Aubrey's Eberron campaign. (Inactive)

Game Master Aubrey the Malformed

Long-sleeve weather here in Phoenix. But I'm still wearing shorts.

Hawaii. 65 degrees in the AM, so maybe wear a LIGHT jacket.

My home computer blew up last night, not sure if it'll be fixed in a hurry, or if I need a new one, or what. Posting might be a bit disrupted.

OK, I posted in the other discussion thread that we were on the western edge, but you folks are making me feel like it really got cold here. ;-)

The idea that Tennessee and that area saw single digit temps or even negatives amazes me. There's a lot of crops that are going to be hit hard by this...

Our crops need it to get good and cold or they don't mature right, so we will have to rely on our standard drought to ruin the farmers' year once again.

Temps here over the last several days look like a roller coaster ride. Saturday is supposed to be quite nice - I'm hoping to continue the remodel, but I want to do the cutting outside because it's one less thing to clean up later. Doing it last Saturday with a single-digit wind chill and blowing snow was not appealing - what can I say?

Hello,

I'm in the process of having my employment terminated.

Might be "touch and go" for the next few days/whatev's.....IDK yet. I'm in shock.

nnnnnnnoooooooooooooooooooo

Heathy, that's really bad news, sorry to hear it. Let us know how it goes.

It might be a while. I'll prolly keep up daily with postings.

Damn; wish I woulda studdied and got an accounting degree back in the day instead of a finance degree.

Oh well. Bygones.

I think, living in a southern state with an ageing population, that a medical technician will probably be OK. He's hoping to swift new employment.

On my troubles with the computer, the guy couldn't get the machine to play up and couldn't find anything wrong with it. I've got it back now and it's working perfectly. But I am now ever-watchful for betrayal by my silicon nemesis.

Aubrey, it might be a connectivity problem; might need a new box for the modem or cable or whatever it is.

I had to get a new one a few months back; I think all these iphones/tablets/etc are kinda disruptive to catching a signal sometimes.

Sorry if I sound kinda goofy. Not much sleep last night.

Could be. It's fine now (typing on it as we speak). The guy was a bit baffled.

Assume it will crash at the most inopportune moment and backup often.

I wrote this on the RotRL discussion thread, but it is pertinent, if less an immediate issue for the Eberron game - i.e. what to do about the ongoing absence of Fatey and Ithers.

Guys, once this combat is over we will be entering the "post-Vethran and Illes" phase, when we agreed the cousins would stay in Sandpoint. We've not heard from either Fatey or Ithers in ages and it is looking like becoming a permanent arrangement, sadly. We were going to run with just the four "survivors", but that could leave us vulnerable if anyone else has to drop out.

The longer Fatey and Ithers stay out the less likely it really looks like they will return. While it would pain me if they didn't - much like Mothy's "temporary" withdrawal from the games - I need to think about the viability of the games going forwards.

What are your thoughts on the matter? Would you prefer to:

1) Soldier on with four, in the hope that Ithers and/or Fatey will return in future? or

2) Recruit two new players?

This is obviously an issue with the Eberron game too, although it makes less sense to pull out Ez and Runzyl at this stage as you are in the middle of a dungeon. Your thoughts on that too would be welcome.

We're lacking in the fighty department and the magicky department. I'd say recruit new guys maybe.

Maybe Runzy and Ez got teleported away.........

Since they were here before me, I will abstain from voting. Wouldnt feel right otherwise.

We can handle being without Runzyl. The loss of Ezreal will hurt more, I think.

This is a tough one. I agree with Vattnisse. Losing Ez will hurt more than losing Runzyl.

My vote is to recruit one person to be a full arcane caster. Although we might be able to muddle through with Gil as our arcane spellcaster.

She's not exactly going to control a crowd like Ez does, I have to concur with bringing in an arcane battlefield controller. As flavorful as Runzyl is, we do have some redundancy in his role.

I don't intend to replace Ez and Runzyl until after you get out of this dungeon, since there isn't really a good reason for them to up and leave and for someone new to come in (unless someone can think of something).

Depends.... do they want to play a pugwudgie? Hahaha

Genius!

as far as creating water goes... i've got nothin'

Ez has a summon monster VI prepared and Gelb has a scroll of summon monster V. We could summon water elementals.

However it will be overkill just for the dust bunnies. We need to go after their source - the dust ghoul(s). But I'm not sure we may realize this. Rod just yelled we needed water to destroy them but he made it seemed that the dust ghoul(s) were the ones destroyed by water.

i think it might be worth it to destroy the dust bunnies, they seem to add quite a difficulty to this fight. taking them out would be a force multiplier

Long-term point: While I'll take a Ranger level next time we advance (mostly for the 2nd level spell), I'm thinking of diversifying after that - Rogue for the sneak attack and evasion, or maybe Inquisitor. Any thoughts or advice?

It depends what you are trying to do - pump your damage output (even more)?

That too. A few sneak attack dice and the Snap Shot Rogue ability would be pretty cool. Also, the remaining Ranger abilities aren't all that exciting to me. Hell, I might even go with some Fighter levels for the feats.

Well, that was really my suggestion. You've probably got what you want out of being a ranger, you are far from lacking in the key skills of your trade as it is, so fighter might be the ticket - feats plus weapon training.

Just to let you know, I won't be very available from Friday evening until Monday morning as I will be away.

it is currently 11pm on Thursday where I am.

I'm going to sleep now, and tomorrow I am going to work early and working straight through 36hrs or so. I may be in in the mean time, but it is not a certainty.

I will be back on about 42 hours from this post.

Please "bot" me as necessary.

Away for the weekend. Might be back Sunday night.

I'm going to be on holiday from tomorrow until after Easter. I won't have much access, though I might be around a bit from next Saturday onwards.

Do we continue advancing or do we hold up somewhere and recover?

Nevharath is happy with either idea. It would be nice to regain casting abilities, as i imagine this is a rather sprawling dungeon.

that said, perhaps sleeping (if we arent in fact already sleeping) in a place where we were dream-assaulted is not the best choice.

at the moment, Nevharath is waiting for the others, who are conducting tests of their own, to be done and decide on an action.

The way I see it, we either push on, or we exit the dungeon and return tomorrow. The latter also holds the appeal of letting Runzyl and Ezreal plausibly move on to something else.

I don't think we can camp in this dungeon.

Agreeing with Vat regarding Runzyl and Ez. However, that means Rod and Gil will be our main spellcasters and Nev will have to step up for Runzyl and Lightbringer as our frontline tank.

I suspect Manfred will have forgotten our deal when we return. We'll need to prepare ourselves accordingly.

Also, it might be a good idea to dust off the Heal skill to recover ability damage to our Charisma. It'll save some spellcasting.

If we can, we can have Ez use scrying before we head back to check up on those locations we've already explored and see if any new opponents have been posted.

I'll see if Gelb can't secure some muscle from the Master; a dolgaunt or two, perhaps?

When Ez and Runzyl check out (my advice - not yet) what do you want to do? With the Runelords game things worked out quite well but this party could end up unbalanced. I think Runzyl's place can quite easily be taken by Nev but Ez is a tougher act to follow. As a universalist wizard he has a lot of versatility to divine, blast and buff. As a beguiler Gil has a few blind spots in her coverage due to limited spell selection and as a cleric Rod can buff and divine with the best but is a bit limited in terms of blasting. I think that things can be covered with what we have but the party will probably need to consider what their tactical options are in a fight, especially in regard to what Rod and Gil can do, and maximise them. The alternative is to recruit.

This is tricky. Are we sure Ez won't be back? If he is coming back, I can play a wizard and have Gelb stay with the Master until Ez returns. If Ez isn't coming back, then we should recruit.

Well, Fatey and Ithers disappeared coming on for a year ago, and there hasn't been any activity on Paizo from either of them for a long time. As with Mothy, it was painful when they went AWOL but in the end they have their own lives to lead. I'm not expecting any of them to come back and I am not that inclined to hold out for them on the off-chance - their absence is sadly looking increasingly permanent. (That said, if any of them are actually reading this, please let me know!) I think it would be a shame to lose Rolund too, especially since we had plans. My advice is to leave both Runzyl and Ez in place for this dungeon, which should give Ithers and Fatey plenty of time to prove me wrong. If they don't, then we can consider recruitment at that point, which would also be a bit more natural from a story-telling perspective. I honestly couldn't see Runzyl just giving up half-way through a dungeon.

I didn't mean to retire Rolund. I meant to play a wizard until Ez returned and/or we recovered Rolund, whichever came first.

But I think its best to go with your suggestion. Continue with the dungeon and hope for their return. If not, its time for another recruitment drive.

Just to let you guys know that from Saturday I'll be on holiday for a week and unlikely to be able to update the games until at least the following Saturday.

Have a fun holiday!

Well I wasn't planning on vanishing at all much less for this long or permanently, but things have a way of snowballing. I just couldn't keep up or find free time for anything but sleep with work claiming more and more time. I have it running smoothly at the moment, but I will be continuously fighting with the owner to keep it that way.

If you aren't too burned by the long absence I think I can finally manage to make it work again. (...given a day or two to read up on what I have missed)

YAY!!!!

Hudak needs buffings!

;)

DUDE! WELCOME BACK!

Stuff does have a habit of getting on top of you - the last few weeks haven't been great for me. But you are of course welcome to return - I should be posting post-holiday tomorrow.

W00t! Good to have you back!

Speaking as one of the stalkers, I'm psyched that this game won't be losing another member of its original party. :)

AWESOME! So glad to see you back!

I, however, will be taking a brief holiday and might be quieter for the next week than normal. Feel free to bot Gil as necessary.

Still reading up for the moment, but my eyes are glazing over tonight. Will continue tomorrow.