Btw Fyrtor, you should still respond to my PM I don't think you've seen.
Guess who has his phone back? This guy!
Still in the woods. Haven’t showered in weeks, haven’t had real food, have no place to charge my phone...but I have it back! Will get caught up
Welcome back :D
Welcome back indeed!
Brolin, I watched your video on Single Transferable Votes. I'm certainly familiar with the Condorcet method, i.e. ranked voting. The bit about multi-member districts in which a winning percentage is 100/X where X is the number of candidates was a new wrinkle though. I think I'll have to think about that.
Is there anywhere that actually uses this system in real life? I know Australia uses ranked voting, but I think it's still one-member-per-district.
I believe that it's used Ireland and in Malta.
Very glad to have you back, Kazador!
Okay, so everybody's here now. I just want to make sure we're all on the same page about what we're doing. It sounds like our plan is:
1. We buff a bit.
2. Túrion hits us with Haste.
3. Kazador D-Doors an assault team into the tower, consisting of Kazador, Algric, Kelian, and one other.
4. Halak's orcs charge in.
5. The rest of us deal with the shaman.
My initial thought was that Mel would be in the tower party, because she could make good use of the arrow slits after the current occupants are dealt with. That said, she's not much use in melee and would likely not have a great deal to contribute to actually clearing the tower.
Meanwhile Túrion has suggested that Mel would be more useful attempting to make the shaman's spells fizzle by readying actions to interrupt his casting with an arrow to the face. It's not a bad thought, and then we could send someone who's more melee-oriented into the tower. And of course Túrion should stay out of melee. So that would make the teams:
Tower party:
Kazador
Algric
Kelian
Shaman party:
Mel
Túrion
The question then is who wants to be the fourth one in the tower party, and who wants to be outside? I could see either Fyrtor or Brolin going to the tower, and I'm not sure which would be more use dealing with the shaman. Brolin's kind of a wild card since he can sort of be anything depending on which spirit he channels.
I think it should be me. I have a decent now I can use at last resort, until then I have a lot of spells that are all pretty much setup to use at range.
It should be you for which, Fyrtor? Tower or shaman?
Tower, because after dealing with the archers I can help more from the tower than Brolin can.
Okay then, I guess that's the plan! Kazador, Algric, Kelian and Fyrtor will assault the tower via Dimension Door. They go in first.
Immediately after that, Halak sends in his orcs, followed by Mel, Brolin and Túrion to deal with the shaman. Mel will be readying actions to interrupt spellcasting shenanigans.
Now's the time for pre-battle buffs if any.
Fyi gm, I will dismiss heightened awaeness For the boost to initiative unless I roll really really well, say 17+
Just as a disclaimer, I did NOT want to start a political discussion there. I was just slightly...irritated because of my local political situation in which the government creatively deconstructed itself, with (once again) premature elections in a few months, and no sensible combination of parties that could form a coalition for majority.
(A hates C and does not want to work with them. B broke up with A saying they are stupid, then entered into a relationship with C. Now they had a fight and B broke up with C. So B is the 'Ex' of both A and C, and A and C will not work. End result? Someone is going to betray their values and voters in order to form a government, somehow. There's minor parties, but if B gets strong enough to enslave those to get a majority, then the 'real'* right-wing leader gets the solo show he's been gambling for those last few years.
* ("Freedom Party" is shown as ultra-right wing internationally, but honestly, those guys are MUCH more tame than anything even our neighbours have, it's just that its the "rightmost" party we have. Alas, if the FPÖ is, on a political scale of -10 to +10, somewhere around 4(with some radical parts bordering on 5), then the "Peoples Party" is at least a 3 with their current leader.)
Rant end.
And welcome back, Kaz.
No worries, Turion. I'm positive there are things we all disagree about but everyone kept it nice and civil. Refreshing.
Indeed. As a point of interest I just saw an article mentioning that a bunch of states have passed laws such that their electoral votes would go to the winner of the popular vote. Apparently they have a condition that it would only go into effect of enough states get on board, and idk if it would suvive in court should it enough states actually pass similar laws to activate the law, but it is an interesting way to circumvent the need for a constitutional amendment to do away with the electoral college
Hmmm. Interesting idea. Sounds nice to me.
28 hours of travel later, we are safely ensconced in the cottage in Cockenzie, Scotland. The property manager had a game of Munchkin going when we showed up, which is a good sign. I'm going to post quickly and then crash.
Glad to hear you're safe. And hooray for Munchkin!
Will try and post ASAP in the next hours...weekend time is family time, apologies for holding things up.
Ha, sorry for the wait again :)
And then such a "non-action" since I am not particularily interested in solo-exposing myself when they go next.
Regardless, I'll have you know my +11 Init is not loony!
It's just not extremely helpful in our current tactical situation :)
@Mel: No need to rush out there and risk something, but even so, +2 on attack and no Dex for the Shaman might help a bit :)
No worries, Turion. Weekend is slow, family-oriented time for me too.
So much for staying in cover and trying not to draw attention to the assault group :)
Shield and Mirror Image were contemplated, but for Nelly, not for Túrion.
I slightly adjusted my position. I kinda forgot Cloudkill has the auto-move feature. So if I tried to dispel next round and failed, I would have been covered by the spell area. Which could turn out quite lethal...need to stay ahead of that thing sufficiently to make a standard action and still be far enough away.
(Same for Nelly)
A slight adjustment, since I, as Player failed that spellcraft check - while my character passed it.
Sorry for the holdup!
I'm looking at the current map and I can't find my character. Am I just blind? Or was I supposed to position him myself, and, if so, where?
Lucky you. Assuming we lined up there and Nelly was behind me, you are happily outside the area of the Cloudkill if you were behind her. Placed you with the group that did not DD.
My laptop lives! Apparently the $50 adapter I bought to convert 220 volt current to 110 and a British-style plug to an American-style plug is a piece of junk, because as soon as we plugged it into my brother's adapter that does the same thing, it began working again.
Getting here took about 27 hours of travel, during which time I had five hours of layovers, essentially -- 2 waiting for a plane in Minneapolis, 2 waiting for my brother and his girlfriend to show up at Heathrow, and an hour at the Edinburgh-Waverly train station, where I showed up an hour before the two of them due to having bought a train ticket for an hour before theirs. But it all worked out, and after an hour-long bus ride we made it to the place we're staying: Cockenzie House, in Cockenzie, Scotland, where we have what amounts to a 2 bed/2 bath flat for a week. We arrived around 7 PM (local time) on Saturday.
There was no one around to let us in initially, but eventually we located the property manager, who was busy playing a game of Munchkin. This was a good sign, and I suspect we'll be joining her and her husband for some sort of game night later in the week. Once she let us in, we collapsed and slept for about 14 hours, I think.
That Sunday was the Edinburgh marathon, and many of the roads were shut down in the area due to being full of panting, sweating people in outfits ranging from standard exercise gear to truly ridiculous costumes. I think my favorite was the team of three running the marathon dressed as fish. In any case, rather than compete with the foot traffic, we just walked around Cockenzie a bit, exploring the area. It's a seaside town with an active fishing fleet and a history of coal mining. Seems small and friendly.
On Monday, we hopped back on the bus and rode into Edinburgh, where we proceeded to hit a bunch of tourist-type destinations. Our first stop was the Holy Roodhouse Palace, the British royal family's residence in Scotland; but their ticketing system had crashed and they couldn't admit anyone. So instead we wandered up the Royal Mile -- the road the connects Edinburgh Castle and the Holy Roodhouse Palace, aiming for what had been planned to be the second stop of the day: the Museum of Childhood. It covers, well, childhood, and has a large selection of toys and games from days past. In addition to the highly insanitary "Blow Football" which involves using straws to blow a ping-pong ball and germs back and forth across a table into goal posts, they had an early iteration of "Chutes and Ladders" which was called "Chutes and Snakes". Many of the chutes led to spikes, boiling oil, or guillotines; and of course, the snakes would eat you. Combined with the standard roll-and-move mechanics, I can think of nothing better calculated to simultaneously impress upon a child both the capricious arbitrariness of life, and the strong likelihood of dying horribly and painfully before reaching adulthood. But they also had marbles, so I guess that's okay.
Returning half a mile downhill, we found that the Palace had sorted out their technical difficulties and proceeded to embark on the tour. The place apparently started as a monastery, the Abbey of the Holy Rood (cross), which was commissioned at the behest of an early Scottish king. He had them build in some rooms for him to stay in as well, on account of Edinburgh Castle is not terribly comfy and less convenient to the town. Over time that got expanded into a full-size palace housing Scottish royalty. Mary Queen of Scots spent a fair bit of time there, right up until her husband burst into her room late one night and murdered her private secretary on trumped up charges. These days it's still a functioning palace; any time any of the royal family visit Edinburgh they stay there and the place gets closed to the public. It was pretty neat.
Traipsing back up the hill again, my brother and I had lunch; we were not joined by his girlfriend, who developed a sudden and to my mind inexplicable desire to visit the Scottish Parliament building instead of eating. After lunch, we headed back to Cockenzie, pretty wiped out; we'd logged about 10 miles of walking, according to my brother's watch. After two-hour naps, we rounded out the evening with fish and chips from the local takeaway, and a game of Azul.
This morning I woke early -- around 5:20 AM -- and couldn't get back to sleep for some reason. This is entirely unlike me. I am not a morning person. Nevertheless, after breakfast, four cups of tea and finishing a book on military strategy in the ancient world, I went into Edinburgh on my own. I had a mission! It is unseasonably cool here, and I failed to pack a hat; and so I went looking for one. And in time, I found one! All it took was three hours and seven stores. Apparently, the Gods of Fashion have decreed that it is summer, and therefore the only hats that may be sold are baseball caps and sun hats. I was looking for something to keep my ears warm, because Mother Nature apparently didn't get the memo about this whole "summer" thing. The trick was to go to a camping supplies store. They keep those in stock year round, for people who may be planning trips to cold places.
With a hat acquired, I wandered about the streets of Edinburgh with no real destination in mind, taking photos here and there, and eventually wound up at a little place on High Street called "Gladstone's Land". It's a beautifully preserved town house dating to 1580. The National Trust has stocked it with period-appropriate furniture, informational placards, and helpful historical interpreters. I had very nice conversation with one of them, a lady who's finishing her MA in Middle English linguistics. We wound up swapping D&D campaign stories. It was great fun.
After a nice lunch -- duck in pasta with plum sauce at a Bella Italia -- I got on the bus and headed back to Cockenzie. And that brings us up to date!
Ah yes. Brolin can be behind Nelly. Lucky fellow avoids the cloudkill, for now.
Sounds like a great time combining the two most ubiquitous elements of travel: New places and fatigue. I too do not understand prioritizing the Scottish parliament over food. Hasn't she heard of Maslow? Cool about the MA in Middle English! Sounds like your kind of random new acquaintance. Tempt her into the world of PBP with us. ;) I'm starting a monster campaign some time in the next few months. Taking my time to plan out what kind of story would be most fun to tell with monsters as the heroes. Did she have any particular fun Dnd stories? How did Dnd come up?
Heads up guys, I'll be unavailable from Wednesday until Saturday. Please feel free to bot me. If there's a qusesrion let Mel be the arbiter of Fyrtor's fate.
At level eight, create pit is ten feet by ten feet by forty feet. The cloudkill should fit in there nicely, and we'll still have five feet of hallway to slip through on our way to the action. As long as no one ends their turn there and Nelly doesn't have to fight anyone while taking squeezing penalties, we should be golden.
My bad. The cloudkill has twice the volume as a created pit. :/
Aye. But it's a popular combo to cast a Cloud-based spell inside a Pit, for double trouble, because the spread is based on the origin point and can be contained.
Since it DOES float across the ground, I simply never considered the spread origin to be affected by gravity, that is, that it would "fall down" into a pit - I may be wrong on that interpretation, of course.
That said, yes, theoretically, it's 10x10x40feet, for 40000 feet³ - while the Cloudkill is a cylinder of 20 feet radius and 20 feet height, for π×20²×20, or about 25132.74 feet³.
It WOULD fit in there.
And the specific text of Cloudkill "Because the vapors are heavier than air, they sink to the lowest level of the land, even pouring down den or sinkhole openings. It cannot penetrate liquids, nor can it be cast underwater." might suggest that your plan could work.
I just never quite could figure it out mechanically. I mean, it IS a spread. But does that mean the height is reduced if there is space to move 'down'? E.g. there's a 5-feet hole 15 feet deep...is the total height now 20+15=35 feet? Or does it "sink down" and only extend 5 feet above ground? Where did all the extra cloud go to?
If it is a hole of 30 feet, does it extend all the way down? And no cloud left on ground level? What happens after the hole is no longer part of the area as it roils past, does it pop back into existance, teleporting back up to ground level?
What about sloped areas? Can it roll down a hill? What about up a hill - it moves forward, not down...stairs? Can it "fall" from a cliff? At what speed does a spell origin fall? And at what speed can it pass through holes or cracks? Would a single drainage hole going into the sewers "dispel" the cloud by instantly draining it into a lower level?
Does the spell "origin" get drawn into the hole and stop it from moving? What if there are two holes, 30 feet apart - does it split evenly? Where's the spell origin point then if it drops down?
It simply seemed less messy to try and dispel it, especially since I had not planned on exposing myself further with my current health situation...you were not trapped behind the cloudkill then.
(And yeah, I had a math typo there. 4000 cubic feet, not 40000. so no, not gonna fit. unless, of course, the point of origin falls down and is contained at -40 feet, where the 20 feet height won't matter - so the question is the same, regardless of actual volume :) sorry for the mistake-)
Interesting discussion. The math is fun but also the cloud, realistically, can spread out if disturbed to cover a larger area at a smaller concentration. I'm going to stick with that to simplify the pit/cloud interaction.
Given that it is a cloud it's too bad that we can't blow it back at them.
We probably could if we had Gust of Wind or a similar wind-making spell available. But I'm guessing we don't.
*checks pockets for spell and shrugs*
My wizard spells are locked in, and gust of wind isn’t a cleric spell. I could try wind wall, or (communal) delay poison, but neither really solve the problem and both would lock me in as a cleric.
GM, rules question: how does Mel's Stealth skill unlock interact with Invisibility and sniping?
Specifically, I'm looking at these bits. From the skill unlock:
5 Ranks: Reduce the Stealth penalty from sniping by 10.
10 Ranks: Stealth check penalties for moving quickly are halved, including the ability unlocked at 5 ranks, moving full speed, and reaching concealment after creating a distraction.
Mel has this early because of the Phantom Thief archetype.
And from the spell Invisibility:
If a check is required, a stationary invisible creature has a +40 bonus on its Stealth checks. This bonus is reduced to +20 if the creature is moving.
Does the penalty for moving that the spell imposes count as a penalty for moving quickly? If so, does that mean she gets a +30 to stealth when moving while under the effects of Invisibility instead of +20?
Similarly, I just want to check that I'm reading the sniping stuff correctly. Ordinarily the penalty for sniping is -20; the skill unlock reduces it to -10 with the level 5 unlock, and then to just -5 at next stage. Yes?
A reduced bonus from the invisibility spell due to moving is not interpreted, by me, as equivalent to a stealth penalty for moving. So it is not halved. That's my RAW interpretation. It's somewhat gray but there we go.
Agreed on sniping penalties.
Back from Britain. Too tired to post. It's 8 PM but I've been up and running for 18 hours. Will be sure to post tomorrow, I'm taking the day off to get back onto a schedule vaguely resembling the time zone I'm in.
Sympathy.
Very busy at work and at home. Can't update today but should be able to tomorrow. Thanks for your patience.
Thanks for the heads up :) good luck with everything
Kazador, if you want next turn I can make a doorway with stonshape for you to get out and pound the shaman. You'll just need to tell Fyrtor in character that that is what you want to do
There is an exit to the tower -- I'm guessing there's a trap door on one of these squares that leads down a ladder to the door we saw from outside. It might be barred from the inside, but that's no issue. I doubt it's locked, as the orcs certainly didn't bother dealing with the lock on the gate at the wall we defended yesterday.
So it might be better to save the spell slot for the moment and just use the door.
Ah, but where would the fun be in doing that? We be murder hobos of the highest caliber! Doors are for peasents lol.
You're probably right, but it is a fun image for a flying dwarf to erupt from a recently solid wall to strike down an orc mage.
Love the image, but save the spell slot. I’m thinking that Algric can shoot them...and maybe Kazador can cast dispel magic? Make the shaman fall to the ground. Perhaps wait until the “friendly” orc infantry is near?
Sounds good. Dispelling the orc's flight will mean he floats down per feather fall. Does Kazador still have that materwork throwing ax? Might be worth tossing it?
I plan on casting much all next turn. I'm bummed that Radient Burst didn't blind the shaman, but I'll try again :)
The friendly infantry is here and are keeping that massive tide of orcs occupied. But for this battle, they're abstracted. The enemy infantry won't go after you guys but will block space, take AoOs, etc. There is a staircase in the wall that leads down to the barred-from-the-inside door to get out of the tower.
Love the image, but save the spell slot. I’m thinking that Algric can shoot them...and maybe Kazador can cast dispel magic? Make the shaman fall to the ground. Perhaps wait until the “friendly” orc infantry is near?
I don't mean to tempt fate, but with the archers doing the dead and the spellcaster unlikely to cast, I think the worst of the fight is behind us. Perhaps we should save our spells for the elves to come, and just lock the shaman down with pointy sticks? If every one of us readies ranged attacks to interrupt, the odds of the shaman evading everything or making all of the concentration checks gets pretty low.
I don't mean to tempt fate, but ...
O_O
Shoosh! You'll waken the Balor! There's always one of those in these dwarven delvings ...
Ah, don't worry. He said "worst of the fight"...that means the guardian golem(+animated traps) in the vault, as well as the elven expedition (quote: "thanks for clearing the way, I'll be taking these artifacts now"), the orcish counter-attack cutting off our exit path, etc... are all still valid.
The Balor only shows up afterwards :)