Thomas Austin's page

Oops, I was a bit late this week, my bad.

Ok, because it's summer, and because I'm out most evenings this time of year, I'm going to have to start updating once every two weeks. The next entry is the longest yet.

Also, if you have any questions, comments, or criticism I'd love to hear it (well maybe not the criticism). ;)

Just to let you know I'm reading and appreciate your work. I like to see the metagame stuff, too, maybe in a

box.

Thanks for the good reading!

I'm glad I'm not alone on this one. While the entire campaign arc is wonderful it looks to me like it might become very tough to run after Scuttlecove (even the adventure under the Isle of Dread looks tough in MHO). I know my players and they want details and story. If I can slice up the content and blend it with few character themed mini adventures then I think it will work for us.

Who knows down the line we can always return to the STAP and complete it.

Ditto here. I'm thinking that the PCs find the cache of shadow pearls in the Crimson Fleet treasury and then have to

- Find out how to destroy them without setting them off
- Until they can destroy them, protect them from theft, retrieval, or actual destruction
- Actually destroy them

This would necessitate a change of some of the info in ToD, otherwise just casting anti-magic shell and stomping them would work. I'm thinking of something like the artifact destruction methods from the 1E DMG.

Tom

In addition to OOTS, I also highly recommend Elizabeth Moon's The Deed of Pakesenarrion. According to the author's notes, she saw a paladin played as "Awful Good" in an RPG session and said "That's not how I'd do it!".

It's fantastic writing, excellent historical research, meaty characters, and real moral development.

Amazon link .

I can't recommend this book highly enough.
Tom

Thanks, y'all. I've been playing since the late 1970s, but some of the 3.5 terminology and rules are new to me.

Interestingly, this encounter was in a published adventure for use against 2-4th level characters. Definitely not a cakewalk at those odds.

Tom

Here are the baddies:
21 generic lizardfolk
3 Warrrior1 lizardfolk
1 Fighter3 lizardfolk

What do y'all think? The RAW about CR seem to break down with these large numbers.

TIA,

Tom

Glad to see new posts here; this is one of the good ones!

Good points everyone.

Secondly the treasure aspect peaves me the most. Should the players have treasure? Yes! Should they get every last item that they desire...in my opinion no.

If this is how you want to play (it's pretty much how I play), maybe the problem isn't the availability of teleport, it's the availability of magic items for sale. If magic items are really special things in your campaign and there isn't a Costco full of potions and scrolls in Sasserine, then the option to teleport back there isn't such a problem. We've been conditioned over the years (especially by computer games) that there is rapid, easy conversion of GP into magic items and back, but it doesn't have to be that way. IMHO, it detracts from the wonder of "wondrous items".

This was covered some in another thread; Mr. Jacobs pointed out that STAP is going to be even tougher in a low-magic campaign, but you can probably find the balance.

Anyway, it's your world, have fun with it.

Tom

Excellent idea to post this journal. I'm kinda lukewarm on Pathfinder so far, so this will give me a great chance to see how it looks in practice.

Thanks!

Tom

(Confessions of a Recovering Munchkin)

Heck, I killed Asmodeus in his throne room with one Bigby's Crushing Hand spell. We even had time to watch Knight Rider afterwards.

Thanks for the suggestion. It's been sitting on my bookshelf for a decade, finally giving it a read. I'm a big fan of his Dinner at Deviant's Palace.

If I can help just one person, just one <sniff> person...

Several campaign journals have made references to "Hero Points". This is a new concept for me, although it kinda sounds like "Good Stuff" points from the Amber diceless RPG.

Can someone explain the rules here? Are these found in a pub somewhere or are they house rules?

TIA,

Tom

My players hate him as well. <snip> Although they still refer to him as Magnum PI.

He looks more like Freddy Mercury to me. Which has soooo many obvious subplot opportunities....

Just a note to thank F2K and his gamers for an excellent read. I'm only on the first page, but I've picked up tons of ideas that I'll shamelessly plagiarize for my First Home campaign, which appears to share some of the same political themes as this one.

Thanks again,
Tom

Tyralandi?

Deserves a bump.....

Tim Powers' On Stranger Tides is one of the best and creepiest pieces of historical fantasy I've read. It's worthy of Lovecraft without being derivative. Zombie pirates, ghosts, evil wizards and witch doctors are wrapped up in a compelling story with three-dimensional characters.

For STAP purposes, vodun zombies are much spookier than the stock version or the ravenous Parrot Island kind, so I'm trying to figure out how to work some in there.

Amazon Link

Enjoy!

These creatures from "Wells of Darkness" are of animal-level Intelligence. Does it make sense that they'd be dealing for the carnal offerings of succubi, and making crude advances on intruders, even if they are corrupted?

I also don't much like that the corrupted template permits creatures of animal Intelligence to have a non-neutral alignment. (The fiendish template, for instance, raises Intelligence to at least 3.) Another example of quirkiness in the BoVD.

This subject is fighting it out with "Kedward Bone's Imp Familiar" for the title of Subjects I REALLY Don't Want to RP.

Awesome RP!

Looking a the drawing of the taxidermist, you just know he's a sleazeball. Probably has a big gold medallion under that high lace collar....

my wife is putting together a ranged specialized fighter (dm wont allow the scout :( in fact core 3 books only) anyway could someone please clarify the stacking of many shot and rapid shot. at 9th lvl can she really fire 6 arrows with three attack rolls simply by taking a -6 to all attacks i know they wont all hit but thats 6d6 potential. make the bow flaming and its 12d6. clarity please...

I don't allow Manyshot, as (for me) it breaks the willing suspension of disbelief. The bow is a "real" weapon and Manyshot smacks more of a tall tale than epic (or even low) fantasy.

(Sorry, I know that doesn't help, but ....)

Tom

So yeah, anyone else do it? If so, what are the names of the campaigns you're currently playing in? If not, any particular reason why you don't feel like naming them?

My current world/campaign is the "First Home of Men and Elves," or simply "First Home." Now that you mention it, I don't know if my players know that or not.

Tom

Just my 2 cents...make Soller Vark more of a threat. TINH has delineated stages where events take place - Vark is the BBEG of his "stage." I thought he kind of got short changed in the write up of TINH.

I can understand how he can't be too tough, since as written he's facing a low level group of PCs.

Make him more than just a common thug. An accomplished down and dirty fighter, skilled with a rapier. Give him some levels of fighter or swashbuckler, and rogue. Make him fight dirty. Besides being a tough fighter, give him an escape route and some surprises.

I don't know...just random musings. Give him a poisoned rapier and a charmed Cloaker that he wears as a cloak, then flings at the nearest PC.

(Am I the only one who pictured Vark with a really thick Cockneye accent?)

Interestingly, the drawing of Vark shows him with a short, heavy cutlass/cleaver-type of knife, but the stat block has him with a rapier and Weapon Finesse. I really see Vark as a brutish Power Attack/Cleave sort of thug, more like his picture than his stats.

Tom

Has anyone started the Stap at Higher levels say 5-7 range and revamped the adventure?

No, but I'm probably going to have to. (Maybe starting ~3-5 vs. 5-7) See some suggestions I got on thread titled "Integration Question".

I plan to only make it a little tougher until Kraken's Cove, when the gloves come off. I'm thinking of the final scenes from Zulu with Savage Zombies.

Let me know what you do, as I may well plagiarize your ideas. I'll do the same.

Tom

Does anybody here does this?

No, but I intend to start now. Thanks for the great idea!

Tom

Not wishing to diverge too much, but what about those crewmembers who man the SW from ToD on? With the passengers off, I'd figure a dozen or so crew so that the PCs don't spend all their time pounding oakum of holystoning the decks.

By the time the SW sails Into the Maw, wouldn't these sailors be some pretty salty dogs themselves? Heck, just to survive being pierside in Scuttlecove you'd pick up a few levels. Makes the Argonauts look like tour boat operators.

And think of the sea stories they'll tell. "Sure, this storm's rough, kid, but there was this one time when I sailed with these four crazy adventurers right into the Abyss itself, I tell ya! Why, just the fish there...."

For what it's worth, I don't think that in most campaign settings allowing a Freedom spell to free Shami-Amourae is either "too easy" or "implausible". Look at Greyhawk. There are probably less than two dozen level 17+ casters in the entire campaign setting who could conceivably know Freedom. Look at Eberron. There are fewer than five such casters. Of these casters, they'd have to pay a stiff opportunity cost to actually know it. Sorcerors would basically never take Freedom; it is just plain stupid to choose it over Time Stop or Shapechange as one of your only ninth-level spells known. Wizards are a little better off, but the fact remains that Freedom is almost completely useless for being a ninth-level spell. Probably no caster in either Greyhawk or Eberron knows Freedom, and that means it can't be bought even if it is within the DMG's price limits.

Remember the Maure Castle adventure in (IIRC) #112? The gnoll cleric got hold of some chunk of Eli Tormorast's body (tongue?) and worked her way up to a level at which she could cast Resurrection. An ally or lover of S-A might well have done the same with the specific intent of taking Freedom if any ol' version sufficed.

I'm of the camp that thinks 7 for a caravel at all times is lenient on the part of the writers of Stormwrack. We used the wrack rules for the game certainly, but once you start reading naval novels (both the Horatio Hornblower and the Aubrey/Maturin series, for me) then you appreciate the difficulty of keeping a wind-powered ship running smoothly.

There are references to ships in those books (and the Aubrey/Maturin author pulled as muc has he could directly from english naval logs for his writing) to ships that work with less tha na dozen crew, but those were always merchants and renowned for their complete inability to maneuver, go fast, or survive in inclement weather unless they could just run in front of the storm.

Also, remember that the ships of Nelson's era were orders of magnitude more complex than the pre- to early-Renaissance vessels used in D&D. Secondly, much of the crew required (about one man per two tons displacement) on those men-o-war were for manning the guns, damage control and making rapid maneuvers in combat, which merchants just didn't have to do.

Up until very recently, ships (especially warships) stood watch and watch, or what we today call Port and Starboard, i.e. two watch sections. Sometimes officers were in more sections, but not always. I've stood Port and Starboard; it's not fun; but you can easily keep it up for a few weeks. Since medieval and Renaissance ships didn't usually pull long stretches underway at a time (SWW is pretty realistic in this respect), these watch rotations wouldn't have been too grueling.

In short, I'll buy 7 as the minimum crew, with 2-3 on watch at any one time and all seven for combat, emergencies and restricted maneuvering details.

Tom

Thomas Austin wrote:

Fake Healer wrote:

Thanks guys, this is what I sent to the player, cobbled together from all your posts, to help the player in question. Let me know what you guys think.

"Firstly, the Leader of your church is Gwynharwyf, an eladrin paragon (a humanoid from another plane of existance), who seeks to to support those who seek to rid the Material Plane of demonic influences. She is not actually a god, but you have 2 choices:

Gwynharwyf, a paragon eladrin, is the consort to Queen Morwel, the ruler of the Court of Stars in Arborea.

Just to be clear: Gwynharwyf and Morwel are both she's?

Tom

I made an assumption with Gwynharwyf but I think I remember the Leader of the Church being a female. Queen Morwel was posted by someone else on the thread who looked to be paraphrasing a Book of Exalted Deeds section, so I took it to be true.

FH

Interesting. I didn't know that eladrins rolled that way.

Thanks guys, this is what I sent to the player, cobbled together from all your posts, to help the player in question. Let me know what you guys think.

"Firstly, the Leader of your church is Gwynharwyf, an eladrin paragon (a humanoid from another plane of existance), who seeks to to support those who seek to rid the Material Plane of demonic influences. She is not actually a god, but you have 2 choices:

Gwynharwyf, a paragon eladrin, is the consort to Queen Morwel, the ruler of the Court of Stars in Arborea.

Just to be clear: Gwynharwyf and Morwel are both she's?

Tom

36 rounds is three and a half minutes, right? Less than one minute each to launch and board small boats? I know that this is fantasy, but that's just awfully darn fast to execute an amphibious assault. Heck, even with motorized boat davits, it takes five minutes or so just to get a small boat in the water. Are these pirates also smuggling amphetamines?

A more realistic timeline might make things too easy on the defenders, so maybe the compression is necessary.

I'm also toying with the idea of an overland assault from the east. That's plausible for the Crimson Fleet and would make the defenders divide their forces. It would also provide the rationale for the victory points awarded for reinforcing the palisade, which isn't attacked in the stock scenario.

Tom

As far as I can tell, this map was designed by M.C. Escher.

Or a Chaotic Evil pirate tainted by the Abyss..... (Johnny Depp voice: "Lemorian Pirate."

Ya want logical maps, fight Lawful Evil baddies!

Honestly, I loved the Escher reference.

Tom

If Lavinia wanted her ship back and had the choice between a 1st level party and a 3rd level party, I know who she'd choose. The reward she can afford may not attract their attention, so it might be good to think of a role-play reason to help her.
They might bump into Kora in the park crying about how her Lady is so sad and her life is such a mess. A painting in her locket (show the Lavinia pic) would get most male adventurers interested in helping her.

Good thoughts. Higher level PCs will also probably make the Jade Ravens rivalry more interesting - the Ravens will react with competitiveness, not so much condescension.

Since two of the players are my wife and daughter, Lavinia's picture may not do the trick. Maybe they're going to be hired by the handsome but helpless Vanthus, after his parents were murdered by his ne'er-do-well sister Lavinia....

Thanks!

Dropping them is far easier for the individual DM than adding them.

Here's another vote against guns. While I have a passionate love for them in this world, they won't be available in my campaigns. Heck, I'm not even crazy about tanglefoot bags and thunderstones.

Dropping them is probably simple in terms of game mechanics (but not if they're a core element of a given NPC, group or encounter), but the pervasive tone of the world changes with the introduction of firearms. It just isn't fantasy anymore. E.G.G. said much the same thing about putting psionics in 1st Ed. That's a much harder change to overcome than subbing out a Wand of Magic Missiles for an M-16. (Anyone remember Bored Flak the Bolt Lobber?)

For those like Mr. Fool who want good firearms rules, an appendix or supplement would be OK, I guess.

Looking forward to August, with or without guns.

Tom

This was a widespread problem. You just need to contact Paizo customer support and they will send you a copy of the map. There was a post about it when the issue came out further down if you want some more information.

Many thanks, Grimmy.

Last week I bought Issue #146 (Serpents of Scuttlecove) at Barnes & Noble. The bag was intact, but there was no "Giant Poster Map!" inside. When I took it back to B&N, neither of the two issues still on the shelf had the maps either!

Anyone have suggestions on a way for me to get a replacement map, other than buying a whole new issue from the back issues part of this site?

Thanks,

Tom

But the map is so freakin' huge that you'd need your whole dining/living room to scale it for minis. ;(

The overview map also features one of my favorite typos ever. Who would have thought that Demogorgon's prison would be populated by angry stockbrokers?