each of the castaways. And this time, the proof is in the picture. Just thought I'd share her art project with the community at large. :)

Brainiac wrote:

Today I received my order in the mail. However, one of the items in the shipment was wrong. The order was supposed to include the print edition of Pathfinder Tales: Prince of Wolves. Instead, I received Planet Stories: Before They Were Giants, a book I did not order. The other items in the shipment were correct (Advanced Player's Guide and Pathfinder 36 and 37). I would appreciate you looking into this matter and sending the correct book. Thank you for your attention.

I'll get a replacement sent out.

thanks
sara marie

I still have not received my replacement book. At this point, if you haven't already sent it out and want to wait to send it with my next subscription shipment, I would be okay with that. Thanks.

My vote is for Lora as Feiya! Also, Tunnel Orcs rule! (She'll know what I mean. ;) )

I'm very impressed by the Fieya costume! Who is the woman wearing it? My commendations to her!

Of course, Jodi is rocking everyones favourite barbarian!

The woman in the Feiya costume is Lora Massey, a professional makeup artist and part-time costume designer. She has been a member of my gaming group on and off for the past several years. She also volunteered as a GM for Pathfinder Society at GenCon last year and this year. She's pretty awesome! :)

Today I received my order in the mail. However, one of the items in the shipment was wrong. The order was supposed to include the print edition of Pathfinder Tales: Prince of Wolves. Instead, I received Planet Stories: Before They Were Giants, a book I did not order. The other items in the shipment were correct (Advanced Player's Guide and Pathfinder 36 and 37). I would appreciate you looking into this matter and sending the correct book. Thank you for your attention.

I think I'll give the BBEG a wand of inflict moderate wounds of some charges and have him UMD to heal himself up. He only needs to make a 7 on the roll to use it.

Remember, as a lich, his touch attack does negative energy. As per the Bestiary, "a lich can take a full-round action to infuse itself with this energy, healing damage as if it had used its touch attack against itself." So he's got a built-in source of healing already with no chance of failure. :)

In my campaign, she is Tascia Leroung, cousin to one the PCs, Traxus Leroung. Her motives are a bit murkier in my game as well: the PCs aren't quite sure if she's genuinely interested in ridding Westcrown of the shadow beast menace or if she wants to try to figure out the cause of it so that she can manipulate the beasts to her advantage.

I started off introducing them one at a time, introducing each PC to the NPC that favored their class. I briefly mentioned the others, and have them give suggestions every now and then, but for the most part I've focused on the "favored" NPCs. We've completed "The Sixfold Trial" now.

The tiefling rogue in the party took an immediate shine to Yakopulio, and the irreverent gnome shows up quite a bit. One of the other PCs is the son of a woman who runs a tavern, so there's a bit of rivalry between the gnome and his mother. When the party goes out drinking, they usually go to her tavern, the Bruised Eel, and even made use of her pimping services to distract Thesing from trying to seduce Calseinica with his elixir of love.

Another PC is a fighter/wizard going for eldritch knight, so I had Tarvi request his help in learning how to use magic. He happens to be a scion of the Leroung family as well, so Tarvi's parents are trying to fix the two of them up. Of course, Tarvi is against this, but the PC might pursue her with fun results--he hasn't decided yet.

We had one player whose PC was a cleric of Iomedae, but he moved away so we had his character go out in a blaze of glory, sacrificing himself to save Arael from a tiefling assassin. At his funeral, the halfling Fiosa took up his blade, even though it was too large for her, and pledged her life in service of Iomedae to honor the fallen hero's memory. Our new player's PC is a priest of Shelyn, and so he and Fiosa have many conversations over the natures of their faith and how best to do good in the city.

Besides those three primary NPCs, Ermolos, Larko, and Mathalen have played minor roles in roleplaying scenes, and everybody seems to like Janiven, so I've had Arael take a behind-the-scenes approach to running the Children, with Janiven acting as the front-man for the most part.

I would just like to take the opportunity to thank Richard Pett, Nicolas Logue, and the Paizo staff for providing our group with one of the best gaming sessions we have had in years. I ran the first half of "The Sixfold Trial" for my long-time gaming group today and we had a blast! It was a truly memorable experience. Coming from a group that has gone through every adventure path from "Shackled City" onward, this is no small statement. Bravo to Paizo for taking a chance on an adventure like this, and we look forward to more brilliance in the future.