r-Kelleg's page

1) Your druid can find interrest in the sewers (full of wild life) the seacost (quite obvious) or even the gray district (not everything is an undead over here). In the first she can meet the wererat, and in the last she can help fighting the undead.

2) in my campaign, they also tried to ask the guard to act. Cressida told her she needed more proof to act and send them to investigate (as it is suggested in the book in fact) and they reached the temple directely by the sewers (thanks to the wererats)

I don't see why giving the BBEG 100% more HP is more acceptable in term of rules coherence than giving more action to the "last one up in the fight". Imho, Giving him more limited use abilities is a complete waste of time if the fight run for 2 or 3 rounds he will not be able to use them anyway. That's exactly my point in fact. A group of six lvl-5 can bring down one 10th Cleric with almost no pain even if the cleric can cast column of fire. Because she will cast one, then she will takes 6 attacks/spell before she can act again...

I also like the hero point idea, but I'm affraid my players will ask for them too :-)

BTW I really didn't know for the 15points for AP.

@Joshua. I think they are 2 level lower than expected by the start of this 3rd book. We are playing tonight (Laori encounter + emperor may be) I'll see how it run.
@MechE. here is how I will probably do:
let see if they can survive at lvl 5 in a lvl 7+ AP. If it become harder, I will not change anything. If it is still too easy. I will use the +2 rules. During that time I will ask them how they feel about the way the game is running.

thank you all for your inputs !

About to run "Curse of the Crimson Throne" and there is a rogue who wants to be able to steal from shops and merchants. Does anyone have any rules for rolling this? Or do I need to create general stats for every merchant?

I was kind hoping to find a chart that had skill level, difficulty of target your are stealing from and either % chance of success or some bonus/penalty to be added to sleight of hand rolls.

it sounds like a skill challenge to me. You might need to fix the DC for each of them.

what about something like this ?

1) spot the stuff. (perception or appraise DC 10?) Failed: nothing to steal. Succeess: you can continue. critical success: get a +2 for the end of the challenge
2) come closer. (bluff or stealth). success:you can continue. critical success: get a +2 for the end of the challenge. Failed, you can try again but the DC increased as the merchant become more and more suspicious.
3) get the stuff (sleight of hand or sense motive) success: you can leave with the stuff, the Challenge ends. critical success: you get one more item. Failed: you get it but you have been spoted. you need to escape
4) escape (escape artist or any other skill that can be used). Failed, you drop the stuff and run away. Critical failure. they got you: you go in jail.

What are the rest of the specifics of the campaign? I am currently DMing a CotCT campaign where I have 6 players, and we're just getting into the final book. I'll post later with some specific suggestions (without spoilers, of course), but give me a bit more details.

What classes/races are your characters?
What point buy or array did you use for stats?
Are you following the wealth in the book?

Quickly, I will say that the Curse of the Crimson Throne AP was written for dungeons and dragons 3.5e, and Pathfinder characters are just innately more powerful than 3.5e characters, so you will HAVE to increase the difficulty of nearly every encounter if you want to keep things a bit dangerous for the PCs. (Danger adds drama, so it's good to at least have some encounters feel like they could end in horrible, horrible death, even if the don't in the end.) In many encounters with BBEGs, I add the advanced template (+2 to all stats) and even add minions on top of that depending on the encounter. Since I have 6 players, I also keep them a level behind where the book expects them to be at any given time - which effectively reduces their effectiveness to that of a party of 5. (Each of their actions are less valuable because their lower attack rolls will miss, or the monsters will resist their lower DC spells.)

Between the fact that Pathfinder creates stronger characters, the fact that the AP expects a party of 4 players and 15 point buy, and where you are actually (most people actually play 20 or 25 point buy for some reason), it could get out of hand quickly. Give me some details and I'll make some additional suggestions.

half elf Magus

they had 25pt. yes, I know it's too much. My main big mistake

for the NPC and monsters I'm using the conversion suggested on the forum. They are lvl 5 at the beggining of the 3rd book. And I did add a little bit of gold (10%) during the first part of the AP.

Thank you :)

The problem with your solution to your perceived problem is it goes against the rules laid out in the game. This in and of itself will cause discourse at your table, which in turn will bog down the game ( at best)or outright break it down. At least that's what I believe would happen at our table, due to the fact that the BBG receives more output per round than the rest of the character's at the table.

You are absolutely right (and this is one of the worst thing in the 4th ed, the difference between encounters and pc)

I might change my suggestion this way. "when one team is fighting at one vs many, the one can act twice. It reflect the last stand heroic fight, even for the npc" in this case the rule is the same for everyone (pc included)

Adding level or feats and so on, don't seems a good idea. Of course you will change the stats, but the fight by itself will not be that different. (in other words, the high priest will still cast one spell on her round and higher is her level and higher are the risk of a TPK imho)
if you played the Curse, you know what the hight priest of Urghatoa looks like. The PC managed to kill her in two rounds thanks to a 1-lvl spell cast by the bard. she acted only one time, then she failed her Saves and was dazed. Then she took 10+ attacks and died. There is no feat that can change this (except on the success failure of the Saving Throw)... I'm not sure I made my point clear :/

thx for your comments anyway !

r-Kelleg wrote:

I'm currently dming the CotCT campaing and my players walked through the 2 first books without almost any casualities. I'm not fond of killing PCs, but it seems a little bit too stressless for them.

Have any of the players complained about the lack of challenge, or is everyone else having fun?

no one complained, but they are less and less cautious, and the what should be epic fights turn out in two or three rounds. Quite frustrating when you prepared it. Still you are right, everybody enjoy the game and that's important.

hi there
I'm currently dming the CotCT campaing and my players walked through the 2 first books without almost any casualities. I'm not fond of killing PCs, but it seems a little bit too stressless for them. I see two resons for this : 1) the cartacters are strong 2) they are six and i'm alone.

Due to the 1st point, there are no risk when they deal with minions
and due to the second, they act 6times when the big bad guy act one.

The classical answer to a big group of character is to add "monsters", but I don't like that. It always looks "overcrowded" or "fake". moreover some BBG just came alone.
An other answer is to boost the monsters, more HP, more AC and so on... but it can lead to a fight where the pc touch only on 20+ and there is no more fun.

So I came to think about this: let the leader of the encounter act twice more often.
In that case, the BBG will act twice when they act 6times. I don't need to add monsters and I don't need to artificially increase his stats.

what do you think about ? did you ever try something like that ?

I copied/paste the dll from on old install (on my previous hd) and the import is working now:)

r-Kelleg wrote:

BTW,

importing files from hero lab crashes combat manager
:///

Try uninstalling and re-installing, then try importing.

I think I may have recreated my Zip DLL problems.

I did

BTW,
importing files from hero lab crashes combat manager
:///

Kyle, it seems there is something wrong in the monsters DB.

1) In the monster/type of monster/ menu, there are 3 strange values:
-294)LE Outsider
-Alignement outsider
-Great wyrm Dungeon dragon

2) the "human" type lead to one single npc.

3) the 12-headed Hydra is probably misplaced in the npc db

----
There are also a few "bugs" that I wanted to report in the monster editor.
1) the skills don't sort in alphabetical order when you add them (unlike the feats, for exemple)
2) in some case you are allowed to add <line feed><carriage return> in the text box and sometime you can't. That's a pitty when you try to copy paste some info. (special abilities for example don't accept multi line copy/paste)
3) last: there is no way to edit/add a source to a monster/npc

tremendous work anyway !
thank you for that !

I will probably play the game in our next session and I decided to custom the Shinglesnipes team. Did someone do this change too ?

here is my team:
Gore and Gree Bognov. Dwarves (ft2/rog3) blockers who resist bull rush and overrun
John half. (urban barbarian 4) Middle field. He is an half ettin with a signle head but an half mind. He is considered as a Large npc for the CMB and CMD . In the match, he will sometime try to grab the pig'holder in order to drop him/her in the pit. (Int check to release her if she had drop the pig)
Jojo the sardine, human (rog5) runner. high dex, acrobtic
One-eyed Henry (he had the lost eye regenerated, but kept his street name) human (fgt 4), middle field. unarmed strike and as many Aoo as possible.
The girl Bertha . Human female. runner (ranger 2/rog 3)
Reef Claw, (ft2/rog3) human. middle field. SoB. he is here to inflict pain and drop down the other team's members (especialy if the opponant is alone and far away from the pig)

they seems strong but I have six high powered PC to manage.
I realy hope they will accept the game :)

I found somewere (I cannot remember were :/) an xls file with about 200 rumors and fact about Korvosa. You might use this to feed your newspaper.
I can send it to you if you want it

my mistake: you are perfectely right. I quote the spell description:
Whenever you are attacked or are the target of a spell that requires an attack roll,

excellent. question closed

the spell says "targeted" not "attack roll", that's the problem. But I will take your comment in my game. Thank you :)

During our last game, the magus cast mirror image.
The bad vampire guy tried to take control on him. The player said: if its a "targeting spell" you first need to determine if it's me or one of my images...

It sounded silly to me as the attack was telepathic and there were only one mind among the magus (image+himself)

what do you think ?

btw I "rolled" for the magus but he succeded his Saving throw

my 0.02c

I put together a data update yesterday and I'll test it on PC tonight. iPad version with data/minor fixes is out for review.

Excellent, my next game will be on friday :)

Kyle, do you plan to recompile combat manager pretty soon ? I miss the poison and disease :-)

Drowlever it won't. Asus transformer is an android platform. you cannot make it run ipad nor windows application (unfortunately)

On the pc version, you can select more than one (by ctrl-clic or shift clic), then right click -> roll attack. But only for those hwo have the same weapon set.

Blood Veil
Level 7 disease, contact or injury; Save Fortitude DC 16
EFFECTS
Frequency 1 day; Effect 1d3 Constitution damage and 1d3
Charisma damage; Cure 2 consecutive saves

excellent.
did you draw a map or something with the wards ?
shouldn't the korvosan guard also available to the players ?

this is how I do it, yes. but it would be more convenient to have more than one "monster" tab. (or a reserve tab from wich you can drag and drop new monsters/npc in a fight)

I also tried to do it with excell but there are soo many flaws in the random table of the book that I pause the project until Paizo publish an erratum

BTW
the gray maiden look like more cavalier than fighter

Gray Maidens (cavalier 3)
XP: 800
Human cavalier 3
LE Medium humanoid
Init +1; Senses Perception -1

DEFENSE
AC 21, touch 11, flat-footed 20 (+8 armor, +1 Dex, +2 shield)
HP 25 (3d10+9)
Fort +5, Ref +2, Will +2; +2 vs. fear

OFFENSE
Speed 20 ft.
Melee mwk longsword +7 (1d8+2/19-20)
Ranged mwk composite longbow +5 (1d8+2/x3)
Space 5 ft., Reach 5 ft.
Special Attacks lion call (60feet, +2vs fear, +1 to attack), charge, challenge (1/day)

STATISTICS
Str 14, Dex 12, Con 15, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 15
Base Atk +3; CMB +5; CMD 16
Feats Iron Will, Quick Draw, Weapon Focus (longsword)
Skills Knowledge (nobility) +6, Knowledge (local) +4, Acrobatics -3, Ride +6, Climb +1, Intimidate +8
Languages Common
Gear masterwork full plate, heavy steel shield, masterwork longsword, composite longbow masterwork (2 str) with 20 arrows

Preparing to enter the latter half of 7 Days, and looking at the Queen's Physicians, I've been considering making them Alchemists instead of Rogues. Looking for feedback on the idea, and also hoping someone already had the idea and has a conversion they would be willing to share/post here.

it was done, (at least by Davaulus) .

Queen’s Physicians (hu alchemist 3)
XP: 600
human alchemist 3
NE Medium humanoid (human)
Init +6; Senses Perception +6

DEFENSE
AC 14, touch 12, flat-footed 12 (+2 armor, +2 Dex)
HP 13 (3d8)
Fort +4, Ref +5, Will +3

OFFENSE
Speed 30 ft.
Melee mwk club +5 (1d6+2)
Ranged dagger +4 (1d4+1/19-20)
Space 5 ft., Reach 5 ft.
Special Attacks bombs (5/day) +4 to attack: 2d6+2 fire DD13 for half
Spells Known disguise selft, detect undead
Spells Prepared shield, expeditious retreat, cure light wound, true strike

STATISTICS
Str 14, Dex 15, Con 12, Int 15, Wis 10, Cha 8
Base Atk +2; CMB +4; CMD 16
Feats Brew Potion, Combat Reflexes, Improved Initiative, Iron Will, Throw Anything
Skills Heal +6, Sense Motive +3, Perception +6, Intimidate +2, Stealth +5, Diplomacy +2, Knowledge (arcana) +8, Bluff +2
Languages Common, varisan, infernal
SQ Fast alchemist, discovery (precise bomb), mutagen, poison use
Gear leather armor, masterwork club, healer’s kit, plaguebringer’s mask

SPECIAL ABILITIES
mutagen (Ex) dex +4 , wiz -2

One "simple" (I guess)addition that would help me is the possibility to have more than one group of monsters. That would help me to preprare in advance the different encounters my players will meet.

thx

Hi, is there a way to add a spell or effect to all the characters at once, instead of one at time? I see that I have the option to delete a spell/effect from all character. If not, that would be a good addition.

Thanks

yes you can select them all (ctrl-A for exemple)or shift/ctrl click to select some of them and then, right-click ... add condition, roll for attack or whatever you need.

BTW, afflictions (poison and diseases) disapeared :-(
excellent job anyway
(roll back to the 1.4.3)

first read this THE COMPLETE Professor Q Wizard Guide

you lost one point in wisdom ?
It's an elf , rght ?

what other classes are in your group ? important for the choice of your spells.

I guess you will choose to bond with an object (no familiar then)

In order to take craft construct, you need to take craft magic weapon & armor and craft wonderous item.
So you have only 2 feats to choose.

On the stuff side, by the book you should have about 33k gold of treasure.
think about your defence first because the wizard is usualy a primary target.
bracers of defences, cloak of displacement (minor) [ask your DM if you are allowed to make it by yourself,if so it cost you "only" 12k]

Long ago , bards could read the history of an object. I did not find any spell that allow to do this in Pathfinder, still it might be interresting to cast a misdirection on the forged paper in order to make them "old". (Another way is to travel back in time in order to write the paper, but it can be a little bit difficult;-) )

According to the anti magic field, your spell resistance will not help the eidolon . The SR should be on it. SR on an armor is a +2bonus.

just a question : why did you chose the fighter instead of the cavalier ?
no shield (the lance is one -handed when you ride) ?

I don't know very much about Kazavon's past (except from the 6th opus of the AP)
4043 Kazavon drives the Belkzen orcs from western Ustalav. see Belkzen in the inner see world guide for details (about orc's invasion)

He built Scarwall In the crags of the Kodar Mountains.
He hide his blue dragon's nature under a human appearance until he was defeated.

-armie /orcs/ slaughtering / blood should be in the paintings.

ghost hand is the solution. Cast it and gives it the bullets. the haunted curse will not apply to the retreiving of the amo as they are no more in the gear :)

A raging sword bonded to recall a spell ? This kind of bond is against the sword's will, for sure.
BTW, you need to have the weapon in hand for the bonding effect take place. Is this possible to cast when raging ?

yet another one: the dead warrens

Then you need to start lvl2 for the background.
Trucmuch was a musketeer of the crown. During one very hard battle taking place in a cemetery, he accidentally shot a tomb. A spirit came to him and started to haunt him with many visions of the past and the future. Unable to distinct his targets anymore, he became an Oracle against his will in order to keep control of his visions...

Imho, this is a good super hero's like background :)

That might be fun.
A battle oracle will gain weapon focus and a pretty good init.
The Metal oracle will give you keen bullets at level 6
the time mystery is fun with all those teleport/slow/haste/reroll

Human I guess (for the feats).

BTW why don't you multiclass ?

in this case it's more like the spontaneous casting of the cleric (or of the druid) than a recall of spell.
As I read it. The spellbinder who chose fireball, can "lose" any spell of level 3+ he studied the morning to cast a fireball. If he wants to cast an empower fireball, he needs to lose a 5+ spell he studied.

I don't see why it wouldn't. It allows the caster to swap a studied spell with another chosen one. It still a spell, so metamagic should work. You still need to pay the cost of metamagic, of course.

alternate sewer dens

same problem imho than the above post.

the same in higher resolution

alternate sewer dens
same problem imho than the above post.

I have one Order of the Seal in my campaign. He was "enrolled" magicaly by people he don't even know. SO he is under a quest spell. In fact the silver crusade is behind him.
The only side effect is the quite uselessness of horses in the two first books.

I was not happy with the lavender map from the second book. I felt the rooms were too small, So I redesigned it.

the alternate lavender map

3 options:
1) Obviously they will now search for something to do. Enroll them in the korvosa guard. A flyer announces that the guard is hireing men to help during this trouble time.
2) make them poor. Steal them, or kidnapp one relative, or make them pay some taxes. they will need money, so they will sell the brooch.
3) Use Zelara to send them on the brooch tracks, for one or another reason.

i hope this help