GM Lithrac's Shattered Star (Inactive)

Game Master Cyril Corbaz

We are going to the tower to see if the Natalya is there.

? I recall agreeing to go to the tower with the tower being the place that the Tower Girls inhabited, but cannot find anything about visiting this tower. I suppose it could be vast enough that the watch and a gang can inhabit it and be very far apart, or that it could be the most expedient path, etc. No objection to being there and it makes sense to check, I just want to check if either of those aforementioned possibilities are true.

There seems to be a misunderstanding: Vandilo knows that the Tower girls have recently left their lair but you don't actually know where it is.

Since Sheila suggested you to visit the city watch (stationed at the Arvensoar - one of the only towers in Magnimar), I thought you were speaking about that one.

Ah, noted, thank you.

Just to be clear Vandilo is trying to be sneaky here by omitting the denomination of coin. I do not think its a bluff, but I'm not entirely sure. He is hoping for an unwarranted assumption.

"A word's not enuff fer ol'Fenster. Who do yew think he is? A fool? Yew'r in ta'Underbridge, berk."

Is that the Planescape Cant usage of berk, or the English cockney rhyming slang berk? Inquiring minds want to know :)

I am very sorry to have missed the last few days. I'm in the middle of my move to New York and a massive family emergency has arisen with my in-laws. I will do my best to catch up/post. 8(

The usual etiquette is to give a heads up to the DM when something arises.

Sorry to hear about the family emergency.

Remains from my Planescape background :) I think Fenster would typically fit the Hive!

No worries Morrigan, I've recently moved myself, I know how hectic it can be. I hope everything will be alright regarding your family emergency. Thanks for letting me know.

And I will be moving tomorrow and Thursday although I'm hoping to still have time to post at least once those days. Next week I'll be house shopping in Madison on Monday-Tuesday though and likely won't be able to post.

Thanks for letting us know EF.

I hope we can move forward quickly, away from Fenster! He's an interesting character, certainly very well-linked to the major themes of this campaign, but he now needs his gold! Too bad the scenario won't let him settle for less than 100gp. ;)

On another topic - regarding social encounters. I'd like to make clear that I don't want more than one social skill used per post. The social skill you're using represents the dominant stance of your character in his dealings with an NPC, thus I'd like everyone to stick to one for the length of the current message. Of course, the stance can (and often will) change over the course of the conversation. If you aren't sure what skill to use, you can simply roll a d20 and add in OOC: "+X if Diplomacy, +Y for Bluff (not sure which one is applicable here)".

There has evidently been a 3rd party product released called "Cavalier Mounts", referenced on d20pfsrd.com. They have added the "Riding Spider" to the cavalier mount list.

I am well aware that not everyone likes 3rd party products and in this case, I'm not sure why they have included this mount when the "Giant Spider" already exists.

Perhaps they are concerned that neither drow nor duergar are ever able to ride the medium giant spider? If this is the case, I don't understand why they didn't make it medium with a level 4 upgrade to large. I think the advantage to the standards, the horse, camel, dog and wolf, is that while they are vanilla, they let you ride them at 1st level.

If you are interested in enlarging the size of Chitterspite, allowing Morrigan to be mounted at 1st level, I think the following statistics are far more reasonable.

This would bring the creature more in line with the other animal companions. Please note that like the 3pp riding spider, I removed "mindless", assuming the creature can be trained if it is specifically for riding.

Naturally, just because d20pfsrd.com introduces new material does not mean you have to. If you would like to keep Morrigan on foot, and there are very good reasons for doing so, please disregard the above. 8)

Additionally, I am having to return to Florida over the next three days and will try to post although I may be held up. I remember that I was only semi-successful on the way here.

No 3rd-party book allowed, no exception.

Morrigan, I made it very clear in the recruitment post that I wouldn't allow any 3rd party product. Thanks for your understanding.

It's all good with me. I came into this with Chitter just the way she is and have no difficulty with her remaining that way. I was informing, not begging.

I really don't know why they put 3rd party stuff on d20pfsrd.com. It seems to me that it isn't really srd if it's got 3rd party stuff.

That's the reason why I'm using Archives of Nethys over PFSRD. Only paizo-published material there!

Going to keep the mount mindless, or give it some int when it gets a stat point? (Intelligence is nice... at least it can take feats then!)

It's obvious the googledocs plan has been moved by someone, dark areas have been peeked. Don't do that or I'll make it editable only by myself.

Bad someone! Bad!

I'm supposed to be the naughty one here.

As to the mount, I think I'm going to have to give it the Int point. If I don't, it can only learn one trick and I will have to always actively Handle Animal to get it to do anything, probably even ride the thing.

I think Paizo kind of dropped the ball on vermin and don't really understand why they separated them out from animals. I also don't understand why Spiders and Scorpions are so different as animal companions.

It's like someone made a typo somewhere down the line. Everything that drow usually do with spiders is not doable with spiders, but is with scorpions, a creature the stories rarely use for mounts, trained beasts, etc. I keep kind of expecting Paizo to address the issue, but they have passed up 4-5 good opportunities to do so. (Drow of Golarion, Animal Companion, Second Darkness)

It's a little thing however. I'm simply roleplaying it as Morrigan training a baby spider into a mount. This way it will be much more dramatic when she finally mounts up at 4th level.

Wouldn't the lack of tricks be at least somewhat trumped by the rules for cavaliers that say:

The mount is always considered combat trained and begins play with Light Armor Proficiency as a bonus feat. A cavalier's mount does not gain the share spells special ability.

(Emphasis mine)

Alright, changed maps to be editable only by me. You can still make comments to designate the target of your spell/attack though, but you'll need to tell me your movements with cardinal directions (N, SW, etc.)

That seems a real shame, I've certainly had the same thought in my own games. I know occasionally when I go to move my token I have sort ended up moving the big map by accident and had to undo to get it back - did not happen to me in this case BTW. It seems far more likely that something like that occurred anyone actively cheating could surely have put things back with the undo command.

I find declaring direction very irritating and always seem to experience problems for myself and others when its in place. I think this is a case of eliminating a pretty minor problem by introducing a much larger and much more irksome one.

Please consider either editing the maps outside of docs so the dark areas cannot be opened, making the maps of the immediate area only, or not placing monsters on beforehand.

Wow, Lithrac, any ability to see who's doing that? That's just horrible.

It is a shame, and it's the first time I have had to do that because the peeking was that obvious (the dark areas changed places multiple times, suggesting more than one person was involved). I'll keep this up for this map until the end of it, and may revert to the "usual" system for the next map. As I've mentioned earlier, this system works on a trust basis, but if peeking happens anyway, then I might have to change the way I handle maps. I expect people to show a fair amount of fair play, and it's sad that it has come to this tbh.

It's honestly hard to imagine why anyone would bother. It's easy enough to go find the AP and just look at the maps there if that's what you want.

I'm going to assume it was an accident, no matter how unlikely that may be. I don't like thinking badly of people, especially when I don't know who to think badly of. I find it more comforting to feign ignorance.

PS: I don't find cardinal directions to be difficult at all so I'm ambivalent to keeping the map editable only by you. As peeking bothers you, it's probably best that you do it and damn the consequences. After all, one person is working here and the rest are playing.

I believe the goblins are up? Vandilo loaded a crossbow as his surprise action...

... or not placing monsters on beforehand.

How did you know they were placed beforehand? It's the first time I've actually done it. It's also the last time, which is a shame because when I need to setup a map, it's not always when I have a lot of time to do so (something that has to do with having a two month-old son at home I believe ;) ), so preparing ahead of time is handy.

It's honestly hard to imagine why anyone would bother. It's easy enough to go find the AP and just look at the maps there if that's what you want.

Yes, I also find this hard to understand. Yet the zones were moved, and not put back correctly. A shame, really.

By the way, if anyone accidentally moves the map, they can always hit the "undo" button in googledocs.

Anyway, the case's closed for now. We'll continue with the cardinal directions (which aren't such a bad thing anyway) for now and we'll see how it goes.

The only difference I could see after your complaint was the goblins, and nothing else is going to be a real issue. I hope its clear I do know how to use the undo button. I also own the AP so if I wanted to cheat I could do so perfectly well with the current less useful map.

I think it far more likely that someone "nudged" the map and did not notice. Were the black all moved in the same direction, approximately the same amount?

I think it far more likely that someone "nudged" the map and did not notice. Were the black all moved in the same direction, approximately the same amount?

Yep, super easy to do. I wish there was better layer management in google drawing - I.E. lock specific layers. Get what you pay for ;)

There are of course solutions that would be client based instead of server based; I've had great luck with maptools. But of course those tools have totally different scheduling, pacing and technical challenges.

I'm not accusing anyone, Vandilo, I'm pointing a behavior that I desire not to see at my table. If it was a mistake it was probably an honest mistake, but no one said he did it. That being said, the zones were very different than what I had laid out (and not merely moved in the same direction), so it spells out the intention.

Of course, making some elements lockable would be ideal, but sadly googledocs doesn't allow that for drawings.

Anyway as I said, case is closed. The point was not to find the culprit, but to make clear that I don't like that behavior.

Hmmm, I thought I had put my character sheet in my profile, although I didn't do it the way Vandilo did. I will use his as a template. Is that HeroLab that you are using to get that nice printout? I use Scourceforge because it's free and I don't think it does nice blocks like that.

It'll take me a bit to get it exactly in that format, but I'll get on it now.

Most folks use Heroforge. If you use PCGen (free), I made a template for printing out to paizo messageboards - has few bugs but generally reliable.

Yeah, that's what I use. It doesn't put it in that nice format. I just did it by hand. Bleh. 8)

Nevermind, looks like you found an output option.

Yes I use Herolab, but as long as its readable anything works.

If this was Monty Python, someone should be wielding a banana.

Or a trout.

I've got a herring, but that's only for cutting down trees.

After finding another shrubbery, of course.

A nice shrubbery.

You're just looking for a nice layered effect.

With a path in the middle.

Will someone in the party be picking up the small heavy crossbows to sell later, or stuff we come across in general? Telka kind of has trouble with the whole "loot" concept, so it won't be her...

For the moment I would assume we do it on our way out.

Hah, Telka's player has learned the hard way not to do that. Gotta pay for that raise dead somehow...

We should search them, just in case anyone's got anything more useful than a crossbow -- but either way we should pick 'em up to be sure noone else does.

They just have a (medium-sized!) heavy crossbow and a small-sized, refuse-covered leather armor each (as well as some bolts).

By the way, did you see last month's releases, Zel? There's the Harrow Handbook. I've just started skimming through it, it's pretty good so far, though there aren't many things for a cleric, unfortunately. I'll keep a close eye on it and tell you if any findings could be worth it for your character.

Not a subscriber.. But I did see it and thought I might pick it up - I do get the Blessing of thr Harrow ability instead of one of my L8 domain powers - so it seemed relevant ... And I was thinking there might be useful feats or a PrC (one where my archetype doesn't overlap so strongly, like I would with Harrower)

I am seriously tempted by that book, is there much actual practical divination? Planning to take the trait that gives you an heirloom harrow deck and +1 CL to divination spells cannot recall its name off the top of my head.

Sorry to spring this on people so late, but...

I just got a call from the nice people who's cottage I'll be renting over the next 2 weeks informing me that the internet connection to the place is currently flaked out.

Originally, I'd not mentionned the upcoming absence because I thought I'd be able to get on once per day (but later, after the country air causes the wife to get all sleepy), but now I'm not so sure what my connectivity will be like.... and it may depend on whether or not there's decent cell service out there.

Anyhow, bottom line: I will not be able to post reliably from Sunday (the 8) until Sunday the 22nd. Again, I apologize for springing this on people, but it's a somewhat unexpected turn of events. Please feel free to DMPC 'Tyieli as needed -- but try not to get him killed. He's the only cleric you've got. :)