GM Lari's Iron Gods

Game Master Dhenn

We've all had terrible weeks, bro. No worries. (Mine was the week before)

A few points of business:
Serithal/Serithiel: You've been spelling your character's name differently than the alias is spelled. Is that intentional (perhaps due to forum availability)? I'll try to spell it the way you prefer.

Ray's Android-ness Letting that out of the bag is my bad. While the fluff talks about Androids as virtually indistinguishable from humans, the art tends to play up their artificiality ("virtually indistinguishable from humans" doesn't make for a very interesting picture, after all). As there haven't really been any consequences to that reveal, I'm happy to retcon that moment if you like.

Notes: Notetaking might be less important in a PBP format, as you can just read old posts, but I'm adding an editable text document for you to share, if you wish.

Loot/Shopping: I've also added a spreadsheet to track party income/expenditures. It's pretty bare bones at the moment, so if people have better tracking methods, feel free to overhaul it or share alternative versions. How you want to handle distribution is up to you. At the Hell's Rebels table I'm playing in, every time we sell stuff, a portion goes into a communal fund, then everyone gets a "paycheck" out of the remainder.

On the topic of the first 300 to spend in general: More than one wand might be a good idea, though six does seem excessive. I've added two partially charged wands to the expenses sheet to get it started. Feel free to adjust the number of charges as you see fit. At the moment, Selkania is the only one who can use CLW wands natively, and Viv is the only one with UMD trained. Serithial will be able to use them once you start to add Bard levels.

Living Expenses: Val will let you stay at the Foundry free of charge, and let you help yourselves to the food there. Unfortunately, there aren't guest rooms there, so you'd be in sleeping bags/cots on the floor. This is basically equivalent to a Poor cost of living (CRB p 405). There aren't significant mechanical consequences, but if you'd like more comfort, you can pay for the difference (7 gp to upgrade to Average accommodations, etc.), moving to one of Torch's other residential options.

Autocorrect from ages long past. To make it easy, just call him Seri.

-Posted with Wayfinder

Autocorrect from ages long past. To make it easy, just call him Seri.

when in doubt, always assume more vowels in chat names!

Nah, no need to retcon anything about Ray's android origins.

I've been watching Ninjago with my little one and the whole story arc where Zane is just an awkward guy and eventually found out to be something else kind of had me noodling on just playing him as awkward socially. Presumably nobody would question his nature, especially with the strange grippli around since Ray might even be seen as the second-least awkward socially in the group. I was originally considering his true origins would wait until he had to nanite surge, which is when previously hidden tattoos would flare up to reveal his possible origins. I've purposely not described any tattoos - my thoughts were Ray's were on his neck and arms, both of which are covered by his cowl/robe sleeves at this stage. Then, the cinematic reveal as it all blew back at a crucial time.

For everyone else's understanding to help better position roleplay in the future... Ray's a bladebound magus as well, so his sword is essentially coaching him to act more naturally (although it doesn't develop into a full blade until 3rd level). So when you see Ray at this stage tilting to head, he's listening to whispers from his bundle and he's stumbling through revising his in-progress statement to be more slang or friendly versus objective. I'm not sure how this will develop as I get more comfortable playing Ray and kind of figure him out more, but as I explained to Lair... think of Ray's sword as John Connor coaching the T-800 how to "fit in" better.

At any rate, we can assume somewhere in the trip, Ray's android origins came up and he reluctantly revealed them and asked everyone if they could keep it on the down-low since androids are hunted as a technology source. I had in mind a bit of comic relief here as Ray requested it to be kept on the "down low", tilted his head and then asked everyone how the proximity of knowledge to the world's surface would actually help (aka sword-coaching).

TLDR: No need for retcon. Let's just play it forward.

Sorry that your plans got foiled, Ray D: Playing it forward will give us new opportunities to go in new directions, but I know how disappointing it is to have your best-laid-plans for a character go awry.

As a side note, I wouldn't necessarily characterize Doctor N as "awkward," at least with what I'm going for. She is perfectly aware that her behavior comes off as weird, but she just doesn't care. She can act more socially proficient, but she just usually chooses not to because she doesn't see the point. She may sometimes even exaggerate her "weirdness" to put people off-guard or to just get humorous reactions from people.

If it's any help, every time I read a Dr. N post, I feel the urge to place ME2...

Awesome! I'm doing a good job then!

Mordin is the coolest thing ever :3

Gear check. I figure OOC is best to do this otherwise we'd spend a week roleplaying it.

Ray has 50ft silk rope. Not much else for exploring caves.

We'd probably want other basics. Clearly rations. Maybe a way to make fire. Pitons perhaps. A crowbar for these doors.

Good call.

I have a flint & steel, mundane torches, and 5 days of rations. I'll buy a crowbar.

Who has the second wand?

Selkania has a silk rope of 50ft. and 5 days of trail rations.

Viv should probably have the second wand since she can at least try to UMD it (at a +8).

I'm already carrying a CLW potion (pour in throat if needed), ink and inkpen as well as some parchment, and four days' worth of rations and waterskin. I can also cast light.

im actually reasonably well equpped: climbing gear, grappling hook, 2X silk rope, hooded lantern & oil...

bring it

Doctor N doesnt have much in the way of practical adventuring gear stuff. Ear plugs are always nice (3 copper pieces per pair). She has a climb speed, so she has climbing taken care of for herself at least. She does also have light prepared. If we are each paying for three charges on a wand, we have 5 gp left each to spend. I'm fine with pooling mine together for anything.

Oh, also, I should mention that I'm leaving town for a convention tomorrow morning, and I wont be back home until late Sunday night. I might be able to do a quick post in the in-between times, but otherwise assume I am incomunicado.

For others benefits as well...

Ah, that reminds me. I think someone mentioned before that we could get a scroll of air bubble, which would be very useful for me to be able to use my gun. I can take some of my money towards the wand, so I can only contribute 1 wand charge then

Just throwing a shout out GM. Finding the right grove for "fast forwarding" and replacing stalled action with exposition at just the right rate is a tricky skill for even excellent GMs.

You've got it. Feels just right.

High praise from Dungeon Master S (who I'd also suggest has "got it"). :)

He's right, though!

Dr. N: Don't worry. While we're hopping right into combat, I'm pretty confident the party can handle this particular one. I can delay things if necessary.

Seri and Ray: Thanks!

I had a few minutes before leaving, so I was able to go ahead and do a quick combat post to keep things moving :)

Hail! I'll be mostly incommunicado from Thursday night until Sunday night. I'll be at Total Con running an unreasonable amount of games (I set a goal for myself of earning my 5th star there, and it means running 4 specials in one weekend, two of them multitable.) Bot me as needed.

Oh, Vaughn will be there too.

But since I'm a player and have far fewer time constraints, I expect to remain fairly active on the board

I will also be GMing an unreasonable amount of games at Totalcon. I'll try to pop in enough to keep combat moving.

What tiers are you running for the interactives?

Siege of Serpents I'm actually playing, Sky Key Solution will be 3-4. Plus about five other scenarios/

Good luck!

You're that local??? Do I know you Lari??!

Hope to meet in person yo!

It was a pleasure to share a real table with GM Lari at Total Con. Thanks for a great (and freaky-deaky) session!

It was also my very great pleasure to have shared DMS' (Serithial) table at which he qualified for his fifth star!! They even let my announce the achievement of Me Brudder. Very well earned, and VERY well deserved.

Congrats Seri, and good to see you and Vaughn!

Thank you very much! It's always awesome to make the real world connection.

-Posted with Wayfinder

Hey guys, I'm going to be gone from Friday afternoon to late Sunday. I'll be on a snowshoeing hiking trip in Northern Vermont, where my connectivity is spotty at best. I'm guessing I won't be posting until I get back.

I know this combat has been exhausting for everyone. I believe the way this is really supposed to play out is to have the gremlins repeatedly retreating and sneak attacking from stealth, while trying to lead you into a series of traps. I was hoping this simplified the encounter for PBP somewhat, but between these things being fairly hard to kill and the dice roller absolutely loathing you guys, it's been rough.

I do recommend desperately seeking atonement for whatever it is you did to bring this upon yourselves. Did one of you start an alignment thread?

Going forward, I've been considering adopting a system picked up from James Jacobs during the Humble Bundle streams, especially as the PFS reroll system isn't really applicable here. He gave each player three tokens which could be cashed in for re-rolls.

In exchange, I'd be able to return three expended tokens back to you in order to re-roll for an NPC. Most of you know that I'm not exactly a sadistic GM, but these would be used pretty offensively (crit confirmations, will saves, etc.). Thoughts?

I've used hero points for the last ten or so APs that I've run. Big fan. Let's the GM ramp up the difficulty and once they see HPs being used, they can tone it back.

Don't worry about the gremlins, it's exposing that at this stage, high AC enemies combined with a dice roller are a weak spot for us. I'm not banging my head against the keyboard yet.

Once thing we could each try is rolling out ~3 rounds of combat in advance if it's all going to be repetitive, especially since there's not a high danger risk given their low damage.

I'm in the same place. It's neither the GM nor the AP. Play enough Pathfinder, and eventually you'll have a rough one.

Once we get through this, I'm still totally gung-ho. I like the mix, the opportunity, the GM style, and the game.

-Posted with Wayfinder

this enemy IS frustrating, particularly for 1st level...relatively high AC, DR, and can escape magically? We need to be exceptionally lucky to actually off them. Which, currently, we are NOT. (although bad luck is a form of luck, so maybe we ARE exceptionally lucky...)

Totally agree with what everyone else has been saying. It's what I expect at low level :)

And with a RM quite high for a first level...

We don't have any cold iron weapon, that's what kill us in this fight.

I don't like hero point, but I like the token thing :) I'm for it !

Yeah, this combat is definitely teaching me its never too early to pony up a few extra gold for a cold iron weapon, melee guy or not (or a few more for silver for that matter)

As far as the 'token' system, I could see that being interesting. I've definitely seen combats where even if it results in an easy victory, the fight is less interesting due to one terrible roll by the enemy that prevents it from doing its thing. Would there ever be a recharge like once per book, or would it just be retrieved by opponents getting a new roll too?

Will be away for the week-end with a limited access only through my phone.
Don't hesitate to GM-PC my character.

I'm away for the weekend until pretty much Monday morning. I'll pick up then. If I'm a player, feel free to GMPC me. If I'm the GM, I'll be back ASAP!

Hey guys, I'm back and ready to go. That being said, This week is going to be insanely busy for me a few days.

Wednesday: Driving down to NYC to see Iron Maiden. I won't be checking the boards at ALL Wednesday until Thursday afternoon.

Weekend: Normally I'm pretty good about posting on the weekends, but I'm the chief referee for a tournament this weekend, and my tournament weekend begins right after school Friday, so I'll be off the boards Friday afternoon until Monday morning.

I'll be available only sporadically. Hitting GameOnicon in Plymouth, NH--and introducing my 2 kids to PFS. I'm hoping against hope they like it so we can go to GenCon 50th next year!!

Please bot me if necessary--but I will be checking periodically, back to "normal" Sunday PM

oh em effing gee.

I had the best weekend at GameOnicon. BOTH repeat BOTH of my children (son of 14 and daughter of 12) have been bitten by The Pathfinder Society Bug. In fact, after one session, my daughter said "I think I'd like to try GMing..."

*sniff*

and in our last session, we needed a pregen to make the table legal. I went to take it saying "I'll play it, but only if you two don't want the extra character..." and my son said "I'll do it dad. I need the practice."

*extra sniff*

This absolutely cinches it...we're going to GenCon 2017. Now if I can only get my wife to play PFS!!

:)

I'm wondering about possibly fitting in a gunslinger dip, probably base gunslinger and then perhaps retrain into techslinger later on (if that's okay). Quick clear would make me a lot more comfortable using alchemical cartridges, I get more skill points, and she has a decent wisdom for grit. It doesnt even delay my technomancer prestige class.

The main trade-off is diluting my casting progression. I'm gonna be leaning on my gun a lot early game, so it might be worth it for the early boost.

Opinions?

I am open to PFS style first level retraining if there are things people want to tweak things about their builds, though the most obvious weakness I've seen in the party so far more about your equipment than anything else. In Dr N's case, you can even call your first level the gunslinger one to get a couple extra HP if you want.

For retraining after this, I think I'll stick close to the Ult Campaign rules. Tech slinger itself isn't an issue, though finding a good chunk of time to retrain will be more feasible in some parts of the AP than others.

Oh, I was definitely thinking more ultimate campaign training for techslinger. I might make one or two tweaks if we are doing PFS style rebuilds now, but nothing major. I appreciate the offer to get the extra HP, but it would also make gunslinger my favored class. I really dont mind missing out on a few extra HP.

I figured it makes more sense to retrain into techslinger later anyways when we have become more immersed in tech.

So I'm struggling with Swashbuckler. So many of the aspects of the class are ...urban adventure. I'm still going with Bard (Archaeologist) but I'm thinking that as he unfolds, Seri is more unchained rogue than swashbuckler. It also fits the explorer motif a bit more....

I think I'm going to take the GM up on this 1st level PFS style and then UC after (I do love the Ultimate Campaign Book, and I'm VERY tempted to try to talk the GM into using their downtime :-)

Ultimate Campaign retraining is definitely good. Other systems I'd have to look into. Actually opportunities to use the rules will mainly be between books, or potentially between acts.

You've just been given an opportunity to gamble, if you feel so inclined. I'll add IC detail about how that goes if you take Garmen up on his offer, but mechanically, we're going to use quick gambling rules, as any other method will take forever via PBP, and I'm pretty sure Paizo doesn't want to be running an online poker ring.

I trust you to roll for yourselves and adjudicate things fairly.

Silverdisk Hall has all sorts of games, primarily cards but also dice, roulette, and others. As such, after you decide how much you want to put at stake, you have options as to what to roll. Profession (Gambler) is the best check, or Sleight of Hand if you want to try cheating. Otherwise, you can roll any mental ability check. Intelligence represents counting cards and other ways to game the odds, Wisdom to determine when to hold 'em and when to avoid making Kenny Rogers references, Charisma to bluff and similar.

Compare the roll to the following list of DCs: