A Nation Is Born (Inactive)

Game Master Ryuko

Honestly, I'd prefer not to restart. Can we instead have someone from the original group decide to go back to HQ and report in wherever they were originally charged with clearing out the bandits?

I think I'd prefer we find new blood at the Outpost rather than hit restart

Hey, fellas. I'm quite happy with continuing from where you are if it won't take too much retconning on Ryuko's part. Really it's up to the veteran players and the GM, rather than us. I'm keen to start fresh, that's very accommodating of you, but not if it's going to dampen anyone's enthusiasm. (Nor do I know how far in y'all are.)

I should have Bastagar written up tonight. I've just been rather indecisive about my single feat, given that weapon finesse isn't a requirement. Agile Manevers would be nice now, because I've never liked being totally useless at combat manevers... But with a wizard's BAB that'd drop off almost immediately. Considering my horrific BAB progression (the unfortunate result of multiclassing) I'll have +2 BaB at 6th level...

Two things about that Twigs: 1) Agile Maneuvers is another feat that my houserules fold into the system so you don't need it. And 2) I don't mind people who multiclass using fractional BAB. I know how getting a level or two in 3/4 BAB classes can screw you.

Looks like that's no restart then. I'll have a bit of a time skip and let Kastus have run back for some reinforcements. That'll allow the new players to get here and the older players to get more of a trusting rapport with the Levetons and the prisoners.

Excellent! Could you post a full list of your houserules in the discussion thread, if it's no bother?

Excellent! Could you post a full list of your houserules in the discussion thread, if it's no bother?

I have it available on the Campaign Info tab if you'll look over there.

I understand the issue, Ryuko. Maybe it really would be better if we restarted the whole thing. That way we could also get to know each other a little closer.

Ahh screw it. I'm happy either way

@Alexi: Bro! Where ya bin?

Quite looking forward to playing my ranger in this campaign.

Likewise, Bastagar is ready, so don't hold up on my account. It's been a good day for my PbP's but a bad day for writing backstory (or my essay, at that.)

I haven't been able to write the bleaching into it in a way that I'd like, but once I settle on that I'll have things done.

Otherwise my profile is completely done! My current weapons will likely be replaced as soon as possible, but I wanted to start with something a little rustic for first level rather than the same things I'll be carrying for my entire career.

Edit: Heh. I just realised I've given Bastagar brogues and a shillelagh inadvertently. This may or may not be related to the fact that in my home games all gnomes/fey sport thick irish accents. :P

Done! I hope everything's alright with him. He turned out a lot more like my elf than I'd intended. I guess I'm just fascinated with the idea of playing a long-lived race after playing humans for so long. Also I really, REALLY love the idea for the Bleaching, so I had to use it somewhere.

Ready to start at any time, and give me a shout if you need anything more from me, Ryuko.

All right ladies and gentlemen, I think I'm going to continue the game as we are. Should have a new post up tomorrow and hope to keep it moving from there.

Excellent!

Sweet. Me an twigs are gonna be best pals in this game for a change. Our chars in 2nd darkness hate each other ;)

Yeah, it's great until it destroys the party! I'm enjoying it for the time being as long as no players are put out by it.

Ahh, we will find common ground. Never let a good story split up a party ;)

Yes, I'm actually quite looking forward to being friendly for a change! :P

Moreover I'm super keen to play with Korgun here, considering how fun his GMing has been.

Also an arcane trickster is one of those characters I thought I'd never let to play, but thanks to Ryuko's houserules and a party twice the size of my home group I can finally get away with it. Heres to a long and fruitful game! Hopefully one that gets me to 7th level! :P

so Ryuko who are you taking as players from the recruitment?

Everyone! Which leaves me a little over on PCs but I'm running a 6 player conversion so I think we can hash it out. Besides, leaves me room when some people are busy

Can we please put in a "minimum posting" rule to keep things moving?

Even if your character is just sucking his thumb, a short descriptive post to tell everyone else that you're around and paying attention is just good etiquette. Even just a check-in in the Discussion thread is good.

I find that games die due to a "quicksand" effect where one or two people stop posting regularly, then the rest get out of the habit of posting because they get used to waiting on the slower folks, then weeks go by without activity.

To counteract that, I propose a loose rule of "After 2 days without a post your character becomes a DMPC. After 1 week, you will be dropped from the game."

Even if I'm frequently like that, I agree on Raxus suggestion. I generally post and after I see no response, I stop checking and only remember a couple days later.

I run the two day NPC'd rule too.

I'd be up for that. It really falls on the GM to keep that pace, though, which isn't always a possibility. That said, I wholeheartedly agree. Let's try and do the same here.

I plan on filling out a "tactics" section for Bastagar not unlike those in the Paizo AP's. It should give Ryuko a good baseline to act off of if combat gets bogged down.

Still waiting on that new post! Ready and raring to go!

No probs at all with the DMPC rule. Me and Raxus have been pretty regular and Twigs and Krogun no I'm addicted to these games.

Wow, I'm currently the only female player character.

And I am trying to think of how I got my charter.

Well we could always get a girdle of opposite gender and then Alexei turns into Alexa or something.

Of If we find a druid to revive one of us.
and casts reincarnate, the GM also rolls gender.

Good call, though I hope we don't have to.

Can we run a roll call? I got in the campaign a little time ago and with all the confusion hadn't had a chance to really familiarize myself with everyone.

I can start:

This is Alexei Yoren, Oracle of the Ancestors, Blade of the Fallen Aldori Swordlords. He sees these spirits of warriors long gone and they offer guidance in battle. When the group found him, he was dressed in rags and taken prisoner by bandits, but in the following battle he bedecked himself in spiritual weapons and armor. Since he has just been saved and is quite confused by the whole situation, I've been playing him shy and introverted, but that will probably change in the future as he comes to trust in himself and his abilities.

How're we gonna divide the party loot?

Are we happy to call dibs on stuff and sell the rest.
I'd like.the Masterwork bow and alchemist fire but will defer if others want it.

Also dm, you forgot to add the horses and wagon to the party loot. They are worth quite a bit to a 1st level party.

Also could I buy an Armored Kilt+Haramaki Armor from Oleg with my share?
I know Haramaki.is eastern but it's just a armored belly plate. They had those in Medievil times so should be able to get/make one.

Raxus. Half Ogre Barbarian. Has ogre-like maners and very un-ogre like ideas.

He's big, blunt and has two dogs that he likes more than most people.

He's wearing mismatched hide armor, a toothed necklace and carrying a big spear.

In another game I play in these forums, we split loot the following way:

Let's say the loot consists of:

8 Leather Armors (5 gp x 8 = 40 gp)
Masterwork Chain Shirt (125 gp)
2 Masterwork Hand Axes (153 gp x 2 = 306 gp)
4 Daggers (4 gp)
8 Short Swords (5 gp x 8 = 40 gp)
8 Long Bows (37,5 gp x 8 = 300 gp)
285 gp
321 sp = 32.1 gp

Total: 1132.1 gp split 4 ways equals 283.02 gp.

We can either sell everything and everyone takes his share or anyone can pick items and deduct their value from their share. Say Raxus wants one masterwork axe, he takes it and gets still 130 gp from this loot. If he wants to get both, he would have to make up for it since his share doesn't cover it; he would give 23 gold back to the group, which would be divided evenly among everyone else.

It looks complicated but it's completely fair to everyone involved. May be a bit too much metagamey for some, though. If we do end up using it, we would need someone to calculate that stuff; I could do it if nobody else wants to.

Sounds good for me, on the loot. Seems a good way to handle it. We can simply do the numbercrunching here and keep the metagaming out of the thread, that should make it a bit more palatable.

I am Twigs, playing Bastagar. I usually make a habit of posting by my usual alias in the Discussion thread. For no real reason than comparing my post-count between different characters, I suppose. I've never really thought about it. He'll probably grow into his roll as an adventurer in time, but right now his travelling gear and equipment is quite basic.

Bastagar is a well traveled gnome rogue, probably shooting for an arcane trickster. Anyone remotely familiar with Gnome-lore will know that he's suffering from the Bleaching, a slow withering away that all Gnomes are afflicted with if they don't constantly experience new things. (And I should be making yearly rolls to counteract. Which, considering the nature of this campaign, will be one of the few APs that it will come up!)

He's journeyed into the Stolen Lands before, looking for a cure to his affliction. So far with no success.

That's a little too much book keeping for me. Personally I've never cared if one person in the group has a little more or less gear than others. Some classes just need more gear.

A simple way I've seen it done is to just list the gear, with what you're taking separate and bolded at the top, with the rest down below. The next person just copies that list, and seperates and bolds the stuff they're taking, and so on. Eack time the list is copied it loses a few items until the only things that are left are the stuff no one wants.

If something is disputed we talk it out or roll off on a d100.

Everything left over gets sold and put into a party fund for stuff like curatives and specialty stuff.

Suits me.

In another game I play in these forums, we split loot the following way:

Let's say the loot consists of:

8 Leather Armors (5 gp x 8 = 40 gp)
Masterwork Chain Shirt (125 gp)
2 Masterwork Hand Axes (153 gp x 2 = 306 gp)
4 Daggers (4 gp)
8 Short Swords (5 gp x 8 = 40 gp)
8 Long Bows (37,5 gp x 8 = 300 gp)
285 gp
321 sp = 32.1 gp

Total: 1132.1 gp split 4 ways equals 283.02 gp.

We can either sell everything and everyone takes his share or anyone can pick items and deduct their value from their share. Say Raxus wants one masterwork axe, he takes it and gets still 130 gp from this loot. If he wants to get both, he would have to make up for it since his share doesn't cover it; he would give 23 gold back to the group, which would be divided evenly among everyone else.

It looks complicated but it's completely fair to everyone involved. May be a bit too much metagamey for some, though. If we do end up using it, we would need someone to calculate that stuff; I could do it if nobody else wants to.

If you are prepaired to do the bookwork thats the best way.

I'm pretty casual about treasure divides so however you guys want to do it.

I agree wholeheartedly with STR Ranger.

Raxus, in that way what would happen to leftover money (the money made from selling stuff no one wanted and cash found in the loot)?

My character, for example, wouldn't take any items in the present loot or future ones (seeing as he doesn't need armor and uses an exotic weapon that'll probably never appear as random treasure). What I do need is the gold so in the future I can make up for my shortcomings by buying magic items (AC items, specially). So my character wouldn't take any items on most loots but he would need the cash. Is there a way to balance that?

On the home game I DM, if a person takes an item (magic, masterwork or anything a little more valuable) he forfeits his share of the gold, which is distributed to the others who didn't get any item. Maybe something like that?

This is all too common with groups unknown to each other. I suggest taking it for the gold amount and splitting it. That way there is always an equal share. If that share of gold adds to your bank and you can afford the item you wished within the last loot drop, then you simply do a retrospective buy of that item. This is the way I DM it in my RL game. Most importantly, it prevents any one character out-wealthing his comrades.

For ease of PC satisfaction, I don't care it there was only 1x +1 Longbow and then two people decide to retro by it as long as it comes out of their gold. It's not realistic but sometimes you just have to sacrifice realism for player contentedness.

Shrug. Remaining items can be liquidated and then the cash would be split up.

Also, I'm always a fan of a "party fund" which would essentially mean splitting the funds one additional way and building a communal pool for items everyone uses, or gets benefit from.

Yeah, sounds good. So you mean, change loot to gold. Split by party number +1 and the +1 goes to party loot. Do you support the retrospective buying in addition to that?

Do you support the retrospective buying in addition to that?

I think it sounds good in principal, but I worry that then the game becomes a lot of economic bookkeeping and concern about keeping GP values among characters equal.

I recognize that some classes have more costly equipment than others, and some magic items are priced in very silly ways. I don't really care if Korgun ends up with twice the gear cost that Raxus has so long as we're both having fun and contributing to the game but not overshadowing others. If anyone thinks they're getting shafted in the gear department, we can address that as a group and maybe pool our money for an upgrade for that character.

I'm more interested in discussing the benefits of what a character gets from a disputed item than I am in trying to maintain some illusion of numerical and economic equality.

Like STR Ranger said earlier, if someone else wants to do the bookkeeping, I'll do it based on clean divides. I just don't want to be the guy looking up the cost of everything we scavenge or craft.

I know exactly what you are saying.

I am happy to keep track of all loot.

Alrighty then. Guess you're the lootmaster. Divy up!

Hello, I shall be your treasurer for this ride.

From Bandit Camp

Coin: 285gp 321sp

Reply to this post with what you want. After that I will let you each know who got what. Then sell the rest at normal 50% value and divide the coin up.
Not sure what to divide the gold by? How many PC's are onboard?

Could you price the items at half-price? Since that's what we'll get if we sell it, I think that should be what we 'pay' for them.

Could you price the items at half-price? Since that's what we'll get if we sell it, I think that should be what we 'pay' for them.

This makes sense to me.

If Raxus sees what the music box does, it will be clear he likes it and would love to have it, though he'd probably never admit it or ask for it.

Don't need anything else on that list though.

Hello Alexei. In response to your request I believe it is not warranted. You do not need to pay for items in my possession. You simply tell me what you want and it magically disappears from my bag of holding and appears in your equipment. Price is only a factor when I must sell items of no use to your party. I hope this makes sense. That being said, once everyone has made their requests or declined any items, I shall make the sale and distribute the coin so yielded.

Wow, that's some treasure haul! What will we do about us newcomers? I'm happy to wait for our next little windfall.