So would you like us to already be in cahoots with each other as a salvage team then?
Good question.
If we're not already part of a salvage team, I'd be good with building in a backstory with anyone:> He can be a hot head (hahaha, fire genasi pun) and he too is looking for his past in a way, so finding common ground with a Kendall could be really easy.
> He's studied long, is well-read, and is religious so finding common ground with Aleena should also be easy.
> He's no farmer, but he finds sheep tasty, and he's got arcane energies in common with Edie... so, that could also be common ground.
But, if we decide that we don't know each other prior to becoming "Salvage Team Omicron", I'm good with that too.
Ah, good point. Pity I posted before thinking about this, but I don't think it'll be a disaster.
I'm fine with knowing everyone beforehand.
Edie might have run across Kendall as a general do-gooder.
She could also have stumbled over Aleena and Kai-Sovis at the prompting of her fey patron. I get the distinct feeling that the patron is behind Edie's readiness to move on. They must have told each other all the stories, riddles and insults they both know by now.
I'd sort of envisioned that everyone had signed up for salvager work and were more or less strangers meeting at the edge of the city's eathmote getting handed the keys to their ship for the first time. It's possible some of you know each other already, or that you've met previously in the process of signing up for a crew, but it's not assumed that you guys know each other yet, no.
Rev Rosey: That and I sort of get the idea that Edie was pretty sheltered with regards to the lands beyond Erarat--or even a lot of the more big city bits of Erarat, but hearing her patron weave tales of the stuff in the wider world may have gotten her more interest in the world "out there". Plus she's got a little more power under her belt than she had, which has got to be a confidence builder.
I'd agree with that. Edie's not had much to do with cities at all. She'll just treat everything like a flock of sheep until she learns otherwise.
So it's been a few days cooling our heels. Seems like entropy always eats play by post games alive. Did we want to get going with the folks we've got? Two players will probably be small enough to keep the game moving briskly. Four was asking a lot probably.
I'm here and posted. Thursday/Friday were tough work days. All better :)
Grim, how do you feel about people making adjustments to characters and powers after the first combat?
I'm asking because once we've seen each other in play, it may make sense to tweak a little.
Peasant Railgun: So what ratio of Bea-*BLEEP* to Maria do you see for your character? Deadly Viper Assassins? Bill? Hatori Hanzo? Austere Austrian Lord? Nazi takeover? Musical numbers? Frankly any combination of these elements sound like a blast--I'm just trying to get a bead on who your character is and what she's after (which really could run the gambit from running windmilling through fields of wildflowers to what the newspapers call a "roaring rampage of revenge.")
About a 33/67 split between B and Maria. I'm going to try and incorporate as many of these elements in as I can for maximum fun! I might have painted myself into a corner with such a character concept, but here it goes:
Not quite fitting in amongst her sistren of the Fiercely Virginal Order of Blessed Exoneration (an order of warrior nuns dedicated to all forms of combat), Aleena was ordered by Mother Superior Wilhelmina to accept the role of governess to the unruly von Trapper children. Whilst living in their vast, underground demesne, Aleena soon grew fond of the von Trapper brood, but unbeknownst to her the von Trappers were actually part of a secret breeding program by the Church of Zehir (the equivalent on Erarat) to create an army of assassin trappers.
Aleena was later betrayed by Wilhelmina—actually a secret cultist of the Zehir-equivalent—who sent her yuan-ti servitors to attack the von Trapper demesne. Captain Dita von Trapper (trapper warlord 11/battle captain), with a bit help from Aleena, manage to fend off the yuan-ti, allowing Aleena and the von Trapper family to escape to Erarat.
Will you permit me to reskin the Sentinel's animal companion as Dita von Trapper? As a trapper she can disguise herself as various floor furnishings such as an ornate carpet or bearskin rug. And while standing within her aura 1, she's actually providing literal support like some kind of anti-fatigue floormat.
Abbess Wilhelmina earned the nickname "Bill" due to her favouring the bill over other polearms such as the glaive-guisarme, Bec de corbin, and Lucerne hammer. Aleena hopes use the Abbess' fondness for collecting rare melee weapons to track her down and kill her.
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"anti-fatigue floormat" had me spilling coffee.
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Railgun: That's pretty freaking fantastic. Awesome!
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Railgun: I love the use of the yuan-ti as the Deadly Viper Assassination Gang! I second the "awesome". It does speak to something strange in so many of us that we know both the Sound of Music and Kill Bill so well. Talk about genre extremes!
Thanks guys! The weird mash-ups are one of the best parts of D&D, as well as getting the flavour to match the mechanics (and vice versa). I remember a type of yuan-ti called the pureblood, so perhaps we can work some Harry Potter references in too! Aleena would love to beat up some Deatheaters!
In order to address the plothole of how Aleena's supposed to look after the von Trapper children, I'd like to reskin the Fey Beast Tamer's blink dog as Dobby the Housecarl, elf, gnome babysitter. And as a gnome, I think he's automatically an accredited pilot!
*facepalm*
Unlike Shoso, Kendall is just the perfect straight dwarf for PG's characters.
I dub thee, Lady Costello.
carding combs are the combs used to help gather and straighten fleece, yes?
That's them.
I think I like having the animal companion be a shapeshifting trapper a bit more than a Dobbie style gnome ornithopter pilot. Plus the Von Trapper thing is funny.
Rev Rosey: As far as rules tweaks go, I think anything that makes your character run more the way they should run and gets their flavor right is great. If you feel like making little tweaks (or even big changes) I'm cool with it. Just let me know.
I do enjoy introducing the ship by having people running from room to room. Reminds me of the Clue movie. I sort of picture it as one long movie shot with no cuts following people up into the ship and back and forth into the rooms. Heh.
Aleena soon grew fond of the von Trapper brood, but unbeknownst to her the von Trappers were actually part of a secret breeding program by the Church of Zehir (the equivalent on Erarat) to create an army of assassin trappers.
So am I reading this right? The whole family are actually trappers...like the monster? Basically darkmantles that instead of looking like stalactites, look like pleasant children and their widower father? And escaping the yuan-ti cult you took them to Erarat to keep them safe, right?
If so, they don't really require looking after much...except to keep them from getting hungry and om-nomming folks.
And if I read it right, your animal companion is a trapper--one of the family who helped fight off the yuan-ti, who now takes the form of (I'm guessing your big suitcase right?) various furnishings.
Personally I like the idea that keeping with the Kill Bill idea, she'd fallen in love with father Von Trapper, forsaking her vestal vows--and that her trapper companion is actually her Bee-Bee. That's messed up in a way I really enjoy. So now a lot of her motivation is trying to turn her cute little daughter into a real girl instead of a creature that's mostly mouth and teeth that can impersonate luggage.
Awesome.
Seconding (or thirding, or generally agreeing with) the awesomeness. Will have to steel myself to watch Kill Bill. In my own defense, I have to steel myself to watch The Sound of Music as well, but for slightly different reasons.
Wikipedia is a great resource to become knowledgable about stuff you don't want to see. It's great that way.
Just so folks know, I'm planning on posting replies and such, I just need to wait till my phone battery recharges (and I want to do some research).
yeah Kill Bill is just....well it might be easier to watch part 2, rather than the 'crosses the line twice' bloodbath of part 1
For a pair of films I'm never going to watch, I seem to know a surprising amount about KBI and KBII. On balance, I'm keeping the whole "never going to watch" thing going. I have a really low bloodshed tolerance on screen, and can take almost anything on stage - strange.
Aleena soon grew fond of the von Trapper brood, but unbeknownst to her the von Trappers were actually part of a secret breeding program by the Church of Zehir (the equivalent on Erarat) to create an army of assassin trappers.So am I reading this right? The whole family are actually trappers...like the monster? Basically darkmantles that instead of looking like stalactites, look like pleasant children and their widower father? And escaping the yuan-ti cult you took them to Erarat to keep them safe, right?
Yes, that's correct. I got the idea from Paizo's take on the trapper in Misfit Monsters Redeemed where the trapper is the female form of the lurking ray.
If so, they don't really require looking after much...except to keep them from getting hungry and om-nomming folks.
Yeah, it's easier if they remain safely on Erarat, otherwise the number of NPCs onboard the Lucky Leprechaun will swell to Normandy-levels of person-spacelessness.
And if I read it right, your animal companion is a trapper--one of the family who helped fight off the yuan-ti, who now takes the form of (I'm guessing your big suitcase right?) various furnishings.
She's blending in with the luggage at the moment, but Aunty Edie's soon gonna find an extra fleece unaccounted for.
Personally I like the idea that keeping with the Kill Bill idea, she'd fallen in love with father Von Trapper, forsaking her vestal vows--and that her trapper companion is actually her Bee-Bee. That's messed up in a way I really enjoy. So now a lot of her motivation is trying to turn her cute little daughter into a real girl instead of a creature that's mostly mouth and teeth that can impersonate luggage.
I do like this better than my original concept as it ties in nicely with Aleena's plot hook, but is it tough love, or child abuse to send your child into combat as a meat shield?
Assuming you *knew* you were taking her with you. Heh.
She's blending in with the luggage at the moment, but Aunty Edie's soon gonna find an extra fleece unaccounted for.
If that fleece doesn't have the right mark on it, Edie is going to be hugely suspicious.
Can I say just how much I like Arcana not being restricted to Knowledge: Arcana, that it can be used as a practical skill for applying freeform magic. I really enjoy that.
Zerombr mentioned having the DM roll everyone's initiative. I'd be okay with that. I'm also okay with using the take ten rule on initiatives... 'course, with our group that would mean we would be going last all the time, lol.
Not likely to give Kendall flack since they were spoiling for a fight regardless of what we did. Well, not just yet anyway . . .
I'm fine with Grim rolling init for us, or taking ten. Whatever works best for Grim.
Initiative is tough in play by post gaming since it slows down what is already a pretty pokey medium, while people who are available to post have to wait for others who aren't on yet, but who beat them on initiative. Round after round. If it's all the same to folks I might suspend initiative entirely most of the time--except when there's things one character wants to do that opposes someone else and "who gets there first" becomes a big deal. That work?
Works for me.
I'm happy to give it a try, especially at this level. It may not work so well if anyone has interrupts or things depending on positioning, but we're not that sort of party at the moment.
I tend to really dislike maps in gaming--especially 4e because people seem to think you can't play the game without it, when really in my experience the written word is more evocative and leads to more immersive, descriptive games.
That said, sometimes a map helps make the situation a little clearer. Hope this helps. MAP
The red dots are the badguys. Maborg is in the center at the bottom.
OK. Let's give it a try. Posted Edie for you :)
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I do generally like the theatre of the mind way of gaming, but 4E is not conductive to it. Distance has to be measured, opportunity attacks need to be noted, area damage, etc.
I mean I play Palladium, all we do is boardless gaming generally, but which'd you rather hear?
"Can we update the map?"
or
"If this guy is close to me, I step back to avoid provoking"
"Can I get two guys in my area attack?"
"Did this guy provoke?"
"I ask the Leader to stay within two of me"
That said, Yeah lets give it a go sans map, I'm always eager to learn new ways to play.
I'd rather it went like this: I run forward to angle my (blast attack] so it hits the two guys coming out of the window and the guy inside if I can reach him.
Or:
I stay close to the leader to be ready in case he needs me to act quickly.
Or:
I pull back from the fight with the kobold, fearing it might take a slice out of me in doing so, so I can sprint across and flank the dragonborn that's savaging our rogue friend.
If you've got questions or something's unclear I'm more than happy to explain, but I don't really see 4e as needing maps any more or less than any other version of the game.
Not like a post after I said how I wasn't using maps. Heh. Oh well.
Lol sorry about that. I was in the middle of posting when the DM must've beat me to it. I didn't intend to cancel the skill challenge. Feel free to ignore Kai's quip and skill away! I'll follow suit with the group.
No there's a higher difficulty than that. I was congratulating the two successes from last post. It's still out there.
The lowest listed complexity is 4/3 for an easy easy skill challenge and it goes up from there based on how hard what you're trying to do is. What you've got going is going to be a toughie, so yeah, you've got a ways to go.
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whew, that's really going to make skill challenges harder if the only way to get a second success on a skill is to beat the initial roll. Again I'll willing to do that, cuz why not? But I'd like to point out an inconsistency.
Let's say the DC for a skill check is 17. I roll arcana and total, roll a 19, so there's a success. Elsie rolls arcana later with a larger bonus, and gets a 22. Two successes.
Compare that to this
I roll arcana, and I have massive bonuses, so when I roll a crit, I actually end up with a 27. Nobody else can use arcana then to succeed at all because I have the highest skill in the group, and what was once a success for Elsie is now a failure, because I already rolled higher, but my roll shut out any other successes.
That said, I still don't mind playing on hard mode, so let me tally the skills used so far
Bluff 8 Fail
Intimidate 25 Success probably shut out
Athletics 26 Success probably shut out
Dungeoneering 16 Success
Perception 19 Success
Diplomacy 21 Success