GM Ladile's TL;DR: A Pathfinder Society Campaign

Game Master Lady Ladile

I think I’m going to wait to see who/what our illustrious GM recruits before I do an actual rebuild but I’m willing to be on the frontline if we need it.

Hepsubia (and anyone else with a suggestion) feel free to shoot me a PM or something to let me know who you've got in mind. While I reserve Right of Refusal, there's only a handful of folks that I can think of that I would definitely not be interested in GMing for so that hopefully shouldn't actually come up. My main requirements are that they be willing to actually engage with the game and do some RPing* and to preferably be able to post roughly 1/day.

@Zithembe - Responded to your PM!

Ylva and Tupp: Sorry to see you go, and best of luck to you!

Re: Me... I am super-busy right now, but I am very much enjoying this game when I get a chance to post.

I've had out-of-town events literally every other weekend since the start of October. (Right now, I'm in NYC to see "Hamilton" later today!)

At the same time, a project I'm leading at work has gone into status:Red, and I am trying desperately to pull it out of the flames. A failure on this project would be, shall we say, a career-limiting move for me. I've been putting in 50+ hour weeks since early October. My typical PbP time is my lunch hour... which I haven't been taking very often.

That said: I very much would like to keep playing, but I can't commit to daily posts right now. If you would rather have a player who can post daily, I understand, and I can bow out until my schedule returns to normal.

Theodric, I'm glad that you're still enjoying the game. I admit I've been a little worried that our pace hasn't been enjoyable for you given how busy you've been of late and how much you usually have to catch up on at a given time.

Normally I would prefer to have everyone able to post at least once a day. But given that we have a couple of others who sometimes lose a few days here and there due to RL (Sylvak works and has grad school, a couple of us do shift work and/or are on call for work, etc.) I'm inclined to be more lenient on that for the moment. So...as long as the rest of the group is cool with you continuing and just being botted here and there as needed, then I'm cool with it.

My PbP plate has been more packed than normal the past several months due to PbP Gameday (don't try to run 6 games at once kids, even if they're just PFS scenarios rather than modules or AP volumes) but things are about to lighten considerably as several of my GMed games are wrapping up and I've also got a few not-PFS player games that appear to be coming to an end as well. This will give me more time to focus on this group and my other long-term PFS group. As of right now I'm also not planning to start any new games as a GM during the holidays so that'll also give me more time to focus on you guys.

So we'll wrap up School of Spirits, get a replacement player for ShieldBug, and go from there. I might also revisit some of the proposed scenarios given that ShieldBug was the main person that wanted to see the Worldwound. Sound like a plan? :)

I don't mind the Worldwound, either. I'm more interested in anything involving the planes for Zithembe.

Okay folks, aside from any back-posting you'd like to add we're officially done with School of Spirits! I'll get the game reported tonight and hopefully have your chronicles all or mostly complete by morning. Since I'll be out of town Monday through Wednesday and then jump right back into working Thursday night we'll tentatively look to get started on our next scenario hopefully by Sunday the 18th, depending on what everyone else has going on and how quickly I lock in a replacement for ShieldBug.

Feel free to use our downtime to make any purchases you might wish to make, level up if any of you level with the completion of this scenario, or engage in shenanigans in the Gameplay thread~

As always, also feel free to offer any comments, critiques, or questions you might have about the scenario here, via PM, or even email if you like. I hope everyone enjoyed the experience - and good job on talking your way through the whole thing without fighting! Except for the thug encounter of course but those guys were jerks and they started it anyway ;)

By the way, if you didn't roll your Day Job back when we started this scenario please go ahead and roll it now. Also, if there's anything special you want me to note on your chronicle (Star Replays, etc.) then let me know that as well. Finally, if any of you have anything you want to try and check off of your Faction Journal cards lay it on me and I'll tell you if it's applicable or not~

Oh and Hepsubia! I need an email address for the organizers to send your boon to :)

Done, Lady L, you got a MP

Thanks GM Ladile! :D

Whenever you get the chance, would you mark Kiango as inactive please?

You've GMed for Rumble in Core before, but our game together will put him into regular campaign status. He has also been rebuilt from ranger into a warpriest since then.

Zithembe is still on Slow track.

Dayjob: Perform (oratory): 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (13) + 8 = 21

While Zithembe's philosophy is more laissez faire, I suppose he could accidentally recruit her to the Dark Archive by providing her with enough information...

...and I don't know how often recruitable named NPC spellcasters show up.

Diplomacy DC 17: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (16) + 8 = 24

Hah! That'll definitely work. Do you want me to note that on your chronicle somewhere Zithembe or...?

Only if you want to. He's only likely to complete Faction tasks during your campaign, anyhow. :)

I track the scenarios where the goal was met on my physical Faction card.

Okay guys, I think I've got everyone's chronicles done but Hepsubia's (just missing a Day Job check from you). You can find them >>here<<. As always, let me know if I've made any mistakes and I'll weep uncontrollably fix it for you as quickly as I can :)

*edit* And the game has been submitted to Gameday VII reporting so you should see it show up in your sessions tab relatively soon!

*revenge of edit* Gummy B, I'm stuck with the terrible 'can't edit campaign' bug so I won't be able to mark Kiango inactive until they get it fixed :\

I got an invite by GM Ladile to come take a look and see if this was a group I would be interested in joining. I love the idea of a long term kind of setup. I currently play in a slow moving but good group for a Core Character and find it's a lot better to have continuity like that. I'm definitely intrigued, is everyone at lvl 1.2? If you all want me, what is the current group makeup?

Hi Pete H. :)

My unoptimized Medium, a Witch (maybe hexcrafter), Warpriest, a Rogue, and a Cleric.

We lost our paladin.

I started a 2nd and am Slow tracking to let the others catch up.

EDIT: I was starting to think I was the only one with that bug.

Hrmmm... so I'm thinking I'll bring this lady (4 XP) and slow track her as well until all even. If all are okay with that I'll dot into gameplay.

She is currently starting with a 2 lvl dip into Zen Archer (to not be useless at low levels) and then going the rest into Empiricist Investigator. She'll add Int to damage with her bow at lvl 3 for combat and otherwise is focused on knowing all the things.

dayjob, Profession Scribe: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (16) + 4 = 20
dayjob, Profession Scribe: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (12) + 4 = 16

notes: Breath of experience gives me +2 for any profession/knowledge, all usable untrained. My omnitool gives me +2 to all Profession/craft. Wordly trait allows me to get the best of two rolls for any untrained skill once per day.

No worries GM Ladile!

Hi Pete! Good to see you/Maria again. I was Faust in our Gallows of Madness game!

lol, active day of posting!

I'm the aforementioned witch, but I'm willing to rebuild if we need it. Right now Rumble would be our only frontliner and we have zero people with full BAB... A zen archer would add some needed dps but unless we're going to be adding someone else too I'll probably start looking at some full BAB options?

As of right now I don't have any plans to add anyone else. I didn't mind giving 7 players a try since I had enough people directly ask me if they could play but now that we've dipped down below that I'm going to cap things back at the more-standard 6 players.

*edit* And welcome Pete H.! Glad you could join us :)

Alright- it'll probably take a few days to figure out but I'll plan on rebuilding to something more melee oriented. Is there a way to change my faction if another one will fit the new build better, or am I locked into this one?

Everything is malleable until your first time playing at 2nd level, including faction :)

It won't change on the website, but nobody looks there except when they're re-issuing Chronicles. :)

She won't be a ton of damage, but shouldn't have an issue holding her own in society play. And right now she is willing to hop into melee to help set up flanks, especially for rogues.

Maria is honestly is the only PC I can really bring, unless I build a new one and work to catch up with GM credits in between sessions. But if you feel like rebuilding, I completely support that decision!

As for what you rebuild to, I usually don't worry too much about party balance unless we have 0 healing or 0 arcane or 5 bards with low damage output (6 bards would be acceptable though because that would be AMAZING).

Also, hi Faust/Blake's Tiger/Rumble Craterkin!

I do plan to multi task Hepsubia, as a Rogue and Alchemist. Perhaps Fighter or swashbuckler too.

Maria will, at some point, get significantly better at Disable Device and Perception for traps. Maybe we'll end up running both at point to double up on our chances to see dangers, but that won't be for a few levels.

On a related note, is there any sort of planned marching order or door opening procedure that the group uses at this point? Any specific battle tactics?

Does anyone have any preference what kind of melee I build? I was kind of fooling around with the idea of a tempered champion paladin of Iomedae that starts with 1 level of swashbuckler (slashing grace is PFS legal, right?)... but with Hep and now an archer we have a decent amount of Dex, but not much Str. Is everyone okay with a paladin or do we want to keep a little more moral flexibility? A pally brings a lot of survivability, and packs a punch against BBEGs, but I could just as easily do like a barbarian or bloodrager to really play up the Str... or maybe a divine tracker ranger for Str-based 2wf (possibly with sword&board). Thoughts?

Maria is fine with paladins, morally speaking. Most of her training comes from fighting demons in Kyonin. There were a few she battled side by side with. She also isn't big into lying or falsehoods and likes to ferret out the truth to things.

Any of the other options are more than acceptable as well.

'Play what you would like to play' is a solid mantra with few exceptions (e.g. constantly raising undead around a Pharasman).

I was thinking the other day that what we're missing is a ranger. With our druid swapping out for a warpriest, we could use the Survival, Perception, Knowledge (nature) niche filled.

Rumble is an LG worshiper Torag, he has no problem with a paladin. A TWF Ranger would be a fun person to hit the frontlines with IMO. Rumble will have some tankiness to him and with 3/4 BAB moving and only getting one attack has a lower opportunity cost, so setting up a blender would be right up his ally!

Alright... let’s ask it the other way then... is everyone ok with someone who worships an evil god? Like if I made a LN guy who reveres/serves a LE god would that be alright?

It depends on the specific evil god. Asmodeus? No problem. One of the infernal dukes would be stretching it. Remember, Zithembe spent centuries being tortured in the lower planes.

I was considering possibly Achaekek, focusing more on “divine punishment” than assassins/assassination...

That wouldn't bother him.

Player knowledge: AFAIK, the evil part of Achaekek is the assassinations. I don't see a LN follower who is focused on the punishment aspect (which would presumably be when it was earned, based on my understanding of this deity) being at odds with a LG worshiper of Torag. I also don't see Torag shying away from rightfully earned punishment. I get the "school of hard knocks" vibe from his entries, AND he has explicit disagreement with Sarenrae's forgiveness (viewed as a sign of weakness).

Rumble's knowledge: He doesn't know why you worship a praying mantis (it is waaaay more squishable than anvil and can't withstand the heat of the forge), but as long as you don't do any evil s%#@ or somehow become an enemy to the dwarven race, he probably isn't going to have any beef with you.

EDIT: On the topic of scenario selection, if there is room for any of the Dwarven citadel scenarios, Rumble would dig that (BUT PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE LADILE, DON'T REINVENT THE WHEEL TO ACCOMMODATE THIS! You do so much work already!).

Checking in briefly before calling it a night:

I'm fine with LN followers of evil deities as long as everyone else is okay with it. I'm interested to see just what you have in mind with Achaekek, Sylvak!

Regarding scenarios I'll repost the tentative outline that I initially came up with, partially for Maria's benefit - if you have played any of the following please let me know!

A lot of the above outline is a mixture of fielding requests (general and specific) with a smattering of scenarios that I would personally be especially interested in running. The primary requests when we first started were:

Planar scenarios (Zithembe)
Mwangi scenarios (Kiango, switching to Rumble)
Worldwound scenarios (Tupp, former player)

Since Tupp has bowed out and Gummy switched to Rumble (and has a new general request) I'll probably look to switch some of the original scenario ideas out for others. So...you guys might be globetrotting a little more in Version 2 but we'll make it work :)

Maria in general is all about knowledge and creation (she dabbles deeply in alchemy at the moment). Thus, she follows a lesser known deity shown to her by the gnomes called Brigh. She also has a very soft spot for Calistria, as many of her friends are devout worshipers and her magic items are crafted by Calistrian clerics.

Achaekek does not appear to conflict with her beliefs, though of course any evil actions would always be under scrutiny if made by any pathfinder. But hey, she put up with a dude that summoned his dead brother as a skeleton so... her morals aren't heavenly!

Also, I changed my avatar. I don't think I could look at sad sad elf lady for 12 levels... and I've finally started nailing down a bit more about her character, this one is fitting a little bit more.

I've done a few Mwangi adventures with another character

Mist of Mwangi
Before the Dawn, Part 1 (2-01)
Before the Dawn, Part 2 (2-02)
Scions of the sky key
Beyond Azlant Ridge
Champions chalice (8-18)

Havent got my chronicle yet, is that normal Lady L?

I'm out of town without my laptop; I'll get yours posted Wednesday once I'm home.

No problem, I can wait. Just checking in case of problems

Hey now, Dumont was a valuable asset to the team, skeletal brother or not! ;)

Dumont saved you guys' bacon so many times...

Pshaw, Maria would have dodged (aka soaked and then used up all the healing in the group) those traps just fine!

I'll take a look at the scenarios, but only a few pop out to me and I've got a plan for at least one of them.

So, I think I'm done updating/rebuilding... LL, if you could look it over and make sure its alright I'll get ready to post in gameplay with him. As you'll probably notice from his background, I'm planning on RPing the change instead of pretending he was always this way...

I'm guessing you're going for the saw-toothed sabers, but take a look at the Sword and Shield ranger style.

I actually started out looking at the sword and shield style, thinking about making a sword and board Iomedaean, but decided to go the sawtooth sabre route instead when the character started to coalesce.