Taissa will undertake some crafting while sailing over the two weeks. She will move to the space below deck on The Seahawk, where she has her crafting supplies (500 gp worth), masterwork tools, and portable alchemist's lab all set up. There is a table and a chair provided by Ren.
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In the first week, she will also be teaching White Fang (and even Daya) more Common and attempting to get through to the worg pup in regard to heeding her commands/instructions.
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During the journey, Ren will occasionally make some more personal small-talk with Taissa (if she is agreeable to it).
Taissa is agreeable to Ren's company, mentoring and conversation. She feels comfortable around him and learns much from him. That she enjoys his company is an added bonus.
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Zayna will craft alchemical cartridges for 3 GP a piece for anyone who wants during those two weeks.
Taissa will purchase from Zayna 10 alchemical cartridges for her musket, at total cost of 30 gp. (This means that the Alchemical Cartridges will reduce the time to load from a full-round action to a standard action.)
Second week, Taissa will try her hand at crafting the following items, with the aid of the portable Alchemist's Lab (+1 bonus to Craft check).
2. She will also attempt to craft using the portable Alchemist's Lab.
Finding herself on deck at the same time as Ren, Taissa stretched her sore muscles (she'd been working on crafting items below deck) and lifted her hand in greeting.
"Ren, I have a question to ask. Back in Korvosa, when we sold The Scorpion, why didn't Captain John or the rest of you seek a portion of the coin?"
When the goblin is not helping them sail, he seems to pay a lot of attention White Fang, but says nothing about it; merely watching the pup and studying him from a distance, suspecting that if he spoke to the pup or moved close to the pup it may anger folk.
During the time she spent on deck, teaching the animals Common or playing ball with them, Taissa noted the goblin's eyes fall on the worg pup.
Giving the pup a good pat on his side, she leaves him to play with Daya and moves toward the goblin.
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Quick Follow-up on Crafting
I think there may have been some confusion on how I’m doing Crafting. I’m going to try to explain it a bit better here.
A standard “Work Day” involves 8 hours. There are 8 hours dedicated to sleeping and an additional 8 hour dedicated to things like eating, dressing, etcetera for the full 24 (it’s just how the game does it). Characters can work beyond those standards, but they start to suffer Fatigue if they do.
But for practical purposes a standard “Work Week” has 56 hours in it (this links to the current rules which allow you to get the job done in less time then a week).
The PC spends 1/3 of the base cost of things on “Crafting Supplies”.
The House Rules on Crafting is almost identical to the book, but it’s faster.
You find the DC, you multiply it by the Check and take ½ of that number to discover how many GP you crafted in a week (all Crafting Checks are broken up into 1 hour Increments for Game Balance; in other words, Crafting takes at least 1 hour to complete the project no matter what the roll).
With that said, for now I’m going to use Taissa as my “Case Example” because she is the only person who really did any crafting on the journey. Nothing personal, but I'm just trying to clarify things a little and using your rolls as my examples :)
During the trip Taissa wanted to craft arrows. If she makes her check it means she automatically Craft 20 arrows in one hour because Arrows are so cheap.
For that she has to spend 1/3 a GP on Crafting Supplies. She made her check, she has to spend at least 1 hour repairing it and she did that.
Then she wanted to make a Healing Remedy.
She spends 33.3 GP for Crafting Supplies.
She made that roll with a 26.
The math says she got 25x25x1/2 gold for a total of 325 GP for a total of 56 hours.
She doesn’t need to work 56 hours though.
She realizes that if she takes the 325 GP and figures out how much she gets done in an hour. In this case it’s 325/56 and gets 5.8 Gold done in an hour. Since the remedy is 100 GP, it will take her roughly 18 hours.
Finally she’s going to make Alchemical Grease which costs 5 GP.
To sum up she gets roughly 2.3 GP crafted an hour on that project, or roughly 5 GP done in three hours (Crafting must be done in one hour increments).
So it will take her 18 hours for the Healing Remedy, 3 hours for the Grease and 1 hour for the 20 arrows for roughly 22 hours.
It cost her roughly 33.3 GP for the potion, 1.6 GP for the Grease and .3 GP for the arrows or roughly 35.3 GP in Crafting Supplies.
That means if Taissa spends 8 hours a day doing crafting she’ll have all of her projects done in less than 3 days and has 13 more days to sail and Social RP (or craft other projects if she can afford to or is interested in doing it).
As quick as this was, if Taissa had used “Accelerated Crafting” on the Grease the DC would have been a 25 and if she got a natural 20 (hypothetically) for a total of 26 she could have finished the Grease in only an hour.
Why didn’t she do that?
If you set the DC and Fail the Check then you ruin the Crafting Supplies and the Time and are out of pocket those supplies.
How much time do you waste?
Same equation – just figure out how much work you do in an hour per week, and figure out how many hours a week you would have taken with the current total (even if it fails) and that’s how many hours/days you wasted if you fail the roll.
That’s why I suggested people spend a few ranks on Crafting.
To Taissa
Ren will be able to give you that information, but it will have to come a bit later, as it depends largely on the actions of your companions. Once he knows what everyone does, he’ll be able to answer that better, but he’s not ignoring the question.
Snaga watches Taissa and says nothing. He learned the price of talking out of turn, his lips still raw from where the gag dug into them after talking to Polux.
He keeps his mouth closed and listens to her.
"Mayhap you can give me a little advice on how to make White Fang heed command rather than act on his will alone. He is young, with a warrior's heart, yet not strong enough to fight as he wishes."
He looks away and thinks a moment.
”He wants to be like the warrior, yess… he wants to show world he is brave and strong.”
”If you give him orders, trick him,” he says bluntly.
He watches your face, and moves on quickly.
”Do not tell him to run like coward – tell him to… to guard your loot! Then you leave loot behind and he can be very proud to guard it bravely, yesss? He is brave to guard your loot, even as you move on to danger.”
”Do not tell him to hide from enemy when he is wounded, that is coward’s way… tell him to scout land behind you to seek for enemy so you can follow him… Then he is brave to check enemy where you know there are none... he does not run away, he scouts out danger… he think he is brave, though, that is what is important, yess?”
Taissa, it’s clear that Snaga’s comments could work on White Fang, despite this, you sense that there is something that is bothering him about this strategy, but he does not say anything else at it at this time.
He remembers his lessons.
What about me aiding her? Doesn't that count for something?
What about me aiding her? Doesn't that count for something?
Technically it would.
In this case it's tricky because she didn't do a Craft Carpentry roll.
But here's what I'm going to do -
Your "Aid" check can be modified to a specific project. In other words, since Craft checks can be done without skill ranks in them, you can "Aid" her in a project.
Your natural 14 means whatever task you aid her with would succeed.
Normally I'd never do this, but as we're still learning the ropes on Crafting I'm going to allow it this time.
I'd recommend you "Aiding" her with the Crafting of the Healing Remedy.
If you do that, she'll gain a +2 to her roll.
This means it will only take her 16 hours instead of 18 to make the Healing Remedy.
However, you will be working on the project with her - so basically you'll be working on it together for those two days.
"So you advise to make him feel worthwhile and be given a sense of purpose to appease his warrior heart? Not to make him feel as though he runs from cowardice...that makes sense. I will attempt to do that in my instruction."
Taissa gets a feeling of something more from the goblin, so she presses, "What is it, Snaga? Are you withholding something from me? I would hear it."
At some point in the first few days of leaving Korvosa for Osirion, Taissa will approach Captain John.
"Captain John, I would like a word, if you have time."
Taking a chance while they are on break on deck, after a well deserved meal, Polux absent mindedly hones one of his blades, addressing Snaga - "So Snaga, tell me: what's the plan? You planning on sticking with me until I die of old age?" - he jests, but does not smile, methodically keeping on with the process, and frequently looking at the wave bladed dagger in appreciation.
"I mean, what is it exactly that you want? Let's put it like this, when you were a young goblin scurrying around in your village, did you ever entertain any thoughts of a future outside of it?"
Response to Taissa
Snaga looks at Taissa, his eyes without expression.
Then he shrugs.
”He is little, you wish him to grow strong, yesss?? Then he must be trained to be strong.”
”When you go to battle, he must make a kill… if he does not make a kill, he will not know what it is to be a warrior….”
”You teach him man words; he learns them well… but he will not be strong or be able to defend himself in a fight if you do not train him to be a warrior… when next you battle, let him make a kill, or at least try to, so he learns what it means to be a true warrior…” he says with a nod.
Johnny glances at you and listens to your words for a moment.
”Yeah – well, don’t sweat it too much,” he says with a little grin.
”Way I figure it, we’re likely even on that score,” he adds.
He looks at Taissa for a bit.
”Well, you know, when you brought that little goblin-lad back with ya’ll? Thing is, Ren brought him over to our ship while you lads where working on repairing that old hulk you sold. We had a chance to talk to him a bit,” he says, pausing to light up a cigarette.
He lets out a long stream of tobacco smoke.
”You know he knows where a hell of a lot of the goblin dens near Beacon were? And he knows where the main tribes frequent during the winter months?”
”We had Vale confirm that he was telling the truth on it all, then we drew up some maps and locations with the dens, locations and amounts of goblins – including the tribes that band together – that were nearest to Beacon.”
”Just before we left we sent the list back to the Lord of Beacon… he’ll be able to send outriders to those points during the next month or so and knock out a hell of a lot of the them… when the springs come and the snows melt those tribes won’t be stabbing north to harass Beacon as they’ll likely be wiped out during the winter when they ain’t expecting trouble.”
”The way I figure it, he’ll be pretty damn grateful for that news,” he adds with a shrug.
He looks at you.
”Ren said that ya’ll ought to have gotten a piece of that action, you know – as you found the goblin and brought him back… but I figured you’d have done that yourselves, you know, if you wanted to…”
”I told him that ya’ll had plenty of time to ask the goblin all sorts of things and when you got the tip you could have sent the message yourself and cash in big time, but if you didn’t want to do it, why should we skip out on the opportunity? I mean – hell! That was a pretty good idea, seeing that trekking overland back to Beacon to hunt goblins was something ya’ll considered, so you clearly knew that he knew the lairs and if ya’ll wanted to send a tip, you would have already done it.”
He shrugs.
”But Ren said that given the loot and fame that the Regent would likely send us our way, we could afford to at least skip out on the rewards that selling that ship would grant us.”
He chuckles.
”I told him that was fair – splitting the coin eleven ways means we’d have about five hundred gold a piece, right? That’s hardly worth it, you know? Still, we did have a deal – but Ren can be pretty persuasive when he wants, so it’s all good,” he says.
”Your crew keeps the loot for the ship, I figure we’ll more than earn it back when we get the cut from the locations of the goblin-lairs… but fair is fair, right?”
He glances at you again.
”Between you and me, I can’t figure why ya’ll didn’t send the tip yourselves when you sent that other letter home… but who am I to argue, you know?”
Response to Polux
The goblin watches Polux when he asks about his plans to watch the warrior die until old age.
”I do not know warriors who die of old age – they normally die in battle.”
”I do not think you would die as old man but a warrior,” he adds.
He considers thoughts for the future.
”Always thinking of one thing – since I was young enough to eat… survive.”
”That is what all goblins want – to survive, yesss? If job makes you survive, then it is good job.”
”As for survive and what gives pleasure? Food – battle – females – victory… what more is that?”
”Future outside of village is only good if you survive. Village is only good if it keeps you alive… village kept me alive, so it was good village. Now you keep me alive – you good chief.”
”Being chief a good thing if it let you survive – but it is bad because then everyone sees you are chief and maybe try to kill you all day. That is not good.”
”But you are chief, if they try to kill, I help you live.”
Snaga picks up the blades and hefts them.
”These be curved blades, like curved swords.”
”All goblin kinds like the curved blades… they cut deeper, they slice better, they make ugly wounds in flesh.”
”Using curved blades very good. I learn young to use the curved blades,” he adds.
He thinks a moment.
”One day chief from other place come to teach me to fight. He show me the Hammer, but I do not like it much. He say the Hammer be better, because slices do too much work – the Hammer is rage only… you cannot slice flesh easy with Hammer, only if strong can you kill.”
”I say he true on some things, but I still no like the Hammer… so he taught me other ways of killing… the Hammer only be one.”
”That chief taught me great ways of power – great ways to kill, if need be…” he adds with a calm expression.
”Now I learn to kill other ways… but I still like the curved blades… maybe one day I use the Hammer to kill like that old chief told me how… we shall see, though, we shall see…” he says with a grunt, smiling a little as he salutes you with the blades.
Taissa does not speak as she comprehends what Captain John and Ren have done. Her eyes grow cold and she simply nods her head once John is finished speaking and with a "By your leave", moves away from him lest she do or say something that would have dire consequences on the other members of her group. And here she was attempting to make recompense -- what a fool she was.
She immediately searches out Polux and Hack and discreetly pulls them away from The Seahawk crew for a private talk.
How many times did she tell herself that people could not be trusted and she had gone and believed Ren and the partnership that existed between the groups. Taissa would not make the same mistake twice. Her eyes grew colder still.
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** spoiler omitted **
Snaga looks at you and nods briskly.
"Aye! It is good," he says looking at you.
"The pup will grow strong; his attack shall be like Hammer; his face howls like the Hammer... when he does battle, his fury shall be like Grond," he says with satisfaction looking at White Fang and he raises his blades in salute.
"Grond, Grond, GROND!" he bellows with battle lust and raises his blades high to White Fang as if the pup is his master.
Then he turns about and mans the cannon, ready to fire.
"I feel shame. I trusted Ren and to a certain degree, Captain John. Now, I do not. I am with Hack -- we watch our backs and what we say in front of them. Polux, you must order Snaga to be silent in their presence. Why he gave them the information, I do not know. I cannot understand this conduct between allies. We helped them when they needed it and this is how they repay our goodwill."
After a moment of silence, she continues in much lowered voice, "Mayhap once the artefact is destroyed in Osirion, we part ways with Captain John and his people. I cannot stomach their deception."
Polux shakes his head at the news Taissa had just brought them - "Nothing of it makes any sense to me..." - he starts - "First, Snaga seems like the smartest goblin in the whole world - I gotta say I would expect him to know something about the goblin dens in the area, but not enough to help pointing them out in a map in such a useful way - it seems we are in face of the goblin ambassador for the Korvosa region" - he jests, but no smile crests his face.
"The fact that The Seahawk crew declined their share on the selling of the Scorpion because they already had this in mind is simply sickening, but then again I am happy that this has happened - it is an eye opener - we now understand that they are employers and that's that. They pursue their goals, and we were hired to assist them - I really wasn't expecting much from them, but now I expect nothing besides what was agreed upon" - he ponders, looking at his companions.
"In fact, perhaps it would be useful to ask them straight what is that we are expected to do in Osirion - I feel hard pressed to 'go the extra mile' from now on. And even though I want to go there, I am starting to see Hack's perspective on this, though we may be too far along to turn back"
"As for Snaga..." - the man stares at one of his curved blades - "I really can't blame him - he has shown that he either threw them on a wild goose chase, which would actually be a fun thing" - he chuckles - "Or he simply does not give a rat's ass about his kin, in any shape or form, providing information that most likely will get them wiped out... I guess that would make him more of a goblin in my book... Regardless, I am guessing that for all his brilliance, he simply assumed Vale and the Seahawk crew were as much his captors as ourselves, and probably answered them like he would answer any of us" - looking across the deck, he adds - "All of that talk of me beig the chief is a big pile of smelly dung though, if that is the way he plans on acting towards it - I have a mind to release him from whatever bond he thinks he has to me, so he can run along and dance with his newfound friends"
Twirling his weapon, he finishes - "All I know is that this ship is becoming too cramped all of a sudden... And I think you should feel no shame at all Taissa - trust is something amazing, and finding those that deserve it, even more so. I don't think one should ever give up on searching for it - I, for one, believe I have found two that deserve mine"
"You make sense -- how is one goblin so knowledgeable on every den in Varisia...Unless he means to lead John astray ... No."
"I agree that we ask them what our purpose is in Osirion and then we do that and no more. If we make stop before Osirion, and dock, I have a mind to simply leave their company. But I do not feel they will stop until they reach their desired harbour. Mayhap this dark relic has tainted their minds and hearts. But it would be too simple and easy to blame the darkness of an object rather than accept the truth of the darkness of a person's heart. Now you see why I have travelled in the company of animals for many years -- they do not play such games."
Taissa shook her head as if waging an internal debate.
Remembering where she was, her direct gaze sought each of the men,
"You two deserve my trust and have it."
"And aye, it is time to inform Stefan."
"Agreed, we should share this with Stefan" - Polux pipes in, then stares at Taissa - "And I've got good news for you - you still travel with animals" - he nods at himself and Hack, and laughs.
At Polux's simple jest, Taissa can't help but give a low chuckle, before replying,
"Then welcome to my pack."
Turning serious once more, she adds, "When do we share this with Stefan? We've been huddled together and I do not want to draw the attention of Captain John or one of his trusted few."
Polux chuckles and lets out his best wolf howl, then quickly looks back at Taissa - "Oh, yeah... Not drawing attention"
Looking around for Stefan, he adds - "I guess we'll have to wait for an opportunity at a later time, perhaps tonight"
"Part of the pack, pack paaaaacck," he howls.
At some point in the first few days of leaving Korvosa for Osirion, Taissa will approach Captain John.
"Captain John, I would like a word, if you have time."
** spoiler omitted **
1. Your company knew that for a new member to be brought on board as a crewmember that John would have to interview that person. Even if Snaga was just a passenger, John would have at least liked to talk to him before he let a goblin on board with his Halfling Priest (especially given the way the Halfling normally acts).
That’s not much of a surprise; for a captain to at least talk to people who come on their ship, especially if they are a goblin. I didn't think that talking to him would be an issue - in fact, I mentioned it earlier on the boards and no one really seemed upset at the time that I could tell.
2. After you sold The Scorpion you guys got a pretty good deal. This is because first, there was no bargaining roll – Ren did that for you as a favor and didn’t charge a fee; he did it because he thought you guys were friends.
Also, the contract that you signed was to share all loot that you found on the quest equally. That’s why the slave girls got so much loose coin and that’s why – technically – you should have split the cost of the ship you found equally among everyone on the mission, because that was the contract you signed. But you guys didn’t do that – you got to keep the whole cost of the ship, and at a very good rate (again – no bargaining, you just got the good rate).
This was because they thought you were friends and they were trying to help you out a little. If that isn’t the case, well, I don’t know what else to say.
3. You guys already knew that Snaga had lost his entire tribe and was the last one in his tribe. You also already knew that the other goblin tribes in the area are enemy tribes to him and he has no love for them because they wiped out his tribe.
When you planned on going over land back to Beacon (as an option) Snaga said he knew the locations and areas of places that the enemy tribes hide in the winter and could show you where they were.
So basically you guys already knew all that stuff on your own. I was honestly expecting you guys to have put those details in the letter you sent home because otherwise things at Beacon could have gotten nasty come Springtime when the snows melt. But no one mentioned it in the letter.
I also expected you guys to ask the goblin a bunch of other things – things that no one bothered to ask or follow-up on. Things like – “How did you learn all this lore?” – “How come you’re smarter than most other goblins?” – “How come you’ve lived so long, what’s your secret?” – and so on; but it didn’t happen.
You guys are great gamers, and you do a lot of great writing. But there is a whole world unfolding before you. You guys are free to social RP things; but if you don’t want to social RP things (like sending the information Snaga had home for a possible reward) I don’t know what I can do.
That said – this is supposed to be about having a good time. If you guys aren’t enjoying it, please let me know and I’ll do what I can to fix things. Toward that end, I'll even remove Ren from overhearing this conversation when he came to try to explain things to Taissa. Don't even worry about the Perception/Stealth rolls at this point.
Right. Now I have to go do some errands. I’ll see you guys later tonight.
My advice is to treat the crew like they’re you’re friends (that’s how I wrote them). So if you’re upset with what they did just go ask them about it in game and they’ll try to smooth things out as best as I can.
Also, even goblins can be smart - after all, they don't get penalties to Intelligence in their build.