It doesn't impact other classes.
Note that taking up Pauls powers would severely stunt his skills, while giving him more spells that he couldn't cast (due to wearing armor), or he'd lose all defensive ability (no armor at all) and lose a lot of his magus ability to fight in armor.
That's why it's considered a neutral merge in the card game.
Neri'd pick up armor expert at tier two which would remove failure for both that and kensai. But the skill hit is the big reason I don't want to do it. Dropping 4 ranks per level is -bad-. Ideally, I'd like a martial class that doesn't have the skills gutted out of it. Ranger is ideal, Fighter could be okay, Rogue is nice, inquisitor seems nice, bard seems like it'd be pretty neutral. Paladin would be hilarious(ly awesome), though unless mdt supports freedom paladins, I don't see it working out. :p. Barbarian would have to focus on spells like chill touch to work... and even then, one could argue 'rage and concentrate on holding a spell are diametrically opposed thought processes.'
There are a few not-so-martial that would also be cool, but off the top of my head, nothing's really clicking.
Losing 4 ranks of skills per level would leave Neri feeling legitimized. A rush of arcane knowledge... but at what cost..? Ew.
Lobotomized* stupid autocorrect. Also, why does autocorrect become word perfect? Am I being trolled by Amazon?
Yes, should the chance ever come up, Kong is more suited to a martial class for the other side of gestalt.
In regards to interaction, I greatly enjoy it, and as long as someone has something to talk about, Neri will be there for it... within reason.
For the sake of moving forward if others would like to... Or for having something to talk about: Neri will supply the adamantine for the picks as swiftly as he can, if that's the direction we opt to go. It'll still take a while though. I suspect Lina will also want a bit for arrows.
Neri's personal 'big' project will be small for now. He's going to have the folks in Lina's compound help him forge some small ingots. Adamantine ingots around 2 ounces each, and mithral ingots around 1 each. The adamantine bigots will have the names of those who have passed on from amongst the gods, if they'll share Harry's name, carved into them. The mithral will be used for the dead villagers. Including the priest if no one objects over much.
He'll return the staff, if no one takes it, to the cavern, and place it with the relief or just in the open if he can't get in. He'll do the same with the adamantine. He'll leave the mithral along the trail leading up, and he'll invite anyone who likes to come with him when he does so.
He plans to do something more, but he doesn't have the skill, time, or materials for now to do much bigger. Likewise, he'll fill any orders for metal from the village or others when possible.
Also,for the sake of two birds with one stone... is there any reason why we couldn't make one of those picks a great sword for Kong? Statswise, it's actually a superior digging tool as long as you don't have to worry about dulling the blade... and I think he'd appreciate it more. :p
Yeah, I don't do that. If you are using a great sword to dig, you don't get full credit for it's damage. It's an inappropriate tool for that, so you get half or quarter damage on it (half for dirt, quarter for stone).
A lucern hammer would be a different story.
Still, an adamantine greatsword hardly seems like a bad idea.
Didn't say it was, just said it's a lousy mining tool. :)
Oh, yeah, I noticed that. My comment really was an add-on, and had little to do with the discussion as it stood.
I was just thinking...if we can manage adamantine pickaxes...well, hey.
Neri will try. If worst comes to worst, we can change the pickaxes into a greatsword while we're away.
How would a hammer work for that sort of thing? Is it just that stone has old school resistance to slashing?
On that note, could we wedge a certain lance into a crevace and hammer..? XD Giant Piton OP?
Also, Kong: How do you feel about wielding a weapon better suited to digging a hole?
As an aside, I still -really- want to play a swashbuckler that wields a pick. But... as cool as it is... it's so mechanically flawed. :(
If we're doing that, note that I have a magic lance and war hammer.
And swashbucklers don't seem to get much bonus from critical hits, compared to other classes, so I'm guessing the pick would just add some old-fashioned Dwarf Fortress flavor.
A warhammer would work as a mining tool (cracking rock) but the adamantine wouldn't do much (being hard as a blunt instrument doesn't make your mass more).
Yes, you could hammer a lance in and do full lance damage, although I think Lina would find a new place to store her lance that you might not find comfortable.
It's not about the stone having slashing resistance. It's about the fact the tool is badly designed for the job you want to use it for. Want to chop down the tree with an adamantine sword, go for it, it's a blade, wood cuts with a blade. Rock doesn't. If you have to have a reason, friction. The blade slices in and after a couple of inches the rock is squeezing on the sides (non cutting sides) of the sword and now it's just stuck.
The game assumes the GM is going to have common sense. An adamantine saw (an adamantine wire with sharpened edge) that's 12 inches long isn't going to be able to cut down a redwood. Even though it says it can be used to cut down trees. Why? Because it's just not the right tool for cutting down a redwood (full grown redwood obviously, a sapling it could cut).
With a bit of magic, we might be able to rig up some sort of perpetual motion device to turn a decent drill, but yeah, picks make more sense than any sort of weapons.
Also, a military pick (what we see on the weapons table) is not actually a proper mining tool—it's just a stick with a spike on the end designed for piercing armor.
Makes sense. Remember, any time I ask for your reasoning on something, I'm not whining, I'm just someone interested in learning about other ideas and concepts. A good enough reason, and you add a 'houserule' to my mind. :)
The inability to get enough leverage makes perfect sense to me. Not to mention, one could argue that a greatsword needs a lot more -space- to be utilized for digging a hole. Such that... while you could probably open a 3 foot wide, six foot tall space with a pick and just keep going... a great sword would require a much larger space to swing decently. That'd -definitely- cut down on the speed at which you could dig, depthwise, if not widthwise. Further, cutting open a larger swath means that you have to work harder to brace the whole thing. Finally, with the need for more space to dig with a greatsword, you'd -also- not be able to pile people in as closely.
So I wasn't trying to argue that it made any sense. I was just seeing whether you'd follow the 'statistics' which were silly, or if you'd go with reason, which I'm completely cool with. :)
Edit: Lina! SHUSH! We're trying to get Kong a reasonable weapon for cheap! :P
Yeah, there's some things that you can use for either.
Warhammers can work, but not swords...
I once had someone argue a rapier was the perfect mining tool if made out of adamantine.
Note the lucerne hammer only works for large caves, but at least it's the right general design. A pickaxe works better because it's the right tool for the job, oddly enough. :)
Why do flanged maces work particularly well? I don't know that much about weapons in -any- sense, that pathfinder hasn't told me (or youtube hasn't given me a crash course on), of course. It'd seem like they'd be on the same sort of level as axes in terms of effectiveness... except suddenly rounded shape. Iunno.
:P As for Rapiers, I totally agree. Almost. Those chinese hook swords have the edge here, though. :P
Same reason a rock hammer works, short wedge shaped surface with a large steel mass behind it. Not as good as a rock hammer, obviously, but the longer lever action allows more force to be supplied.
Under normal circumstances, a flanged mace (or spiked for that matter) would dull to fast to be usable. The advantage of a mining pick or rock hammer is that it's high grade steel and you can continue to sharpen it (that's the reason for the long curved blade, so you can grind it sharp again, over time the pick part get's shorter and shorter).
Adamantine would overcome that limitation of bending/losing edge on the flanged parts. Note I'm only offering non-mining equipment that would work if it was adamantine, not stuff made from steel. Even a crowbill wouldn't work well for long, they were designed for (A) puncturing armor, and (B) damaging defensive structures (wooden walls, morter in walls, etc).
Ah, yeah, that makes sense. Weapons like the horseman's pick or bec de corbin may have evolved from mining picks, but they weren't intended for mining; but making them out of adamantine might help with that.
That said, if it takes too long to get enough adamantine, a regular, non-weaponizable pickaxe made of quality steel should be decent enough for Lina's burly arms.
Yep, and a lot faster to get too.
Jacob: If you haven't picked both your level 2 spells yet, this might be a good place to learn Tongues, since you're the only one in the party who can learn it right now.
mdt: How long would you say the adamant and mithral would take? (I recognize fractions of weight for the adamantine -really- doesn't work that well. I made sure they weren't weaponizable weight, and promise I have zero intention of weaponizing it.) Further, do we have the tools to get something like that done? Neri will hold off on the retraining, possibly. He may just split painting and sculpting.
Also, if we find spellbooks, will Neri be able to learn from them, given that he uses runes rather than pages?
Edit: Adamant and mithral for Neri's memorial project. Not for the other stuff. Though the other stuff also factors in, of course.
You're talking about plaques, which is a thin sheet with engraving, on a stone panel.
Probably a weeks worth of production to handle both the mithral and adamantine.
Pretty much, yeah. Thin headstones. More 'real' sculpting down the line, if he winds up with more time than he needs. As it stands, ingots seemed a lot more likely for Lina's place to be able to do than actual plaques.
That leaves Neri with either mining work (which profession miner he'd be okay with, but strength checks, he'd be useless, or worse, constitution/fort checks), or getting more goodies for Luna during the last months, and pulling metal for other uses during that time. So, he should have 7 more checks for Luna supplies, right? I'll roll those if we don't wind up 'using' those weeks for something else, or leaving earlier, or what have you.
If Neri can figure out the approximate size of the space from tunnels to surface in say... feet or meters, and he could communicate them to Lina's folks, would any of them have the 'profession: miner' to let Neri know how long that would take for the nearest of each option?
Just Lizards?
Just 'people'?
Both?
Also, were Neri's people able to transfer the metal to Lina's place on their own, or does Neri have to?
That'll help to determine if Neri just works at getting Kong an Adamant sword while we work with iron pickaxes, if we -really should- go with adamantine (I'd say it's worth the investment, so we can -dig out- faster.)
@Kong: Any weapons you'd be cool with wielding that's also a mining tool? Also... do you have the proficiencies to even wield a greatsword? :P
As a warrior, of course I have proficiency - with all martial.
Greatsword is a favorite, but Kong would be decent with any good martial two-hander...or even a one-hander and shield.
Ah. Right. Leave me alone with my derpness. I knew that. I couldn't for the life of me figure out why I'd never thought to ask that. XD
Well then, it comes down to how long you want to wait for the weapon. If you're cool with it taking longer, we can go the route of the greatsword. Otherwise, MDT sent us tons of options that could work for both skulls and cave walls, and you could pick one for both. :P
Nothing to stop us from having a greatsword made while we're gone. :)
I'm cool with that.
Picks are fine...can I get a shield, or go 2-handed?
Temporary armor?
You'd need a mithral shield to avoid Arcane Spell Failure... and Lina's people should be able to provide any non-masterwork light or medium armor at a moment's notice.
Either or. It actually helps to be like 'golden pick? Vat use is zis?' *shatters portion of cave wall.* 'Zis... I can use.' :P
Thanks for the update, MDT. Neri will try to get some iron for the guys as well (I -very much doubt- he could get coal short of making it out of wood for steel.). That way the village can have proper tools and such as well.
As for getting kong a dagger, I'll go with mundane materials, cause we're significantly limited at the moment in how much we know we can use.
Are we paused because everyone else is busy, or because no one else has anything to say? :)
If everyone's done with the conversation, then we can happily move on and find out what we can down the line. Neri will want to talk to Luna before she heads off, since no one's -really- had an indepth conversation about this stuff, but aside from that Neri's covered everything but the staff.
I'm sure there'll be more questions that go along with time passing once we're moving again, as there's still a ton of information to gather on our goals before we set our goals in stone. :)
I'm mostly waiting for the group to say they are ready to head out to do A, B, C. I don't like to rush people, that way when their fat is in the fire, they can't say I pushed them out of the frying pan.
:P Yeah, I was mostly sure that it was just that you didn't have anything you could possibly say at the moment. I'm just checking to see if the rest of the group is ready to move on. :) Someone has to be the first to ask. :)
Also, who would get mad at you for their butt being in the fire? It's Neri's fault that he's going to explode himself again at some point. XD
Kong is lean and mean, and ready to go once he's armed.
Fire seems to be Neri's thing, and I don't things any of us are fat. :p
Luna would like to go back to town to tell the others they are leaving but after that she'd have nothing else to do
So in one or several levels, there's a burrow spell that might help with digging if we make the tunnels a priority. But Lina's ready to go wherever, and she's actually trained her mount to fight in hallways/tunnels, so it could come too if people want to take a pack animal with us.
I'll do my best to get that conversation roleplayed out tonight, then I'll know what is and isn't up to Neri for the coming weeks. Most likely, I'm good to timeskip short of information bits and pieces.
For any caves that Neri finds that are connected to the surface aside from the one that looks best for digging down to the lizardfolk (for example, the cave we came in) are there any other caves or tunnel systems near those as well?
What does Mahb and her crew think about us going to meet with lizard people? Specifically about us opening a hole that they could climb out of. Ditto the compound folks. Also, Id. He'll also ask for everyone's name from the village that died.
Anyone who wants to look into this stuff that isn't Neri, be my guest.
Once the mithral armor is done, Neri will get the plaques done alongside some iron picks. After this he'll get the Villagers anything that they need. He'll then pull some adamantine to start on an adamantine pick (Kong's choice on light or heavy, it makes no difference, really for what Neri's doing.). While the Adamantine is starting to be worked, he'll head up the mountain to return staff as well as place the plaques along the way.
After the adamantine is worked, he'll be getting glass materials as well as all manner of other metal and stone and gem that's available to him in varied values until they're done, that way they'll have something to barter with with the lizard people, as a show of good faith if nothing else.
During all this time, he'll spend whatever spare time he has getting more materials for Luna, or scrying for sources for her.
Nope, you don't find any other caves to the surface, that is the best one to approach. It looks as if there may have been more at one time, but they have been filled in or collapsed.
They think you're nuttier than a fruitcake, there's no such thing as lizards in the ground, it's an old wives tale people tell. Those from New York (Luna) have flashbacks of people talking about gators in the sewers.
Good. No dissenting opinions on opening it, then. :) If there'd been stories of a great war,and sealing off the lizardmen who feasted on the succulent flesh of children.... Neri would be scrapping the dig plan. :)
So, barring catastrophic events or a change of heart, I'm thinking Neri will try to carve a map out of metals. The idea is to have various depths as its own thin plate. Carve out the basic shape of one 'floor' on a map like its own road map. That way you wind up with tunnels carved out for approximate depth and such. Then carve another plate the same way, but for the next floor, and so on. Join the plates with a ring, and then we'll have a basic idea of the layout. Where tunnels would wrap around a spot, Neri would use a different metal to fill the space to make sure a wall of rock is still where it should be.
Doing this means we'd have a book that flips out into a full map of the underground area, including the areas where levels meet due to the carvings lining up. He'd take his time on this, so he may not really have any other space for other things... but I figure you'd have to be a moron to go into a cave system without the proper gear,a map, etc... and think it'll turn out alright. About how much would a 'metal book' like this weigh? Also, I'm not asking you to map the full cave system. I just want them to not get lost unless they go out of their way to do so.
For everyone else: Neri would suggest we gather up plenty of supplies. More than we expect we'll need. Food and rope especially. Climbing tools, sources of light as a secondary. Valuables to trade with the lizards and not-lizards as a tertiary. He'd also suggest we all do one final pass of our compounds in full for anything of value or hidden pockets of knowledge before we fully set out.
I'm as ready for 'let's go' as I'm going to get. Luna and I had the mini RP. I doubt it's of much consequence, really, and doesn't at all achieve what Neri was going for, but that's just how it goes. No real change.
Sounds good. Lina's been set on "let's go" for a while.
Sorry for the poor posts and the mistake regarding the question. I thought Neri might have had a vague idea (and didn't think his vague idea was the idea listed, like a derp. :p) of depth of the stone to share, given his experience with the system. Also, though, since we're ramping up for fall break at work, I'm having a little less time to respond, so squeezing what I can in. We get busy here whenever school dies down.
No problem Neri, I wasn't mad, I thought it was funny. :)
Alrighty :p there's no way to know, and the last time I thought folks were just kidding around, they were harboring secret hatred and loathings. Sooo... I'ma play it safe.
In the mean time, Neri doesn't have much to do except 'help' with the digging. That or go home and pull more metal and find more herbs and such for Luna. He kind of figures what she could make would be worth more than what anyone else realistically could in an underground environ. So... Neri digs, or he heads home if it's suggested to him to do so.
Also, did the voices have anything to say on the lizard people to us? I figure they might know something (especially Id, given that he's kinda got a mountain that lets him spy on the creatures), and you said they'd spontaneously mention things without us poking them, and it'd be a -lot- more coherent when they did :P
Oddly, the voices didn't seem to know much about the lizards. The group got vague 'not ours' responses, as if they had nothing to do with the lizards.
Kind of an important note, Neri's probably set much of the caverns to memory in one way or another. He'd have offered to let -others- carry the map and familiarize themselves with how it works if he had it. That way, if they got separated, it wouldn't necessarily mean that they'd be lost without him.
Neri's map is a 15 foot diameter stone bowl full of lava. I don't think he's carrying it.
Now, if you drew a map on some paper (which I'm not sure where you got paper), that would be different.
So, barring catastrophic events or a change of heart, I'm thinking Neri will try to carve a map out of metals. The idea is to have various depths as its own thin plate. Carve out the basic shape of one 'floor' on a map like its own road map. That way you wind up with tunnels carved out for approximate depth and such. Then carve another plate the same way, but for the next floor, and so on. Join the plates with a ring, and then we'll have a basic idea of the layout. Where tunnels would wrap around a spot, Neri would use a different metal to fill the space to make sure a wall of rock is still where it should be.
Doing this means we'd have a book that flips out into a full map of the underground area, including the areas where levels meet due to the carvings lining up. He'd take his time on this, so he may not really have any other space for other things... but I figure you'd have to be a moron to go into a cave system without the proper gear,a map, etc... and think it'll turn out alright. About how much would a 'metal book' like this weigh? Also, I'm not asking you to map the full cave system. I just want them to not get lost unless they go out of their way to do so.
For everyone else: Neri would suggest we gather up plenty of supplies. More than we expect we'll need. Food and rope especially. Climbing tools, sources of light as a secondary. Valuables to trade with the lizards and not-lizards as a tertiary. He'd also suggest we all do one final pass of our compounds in full for anything of value or hidden pockets of knowledge before we fully set out.
:P
I understand if that's a 'no' but I never got a no. :P