Mage Evolving's page

I haven't logged in for nearly a year and a half and the very first post I see is one I was part of nearly 8 years ago. Crazy.

I love the idea of them getting fatigued or experiencing withdrawal if they don't get their fix.

537. Old Boy: After a brief stint as an adventurer you wake up one morning in a room as a prisoner. Beaten, tortured, and constantly asked to think about what you've done, after 15 years you've finally been released and now are out for sweet sweet vengeance.

520. Take Refuge Below: Deep below the surface the survivors of the mist struggle to rebuild their lives. Surface dwellers forced underground by the mist and the horror it brought.

Nearly 200 hundred years ago a dense mist settled over the island of Eganrack. In that mist lurked foul and murderous beasts who forced the inhabitants of the sleepy isle to flee into the caves and eventually underground.

I've been playing with the idea of taking the various feats from the Core and APG and breaking them into 3 tiers.

Tier 1 feats would be high valued feats such as Spring attack. These feats would cost a feat slot and be treated as normal.

Tier 2 would be feats that are good but not great or always needed such as weapon focus. These feats would cost 1/2 a feat and two of these could be taken in a feat slot.

Tier 3 would be feats that often are not taken such as alert or athletic. These feats would cost 1/3 of a feat slot and 3 could be taken per feat slot. You could also take a tier 2 and a tier 3 in place of a feat slot.

I want to try this in order to encourage players to expand their feat selection. Has anyone tried anything like this?

53. Timtom: At home in the treetops of the jungles canopy. The timtom is the smallest species of feline known. Weighing in at just 12 oz. these tiny predators feed almost exclusively on Squints and are known for their raucous mating calls that can be heard for miles around. Legend states that timtom gallbladder can cure gout.

You just described recent seasons of Supernatural...

You mean every season beyond 5th...

It really is a shame that this isn't off the ground yet. I know so many people who were waiting for it to be realized and have since just moved on to roll20. The chances that they will ever come back to paizo for game space are slim to none. It just makes me sad...

471. Ready, set, go: Once every 25 years comes the Great Race to Freedom. It is a time when the city of Dantre allows 1,000 of its slave a chance to be free. The first 25 slaves to make it to the isle of Dryas are hailed as heroes, given a title, 10 acres, and slaves of their own. The rest are condemned to death and sacrificed to appease the gods.

All you need do is avoid being killed by your fellow slaves, defeat the creatures that are sent out to hunt you down, and get past the devious traps placed between you and your freedom.

You and your companions have been trained by your master, who has a great deal of money riding on your survival, in the various arts. Now all you have to do is survive. No problem right?

Too much voting makes wife angry... I've seen my submission 4x and I even voted for it 3x! The other item was just so damned awesome.

16. Order a pizza and garlic bread.

11. grade students exams.

12. change the light bulb over your desk.

13. find a new red pen.

Just got my first keeper ring! Really interesting ability, and not a single numeral in the description.

I think I know exactly what you are talking about. I fell in love with it last night.

Apparently a lot of people have read the subtle knife. I just read two entries with nearly the exact same ability.

Some times I find myself not voting for an item but rather voting against another.
- I especially don't like items that just grant abilities. No Save dc vs death/suffocation/being swallowed whole/ect.
- Or any item whose abilities are so ill defined that I don't know what it does, how long it lasts, who it affects, how many charges it has.

Stupid question but were you meant to fight this creature?
I mean sometime a GM will throw an impossible challenge at a party as a plot device... every once in a while the players choose to fight rather than run.

I'm going to spam the heck out of this feat next week. I can't wait.

Reading this over I see where you are coming from OP. However, I think that in this particular case you might want to just restrict access to CLW wands. As you said there are two small towns near the dungeon. These small towns will have access to ~75% of items below 1300 gp. That however does not mean that they will have an infinite number of these items. Most likely the villages are getting these items delivered once or twice every couple of months. They could very easily sell out. Especially, if other adventurers are rolling through town on occasion.

Heck I live in a city of 3 million people and there are times when I find myself unable to purchase specialty goods (like clw wands or Densite plaster) because they are simply out of stock in every store I go to.

You're kidding, right? That would hardly be a rogue fix at all. The problem is he already has to work to be situationally useful. Other classes aside from the Duelist get a version of Canny Defense (like the Kensai, for example) and it doesn't hurt the Duelist at all. And make it a rogue talent? You may as well not change the class at all.

I have to agree. Setting up a sneak attack is hard enough that the rogue should really be rewarded for it.

I have found this thread incredibly enlightening. Thank you so very much for the effort you've put in Dabbler.

It sounds like you are all good to go. I think the build sounds like a lot of fun.

While not an item exactly I recently introduced these to my campaign.

54. Waystone Constructed by a long lost civilization these large magical pillars can be found along the old kings road every 50 miles or so. Sought out by travelers these pillars give off an aura of warmth (20 ft), Can create water (10 gallons a day), and can cast daylight.

I recently started making 3D terrain for my games.
TheDMGinfo youtube channel is pretty great although I think he makes somethings overly complicated.
We also made a 2 tiered gaming table. The second tier is just tall enough that a 2 liter of Mountain Dew fits underneath. This lets everyone have their food and drink and books and dice out with out having it on the board. The original table was super easy modify and it cost less than $10. The best part is that the top tier just comes right off so the wife can't complain about the stupid look table.

Me and my GM have a disagreement on this. he told me to ask the Paizo forums.

One side thinks that 5-foot steps and free action can only be activated during your turn.

The other thinks they can be activated any time.

From my understanding you can use a free action anytime you are taking an action. So free actions are ok during your turn, during AoO, and during readied actions. Or at least that is how I am understanding it.

Can a witch use a hex while grappled? If so is there a concentration check?

I would not like this... As a DM it's too much work. As a player it's not much fun.

I've done this in the past. It works out although it feel very canned.
some ideas...
-Escaped prisoner: Bounty hunters needed.
-Caravan Guard needed.
-Missing adventuring party... Families hiring trackers.
-Body guards needed for visiting dignitary
-Contestants needed for tourney of champions
-Shipmates needed for wreckage salvage mission
-Prisoner escorts
-Kobold removal service wanted.

I think the greatest character I've ever played was evil. My fellow players had no idea that I was evil until an alignment spell outed me.

My fellow players had no idea that nearly every person that we spoke to in our quest to find an artifact was then murdered by me. I mean why should they know. It didn't hurt them... I was helping. I didn't want the informants to tell other adventurers or evil monsters what they knew. Be sides loose ends make a whole mess of trouble.

My fellow players also didn't know that the crime we were blamed for in city "A" was one that I had actually committed. They just thought it was a plot point. They all thought that I had learned a bit of information about a enemy via a divination spell... not torture.

I didn't steal from the party, I didn't back stab them, I didn't kill them or argue. If I disagreed I just took matters into my own hands. Of course this all required DM approval but it was all great fun and when the other players found out it was awesome.

445. The PCs lay siege to a bandits stronghold only to discover that it is only guarded by a token force. By the time they are ready to leave however the entire bandit hoard is at the front gate and now the PC must do their best to keep them out.

A bit off topic but reading your section on forest terrain here is a quick tip for creating a random forested area. If you use battle maps you can simple take a handful of dice and drop them on the map.

Just finished reading your guide and I have to say I am very impressed. It's clear you have a strong grasp on the math behind the system and you do a fantastic job of explaining it to the reader. Great work and definitely worth the read.

The worlds greatest commoner!

245. You have been hired to investigate the ruins that were recently unearthed during a rock slide. Entering the ruins you find a series of rooms each with guardian, traps, puzzles and monsters. At the end of the tunnel you come upon a large room, far to large to make sense of but from out of the darkness you are attacked by Allips. When defeated you realize that they emerged from a well in the midst of the giant room. Looking down the well you see a giant eye flicker open and the room/complex/earth begins to shake. It appears that you and your party may have just unleashed a very powerful evil on the earth. And those Allips where the only thing keeping it down.

In the thread this monster was the tarrasque. The allips continually feeding on it would it was theorized keep it unconscious but it could be any monster you want. I just like the idea of the characters having to clean up a mess they caused.

I really enjoyed Paizo's first AP Shackled city.

I'm running a low level, low magic game and was wondering if allowing my players to buy combat feats (ie pay to train with masters for combat feats) would be a good idea. It's a small 3 person party that is less than optimized so I thought giving them a combat feat might be a viable option.

any suggestions?

Suddenly the twin brother of Gon the barbarian Fon the the barbarian arrives with an urgent message for his brother. Then he decides to stay and hang out with the guys.

224. You and your adventurer companions have been hired to kidnap the princess bride of Florin by her soon to be husband in order to start a war with Gilda. But no one said anything about the Man in Black who is now mysteriously on your tail.

If I were a villain I would put together a Batman like utility belt composed of the following.

-"An escape plan"-This can be a potion, scroll, minor artifact that will allow me to bug out when the heroes are pummeling me.

-"Sight beyond sight"- past level 6 you should expect your enemies to come at you at all times. Especially utilizing stealth and invisibility. A potion of true seeing, see invisible, glitter dust, ect.

"knock out gas" or "stun grenade"- Every once in a while your villian actually gets the jump on the heroes and rather than just charge in and mack the first guy he sees he should first soften them up. Use something like slow, cacophonous call, or confusion to take some out of the battle while you make your attack.

-"Poison"- No reason in the world why you should not be using this stuff. Some of the cheaper poisons are really effective at slowing down your everyday hero.

-"Buffs"- Ideally the best villain is wearing a cloak of resistance or something that will help him against the inevitable will or fort save.

-"Battle field control"- tangle foot bags, alchemical fire, pits, anything that will create space between you and your enemies.

="The grappling hook"- Sometimes you need to scale a wall or jump out of a window and something like a potion of fly, ring of feather fall or slippers of spider climb will come in handy.

I'm sure that I'm missing a lot but this might be a good place to start. Great bad guys always get away and if they have an intelligence above 14 should be taking notes. If the heroes rely on their bard or cleric then a well placed silence spell is going to come into play. If they always fly then a web spell, dispell spell, or a team of archers is going to be waiting. Evil does not equate to stupid or crazy.

172. Your valley has long been a place of peace and harmony. The orcs do not enter, the game is ample and the harvest is always a success. But now fire will not burn and the snow which has never entered your valley before has begun to fall.

173. Evandorf the notorious catpurse has escaped from prison and is on the run. Rumor has it he stole something that the Duke desires. Do you join the team that is going to be sent out after him or do you leave your half-brother to the mercy of the posse?

174. For the dwarven party. The mines of clan Redshield were legendary. Once producing nearly all of the mithral in the region. Then one day the production stopped and the clan simply vanished. Now nearly 250 years later your small dwarven town was attacked and all of the ogres were wielding mithral weapons with the red shield stamp.

At the beginning of each game I used to remind my players that this was a no holds barred, life or death game, and that they should try not to bite off more than they can chew and above all else don't do anything stupid.
Now it's kind of a joke. Every time I sit down as DM I get asked to give the speech.

I like to think of it like a course syllabus. I pull no punches. If you want in you have to accept that. You have a problem with that please refer to the speech.

It is a cheap move. I mean- why would the BBEG sunder the BBN’s weapon, since the BBEG expects to win, and thus he’s breaking his own loot?

Pc’s rarely sunder the Bad guys stuff for that very reason.

Now sure, if it’s a Ogre-bane weapon, the equivalent of “Biter” or “beater”, known and hated by all Ogre-kind, then that’s just good RPing.

Stuff is both a reward for the PC and a reward for the player for having done well. This is why we no longer rain experience points/levels by undead touch.

I have been playing with a magic fearing barbarian that has sundered almost every magical weapon that every BBEG has wielded. It's something of a joke in the group now. We'd get rid of him but he's really good at killing stuff.

I say sunder away. It's a legal tactic and one that is very smart when standing toe-to-toe with a barbarian. I feel like I've read a lot of these threads lately and I just don't get it.

In the last 2 games that I've played:

1. The ranger lost both of his magical weapons.
2. The barbarian lost the arm that was holding his adamantium club.
3. The wizard was hit with a finger of death and rolled a one on the save.
4. The inquisitor was struck blind.
5. The druid lost his pet tiger to a harm spell.
6. The bard back talked to a demi-god and was severely punished.
7. The ranger lost 3 points of dex.

We all walked away saying: "Wow. That was awesome! I can't believe that happened." Because those are the risks you take when you fight Big Bad Evil Guys.

151. Something has begun to taint druidic magic. It's spells have begun to turn. Summoned monsters are uncontrollable. Spells meant to preserve are beginning to corrupt and the forests themselves are no longer safe to travel. The Druids themselves are fearful and those that have tried to commune with the earth have been driven mad...Has mother nature had enough or is there something else tipping the balance?

152. The neighboring kingdom has been destroyed. Refugees tell of a large floating orb that settled over the city and released a destructive blast. Then came the fog. Those that survived the blast were lost to the fog... All you could hear from inside the impenetrable fog were cries and screams of mercy. Wen the fog vanished not a single body was found. Now the orb is slowly moving North towards you. What is this orb? Who controls it? Are those that were taken in the fog still alive?

153. You and your group of bandits have made quite a name for themselves. However, your latest raid on a seemingly nondescript caravan has yielded some surprises. The king and young prince was in the caravan. They were fleeing the castle and they are now your prisoners. The King promises you and your men a title and lands if they could kill the queen, an evil witch.
Whether or not you agree to help or simply kill the king and prince the Queen blames you for the kings death and declares you a blight upon the lands. The bounty on your head has been raised attracting all sorts of unwanted attention. Now the forces of good and those looking to make a quick buck are hot on your tail. Do you fight for the side of good? Simply try to stay alive? Or make a move for the crown?

While I love playing them. I think the monk could go bye-bye.

"If we only had a monk we wouldn't be in this situation" Said no gamer ever.

Sweet! Very excited.

@Mage Everything: I'd be curious to have your inquisitor build, could make a though enemy. And the rage domain, he already spoke of it... the fact that you can't cast while raging is a very, very big downside to a high level cleric.

Thanks for all your inputs guys, I'll look forward a few things!

Here you go:

Every day I would cast magic weapon (+3) and magical vestments (+3 ac).
In battle I tended to buff with judgements(swift) and perhaps on the first round before I close the distance cast a spell (standard) or make a demoralization check, then next round I bane my weapon (swift) rage and power attack. This gets the damage silly high levels and if he is intimidated (and everything is intimidated when you have a +41 modifier) you only have to hit flat footed AC.
Alternatively, you could take the Enforcer Feat, and after the first hit only have to hit touch AC. While the enemy is shaken.

First off... Never take over a city. It's not worth it. Just too much work. You want to be the one behind the scenes pulling the strings not the one who everyone is trying to kill.

A number of fun ideas.
1.Rob from the rich and give to the poor.
2.Become the shadowy leader of the resistance, then volunteer to find and kill yourself... For a price.
3.Yojimbo.
4.Open up a bar.
5.Begin focusing on magic item creation.
6.Begin working out what exactly you would need for a thieves guild. Man power, alliances, items, wealth. Then set at getting it.
7.Use the new found power of the thieves guild to build a school of magic.

88. You have been sentenced to life imprisonment on the isle of Zartacla, the realms harshest prison. On your way there however the ship is caught in a fierce storm and blown off course. With the ship grounded you find yourself on a small uncharted island with unfriendly natives, horrible monsters, and surrounded by thieves, murderers, and worse.

A Dwarven monk/socerer. I had such high hopes for him but only played him in 2 games...

Zimheaho wrote:

Will be starting a new campaign soon and looking for some new and original ideas for bringing the PCs together and/or creating relationships/bonds between them such that the adventuring band is more naturally drawn together. The fact that the players are sitting around a table shouldn't be the basis for their heroes to also just come together.

Everyone starting off in a tavern has been done to death, so I would like to explore some new possiblities.

Any suggestions?

Hello Zimheaho,

I find that shared events make for a better bonding experiance than a backstory that is just on paper. Here are a few ideas.

1. An event such as an earthquake shakes a town sending buildings toppling and creating a deem chasm. The players could be from all walks of life and awaken as the only survivors that are currently at the bottom of the aforementioned chasm. They must find a way back to the surface and encounter some creatures on the way and maybe find out that the earthquake was not as natural as they thought.

2. Players could be from any and all walks of life. They could be from any region and pretty much any race. When a young wizard uses an ancient scroll to summon monsters to aid in his battle the group members find themselves “summoned” and for a brief moment are under the effects of a summon spell. (The monsters have to come from someplace right?) However for some reason the players remained even after the duration. Why? Maybe the gods have plans…

3. A traveler comes into town and does a “show and tell” of some artifacts he found in ancient dungeon. One of the artifacts drop and there is a flash of light everyone is dazed for a moment. Not much is thought at the time bit everyone in the bar begins seeing odd things. Soon it’s reported that a person died, then another. Players discover that the people who were in the bar and saw that flash of light are the ones mysteriously dying. The players characters are the last remaining survivors from that ill fated...

You should add these to the 1001 campaign seeds thread...

To the OP. I recently ran a campaign where the characters were all brought together in order to recover an ancient artifact. Each of the characters were "needed" because of their unique bloodline that enabled them to handle and use said artifact. The wizard was the great-great-great-great grandson of the original crafter. The barbarian the distant relative of the Hero that had the artifact created. The Dwarven monk was the grandson of the dwarf that created the weapon that was then enchanted by the wizard. Etc...

I played up the fact that if I could find another group of heroes I would but they were all the realm had. The fun part was that there was another group of adventurers seeking the same artifact... All were distant relatives and were actually working for the good guys. My team was just a bunch of well meaning saps working for an evil wizard.

Trying to ride flying zombie bears...