Conquering the Stolen Lands (Inactive)

Game Master dunebugg

Ah, you'll be fine. You're stabilized and there's no one left to kill you. Again, when you meet her you will discover she's anything but a typical hobgoblin.

Refraining from reading your backstory, hope to meet you soon.

and hope to wake up soon, have something to tell Roga.

Hey, welcome to the party Grendolynn!

It appears that Roga did not get my hint about Happs... :P

Also - welcome Grendolynn! You can ride into camp as soon as combat is over and help try to put out the fire if you like.

Badly wounded isn't dead, I'm badly wounded atm at 2 hp. :D

Badly wounded, and then one more swing killed him haha. What happened to taking one alive!! I was trying to hint for you to do non-lethal D:

So, today I was looking at the second book for the Rise of the Runelords AP to take a second look at the sphere-walker prestige, and apparently the pictured priest of Desna is the same I used for Triaxus' icon. Which is more amusing considering that I really didn't care for it much at first.

It might have been take one alive before the bastard almost killed us. As you put it diplomacy failed :D And to be fair he had the option to surrender before and during combat, but he chose to set the stables on fire. But in hindsight a live one would be nice and I do believe we have one entangled in the stable.

since this is ooc, when you guys wake me up, I would kill the dude for being a douche anyway =p. Then I'll take his cloak and replace mine.

He had Favored Enemy (Elf). You were the only Elf, Elros :( Sorrryyy.

I had totally tried to just write out that bandit, to make the encounter CR appropriate with the loss of Caelus (hence running straight to the stables and being stuck, and not shooting anybody). But I guess I didn't think he would still live, d'oh :P

Oh noes, I guess disguise does have it purposes, unless you disguise as someone's favored enemy, but at least then the bonus won't work =p

and I do believe we have one entangled in the stable.

And on fire ^^

Alright folks, I'm here. Gotta go for a while though. I'll check back later.

Re: Initiative

My opinion on this is, that while it does provide a benefit to take initiative boosting feats/traits/whatever while averaging initiative modifiers, it also greatly penalizes people with high initiative modifiers.

I think that should have been something people were aware of when making their characters. I, like Elros, Moonie etc., would never heavily invest in initiative boosters if the party all acts together. The whole point of it is to be able to get that spell off before the enemy reacts, if all the enemies go before you because you have that fighter or whoever with a +1 modifier pulling you down then yeah, it's a total waste.

So respecting that it's your decision on how to run combat, and that it's much easier for the DM to run things averaged, it's my vote that anyone who took initiative boosting character options without the foreknowledge that their initiatives would be averaged (me included! Reactionary) should be able to change them to something else.

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Dunebugg - Is my horse wartrained? What extra feat are you going to give me "based on my background"? I'd prefer furious focus or quickdraw.

Re: Initiative

My opinion on this is, that while it does provide a benefit to take initiative boosting feats/traits/whatever while averaging initiative modifiers, it also greatly penalizes people with high initiative modifiers.

I think that should have been something people were aware of when making their characters. I, like Elros, Moonie etc., would never heavily invest in initiative boosters if the party all acts together. The whole point of it is to be able to get that spell off before the enemy reacts, if all the enemies go before you because you have that fighter or whoever with a +1 modifier pulling you down then yeah, it's a total waste.

So respecting that it's your decision on how to run combat, and that it's much easier for the DM to run things averaged, it's my vote that anyone who took initiative boosting character options without the foreknowledge that their initiatives would be averaged (me included! Reactionary) should be able to change them to something else.

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Dunebugg - Is my horse wartrained? What extra feat are you going to give me "based on my background"? I'd prefer furious focus or quickdraw.

Each player is allowed to re-do any part of their character they wish until the 4th battle begins. This gives you some time to feel it out. So if you feel your initiative bonuses are wasted, feel free to re-assign traits and feats.

The horses from Pioneer are Light, non-war-trained Horses. The trait is very un-specific and I quite freely gave out gold. There are also enough war-trained horses waiting in the stables (via dead bandits) to hand out to most of the party. I ruled that if you start with 1 rank in Handle Animal you could give your Pioneer horse the Riding purpose.

Today has been a busy day but I will go through your background again tomorrow and come up with something appropriate. If you check the feats that I gave out early in the discussion thread, only 2 are combat-useful. (Animal Affinity, Improved Familiar, Fiendish Facade, Eldritch Heritage(Celestial), some summony thing). Mainly they're there so I can help you bypass a feat tax, or give your character something fun or flavory.

Cool. Sounds great.

Edit to my character.

Summary:
Took out my trait, and added Adopted - World Traveller (Sense Motive).
Changed my Familiar from Compsognathus to a Hawk still called Jimmy.

And I realise that my previous Brigand trait gives me 100 extra gold, so I've edited my equipment a bit.

So, anyone else getting vibes from the Avengers movie with our first foray into combat? Specifically

Not a complaint about play styles by any means, just amused me.

I too am amused by this XP

Incidentally, I too have swapped out a trait and feat. I took Deft Dodger for a +1 Reflex. And I changed my feat to Spell Penetration.

Bonus feat!!
Grendolynn, you for now get the ability to use your Snare Trap 1/day. Upon reaching level 5 (when you would gain the snare trap for free), you lose that bonus and instead gain Advanced Ranger Trap.

Important Note:
I will be MOVING on June 2nd, not sure if I mentioned this before or not. So the next two weeks will be a little hectic - I may only get to post once or twice a day, and sometimes not until the very end of the day like now. I will still post every day (no promises about Saturdays, as usual).

Also, thanks for your patience as I try to figure out the best way to run combat. My first real time in a PbP, let alone running one.

Sounds good, thank you.

Different ways I've seen combat done in PBP so far:
I'm in one game where the DM rolls intiative individually for small battles, then uses a more narrative style for middle or large scale combat. Nine PCs, and no maps. (works fine)

Another game the DM rolls individually and uses maps. (most work for DM, easiest for players. Closest to the table-top feel.)

Third game, the one with Tensen, GM_Jacob has been running it same way you ran here, except sometimes with map. Also works fine, as long as everyone clearly labels posts with time and location.

Edit: I wouldn't mind that Longbow if no one else wants it. If someone does, it definitely yours, I wasn't even there for the fight.

I think you could use it for now Gren, then on level 2 when amoonrann pick up zen archer pass it to her.

Can I use that bow though? I mean...is that +2 strength like the Mighty +2? Or is that a +2 bonus to the stat? Because if its the former, I can't use it anyway (my STR is 12, so I wouldn't be strong enough to use it). But if its the latter...well, if it is the latter, I wouldn't mind using it next level...though, really, I wouldn't get real worth out of it until level 4 at best (when Zen Archery kicks in).

3rd level zen archer, aka level 4 overall? So you mean where you use wisdom, to hit rather than dex right?

Either way I still think Gren could makes use of it the most atm. And I thought later on you would be our actual range character, it be better for you to have the bow(now at level 4 I guess).

Also we seems to be quite melee heavy aren't we?

Roga, Gren, Triaxus are melee

Amoonrann, Elros and Stellan = range

but on range, almost only Amoonrann does damage from stormburst, and it's non-lethal too.

I believe me and Stellan, would only be able to do 1d3 damage(weak).

Making battlefield control not very useful.

It's a composite bow (+2 str), as in you can add 2 of your str bonus to damage. I'm eventually going to buy one anyway, but the one I really need is a Composite Longbow +4 (500 GP). Too much for the level 1 purse. I mean, I can do pretty good damage at range. In fact, I think I do the most damage at range right now. Roga's melee average damage is 16 mine is 14.5 so we're pretty close there.

Elros while looking at your character sheet to see why you couldn't use a longbow, I saw that you have one but your Str was the problem. Just wanna point out that you can only carry 23 lbs. unencumbered, and without adding it all up I'm pretty sure you're over that with the gear you've got now.

Actually now, that I'm looking at people's sheets. Traixus should take the bow, unless he's only planning on using starknifes for character reasons or something. It's perfect for his str bonus, he has point blank shot, and his melee damage is only 4.5 on average. Compared to 8.5 at range (within 30'). I understand that you want to play the character in melee Triaxus, and I'm cool with whatever you wanna do (it's your toon). Just looking at the numbers. I'm guessing you're going to go Two-Weapon Fighting combat style to bypass the feat Dex feat pre-reqs, right?

The bow is most useful for Triaxus, followed by me and then right behind me (only due to his lower dex) is Roga. Based on people's ability scores and feat choices Triaxus is our best candidate to fill the 'ranged' role right now, and he will remain so until Moonie is 4th level. Even then they will be relatively equal in ranged damage output, depending on what other feats Triaxus chooses.

How's that for overanalysis Stellan? :P

I'm never, if rarely going to even use the bow I have right now, and the +2 would be a waste for me with my -2 str instead. Like previous post, you could use it the best.

Speaking of Zen Archery...do you guys want me grabbing that quick as I can? Or going back and forth between Druid and Monk to try and balance the casting and archery progression?

I was planning a getting a bow as soon as possible, if for no reason other than occasionally, bad guys are more than 20 feet away, for some odd reason. :) And my damage numbers will be a bit higher than presented, with favored enemy and the number of humans in this adventure path as enemies. Shooting the long bow first turn to soften them up for a turbo-gensu of starknives, bastard and greatswords is fine by me. Triaxus uses starknives largely due to his upbringing, but bows stop bandits just as well.

As far as your question goes Moony, I'm cool with you switching off; I don't believe Stellan or Elros intend to class out anytime soon, and any further ranged capacity in our group could only help. Either way, it's your character. I'm still waffling myself as whether or not to multi-class to cleric before hitting the sphere-walker PC; casting like a eighth level cleric along with all the fun things the prestige class does makes the BAB hit more than worth it, and it would fit the character pretty well.

@Grendolynn, pretty good over analysis :p. I really had to take a good look at the characters before I understood where they were going, especially Triaxus and Amoonrann, who are characters with "great potential" and by that I mean not optimal for 1st level, they come into their own later.

Amoonrann it's always your choice as to what you want to play, saying that, I'd go for it at once. The next couple of levels of Druid give you incremental increases in your Druidness, taking Zen Archer is a game changer for you. (Drop the armor, your unarmed melee would be better than your current armed, etc.) Small drawback, you'll be 4th level before your to hit becomes good. The big drawback I see, it delays your gaining +1 BAB, which may cause some issues with action economy, and I'll stop there before I write a dissertation. :)

In terms of pure efficiency, giving the good longbow to Triaxus and having Gwendolynn borrow Elros's bow would be excellent, just not sure how that would roleplay.

@longbow We'll work something out.

@amoonrann Whichever you feel would be more comfortable with.

@class I'm more than likely going straight wizard, or possible prestige Loremaster, provided I don't die before then XD.

@Elros Posting here to avoid cluttering the gameplay thread too much. According to the long term care description, you'd be conscious in about eight hours, and at positive hit points by the next morning. This is assuming complete bed rest for said periods, as I understand it.

Koo...I was leaning towards grabbing monky stuff first anyways. Its just Elros getting pwned kinda drove home the fact that we're a little light in the heal department, and it'll only get worse if I drop 3 levels behind in spell casting.

Mind you, we won't be getting caught with our pants down for most battles XP

@Elros Posting here to avoid cluttering the gameplay thread too much. According to the long term care description, you'd be conscious in about eight hours, and at positive hit points by the next morning. This is assuming complete bed rest for said periods, as I understand it.

Ah yes should've done that, thanks for reminding. =]

@my rest, I'll be resting for a full day, to get that 4hp healed, so tommorrow the same time when Stellan took care of me, I'll wake up, with 2 hp, I believe.

@me getting owned, Yeah that was devastation, I mean if I'm a normal Wizard that took improved initiative rather than toughness, I'm pretty sure I'm dead, the 11 starting hp helped a ton, rather than 8hp start...

#1 rule of being a low level wizard. Never stand near or in line of sight of anything that could have any desire to kill you. Being right out front like that, in no armor is what really got you. Why shoot at the super heavy armored guy, when you can shoot the squishy elf?

That being said, yeah toughness can be pretty sweet.

@Moonie - Do you want to be an archer with a couple spells, or a druid with a bow? 4th level is most likely a loooong looooong way away in PBP time. I'd say take a level of monk for level 2 to loose the armor, and get a couple ranged feats (ie. Precise shot, etc), but then go druid for a while. For the same reason you said, this party lacks a channeling healer, which means we're gonna be light on healing for a while. If we get access to a wand of cure light wounds that changes everything, but until then better safe than sorry.

indeed, and I was caught flat-footed too. My character had something to say, when he wakes up. =p

Oh yeah +4 HP for all day and given it was dawn when Elros got it, and I had him in LTC within 5 minutes, that's likely to apply.

It'll be interesting to see the pacing of this PbP. Most die before 2nd is reached, others are slow, one or two levels per year, one, at least, did seven levels in one year. Pacing is everyone's contribution but the DM is critical, if dunebugg can post "early and often" then it could go fast, (by-pass slowpokes) but more likely RL will show up again and slow things down. If dunebugg is OK with it, if we move very fast, we can get through adventure one by the end of year which is 3rd level (at less we better be...).

Per wizardly/witchy vulnerability... there's a reason why Stellan is remarkably good at hiding for an arcane caster.

Per wand, yes we need a cleric in a can ASAP but is dunebugg enforcing the arcane/divine divide when it comes to wands. If so, then it should be divine, as Roga and Triaxus would someday be able to use it. I think only I could use an arcane CLW wand..

Is there an arcane/divine divide written into the wand rules? I thought that was only for scrolls...hmm.

Point, looking over the pathfinder rules, it seems the only requirement for a spell completion item is that the character has a class that can ever cast the spell within, even if they can't cast spells yet. So by that it appears that rangers and paladins can use wands from first level and there is no arcane/divine wand division made. So Triaxus, Roga, Amoonrann, and Stellan can use wand of CLW but Grendolynn the trapper and Elros (CLW not on spell list) could not.

RE: healing. Look up the Infernal Healing, spell. Lesser Vigor 2.0? Sold. We abuse the hell out of it in my local game. So it's an evil spell, whatever.. You're all mostly neutral anyways.

Moony: do you ever plan on using Wild Shape? If the answer is no, I will be happy to work out some Zen-Archery stuff for you as a druid. I'm nothing if not an extremely flexible DM. The rules are nothing more than guidelines for how to play.. That way you can archer + druid to your hearts content.

Well, Stellan is neutral good, he'd never use that spell and be a bit concerned if anyone else did. Getting the materials for the spell could also be interesting. And Roga would, justifiably, go medieval on anyone he sees using it.

@Infernal Healing, If I'm not mistaken this heals you for 1hp per round aka every 6 seconds, since the spell last for 1 minutes, that's 10hp healed am I right? The same goes for fast healing.

I don't believe anyone here got the curse water, so unholy water is gonna be fairly hard to come by, unless Oleg just so happen to have some =p.

I think infernal healing would be possible upon reaching level 3, at least for me, as I could summon a Lemure(devil) take a bit of blood from it, and store it in a flask or something.

I would really appreciate that not happening, I interpret the code as not being able to campaign for long with people using evil spells, once or twice would provide some interesting roll-play, but more than that and we have a problem.

You still need the ability to cast spells before you can use the wand, but yeah if it's on your spell list you can use it.

I think the rule for needing spells is under "spell-trigger items"

I would really appreciate that not happening, I interpret the code as not being able to campaign for long with people using evil spells, once or twice would provide some interesting roll-play, but more than that and we have a problem.

Like I mentioned earlier about your code: take anything the book says about your code and don't go against it. A wizard casting an Evil spell? Well if it benefits good, you can't argue against the party using it, unless it specifically goes against YOUR moral code, of your character, or if your god would not like it.

Moony: do you ever plan on using Wild Shape? If the answer is no, I will be happy to work out some Zen-Archery stuff for you as a druid. I'm nothing if not an extremely flexible DM. The rules are nothing more than guidelines for how to play.. That way you can archer + druid to your hearts content.

See, I don't wanna dump Wildshape entirely because its one of the most versatile abilities in the game. Yeah, I'll never be an amazing shifting Druid who can bear form and just crush guy after guy, but if they do get past the front-liners, it'd be nice to be able to deal with them in a competent fashion. Also, Wildshape makes for amazing scouts -- literal flies on the wall. But I didn't go Druid specifically for wildshape. I wanted a Divine caster archer and Druid spells are the coolest spells of the divine caster classes, imo.

The use of Monk isn't just Zen Archery though. Monks also get the WIS to AC bump. Basically, everything I'd ever need from my stats works off of just one stat. Also, I'd need the Zen Archer weapon proficiency to use bows. Everything else can kinda be sacrificed (though, monk boost to REF and eventual Evasion is really sweet).

If I could get all of those things on the Druid scale by level 4, the Hell yeah I'll gladly swap stuff around. Just off hand...perhaps swap out Druid armor and weapon proficiency for the Zen Archer monk WIS AC and weapon proficiency, and then Zen Archery at level 4 instead of the first wildshape? Proceed at the regular Druid levels with all Wildshape taken at -1 (so 2/day means 1/day) and that ability caps at level 20 with 8/day?

Needing to be able to cast the spell was the D20 rule but it looks like Pathfinder changed that as follows:

Spell Trigger: Spell trigger activation is similar to spell
completion, but it’s even simpler. No gestures or spell
finishing is needed, just a special knowledge of spellcasting
that an appropriate character would know, and a single word
that must be spoken. Spell trigger items can be used by anyone
whose class can cast the corresponding spell. This is the case
even for a character who can’t actually cast spells, such as a
3rd-level paladin. The user must still determine what spell is
stored in the item before she can activate it. Activating a spell
trigger item is a standard action and does not provoke attacks
of opportunity. Pathfinder Core Rulebook page: 458.

I looked up the pathfinder rule because I've had some issues with remembering D20 rules and not the Pathfinder, here and there changes. It's the biggest issue I have with playing Pathfinder, not that's Paizo's fault, they made a lot of little changes, never can remember which ones.

Quick question, is it an evil act to cast an evil spell or does one become evil of doing so? Is it an evil act to accept the spell?

After having thought about it and read the code and dunebuggs post I arrived at the following: The spell is evil in nature but casting does not make the caster evil, I don't think it is an evil act to cast or accept the spell the spell (depending on what is required to do so) but it is against the intention in the code. Let me hear what you think.

EDIT: I am planing on not asking Stellan for aid as my character does not trust him fully yet, but that would take some time before Roga is go to go. How would you like for this to play out having in mind it shouldn't affect the party mechanics.

Oh s~+*. I didn't know that at all. Thanks for sharing. No more waiting until 4th level to use wands? All those PFS mods I ran wrong?!? Oh well...

What type of spell do you think cure light wound is? Good or Evil. Though it may be neutral, it's leaning towards good than evil, this doesn't stop evil-doers from using it.

What I'm trying to say it, it's not what the spell is, it's what the person using it for; doing good things or bad things.

I don't think a person casting evil spells makes a person evil as long as it's used for a greater good. Otherwise it's basically saying those who use Arcana are mostly evil, and those who use Divine are mostly good.

Just as an Evil person casting a good spell, doesn't make him good, it's only if he cast a spell, which could be class evil or good that helps other, would it considered a "good" act.

Another example, killing a person is an evil act.(most of the time)
But killing an evil person, won't make a Lawful Good person, drop to Lawful Neutral, or Neutral Good.

dunebugg wrote:

Moony: do you ever plan on using Wild Shape? If the answer is no, I will be happy to work out some Zen-Archery stuff for you as a druid. I'm nothing if not an extremely flexible DM. The rules are nothing more than guidelines for how to play.. That way you can archer + druid to your hearts content.

See, I don't wanna dump Wildshape entirely because its one of the most versatile abilities in the game...If I could get all of those things on the Druid scale by level 4, the Hell yeah I'll gladly swap stuff around. Just off hand...perhaps swap out Druid armor and weapon proficiency for the Zen Archer monk WIS AC and weapon proficiency, and then Zen Archery at level 4 instead of the first wildshape? Proceed at the regular Druid levels with all Wildshape taken at -1 (so 2/day means 1/day) and that ability caps at level 20 with 8/day?

Here's what I will give you:

Does that sound fine?