The joy of new life brought on by spring has been broken by a series of shocking murders. Can the heroes of Sandpoint stop the culprit before he strikes again...
Some Bookkeeping Before We Move On
Most or all of which relates to this post.
Tera's the only who ever commented on the white cape/cloak of protection... I'm assuming, based on the absence of any objections, that it's going to Marcus (who didn't get a cloak when everyone else did because he wasn't in the party yet)? @Marcus- add that to your character sheet (and saves).
The church provided a few potions, who has those?
There were more potions for sale in town- how many (if any) of those are you buying? I assume that cost would come out of the 2,400g before splitting it up?
Oh, and who's carrying the everburning torch?
This last bit is just for future reference: unsold loot
+1 bastard sword
+1 elfbane arrows (4)
+1 returning dagger (tiny)
+1 (horse) hide armor (small)
male human Oracle 5 (spirit guide) Hp53/53 perception:+11 Initiative:+0 Ac:19 To:14 FF:15 Hero pt:1 (current spirit:Flame)
I cant cast shield other without a pair of platinum rings worth 50gp. Marcus still has no money, which is fine, just wanted to know if he should try to sell something to get to his full spell compliment? or pick a different spell?
Sorry for the delay- partly I’m hoping to square away the equipment questions before we go, but mostly I had a long day and feel like crap so I’m going to bed early.
Marcus- you went with Tera to sell stuff... go ahead and buy the rings if you want and take the cost out of the gold that’s yours once everything is divied up- I’ll announce the total for each person once I get some direction on buying potions (and whether everyone’s cool with giving Marcus a full share or only a partial one).
Shoanti Marked of Sarenrae; HP 40/40 4NL, AC16 T13 FF13, Saves: F+9, R+8, W+4, Initiative +3, Perception +9
Full share obviously... not particularly driven to purchase any specific potions - unless other folks are suggesting things and I decide I want to be one of the cool kids....
Alright- Sister Amet'Ra will carry the potions from the Cathedral to distribute as necessary. Each PC gets 400g from the sale of items, except Marcus who gets 350g plus those rings he wanted.
I have to take my son to an appointment right now but I'll get a gameplay post up later today. I'll also send Kaede a PM, its been almost 2 weeks since her last post.
Okay, so it looks like we for sure have these potions provided by the church:
CMW Potion x1
CLW Potion x2
Between the various shops in town we have access to but haven't actually bought (yet):
CMW Potion x1
CLW Potion x4
________
Sal is still carrying a CMW potion from earlier so she'd suggest giving the other potions we actually have to some combination of Kaede, Zache, Marcus, and Kaelaah. Do we want to buy any of the other available potions?
It's a bit late but I'm fine with Marcus getting the Cloak of Protection.
As far as the Everburning Torch...I know Tera usually uses her Light spell. Sal could carry it so we have light at the back of the group if no one else has a better idea.
No post tonight- my younger son got violently ill... I should have time to post tomorrow while I’m doing nothing because he has to stay home from school
Okay, my apologies for not posting. Between a bit of ennui that I get from time to time, bad timing for posting(Mainly from work), and a bit of getting myself overwhelmed by what i needed to respond to, I just sorta prevented myself from posting. I'll -try- to get something up tonight.
Yes, welcome back! Hang in there and don't feel pressured to respond to every single thing in one go, okay? Just write what you feel inspired to write :)
Yes! I know of an idea that could help if you need it. Tera did let slip that A) she's infatuated with both Zache and Aldern and B) She wouldn't mind having them both to both Sal and Kaede the night before. Perhaps Kaede has something to say to that.
So, caring for a sick 7 year old has proven more demanding than I hoped. I barely slept last night and now that he’s fallen asleep I need to do so as well. Silver lining- it’ll give Kaede a little longer to get something up before we’ve moved farther along.
I will post something tomorrow.
@Kaede- feel free to just jump into the current events if that’s easiest, you can always respond to other stuff you may want to comment on with flex-time spoilers when you’re ready to do so.
Male Varisian Bard 4/Swashbuckler 1 | AC 18, T 13, FF 15 | hp 39/39 | Fort +3, Ref +7, Will +4 (+2 vs charm & compulsion) | CMD 17 | Initiative +3 | Perception +8 | Bardic performance 15/15 | Hero points 3/3 | Agile Feet 4/4
Spells:
1st 5/5 | 2nd 2/2
Boy, life. It happens, huh?
Protip: if you have a Microsoft Surface, don't use it as your primary device and spend 8 hours a day on it. After getting really bad headaches and hand cramps, I had to drop most of my backpay on a new laptop, and spend days setting it up. *rolls up in blanket and sobs*
I'm checking into discussion threads now, and hopefully I can get to gameplays tonight.
Male Varisian Bard 4/Swashbuckler 1 | AC 18, T 13, FF 15 | hp 39/39 | Fort +3, Ref +7, Will +4 (+2 vs charm & compulsion) | CMD 17 | Initiative +3 | Perception +8 | Bardic performance 15/15 | Hero points 3/3 | Agile Feet 4/4
Spells:
1st 5/5 | 2nd 2/2
Okay, so I know it's taken *way* longer than it should have, and I'm sorry. But I finally got a chance to figure out what to do with Zache.
With nate's permission, I've retrained Double Slice, as he generously decided I can gain the full benefits of the feat from my Divine Fighting Technique feat (but only with starknives). With that in mind, I've decided to go for a level in swashbuckler (unarchetyped) and retrain the feat to Combat Expertise.
+1 BAB, +2 Reflex, +8 hp (6 from level, 2 from Con)
Panache pool of 5
Deeds: derring-do, dodging panache, opportune parry and riposte
This isn't going to take up any more of my levels; I'll probably be focusing entirely on bard from next level on unless I decide to prestige.
Cool Zache. Personally, I probably would have grabbed bard 4 first (for the 2nd level spells) but I think a little swashbuckler could be nice for you. If you're dipping one level anyways, it might not hurt to take 2, imho- your Cha is so high that charmed life would be really handy. Also...
IMPORTANT REMINDER ABOUT FRACTIONAL BONUSES:
Remember, we're using fractional bonuses for multiclassing. This does make things a little bit more complicated, and it makes it so you can't stack good saves super high, but it also means you never get +0 to anything...
For BAB, you gain .75 from every bard level, and 1 from each swashbuckler level. So, you're going from 2.25 to 3.25; you always round down to find the bonus to your roll, so functionally you go from +2 to +3. If your next level is a full BAB class you'll go to 4.25 (or +4), if it's a 3/4 BAB class you'll go to 4.0 (also +4), or if you took a level at 1/2 BAB it would go to 3.75 (or stay at +3).
For saves, you get .33 for every level of a bad save and .5 for every level of a good save. You also get +2 on any save that's good for at least one class, but you don't get that +2 extra times for multiple classes... so, for you:
Fort- +1 from bard +.33 from swashbuckler =1.33 (or +1)
Ref- +1.5 from bard +.5 from swashbuckler +2 good save =4 (+4)
Will- +1.5 from bard +.33 from swashbuckler +2 good save =3.88 (+3)
I can help with that at every level if you want (I have been for Tera), If you have any questions please feel free to ask!
Eh, I'm used to it. I've got horrible luck with the dice most of the time. Sometimes, though, I wind up with a streak where a character of mine just demolishes enemies, thought it helps that Tot's got a keen greatsword do to the demo work with. :)
Ask Kaelnaah about it. She's a character in his Emerald Spire game.
Also, sorry for not updating Tera's HP. I tend to be a little scatterbrained at times.
Everyone still here? I'm ready to move on based on what Sal and the others who have posted are doing but I haven't heard from half of the party in a few days... are we ready to keep going?
Hey folks, I'll be heading out of town to DieCon 18 from today through Monday the 11th. While I'll have my phone and Kindle with me, I don't anticipate having much time to catch up on posts so please bot Sal as necessary!
Shoanti Marked of Sarenrae; HP 40/40 4NL, AC16 T13 FF13, Saves: F+9, R+8, W+4, Initiative +3, Perception +9
Please note I am fairly flat out at work trying to get a report finished by the end of this week... apologies that posting has been scarce - and please GMPC as needed - normal service should be resumed next week!!!
Thanks for the update Kaelaah. We've mostly been in RP mode for the last 2 rooms, so botting hasn't been necessary at all. If you find the mysterious 'voice in the darkness' in the next day or two it might become more of an issue...
Hey guys, just a quick check-in to say that DieCon was a blast and that normal operations should resume tomorrow afternoon/evening once I've gotten home and had a chance to get settled in :)
Just a heads up, I've got a lot on my plate at work this week, so I'm going to be a bit spotty this week with posting. Hopefully, I'll get on top of things and I won't have to put in 10-11 hour days next week.
For anyone that's interested in reading about my convention experience:
DieCon Stuff (Spoiled for Holy Crap That's A Lot to Read):
So, DieCon 18 - my second DieCon to date - went great. My brother and I hit the road around 8:30 or so Thursday morning and, even with making a couple of stops to hit up a game shop, use the bathroom, and eat, we arrived in Collinsville, IL just after 4:00 pm. We met up with friends Chris (who lives a couple hours north) and Becca (who flew in from Las Vegas and was crashing at Chris' place), got checked in to the Super 8, and then loaded up and headed into downtown St. Louis, MO to have dinner at Blueberry Hill. While there we also met up with another guy that Becca & Chris know from their time in World of Warcraft. This was the second year I've met him and he's a rather odd duck, but nice enough. After dinner we went down the street to the Snow Factory for some Thai-style ice cream. While good and also a rather novel experience, I'm not sure it was worth $8. I'd have been just as happy to go across the street to Fitz's for shakes. After all this the hour was getting late so we headed back to the Super 8 to get some sleep.
Friday morning, we got up and headed to the nearby Denny's for breakfast before going over to the Gateway Convention Center to get ready to sign up for games! Normally registration and sign-ups open at noon but for some reason they started about a half-hour early. Since I'd already preregistered I was able to get my t-shirt and convention booklet and hop right into the registration line.
Event signups for DieCon are interesting in that, with the exception of Organized Play programs like PFS or DnD AL, you sign up in-person and the events tend to be something of a first-come, first-serve basis. You have a card and you write down three sessions that you really want to get in to (first choice) and then write down two alternates (second choice) and then go through the line. The people at the desk then look at your paper and go to see how many slots are still open for the events you want. They then give you stickers to place in your booklet for the events you're able to get into. One limitation they *do* impose for Saturday and Sunday events is that they only give out maybe half of the tickets for those on Friday and hold the rest in reserve for folks who can't get there to sign up until Saturday or Sunday. Luckily for me I was able to get into all of my first choices right away and for the PFS/SFS I'd signed up for, my tickets were held in reserve and waiting for me since I'd done my signing up via Warhorn.
After a quick walk over to the nearby Mexican place for a drink (no lunch since several of us had just eaten) we then filtered back over to the convention center for Session #1, which started at 2pm. My event for this was a board game called 'Mansions of Madness' - gameplay seemed somewhat similar to 'Betrayal at House on the Hill' except with a heckuva lot more Cthulhu creep factor. The rules were a little complex and took some getting used to but the game itself was quite enjoyable and it came right down to the wire on whether we, the players, would win or the GM! I enjoyed it enough that I would've shelled out money for my own copy but none of the vendors seemed to have one. Sadness :(
Each session has an hour-long break before the next session starts so those are good times to hit the restroom, grab a bite to eat, go smoke, wander around the convention hall, etc. I brought some of my own snacks and flavor packs for my bottled water (which I just kept refilling using the canteens placed around the hall) because the snack bar is crazy expensive.
Session #2 was my first foray into playing Savage Worlds. What I didn't know, because the blurb for it didn't mention this part, is that we were going to be using the 'Pirates of the Spanish Main' setting for the game. So when I sat down and ended up being the only one at the table who hadn't played before, the GM grinned at me and said, 'Okay then, you're the captain' and tossed said character sheet my direction. Pretty sure I had an 'Oh god' look on my face but hey, it's good to try new things right? And actually, it turned out pretty good! I mean yeah, we narrowly escaped being executed only to have a rival run off with our ship (after having 'repaid' me by helping to bust us free) and had no navigator and like 5 NPC crew and no money or supplies but we did manage to take a merchant ship (using our persuasive smooth-talk and the one sword we had between 6 characters) and made it to what amounted to Tortuga. The session ended right as we'd finished negotiating a deal for our cargo and making some preparations to buy supplies and start tracking down leads on where to find some cannons...but the rest will be detailed further down for I'd also signed up to play the second part of this little adventure during the middle Saturday session! I also received a copy of the Deluxe Explorer's Edition of Savage Worlds - hooray for free swag!
After a decent night's sleep, we all got up early Saturday morning and trooped back over to the convention center for moar gaming! Session #3 was a game of 'Call of Scooby Doo' using a game system called 'FAST' that was developed by brothers Larry and Woody Babb. Larry himself ran our game and the best way to describe the experience is like a standard Scooby Doo mystery (including special guest stars as playable characters) mixed with puzzle solving and some Cthulhu-style horror. I played this last year, where the scenario was called 'Wednesday Mourning' and featured Wednesday Addams as the special guest star. This year's scenario was called 'Cereal Killer' and featured Count Chocula (or his daughter, the Countess Chocula) as the special guest star. I played Velma, same as last year, while my brother and another con-friend reprised their usual roles as Scooby and Shaggy. The player of Shaggy even brings Scooby Snacks to the game each year! Much fun was had by all and we solved the mystery and defeated the crazed Sonny the Cuckoo Bird, who was the villain for this year's scenario.
Session #4 saw the continuation of Friday's Savage Worlds game and most of the same players returned, including myself. For those of us who played both sessions, we actually got to 'level up' our characters before getting started, which was nice. More pirate hijinks were had wherein our fence wound up murdered and our money stolen...along with someone's daughter? I suspect that said daughter was originally supposed to be my character's daughter but see, I hadn't paid close attention to my character sheet during the earlier session and had given my captain a female name and gender...which in the real world setting and time period the game was set in, would've been really unusual. Oops. But it did lead to some amusing comments from the rest of my crew. At any rate, we raced off to Haiti to try and rescue our money (and the girl, I guess) from the clutches of Baron Samedi and encountered storms, hostile locals, and a bloodthirsty shark along the way. Unfortunately we kinda ran out of time after the shark encounter and the GM had to narrate the rest of the adventure and conclusion but I had a surprisingly good time with the whole thing and would definitely play with this GM again at future DieCons.
Session #5 is where I finally sat down and played my first ever game of Starfinder! Starting with the very first published scenario, Claim to Salvation, which is run using 4th level pregen iconics. Most of the other players had about as much experience as I did, which was none, so it was nice to be more or less on a level playing field with everyone else. I also saw a familiar face at this table, a kid (probably 14-15ish) who was at all of my PFS tables at last year's DieCon. He seemed to have grown up a little in that this time he didn't try to go all murderhobo right off the bat and also didn't keep interrupting the GM as they were trying to talk. All of the other players, as well as the GM, were super friendly and helpful and we all had a great time playing through the scenario. While I think Pathfinder will remain my main squeeze, I definitely enjoyed Starfinder enough that I plan to make my own character for SFS play.
Sunday morning rolls around after another night of adequate sleep and this is the day where my brother and I are in all of the same events together. Session #6, our first of the day, was a PFS game playing the scenario 'Scourge of the Farheavens'. We only had four people for this and had a really weird level split with one 5th level character and everyone else being 1st level because most of said players either only had those characters to play (the 5th level shaman and the 1st level fighter) or just really wanted to play a particular character (my brother and his 1st level druid). I can't say a lot about the particulars of the scenario itself as I want to avoid spoilers but it was highly amusing and surprisingly challenging in certain parts. It was also pretty straightforward and we finished with an hour to spare so it'd probably be an easy one to run for anyone contemplating GMing PFS scenarios.
Since we got done with plenty of time to spare, my brother and I actually hit up the nearby steakhouse for lunch and had the first proper meal we'd had since Friday morning. Afterwards, we went to Session #7 which was a homebrew game of Deadlands titled 'Large Trouble, Small China' wherein we had to solve some issues with gang violence occurring in San Francisco's Chinatown. Oh, did I mention we had to fight an evil wizard and his nigh-invincible henchmen? That was a thing. I've played Deadlands before and would actually like to play it more in the future, if our home group can ever finish some of our Pathfinder campaigns.
Last but not least, our last game of the convention was Session #8, where we played another PFS scenario titled 'Beyond the Halflight Path'. This one is a 3-7 evergreen with multiple story arcs that can be played and it was my first time playing it. The beginning has plenty of social stuff happening and then the latter part was more dungeon-crawl than anything, but that's okay. Once again, we just had 4 PCs but at least this time there wasn't quite as much of a level gap. We won and survived, but man we had one or two tough fights! Our ectoplasmist spiritualist was the MVP of the scenario and I'm positive that without his assistance we would've wiped on at least one of the encounters. On the other hand...what's up with characters not having any ranks in any knowledge skills? Some classes that are skill-starved I can understand but otherwise, I mean...really? Especially when you're 5th or 6th level? I've seen this several times now with live play but I don't know that I've ever seen it in a PbP game. I try not to tell people how to play but sometimes some decisions leave me shaking my head a bit. Ah well.
Anyhoo, that's pretty much the tale of my experiences at DieCon 18! Had lots of fun, picked up a little swag, and managed to survive through all of my games. I'm totally looking forward to next year :)
Also, apologies to those of you who will see this posted across several games!
Sorry for the slow down. I'm officially done with my semester (plus the extra 5 week intensive course I added) and I'm looking forward to getting back into a regular posting rhythm.
Technically this never ended, but just a reminder- we're still using the posting incentive system... each (RL) day you can add +1 to one d20 roll if you made a real gameplay post the day before... I know that's not always easy to do in combat when your turn is coming every other day but a couple sentences describing how you react to a certain action or a few lines of inner monologue as the fight develops are plenty to get the bonus...
Under the domain section of the cleric class description it explains that using any domain ability is a standard action unless it specifically states otherwise (obviously abilities that are always in effect--like the bonus speed from the travel domain, or the save bonus from protection--are exceptions to that).
Male Varisian Bard 4/Swashbuckler 1 | AC 18, T 13, FF 15 | hp 39/39 | Fort +3, Ref +7, Will +4 (+2 vs charm & compulsion) | CMD 17 | Initiative +3 | Perception +8 | Bardic performance 15/15 | Hero points 3/3 | Agile Feet 4/4
Spells:
1st 5/5 | 2nd 2/2
Sorry for the absence, folks; turns out I'm moving house. It all happened pretty immediately. Boyfriend was given two months' notice a week ago because the landlord is demolishing the house, and we signed a rental lease at a new place last night. Things will be spotty for a few days while we move and get set up.
