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All of the guards who were asleep finish getting up out of bed and arm themselves. The three of them bunch together in fear of the monsters on the loose. Alluriel makes her move:
The guard takes a wild swing at Alluriel, but doesn't hit hard enough to knock her out. As a wave of energy passes through the camp, all of the guards seem dazed except for the fellow who dodged the fireball earlier.
I will be pushier going forward. Right after I made the vow to go quicker real life dropped a bunch of crap on my head. This next week or so I'm going to be more reactive, but I should be more proactive after that.
Yeah. You can move and get them into your channel radius. Note that the waking guys are in cloth armor and are still prone. The two guys who are awake are in full plate and have greatswords.
The guard's eyes roll up in the back of his head and he goes completely limp.
Kyra's strike hits home. The unfortunate guard is knocked flat on his back and looks like he had his bell rung. A cleric might describe him as disabled. The charmed guard is shocked by the sudden turn things have taken for the violent. He stops in his attack to turn and address Danira. "What are you doing? I thought we had something special?" The other guard doesn't want to get between his buddy and the drow throwing fireballs around. Fortunately for him, he has another spellcaster to pick on. He moves and attacks Alluriel.
One of the guards manages to interpose his blankets between himself and the fireball. The blanket is turned to ash, but he seems to come through the experience with less damage than the others.
I reached out to Myz. If I don't hear back by tomorrow she'll get "killed" in the confusion of the escape and I'll get an alt on deck for the next scene.
We are still waiting for Danira and Myz unless I'm missing something. Could everybody do a quick check in post to the discussion thread? I've been letting the pace slide a bit but I'd like to speed things up.
Alluriel, the guard looks at you, takes one hand off his weapon to make an obscene gesture, then resumes a two handed grip on the sword.
"Dammit man, pull yourself together!" The non-enchanted guard takes a swing at his friend, trying to knock some sense into him.
The charmed guard staggers back under the assault, but grits his teeth and fights on. "Stop getting between me and my girl!"
His wild swings are ineffective. The guards that are just waking up are busy extricating themselves from their bedrolls and trying to figure out what's going on.
I was kind of waiting for a full round of posts and then got sidetracked by the weekend. Guard actions will be up in a bit.
Just post as you can and once we've posted a whole round I'll write up what happened. If you want to make something conditional you can either write it up as an either/or statement or you can do a post noting that you want to wait to decide what to do and then do another post when the people ahead of you in initiative have gone.
Saves:
Will save: failed
Charisma check: Danira wins Both of the guards are shocked to see Danira casting a spell. "She's not supposed to..." one says, trailing off as the magic takes hold. "WAKE UP YOU IDIOTS!" The enchanted guard, seduced by Danira's honeyed words, draws his greatsword and tries to knock out his former friend with the flat of the blade.
His attack clangs off of his friend's armor, doing no damage. Initiative:
Kyra, Awake Guards, Lucifer, Danira, Waking Guards, Alluriel, Myz.
Danira, I appreciate what you're trying to do here, but per the rules casting stealthily isn't possible without feats AFAICT. Casting a spell is ~5 seconds of chanting and finger waggling plus a light show. I'm open to persuasion on this if you have a feat I missed or there's an argument I haven't heard before. If you're not trying to be sneaky with the spellcasting, please just confirm it on here and we'll go from there.
The guards roll their eyes, then turn back and take Lucas by the arms.
Danira, the guards look your way.
The guard looks at Lucifer without saying anything. A moment passes. Finally, he nods and whistles for the other guard, who breaks off his patrol of the perimeter to join his squad mate. "Help me drag this one off 'is bedroll before he s#+*s all over everything." The two of them approach Lucifer cautiously, intending to drag him a bit away from the others so he can take care of business.
Standard action to unlock.
The guards seem to favor longswords or greatswords as their primary combat arms. Of course, being practical men, they all have a knife or two on their person that would be perfectly usable as a dagger. Those of you who are interested in such things may have noticed a large rhinoceros shaped figure near the party's horses. The rhino's head is covered with a black hood and it's legs are restrained at night by a daunting array of chains. If you look very closely the chains seem to be secured by a lock that looks much like the one attached to your own chains.
Sorry, should have mentioned earlier, if you have a tattoo you're good to go. In my first scan I was just looking for the trait.
The next morning you wake to find that a small note has been tucked into your bed while you were sleeping. Breaking the seal and unfolding it, you read: A fine choice! Your equipment will be stored in the supply wagon, along with maps of the area. The trip will take five nights in all. I suggest waiting until at least the second night to escape. You may do as you wish with the guards. They have all been specially chosen for this mission and will in any event be executed for their failure to deliver you in chains. The note also contains a diagram of a padlock. A red circle has been drawn around an otherwise unremarkable section of the lock. Before you have time to do much more than memorize the location of the circle, the note catches fire and drifts away in a puff of ashes. It's still early in the morning when a troop of guards approaches your cell. Heavily armored, they move with the practiced ease of trained fighting men. Five of them hold you at spearpoint while the fifth secures you in shackles and leg irons. They march you out of the prison and repeat the process as they remove the shackles and secure you to the cuffs hanging from the inside of a prison wagon. The wagon is built neither for comfort nor speed. It's heavily built with thick wooden walls and no windows. Once your entire team is secured in the wagon and it jolts into motion your initial guess that it is completely unsprung is confirmed. Even though you don't have to actively do anything, the wagon ride is tiring. Trying to find a comfortable posture with the limited play allowed by the cuffs is difficult and made more so as the wagon jolts over uneven ground. It's a relief when the wagon comes to a halt. The guards are obviously still not interested in your comfort. They march you off one by one to be trussed up in chains and laid out on flimsy bedrolls. Mindful of the notes' instructions, you spend the first night gathering information. DC 0 Perception Check:
The padlock used to secure your chains matches the diagram from the note. Close examination reveals a hidden catch at the location of the red circle that operates like a false manacle to open the lock. There are six guards. They are all human, and seem to know their way around a fight. They maintain a small campfire that casts a low light on the sleeping group of prisoners. The guards sleep in shifts, with two of them sharing three hour shifts. One of the guards on watch patrols the perimeter of the camp while the other watches you. The guards are disciplined, but not inhumanly so. The night ends uneventfully and you are returned to the wagon for another day of travel much like the first. You are trussed up and put in position to "sleep" much like you had been the first night. Soon enough, the guards have finished with their meal and four of them have gone to sleep.
Let's go with the +2 to a stat or a non-combat oriented animal. You guys should have a healthy amount of non-combat stuff to do. I'm happy for everybody to have good versatility but I'd rather we didn't start out with action economy totally broken.
I'm going to give Kyra until close of business Monday to check in and then tag in an alternate. I want to keep things moving briskly enough to keep everybody interested. Gameplay's looking good so far...
You have time. You don't have your gear at the moment, though. I believe clerics can prepare without a holy symbol but you do need to get your hands on it to cast. For the first week or so I am also open to limited rebuilds as we work out the kinks in gameplay.
I didn't even notice that before. It always surprises me how many races have darkvision. Kind of makes me think of that goblins comic... We are still waiting on Kyra. Also, when you are done discussing and want to register your vote for the next stage in the plan just put it in ooc text over in the gameplay thread. I'll handle the communication of the votes in the narrative. Of course when the vote can be put into action by you guys directly you can just do that in the thread.
Thank you to everybody who submitted. There were a lot of great entries! Unfortunately there are only so many spaces available. Our starting squad will be: Kyra Banior
Please check in on the discussion thread and check out the gameplay thread. The following people have the option of being alts: Silvio Slate
Please pm me if you would like to be an alternate. This could involve filling in should we lose squad members or filling out a new squad if I find the bandwidth to run another game. Also: Seth86 -- I told you your submission was complete when in fact you did not have a background or capture story posted. If you'd like to be considered for alternate status you can write up your background and capture story and send them to me. Thanks again everybody!
You take a moment to study the man in front of you. He's a plain looking man in plain looking clothes. Not what you would expect from somebody who is able to commandeer the warden's office. You're not even sure you would recognize him again if you passed him on the street. If he notices your attention, he doesn't seem to mind. He sets the piece of paper in his hands on the desk and slides it over to you. It's a pencil sketch of a gnome in profile. You can't help but recoil when you realize where you've seen this before. "Gentleman Jack," the man confirms, no trace of mockery in his voice at your reaction. Gentleman Jack. The Butcher of Brastlewark. His diminutive stature belied his outsized reputation. His obsession with his ghoulish "art" of knifework had held a whole community hostage in breathless anticipation of the appearance of his next victim. He had evaded capture until the Hellknights got involved. Nobody would say just how large the task force was that had brought him in, or how many had been lost. "He's been seen in Marmorata, a town in Cheliax near our border. He's turned over a new leaf. Given up the killing for more restrained criminal activity," the man says, grimacing. "His new boss is keeping him on a short leash." You share the man's distaste. Anybody who can keep Gentleman Jack in line is bad news. With a sinking feeling in your stomach you start to realize where this is going... "I don't give two s$&+s for Cheliax, but the last thing we need is a gangster state on our border," the man says. "Your mission is to eliminate Jack's gang and investigate his links to this new kingpin of crime. Kill everyone associated with that organization and you'll have earned your freedom." The implications are just starting to settle in when the man coughs, drawing your attention once more. He holds a small ceramic disc between his fingers. "It's amazing what happens when you get an alchemist and a wizard working together," he says. "This material is perfectly inert. It can be implanted in the human body with no side effects. It won't even show up in general magical diagnostics. But if you probe it too closely..." He sets the disc down and waves his hand over it, muttering a magical incantation. The disc begins to glow bright white and he hastily waves his hand over it again, casting another spell. The disc explodes in a fireball that is contained in a newly revealed shell of force the size of your head. When it dies down a corner of the warden's desk is simply gone. "It reacts badly to attempts to remove it. It also activates on command, of course. Wouldn't want you to wander off, now." With a chuckle, the man continues the briefing. When he finishes you are taken straight to what passes for the prison's operating room where you are put under general anesthesia. You wake with a new scar on the back of your neck. You also have a choice to make. You and your teammates will be transferred to a new government facility. While the guards are not aware of your new mission, once you decide how you want to approach things assistance will be provided to you. Do you want to: (a) Escape in transit while the convoy is moving, (b) Escape in transit while the convoy is bedded down for the night, or (c) Escape after arriving at the new facility? Every morning prisoners are given an opportunity to exercise. You are placed in groups of five and forced to walk several circuits along a line painted on the ground in the prison yard. At the far corner of the yard you will be out of earshot of the guards for about ten paces. This will be your only opportunity to discuss matters with your new teammates before the transfer.
This is the place for rules questions, ooc chit-chat, and basically anything that shouldn't be on the gameplay thread. Some explanatory stuff to get things started: - Please follow the usual conventions for the gameplay thread. This includes bolding dialogue and using the ooc tags for ooc questions. The basic idea is that the gameplay thread should be somewhat readable as a narrative. - The basic format for this game will be as follows: I'll write a bit of the story, then present you guys with a choice. You'll have a chance to discuss the choice in character (usually). Once you've arrived at a decision you'll get some challenges to overcome (or not). Eventually you'll hit another choice and the process cycles through again. Sometimes the choice will allow for write in options and sometimes it will just be choosing from a list. - Sometimes the challenges presented will be in the form of combat. Since this is homebrew there aren't any map pregens available. I'd be ok doing combat in narrative form, but I understand that a grid makes it much easier to see what's going on. I'm open to suggestion as to online map presentation software. Please let me know if you have any questions. Also, if you like you can take this opportunity to introduce yourselves and explain what everybody would know about your characters based on time spent together in prison. The prison experience is a medieval-style supermax. Not totally isolated, but near-total supervision.
Sorry about the delay, decision will be up Friday.
Quick and dirty advice: pick a movie character that you want your character to be like. When confronted with a new situation ask yourself "what would this character do?" and do that. Longer version: You're running into a literary issue here: you want to make an interesting character. You're trying to solve it by adding wacky quirks. The problem is that quirks make a character memorable but not necessarily interesting. An interesting character is a character that when you read about them or watch them you are curious about what they are thinking. You wonder what choice they will make. You speculate about what they would do in a hypothetical situation. What would Conan the Barbarian do if he was dropped into the fighting pits of Meereen with nothing but the sword on his back? I don't know but I'd sure watch to find out. Making a character interesting is a deep and challenging topic. Typically character is revealed by choices. Unfortunately, Pathfinder won't set up like a novel in perfectly providing choices to reveal your particular character. You're not going to get a setup like Mattie Ross in True Grit trying to decide which marshal to hire to track down her father's killer: "Who's the best marshal?" "Hmm, I'd have to think on that. Bill Waters is the best tracker. He's part Comanche; it is a pure joy to watch him cut for sign. The meanest is Rooster Cogburn; a pitiless man, double tough. Fear don't enter into his thinking. I'd have to say the fairest is L.T. Quinn; he always brings in his prisoners alive. Now, he might let one slip by evry now and then, but-" "Where would I find this Rooster?" Also, you don't want to have to provide novel-quality writing to have fun in the game. So, let's use the screenwriting guide to likable characters: Pick at least five of the following:
(example: Inigo Montoya hits eight or nine out of nine) Put them in your background and keep them in mind while you're playing. Behave consistent with the background and I think you'll find you're portraying characters that are fun for you and others to interact with.
This feels like a railroaded punishment. Anything where you have one character or one event just lay the smack down on them is going to come off that way, I think. What I like about the angry mob is that they are put in a situation where they could fight their way out but don't want to since it would involve massacring relatively innocent people. The other thing that might work is to be strict about the daily care and feeding of the troll. Rapidly ramping up the DC of diplomacy checks every day that he doesn't eat a sentient creature, having him tend to try to wander off and snack on bystanders, having to hide the troll from new people they meet or eat the diplomatic consequences, that kind of thing. It's still a little GM punitive but it's also a logical consequence of running around with a freaking troll in tow.
All right, submissions are closed. I will start going through everything tomorrow. Don't expect a final decision before Wednesday. I will keep you posted if it is going to take longer than that.
So what you need is a way to... troll your players? If some of the gnome prisoners saw what happened and had a chance to run on ahead then they could easily have a lynch mob whipped up. That could give the players a no-win situation without feeling too railroaded.
Ok, these are the submissions I see to choose from so far: Picciui . . Afla
If you have posted a submission but are not on the list please let me know. If you would like to make a submission or edit your submission you have until 11:59 pm eastern time on Monday 8/1 to get it done.
Nobody has been forgotten. I'm going to collect everybody into a list for a big reminder post tomorrow. You can edit your character all you like until the deadline.
Let's stick with the race restrictions as given in the original post.
Doing a Blazing Saddles style rolling bar brawl is tough. You could do it up as a Performance Combat kind of thing. Make it so that "winning" means impressing the crowd/the girl/the important NPC. Just knocking out the opponent isn't enough.
@Cam James: If you want to give your character a bonus capabiliy then you will have to invest some resources in it. That's just how the game works. I don't think a single rage power is that much of a burden. I suppose this is a homebrew setting though, so we can be a bit creative. If you want, you can take the combat trait: Strong Leaper: While raging, you may use your strength modifier in place of your dexterity modifier when using the acrobatic skill to jump. @Monkeygod: unchained is allowed. Unchained rogue gets skill unlocks and anybody can take the Signature Skill feat.
(1) If you can figure out a way to do it by the rules then you can. Honestly IMO a 25 point buy gives you a lot of freedom in putting a character concept together. As a barbarian you already raging leaper if you want to jump around. That also lets you build into bestial leaper and raging flyer. (2) Nightstalker is fine. In general monster feats will probably be ok but should be brought to my attention when you use them.
So, it's worth noting that caster level is really that important for landing the spell. It will help you get over spell resistance, its good for increasing the damage of damage dealing spells. However, caster level doesn't affect save DCs. This is a good point. To salvage the tactic, coven works with hexes as well as spells. At level 14/15 the witch has access to major hexes such as Ice Tomb, Harrowing Curse, Waxen Image, and for tieflings Steal Voice.
Also if you want the option between a sword and something whip-like you could be a magus and abuse the heck out of Blade Lash. At level 3 you can take the wand wielder arcana and just go all day with a wand of bladelash in your off hand. Your weapon elongates and becomes whip-like. As part of casting this spell, you can use this weapon to attempt a trip combat maneuver against one creature within 20 feet, and you gain a +10 bonus on your roll, after which the weapon returns to its previous form.
Assuming you've ruled out the Infiltrator Investigator Hitman no fatalities run... Monster Tactician Inquisitor is probably your best bet if you want to do some fighting yourself. Standard action minute/level summon and your summoning ability isn't dependent on your casting stat. Throw the 17 into strength, 14 into wisdom, and get Augment Summoning from the jump. You've also got some nice choices available of domains.
Sorry. Can't talk about Dwarven Fight Club.
I always liked the floating disc hoveround.
Please go ahead and pull me from consideration.
Go asymmetric, go Hard Mode. Rogue and stealth pull/kill all the things a la original Baldur's Gate. Goblin Alchemist with Skill Focus (Stealth), the Silent Hunter trait and a backpack full of smoke sticks. If you max out Dex you'll be rocking +24 to stealth checks (+1 rank +3 class +4 small +4 goblin + 3 focus + 1 trait + 6 dex + 2 dex mutagen). If you can get your hands on 250 gp an elixir of hiding will give +10 to your stealth checks for an hour. Cloak of elvenkind is a permanent +5 for 2500. Or go Kitsune Trickster and max out disguise to go all Hitman on everybody. The tricky part there is actually killing anyone.
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