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Any other APs have that "wonderful" feature?
You could always do one of the super dungeons and just mostly hand wave away any of the in-town experiences. Emerald Spire would be well suited for this, especially.
Of the APs I've read, Legacy of Fire is kind of close. There is an early portion with a central NPC in Book 1 and most of the rest of the entirety of the AP (except book 3) takes place in places where killing pretty much everything is ok. The central NPC from Book 1 doesn't really even need to live, though the GM will have to come up with some other hook to move portions of the plot forward.
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(And yeah, I suggested We Be Goblins to him, but he felt that letting the players be goblins would be more than he could handle...)
I ran We Be Goblins once. In the very first meeting with the chief, after the first bit of box text, three things happened.
One player attacked the butler, one backstabbed that guy, and another attacked both those too.
We then still played out the series.
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That's how goblins do.
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Bards and their darned G-spells!
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Bards are the most powerful class in the game.
We resumed after a 3-week hiatus mid-fight, just in time for Gbala to perform the utterly broken, "I'm Hasted, I have Spring Attack, and I have a sneak attack that also drains levels and does bleed."
As written in his tactics, he'd pop up from among the sarcophagi, stab Heron (who was in front), gain a bunch of temporary hit points while draining Heron, then finish his move back in cover so he could Stealth again to repeat this tactic next turn.
The party was Not Pleased.
So for a couple of rounds there was great confusion (and great damage to Heron) as some of the party (Kwai Chang and Malek) decided to engage the rawbones, while others gathered to try to figure out what to do about Mr. Hidey-Stab. Unfortunately, Malek ran into the rawbones' nausea field, and decided to decorate the floor with bugs, worms, small rocks, some mud, and whatever else it is that gripplis eat. More time was lost as Voren put Delay Poison on him. (While technically the rawbones' aura does not allow for immunity to poison, it is SO similar to the Stench ability that I granted that those with immunity to poison (Voren, Kwai Chang, and now, for a little while at least, Malek) were immune to it.)
Narlock had finally had enough, and the Glitterdust spamming began. Take a look at Glitterdust. A 2nd-level bard spell that hits a 10' radius (rather huge), no SR, no save, and you're visible (or you get -40 to Stealth). And don't get me started on Grease. If you've read either my CotCT or RotRL journals, you know Grease has been the bane of my bad guys' existences for years.
Gbala was lucky in that Narlock's first cast missed him. Hooken had dropped his useless lions in to harass Gbala, and Gbala had finally taken a position where he could get Stealth on everyone, the lions included, so he was away from where Narlock thought he was. Heron retreated to the rawbones' room, only to fail his save and start throwing up all over Malek.
Yeah. Malek had a messy night.
The next few rounds were interesting. The Hasted Gbala went around the back way to flank the party. Hooken did not want Heron suffering any more damage, so he obliterated the rawbones. I couldn't say I was particularly sad. Kwai Chang was taking on the rawbones, and for two rounds in a row it had rolled natural 1's trying to hit him. So it wasn't exactly a particularly threatening creature. Everyone stood around wondering what to do about the missing Gbala, and started honestly searching for him. (After the last session of metagamery, it was nice seeing the kids take my tirade to heart and do their best to roleplay what their characters would do.)
Eventually, the party decided that Gbala had fled, and decided to explore the next room, leaving the still-nauseated Heron all by his lonesome.
I felt bad. Gbala came running up to the near-helpless Heron. However, Heron has scent, so I ruled he knew that something new had come near, even though he couldn't tell what. Everyone came running back to Heron. Narlock's second Glitterdust was off-target again, thank goodness. Hooken ran up right next to Gbala's hiding location, and Gbala delighted in knowing he would be able to kill both the ranger and his pet.
Then, Malek happened.
Malek tried to run directly into Gbala's square, so Gbala stabbed him. He took his next full-round action to rip Malek for 6 more levels. One move, 8 levels. Malek Did Not Like.
Unfortunately, this was the point at which the Wheels Fell Off.
Narlock, finally able to see Gbala, hit him with Glitterdust. Of COURSE he had to blow his save, losing both his Dex bonus and another -2 off his AC to ranged attacks. Which brought up the Hasted Hooken.
Ow, ow, ow. 169 points later, Gbala was pondering the wisdom of his undead life.
Malek, not appreciating the level drain, gave Gbala another good whack before retreating. A natural 1 on the attack of opportunity brought my total to three natural 1's for the night, on a total of maybe 15 rolls. Ouch.
On the other hand, I got to watch Malek fail his Will save to accept a Death Ward from Athelya, her hit him with it anyway using a touch attack, then him roll a natural 20 to resist it. Malek shall not be Death Warded!!!
Kwai Chang ran up and hit Gbala once with his temple sword. After the mayhem that was Hooken and Malek, it seemed trivial. But the 14 points was enough to send Gbala below 0 hit points and the fight was over.
That (plus technical issues) brought an end to our night, and the party will finish exploring the Vault of Silence next week...
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...and for those keeping track, that's another 12 levels drained, bringing the total for this ONE vault to 42(!!).
So... either the PCs are going to start taking the Paranoia condition seriously enough to deal with it so they can Death Ward everyone, or I may be in for an absolute record-breaking run of level drains.
Yeah, Athelya and Narlock tried to make Knowledge rolls to figure out what was going on, but once those rolls were bad they pretty much decided, "Ah, well! Better things to do," and moved on. Pretty much the story of this AP. "Oh, something's happening that's not directly in the path of what we decided we're going to do next? Not our problem (even if it is). Let's move on."
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Our group hated the paranoia part of this adventure.
Yeah: it's a thing that rocks faces off in a really bad way.
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On that note:
No; I hate the spores, too. The fountain'll grant permanent immunity to them... IF they ever find it!
(They already very carefully searched EVERY SINGLE ROOM in the Vault with the hints EXCEPT the one with the secret door, and Hooken's take 10 wasn't high enough so I couldn't give it to them. It was... quite painful...)
Oof.
That is painful...
>_<
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Oops, there goes another Pathfinder camp
It was a short session tonight, as Narlock's player didn't show up, nor did Irwin's, and the group's about to take on the Aspis Consortium once and for all, so next week is going to be one giant battle.
Add to that several massive errors on my part to kill Kwai Chang, and it's probably best that we ended early.
So, the quick highlight tour:
Short two players at 8:20 in the evening (we usually stop at 9), the group chose to call it a night, and have the massive battle next week.
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Oh no. I hope no one important was in that camp?
Not that they're aware of...
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Well, I'm giving Drejk credit here even if he didn't post here. Pounce DOES allow the tiger to rake on its first attack, so Kwai Chang was indeed "nearly dead".
So my only error was the whole, "16d4 instead of 8d4" on the four claw hits. Not hard since I was typing into Roll20, and it was
/roll 4d6+16+8d4+32
Not at all hard to see why I might have changed that to 16+16d4.
Ah, well, no "real" harm done...
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8d4, 16d4, no big deal... it's not like 1d4 is a proper die anyway!
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You can always claim you rolled critical hits for all of the claws and rakes and that you actually lowered damage because you forgot to double Strength bonus to all claws!
Just saying.
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No game last night; Impus Major is being inundated with what can only be described as a punitive amount of homework.
I swear, 7.5 hours of school a day, 3 hours of homework a night, then another 6 hours over the weekend.
Since when did sophomores in high school have 60-hour-a-week "jobs"?
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Always. We just refused to do it and got away with it.
Of course, that was over 30 years ago for middle school so....
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Always. We just refused to do it and got away with it.
Of course, that was over 30 years ago for middle school so....
LOL. Totally different worlds, then. When I was in high school even an hour total a night was considered "excessive", and the breaks were sacrosanct. Impus Major had to do about 20 hours of homework over the winter break.
Not such a great break...
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Speaking of school, homework, and so forth, my 3 high school players requested a break from gaming until after dead week and finals.
Considering Impus Major's workload, I can only imagine that the other two are equally under duress.
Our next game is now scheduled for February 1.
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*sigh*
How is that homework is still interfering with my fun, over 15 years after I am done with school and 12 years since the end of my university studies?
|
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No game last night; Impus Major is being inundated with what can only be described as a punitive amount of homework.
I swear, 7.5 hours of school a day, 3 hours of homework a night, then another 6 hours over the weekend.
Since when did sophomores in high school have 60-hour-a-week "jobs"?
Eyup, that's the struggle. More homework, more tests, less learning. I went from doing 5 hours of homework per week for fun at an alternative middle school to doing 10 hours of homework per week (for not fun) in freshman year of high school. Or at least, that's what I started out doing, but I declined pretty precipitously . . . and then dropped out . . . and then got a GED . . . and eventually got straight As in college.
High school sucks!
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Oh, wait, you are on the late side of the world... :/
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Oh, wait, you are on the late side of the world... :/
Even where you are, it's not February 2 yet.
Look for groundhogs.
(Hmm... the game will be on February 1, but I like groundhogs, so I ain't gonna fix it!)
EDIT: Grrrrrrrr... I cannot frigging BELIEVE it!!!
Parent-teacher night for all 10th-grade parents.
Wednesday, February 1.
Of course.
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Even where you are, it's not February 2 yet.
Oh, wait, you are on the late side of the world... :/
It is now...
Look for groundhogs.
We don't have them here.
(Hmm... the game will be on February 1, but I like groundhogs, so I ain't gonna fix it!)
EDIT: Grrrrrrrr... I cannot frigging BELIEVE it!!!
Parent-teacher night for all 10th-grade parents.
Wednesday, February 1.Of course.
*sigh*
Maybe GothBard could GM the session for change?
...
Now I wonder, would be GothBard as lethal GM for this particular group of miscreants? More? Less?
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*SHE* is in Fremont playing in Shiro's player's Wrath of the Righteous game tonight.
I can just imagine *her* trying to run the kids.
GothBard: You want to do what?!?!
Impus Major: I'm going to lick Athelya all over so she's nice and sticky, then she can roll up the wall like a backwards slinky.
GB: Eeeeeew! No, no, no, no, NOOOO! You all DIE!!! You die, the girl dies, everybody dies! Session over!
Talky: But you haven't heard my idea about where Narlock is going to hide...
GB: I am not listening! Na na na na na na na!
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DANG YOU PARENT-TEACHER CONFERENCE~!
DANG YOU RIGHT IN THE PAPER~!
(I don't actually know what that might mean.)
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Hm. It may say something that, of all my posts in the Serpent's Skull Subforum, going by "newest first" the first four pages are all posts in this thread. Dang it, PTC. Let them gimme my hit! I neeeeeeeeed it! >:I
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To the gypsy whose cat I must have run over accidentally: I'M SORRY ALREADY!!!!!
Yes, our game has become accursed. Cursed? Poorly planned? An ex-herring?
Anyway, two players just informed me they'll be playing in a band concert tomorrow night, meaning a third player will be watching said concert.
Amusingly enough, the "bright" side of all of this is that one of the players injured himself, most likely won't be able to make fencing practice on Thursday night, so we may be able to play on an off night this week.
Otherwise I'm totally forgetting what the heck they're doing.
They're insane, they're travelling with Malek, and Malek is married to a Froghemoth. That's about all anyone needs to know.
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Oh, Gods. GothBard read this thread. And she's going to ask Impus Minor to retire his bard in favor of a Sable Company Marine (a hippogriff-riding ranger) for Crimson Throne.
What do I tell my group of adults when an 11-year-old utterly pwns them?
Impus Minor knows rangers, Lily.
(10 points if you can name that movie!)
In the Line of Fire. What idiot thought it was Legends of the Fall?
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...and yet, this party is so much less dysfunctional than ours...
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...and yet, this party is so much less dysfunctional than ours...
Oh, I've omitted a lot of Malek trying to hump the leg of anything he believes is female.
At least he did, until fear of his waifu set him on the straight and narrow.
Considering she's INT 2 and has no clue what's going on most of the time, it's a lot of fun...
EDIT: And still, last session where those two greater shadows fell in a single round to Kevril's bow-o-doom really show Impus Minor's facility with rangers. Now if only he'd try ANYTHING else in some campaign...
(He's in all 3 of my campaigns, and is a ranger in all 3...)
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...and yet, this party is so much less dysfunctional than ours...Oh, I admit a lot of Malek trying to hump the leg of anything he believes is female.
At least he did, until fear of his waifu set him on the straight and narrow.
Considering she's INT 2 and has no clue what's going on most of the time, it's a lot of fun...
EDIT: And still, last session where those two greater shadows fell in a single round to Kevril's bow-o-doom really show Impus Minor's facility with rangers. Now if only he'd try ANYTHING else in some campaign...
(He's in all 3 of my campaigns, and is a ranger in all 3...)
... says the father who immediately made a Halfling ranger for Mummy's Mask...
>.>
*cough*
... wait, what-
waifu
<snip>
she's INT 2
wat. What happened to that brilliant guide/advice I gave you all earlier?!
*mutters something about ungrateful youngsters, mutter-mutter*
Hmmmmmm... I wonder if now is a good time to introduce a character...
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... says the father who immediately made a Halfling ranger for Mummy's Mask...
Who was dual-wielding daggers using a DEX build.
I can be horrifically inefficient when I put my mind to it...
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... says the father who immediately made a Halfling ranger for Mummy's Mask...Who was dual-wielding daggers using a DEX build.
I can be horrifically inefficient when I put my mind to it...
Belkar? Is that you?
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To the gypsy whose cat I must have run over accidentally: I'M SORRY ALREADY!!!!!
Yes, our game has become accursed. Cursed? Poorly planned? An ex-herring?
Anyway, two players just informed me they'll be playing in a band concert tomorrow night, meaning a third player will be watching said concert.
Teenagers == Curse
Too many social engagements on the calendar ... gaming priority suffers ...| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Well, we're on for tonight, in spite of the horrific weather. (1"-2" of rain per day is about as hard as it gets around here, so it's a "really big storm" for us).
Now, what the heck were the kids doing again?
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Reread the last few entries on this thread to refresh your memory...
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You know darned well I was just kidding. After the Aspis Consortium sacked the Pathfinder camp, they're on the warpath to utterly annihilate them.
It's going to be a HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE fight that'll likely go more than one session. We'll see...
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Hmmm.... 6:30 pm... Check! Talky here? Check!
Anyone else here?
Hello? Helloooooooo?
Maybe when I asked, 'Are you all free on Thursday?', they thought I was just curious about their social lives...
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OK, they showed up and had quite the session... writeup tomorrow, depending on how long it takes me to write up my labs for work...
Hey! NH!
Want a totally weird quasi-thematic monster to throw at them?
'Cause if so...
(Yes, that means all that aren't NH's players are immune. ;P)
EDIT: Oh, and if you want one (or several) you can PM me...
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Let's Do This the Hard Way
We resumed last night after our long hiatus, and after a few short minutes of discussing other options, the kids said, "Heck, no! We're taking out the Aspis Consortium!"
Apparently wiping out the Pathfinders had its desired effect.
Unfortunately, they still strongly subscribe to the, "Act first, think later!" mentality. So they carefully marched down around Captain Obvious' pond and the "temple of many nasty undead" to arrive 400 feet east of the approximate location of the camp. They started casting all their minute-per-level buffs. Then came the "interesting" questions:
So, the whole response was, "Oh, well, so what?"
Hooken with his Woodland Stride had no difficulty whatsover scouting ahead, and Bara's entire response was, "What brambles?", so Malek rode her. Since they were creating the "freaks of nature" parade anyway, Kwai Chang used his Boots of Levitation to float above the brambles, being towed by Hooken. Deciding that Bara might be too big, the party decided to have Kwai Chang carry Malek in his arms, with Bara taking up the rear.
Yes. You are reading this correctly. This was NOT a joke.
Through the bramble-choked ruins strode a half-elf ranger towing his own monk balloon. Beside him was his wolf. In the monk's arms was an armored grippli. Behind them came a tiefling, a dhampir, and a human native. Taking up the rear was a froghemoth.
I swear, San Francisco's Castro Street parade has nothing on this lot.
More joyful still was Athelya's plan to keep them all in a Silence field while they approached, while the others cast last-second buffs before they charged in. Yeah, I didn't say it was a good plan...
So to keep track of it all, we went into initiatives. Unfortunately, we promptly learned that Voren was being left behind. He'd put Fly on Hooken, Athelya had her own Wings of Fire, Hooken was towing Kwai Chang, Kwai Chang was carrying Malek, Narlock's move of 30 was just enough to keep up at the tail end, and Bara just didn't care.
Then came a few rounds of, "OK, this plan was a complete mess. Let's abandon it."
Instead of trying to itemize the whole thing, let's just go for, "What happened when the first guard heard Bara approaching?"
Yes, kids, indeed you had. And she hasn't been seen yet. Wonder where she could be?
Seriously. He walked out of his tent, took 204 points of damage, and was dead before he even saw who was attacking him.
The kids have all kinds of neat theories about the green goo that exploded out of his head when Hooken nuked him.
So we stopped there. Ivo is dead already, the guards have ample targets and good morale, the spirit dancers are doing their thing, and Zakkiya is MIA.
Next week, we resume...
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Hey! NH!
Want a totally weird quasi-thematic monster to throw at them?
'Cause if so...
** spoiler omitted **
Oh, just shoot it on over! Worst case I can ignore it and you can post angry posts at me, as now I know you do...
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Anger! Rage! Fffffuuuuurrrrrryyyyy~!
:D
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Hooken with his Woodland Stride had no difficulty whatsover scouting ahead, and Bara's entire response was, "What brambles?", so Malek rode her. Since they were creating the "freaks of nature" parade anyway, Kwai Chang used his Boots of Levitation to float above the brambles, being towed by Hooken. Deciding that Bara might be too big, the party decided to have Kwai Chang carry Malek in his arms, with Bara taking up the rear.
Yes. You are reading this correctly. This was NOT a joke.
Through the bramble-choked ruins strode a half-elf ranger towing his own monk balloon. Beside him was his wolf. In the monk's arms was an armored grippli. Behind them came a tiefling, a dhampir, and a human native. Taking up the rear was a froghemoth.
This should really be pictured by someone remotely pencil-savvy...
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Are there any FaWtLers who take commissions? I'd commission that! :-P
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Are there any FaWtLers who take commissions? I'd commission that! :-P
David, though his style might be too dark for the silliness that your group is...