A Madman GM's the Shattered Star AP


Campaign Journals

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Cast of Characters

  • Abba-Zaba CG male aasimar oracle of flames 1st, Alabaster Outcast #1;
  • Kit Kat ?G female human sorceress 1st, Alabaster Outcast #2;
  • Snickers CG male human two-handed fighter 1st, arena fighter guy;
  • Violet Crumble Neutral female gnome rogue 1st, Ex-Sczarni

Yes, the chuckleheads named their characters after candy bars.

House Rules:

  • Natural 20 automatically confirms a threatened critical hit barring extenuating circumstances that thwart critical hits
  • 2 bonus skill ranks per level in Craft, Heal, Knowledge, Perform, Profession or Sleight of Hand to explain how the character earns a living
  • 25 point buy; 20 point buy for the aasimar (the extra RPs come off the ability point buy)

1st Session

Being the character creation and 'getting to know each other' session for the players, we squeezed in the hook and sent the four PCs off to chase down leads in order to find the wayward N.Vencaskersin, take her stuff and optionally bring her in alive for some extra coin.

They go to the pesh junkie's fortune telling tent in the laundry and tailoring district of the city, Violet Crumble has to restrain herself not to sneak around the back, sap the man unconscious and take his stash of pesh. "I've never done pesh before, c'mooon, y'know you wanna..."

Once they pay the man his 15 gp, they go on their way to track down a rumor of Nidalese slavers operating on the sly out of an abandoned tavern in a run down section of the waterfront. They get in about 2 hours before midnight, scout the place out and prepare an ambush.

Violet Crumble situates herself in the rafters overhead. Snickers gets comfortable in the corner behind the front door. Abba-Zaba and Kit Kat crouch down behind the bar. And they wait.

Nearer to midnight Plutivarch Dremis approaches the tavern and notices the quiet rustling of three of the four PCs lurking inside of his tavern. He backs off a bit, pops off a mage armor, slides his wickedly curved dagger out of its sheath and downs a potion of invisibility. Plutivartch sneaks around the back - only Violet Crumble notices the chap sneaking into the tavern.

Violet blows her initiative check which lets Plutivarch zap Snickers and Abba-Zaba with his first color spray of the fight. Nappy nap time for Snickers!

The fight takes roughly 10 rounds, with the entire party chewing on their fingernails as only Snickers was not unconscious from the ensuing battery of color sprays. He needed a natural 14 to not get sent back to nappy-nap land again. Violet Crumble was a snoring crumpled heap on the tavern floor behind Plutovartch. Kit Kat was stretched out on the floor counting sheep. Abba-Zaba was 'resting his eyes'. Abba had managed to score a critical hit with his morning star (4 hp), Violet had skewered him with two sneak attacks from above, only to hate the man with a passion as he drank both a potion of cure moderate wounds and a potion of cure light wounds during the combat to keep standing before he plastered her with a color spray that kerplunked her face first into the floor.

Plutovartch fired five color sprays - exhausting his entire compliment of non cantrips - with his final attempt to subdue the PCs.

Snickers rolls a natural 17 on his Will save not to join the rest of the group in Nappy-Nap Land. Kit Kat was bemoaning the prospect of a TPK barely 2 hours into playing the campaign.

Needless to say, Snickers the Mighty - after fumbling his first attempt to take Plutovartch down - latched onto him like a pesh junky a day without a fix and throttled his sorry ass into Nappy-Nap Land.

Plutovartch was interrogated about the weekly abductions - the dummy promptly told them to ask the Watch, who were all too happy to fork over 100 gp for Plutovartch's nearly naked hide and tell them that the best lead they have ...

Would be learned at the beginning of the next session.

The PCs earned 600 xp in the 2 1/2 hours' meager game time actually played today. Stay tuned some time next month when the fearsome foursome once more do battle with [redacted].


Late night for you, eh? These types of encounters are the ones you most regret as a GM. You almost had the PCs in the coffin, but just couldn't close the deal, and then they pulled out a miracle. And given your tradition for opening day Schallackings (Savage Tide), they probably had good reason for concern.
If you need some bereavement counseling, call me...


K_GM wrote:

Late night for you, eh? These types of encounters are the ones you most regret as a GM. You almost had the PCs in the coffin, but just couldn't close the deal, and then they pulled out a miracle. And given your tradition for opening day Schallackings (Savage Tide), they probably had good reason for concern.

If you need some bereavement counseling, call me...

Oh, as written the potential TPK wouldn't happen no matter what. If it had I would probably chalk it up as a TTPK (Technical Total Party Kill). Script says that Plutovartch is not intent on killing them, merely subduing them, tying them up and attempts to score some favor with the rival to the PCs patron. Luckily for Plutovartch, the PCs overcame the color spray beat down at the eleventh hour.

EDIT: First FULL session hasn't happened yet. ;)

Late night was due to work combined with the game.

There is another house rule in play - oh yes, we're using Hero Points in this campaign. From the look of things, they're "ok", not "game breaking". Naturally, if hero points thwart proper casualties, TCDs will be reported. After all, over the course of a 20 level career, you only get 20 hero points (barring feats and alternate racial traits being selected). At best that thwarts 10 deaths per character. I'll take 10 TCD's per player character! ^_____^

Also, there could be as many as another 3 players attending the next session. So the intent to run the AP 'as is' may go out the window.

deep raspy breathing

All too easy ...

EDIT: During the nailbiting time when most of the PCs were sweating bullets as to getting wiped out to the last in the partial first session, several of them threatened to play Ponyfinder characters. Naturally, that didn't do any good. ^_____^


Hee hee! When's the next session?


Macharius wrote:
Hee hee! When's the next session?

The 23rd. :)

Sczarni

Woot!

Kill zem all!


psionichamster wrote:

Woot!

Kill zem all!

Wait until Carrion Crown begins in (most likely) April my friends...


Oh man, Shattered Star and Carrion Crown? I love it!


Who are the three new guinea pigs? Ineptus?


K_GM wrote:
Who are the three new guinea pigs? Ineptus?

Da Pimp, Ineptus and Torsin are not part of the Shattered Star group. The three prospective guinea pigs are players I've never met before.


No cleric? Or can an oracle handle healing well?


Captain Sir Hexen Ineptus wrote:
No cleric? Or can an oracle handle healing well?

All Oracles get either all the cure spells or all the inflict spells gratis. Unlike most divine casters they do not need a DF for their spells...

Especially a Life Oracle. A human life oracle that takes Extra Channel and Improved Channel at 1st level gets 7/day with a 16 Cha at a DC of 15 or 16. That is usually a reliable DC at low level. not to mention that 7d6 free healing/day to a 1st level party means that they won't likely be using any of those cure spells early in the day if at all.

Granted, with but one good base save (Will), Oracles are often considered squishier...

Sczarni

Oracle can totally handle the healer role.

My Heavens/Haunted Oracle in Jade Regent ko's with color spray, flies all the time, and buffs like crazy.

Tis fun!


Turin the Mad wrote:
Captain Sir Hexen Ineptus wrote:
No cleric? Or can an oracle handle healing well?

All Oracles get either all the cure spells or all the inflict spells gratis. Unlike most divine casters they do not need a DF for their spells...

Especially a Life Oracle. A human life oracle that takes Extra Channel and Improved Channel at 1st level gets 7/day with a 16 Cha at a DC of 15 or 16. That is usually a reliable DC at low level. not to mention that 7d6 free healing/day to a 1st level party means that they won't likely be using any of those cure spells early in the day if at all.

Granted, with but one good base save (Will), Oracles are often considered squishier...

Perhaps if I ever consider re-building da-Cultist I will make him an Oracle.


There are a lot of APs out there now. What made you decide to run the Shattered Star AP?


P.H. Dungeon wrote:
There are a lot of APs out there now. What made you decide to run the Shattered Star AP?

Shattered Star is partially a "multi-sequel" (touching on events from several of the earlier APs, especially CotCT which two of these players went through during our PF Beta-test) and partially a "classic series" of dungeon crawls/other stuff adventures, complete with getting to play with a powerful artifact during the last chapter.

Two of the players are pretty new - one is brand shiny squeaky new to Pathfinder. Since Shattered Star does not have the raw potential for abuseable hosejobbery that CC does, this group is getting Shattered Star.

One of the things I like about it that there are some "WTF?!" moments herein. Just not the kind of "WTF?!" that leads to Sanity loss like there is in CC. Pett's chapter, for example, has a really creative "hill giant fort" with some malevolently entertaining defense tactics.


Well yeah, but that's Pett.


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Orthos wrote:
Well yeah, but that's Pett.

Which makes him so near and dear to our collective hearts. Many players decry his name, but that just means they're sweating buckets like they should be.

Contributor

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Their cries make me smile Turin and Orthos, they must be punished:)


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Richard Pett wrote:
Their cries make me smile Turin and Orthos, they must be punished:)

[deep Yoda voice] They will be. They will be...[/deep Yoda voice]

Just wait until the other group gets to CC:TotB, Mr. Pett...


Turin the Mad wrote:
P.H. Dungeon wrote:
There are a lot of APs out there now. What made you decide to run the Shattered Star AP?

Shattered Star is partially a "multi-sequel" (touching on events from several of the earlier APs, especially CotCT which two of these players went through during our PF Beta-test) and partially a "classic series" of dungeon crawls/other stuff adventures, complete with getting to play with a powerful artifact during the last chapter.

Two of the players are pretty new - one is brand shiny squeaky new to Pathfinder. Since Shattered Star does not have the raw potential for abuseable hosejobbery that CC does, this group is getting Shattered Star.

To clarify a bit: Shattered Star is better suited than CC to new players. All new players' campaigns should incorporate the classic tropes of PF/D&D: dungeons, an artifact, a dragon ... and poo flinging goblins.


And one (1) week from today, we should have the AAR of the Shattered Star's second sesion in.

Will our addle-brained, hapless heroes be masticated into critter kibble?

Will our erzatsz PCs manage to chew bubble gum, kick butt and take names simlutaneously?

Or will they die horribly, eaten/killed by humiliatingly low CR critterbeasties that fling poo?

A week's time (more or less) will tell the tale of foolishness, mayhem and violence! Stay tuned ~23rd or 24th March, 2013!

And in hopefully 2 months' or less time, a seperate group will be slaughtered in horrific and merciless fashion, repeatedly, in the opening chapter of the Carrion Crown Adventure Path. That campaign journal, kiddies, will not be for the wuss of heart. Fear not, gentle reader, for you will not have to weather the Cthulhu d20s of Carnage. Merely, you will cackle gleefully at the hideously messy PC deaths to ensue for the currently-May-2013 start of the dreaded Carrion Crown Adventure Path!!!!


Richard Pett wrote:
Their cries make me smile Turin and Orthos, they must be punished:)

I'm about to go through your play in Sixfold Trial from playerside >_> Don't think I don't know how bad it can get


Orthos wrote:
Richard Pett wrote:
Their cries make me smile Turin and Orthos, they must be punished:)
I'm about to go through your play in Sixfold Trial from playerside >_> Don't think I don't know how bad it can get

We did the play via reading lines interspersed with game play of the nastiness. It was an absolute blast, you're going to love it!


Richard Pett wrote:
they must be punished:)

Amen to that.


Who's running CC, by the way?


Macharius wrote:
Who's running CC, by the way?

That would also be me. CC will be much less "user friendly" than SS is for the PCs. grins evilly


Today the first full length session of Shattered Star takes place. Our fifth player 'Ritter' will be joining us, although Abba-Zaba's player is absent due to his monthly family get together taking place today.

Never fear ladies and gentlecritters, for today Our Heroes tangle with the first real fights of the campaign before heading into the Chapter 1 'megadungeon'.

Will our overpowered hero point laden troupe lay waste to all that they see, or will they die screaming for their mommies in a hail of projectiles and flung poo?

Stay tuned, dear readers, for the first full session AAR of the 'Shards of Sin'.

Cast of Characters (in alphabetical order):

  • Abba-Zaba, CG male Blackened Aasimar Oracle of Flames 1 (absent)
  • Kit Kat, CG female Human Starsoul Sorceress 1
  • Ritter, ?? male ?? ?? 1 - alignment, race and class YTBD - should find out today, hopefully by drowning in 3 feet of sewage
  • Snickers, CG male human Two-Handed Fighter 1 (no-dachi)
  • Violet Crumble, N female Gnome Rogue 1


The first full play session of Shattered Star saw Our Candybar Heroes nearly get their asses kicked by poo flinging goblins.

In the Arvensor, our heroes found Abba-Zaba mired hip deep in both paperwork and red tape. As it so happened, another agent of Sheila Heidmarch - Ritter Kaijitsu - made himself available to Kit Kat, Snickers and Violet Crumble. Sallying forth, armed with a lead regarding one Mister Fenstet the Fabulous, they found his disease-riddled self in his rowboat condo in a particulaly odiferous stretch of "waterfront" beneath the Giant's Bridge.

Fenster, blind in one eye and a carrier of at least 4 identifiable diseases, thoroughly grossed out Violet. They paid him 5 gp and completely hoodwinked him on the "valuable gemstone" (nearly worthless bit of costume jewelry adorning Ritter's tattered noble's outfit. Fenster, so convinced as to the worth of the "gem", appraised it with his milky eye and pointed out Natalya V's semi-delapidated hideout.

Approaching to within 10 paces of the place, the candybar brigade sent Violet ahead to scout as a rogue should. She peered up beneath the disguised shutters on the shack, noticing the teo thugs within. Making a circuit around the place, the appalling stench of sewage assaulted her nose. She heard something slithering about along the back wall and human's weight creaking about in the attic.

She snuck back to the group, they determined to have Violet quietly approach the shack once more to throw open the shutter so Kit Kat could toss a sleep spell into the shack and hopefully solve that approach.

Violet made it to within 10 feet when the usually inattentive guards actually rolled great Perception checks. They called out, and the carnage was on. As was the comedy.

Violet dashed forward and flung open the shutter, Kit Kat's spell sailed in and the two guards took a trip to nappy nappy land. Ritter handed Violet an improvised sap - a stinky sock filled with rocks and sand - while Snickers opened the door into the shack. Violet attempted a nonlethal coup de grace (fail save to not spend an extended stay in nap-land). Instead the thug made the DC 21 fort save, waking immediately.

Long story short, the Candybars wound up butchering the two thugs before repositioning at the only door into the structure.

Violet determined that the door was not trapped. Snickers promptly put his foot through the door, resulting in a tinkling-sounding fecal splattering upon the door and two direct hits with sacks of poo filled with broken glass upon Snickers' foot. And mocking laughter from inside by a trio of sewer goblins.

Scraping his boot upon the door, Snickers made the next booting attempt quite successfully, wrecking the worn hinges in the process. Kit Kat put two of the three little football-headed bastards to sleep (they would drown in the sewage). The third goblin missed pegging someone with his last sack of Trick r Treat poo, only to join his fellows in dtowning to death in the sewage of the entry room's cellar.

A narrow plank led across the sewage to a second door. Ritter scaled the ladder leading up into the delapidated attic, only to have the decrepit thing nearly disintegrate out from under him, dropping him into the 3 foot deep sewage below. Violet was tossed up into the attic by Snickers. Kit Kat pulled her players' traditional "bone-headed moment early in s campaign" racing across the plank and opened the door into the next room.

Unfortunately for Kit Kat, her 12 AC offered little protection from the two Medium heavy crossbow bolts that slapped into her torso, one of them hitting something vital (a confirmed critical hit) putting her well into negative hit points. Luckily she did not flop boneleasly into the sewage, instead flopping back onto the plank that she just came across.

The three goblins that had just fired with their readied actions promptly cackled gleefully at her expense. Violet was rudely surprised by a pair of pet stirges that latched onto the pint-sized self-propelled field ration and began slurping mightily.

Violet panicked and plumetted back down into the first room's sewage with alacrity, hoping that the bloodsucking monsters wouldn't hold their breath.

Of course the hungry beasties held their breath and continued slurping.

Ritter moved over to Kit Kat and magically stabilized her, then Snickers slid the entire plank back out the front door and tipped the woman off of the plank.

During the ensuing comedy hour the Candybar brigade would futilely attempt to get the batskeeters off of Violet, see a lethal crossbow bolt shot into Kit Kat's right eye, Ritter make off with a full stirge to train, Kit Kat's comatose body, Violet hollering that she'd meet them back at HQ and Snickers eating a crossbow bolt in the back for 9 hp.

Due to the fell influence of her Shard, Natalya V. saw an unconscious rival for "sorceress supreme" lying there with 2 heavy bolts sticking out of her chest. "There can be only ME!!" *perforate* And the first PC death. A confirmed criticL hit with a light crossbow via sneak attack and Kit Kat had a bolt buried into an eye socket.

Having already decided to incorporate hero points, I made the call to allow a 1 Hero Point "cheating of death" - at a price. The price for surviving what should have killed you will depend on how you died and how far past your 'death threshold' you went. A few points probably would only cost a finger or toe or something similar. In this case, she lost her right eye (-8 past her Con) but would not suffer any brain damage ( which would start at 10+ past Con).

Kit Kat gladly took the deal, so she suffers a -4 on all vision-based Perception checks until she gets the organ regenerated or she is reincarnated.

They waited several days, weathered the filth fever checks and got Violet's 8 points of Con damage fixed up before they went back.

Violet used her gnomish gift of gab with burrowing animals to chat up the rats snacking on the gory bits still on the floor of the shack to nom a decent-sized hole through the wall. This permitted Kit Kat line of sight and effect on the arbalest toting goblins.

Needless to say, the Candybars exactex bloody vengeance upon the goblins, a goblin snake and captured Natalya V - although Kit Kat went Old Testament on her and gouged out her right eye with her dagger.

Hearing the horrid screams of a woman having her eye gouged out, the ones watching the house stayed right where they were. The candy bars hauled the woman in, blahblahblah'd with Heidmarch, got the skinny on the main thrust of the entire campaign and have the lead on where they will be spending at least the next two sessions (if not 3) happily dungeon crawling to their heart's content.


Turin the Mad wrote:


CC will be much less "user friendly" than SS is for the PCs. grins evilly

And why is that, pray tell?


K_GM wrote:
Turin the Mad wrote:


CC will be much less "user friendly" than SS is for the PCs. grins evilly
And why is that, pray tell?

Let me put it to you this way ... finding two more players would be a good idea.


Remind me never again to type up a campaign journal entry on the 'smart' phone. Stupid predictive text 'feature'.

2,153 XP awarded for the session per character (placing everyone well above 2nd level at a total of 2,753)

Anyhoo, as things stand the Candybar Brigade comprises a roster of five:

  • Abba-Zaba, CG male aasimar Blackened Oracle of Flames
  • Kit Kat, CG/N female Varisian Starsoul Sorceress
  • Ritter, N or NG male Varisian Pack Lord Druid
  • Snickers, CG male Varisian Two-Handed Weapon Fighter
  • Violet Crumble, N female gnome CRB Rogue


Our next session is currently slated for Saturday 13th April 2013.

Will the Candybar Brigade as an APL 3 party manage to get themselves TPK'd?

Will they instead put the villains to the sword and take all of their stuff?

Who are we kidding ... of course we're rooting for a TPK!!

^______^

Stay tuned to this campaign journal, gentlecritters. Same Hack Time, Same Hack Channel!


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1 week to go ... tick, tock, tick, tock... 'til the bodies squick and flop ...


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Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love you, tomorrow, you're only a day awaaaay ...

From piles of precious mangled, masticated and munched upon Candybars!!

Weeeeeeee!!!

^_______^


How did the

Spoiler:
pugwampi
fight go, or haven't they seen the
Spoiler:
Thassilonian puzzle-box
yet?


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Charles Evans 25 wrote:

How did the ** spoiler omitted ** fight go, or haven't they seen the ** spoiler omitted **yet?

They hated it. They are en route to the Crow, during their trip they will conveniently pass a decrepit theatre hosting a (badly done) performance of the King in Yellow...


The good news: 3 TCDs. The bad news: they're running out of hero points...

More details later!


Om nom nom...

Yummy yummy adventurers...


Turin the Mad wrote:

The bad news: they're running out of hero points...

More details later!

How is that a bad thing? :D


As hinted at before, the Candybar Brigade -having attained 2nd level - got the "red neon sign" telling them to go to the Crow, kill everything and take their stuff, specifically the next Shard ofvthe Sihedron.

However, whatsherface that paid them 100 gp asked them to check on another rash of abductions going on beneath the Irespan while da Bosette rounded up a skiff for them to use.

Off they go. The decrepit theatre is hard to miss - there are filthy yellow banners hanging on the front of the place depicting a very unsettling "squiggle". Crumble and Ritter sneak in closer to eavesdrop and see what tthey can.

Sadly, sixteen little beady eyes notice the banded mail wearing Snickers not too far off, alerting their masters. The beady eyes belong to two scarlet spider familiars of a pair of 2nd level adept mini-onions of their Boss.

The Candybars notice that (a) three villains are donned in voluminous filthy robes of the same material & "squiggle" as the banners on the front of the theatre; (b) that all three men are bad, bad performers; (c) that all three men are packing elven curve blades; (d) that all three men are actually half-elves.

Setting about to pick the nearest side door's lock, Crumble botches it and snaps a tool off in the lock. Crumble also notes that the "dog" sniffling at them from behind the door is not of this world. Her and Ritter return, gather their companions, discuss their plans and make their way to the other side door, pick that lock and sneak inside.

Crumble, Rittter and Abba-Zaba do well to hide behind the backstage curtain. Kit-Kat coordinates with Snickers to open the door so that the big meat snack can go in and kick butt.

The "dog" sniffle-whiffles along the curtain but fails to note the PCs hiding behind it.

All hell breaks loose, Snickers takes a trip to nappy-nap land via an adept's sleep spell before the Boss drops him and Ritter into a magical pit 20' deep.

During the fight the Candybars are freaked out by the adepts' tossing of iron pellet grenades into the pit, use a summoned eagle to fetch them out and deposit them close to the Boss, a second pair of grenades gets tossed into the pit, one of the scarlet spiders -the same spider each time - succeeds on saves against charm animal, 2 sleep spells, falling into the pit and at least one burning hands.

The adepts were never harmed. The Boss at one point had been reduced to -1hp after hewing Snickers down, after gutting Abba to 1 hp and slicing through Kit-Kat's entire hp pool to exactly dead with a combination of bull's strength, enlarge person and a confirmed critical hit. Ritter and Snickers, having naturally stabilized, had to be abandoned by Abba and a sleep-KO'd Crumble as they fled the TPK about to happen.

Thus three more deaths. The three PCs were looted, the bodies dumped in the alley along with the 12 commoners and the King in Yellow was an utter failure.

'Cheating death' found our three candybars recovered by Crumble and Abba, returned to da Bossette, nursed back to health after a few days, refitted and sent on to the Crow.

Therein they smoked almost all of the Tower Girls, collected bucketloads of loot and returned to the city to sell their violently gotten gains.


Ia! Ia! Ftangh, garble!

All glory to the great old ones!"


Crazed Cultist wrote:

Ia! Ia! Ftangh, garble!

All glory to the great old ones!"

You didn't think that there wouldn't be at least a cameo by the Great Old Ones, did you?

And now the Candybars have a recurring nemesis...


Silly me, I forgot to update the cast of candy bars:

  • Kit-Kat female Varisian human sorceress 2, Starsoul bloodline
  • Abba-Zaba male aasimar Oracle of Flames 2, burned curse
  • Ritter male Varisian human Druid 1/ Rogue 1
  • Snickers male Varisian human Fighter 2, two-handed
  • and shortest but certainly not least Violet Crumble female gnome Rogue 2

Death tally is 2 for Kit-Kat and 1 each for Ritter and Snickers. Kit-Kat has an impressive facial scar that matches to her empty eye socket now. She is working on becoming a pirate yet! YARRR!!!


So hero points saved their butts?


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Hero Points directly saved Abba-Zaba's butt from being hewn into ham chops - he ate the same sleep spell that Crumble succumbed to, so he burned one to add 8 to his Will save - and he rolled a 2 on the d20. If he hadn't done that, it would have been a full-on TPK.

Hero points provided the game mechanic for why, despite being otherwise messily deceased, three of them miraculously survived comic-book villain style. I prefer the 1 point 'cheating death with consequences' version I'm using instead of the 2 point version in the APG.

[Robocop moment]"You're dead! I KILLED you! You're DEAD!!"[/Robocop moment]

Of all of the PCs, only Violet Crumble has her full allotment as I understand it. The rest are either completely out or only have 1 remaining.

As memory serves:

Ritter got himself critical'd by one of the elven curve blade wielding adepts - he elected to not use a HP to save his bacon from the crit, so instead the 2d10 put him at negative hit points (from which he stabilized, only to get gacked, looted and tossed into the alley with the rest of the corpses). 1 point for 'cheating death'.

Snickers, facing an enlarged 4th level Summoner with the benefit of haste and bull's strength while holding onto the very rope he had just climbed out of that Summoner's pit, took the first chop from the elven curve blade and elected to voluntarily fail his Reflex saving throw (dropping back into the pit), resulting in Abba-Zaba eating the second hasted swing by the Summoner (which put him at 1 hit point).

Poor Kit-Kat ate a confirmed critical by our friendly neighborhood Summoner's ogre-sized self and his 2d8+7 elven curve blade, resulting in exactly enough damage on 4d8+14 to outright kill her.

Luckily for the candybars, the other adept - who still had his last sleep spell up his sleeve, had just spent his round administering one of his Boss' cure light wounds potions - while the Boss downed another one of those potions on his action - instead of tossing yet another sleep spell into the mix.

It was a beautiful first third of the session.


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Looks like Hero Points kept these Candybars from getting...

All Wrapped Up.
Yeah, I've been waiting to use this one. I'm not pathetic at all.

Is this King in Yellow part of the AP, or was that special something cooked up just for this group, Turin?


Talking Skull wrote:

Looks like Hero Points kept these Candybars from getting...

All Wrapped Up.
Yeah, I've been waiting to use this one. I'm not pathetic at all.

Is this King in Yellow part of the AP, or was that special something cooked up just for this group, Turin?

As-written there is a CR 4 ambush waiting for the 1st level party when they step out of the "goblin house". Basically, a TPK. I elected, with player input, to replace the ambush with an encounter of the same encounter rating that, should they have succeeded, would have garnered an additional XP award for rescuing the commoners (+1200 xp for the party).

I awarded half of the combat xp for "lessons learned".

The CSI Miami nod was suitably ....

Tacky.


Turin the Mad wrote:
I prefer the 1 point 'cheating death with consequences' version I'm using instead of the 2 point version in the APG.

I think when I pick up Savage Tide again after finishing up KM, having already told my players I'll be using Hero Points in that game, I may add this option as well as leaving in the original. 2 points to miraculously get out unscathed, luck of the gods style, or 1 point to get out by the skin of your teeth with some kind of aftereffect tacked on. That way if they're skimming low on Hero Points and a nasty crit comes out of nowhere they can still eke out a survival, even if at a cost.

I might also up the total potential Hero Pool, still debating on that. Got a while before it'll be relevant though, my KM group is just edging up on the end of Rivers Run Red now.


I'm liking it a lot, Orthos. In practice, the 2 point version seems to be a good way to wind up dead after spending the 2 points. The 1 point version buys the PC an out (since they're dead for the rest of the fight).

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