If the AoO talk is about Felgar getting one against Neva as she casts, I'm pretty sure I remembered reading that if you were unarmed, you couldn't take an AoO (unless you had Imp Unarmed Strike).
Hello all. I'm new to this play by post thing but I am in one of Aardvark's table-top games and he has invited me to sit in on this campaign. I will, in all likelyhood, be lurking for a while to familiarize myself with the way it all works. But I thought I would stop in to say hello.
I've been playing pathfinder for about three years now and have dabbled in other systems but to no great extent. Pathfinder is where I have most of my experience by far.
Well. If you need any more info out of me let me know. I'm more than happy to talk.
If the AoO talk is about Felgar getting one against Neva as she casts, I'm pretty sure I remembered reading that if you were unarmed, you couldn't take an AoO (unless you had Imp Unarmed Strike).
This is correct. You cannot make an AoO if you are unarmed. Similarly, a guy with a bow couldnt do anything about it if someone provoked from him, either, since it's a ranged weapon.
Welcome Magus! May I recommend that whatever character you create, you don't skimp on the will saves?
I'm thinking my next one will have a +8 against this kind of domination effect. Anyone let me know if I'm doing something wrong:
+2 from 14 Wisdom
+2 iron will taken at lvl 1
+2 vs enchantment spells and effects as a half-elf
+2 from dual-minded alt racial trait
Rutter, that sounds about right. Of course, he'll die to a poison effect. :-)
Actually, considering my dice history, he'll probably still die to a failed will save.
Yes, welcome Magus!
Indeed...welcome Magus!
Huh, just noticed that my "Welcome to Magus" post from Monday didn't show. I probably didn't do it right!
My apologies, and Welcome Magus! Please don't be scared away by us getting slaughtered. It'll be fine.
Lol thanks for the welcome. I'm not to worried, though I've been hearing stories about the encounter your in currently for the past two weeks.
Right now I'm thinking of writing up a sound striker bard. Though that will depend on how the current situation is resolved.
You know, I think we can do this! I think we can actually survive. I'm looking forward to my turn. Let's see what happens.
What I'm really enjoying about this: I can't remember all the exact rules on vampires, fast healing and gaseous form. At least not the particulars on how they interact.
Can a scorching ray hurt a vampire in gaseous form? Would it suppress fast healing? Does a vampire in gaseous form in an open coffin suffer from channeled positive energy?
Not being sure is making this more exciting!
I think the only kind of damage prevention a creature gets while in gaseous form, Vampire or not, is DR10/Magic, which would not affect Scorching Ray, obviously. However, I dont know if Copper was able to correctly able to identify what was going on with the small cloud of fog or not to know to target it. :/
And does staying in their open coffin do anything at all? I had never heard or seen anything like that, but figured it probably did, since they are doing it alot.
Mutha-f%*king, will-save-making vampires!
:-)
Ok, let's get the frak out of that crawl space and run for our lives.
MagusX, now that they are out of the crawlspace, currently the only one that needs to be replaced is the Summoner.
Feel free to write up your PC and alias, and we can work him into the story.
I'm not she how to create an alias here, but I'll get on it. I've already got a bit out a sheet ready, I'll send it to you shebang I get the chance.
Magus, if you go to the upper right and enter the 'My Account' tab, it will take you to a screen where you can make an alias.
It is the third window down on the left (marked messageboard aliases), under your main alias.
Ahh, I see. And I have done so. Hopefully you all don't mind a bard.
Alright, Rutter, Copper: we need a frickin' plan. Felgar is down there, it doesn't look good, and I'm not sure how to deal with these vamps other than running to NPCs who are stronger than us and asking for help (which is officially cheating in a role-playing game).
Do we go buy holy water? Try to talk a church out of a anti-undead weapon they have stored in a musty closet? Find a mystical urchin who is preordained to transform into sunlight when he meets his destiny?
Let's brainstorm this. Hopefully we'll have some options that would benefit from the knowledge skills of a bard. :-)
Okay Magus, to fill the profile you click on the link and there will be a tab at the top that says profile.
In the upper right corner of that tab, is a button that says 'edit my profile'. If you click on this it will open it for... editing ;)
You can usually just copy/paste a herolabs profile in there. Or whatever media you use. I have a whole profile format I use for all mine, I can email it to you (with all the bolds, spoilers, and whatever) and you could fill it out and paste it in. I use the text and labels from the SRD to fill in all the blocks (vice typing it all).
@DM Aardvark: As they approach my location by whatever means the group chooses, can you please PM me the current status of my domination and actions if any that I must or can perform? thanks
BTW Guys, thanks for not leaving me to my ultimate demise. I am helpless, but I have been following your exploits!
Will do Felgar
I guess here would be an adequate time to introduce the new character. Once he is finished with his profile (or is ready to post as he finishes it), he can come across you guys tearing at the building.
Well if the alley's in vamp-friendly darkness, i guess there's no point in dismantling the wall. How about someone runs to a nearby church and buys some holy water and maybe some silversheen and prot from evil scrolls while Rutter and the other stays to try to draw Felgar out.
Maybe at the church or the shop with the silver sheen, the new character overhears the talk about vampires and decides to come along and help. Or maybe he's the one that passes the knowledge check to give info on their weaknesses when the PC comes in talking about vampires and "how do we kill them" to anyone in earshot.
I like those ideas. Rechecking the map and with DM's post, it doesn't look like we can get sunlight into that little alley and shop.
Aard? Any checks we can make to know of a place where we can go, etc?
Well, if the back is a workroom, the storefront may be through the door that we didn't explore. Maybe we could get some sun to stream in that way. I kept imagining the alley to be behind the store. Now I see it's alongside.
We should probably open a discussion about balancing in-game knowledge with metagame knowledge. I had to sneak a peek at a couple other pbps to see if anyone else was so overwhelmed by this encounter. I managed to avoid spoilers, but I saw that the players used meta knowledge in their approach, even when their characters failed to identify the vampires. My approach is pretty much that there's no reason to carry a silver dagger if you've never encountered anything vulnerable to it, and maybe vampire literature and movies aren't as common in Golarian as they are in the real world, but maybe that's the wrong way to approach it.
I mean, we pretty much would have done everything differently if we played like we knew what we were up against. But playing in character,
1) we went inside because our party has never faced anything it couldn't defeat before,
2) only two characters went down into the crawlspace, because it was supposed to be cramped quarters,
3) Rutter tried to kill the thing in it's sleep, because that's the only way he's been able to kill anything,
4) he stayed there and tried to kill it again, while all the other things rose up around him because he figured it had to be on the brink of death,
5) no one had any other kind of weapon, like silver or magic, because we've never encountered anything that had particular weapon vulnerabilities so how could we know that even happened?,
6) we let ourselves get dominated, because our characters don't know about vamps' domination
I don't know. I'm just trying to think of how the adventure intended this encounter to go. Are our characters too 'minimized'? I know I'm ready to call my experiment in a crit-maxing TWF build a completely unplayable failure.
I know what you mean Rutter, I actually scoured the forums as you guys began the fight. There was no mention of it in the Obit thread, or any of the issues with the AP threads. I think you all did very well maintaining the separation of player/character knowledge.
I think the only explanation for others is that there is a lot of hand-waving of monster knowledge (it seems based on the forums, people do that a lot), or people just rolled the appropriate knowledge checks well. It is kind of odd to have a group without a single person trained in religion. Planes or Local you see left out more often, but religion I think has become an expectation for a lot of groups I would guess. Just to be clear, that is not a dig at anyone for not having it, I'm just making observations. As I said, I even put them at base DC 5 as a monster like a vampire has a lot of rumor and talk about them it would seem.
As far as waiting or running for supplies, you guys did see them heal/regen as you fought them. If you wait too long they will be fully healed, and you'll all still be down the resources you have already used and may not know of many more weaknesses.
If I were a member of the group, my PC would probably suggest the study and come back fully prepared. You guys want to save Felgar, but there's no telling if he has even survived up to this point. By the time you guys left the building, you kind of had to accept that he could be lost to you once you were out. These aren't strongly hinted DM urgings, just how I see the situation as a player.
Not sure if I should go ahead and jump in the campaign somehow? Give me the go ahead and I'm ready... still need to roll my hp though. I'll do that now.
Pretty good, if you ask me :D Let me know when I have the go ahead and I'll jump in.
Jethro, I think you misread your last roll on the HP (it was a 6 not an 8)
you wrote 1d8+8 and the results begin with the roll in parens = (6) + 8
Also, I think your FF might be a little off (you have it as 33)
I would like at some point enough of the PC's stats in the profile, so that I could DMPC you if needed after a prolonged absence (or if you know you will be away).
That being said, you could jump in now if you like, maybe react to the calls for help from the others.
Traveling for a few days, and I'm not sure of available time nor internet coverage, so I might be slow to post. Back home on Tuesday night.
It's all good. Work is kind of hectic for me right now. Working on closing down this facility then figuring out where to go from there. So. Sending out applications/resumes and such lol. I'll be around, just may not have time to post. PM if I take too long.
Good in-character exposition post, Jethro! So, shall we gather up garlic, holy water and/or rest? Let's have a plan so we can post through this quickly. We've gotten bogged down here.
Yeah, I am anxious to find out if I need to roll another PC!
Well, I can tell you that Jethro isn't all that keen on going after vampires. As a player I think it may be better to rest and try again when the vampires are not just waiting for us. Stock up on the garlic, a mirror or two and some holy water. Bringing some wooden stakes wouldn't be a bad idea either. If they keep Felgar there it will likely to be as a guard so it may be difficult to get them staked but we should still consider it an option.
As for rolling through, if everyone is around today we could likely get through a few posts. If not I can make a post or two a day during the week, but not until 10/11 pm est.
Oh, and thank you Neva for the compliment. I was unsure how to convey the information and sound in character.
Sounds good to me: rest, gear and return. So, unless Rutter has a problem...let's do that. Aardvark? Can you move us along from here, or do you want us to RP this part? Either way is fine, but I'd prefer to cut to return engagement, for Felgar's sake.
Yeah, I'm good with us buying some equipment today (game time), staying somewhere else and posting watch during the night in case they question Felgar about our base of operations or track us, and then going after them again the next day. I may be slammed the rest of the day, if someone else has time to look up prices and items we might need.
stakes (proficiency requisites?)
scrolls of prot from evil (potions available?)
weapon vulnerabilities (our characters think they're full vampires, so magic and silver, right? so maybe scrolls of magic weapon and either silver weapons or blanches?)
holy water (price and damage?)
scroll of Daylight (price and effectiveness?)
something to restore Rutter's negative levels? (not up on my divine magic options)
options to incapacitate Felgar (sleep?)
anything else?
GM Aardvark, I'm sure you have an idea whether Felgar's dead or alive, so maybe private message him if he needs to create a new character so he has time (I know it takes me a while to create one). I'm sure he'll keep it secret.
Copper, you still with us?
GM Aardvark said he would keep me up to speed on what I am facing. Still awaiting word.
For the rest of you, feel free to handwave the time spent shopping. Just let me know if you are shopping today and returning later, or returning tomorrow (or even later).
stakes (proficiency requisites?) simple weapon, no charge
scrolls of prot from evil (potions available?) 25gp scroll
50gp potion
weapon vulnerabilities (our characters think they're full vampires, so magic and silver, right? so maybe scrolls of magic weapon and either silver weapons or blanches?) scroll of magic weapon (lasts 1min/lvl) 25gp
oil (1 standard action to apply) 50gp;
silver blanch 5gp/10 projectiles,
silver heavy mace 102gp
holy water (price and damage?) 25gp; 2d4 direct, 1 splash, necessary to anoint the severed head
scroll of Daylight (price and effectiveness?) Ineffective "Despite its name, this spell is not the equivalent of daylight for the purposes of creatures that are damaged or destroyed by such light."
something to restore Rutter's negative levels? (not up on my divine magic options) restoration hired spellcaster 380gp
options to incapacitate Felgar (sleep?)
Doom scroll 25gp
Sleep scroll 25gp
manacles 15gp + simple lock 20gp
anything else?
mirror 10gp (standard action, then they get a will save)
holy symbol wood 1gp, iron 5gp, silver 25gp
hide from undead 10 min/lvl or until attack; scroll 25gp, potion 50gp
consecrate scroll 150gp (would casting this count as an attack?)
bull's strength potion 300gp, scroll 150gp
scroll of silence on the stake (1 round/level), in case Rutter can sneak in on them again, it won't wake the next one: scroll 200gp (hmm.. maybe not.. that on your spell list, Copper or Jethro?)
halt undead scroll 450gp (can anyone afford it? who can cast it?)
searing light scroll 375gp ranged touch attack does 5d8 points of damage vs vamps
alchemist's fire 20gp
tangleburn bags 150gp
Definite buys:
spellcasting service: restoration (380gp)wooden stakes (6)
holy water (4) (100gp)
silver heavy mace (102gp)
kikko armor (if available) 30gp
mirror (10gp)
oil of magic weapon (1 min/lvl) (50 gp)
protection from evil potion (1 min/lvl) (2) (100gp)
hide from undead potion (10 min/lvl) (50gp)
shield of faith potion (1 min/lvl) (50gp)
potion of bull's strength (1 min/lvl) (300gp)
scroll of sleep (1 min/lvl) (25gp)
manacles & lock (35gp)
light steel quickdraw shield (59 gp)
total 1291gp
objective 1: save Felgar
Use hide from undead potions to accomplish this objective first.
A) If Felgar is not in the ground floor room, go to objective 2.
B) If Felgar is standing guard in ground floor room, if undetected, cast Lullaby (Jethro, 12.5gp) followed by sleep (Jethro or Copper). If detected, just cast sleep (Jethro or Copper).
C) If we're engaged with vamps when we knock out Felgar, first try to defeat vamps, focusing on vamp who dominated Felgar, if identifiable. If tide turns against us, secure Felgar with manacles & lock, but continue fighting if possible. Try to defeat vamp who dominated Felgar before we retreat. (Who should carry Felgar? Copper or Jethro with a scroll of expeditious retreat? If Rutter finds the kikko armor, his speed will be down to 15 with light encumbrance.)
D) If we're not engaged with vamps, secure Felgar with manacles & lock, and gag him. Should we take him off premises before we engage the vamps? He'd still be under domination in subsequent days.
objective 2: kill vampires
Without a heavy hitter, this could be hard. One might be standing guard, now that they've been discovered. They may have even moved.
A) Use hide from undead potions to remain undetected, whether they're awake or asleep. If they're awake, it's possible some may succeed their Will saves and detect a few of us. If some remain undetected, what can you do before you join the fight? Save Felgar? Cast guidance on Rutter each round or another buff for someone? Cast consecrate?
B) If we find them asleep again, hopefully Rutter can stake one in their coffin. Two, if Copper or Jethro has Silence in their spells known. Four rounds is enough to stake one and move to the next. One round, if Silence is cast from a scroll, probably is not. You'd have to cast it from the crawlspace before Rutter stakes the first vamp, and your casting may wake him before Rutter can stake him.
B2) We'll all need magic and silver. Silver blanch on a melee weapon is only good for the first hit, but on a ranged weapon, it's good for 10 projectiles, so it's the best deal for any archers/crossbowmen. If you do melee, a silver weapon may be better. Keep in mind, alchemical silver piercing and slashing weapons do -1 damage per hit.
C) Neva's channel energy will be valuable. Consecrate drops some of their resistance. Where do we set up the consecrate area? In the front room (see E)?
D) If anyone buys/uses halt undead, make sure you do it when someone is in position to stake a vamp that fails its save.
E) Let's try going in through the street entrance if it won't make too much noise to open. Or we use that front room as our battleground. If the street's brighter than the alley, we'll have a safe exit they can't follow us, and we can create a bottleneck at the door from the room we were in if the battle starts in that first room or the crawlspace.
F) Searing light may be a better buy than halt undead
G) If we fall back to the front room, use the mirrors and holy symbols to hold them off while we move
H) How/where can we use garlic? Hang it around the entrances of the building during the first day to keep them from leaving during the night? Maybe it'd draw Felgar out to clear it for them, so we can rescue him that night?
I) In a fight, we have to defeat all four of them, otherwise we won't be able to go to their coffins and finish them off
J) Since we don't have any heavy hitters, how much damage can your character do to these guys in a straight-up battle (if we don't catch them asleep)? Rutter's going to wield a silver heavy mace two-handed. He needs to put oil of magic weapon on it to defeat DR, and he'll use a potion of bull's strength to give his damage a boost. Still, he'll only be doing 1d6+7 points of damage/hit, and that's only for 1 minute.
Neva, what spells are you going to memorize? Rutter could probably use a prot from evil that lasts longer than the 1 minute that the potion will.
Copper and Jethro, what spells do you know? Do you have Use Magic Device?
We should probably let Jethro try identifying that magic dagger that Neva has, if he has the skill ranks.
Man, this got long, but I could see this being brought up during the discussion as the 3 survivors and Jethro research the vamps and prepare for the next meeting.
Just scanned, but great stuff, Rutter. I am swamped today with family and work stuff, but I'll be back in the saddle tomorrow. I can help with some of the effects, etc, so let me go through this and my spell list together.
Nice planning Rutter. Silence is not on Jethro's list so that's not an option out of the gate. The scrolls would work, but it is only a few rounds at most - I believe it would be 4 if the scroll is created by a bard, as they don't get level 2 spells until lvl 4 and its rounds/lvl.
Jethro has UMD. As far as spells :
0 LvL Spells :
Lullaby
Summon Instrument
Light
Dancing Lights
Message
Read Magic
1st LvL spells (5/day) :
Charm Person
Confusion
Cure Light Wounds
Moment of Greatness
2nd LvL Spells (2/day) :
Glitter Dust
Enthrall
UMD +8
2nd: Scorching Ray
1st: Grease, Identify, Mage Armor, Magic Missile, Shield, Sleep
0: Daze, Detect Magic, Light, Mage Hand, Mending, Message, Read Magic
Wands of Enlarge Person, Magic Missile (CL 1st) and Color Spray (CL 1st)
Also, you dont need UMD to cast a spell you dont know, as long as it is on the list. So while neither of us know Silence, we (or I at least) could still use a scroll without using UMD, since it is a Sorc spell. But yea, it would have a short duration.
Is Jethro filling the spot for/replacing Pravlox? Or were we looking for one more? If we do look for one more, I suggest we do so before going in to fight these guys again/rescue Felgar.
Neva can cast hide from undead, which will effect 4 targets and last for 40 minutes, and might work on half of them if we're lucky. This should give us a chance to rescue/subdue Felgar. And I have a scroll! (Which I wish I had remembered when we went down here the first time.)
I will add hold person to lullaby and sleep options...he's bound to fail a will save eventually!
In addition to hide from undead I can memorize 3 protection from evils which should a) give some protection against domination and also, perhaps, b) give Felgar another saving throw.
I suggest we buy 2 potions and I'll memorize 3, that gives us 5 total for everyone.
I can use my channel and the wand of cure moderate wounds as my weapons, and cast magic weapon on someone else.
Casting consecrate in the area will increase the DC of my channels by 3 and put them at -1 on all attacks, damage rolls and saves. It's only a standard action to cast.
So, spells would be:
1: 3 x protection from evil, magic weapon, and cure light wounds(D)
2: hold person, consecrate, silence and remove disease (D)
I'd only need to buy one potion of protection from evil to make this work, or I can try to scribe a scroll while we wait out the rest of the day, etc.
I was thinking hide from undead in potion or scroll form. If it's cast on us all, if one of us attacks, it breaks it for everyone in the casting. So if, say, Rutter is detected, and needs to fight back, it'd break for everyone. But if he took a potion instead, it'd only break for him. If we get lucky (after getting unlucky that all 4 vamps are waiting for us), at least one person will remain undetected by all 4 vamps, and can secure Felgar while the rest of us distract.
Man, I didn't even realize silence was on the cleric spell list (or that it wasn't on the wiz/sor). That'd be lucky if we caught them asleep. Maybe we should wait until late in the day (2 or 3 Kosovo time). They may be on high alert in the morning, but after several hours, maybe they'll think we're not coming back and go to bed (coffin).
Maybe Neva should memorize silence twice? So in case Felgar's guarding, he won't alert the vamps before we subdue him?
I like all the prot from evils. Could be we put Felgar to sleep, kill the one dominating him, and then he wakes up and helps us. But maybe we buy some potions for that, and pour one down his throat when his "master" falls. Course I just remembered, the vamp would just go back to his coffin, so Felgar wouldn't really be free until we staked the vamp, beheaded him, and anointed his head with holy water.
So no point saving a prot/evil for Felgar. Who gets them? Rutter, Neva and Copper? And we buy a bunch of potions for Jethro?
Forgot to suggest a mundane longspear for some of the non-melee'ers. Especially if we bottleneck them at the door between the front and back room, someone can offer an aid another to help Rutter's AC (presumably he'd be the meat shield).
What can Jethro do during the fight? Glitterdust might blind one or two of the vamps for a round or two. Does he use a bow or melee? Maybe he can use scrolls to cast Magic Weapon for his own and Rutter's weapons during the fight, and can use a longspear to aid another or use alchemist's fire or tangleburn bags on the vamps.
My night to make dinner. Will try to post more later.
Okay, so I think there's about 4 things we can make a plan for:
1) Approaching the building
2) If Felgar's on guard alone
3) If Felgar's not alone
4) Vamps remain asleep
1) The approach
We'll try the front. We use message to stay in touch.
Rutter will approach front door alone.
He'll message back what he finds. If empty, he goes in, and everyone comes forward to the front door.
Rutter will then check the door to the back room. If nothing detected, Copper and Jethro join him at the door. Neva waits in the middle of the front room.
Jethro and Copper prepare to cast.
Rutter opens door.
2) If Felgar's on guard alone.
Jethro hits him with lullaby
Copper hits him with sleep
If he falls asleep, Jethro or Copper secures him and drags him back to the front door.
If he doesn't fall asleep, Rutter faces him in total defense. Copper casts grease on his axe, and then follows with another sleep until it succeeds. (Maybe we should get grease on a scroll, so Jethro can cast it instead, save a round?)
3) If Felgar's not alone.
If we're not detected by the others, proceed with plans for (2) until we're threatened.
If we're threatened, Rutter tries to engage the others, while Copper and Jethro continue to subdue Felgar. Neva moves up to assist Rutter in fight. When Felgar is asleep, Copper and Jethro join the fight. We don't secure Felgar until immediate threat is defeated.
4) If vamps remain asleep.
Rutter goes to trapdoor. We all go to trapdoor.
Rutter opens and goes down, followed by Neva.
He opens the coffin that Felgar's master was in, or the nearest one.
Neva casts silence on Rutter.
Rutter stakes him in dead silence.
Rutter moves to next coffin and opens it.
He stakes him in dead silence.
By now, silence may have worn off.
Rutter opens next coffin with his natural stealth.
He stakes him, waking him and his screams wake the last vamp(s).
We fight the last vamps.
Cut off heads, anoint with holy water, and level up? :)
I've been here following along, and it sounds.... like an incredible amount of planning. Rutter, your breakdown of actions in order will help A LOT in adjudicating the results and the scene (thank you).
Just a couple things:
First, have you guys cemented a shopping list. When and if you do, what is the total and can you afford it (who pays how much)?
Second, how long (days/hours) will you be spending on shopping and preparing, and what time do you expect to return?
I think final shopping list looks like:
2xHide from Undead at first level (scrolls, but potions if not) Neva should have time to make this.
2x protection from evil scrolls (I think this gives Felgar another save, which is why I wanted one for him. And, if he breaks dominion, then we want to prevent another attempt on his will.)
1x magic weapon scroll (I can cast one on Rutter, the scroll would be for Jethro, Copper and I would use magic.)
Garlic to drape around the whole building.
We buy this stuff and then stake out the shop (no pun intended) from a safe, well-lit distance. We get what rest we can until the morning, then reconnoiter to find out about how Felgar and the Vamps have been positioned.
I think we're all pretty close to end of planning. There are so many options that this process could continue forever. So, I think we force ourselves to move forward.
I vote that Rutter be the "caller" on this, writing the main post of what we actually do as a group, after Aardvark rules on the shopping issues. Aardvark and the rest of us can react to that, but we need some in-character movement.
Neva's final off-screen actions:
1. Purchase what magic she can
2. Write a scroll if she can (for anything we couldn't buy)
3. Rest
4. Memorize the following:
1st: 3 x protection from evil, magic weapon, and cure light wounds(D)
2nd: consecrate, 2 x silence and remove disease (D)
5. Arm herself with the wand of CMW (2d8+3, DC 15 Will for half)