DM Pendin Fust Wrath of the Righteous - Group A (Inactive)

Game Master theheadkase

Ok, so I'm going to put together a conclusion post, we are at the end of the 1st book for this campaign.

You are now Mythic characters, with your first Mythic Tier!

Go ahead and update for Level 4 and Mythic Tier 1.

I think we should take this time to have a quick conversation about ya'll's expectations for Mythic, how you want to progress (do you want to do the "tests"), and if you have any specific questions.

Woo! Second level spells! Scorching ray, pewpewpew!

While Lucius is probably going to multi-path into Marshal later to get the most of of his summoned/called minions and Cohort, I think it's a little early for him to do that.

So adding Archmage at this juncture. I really like the opportunity to get rerolls for spell resistance and to force re-roll of saves - that will definitely help his spells get through, and will increase his success percentage on planar binding.

But at the same time, I see Wild Arcana giving him access to the entire Sor/Wiz spell list and kind of think I'd be a sucker not to take that instead, especially give how many spells known the magic circle, dimensional anchor, planar binding trifecta is going to take up.

Opinions?

As for the path ability - my short list includes Crafting Mastery, Enduring Armor, Flash of Omniscience, or Commune with Power.

I have to admit, I don't remember mythic well enough to recall the tests, but I'm up for whatever.

IIRC, I was planning to go with guardian for Nebbin's path, and my notes indicate my plans were as such:
Mythic powers to consider:
1st: Legendary Item, Ever Ready, Retributive Reach, Fast Healing, Extra Mythic Power; 3rd: Legendary Item, Parry Spell, Shrug It Off, Enhanced Ability; 6th: Legendary Item, Indomitable, Mythic Resolve

Legendary item abilities to consider: upgradable, foe-biting, powerful, rejuvenating, unstoppable strike, unyeilding,

I'll try to update ASAP. Looking forward to welcoming our new player too.

If I recall from the mythic book, a test is a thing you have to do to move up a mythic tier. I'm up for those if they are provided as part of the AP, but I'd rather handwave them if they're something we have to come up with on our own: PbPs move slowly enough as it is.

I also realized we get a Mythic Feat at first tier. I'm not sure what to take. I could pull the band aid off for Dual Path, or I could invest in something more immediately useful like Mythic Spell Penetration or Mythic Spell Focus.

Seems to me that taking Dual Path now doesn't make much sense if you're not going to use it right away. Might as well use something you can take advantage of.

Dual Path would let me give Nebbin or Saoirse an extra attack as Lucius's swift action.

It gets more useful with a cohort and a bunch of devils on the table, but it's certainly not useless.

Oh, well, that's completely different then. :)

May be time to go reread the mythic rules. It's been a while.

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OK, finished updating as base barbarian:
+1 Con, +1 BAB, +1 Fort save, +1 DR
+1 Perception, +2 Acrobatics and Climb
+2 rounds of rage, +1 rage power

Going to look at mythic now...

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OK, adding in mythic powers.
I picked sudden block for my guardian's call ability, though I'm still debating whether absorb blow would make more sense for Nebbin...

However, here's my question: I'd like to have my first tier power be legendary item for Nebbin's hammer, but it looks like that's really meant to be only for magic items. Now, assuming we have the cash (I only have 370 before we figure out loot for the final set piece, but WBL indicates we should have around 6,000 gp worth), the first thing I'd do is make his hammer +1. Can I assume the mythic-izing also transformed his hammer? Obviously I'd spend the proper funds to get it enchanted, but I feel like that would be far cooler than him having to take the hammer to a smith/wizard/whatever to get it done (also would let me take legendary item right now without really handwaving the fact that I'm technically getting the weapon enchanted afterward)...

I think Lucius is going to take Crafting Mastery. Would having a party member do it feel better than the village smith? It'd save 2,000 GP, too.

Had a rough weekend and couple of days. I'm catching up.

As for Mythic, I was always planning on Thom taking Heirophant for synergies with healer-y goodness with his Life mysteries, but I'm also interested in Dual Pathing with either Champion or Guardian. I likely won't take that as the first Mythic feat (which will mostly likely be Power Attack or the one to pick up Mythic spells), but will pick it up as Thom levels.

I also had planned on picking up a Mythic item (Ragathiel's blade; a bastard sword), but I'm not keen to do that until I can actually pick up proficiency in it. Yes, I could two-hand it, but that cuts down on his tactical options, and tactical flexibility is something I'm always working towards.

I'll update later today with my level up details and what I've landed on for my initial Mythic choices. And I agree with Ross; dreaming up our own tests only increases the demands on a PbP game and its DM ... something I'm keen to bypass in this game.

Ross, if the GM doesn't want to just let it be part of the light burst, obviously I'll take that, but I think it just feels more ... mythic ... to have it be "natural."

Fair enough. Crafting Mastery won't be flashy, but it should let me distribute a lot of +1's rather quickly.

I have some armor that would love to be +1 (though I guess it needs to be masterworkedly transformed first or replaced with such)...

Just need to figure out loot first. It looks like we should have at least 10,000 gp to divide up between the five of us, though (via the manual of war, two unclaimed +1 weapons, horn of clarity and the masterwork short swords on the loot list)...

Alright, Saoirse is up to date, here's the new sheet. :)

Changes Short list:

Power of Faith: Supernatural standard action. 30 ft. radius nimbus of light, all allies receive +1 morale bonus to AC and on attack rolls, damage rolls, and saving throws against fear as long as they remain in the area of light. This power lasts for 1 minute.

The Aura of Courage wont stack with this so the fear bonus remains +4, but the rest of it is a kind cool mini-bard ability that will grow as we level :)

Mythic Tier: Picked Marshal with the Rally Marshal's Order, then picked Extra Mythic Feat as my first path ability choosing Mythic Power Attack and Dual Path. Dual Pathing into Champion giving Saoirse the Fleet Charge Champion's Strike.

Gonna start the Dual Path now and just rip the bandaid off. The only other two path abilities that looked really fun for Saoirse at these low tiers are Impossible Speed and Focus, both of which are powerful but not so important that I feel its worth delaying the Dual Path dip I want to roleplay.

Let me know if you think is anything wrong DM, otherwise I'm ready to go!

Those look rocking, Saoirse. How often do you see yourself using that Power of Faith nimbus ability? It's far more powerful than Bless, and will work well with Thom's Moment of Greatness. I just want to make sure I'm picking the right spells to complement you guys.

SEcondarily, I need some input. I'm definitely Dual Pathing Heirophant/Guardian, with the goal of making Thom as tough as possible, so he can make the best use of his Heirophant and Oracle of Life heals/buffs. My intention was also to pick up the Large-sized bastard sword + Power Attack (mythic) + Vital Strike (mythic) options to bring a level of damage burst-erosity to round out his combat skill set.

Now, the question, as Mythic Power Attack doesn't provide great returns at this level (and for a few levels beyond), I have two options. And I'd love to hear what the team thinks is going go to be the best use for the short-term.

A) Use the mythic feat slot to pick up Mythic Spell Lore (mythic Cure Mod. Wounds). Coupled with Faith's Reach (deliver touch spells at a 30 ft range), he could drop 4d8 + 8 CMW's at the cost of 1 mythic point for an average of 26 HP healed to anyone within 30 ft. This is a fantastic level of "nova healing" for when we need it ... and as I expect we might be seeing some Mythic opponents here or there, being able to keep pace with big damage opponents could really make a big difference. This will only get more powerful down the road as he can pick up the Life Oracle's Enhanced Cures mystery (basically removing the caster level cap on the additional healing for Cure spells).

B) Go ahead and Dual Path and pick up Fast Healing as my mythic ability, instead of Faith's Reach. This would be a hit to Thom's over-all flexibility (as Inspired Spell + Faith's Reach brings the Oracle a massive amount of tactical spell-casting options), but would let him make much better use of his Life Link ability by way of Fast Healing 5 for many of our fights per day.

I'm leaning towards option A, but would love to hear other thoughts.

I think either one could work. I'm not sure 26 hp in a round will matter that much against a mythic foe, honestly, but it can certainly help in other battles.

I think as always do whichever one makes you happiest. I know I can find it really easy to get too caught up in optimizing. I really want to be able to take a couple of the later rage powers that depend on superstition, for instance, but said power just doesn't make sense for Nebbin...

Site ate my char sheet update. I'll do it again later.

I think Fast Healing is a great combo with Life Link. Nothing Lucius is doing has that kind of synergy.

Edit: Went ahead and re-did it. Decisive strike is going to be handy, and wild arcana will let Lucius cast whatever spell he damn well pleases.

Scorching ray is new, hope he can hit with it.

And as soon as we get some downtime, Crafting Mastery will start churning out +1 items. He can make +1 weapons and armor without a check. Items like rings of protection with a spell prerequisite (that he doesn't have) have a small chance of failure, but mythic surge should cover that up. Barbed pentacle of Asmodeus, here we come. Any other requests?

Everything else is a bumped up number here and there.

Okay, I went with Dual Path > Fast Healing. It feels right to make Thom tougher. And the Guardian’s Call looks pretty sweet, too. :D

Thom level up:

Oracle 4:
Attributes: +1 charisma (now 16; affects skills, spell-casting DC’s, Concentration, and Channel Energy)
HP: 38 = 27 + 5 oracle + 2 con + 4 heirophant
Favored Class bonus: +1 first level spell (Liberating Command)
Saves: +1 will
BAB: +1
Spells: Gained Lesser Restoration, Cure Mod. Wounds as Oracle/Mystery bonus spells known. Picked up Grace (gotta be where I wants ta be!)
Skills: one rank into the following — Intimidate, Know (Religion), Spellcraft, Survival

Mythic: Hierophant 1 (4 extra hp)
Divine Surge: Inspired Spell (for the reason Ross so eloquently voiced)
Mythic Feat: Dual Path (Guardian)
Guardian’s Call: Sudden Block
Path Ability: Fast Healing

Now gear: 3 questions.

1) Is that 10,000g split among us correct? And will it end up being split 4 of 5 ways?

2) Should we assume we'll have time for Lucius to do some crafting for us? And all we need to do is provide him with the base mats/gold to do it?

3) Does that +1 adamantine morningstar we picked up bypass DR/cold iron?

No, that was just a very rough estimate. I think we need the DM to weigh in, especially considering we kind of raced through the upper levels.

Can I assume the mythic-izing also transformed his hammer? Obviously I'd spend the proper funds to get it enchanted, but I feel like that would be far cooler than him having to take the hammer to a smith/wizard/whatever to get it done (also would let me take legendary item right now without really handwaving the fact that I'm technically getting the weapon enchanted afterward)...

Yes, let's assume that the infusion of power from the Wardstone made it +1.

As for the gear and loot list, I am still compiling (been an interestingly busy couple days). I believe this is going to end up more than 10k, likely enough to allow you all to have 3k in funds (or close to it).

You're going to have some downtime right now, as soon as I get the wrap-up post drafted.

Cool. Thanks!

Will finish updating Nebbin then with his mythicism, adding legendary weapon. Hmm, though. I'd been thinking I was going to get upgradable, which would basically let him simply do any upgrades as if he were crafting it (at least from my reading of the power). If Lucius can just do that with Crafting Mastery, though, I wonder if I should go in a different direction...

In other mythic games I've played, I've found that accessing mythic spells immediately is usually the most powerful option for any full spellcaster. So for Thom, I'd say option A would be best for the group. Option B feels like a supplement to enhance our ability to survive rather than the primary means.

I haven't actualy played Mythic before, but I've been pretty underwhelmed with reading mythic spells. Possibly because there isn't much overlap between spells with a mythic version and spells I want Lucius to pick up.

If Lucius can just do that with Crafting Mastery, though, I wonder if I should go in a different direction...

It might depend on what you want to make: Crafting Mastery doesn't let Lucius avoid the DC bump for unknown spells, which as a themed sorcerer is going to be most things he wants to craft. An item with lots of spell requirements can have the DC explode fast, and no one wants Lucius to accidentally make a cursed item. In short, +5 flaming hammer easy, +1 flaming ghost touch holy hammer of impact, not so much.

Likewise, the +X items require a CL of 3 times the bonus, but upgradeable doesn't have that limit - you can upgrade to any item you can afford. With Lucius, we have to be 6th level before he makes +2 weapons, 9th for +3, and so on.

And I don't know if this would ever be relevant, but Upgradable only takes 8 hours. Upgrading by crafting takes one day per 1,000 gp cost of the upgrade.

That said, I don't think Upgradable is worth it if Lucius has Crafting Mastery. Spend those legendary abilities on things like Unstoppable Strike instead.

4th level means Lucius can trade out a lower level spell. I think he's going to jettison burning hands, since he has scorching ray to much more effectively cover the 'hellfire and brimstone' element, without needing to get as close. (Daze has also not worked out as much as I would have liked, but swapping it for prestidigitation or mending doesn't get much.)

Considerations for a replacement spell:
Disguise person - The 'be someone else' bluff worked well for us, and will have a better Will save than the scroll version.
Enlarge person - This doesn't really fit Lucius's 'trickery and devils' theme, but would be effective on the heavy hitters.
Grease - Again, off theme, but super effective.
Ray of enfeeblement or sickening - Ranged debuff, on theme.
Magic missile - Never awesome, but never fails.

Crafting shortlist:
barbed pentacle of Asmodeus for Lucius
circlet of persuasion for Lucius (+3 to all my Charisma skills, don't mind if I do.)
2 cloaks of resistance +1 (We already have 2)
3 rings of protection +1 (Won't stack with the barbed pentacle)
2 amulets of natural armor +1 (Same slot as barbed pentacle, and Nebbin already has one)
+1 armor for Thom and Nebbin

Let's see, Soairse has Radiance, and Nebbin's hammer just turned legendary. Lucius has a +1 mace already, and he doesn't make enough attack rolls to make it worth worry about getting him a +1 cold iron one yet. Does Thom need a weapon magicked-up?

Most of the good ones you can't take until third tier. I could take powerful (+2 legendary power uses/day) or unyielding (makes it tougher) now, but I think I will stick with upgradable to star. It'll let me get it a little better a little faster, I think.

Eventually I plan to add furious and demonbane, I think...

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As for spells, I think stick with theme. Ray of enfeeblement seems like a good option considering what we're likely to face.

I think Thom's good on weaponry for now. He's got a +1 longsword and a cold iron morningstar. Until I can figure a way to pick up a Large bastard sword and gain proficiency, I'm likely good.

Also, Saoirse is convincing me to switch back to Faith's Reach and ??? for my feat. Just so much tactical flexibility in that for an oracle who can spend a mythic point to cherry pick group buff spells to deliver from range.

Its true that the selection of mythic spells and feats does leave a lot to be desired, and pretty much restricts itself to the core rulebooks selections. But, here's a few spells I've found super useful and why:

Contingency: Multiple contingencies! You can have up to 6 active by Tier 10. Paranoid wizards rejoice!
Enlarge Person: Increasing the target to Huge size is definitely noteworthy.
Haste: If there’s one reason to take Mythic spell casting, it’s this. You get a bonus move action.
Globe of Invulnerability: By 10th Tier, you are now immune to non-Mythic spells.
Magic Vestment, (Greater) Magic Fang, Greater Magic Weapon: This can save you some cash on decent weapon augmentations. Pretty nifty.

But still, ultimately most of Mythic is so powerful its perfectly fine to just take fun characterful stuff.

Okay, an update on Thom’s level up and first Mythic options. I’ve made my decision, and there’s some tweaks to what I posted above.

His Oracle choices remain the same.

Here are what I’m going with for Mythic options:
Heirophant, Tier 1 (+4 hp)
Divine Surge: Inspired Spell (crazy spell casting flexibility)
Path Ability: Faith’s Reach (crazy spell casting flexibility ... AT RANGE!)
Mythic Feat: regular feat: Exotic Weap Prof (bastard sword).

This allows me to realize his vision from the word “Mythic”. I’ll Dual Path down the line, but this frees Thom up to have some revelation about Ragathiel’s involvement as his mysterious divine patron, with the iconic weapon to go with it. This also means I”ll be able to pick up Legendary Item (Fury’s Edge; a Large-sized bastard sword from Ragathiel) whenever it’s appropriate to eh story or I just decide I want that as my primary weapon. :)

... which gets me one step closer to Mythic Power Attack > Mythic Vital Strike > Mythic Improved Critical shenanigans. :D

Updated thoughts on gear for Thom, with Lucius's craft-ology in mind:
AKA, stuffz I wantz!

+1 full plate: 2,150g = 1,650 mwk full plate + 500g crafted enchant
+1 light steel quickdraw shield: 709g = 209 mwk quickdraw shield + 500 crafted enchant
+1 Ring of Protection: 1,000g

Can contribute to our selling loot pile: 385g
• half-plate armor (300g sell value)
• mwk heavy steel shield (85g sell value)

Also, it’s worth noting that Thom actually currently has the +2 Cloak of Resistance we pulled from Jeslyn. So (after a brief but thorough cleaning) let’s keep that in mind as we’re outfitting the team. It may be a good thing for Thom to have for now, but at level 5 (when I plan to take Divine Protection, pushing my saves up by +3 each), it might be a smart play to swap this out to a character who needs the greater benefit, and give Thom a crafted +1 Cloak of Resistance.

____

And thoughts on Thom’s future Legendary Item (which I’m tentatively calling Fury’s Edge). From a story perspective, I’d love for this to be a gift from Ragathiel or one of his agents … sort of a legitimizing of Thom’s role now that he’s proven himself capable of stepping up to the task given him by Ragathiel. Mechanically, I’m happy to pay the cost of the +1 bastard sword if that’s necessary, but I’d love to have it be a RP/story component, much like Nebbin’s hammer was “gifted” him from the wardstone.

Thoughts, DM? (And it's worth noting that I only know of Ragathiel what I can find on golarion wikis and stuff ... so my character may show a similar lack of knowledge about the lesser deities story and quirks. I just know he's all about combat, strength, and righteous, furious vengeance!)

So, re-reading the Magic Item Creation rules (this is the first character of mine that I've actually made items), it looks like Lucius can make +2 items, but it causes one of those +5 DC bumps. So a cloak of resistance +2 would be DC 20 (5 base + 5 CL + 5 for resistance + 5 for not having CL of 6). Lucius has a Spellcraft bonus of +10. That means he can succeed by taking 10, but he can't rush. Armor and weapons are easier, because they don't have a spell prerequisite.

Motteditor, I don't know if that changes your conclusion re: Upgradable.

Lucius is scheming. Thom is crying.

... ya know, the usual.

(Sorry if that post was a bit dramatic ... this is heavy stuff.)

So this just clicked for me:
Nebbin is a quarryman. He breaks stones. He broke the Wardstone. Of course that has a legendary effect on his tools.

(Even if he didn't actually use the hammer to do the deed.)

Lucius would explain with some lovely arcanobabble about the Law of Sympathy (stonemason breaking a stone) and Law of Contagion (Nebbin was the closest to the stone, and was holding the rod of cancellation when it overflowed).

Nice. I didn't quite pick that up myself, but it works.

I think I am going to go with upgradeable. Again, assuming the GM's amenable, I'll probably mostly handwave the actual ritual, pretending the weapon's just getting more powerful, but that's mostly the fluff aspects. Obviously I'll factor in the cost, etc.

That's fine - It kind of makes sense to me that Lucius's infernal power might not be fully compatible with the Wardstone energies that hunk of cold iron hoovered up, so he wouldn't be able to upgrade it.

I don't see Nebbin performing a ritual either, so my in-character suggestion is that the money goes to tracking down and obtaining fragments of all the other exploded Wardstones from along the border. The 'ritual' then would just be touching the hammer to Wardstone shards to absorb their residual power.

Eben, can you remind me how much of a magical/religious education Thom has? I know his powers are a relatively new result of his curse, but how much does he really know about magic?

Well, I can see his skill ranks. Let me ask a different way: How much of Thom's knowledge came unbidden with his oracular gift, and how much was something he knew from his former lives?

Magical training would have been zilch. That rank in Spellcraft is from this last level up, and frankly I'm considering swapping it for another rank in Linguistics to reflect his ability to understand Celestial ... another gift of his curse.

As for Religion, I figure that he had a bit more religious training than your average citizen due to his mothers role as a crusader in the past. She'd have wanted her kiddos to grow up following the teachings of Iomedae.

EDIT: that foundation would have been expanded upon by his Crusader trainers, then broadened to include introductory instruction on Planar knowledge (his rank in Know: Planes).

Does that answer it?

I does! I was trying to figure out to what degree Lucius would regard Thom as a fellow expert.

Lol. Well, that's tricky. At no point would Thom have presented himself as any kind of magical expert, though I guess his casting of spells might leave a muddied impression.

As far as religion, he'd probably be considered an amateur religious scholar at best. He knows more than the average Joe, but hasn't had the training or experience to be called a true scholar, either. At least not yet ... fate (and Ragathiel) are kind of forcing his hand to learn what all he's caught up in.

Now, how Lucius interprets all that based on our group experiences and discussions ... I'll leave that up to you. :)

Sorry all, daughters been sick and I've been handservant :) Will update as I can.

Understandable. Hope everyone gets better quickly.

Also, a have a buddy who wants to pitch a character concept once the Recruitment for Aero's backfill goes up. He was wondering when that was likely to be. I realize you have things going on, but do you have any idea of when you're re-opening recruitment?

Have him PM me!

The treasure from the rest of the rooms that you would have searched (if any of these are duplicated please ignore):

6 tomes of history/tactics worth 50 gp each
1 manual of war
1 scroll of restoration
Documents with regards to Mendevian troop movements, tactics, resources, and war plans.
6 ivory figurines depicting nude humanoid females with disturbing animalistic features worth 45 gp each.
6 wardstone shards, embedded in the walls. (more on these later)

Wardstone shards, you say?

Interesting.

Is this the second time we've run across those disturbing statues? Or am I just remembering their initial description back in the Garrison?

Is this the second time we've run across those disturbing statues? Or am I just remembering their initial description back in the Garrison?

I think that's the same ones.

Right. Gotcha. Ahem. Carry on.

Yep should be the same, I wasn't sure.

Yes, wardstone shards ARE interesting... :)

Ok, I've got to put together another epilogue post up then an intro post for the next book. I'm almost ready to do that, hopefully tomorrow!

Cool. Looking forward to it. :)

Happy monday, everyone. Just a bit of a bump.