Aubrey's Kingmaker Campaign

Game Master Aubrey the Malformed

Quinn eats in silence for a while, nodding his head at the various questions posted by his companions.

He isn't surprised by the turn of events. Ever since he came into this land, the bandits have been an ever-present danger. Looking around at the group he has come to know in the last day or so, he reckons there may be a nasty surprise for them when they return.

Nodding again, this time to himself, he returns to his stew.

Lost my post

Try again

Quinn eats in silence, his head nodding at the various questions posed by his companions, and at Svetlana's answers. A dark frown crosses his face - briefly - upon hearing of the loss of the woman's ring.

He isn't surprised at the turn of events. Ever since he came into these "river kingdoms", bandits have been an ever-present danger. He pauses to look around at his new-found friends. Mayhap there will be nasty surprise for the bandits when they return.

Nodding again, this time to himself, he returns to his stew.

"How regular have their visits been? Do they come on the same day each time? Are they on horseback?"

"I'm thinking we should mount an ambush. Let them stroll in, expecting no resistance - then we'll slam the gates shut behind them and wipe them out like rats."

"Should we at least offer 'em the chance at surrenderin'? Way i see it, they only done some stealin' and bullyin'."

"Should we at least offer 'em the chance at surrenderin'? Way i see it, they only done some stealin' and bullyin'."

'No.' Says Quinn. Pulling out his charter, he unfolds it on the table. His finger stabs down with vehemence on a line written there.

"The punishment for unrepentant banditry remains, as always, execution by sword or rope."

i'm all for getting into a balls to the wall fight here... the key word being 'unrepentant', tho Thom'll happily break some heads, too :)

i'm all for getting into a balls to the wall fight here... the key word being 'unrepentant', tho Thom'll happily break some heads, too :)

Stealing to survive=one thing, stealing a woman's only treasure, and threatening her with gang assault=banditry on the worse scale. The way I see it, repeated trips doesn't seem very repentant. Repentant when they are about to get their ass kicked isn't repentant either.

Lol. point taken... tho from the thief's pov this might just be low-hangin' fruit. Like i said, Thom doesnt disagree with you... he's just new to this whole schtick.

Sorry, not pontificating. 'prolly would've been better IC, but Quinn isn't a talky type...and his background involves bandits beggaring his family so he isn't really concerned about their well-being.

thomril wrote:

"Should we at least offer 'em the chance at surrenderin'? Way i see it, they only done some stealin' and bullyin'."

'No.' Says Quinn. Pulling out his charter, he unfolds it on the table. His finger stabs down with vehemence on a line written there.

"The punishment for unrepentant banditry remains, as always, execution by sword or rope."

"I hate to be the one to bring this up, but if I understood Lady Svetlana correctly, there are more bandits than the ones that will be showing up. We may need to capture some of the bandits alive to find out where they lair if Master Oleg & Lady Svetlana do not know where the camp is located."

"How many showed up last time?"

"...we need to...be ready to kill. Make the mind prepared. hesitation is loss....killing is a hard thing to do.
Question self later."

"They may want to surrender once we've pounded them a bit. We should encourage this, both beause we need information from them and because we are honourable men. Those that do not surrender... Well, they will face the immediate justice of the Iron Lord."

"....I....I can tell; YOU....you're ready, Heimoth.....I can tell you're blodded....ready with that sword, to do this thing.....Heimoth. who's ready? huh? who's ready? HEIMOTH'S ready, isn't he...."

Gleeful, giddy; first time he shows any modicum of emotion the whole day or whatever you've been around Aleph. Then he kinda shakes his head in dismay; returns to his droll monotone.

"...okay I'm ready...."

"Yup." Heimoth sends the warlock an odd look, but he merely nods in bland agreement. "I was born ready."

*coughs nervously. tries to stifle the cough which makes it worse; sprays out a coughing fit like no tomorrow; stops; clears his throat and looks around embarassed*

"I'll be ready" Thom mutters quietly looking at no one in particular, though it's questionable whether it's for the benefit of those present or himself.

After a second of quiet, he begins to look around to hear the answers his hosts might have to the questions that have been posed.

Just waiting to hear what Svetlana and our dour host have to say about those questions above.

Svetlana explains that the bandits first showed up in force - a dozen, including their woman leader and her seeming deputy, a cloaked man with a bow. On the second visit, the man with the bow showed up with about half a dozen cohorts, and on the third he had a similar number. They always arrive within an hour of sunrise on the first day of the month, and the next day they are due on this schedule is tomorrow.

The woman was quite talkative, alert and clearly in command of her troops. She was also probably the most frightening of the bandits, with a malicious sense of humour that involved nearly cutting off Oleg's hand at one point. Her deputy, and the rest of the bandits, seemed fairly unintelligent by comparison.

Oleg dismisses any idea of making the fort 'defensible'. "Defend against what? This fort was rotting away here for years before we moved in and started using it as the trade post. We aren't soldiers and anyway don't have any money to make it a fort again. These bandits" - he pauses to spit in the fire - "are a bunch of thugs, not an army. You will probably outnumber them when they get here tomorrow."

Marc listens to Svetlana's tale, making appropriate noises of concern and sympathy at the appropriate moments, but not interrupting her. He nods slowly as Oleg speaks.

"MAster Oleg is right. Even if we had more people, what we lack is time. Personally, I like Master Heimoth's idea. If the gates work, we should just hide out of sight until they enter as usual, then close the gates behind them." He smiles, and it is a happy, but wicked smile.

"Depending upon what we are able to learn from our first batch of 'visitors', we can then decide whether to follow them back to their camp, or wait for them to send another group to see what happened to the first."

After waiting for discussions on his proposal, Marc dabs his mouth with a kerchief, smiles and thanks Svetlana for the meal. ("After more than a week on the road, it was the very nectar of the gods madam!") And proposes that they look at the post, find the best hiding spots, and plan to be up early tomorrow.

Quinn nods his head at Marc's suggestion.

'I will be the lookout when the time comes.' he says firmly.

Hasren listens to the discussion while he finishes off his stew & mops up the remains with the last of his bread. He weighs in with the following comments:

"So it sounds like we have a plan here! We should probably take a quick tour of the place before it gets dark. It will give us a chance to figure out what preparations are possible. That said, there are a few more things we'll need to know so we can keep an eye out for things that will help us prepare our ambush."

"Lady Svetlana, Master Oleg, do all the bandits arrive on mounts? Do they have a wagon to haul away their loot? If so, it will be to our advantage to shift things around to either pen them in, or channel them to a place within the fort more to our advantage."

"Also, you mentioned a cloaked man with a bow. Is he the only one with a bow? Do you recall if any of the other bandits have ranged weapons? Setting up places to take cover near where we expect to fight them might be a good idea if that's the case."

"One last thing, are there any other men that stand out as seeming particularly dangerous? We'll want a description so we can take them down as quickly as possible. Take out the tough guys and the rest tend to lose the wind in their sails."

"I can stay out of sight well enough… I reckon I'll be hidin' when they get here."

Other than that, Thom's happy to finish his meal, letting the others do the rest of the chatting… only speaking up to give thanks to Svetlana for the warm meal. When they take the tour, he'll be intentional about finding good spots from which to ambush the bandits.

I'm ready to get this thing going. And thinking i might be a good choice to go after ranged opponents - like our cloaked friend, if he makes an appearance.

im better at seeming innocuous than i am at hiding. just to let you know

"I'm useless at stealth in regular clothes - and while wearing all this armour... I think I'll be the bait in our trap; I'll stand on Oleg's porch and tell them to surrender their weapons to me. If they do, that'll be great, and if not, they'll hopefully close in on me. That's when you move in from your positions. I can hold my own against just bout anyone in pitched battle, but I'll struggle against eight men."

"Might I suggest that we all hide, at first? We don't want to give them any warning of the ambush. And we don't want them to see us and not all enter either. I suggest that we stay hidden and let Oleg and Svetlana greet them as they always do. Once they are inside and we have closed the gates, (They gates do work, right?!?) Then you can step out and demand that they surrender while Oleg take Svetlana to safety. If they do, great! If not,... well, then we all get to indulge our baser desires and teach them a lesson." Marc suggests in a tone one might expect to hear while discussing the weather, or business.

"I'm likin' the idea of Heimoth standin' with the Oleg's. I mean, that way he's there to protect'em if things go sideways up front. No offense, intended, Master Oleg, I'm sure you're right handy in a fight on yer own, but it'd make me feel a might better if Heimoth were there if worse came to worse."

"It is a good refinement on the original plan. I'll start off inside of the house and then step out once the band of bandits are inside the walls."

"Next up, we need to decide upon and then prepare our positions. Someone will need to close those gates - preferably someone who's OK at stealth and not afraid of taking a lick in close combat. Our ranged combat specialists can camouflage themselves up among the catapults."

Hasren listens to his companions palns & makes the following suggestion:
"Let's go have a look at those gates & see how easy they are to move. I'm willing to help close the gates, but might have trouble shifting the gates if they're not moving well on their hinges. Also, while I'm not great at sneaking about, in this case, I would have the advantage of being out of sight behind a gate and should be ok."

i like hiding. i'm always hiding. i'm hiding right now

"I'll help with the gates, too. That'd put me in position to help out Hasren if he needs it."

Marc smiles.
"Excellent! That places us all around our, 'visitors', they will be surrounded and cut off. ALthough,... while I admit I like the idea of enjoying the show from the balcony,... I think I'd feel better being on the ground than in the tower. That way I'd be closer to provide assistance should things turn,... unpleasant." He smiles again.

"I should be able to hide behind one of the gates and assist in closing it, I'm stronger than I look, or behind one of the buildings." He adds as they head outside to have Svetlana and Oleg show them the trading post.

Aubrey

Quinn:

Quinn:

** spoiler omitted **

The following is a map of the trading post, for the coming encounter and to help you plan. A to Z across the top, 1 to 28 down the side.

The walls and towers are made of wooden logs. The “towers” are little more than platforms with non-functioning catapults on. There is a 5’ wide walkway on the top palisade, accessed by two ladders, which has a waist-high battlement on the outward side but is open into the bailey of the fort. The walls (with battlement) are at G/5-11, I-V/3, X/5-24, I-V/26 and G/18-24. The towers are at E-H/1-4, W-Z/1-4, E-H/25-28 and W-Z/25-28. The ladders are at H8 and Q25. The catapults are at F-G/2-3, X-Y/2-3, F-G/26-27 and X-Y/26-27 – as noted above, they don’t work, but could feasibly offer cover or a hiding place.

The gates are at G/12-17. They are old, sagging on their rusty hinges and resting on the ground. They habitually lie open and weeds have grown up around the bottom, also making it more difficult to close them. To do so is a DC 20 Athletics check for each gate (there are two) – obviously, two people can try to close each gate to close them in a single round and more can Aid as normal.

The visitors’ bunkhouse is at I-K/17-23, with the door at K20. The interior is an open space with bunks for about ten.

The stables are at J-S/5-9, with the door at O-P/9. The stall inside are at J-K/5-6, L-M/5-6, N-O/5-6, P-Q/5-6 and R-S/5-6. Otherwise, it has the odd bale of hay, tack on the walls, and (currently) no horses.

The storage pen is a fenced-off area with a roof on poles at each corner. The fence is 6’ tall and the gate is locked with a stout padlock (Oleg has the key). Inside are bales of trade-goods (furs, wool, foodstuffs and so on). The storage pen is at Q-S/11-14.

The house is at Q-V/16-23. The double doors at the front are at Q/19-20. The dining room is at Q-S/16-18, Oleg and Svetlana’s bedroom at T-V/16-18, an office is at Q-R/21-23, S-T/21-23 is the stockroom and U-V/21-23 is a storeroom. A corridor runs Q-V/19-20.

There are three midden pits at U-V/6-7, U-V/9-10 and U-V/12-13. They are nasty and smelly, and count as difficult terrain. And you could catch something if you wallowed in them.

And, finally, there is a cart with a broken wheel at M/13-14.

Hmmm,... The gates are not in great shape, (DC 20 is not easy at 1st lvl in ANY edition!) but perhaps if we closed them once, then opened them back up, it would make it easier for the next time? Clear the weeds a little maybe? Or would it be easier to fix the broken wagon wheel and use the wagon to block the gate?!?
Also, do 4E druids have Entangle? That could be a very useful way to introduce ourselves! :)

Off to try and draw a map,...

They may have Entangle, but I do not. The wagon may be the way to go, and I can restrict movement to some extent.

Heh, sound good Quinn! You pin 'em in place, and I'll blast 'em!
:)

Hmmm,... The gates are not in great shape, (DC 20 is not easy at 1st lvl in ANY edition!) but perhaps if we closed them once, then opened them back up, it would make it easier for the next time? Clear the weeds a little maybe? Or would it be easier to fix the broken wagon wheel and use the wagon to block the gate?!?

DC 20 isn't that hard - it's the DC to close a gate in a single round. It's an Athletics check and a 1st level character with a decent STR and the skill trained should have a decent modifier. Also, Aid Another is pertinent here, and there are measures you can take to make the DC easier too which you allude to.

Heheh, looks like Marc gonna get his hands dirty! Awww,... ;P
Anyone else wanna help clear some weeds? ;)

So, It looks like half of us should hide behind/near the gates to close/block them, and the rest around to surround and prevent escape?

Which way do the gates open? Looking at the map as described, it would appear they open outwards. This could be something of a problem for our planned ambush. First, it might make them less useful as cover as we'd have to be outside to hide behind them. Secondly, I think any prep work to make the gates easier to close would be more visible & thus more likely to warn of an ambush. Do we want to take that chance? And lastly, does it make a difference in how quickly we can close the gate if we're pushing vs pulling?

Apologies if I'm being too much of a worry-wart. I'm just trying to think of ways to make the ambush go as well as we can.

Which way do the gates open?

Wag, look at the pics linked in the discussion thread. That will clear up most of your questions I think. (No worries, I needed to see the map too!) ;)

A day's worth of carpenty-work, weed-picking and hinge-oiling should reduce the Athletics DC to a tolerable level. However, relying on making two DC 20 rolls is just crazy. I like the wagon as a backup plan.

"Looks like we have some work to do." Heimoth gets out of his armour, grabs some tools and starts working on the gate hinges.

The gates open inwards.

Oiling the hinges reduces the DC by 2. Clearing the weeds and trimming the base of the gates reduces it by another 2, to a total of 16. However, given the size of the gates and the time of day, that is pretty much it in terms of what you can physically do to prepare, unless you have ideas that might be quick to execute.

Hasren will help clear obstructions in the gateway & then do what he can to hide any scuff marks the gate leaves when moved.

As the group begins oiling hinges, moving the gates, and picking weeds, Thomdril realizes his only expertise to lend here is.... to pick weeds.

"How did I go from pickin' weeds for the priesthood to pickin' weeds for the crown? That ain't right."

He does spend the rest of the evening, however, on hands and knees making sure the gates will move as easily as possible.

"Actually, we are picking weeds to enhance our bandit-smashing effectiveness. As this will please Gorum immensely, we are still picking weeds for the priesthood in a way."

Finally drew out the full map. This courtyard is a tight fit! I guess that's good for our spellcasters, though, as it forces the bandits to bunch up.

Heimoth will start off around O24. One gate team (Thom, assisted by Quinn?) starts behind the gate in G18 and H18 (I assume this gate is half open, as it can't swing past the bunkhouse), while the other (Marc, assisted by Hasren) start off in H9 and 10. Where does Aleph want to position himself? The towers have somewhat limited line of fire into the courtyard, so the stable roof may be a better option.

roof sounds good. J9. I'm gonna bail some hay at i9 on the ground if I need to jump down there.

Can't you just teleport around? Or is that a different pact warlock?

I'll take H9 i suppose. ;) IF we run into some REALLY tough weeds, Marc will use his acid to simply remove them. Then he will help to make sure that there is dirt over the area to hide any scorch marks or gate-scuffs.

MArc begins helping, happily supervising the tasks that need doing.
Once he realizes that he is getting unfriendly glares, he smiles sheepishly and begins removing his bright red jacket.

"Ah well, Father said that I needed to get my hands dirty. I just didn't think that he meant it quite so literally!" MArc mumbles as he gets face-to-flower with a particularly large, tough-looking specimen. A moment later it is shriveling under a blob of acid.

"What?! It threatened me. It had pointy leaves!"

Ok, I'm sticking up a thread here to try and organise things. At this point I want to gauge interest from the assembled worthies on the other threads. I have basically a series of maybe's from:

- Mothy
- Vatters
- Ithers
- Raggy
- AinvarG-y
- Heathy

A more maybe maybe is Old Guy. And that's about all my jetlag-fuddled brain can remember - apologies if I left you out and you were gagging for it, but then that's why I put up the thread.

Now, I probably want to run with six max, so I may need to winnow things down. As we all know, there is very likely going to be a 4e Dark Sun run by Heathy in the next few months. So I guess the questions are:

- who wants to be in the 4e Kingmaker by preference?
- who wants to be in Heathy's 4e Dark Sun by preference?
- who is greedy and wants to be in both?
- who is meh about the whole thing and is just being polite?

Off the back of that, if I end up with less than five, I'll advertise on Gamer Connection. Your votes, please (and any other queries)!

(Oh, and bear in mind I might not actually reply for a week.)

Maybe you can - I haven't totted up numbers yet.

Well, let me know. All in for Kingmaker. Thanks for the consideration.

Ok, I'm sticking up a thread here to try and organise things. At this point I want to gauge interest from the assembled worthies on the other threads. I have basically a series of maybe's from:

- Mothy
- Vatters
- Ithers
- Raggy
- AinvarG-y
- Heathy

A more maybe maybe is Old Guy. And that's about all my jetlag-fuddled brain can remember - apologies if I left you out and you were gagging for it, but then that's why I put up the thread.

Now, I probably want to run with six max, so I may need to winnow things down.

I responded because I'm intrigued by Kingmaker and know your pbp will be quality. I'm meh about 4e. Honestly, I'm stretched pretty thin, so I probably should have not thrown my hat in the ring. If there's any conflict, you can bump me without issue - I'll go quietly.

I’m interested in playing Kingmaker. Much as I’d love to play in another one of Heath’s game, it’s hard to say at this stage whether I’d really have the time to commit to both, and I’d probably put Kingmaker above Darksun at this stage (besides, I’m not sure I can get my head around 4e and Dark Sun and Psionics…)

Heh, I feel your pain Moth! :)
(Actually, if your going to try to include psionics in your list of headaches, you should probably go ahead and jump into Heathy's 4E Dark Sun, because unless I'm mistaken EVERYTHING is just a 'power' in 4E, fighters just call them 'moves' wizards call them 'spells', etc, but they are all just powers, all supposedly balanced. Supposedly,...) ;P

At this time, color me interested.
But , like above, I may be stretching myself a LITTLE too thin. (You can't quite see through me yet,...)

I AM very interested in both games. (Both of you guys are just WAY too much fun!) Please keep me on the list until we see how many players both end up with, and then I'll re-evaluate my remaining time, and we can go from there!

Thanks!

I’m interested in playing Kingmaker. Much as I’d love to play in another one of Heath’s game, it’s hard to say at this stage whether I’d really have the time to commit to both, and I’d probably put Kingmaker above Darksun at this stage (besides, I’m not sure I can get my head around 4e and Dark Sun and Psionics…)

I'm in this camp. Put me down for Kingmaker.

Hope it goes well; going to try Kingmaker with Savage Worlds.

Well, I, for one, would be interested in Heathy's Dark Sun game just because I love the crap out of Dark Sun. Plus, though Aubrey is a most excellent GM, I'm in two of his campaigns already and the change of scenery might be refreshing. I'm not sure I'll be able to keep up with Heathy and his 10,000 posts-per-day, though.

Though I'm not really a super-big 4e fan, I do know the system and own a couple of the books (specifically the PHB and PHB2) so I can manage that well enough. As far as character ideas, I'm partial to the Striker and Leader classes, so I'll likely fill one of those roles in the group. The Invoker class has certainly piqued my interest, though, and so I might be persuaded to play one of those (a Controller) if necessary.

Dot me.

So I got fatey, rags, and aubster down for my game, if I got it right's....
(lol) It'll be a while before the Dark Sun book is out, so...

Oh; and I'm down for Kingmaker.
Still looking at the PHB and whatnot; I think I have the jist of it.
It is kinda a lot like Book o Nine Swords and whatnot.

I'm not sure I'll be able to keep up with Heathy and his 10,000 posts-per-day, though.

I think that, since I can't really post at work any more, there won't be quite the problem. I actually had 9 posts yesterday.

Managed to find a French computer, surprisingly difficult to get it to work (non-querty keyboard just the start). Personally, I`m more excited about Dark Sun than Kingmaker, and very much looking forward to see what bizarre stuff Heathy inflicts on us.

c'est manufique!

Inflict Away!

Sorry for absence,
Tech week for the musical, (Which I'm also IN), so a little past insane right now.

SHOULD be back by the weekend.

Laters~

OK, so it looks like for definate I have:

Mothy
Vatters
Heathy
Raggy

Possibles:

Old Guy
Ithers

I have left out AinvarG as hesaid he is not bothered. If the possibles go definate then we have a party. Could people confirm their status and then we can think about characters?

In.

I’m in … but … I’ll probably need to read the adventure soon enough, as I will likely be running it for my group, and given the pace of pbp I’d say we’d be lucky to finish the first chapter by the time my group is ready to start it. If that’s a problem (for you or any of my fellow players) let me know and I’ll bow out.

Assuming it’s cool, well, I might finish reading the players guide before I settle on a character type, but what have we got to choose from in terms of 4e PHB? As I’m not familiar with the rules and won’t likely have them to hand, I was thinking of going with something that I presume will be fairly straight forward rules-wise, such as a fighter or ranger. Most likely human.

How many are you looking for Aubrey? Old Guy GM, you seem pretty eager to play, what sort of character do you have in mind?

OK, so it looks like for definate I have:

Mothy
Vatters
Heathy
Raggy

Possibles:

Old Guy
Ithers

I have left out AinvarG as hesaid he is not bothered. If the possibles go definate then we have a party. Could people confirm their status and then we can think about characters?

Sounds good, thanks for considering me.

How many are you looking for Aubrey? Old Guy GM, you seem pretty eager to play, what sort of character do you have in mind?

Wasnt really sure if Aubrey wanted the possibles to chime in, but I did anyway, just in case. Just glad to get considered really, for this group.

As far as characters go, I am open. I know that sounds a bit wishy-washy, but I can (and will) play anything. I might wait to round out the group. If pressed, I am leaning toward human druid.

It is the possibles I would like to chime in, so I can see if they are still interested. I am looking for 5 to 6 players.

On the issue of reading the adventure, I guess it is down to you, Mothy: do you think it would impair your enjoyment of the game? Given it will be a conversion, the encounters will be different in many instances though the basic campaign will be effectively the same. I leave it up to you.

In order to gain some insight into what races and classes to play, I suggest you download the Kingmaker Players Guide as this contains lots of campaign-specific advice.

4e divides classes into four basic types: defender (tank, to soak up damage and protect the vulnerable party members); striker (providing a high level of one-on-one damage); controller (area-effect and battlefield control); and leader (healing and buffing). A normal party of five would have one of everything except strikers, for which two is the normal number. However, these numbers are not set in stone, and you can do without one element in a party (though going without a leader would be bold).

The classes divide down (roughly from memory):

Defender - fighter, paladin, warder, swordmage
Striker - ranger, rogue, warlock, barbarian, avenger, sorcerer
Controller - wizard, invoker, druid
Leader - cleric, warlord, shaman, bard

Generally a good class to play if you are newish to 4e is a striker, but I suspect it does not matter with an experienced group like this. For those unsure of the new classes:

warder - nature warrior with limited polymorph powers
swordmage - fighter with added mage to hinder enemies and enhqnce movement
avenger - holy warrior/killer
invoker - a sort of divine wizard
warlord - a warrior who inspires and motivates with charisma and cunning
shaman - holy priest of the nature spirits accompanied by a totem spirit

In!

I'll order a copy of the 4E PHB tonight.

Me too. At first glance I'm tossing around an exiled Galtan noble whose family managed to flee the revolution but still have an eye on their homeland, or a gnome getting a little too close to the bleaching who is looking for trouble to stave it off.

Possibly warlord or swordmage for the first, maybe sorcerer for the gnome.

They have Jack hammered our electricity away today. Man I hope they sort that out as it is 7 pm and totally candlelit up in here.

While I don't have a concept yet, I like the sound of the Warder and Swordmage... I'll look at the campaign setting tonight for some inspiration

OK, so it is souning like:

Heathy
Raggy
Ithers
Vatters
Oldy
Mothy (though he is a probably rather than a definately until he decides)

Please post up your ideas for characters. In the meantime, I reiterate:

- if you want to lay down the smack, be a striker
- if you want to heal and buff, be a leader
- if you want to defend your fellow party members, be defender
- if you want to area effect damage and debuffs, be a controller

Some of the classes can double in other roles at a pinch and depending on options taken (for example, some paladin builds can be quite brutal in combat as well as providing a modicum of healing) but these are the general rules of thumb to bear in mind.

While I'm at it - any reason to get the PHB II?

While I'm at it - any reason to get the PHB II?

If you don't mind a random fan bursting in to answer this, only if you want the actual book or don't want to subscribe to D&D Insider. Yeah, it's the book Half-Orcs, Gnomes, Bards, etc were released in, but it's cheaper to subscribe to Insider for a month and get the rules for it from the Character Builder if you're just getting it for this game.

Anyway, I'll be following along with this until it passes my Kingmaker pbp, so good luck with the game.

I’m in, unless someone has a fundamental issue with it. Hell, I’m playing RotRL and have read from our current adventure onwards, I’ve read CotCT and am a player in that for my RL group, so this will be nothing new. I seem to be able to separate player knowledge and character knowledge pretty well, and I haven’t noticed a particular drop in my enjoyment of the game. On the other hand, I’ll try to hold off reading the adventures for as long as I can (after all, its entirely possible given my group they might decide they want to play something else when it comes to the crunch – I find the excitement surrounding any particular AP seems to drop off by the time the second or third adventure is on the horizon).

I will play a 1st level Warlord!

Um, no I won’t …

As far as role goes, I’m actually comfortable with any of them, but I guess my initial class choices suggest defender or striker. As it sounds like Vatters is going with a defender, I might stick with ranger. I assume that the 4E ranger is not completely unlike the earlier incarnations of the class? Nature loving homicidal killer with a cute animal friend?

Davi, I'm a 4e virgin, so I welcome the advice (though I'm still going to see if I can go bookless and subscriptionless with this ...)

EDIT: Rangers don't get the lovable little animal companions by default, but they added it in as a class feature in Martial Power. It's best at low level, mainly because beast companions don't really get magic items. At low levels, this is a difference of roughly 1 on attack and damage, but the difference just gets worse as time goes on. Otherwise, ranger continues to be one of the highest damage strikers out there.

Davi, I'm a 4e virgin, so I welcome the advice (though I'm still going to see if I can go bookless and subscriptionless with this ...)

I forgot to mention, you could download the Character Builder demo, which should include all the stuff up to either the PHB2 or Martial Power for up to level three. It should be enough to get started.

That’s cool, I can live without the furry friend (so long as it doesn’t get too cold at night …)

Since Davi broke the ice...

I think you'd still want to buy the Player's Handbook as it provides the base rules for 4E. But, I'll second the D&D Insider subscription recommendation for everything else.

This recommendation assumes you don't want to buy a lot of books you won't use otherwise. Going with D&D Insider gives you access to most of the information you'd want for making a wide variety of character concepts. Otherwise, you'd need to spend bucket-loads of cash to pick up the various books to get similar access. Also, while having the books is nice, there's something to be said for the way the tools make accessing the information less of a hassle.

Within D&D Insider, you could look things up in the D&D Compendium, but I think diving right in & playing around with the Character Builder might yield more satisfying results. The advantage of the Character Builder is that it starts filtering the information down to that which is relevent & "legal" for your character once you make your class, race & stat choices.

I'll also be following along with this thread and the resulting PbP as I'm intrigued to see how it plays out. Also... should you ever need another player...

Completely forgot about the Character Builder demo...

Awesome advice Davi!

Hmmmm.... I'm comfortable with the Defender role. A number of options spring to mind - a paladin headed to Mendev who stopped along the way, a warden from Kyonin or the Land of the Mammoth Lords (depending on how bestial the polymorph powers are; it would be fun to play a feral elven shapechanger/ass-kicker), or a swordmage from a family of exiles from Razmirian. The last one fits in pretty well with the "take land and build a realm" theme of the adventure path.

Oh, well... I've ordered the book - I'll decide once I get it.

Hmmmm.... I'm comfortable with the Defender role. A number of options spring to mind - a paladin headed to Mendev who stopped along the way, a warden from Kyonin or the Land of the Mammoth Lords (depending on how bestial the polymorph powers are; it would be fun to play a feral elven shapechanger/ass-kicker), or a swordmage from a family of exiles from Razmirian. The last one fits in pretty well with the "take land and build a realm" theme of the adventure path.

Oh, well... I've ordered the book - I'll decide once I get it.

If you have the time, you might want to check out the Character Builder demo that Davi mentioned.

The Player's Handbook will only have information for the following classes:
Cleric
Fighter
Paladin
Ranger
Rogue
Warlock
Warlord
Wizard

Here's a premature listing of peoples' initial thoughts on characters:

Heathy - ?
Raggy - ?
Ithers - Leader (Warlord) or Striker (Sorcerer)
Vatters - Defender (Paladin, Warder, or Swordmage)
Oldy - Controller (Druid)
Mothy - Striker (Ranger)

I used the character builder thing and made both the Human Warlord (Bravura) and Gnomish Sorcerer (Chaos Mage). I don't really know if I've made smart tactical choices in the builds, but I'm looking further into it. The abilities seem too similar at first glance without knowing how the game plays. It's all "Attack hits and shift one" "Attack hits and Ally slides one." Anyways- I'll read a bit to see how this works.

4e works by having a number of different build choices, which then influences power and feat selection. For the ranger, with all the supplements available, there are five basic choices (2 in the PHB):

- archer
- two-weapon
- beastmaster
- marauder (mobile, swapping between thrown and melee attacks)
- hunter (moves quickly between ranged and melee attacks using quick drawing)

More broadly, if you read the Campaign Guide you will note that the PCs will need to occupy a number of niches within the hierarchy of your fledgling kingdom based on stats. Since the stats are the same between editions this element won't change. Just to let you know, the primary stats of those classes alreqdy mooted are:

warlord - CHA, INT, STR
sorcerer - CHA, DEX, STR
paladin - STR, CHA, WIS
warden - STR, CON, WIS
swordmage - INT, STR
druid - WIS, DEX
ranger - STR or DEX
(Roughly - I can't remember all the details. And some classes rely on a singly stat more than others.)

On the powers, 4e emphasises mobility so moving enemies (and allies) is quite key to a lot of the powers. They don't all do that but some classes do more of it than others. This can become tactically quite important.

By the way, I'm not posting on the other games because I don't care anymore, but because I didn't bring any of the relevant materials on holiday. Normal service should be resumed on Sunday, and then disrupted again for a return trip to the US on Monday.

If the PHB doesn't cover the Swordmage or Warden, I guess I'll be looking primarily at the Paladin.

You should try out the character builder these guys have referenced above. It will easily let you make one of those other classes if they appeal to you or just make sorting through the choices easier for the paladin if you go that route.

btw Aubrey- How are you doing the stat array? I used the auto pick thing where it is 18, 14, 11, 10, 10, 8.

That character generator is pretty handy. I just hammered out a half-elf warden, and I'll check out a paladin build next.

I would suggest the standard point buy set out in the PHB, which is available on the Character Generator.

After screwing around with the character generator I'm leaning towards a half-elf avenging paladin. I want to look over the powers and feats in the book a little closer first, though. What will we be doing with divine powers? After all, the Golarion deities aren't in the 4E ruleset.

Downloaded the character generator demo and made a human guardian Druid. Fairly straight forward.

Where did my old post go? Oh, well - I'm leaning towards a half-elf avenging paladin. I want to look over the book first, though.

I wanna be a messed up warlock from Ustalav; tiefling or a sixteenth spawn of Yog Sothoth maybe; IDK yet.
Maybe just inbred human.

Hmmmm.... I just cooked up a dwarven warden I really like....

what do I need to do to get hold of this demo character generator thing? do I need an account at the wotsy site? Anyone got a link?

what do I need to do to get hold of this demo character generator thing? do I need an account at the wotsy site? Anyone got a link?

You can get it on the D&D Insider main page. I don't think you need an account to get it, but at worst you just need a forum account.