[AP] Curse of the Crimson Throne by GMs Rutseg, Zek and Snowheart (Inactive)

Game Master Balacertar

Ok, good luck then!

Thank you, I'm going to need it.

“And part of that work, and my own duty as a priest, is to save as many people as I can. I came here fully expecting to have to kill everyone in this room but that doesn't mean I want to, and I know you don't want to die either, no one does. So tell me, what can I do to help you?"”

Ballsy! Can’t tell if this is a diplomacy or intimidation check.

<eats popcorn while watching>

I think it's going to be a hit point check.

lol

@Varor

Full defense is a standard action and so is casting shield of faith. Though it would 100% make sense for Varor to cast it *before* walking down suicide alley

Also in the future if you are going to be our diplomat please make a diplomacy or intimidate roll. I don’t think that without it the diplomacizing can work.

@ Zamanda

“Action: Using Diplomacy to influence a creature's attitude takes 1 minute of continuous interaction. Making a request of a creature takes 1 or more rounds of interaction, depending upon the complexity of the request. Using Diplomacy to gather information takes 1d4 hours of work searching for rumors and informants.”

So I don’t think that by RAW a diplomacy check can be combined with an attack action. In fact, by RAW it takes 6 rounds to use diplomacy when in initiative! Which is very, very stupid. It really discourages talking one’s way out of problems.

But, if I was a GM I’d certainly allow it combined with our previous diplomacy rolls I’d likely allow it to see if it can push anyone over the edge into not attacking. ;)

Just throwing the raw out there. And asking if we can have a house rule to use talking skills in combat, as they are often more fun than just attacking

If I had known I had the one chance to try and talk things out I would have made the post a bit longer, but there's no use crying over spilled milk. At least this way we aren't waiting for long posts of discussion.

This comes down to how a GM translates action economy. It's one of those intentionally vague design choices for tabletop games. If the GM wants me to take only one of those actions I'm completely fine with just choosing one over the other.

Normally I'd say the full defense and shield of faith can't happen on the same round, but I was trying to provide time for folks to cast spells in advance of heading in (put another way, there was time), so I'm fine with it.

And diplomacy does usually take a minute. Since this was the start, I wouldn't dismiss it out of hand, but it's effect (if any) may not be apparent.

6 rounds seems excessive. I always thought you could talk as much as you wanted since it was a free action. Thanks for sharing the rule, Kalem.

It surprised me too when I first ran into it, in PFS if I recall.

Though to be fair I commonly mix different diplomacy checks. Such as Bluff to fool on identify and then intimidate for attitude shift. Now that I think about it I’m not 100% sure on doing that. At least not as a same Round Action, even though I think it should be allowed...

Everything's in the hands of the GM making the calls, but yeah, 1 minute minimum on diplomacy. Makes it awfully tricky to talk people down if they want to kill you (assuming you're playing by RAW).

Sometimes I think they go so far towards making the game supposedly fair for all parties that they make it unplayable. I love Pathfinder, don't get me wrong, but so many things have been nerfed or strangled because we're trying to stop people from abusing the game, or trying to balance things that just can't/shouldn't be balanced. Life isn't fair, neither is the game, and sometimes you just have to play it by ear.

I feel like now that I know this rule, my characters are going to talk less, and just start shooting first, since talking wastes at least 10 rounds. Kind of unfortunate.

Well...fick. Now I feel bad. Sorry :(

So...found this

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/call-truce/

Maybe we can house rule, based on it, that diplomacy/Bluff/intimidate is 1 full round action instead of 6?

Seems like it makes more sense and it is based on an existing feat

Seems kind of silly to require a whole feat for something like that, so I wouldn't mind a house rule. The DC might be a bit high, depending on the opponent, but I could see having some sort of static penalty to the check due to being in combat/having weapons drawn, etc. For it to be at all likely to succeed, we'd probably need to allow for Aid Anothers to the initial check.

So, here's the thing. There is the rule and it's why, mid-combat, I don't usually let Diplomacy give a quick way out. But, given the context, before combat I'll let it work (as it did in the entry) and, even in combat, sometimes I may make it more likely someone will surrender later.

Total side story: In 3.5, I had a player take a prestige class around the charm person spell and diplomacy and completely break the game with it. Through the PrC, he was even able to get the spell to work on undead and constructs. Ultimately, I was just like, "Nope, that didn't work," he replied, "You're ruining my character," and I replied, "You're ruining the game for everyone else. Make a new character." Which was to say (as you've all probably noticed by now), I follow the rules until they get in the way of having fun. I think diplomacy can be fun and I see the one-minute rule as a guide, but there are also times when, just like in real life, no matter how pretty your words are and how true your intentions, some people are just going to want to knock you into the ground. Conversely, it may take people a little time to mull the words but ultimately they'll come around.

I get why the rule is there, and how it can be abused. Agree with the current ruling.

Just saying that the rule breaks it the other way. Of course players shouldn't be able to force bad guys to become good, but players should also be able to try whatever they think of, and (depending on the circumstances of course) have a chance (even if incredibly minute) of having a good idea work. If it doesn't, it doesn't, but at least the character gets to try.

It seems like as soon as you make trying a certain thing into a special case and write it up, then it becomes a barrier to entry, and people can't try normal things anymore. I had a GM the other day say that I couldn't try to hide my spellcasting because some class has a special ability that does that... so now normal people can't even try? That nerfs illusion spells pretty well, but the same thing goes with a lot of abilities. I know some, maybe a lot, of it is just my ignorance of the rules around different builds, but it can be frustrating when your choices are severely limited. Although, that might make it easier for the GM, which probably trumps regular player frustration. :)

I feel your pain on the Spells. Enhanced Diplomacy sounds great...until the GM says that everyone knows you are using magic, thus ruining the diplomacy. :(

Yeah, same with the "innocence" spell. I've had that one before, and it seems like there is never a circumstance where you can actually use it.

Yeah, I'm with you Zamanda on cool ideas always having a chance to work.

As for your spellcasting experience... that's the spell manifestations FAQ in action. Back in 2015 Paizo clarified that all spellcasting (SLA and regular) had some kind of obvious manifestations that you could use spellcraft on to identify, even if the spell was stilled and silent (for example, if you're a Psychic spellcaster with emotion and thought components only). All of a sudden you *HAD* to have one of the spell concealing feats or class mechanics.

I have an illusionist wizard in one of my other campaigns (one that Kalem is in too) and I just have my fingers crossed that the GM will have mercy with the spell manifestations rule if I try to do anything tricky :>

So...Varor is at 1HP.
We are stuck at a choke point. Kalem can’t get into combat.

What do we do?

Ye Olde Advancing Meatgrinder tactics. Bashiel attacks, drops the wererat, Kalem enters the wererat's square and drops another wererat, someone enters that new unconscious wererat's square, repeat :>

Now I just have to not roll terribly. As soon as pink is down, Varor will have a withdraw path that will trigger AoOs only from the weaker wererats that have had trouble hitting him thus far.

Not rolling terribly has been achieved. Kalem, unless this pink wererat is some kind of HP superstar, you should have a clear path forwards to attack or support Varor.

Yup! And quite likely splatted that one as well. Choke point has probably been well and truly shattered.

Love what Ilsa is doing! I think she needs line of sight for her abilities? So I'd recommend joining Kalem in charging through the gap so you can see the rat leader.

I...think this will work out. Now, even if Ilsa can't lock down the leader, he will hit on a 3+...but will do 2d6+3 damage due to DR. That's on average 10 points of damage. Even if he has a second attack, that probably won't bring Varor down to being at death levels, so we can still save him.

Hopefully he'll be locked down, and we can get out of this cleanly. But yeah. This should work out alright.

Okay...I couldn't tell which rat was the leader. I think it's the one that's the different portrait, I guess.

If I need to move before casting my spell (and if there's room, I'll do that).

Okay, I'm off this week for my last big camping trip of the year, but I'll be gone from Wednesday through next Sunday. See you next week!

FYI: Leader is orange. He has a slightly different token, too.

I think the screamer mushroom thing is screaming by now too... we got too close.

Yup, thanks. I noticed that when I was updating the map last time. Going to incorporate it into the next post.

This last encounter:

(1) Kalem has the idea of bluffing that we were the guard, and that if they didn’t deal with us, they’d have no chance of getting out alive. The hope here was to scare some of the wererats off. Bluff

(2) Then Bashiel and Zamanda didn’t follow up with the Bluff, but instead worked purely on good-will of “we are here with peaceful intentions.” Which could work, but didn’t flow out of the first Bluff. Diplomacy

(3) Then Varor decided to go in by himself and to threaten the wererats, saying that he came here to kill everyone, but if they didn’t want to die then he wouldn’t need to kill them all. Because this wasn’t discussed, we weren’t able to turn this into an ambush. Intimidate

So...we all tried very different approaches here. None of us worked off each other, or even discussed what we planned to do. As such, we ended up with a very messy fight. With an unarmored cleric surrounded, and our Martials forced to break open a choke point. A few dice rolls differently and Varor could have died.

I really think that in the future we need to work our plans out in advance. None of us should be surprised at what we do diplomatically when we have time to prepare.

I was playing it by ear. I was trying to use what everyone said in a way to make my action make sense. The kill everyone thing being part of the guard lie, and the trying to talk them down was trying to play off of the peaceful intentions angle, didn't really work out.

Nope, it didn’t. Might have pulled it off though with a high intimidate or bluff roll though. So I’m not saying what you did was wrong per se.

I think that any of the approaches could have worked. It’s just that everyone played it by ear. And while that has to happen sometimes, we had plenty of time before this to work out a plan. So IC Kalem is angry. OOC I’m just saying we should learn from this so we can all be more effective next time.

—-

By the way the enemy is getting away, and Kalem is wasting time complaining. It’d be great if someone could do something about this. ;)

Yeah! Someone should hit Kalem! o:-)

In character Varor is tired from nearly dying. out of character I'm having a blast. And I think we will all be taking this as a learning experience.

It seems I'm very good at getting into fights with Kalem even when I don't mean to, and for that I am sorry.

It’s just RP. I’m not mad at all. You’re talking to a guy who has had his halforc barbarian wander through an enemy controlled house because he was bored, and then run back to the party screaming “It’s not my fault!” Said half orc also had an issue with eating downed enemies that more than once lent to him becoming poisoned.

Also in a RotRL campaign I am in right now, the issue is that my dwarf just killed two nobles that he thinks are shapeshifters. And the party Wizard is lecturing my dwarf on the very real possibility that two innocent people were just murdered.

So yeah...I’ve done things 1000x worse than Varor’s honest attempt at diplomacy. One of those things at this very moment.

Kalem’s ranting is just that...his. My apologies if anything about it seemed OOC. It’s just how I feel his personality to be. When I play any character, I tend to have them do whatever feels natural for them. Kalem is headstrong, passionate, and confident. He is a Cha20 melee character who rages, and who can easily get drunk on power. He needs people like Bashiel to keep him on the straight and narrow. On the flip side, when I have a Cha6 character with no face skills...well...let’s just say I have one of those and his contribution to diplomacy was sputtering and staring.

So...yeah. I really am sorry if his ranting got carried away. It’s his, not mine. Believe me, you’re good.

Well I wanted to apologize anyway because I know my attitude can be unbearable for people because, as I'm sure you've noticed, I tend to be very passive aggressive. And there's a good reason for that, I am passive aggressive. But I'm willing to man up and apologize if my actions were unwarranted, even if I don't know what I did wrong.

In real life I tend to be very sarcastic and mean-spirited if I feel it's deserved, and I'm not sorry about this because I don't view any of these things as a problem, but I know that's just my opinion and some people can find it unbearable.

Well here there’s no hard feelings, just fun RP. So with that in mind, let’s bicker and kill ratpeople.

I didn't have time yesterday to explain the plan in my head but looking at the gameplay posted doesn't really matter much.

The basic idea is this Kalman and Ilsa take on the Otyugh. Even if they can't beat it (Which I bet they can) they would be able to buy time while the rats are taken care of. The plan for the rats was essentially bottlenecking, force them to move on to the square with the campfire, and even if the GM says that all of the rats move around the fire, I'm summoning a small fire elemental (which I'm now realizing I forgot to specify earlier) and that's just good incentive for me to summon the fire elemental on the campfire, putting a fire elemental right in the middle of a swarm of rats.

I don't think we have to fight the Otyugh at the same time. We only hear it. It isn't currently attacking us.

I'm back from my trip! It looks like I just acted, so I'll watch for when I'm up again. Thanks for botting me.

Swamped at work with new project but will aim to have update up today.

And just as one project is wrapped up I'm getting hit with another one starting tomorrow. Will try to update tonight.

No worries, Snowheart! RL first, and we'll take the extra time you have, if any! Really enjoying this campaign, so keep your sanity first. :)

We’ll be here! Take care of yourself

Hey all. Very sorry. Been slammed by a combination of work with back to back projects then childcare in the evening as the spouse is also slammed. Aiming very hard to have an update up tonight.

Mechanically what happens if Kalem doesn’t get cured?

I laugh!

"Muahahahahahahah!"

Honestly, I think we'd have to retire him as an NPC. It's just getting silly-powerful.

Awww. I’ll get him cured.