spamhammer's page

Have you tried using PHB races? a human, gnome, or half-orc commoner with baseline stats (adjusted for modifiers) is a slightly tougher challenge than a goblin/kobold, but still well within the ability of a 1st level party.

If you want to play up the monstrous nature of the opponents, have them wear masks or dark hoods. Or just give them dog heads and say they're half-gnoll.

Here's a commoner that looks scary, but isn't.

Thuds, Enforcer for the White Tail Gang
CE Male Human Commoner 1

Str 10
Dex 10
Con 10
etc...

feats: Light Armor Proficiency, Martial Weapon Proficiency: Greatclub (probably described as a gargantuan mace)

With leather/studded armor, you can describe him as a warrior, but he'll still be easy to hit. 2-handed weapon means no shield, low strength means no bonus damage. The greatclub's crit makes it unlikely to autokill a PC. It's still possible, but less likely than with most other simple/martial weapons.

And they can all work for a diabolical Duergar warrior (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/dwarf.htm). A couple of fights with these guys, and your players will be second level, and you can crack open the MM and use some orcs, hobgoblins, and so on.

I was asking about combining orders with subscriptions in particular. Thanks for your help, both of you.

To be honest, the reason the NPC notes at the endings of D1 and E1 are so negative is merely because these choice make MUCH better springboards for further adventures involving these NPCs. If everything ends up hunkey-dory with them, then there is no conflict to set up in the future involving them. If things twist out bad for them in the end, suddenly the adventure isn't over on the last page of the module, but rather it has only just begun. This was really my goal with the NPC end notes - a starting place for the DM to take the conflict to new places. You can totally ignore them if you're not interested in pursuing those story lines and proclaim a happy ending if you want.

(snip)

With the "there is no way to simply win win win" aspect is something I find near and dear to rpgs. Heroes don't always succeed and one person's hero is ALWAYS another person's villain. I use the hard choices in rpgs and bring on the bad consequences for evil's actions because I find it more true to life and true to drama (if that makes sense). Again, if it doesn't work for your group, it's pretty easy to alter swiftly in most cases.

As a player/DM, I find too many "unintended consequences" to be very frustrating, because it reinforces the idea that doing nothing would actually make things better in the long run. That said, Mr. Logue is quite right. It's a minor sidebar with ideas on how to proceed with these characters. It can be adjusted or ignored.

Like jwl*, I think the adventures might too dark at times, but it's flavor text that can easily be removed or adjusted. And for all my complaining, I look for to running the Darkmoon Vale adventures because they're solid work.

*Congratulations on your triumphant return to Monday Night Raw, by the way.

Where do I go to change my shipping options for my orders? That is, how do I change when my items ship, as opposed to which service they use.

I've replaced Dragon with Kobold Quarterly. I think KQ really fills Dragon's empty shoes. But Dungeon....she's just gone.

I'm sure once KQ has been going for a while they'll consider the merits of Goblin Occasionally.

It's a two handed weapon, and Nualia has a nifty claw hand; it seemed like it would be a waste if her demon hand was only holding onto the handle of her sword, so the option at that point was to just give her a one-handed weapon so she could make secondary attacks with her claw. I still wanted her to have the biggest weapon she could wield in that one hand, and that's pretty much the bastard sword. In addition, since she's a spellcaster too, she needs a hand free to do the somatic components of her spells; it'd be too awkward for her to not have that hand free, really, to wield her weapon properly AND be able to cast spells as she wants.

I'm a little confused. Is there something in the rules that prevents her from letting go with one hand to use the claw for spell-casting or a natural attack? I understand that you wield the weapon two-handed when you attack, but that doesn't mean they're super-glued to the handle for the rest of the round. Maybe you could argue that letting go forfeits attacks of opportunity with that weapon, but that's why she has an evil claw in the first place.

(I also rebuilt Nualia to accomodate a large party, and gave her a Falchion, amongst other changes. I didn't use the modified AoO rule, but I might in the future.)

I do not expect WotC to make a huge mistake.

In related news, Wizards of the Coast recently appointed Gob Bluth, formerly of the BLuth Company, to head their Paizo Integration Synergy System initiative. I'm sure this will end well for all involved.

Could someone give me a clue if there is going to be any more material about the Lost City of the Elves, besides the Gazeteer? I'm thinking of using it as part of RotRL, either as a replacement chapter 3 or a final swan song for the campaign. I don't mind making some of it up, but I don't want to go too far, only to have it contradicted six months later, as I'm "sharing" the campaign setting with other DMs.

B with a side order of C. I have plenty of material to last me through to the next revision in 2011.

Reasons for B:
-I have 3.5 already. 4th costs money.
-I understand 3.5 already. 4th is a new game.
-I like 3.5 already. 4th might not be as good.
-Paizo is publishing 4-5 campaigns worth of material (including Gamesmastery, natch) in 3.5. At the moment, they have plans for 0 4th Edition games.

Reasons for C:
-You'll note that two of the above reasons are irrefutable, but two are subject to change. 4th Edition might walk my dog and massage my back. Who doesn't want a game system that does that? Until I know for sure, however, I'm sitting pretty with some great 3.5 material.

I'll play whatever Paizo makes.

I'll be more enthusiastic about it if it stays 3.5, however.

I declare this thread the winner.

One of my players offers this nugget, sort of a "Let's Twist Again" to the Goblin's "Do the Twist."

Vence shoots goblins in the head, Vence shoots goblins 'til they're dead.
Stab the heart and slice the eye, Vence will smirk as goblins die.
Vence gots guts and Vence gots skill, Vence will always aim to kill.
Kick them down and stomp the teeth, goblin blood 'dorns Vence's sheath!

As we find out out more about the Gamesmastery modules, I'd appreciate it if Paizo was a little more explicit about which modules happen in which region. Right now, we know that D0, D1, and E1 all take place around Falcon's Hollow/Darkmoon Vale, somewhere on the east Coast of Varisia. Similarly, W1 and D2 share a setting with each other. Unfortunately, all of this information is in random pockets of the message board or the blog.

Since we won't see a comprehensive atlas/gazeteer for a while, it would be aces to know which adventures can be run together as is, and which would require some work.

I am digging everything about Golarion so far, but I wouldn't want my players getting lost there.

Mayor: I must say, I never expected to see Larz Rovanky at the festival.

Lars: NO ONE EXPECTS LARZ ROVANKY!

I'll do whatever Pathfinder tells me to do.

Ditto. As much as I'd like to do my own thinking, I'm at the mercy of my overlords' whims.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned this yet.

I'm guessing the release date is actually Jan 2008, but I'm looking forward to it.

Because No One Likes a Naked Gamer

I beg to differ.

Will the GameMastery modules indicate the specific level ranges for the adventures? Right now the syopses merely say "low-level", "mid-level", or "high-level", whereas the Pathfinder releases at least narrow it down to three levels or so.

I wanted two of the Pathfinder gods to be named "Big Tony" and "Little Tony," but nobody would listen.

House ruled!

As for frog-like creatures to replace kuo-toa, how about bullywugs?

Or even Sahuagin or Skum? There are so many frog-like races in the first MM, cutting two from the SRD doesn't seem to matter.

It is something we are considering. I take it by your question that you would be interested in such a service. Anybody else? For or against?

If "Yes" was a dance, I'd be sahking my booty right now.

The write-up on goblins makes me very excited about the first adventure. Any chance we will see these critters in later adventures or will they remain the big fish in small ponds?

On a slightly related topic, there's something very familiar about Wayne Reynold's goblins.

Wait a minute...

Thanks for the suggestions, especially on what specifically to trim. I think we can squeeze it out just in time.

If they weren't so far into the adventure, I would probably give the character the heroic/villainous exit, but the group is fairly small, and I'd rather not bring in a third-act wonder just for the last few sessions.

(Also, for this character, the villainous exit would be hilariously obvious. Right now, the others see him as a cold-blooded killer who talks to inanimate objects.)

I've discovered that one of my players is starting school at the beginning of June, and I have the daunting prospect of squeezing the final five adventures into eleven sessions.

My current plan is to condense the Prince of Redhand into one session (essentially just the party, with Belakarde's notes providing most of the info they miss), and severely cutting down Library of Last Resort and Kings of the Rift. Will my players lose too much of the experience this way? I think the real meat of the high-level adventures are the trio of Lashonna, Dragotha, and Kyuss, but I don't want them to get burned out on the action.