Tacticslion |
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Yeah, book 3/4 is so vague as to possibly be... meh-inducing. But seriously; kids: rails by five. Keep it up. It all becomes worth it, I promise! I want you guys to make it through! I want froggy's Malak's necklace to mean something and get friends back! I want to see <spoiler> get <spoiler>! You guys will LOVE it... IF you keep going hard and make it to the end! Which you can! I believe in you! Go-go good-guys!
NobodysHome |
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Hey, now that they're *finally* exploring the vaults, they may do something unheard of... like... leveling up again!
I think they last leveled up back in February. Since then, it's been a looong series of run-in-circle misadventures.
According to Book 4, they're supposed to be "near 12th level" by the time they hit the last vault. I figure it's been long enough that any of them that survive Vault 1 can go up to 11, knowing that once they're in the final vault they'll get to 12.
Gives them something to look forward to!
EDIT: And yes, they're STILL discussing going after Yog'Oltha at the bottom of the lake. There's obsession, then there's Captain Ahab, then there are MY kids...
Gark the Goblin |
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Too bad they've killed every single NPC they've ever traveled with!!!
They're pretty amazing about that.
Is it any wonder that when I suspected the Muse would be working with them I buffed her with a few levels and a Mythic tier? I figured I needed to keep her alive as a resource for them...
Oh no, I completely missed that. That's terrible.
I mean, my PCs tried their damnedest to do the same, but after Ishirou was killed in a duel to the death died, the remaining NPCs learned to keep their distance.
Except for Gelik, who despite being used as a human shield is too annoyingly lucky to get hurt.
NobodysHome |
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Gelik was the first to die in the entire campaign...
NobodysHome |
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Hmm... there were two players that left the game -- one played a druid, the other a cleric. One of them was around for 5-6 sessions on the island, then got tired of the nonsense and quit, and the other one never bothered to show up more than twice.
I forget which one was Mr. Mediocre (probably the latter), but those are the only two departures.
And the kids keep asking me whether I'll allow another player, and I keep saying, "No, no, NO!!!!!"
Games work best with 3-4 players. They work OK with 6 players who get along well. With 7 players who argue quite a bit, I'm not about to add on to the pile...
Aimless |
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The gunslinger built on all 10s - the player had only applied racial ability score modifiers having entirely forgotten about the character's point-buy pool. Dangit I can't remember the name...
5 players works well too in my experience and in some ways is preferable to only 4. If nothing else, when the RLM shows up and noms on one player, the game should be able to continue with minimal interruption.
NobodysHome |
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The gunslinger built on all 10s - the player had only applied racial ability score modifiers having entirely forgotten about the character's point-buy pool. Dangit I can't remember the name...
5 players works well too in my experience and in some ways is preferable to only 4. If nothing else, when the RLM shows up and noms on one player, the game should be able to continue with minimal interruption.
Ah, that's Deady McDeadDead!
The gunslinger was Izren, and he retired him in favor of the equally-useless ninja Irwin.
One thing I'll say about Pathfinder rules now that I'm running two "uninvested" groups: If you as a player don't pay attention to upping your damage output, then you're out-and-out useless in combat by 10th level if you're not a caster.
A CR 10 creature should have an armor class around 24, with 130 hit points.
I expect a "mediocre build" full-round attacking 10th-level PC to do around 30-40 hit points to that monster, whether it be a 10d6 fireball or a few hits from a Power Attack or crit-focused weapon.
My group has a couple of really nasty hitters. Guests just arrived so I can't do the absolute numbers, but omitting the casters it's pretty much:
Hooken: Around 70 points/round to such a critter.
Malek: Around 40-60, IF he happens to be paying attention.
Templari: Maybe 40-50, but only because of the sword. Without the sword, she would be in the teens and in the lower category.
=============
Kwai Chang: Maybe 15? He's only +10 to hit and does 1d8+5.
Irwin: Even worse. +14 to hit, but only 1d6+1.
So Kwai Chang contents himself with mobility and acrobatics. Having all the "schticks" gone, and not knowing how to generate any damage, Irwin just sits around, watching everyone else fight. He doesn't even know how to use his ki pool, even after I printed it out and said, "You need to be doing these things!"
He isn't invested in building a decent character, so his characters never do damage, so he gets frustrated and doesn't pay attention. And when I took the time to build him a decent character (Blaarg), he promptly killed him off, because Blaarg wasn't "his".
Aimless |
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Surprised that Deady McDeadDead doesn't roll up a bard themed to whatever musical taste suits his fancy. Then he could make himself useful ramping up the rest of the group's ability to bring on the pain with assorted reactive abilities (countersong, distraction, et al) - and wait until he gets within range of those awesome masterpieces!!
Aimless |
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Maybe he isn't the type of player who gets enjoyment from seeing his subtle machinations on party have effect on the enemies as they tear them apart?
Seriously, why don't people like playing buffers more often? :D
I was pawing through the masterpieces the day I posted the above comment. With the several that can benefit from Lingering Performance and that some of them just look like a lot of fun, I know my back-up plan if my current character gets turned into toe jam. Especially once you hit 7th level, the fun really gets going!
" Lemme get this straight, you let loose a riff on your git box as a move action that sets all the bad guys on fire, doing something else nasty as a swift, take a 5-foot step and STILL have a standard action?! " "Yep."
Aimless |
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I've said it before and I'll say it again: Bards are the most OP class in the game.
They can be, especially if they're able to gimp along until they get Versatile Performance.
Starting at 2nd level = convert 1 set of Perform skill ranks into TWO sets of skill ranks at no cost ... hell yeah.
By 10th level a bard can invest ranks in 3 skills and wind up with Cha-based awesomesauce in SIX skills. And they still have 3 other skill ranks/level plus INT bonus (if any) plus favored class bonus (if applied) etc. etc. ... oh yeah, let's bring on some pain.
Lots and LOTS of Extra Performance, plus a few masterpieces ... yikes.
Gark the Goblin |
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5 players works well too in my experience and in some ways is preferable to only 4. If nothing else, when the RLM shows up and noms on one player, the game should be able to continue with minimal interruption.
RLM=Real Life ?Monster?
We recently added a fifth player to our Serpent's Skull game. I kinda resisted it, because it's supposed to be my "run with minimal prep" game, but it's working alright so far. One of the original players is chronically missing so the fifth player ensures they're always at least at the power level the book expects. But as they gain more system mastery (and assuming the absent player changes her ways), I'll have to add more enemies to compensate.
At least we don't have NobodysHome's scheduling issues :O
Tangent101 |
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You want scheduling issues? My old tabletop game at the end had two Skype players and two tabletop players. We went six months without a game because of scheduling and finally killed the game.
The Tabletop gamers (who are husband-and-wife) ask if they can do another game, including the husband's teenage son who lives with his mom (previous marriage). Sure, why not? We've had two games in six months. Because it depends on when the son is available, interested, and... *twitch*
The irony is that my Skype group? Four players (and me), different schedules, some work on weekends and others have lots of friends and social lives... and yet we still get together online every three to four weeks without any real problem.
It really depends on the players. Some are great! Some? Make you wonder why you bother trying to schedule these things.
Aimless |
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Why does no one listen to me about this thing? It's very useful...
We use those, wonderful things to implement.
Aimless |
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Aimless wrote:5 players works well too in my experience and in some ways is preferable to only 4. If nothing else, when the RLM shows up and noms on one player, the game should be able to continue with minimal interruption.RLM=Real Life ?Monster?
We recently added a fifth player to our Serpent's Skull game. I kinda resisted it, because it's supposed to be my "run with minimal prep" game, but it's working alright so far. One of the original players is chronically missing so the fifth player ensures they're always at least at the power level the book expects. But as they gain more system mastery (and assuming the absent player changes her ways), I'll have to add more enemies to compensate.
At least we don't have NobodysHome's scheduling issues :O
Monster, yes. Or Manager. Or Mayhem-and-foolishness. Take your pick.
With newer players, a 5th is no big deal as you've seen. Give them a couple-three AP's under their belt and then you can bring on the pain. ;)
NobodysHome |
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New one!!!! I killed Voren this week.
We stopped the session in a sheer cliffhanger, with Athelya having to decide whether to sacrifice her own life to Breath of Life Voren, or whether she lets Voren suffer his bitter fate.
I'll write up the details, but it was pretty much the classic, "Wow! This dungeon is so easy we're just going to march straight through to the end. Hey! Big double doors with a caster behind them? Let's kick it open!"
SOOOOOOO not good....
NobodysHome |
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Caught Between a Rock and an Undead Place
One of the difficulties of recurring villains is putting them in "reasonable" places, and then hoping the PCs don't do anything silly.
Oh, how I wish I'd typed that BEFORE last night's session!
As you may recall, when the party first found Juliver and destroyed her undead pursuers, they saw a clear trail that indicated that both Juliver and the undead had come from the east. Hooken failed his first Survival roll, the party just said, "Meh", and they let the entire incident drop... for well over a week!
So, going over Sozothala's options, he could move into a house that had already been infested by adventurers twice, or he could go back to his nice, safe vault, and start building his undead army as indicated in the AP. Guess which he chose to do?
Unfortunately, the party picked up on exactly NONE of the clues that I hit them with. A group of kech zombies who had storerooms full of food and barriers on the inward side of their area? Doesn't merit investigation. Another group of sabosan zombies, again with stores of dried meat and grain and various barriers erected? Not a second glance. No one asked, "Why were the zombies stockpiling food?" No one asked, "How recently were these zombies made?" Just a simple, "Kill 'em and move on" approach.
So after exterminating all of the kech and sabosan zombies, they showed a similar attention to detail in other rooms that should have provided strong hints. The room with the open-air roof, empty army ant nests, and vines coming down from the ceiling? Not worth a sniff. The corridor that was mysteriously named B9 in spite of there being nothing obvious in the corridor? Performing any sort of investigation would be metagaming, obviously. (So yeah, I'm kind of proud that they ignored it, but it wasn't so much a lack of interest in metagaming as a lack of interest in doing anything beyond finding the next fight.) The giant incongruous statue standing menacingly facing the 10' wide stone door? A Detect Magic showed nothing, so it wasn't worth paying any attention to.
However, Athelya's Detect Magic did start someone casting on the other side of the big stone door, and Athelya immediately identified the spell as False Life. So the party dutifully bunched together at the door as I moved Sozothala and his minions into tactical positions on the other side of the door.
The moment Malek pushed open the door, both the mummy's Fear aura and all four ghast's Stench auras hit the party, since they were so obligingly gathered around the door. Irwin ended up paralyzed for 4 rounds, Athelya for 1, and almost the entire party within range of the stenches was sickened. Not an auspicious start. It got worse when Sozothala hit Templari with a declared Ray of Enfeeblement as the stone golem animated behind them and started pounding on Hooken.
After such a catastrophic first round, the party was already discussing running, but Templari wouldn't hear of it, and insisted on staying right there, between two sets of enemies, being pounded on both sides instead of listening to Hooken and moving up the passage to turn the fight from a two-front fight to a single-front fight. (It seems that every time the party fails to listen to Hooken, someone dies. He's kind of the anti-Xethos that way.)
It was ugliness. Templari got hit by an Enervation and lost a level. Both Hooken and Heron got pounded within an inch of their lives before each managed to get out of the golem's reach. Athelya used a fireball to great tactical advantage to eliminate all of the ghasts, the mummy, and all but one of the wights, but Templari had already used both her Paladin's Sacrifices to protect Malek from Mummy Rot, Athelya was nearly dead from the golem turning its attention to her, and Sozothala had still barely been touched (the fireball grazed him a bit). Kwai Chang used smoke bombs to block Sozothala's line of sight, but that also blocked the party's view of him, greatly reducing their effectiveness. Voren used Dispelling Bombs against the golem's Slow (I know, I know, it's a supernatural ability and hence shouldn't be able to be dispelled, but I call "cheese" on that one), and a few firebombs to do some AE damage to the undead (before Athelya roasted them).
In spite of the pounding, the party still refused to move out from between the two sets of enemies. The golem was focusing on spellcasters, so Athelya had to flee, leaving it to Voren to take the pounding. Two rounds later, Voren was dead. Templari raced into the room with Sozothala, hoping to engage him one-on-one, so Sozothala just rolled his undead eyes and cast Darkness. Templari is now blind, alone in a room with Sozothala, and he has a wand of Enervate. You do the math on Templari's chances of survival.
So at the moment, we have:
Barring a miraculous turnaround, I see Templari and Athelya joining Voren before it's all over.
We'll find out next week!
NobodysHome |
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OK, the obit is posted, but it's just a somewhat-abbreviated version of this writeup. So there you go.
NobodysHome |
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This thread will soon be re-titled, "NobodysHome's Lame-*** Excuses".
The moment we got everyone squared away with Wednesdays, Albany High decided to put its open house on... a Wednesday! So we finally finagled things around to play on Thursday of this week, and Albany Middle school put ITS open house on... Thursday!
So feh on you, Albany Unified School District! Your open houses and homework are impacting MY game!
We'll see how Voren's fresh corpse fares next week, but it sounds like action economy dictates that they let dead alchemists lie...
NobodysHome |
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You should check out the pics and see whether you recognize either of the Imps.
Of course, Impus Minor is barely visible in his sleeping bag but hey, it's camping...
Gark the Goblin |
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Does Hooken have the Boon Companion feat yet? I know he's an archer so feats are at a premium, but it's really nice to have an animal companion who can survive extra hits. My Animal domain cleric has it and his pet roc is still kind of a glass cannon, but at least she can't get killed by a few high rolls in a full attack.
NobodysHome |
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Did Major have glasses? I don't think I recognize them. Of course, they tend to transmogrify a fair bit in the MS years. I taught 8th two years ago so if Major is entering HS, he missed me. Maybe to his relief as that was the year ALL the 8th graders did science fair... mwu-ha-ha.
Nah; looks like you missed him. Major was in 8th grade 2 years ago, so he was there at the right time, but he looks very much like he did then:
- Shortest kid in class (both boys and girls)- Skinniest kid in class (both boys and girls)
- Never any glasses
Small world, but not TOO small...
NobodysHome |
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Does Hooken have the Boon Companion feat yet? I know he's an archer so feats are at a premium, but it's really nice to have an animal companion who can survive extra hits. My Animal domain cleric has it and his pet roc is still kind of a glass cannon, but at least she can't get killed by a few high rolls in a full attack.
I'll mention it to him for 11th level. He loves him some Heron, and watching Heron trying to trip the golem was... epic.
Totally ineffective, of course. But epic.NobodysHome |
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That's sad to hear. Evidently it was just her though?
It was an interesting evening.
Long story short, almost everyone died.
Then Bara showed up, giving Hooken the courage to shoot the golem (he'd been hiding around the corner the whole time). Whereupon I learned that golems can indeed be crit. Who knew? 139 points of damage in a single round later, and the fight turned around.
Rangers OP.
Drejk |
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Supperman wrote:That's sad to hear. Evidently it was just her though?It was an interesting evening.
Long story short, almost everyone died.
Then Bara showed up, giving Hooken the courage to shoot the golem (he'd been hiding around the corner the whole time). Whereupon I learned that golems can indeed be crit. Who knew? 139 points of damage in a single round later, and the fight turned around.
Rangers OP.
Rangers are ok. Impus Minor OP.
NobodysHome |
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A Paladin Falls
So we had a couple of weeks off, so rather than bemoan the things the group couldn't do ("You're a 10th-level party and you're flummoxed by a simple Darkness spell? Seriously?", or even worse, "You have a 10th-level divine caster and no Death Ward? What?"), I tried to provide them with some guidance as to things that they could do:
The first round seemed like things were going to go OK. Irwin and Kwai Chang closed in to join Malek against the golem, Hooken ran up the passage, Athelya continued to cower, Voren continued to be dead, and, after getting hit by another Enervate, Templari started heading out of the room and towards the golem.
Then, the wheels fell off pretty darned fast.
Sozothala hit Templari with another Enervate, then moved behind the smoke cloud. (Yeah, a wand of Enervate seems unbelievably powerful to an unprepared party, but a Hasted paladin with Death Ward and Daylight turns that fight awfully silly awfully fast.) Malek moved into the smoke cloud, not realizing Sozothala was behind it, so missed him. Templari couldn't quite make it out of the room, thanks to all the dead bodies. Unfortunately for her, that gave the golem yet another "5' step-and-slam" and it hit her for a solid 20-ish points of damage. Hooken just kept right on running. Apparently he missed the part about, "And turn back around and start shooting." Athelya decided she needed to summon a bearded devil, because, y'know, paladins of Iomedae LOVE that kind of thing. Irwin, determined to maintain Deady's nigh-perfect record of uselessness, fumbled and tossed his sword under the golem. We're all proud of you, Irwin!
About the only things that went right for the round were Kwai Chang hitting the golem with Scorpion Strike (and a natural 20 on its save rendered that pointless), Hooken hearing "something big" coming up the passage and concluding that it HAD to be Bara, and Voren's ability to stay dead.
The next round started with Sozothala, and since I didn't want to give him an unfair advantage, I was having him plan his moves one turn in advance. As scripted, he stepped around the smoke cloud to regain visibility and fired off his Scorching Ray. I looked for targets... and there was no one except Templari to hit.
The 33 points put her to exactly negative her CON. In such situations, I rule that she has until her next action for someone to heal her. Unfortunately, no one could make it in time, so Templari expired on the floor in the middle of the battle. For those of you keeping score, it was Athelya's early fireball that put Templari over the edge, so put another notch in Xethos' belt.
We had another 3-4 rounds of rather mundane back-and-forth as Bara heaved her tremendous bulk up the passage. Kwai Chang and Irwin did a magnificent job of keeping the golem at bay, but got pounded something awful as a result. Irwin had to retreat to Athelya for healing, so Athelya was spending her rounds healing herself, Irwin, or anyone else who came along. Malek suddenly couldn't hit the broad side of a barn, rolling 6's and under his whole time against Sozothala, so Sozothala was Enervating him to death, too. The bearded devil was smart enough to try to sunder the wand, so Sozothala spent 2 rounds sending the devil back from whence it came. Once the devil was gone, Malek was down to 3 levels left and had to flee the room.
Bara finally came around the corner.
Hooken, seeing a 200+-hit-point barrier, stepped out and laid into the golem. A natural 20 on his first shot, plus Manyshot, plus NobodysHome failing to read the rules on Manyshot until now, put him at 8x damage (including two additional hits). 139 points later and the party was feeling better about the golem. Especially when Bara proceeded to grapple it and start swallowing it. It failed to break loose (big surprise) and Hooken rendered it rubble in his next round.
On the other side of the fight, Sozothala, left alone to his own devices, walked up and cheerfully used Animate Dead on Templari's corpse to send a Templari zombie after Athelya.
The next few rounds were hilarious as Malek desperately tried to roll a high enough Handle Animal to convince Bara that there was still a threat. While Malek flirted with his waifu, Athelya started dropping Fireballs on Sozothala. Unfortunately for him, his wand of Enervate didn't work on her, so he was falling back to reconsider his strategy when Malek finally got through to Bara.
Ahem. +24 CMB, a CMD of 35, and a 20' tongue does NOT make for a happy necromancer. Hooken got the kill (of course. Not hard to shoot a grappled necromancer), but Malek failed his Animal Handling again and down the hatch he went! The party is NOT looking forward to 3-4 days of straining through froghemoth poodoo to get the necromancer's surviving magic items.
Fortunately, Malek DID manage to stop Bara just as she started eating Templari's corpse, so there's a plus...
There was a tiny bit of post-fight roleplay, and then the party leveled up to 11.
CorvusMask |
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Meanwhile in Rise of the Runelord campaign I run...
Barl Breakbones is essentially(sorcerer did help a little, but for most parts he was soloing him) dueling party's resident giant slayer while rest of the party is dealing with Lucrecia. First two attack rolls on subsquent rounds(for +22): 1, 2. Doesn't matter how op weapon earthbreaker is when he misses majority of attacks...
...Basically, each time party gets in situation where someone COULD actually die, dice gods say "Nope" :'D This has result in party getting really over confident espicially since none of previous books mooks(goblins, ghouls, ogres...) have been able to pose threat to them.(their main tactic is buffing the fighter, the buffed fighter's ac is impossible for ogres/ghouls/goblins to hit and there aren't many spellcasters in first three books beside as bosses :'D)
So basically I'm here worrying that party will eventually get over their heads hard once in Book 4 the opponents start actually being able to wear them down while in your campaign seems like party gets over confident despite numerous casualties :D
Drejk |
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Early impression.
Bralani azata seems to be a generally better choice (higher attack bonuses, though the damage is marginally lower, has a nice set of spell-like abilities, more AC, better hp, and a nice line-shaped supernatural blast). It has nice defensive abilities, though it has only 10 points of friendly fire resistance
Even babau demon seems to be a better choice in this fight (higher hp, higher attack, acidic slime dealing damage to creatures using natural attacks against it).
Celestial dire lion can deal nice damage, though it's Large size could be a problem, it needs space to pounce to show it's true power comparing to other available summons.