The plan:
(1) Leave the area, to ‘go back for his armor.’
(2) Return, with his armor and hammer, using the Glamered enchantment. I’d write it up so that it looks like he has standard plate, of no particular quality, and a dueling club.
(3) Start the nonlethal fight
Time to put the Glamered enchantment to use!
I'm just happy that I got to say "Oh, poot!" in character. ^_^
Good time to enjoy glamer!
And yes, poot is a great word.
Happy anniversary, everyone! We've been level 8 for one full calendar year!
Haha. You'll level up very soon, don't worry.
After 2 nat 20s on Bluff I need to make that into a class skill.
I rented an apartment for Turion and I. I hope I can put together half so nice a description of that once we actually check it out. How much of Mel's description is GM input vs Mel's personal touch?
That's 100% Mel. And I didn't make it up -- it's based fairly closely on #6 Rider Road, in Woodhouse, Leeds, UK, where I lived for a few months one summer in ... must have been 2002? Jeez, time flies.
There were seven of us crammed in there: Me, an Italian girl (Laura), a German guy (Stefan), an American whose name I forget, Laura's French boyfriend Nicholas may as well have been living there, a Camerooni guy name Ferdinand, and Ferdinand's brother (?) to whom he was illegally subletting his room.
The place had been designed for use as a single family home, but then got converted for cheap student housing. I slept in what was once the living room, and the owners had popped out some windows in the attic space and divided it into two more bedrooms to maximize the number of people they could rent to simultaneously.
There was also a basement, which I have omitted here -- it stank of mildew and we had problems with slugs leaving trails of ooze all over the carpet during the night.
It was not a very nice neighborhood. All the doors and windows had bars. I walked back and forth from there to university, and routinely came across used needles, used condoms, and in two cases pools of fresh blood on the pavement. There was a large-ish park near by that reputedly had the highest rate of gay rape in the UK (!?) at the time. I'd spent much of the year living in an official dorm about half a mile away, which was newer but the neighborhood was just as bad. One night I observed a smash-and-grab robbery from my window there. Oh, and there was that murder victim who showed up in 14 chunks in the abandoned 13th century graveyard a few blocks away.
But for all of that, I have fond memories of that summer. I spent a lot of time hanging out with Laura, Stefan and Nick -- less so with the American fellow. As for Ferdinand, well ... we would have called him "Ferdinand the Silent" because he said so little. But he would stomp on the stairs, and periodically he would corner somebody and berate them about building security. So we called him "Ferdinand the Uncommunicative" instead. We had long talks about our respective fields of study sitting around the kitchen table, and watched movies together in the stinky basement, and shared big orders of balti murgh from the balti house down the road. Laura would sometimes go out to dinner at Italian restaurants and offer to correct the Italian grammar and spelling of their menus for free if they'd spot her the meal.
It was a good time in my life that I think of fondly. So it seemed like a good model to use. I always thought the layout of the place was well thought-out -- it made very efficient use of a small amount of space.
I may have made a map of the place.
Bannerhold Terrace, ground floor
Bannerhold Terrace, upper floor
I was trying to make the interior walls look like plaster over lath. Not sure it works that well.
I did not map the attic, but the trap door/sliding ladder stairs that go up there are located adjacent to the hall closet on the second floor.
And all it took was six hours in Photoshop! Good thing my employer gives us President's Day off. :-D
Hey, GM! This means you need to attack us there at some point, just so we'll have an actual need for a map!
Haha. Cool. These maps are canon now, as is the description. Don't worry. I'll be sure to put this to use. ;)
Nice Mel, those maps are characteristically excellent. Can't say icll make such nice maps, but I have a general idea for what an apartment layout would be. I'll have to start on my description as I expect we'll be headed there soon.
Trip: 1d20 + 22 + 2 + 1 + 2 ⇒ (2) + 22 + 2 + 1 + 2 = 29
Man...are you designing enemies who will always trip/disarm me, regardless of the roll? That’s a 5+ to trip when not flat footed. How did you manage to get +27 to trip at lvl8? And without a weapon designed to trip as well. It’s impressively scary.
I’m thinking of my actions now. Kind of afraid to get up, as he will just go down again.
Sorry I forgot to answer your question: The mwk greatclubs (or different club if you prefer) are padded so they automatically deal non-lethal.
I can give you a fuller breakdown tomorrow but here's a rushed version:
8 bab + 6 str + 3 dex (fury's fall) + 2 improved trip + 2 greater trip + 2 charge +2 studied target +1 mwk = +26. That's off the top of my head. I might be forgetting something since I don't have HL pulled up. His dex is actually probably +4.
Well he's built to be very capable but also fairly flexible. He doesn't have weapon focus in anything in particular and has a bunch of skills you'd expect in a guard captain. He's a decent ranged combatant as well.
Also, Melia can attest that I like greater trip on urban melee builds. Just makes sense to me, somehow. And if you're gonna build for trip, you're gonna build for trip.
Indeed I can. It proved useful on my urban ranger, Bint Gutterson, in a CotCT campaign (ongoing). Most notably, we were up against a very high level NPC specializing in mounted ranged combat.
So I tripped his horse! And smacked it pretty good too, though not hard enough to kill it. I was sad I couldn't use my AoO from Greater Trip to disarm the rider, but apparently you can only use an AoO against the creature that provoked it even if it's sharing a space with another creature.
He then proceeded to land on his feet, look me in the eye, spit and say: "I could have forgiven you for helping these savages, on account of you're an ignorant city slicker what don't know better. But you never. Touch. My. Horse!"
He then took a five foot step out of my reach and proceeded to fill me full of crossbow bolts. Five? Six? I lost count. But it was enough to take me from full health to unconscious and bleeding out in one full attack.
I'm glad I have friends with healing magic.
So I think I found the feat needed for this combat. Getting up without provoking pretty much means he gets 2 attacks per turn. One to trip, the other when I fall.
Now he has better to hit, and better damage, but I’m hoping that I have better HP or AC. Kazador might feel that this is going to end badly, but as a player I think the dice might have a say in this just yet.
And worst come to worst, everyone thinks this is a random Dwarven healer up against a certifiable badass. So even if Kazador loses, it should still be impressive.
Oh that's funny, Mel. Was the horse an animal companion or a normal horse? Pretty impressive to trip a four-legged animal companion.
Yeah don't worry too much about this battle as it's just for fun, even IC. This guy is made for close quarters combat and sneaky/guardy skills. There are other situations he'd be worse in, e.g. resisting spells.
Can you explain the martial flexibility thing to me? It seems that taking a move action to select the feat and a move action to stand up doesn't leave you with a standard to stand up. Or is Khaz attacking from prone right now?
Oh. Shyt. You’re right. Move to get up and Ability. Sorry, first time using it for a feat and lost my action economy. I’ll roll the attack into the next time he can do so
Works for me. Update more later.
Also, Melia can attest that I like greater trip on urban melee builds. Just makes sense to me, somehow. And if you're gonna build for trip, you're gonna build for trip.
*Growls acknowledingly*
Level 5: Dirty Fighting
Level 8: Improved Trip
Level 10: Greater Trip
Level 13: Furys Fall
Yeah. I can see how to get CMB high, but what about CMD? Anyone have any advice?
Right now I have a Weapon Cord. Can I buy an adamantine one to prevent sundering? Also I’m going to get a weapon lock gauntlet for +10 vs Disarm. CMD37 at lvl8? Still not enough, I know. But I can’t think of any other way to boost it.
And for Trip. CMD30 doesn’t cut it either. Any feats or items I can take?
I was going to take extra traits to get Diplomacy and Bluff as class skills. But I think that this takes precedence.
Oh that's funny, Mel. Was the horse an animal companion or a normal horse? Pretty impressive to trip a four-legged animal companion.
Yeah, it was an animal companion. I rolled pretty high and got something like a 43 or so to trip that horse, which he failed to beat with a Ride check to negate the hit (from Mounted Combat).
I can see how to get CMB high, but what about CMD? Anyone have any advice?
The same way you boost your AC. All of the following apply: deflection, dodge, insight, luck, morale and profane/sacred bonuses to AC also increase your CMD. So a better Ring of Protection, or a dusty rose prism ioun stone -- the full version, not a cracked one. It's hard to get a luck or morale bonus to AC, alas. Dodge bonuses apply, so Dodge would work. And of course untyped bonuses always stack, so Combat Expertise would work.
You will note that armor, natural, and shield do not apply.
I love the Human Fighter Favored Class Bonus for that...+ versus trip and grapple are my usual picks.
That said, you are not supposed to be able to be immune to all kinds of Combat Maneuvers. You cannot be, there's plenty of specialized builds that push things even higher.
Your CMD is great for general utility and defense. Further safeguarding would come at opportunity cost not worth it imho. As said, you can never be "safe", you can just make things more difficult for semi-dedicated builds.
But in doing so, you diminish your own options(combat or otherwise) by not chosing a different Feat.
All that said, I am back home, everything went well, daughter #3 is currently still being integrated into daily routines. We are adjusting, but right now, I spent most of my spare time dozing on the couch. Will try and get back to most games in the following couple days. Posting may be spotty initially, but I'll try to keep up if I can.
(Also, as manner of a theoretical example: At level 13 - when she gets Furys Fall, Nelly will have:
+8 BaB, +7 Str(base), +3 Dex(Base), +2(Improved), +2(Greater), +1(Size), +3(Greater Magic Fang - her bite is the weapon she uses for the combat maneuver so the attack bonus translates) - which is a raw 26 - at least - 30 if she flanks.
Until you remember that she has share spells and Túrion has access to Transformation at that level which is a straight boost for Nelly, and which gives +4 Str/Dex as well as +3 BaB, for another +7, and potentially Animal Growth for another net +3(+4 Str, -1 Dex, +1 Size, -1 Attack) - or a bonus of 40 for trip(which she gets to attempt on each successful attack).(and getting a free attack if the attempt succeeds - and she has reach - and 6 AoO's per turn.).
And thats just a boosted companion. Trust me, this is an arms race that cannot be won. We are stronger through combined arms - and smartly picking our enemies. Do fetch your traits - we'll take care of each other if necessary.
I 100% agree with Turion and was about to say the same thing. It's just like trying to have an unhittable AC. The game is balanced so players mostly can't make themselves immune to things. 30 CMD against trip is good for level 8.
Turion: Glad to hear the child came into the family nicely! Very glad to hear everyone is safe and sufficiently healthy. I'm about to take paternity leave so I may drop off the face of the posts and am already disrupted in terms of schedule so we'll see how that goes.
@GM: I won't be at all surprised if you completely drop off the face of the earth for quite a while once your new kid makes their appearance. Possibly for as much as several months. Particularly since this will be your first.
Eventually I'm sure you'll find a new balance. People do, you know. I'm told it helps a lot once the kid finally starts sleeping through the night.
The game will still be here when you're ready to get back to it.
So many wee ones! I second Mel
Thanks all. I will at least log on to give notice of craziness when things go down.
Kazador: I feel this ring battle is a bit of a failure of balance on my part. I tend to shoot for very challenging but winnable encounters. I see now that I overdid it a bit and this encounter would have required friendly dice to be winnable. Instead, the dice were anything but friendly. This is a testament to how strong I think Kazador's build is that I mis-calibrated to make the encounter rather too tough. On the bright side, I don't think that crit confirms against FF so Kazador should still be rolling.
Pretty sure it does confirm. I mean, being flat-footed drops his AC by 3 due to his lost DEX bonus. Prone takes it down another 4, for a total of -7 AC. With that kind of confirmation roll, Kazador's taken 96 damage in two rounds, never touched the guy, and will have a serious headache in the morning.
Yup. 30 flat footed. -4 for being prone makes it 26. +2 for helmet for 28. Rolled a 29. 96 damage means that he is very unconscious.
I think that the issues are thus:
(1) Trips and disarms counter fighters hard. Without shenanigans it makes fighting near impossible. It is like sundering a wizard’s Spellbook.
(2) Kazador is only strong because he has access to spells, and is geared towards using his hammer. This fight was with clubs. Therefore Kazador lost all of his spells and half of his feats.
(3) The dice were on your side. Even if he had his hammer, he still would have been 2-shotted. Two handed fighting can be like rocket tag when a crit is confirmed. Dice happen. Good thing it wasn’t lethal!
It happens. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to making unbalanced encounters before. As a player I’m totally alright with things like this happening. So even if Kaz takes it hard, know that I’m 100% good on this.
One thing, while I’m thinking of it. Kazador has great fortitude, which was taken before our rule change on how his spell casting works. And his will save is trash (+6). Could I switch great fort for iron will? If not no big deal. In that case can I retrain at some point?
I can think of a couple of ways that might have gone better.
Losing initiative was a big part of it. Once you were down, you were in a bad place.
In your place, I think I might have tried using Martial Flexibility to get Combat Reflexes, and then readied an action to disarm them when they try to attack me. If it worked, then their first attack would be essentially negated and they would be weaponless. If they then chose to continue with a full-attack sequence, they'd provoke an AoO for each strike unless they happen to have Improved Unarmed Strike.
I would still have lost, but I'd at least have had an opportunity to try and kick them in the goolies on the way out.
Another option would be move action to get the feat the prevents AoOs for standing up, then a standard action to ready a Dirty Trick maneuver to blind them by hurling dust in their eyes when they attack you. Again, the penalty for being prone makes it much less likely to work, but if it did then it might well have kept you in the fight another round by imposing a 50% miss chance on all their attack rolls for a turn. It would also have dropped their AC and CMD considerably (-2 penalty in addition to losing their DEX bonus), making it that much easier to turn the tables on them by standing up on your next turn and then tripping them.
EDIT: Oh, and getting tripped isn't nearly as bad as a wizard losing their spellbook. Standing up is way easier than spending thousands of gold and countless hours on re-scribing all your spells and being mostly useless until you do.
Yeah...but all of those provoke. With Kaz at -7 AC. That is a near guaranteed 25 damage. And combat reflexes just gives more AOOs.
Let’s say I disarm him, and by luck he didn’t hit with his AOO. Standard to trip, then he picks up his weapon. Or keeps attacking, as let’s be honest. A character designed to have close quarters will have Improved Unarmed Strike.
So yeah. I think overall you had the right idea. But at the time, I figured that with Str18 and Dex18, I’d probably fail to hit his CMD and would just be giving him a free attack. I figured that getting up as move and standard was my best chance at drawing some blood.
Shrug. Well, water under the bridge. Maybe you'll get a rematch sometime.
Also, I can't find a price for a bed. Cots are 1 gp apiece. Even Aurora's Whole Realms Catalogue has failed me, alas! She has bedding of all kinds, including mattresses (22 gp for a double feather mattress), but not the actual beds themselves.
@Kaz: Do re-check. If memory serves, Great Fortitude was allowed to count for your spellcasting, do diminish the impact of the recalculation.
Also, your will save is 6, but with a +2 bonus from Hardy, it's 8 for most practical purposes.
That is good for a Martial.
@Melia: I would assume a trained Hireling could build a bed within a day, given the raw materials needed. If you give him a second day to acquire and prepare said raw materials, thats 6 SP for the work, plus the cost of the raw wood - which is probably dependent on what you want, some woods being more costly than others.
I would assume you could spend around 5 GP for a high-quality bed with a second trained hireling assisting.(e.g. one building the frame, one the mattress base).
Well hold on a sec, I'm not convinced Kazador is prone yet when the aoo happens. I know it's odd but the triggering action is a successful trip so the aoo happens just before Kazador actually falls. That's why I thought the crit would not confirm.
Also, I don't mind if you swap great fort for iron will. But I think Turion is right that iron will counted for your casting. We'd have to have someone go back and look.
This comes down to whether the AOO happens before or after Kazador became prone. And the answer to that? I have no idea. It’s your call. If it is found that it didn’t confirm (which it wouldn’t if not prone) then please apply his one attack as rolled prior as he would get up and swing. And then take him down again. ;)
Just don’t crit him again. That might put him into lethal damage territory!
As soon as he can do it without showing off Fyrtor will heal Khaz burning a slot or two. But for now he'll hold off unless he's in real trouble.
Now I wish I had a concoction of healing on hand. That would be in character for a woodsman and hunter if still remarkable. But straight up spellcasting? That'd be harder to brush off I think.
I know it's odd but the triggering action is a successful trip so the aoo happens just before [the target] actually falls.
What? That's ... absurd. Which doesn't mean it's not true, the PF 1e rule set is full of absurdities. Is there an FAQ on that or something?
But just on the face of it, I'd say your trip attempt is not "successful" until your target is prone. You know it worked when they fall over.
One thing to note though, I don't think being prone means you are flat footed.
I did some google-fu. It seems like PF1 ruled it that way to avoid stun-locking people. So you successfully make the trip attack, resolve the AOO, and then the enemy is tripped.
Likewise if an enemy provokes when getting up, you hit him when he is down (-4 AC) and he then gets up. That way you can’t ready a trip action.
It’s absurd, as in it seems like the AOO hits the enemy when they are still standing. And I’m not 100% on how this all works. But it’s the best I can make of it.
——-
Fyrtor: you can hold off on the healing then. I’m sure there are in-house healers on staff, so you won’t have to break your cover.
I rule that the aoo happens before the enemy falls, which I agree is crazy. But PF 1e rules are that the aoo happens before the triggering action, which is a successful trip. That way you can hit someone who's leaving your reach, interrupt spell-casting, can't trip-lock, etc.
@Fyrtor He's flat-footed because the slayer successfully feinted him as a move action.
Okay, well, I guess that's how it'll be. And I can see the logic for preventing trip-locking by resolving the AoO from standing up while the character is still prone so they can't be re-tripped.
But it's still going to bug me that a trip attempt can be considered "successful" before it actually takes effect.
EDIT: @Kazador I don't think your helmet provides an AC bonus normally; it's a Dwarven Boulder Helmet, which has been enchanted as a +3 weapon. It gives you a +2 circumstance bonus to AC against critical hit confirmation rolls (like the one earlier!) but does not add anything to your AC ordinarily.
The +3 bonus makes it better for head-butting people, I guess.
To be fair. This is the same system that says a high level fighter with greater two weapon fighting can make a 5ft step and attack 7 times. But if he moves 10ft he can only attack 1 time.
The way I’m seeing it, is that the AOO is combined with the roll to knock the person down. So the take-down is doing damage, you aren’t hitting the person while they are on the ground. It’s the different between just tripping someone using momentum, and tripping them by bashing their legs with a club.
EDIT: @Kazador I don't think your helmet provides an AC bonus normally; it's a Dwarven Boulder Helmet, which has been enchanted as a +3 weapon. It gives you a +2 circumstance bonus to AC against critical hit confirmation rolls (like the one earlier!) but does not add anything to your AC ordinarily.
Agreed!
Armor
AC: 10 + 3 (Dex) + 11 (armor) + 5 (shield) + 3 (natural armor) + 1 (ring) = 33
Touch: 10 + 3 (Dex) = 13
Flat Footed: 10 + 11 (armor) + 5 (shield) + 3 (natural armor) + 1 (ring) = 30
+3 armor and +3 shield. Helmet is indeed only +2 vs critical hit confirmations. The only way to add it to AC is via defending enchantment, which would be very expensive.
I think your numbers are off.
You've got:
- +3 nimble comfort stoneplate (8 base armor, +3 enhance, max dex +3)
- +3 buckler (1 base, +3 enhance)
- Amulet of Natural Armor +1
- Ring of Protection +1
- Shield Focus feat (shield bonus to AC increases by 1)
That gives you:
10 base + 11 armor + 5 shield + 3 DEX + 1 natural + 1 deflection = 31
Flat-footed would be 3 lower (28).
Your profile lists a cracked dusty rose prism ioun stone in a wayfinder as providing a +2 natural armor bonus; but it does not. If you check the stats (cracked is at the bottom of the page) you'll find it gives you a +1 competence bonus to initiative, and a +1 insight bonus to CMB, but no AC bonus.
That item got errata'd a while back. In an earlier version, its resonant power was +2 insight to CMB and CMD. Perhaps that's where you got the +2 number; but it's never had anything to do with natural armor.
A regular dusty rose prism ioun stone (i.e. not cracked or flawed) would give you a +1 insight bonus to AC (which also applies to CMD).
Finally, note that your buckler and helmet are both made of metal; wearing them disables your shifter aspects, because shifters are prohibited from wearing metal armor, like a druid.
Rolled for Ioun stone, that’s how it got the natural armor. It was accepted at the time, so I’d prefer to keep my good fortune.
As for the buckler and helmet, I’d assume that they don’t need to be of metal. If they are...then I don’t get anything from shifter and will spend gold to respec. But for this fight I didn’t use anything from shifter, so I don’t think it matters.
Oh, I see! I had forgotten that. Well then, I stand corrected.
As for metal, the helmet description says: "It occupies the head slot and is made of metal, not stone, meaning that it can be crafted from unusual materials as a metal weapon."
And the buckler description says: "This small metal shield is worn strapped to your forearm."
The buckler came from the Magister of Conjuration, who likely had no reason to have it made out of non-metal; that'd be up to the GM.
As for the boulder helm, considering that was custom loot in a pile of stuff that was evidently carefully tailor made for the party by dwarven sages who foresaw their abilities, it wouldn't surprise me if the helm was not metal after all.
@Fyrtor He's flat-footed because the slayer successfully feinted him as a move action.
Ah right. Nevermind carry on :)
Well, GM. The issue comes down to the Helmet and Buckler. If they are metal can I (A) change the shifter class into something else, or (B) spend gold to retrain it? Would probably just make it another level of Brawler and use a skill point to know Druidic. Keep it simple.
Just to add to the trip thing: There's Vicious Stomp, and the clarification there did clear things up.
It very much depends on what TRIGGERS the AoO, and in the case of Greater Trip, it's the mere fact that there was a successful trip. The target is not yet prone. With Vicious Stomp, the trigger is a target falling prone, which is separate, and would add another AoO(for a trip-focused monk-build, e.g.).
The buckler is made of metal but you can retrain the shifter level if you like.
Yes we are doing resonant powers for ioun stones but I will roll whether or not they exist. You might have to prompt/remind me when it happens, though.
AoO timing: Yes vicious stomp seems more like the aoo might happen while the target is prone but aoos are still just weird. Your aoo on someone for leaving a threatened square definitely happens while they're still in the threatened square, for example.