GM Lil"Eschie Second Darkness- or L.S.D (Inactive)

Game Master Escharid Blackrose

just to give you a head up, I'll be on vacation for the two first weeks of August, without my computer, so I won't be active.

Sorry game, I thought I had posted up a notice that I was going to be out of pocket for the next few days. I'll catch up here, and do my best to post something this afternoon or tomorrow morning. I'm sure we can get into trouble all the boss is out of town having fun!

I'll soon be myself on vacation and unable to post for two weeks, so that's no great deal, Hal.

Yay! Eschie's back.

*Gives Eschie a welcome back lap dance*

*enjoys the show*.

@Cameron: to answer your question on background skills: I'll allow them

Background Skills

At every level, all PCs gain an additional 2 skill points to spend on background skills. You may spend regular skill points on background skills if you want, but you may not spend background skill points on adventuring skills.

Background skill list you can select:

Appraise *
Artistry [-new skill-]
Craft
Handle Animal *
Knowledge (engineering)
Knowledge (geography)
Knowledge (history)
Knowledge (nobility)
Linguistics*
Lore [-new skill-]
Perform
Profession
Sleight of Hand

All other skills are adventuring skills.

[Note that the Knowledge skills that allow you to know stuff about monsters in combat are adventuring skills.]

Lore is a class skill for all characters.
Artistry is a class skill for any character with Craft or Perform as a class skill.

Artistry (Int)
You are skilled in the creative arts. Like Perform or Craft, Artistry is a number of separate skills. You may have multiple Artistry skills, each with their own ranks. Artistry represents creating works of art that are not necessarily tangible objects. Common Artistry skills are choreography, criticism, literature (including poetry), music composition, philosophy, and playwriting.

Lore (Int); Trained Only
You have specialized knowledge about a specific topic. Your knowledge is generally much narrower than that of a sage of scholar. Like Artistry, Lore is a catchall skill. You may know Lore about several topics, each with its own ranks. Lore may be about a region (such as a town or forest), a narrow discipline (such as riddles, owlbears, or metallurgy), or a kind of person (such as famous musicians, Chelish naval officers, or Shoanti chieftains). Whenever your topic comes up, you may substitute a Lore check for a more general Knowledge check.

Houserules:( we can discuss these, of course!)

Appraise/Handle animal: are restricted to a general category as for example Appraise-gems and jewellery, Appraise-arms and armor, Handle animal-farm animals, handle animals-birds of prey and so on.

Linguistics: can be used to get an additional language

Perform/Sleight of Hand: IMO, these two skills are too linked to specific character classes (Bard and Rogue) to be allowed as Background skills.

Converting Existing Characters
Converting existing characters is easy. PCs gain 2 background skill ranks per character level, and can spend those on background skills as usual. PCs that already spent ranks on what are now background skills can trade the new points for points already spent, freeing conveyed ranks to spend on adventuring skills if desired.

If you select Background skills, please put them in a separate list from your "regular" skills

Nice!

I understand slight of hand being excluded as it is a very specialized skill that is very strongly linked to rogues and , to a lesser extent, bards. There are also few "legal" ways to make a living with it.

Perform, on the other hand, is not something exclusive to bards, though it is a major part of their mechanics. Not all performers are bards, nor should they be, certain religions make sense that it should be a class skill for their clerics (Shelyn for example) and it is a way for charismatic individuals to make money legally. It is also easy to make it a class skill via traits, at least three non-campaign ones can make it a class skill iirc.

Ultimately your decision Eschie, just felt I should throw my two cents worth in on the topic.

What i was thinking was to use Artistry as a toned down Perform.

You fancy yourself a good singer under the shower? Artistry
You are able to sing for an audience, have a wide range of knowledge of songs? Perform

You can make a few words rhyme for Mom's day? Artistry
You're a great poet, able to recite verses all day? Perform

You can draw a good portrait, and not just a stick figure? Artistry
You're last work was the Sixtine chapel? Perform.

You get the idea....

It's the same idea about Appraise, Handle animal and Linguistics, giving a little knowledge and some practise, but not a speciality,as Lore is to Knowledge

You can know your stuff enough to make a living out of it (as Craft and Profession are Background skills) but you're not an expert

Fair enough I suppose, I think the only other thing of note is that performance really doesn't have a lot of uses outside of bardic performance and making money.

Ultimately you're the gm so it's up to you, just felt I should point those various things out to you. I'll get mine added after work.

Thanks! I wanted Cameron to have profession:gambler as a skill to round out his character. Of course that means he can't have heal or diplomacy...

He also has oratory but that's sortof needed for sermonic performance: countersong. Actually I can't imagine him actually using that over inspire :)

Anyway I'll take a closer look at this tonight.

Countersong can be a lifesaver. I have a PbP Bard that saved the party from a TPK ;)

I've played several bards and have never used it.

<--- Cameron's PbB bard.

There, got my background skills done.

One info I doesn't know: does the class skill bonus apply to background skill?

I mean, Know-Engineering isn't a Fighter class skill. If he chooses Know-Engineering as a background skill, does he get the +3 bonus he wouldn't have if he took the skill "normally"?

as for Perform, I can let it in the background skills

Does my proposition for Appraisal/Handle Animal-having a cloe field of expertise-sounds logical to you?
Because it could be boring to keep track of a generalist Appraise in "adventuring" skills and a specific Appraise-Clothes as a "background" skill

Nope, background skill aren't automatically class skills except for artistry and lore.

I'm pretty sure it doesn't become a class skill, it's just a free couple of points to spend. To make it a CS, we'd have to grab an associated trait or something similar.

Dolgrin will put one point into Knowledge (history) and perhaps Lore (dwarvish enemies through history), if that is a thing, which fits with his Lorekeeper race trait. Or something else related to his Socuting for Fiends or Scholar of the Great Beyond, if I can think of something that fits.

If anyone has the Researching the Blot trait, maybe you can take Lore (Blot).

A rank in each Linguistics and Know-Geography :) Makes sense for a well travelled sailor to be...well, travelled.

And I think if it would *normally* be a class skill it is still a Class Skill (so a Fighter would get the +3 to Know-Engineering). Also, Lore is *always* a class skill :)

Tweaked the background skills slightly, particularly since I realized that I somehow had one to many skill points included (not sure how). Did we have 1 extra point at the beginning?

No extra point... What is your favorite class bonus, Nessa?

Sorcerer.

I think what it was is I had an error is my ability scores at some point that resulted in a 12 int and, upon catching it, forgot to correct the skills. Should be good now.

Sorry, my question was : did you choose an extra HP or an extra skill point as your favorite class bonus? Or another kind of Tiefling racial bonus?

Ah, skill point, hence my hp bonus of 0, otherwise I'd have only two skill points per level. That -2 int for demonborn kinda sucks sometimes.

Hey gang. I hate to say it but I'm really struggling to keep up on this thread. The game is awesome and I love Hal. He's a really challenging character personality (and I got to incorporate my RL ridgey into the game too). The team is great too with some really unique character concepts! But between the 3 RL & Roll20 games I'm running, a podcast and video editing (not to mention the day job going 10 hrs per day latley) I'm going to have to step away for the time being. Please feel free to bot Hal'dorel and Inceku, I'll leave his character profile alone so you can know his stats.

Good luck, everyone!

Awww, that's sad. I liked Hal too.

Alayna barely knows him, but feels she can trust him... he is always honest in his disdain for the swill he's swimming in ;)

Sorry you're leaving Hal, good reasons though. I'll miss trying to win you over.

Yeah it's a shame, Hal was one of the most memorable characters I've encountered so far on a PbP.

I'll will put Hal aside, so you can maybe come back later if you want/can

Will post tthis afternoon in the RP section.
Meanwhile, what kind of character do you feel you need to complete your team, now that Hal will be gone? Another ranged character? Arcane? Divine?

A consistent poster!

In all seriousness, any character that has a vested interest in the story. :)

What she said.

+1. Oh and I value an interesting character over everything else.

Found a really good picture of what I think Nessa looks like and added it to the bottom of my alias. For those interested for a shortcut though here is Nessa.

Just a note:
I am getting ready to leave the Army after 20 years; I will be moving around a lot and may have limited access to the internet. My new job will require a lot of travel too, but not to super remote areas. I will let you know if I need to drop off for a while. I plan on keeping up with this game!

*Blushes at your interest for this game*

Does Cameron know there is somebody asking for him?

yes.

Sooooo, what happens when your entire department abandons their jobs at the same time? I'm the one left holding the bag, answering phones all day! :-D

I'm determined to make this work+game+school life work!!!!

/rant

Do you have a preference among the potential new recruits?

From an RP point of view, I am kind of intrigued by the prospect of Nessa eyeing up a paladin as a conquest.

Hello everyone, and thanks again for picking me. I'll be your next companion from now on, and I'm very glad to have the opportunity to join your party.
@DM: Is there something you think should be fixed in Izkrael's background? Just let me know how and when I can join the party and I'll post in the gameplay thread.

I'll get you into the group by the next two days, Izkrael. I'll have to re-read your background, but nothing strange springs to mind right now.

I'll get you into the group by the next two days, Izkrael. I'll have to re-read your background, but nothing strange springs to mind right now.

Ok, I'm fine with that. In the meanwhile I will read the gameplay thread to acclimatize myself to the campaign.

Just one thing I'm noticing on your melee damage: you got a 1d10+3 dmg with your elven blade and a 1d4+2 with dagger. Is there a reason for the 1 point difference?

No problem with the drawback or additional Trait

Two-handed for curve blade = 1.5 x str instead of 1 x str.

Thankies Nessa. :-)

As Nessa said ;)

Sorry, i'm starting a new job (started today, in fact), and things are bumpy, as always in theses conditions

Will post tomorrow, probably.

Giving Eschie a chance to reply before I post again. I also want to ask this since it looks like it might come up. I know most gm's and players don't want to deal with PVP issues, I don't care for them much myself. It is starting to look more and more that Nessa and Alayna may be heading in that direction because of Sylee.

I want to bring this up now, and I don't want it to come across as a threat, it's not meant that way, but due to Nessa's character it needs to be brought up now. If Alayna manages to steal Sylee away and send her somewhere else, and Nessa finds out it was her, one of us will end up dead because either Alayna will have to kill Nessa, or Nessa will keep coming until she succeeds in killing Alayna for it. The only end to this besides death would be Alayna aiding in getting Sylee back somehow. I'll work on finding a different way to resolve it if this all happens, but I can't promise I will.

Also, when it comes to the "selling sex" in the casino, I want to make sure it is clear what Nessa was describing in case it was misunderstood. She's not trying to set the place up as a brothel, she's trying to avoid that. She knows these men are Calistrians like herself and she's trying to prevent them from using the business as a brothel, to keep such liaison's outside of the place. I don't know, Alayna, if that's how you read it or not, or if it really changes anything. I couldn't tell if you were going off of how Alayna would act to all of this or if your reactioon was because of misunderstanding what she meant/said.

Alayna's concern is the environment that Sylee is being brought up in. A den of inequity :) Even if there is no actual cash-for-sex happening, the *implication* is there. As Sylee is as young as she is, and has had little to no adult mentoring, Alayna doesn't think that the Goblin in general and in the presence of strippers specifically is a good place to rear a child. And, would a child understand the difference? She is already directly emulating the succubi working in the goblin. Alos, with the types of threats we are facing (venomous snakes in the larder!) it is patently unsafe for a child.

Our characters have had a dialogue and Nessa dismissed Alayna's concerns out of hand. I say this because Nessa explained exactly what the Chippendale's boys were going to be doing for the Goblin.

As to PvP, and yes, it's on the horizon (Alyana's sympathy for Sylee will override any passing loyalty to a new crew...), I would have Alayna jump ship earlier rather than spoil a game and group with PvP. Personally, I hate it, and it never comes to any good :) Nessa has a more vested interest in the story thus far (Alayna after all is just hired help :) )