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Ralph isn't going to kill him if he can be captured and held. The fact remains however that the more time we waste on this guy, the more Geatan is having to handle the armory situation on his own.
Funny thing is that as a player, I'm thinking that Ralph and Red Raven actually have alot in common. Both appear to be proud, stubborn anti-heroes. My guess is that Red Raven was duped into killing Adril Hestram, and that in the default plotline we're supposed to kill Red Raven at around the 75% mark of the scenario only to find out at the end that he was tragically duped, ending the scenario with a "Requiem for Red Raven".
So by capturing Red Raven alive, we're either forcing an early plot-mandated death for him, or we're driving the plot into a huge sand-box that GM Mars will need to work with. But hey, it's more fun that way, right? :)
Question about concealement. (always confused about it.) If i am just in the least 5x5 fog. And there one just outside. What is his status?
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If we have their leader we have some leverage. My only worry is that Cale is the leader instead of Red Raven. RR seems less crazy than Cale, so maybe we can talk to him. If Cale is the leader and has abandoned Red Raven, we may have something to work with on.
First I want to make sure RR hears that Cale and his men were attacking unarmed servants and getting ready to kill them "for the rrrrrevolllllluuuuution". Then I will ask him some questions and decide whether or not to suppress the domination so he can express his views.
So the plan is:
1. We heal up and recover Eliza and Osprey. I will leave recovery to Geatan while I show RR what Cale and his men did.
2. If they are still alive, we can hold a conference with Eliza and Osprey, and get answers out of the dominated RR.
3. I decide whether to suppress the domination and let RR speak freely.
4. We make further plans.
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I'm undecided on who is the leader, but I think Cale is either the main villain or one of the major villains in this story arc. We will need to deal with him, at least to get the sword back.
Ok guys, I will be altering RR's memory to erase the arguments that made him hate Ralph, but one thing Ralph is not good at is diplomacy. That's why he usually keeps a paladin by his side (Lavode you know him as 'Mister +30 diplomacy' Exiel).
The question now is who amongst us is actually good at diplomacy?
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Ok guys here is what I am thinking of changing RR's memory to. What do you guys think? Since this is a pbp, I can take my time to discuss this with you guys out-of-character. :)
"Get rid of these annoyances, but try not to kill them if you can."
Ralph: "Stop! You will answer for what you have done in attacking this lodge and its inhabitants, as well as murdering Adril Hestram in cold blood!"
Raven: "Hold on a second. I’m just enacting justice for one of the most prominent murders in recent history! You’re not only defending a convicted murderer, you spent the past 20 minutes singing his praises, and you summoned a demon. I’m definitely on the right side here. There’s no way I can trust you!"
Ralph: "A demon that's capable of making them run so I don't need to make him kill them, idiot! Hmmph. You make an audacious charge indeed, and I'd question who it was that convicted Hestram. By the way, I barely mentioned the oaf in my speech, so I wonder how you can think I was singing his praises. Nonetheless, you are coming with us and that's final! Koraq, take him!" (Cue dispel magic)
All real dialogue and events concerning Ralph and Koraq forgotten, and instead RR's memory is changed to him actually escaping Koraq's grasp momentarily.
Ralph calls out "You're not getting away!" and casts enervation. RR feels himself weakening and Koraq grabs him again.
All real dialogue and events concerning Ralph and Koraq forgotten, and instead RR's memory is changed to him actually escaping Koraq's grasp momentarily yet again despite being weakened by the enervation.
Ralph calls out "If we cannot hold your body, then I'll just need to hold your mind" and begins casting dominate person. Koraq grabs him yet again, they struggle, and just as he almost escapes again, Ralph dominates him.
"You have only yourself to blame for this. Now you will stand before a council of our senior members and answer for your actions."
The dominated RR is forced to cooperate as Koraq ties him up, which melds into his real memories from round 9 onwards.
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By the way, GM, as a player I think Red Raven's fears about Ralph from (which he should no longer remember) are actually well-founded. The character that Ralph's character is modeled after eventually turned from neutral to evil and even became THE evil god of the dragonlance world, but his brother obtained a time-traveling device in the past, went to the future and saw the results of his brother's ascension and then went back in time and... spoilers. I highly recommend the series. It's a great read.
In Ralph's case, the fact that he has access to such a wide array of spells including modify memory (normally a bard spell) makes him an incredibly powerful and dangerous person. I'm just saying that as a player, I completely understand where Red Raven is coming from. And his reaction means I'm doing a good job of playing Ralph's character as intended. :)
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I have read the dragonlance serie till the return of takasis after the fall of chaos.
You are happy that Géatan hasn't read them.
-Posted with Wayfinder
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I think I will also insert a memory of the red raven hearing a servan't voice yelling "run for your lives! The elven mage has stolen the Pale Maiden and means to kill us all!" To be inserted I think in round 6.
Apart from that, if no one else has input on the modified memory, this and my post from 8 hours ago will be it.
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Ralph are you sure you are not doing this for your own sake?
His tongue had hurt you like a blade?
-Posted with Wayfinder
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As I also realised that he is very close to evil to destroy such important dialogue.
-Posted with Wayfinder
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Okay, I have tried resonding three times today, and all that's coming out is gobbldygook. Parent/Teacher Conferences have melted my brain. I'll try again tomorrow.
Ok. Don't forget in one week you have a marriage to attend on Thursday! (or the last night of freedom)
To return to our game, The red raven did "die" in a way because of his lost memory.
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About Ralph:
Fear the one who can burn the flesh from your bones.
Fear even more the one who can screw with your mind.
And fear most the one who can do both!
Cue evil laughter.
But it's true, Cale did want to kill us all 'for the rrrevolllluuuuuution'. And what Ralph did was essentially change the one minute of interaction with us (admittedly mostly Ralph) that would make him most averse to cooperating with us (admittedly due in large part to Ralph). He does not have the power (yet) to completely wipe a person's mind or personality.
I'm mainly hedging our bets in the event that we need his cooperation in a way that cannot be compelled through domination. It's just pragmatism, and Ralph would be amused if you mistook it for morality. He's not that kind of 'hero'.
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Okay, I have tried resonding three times today, and all that's coming out is gobbldygook. Parent/Teacher Conferences have melted my brain. I'll try again tomorrow.
I feel this might also be partly my fault as a result of Ralph's actions, so I must say sorry about that. Thanks for taking the effort to respond to Ralph's rather extreme actions.
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Géatan - no you haven't killed a humanoid since you've been here, which is really impressive.
Also, you play Legacies? I hadn't made that connection (and I'll admit it took me way too long to realize what you were talking about).
Ralph - Well, your actions certainly don't help. :p I'm glad that I'm running this via PbP because it's been giving me time to respond. (But seriously, I could do basically no thinking last night just from conferences - it was impressive.)
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Ralph - Well, your actions certainly don't help. :p I'm glad that I'm running this via PbP because it's been giving me time to respond. (But seriously, I could do basically no thinking last night just from conferences - it was impressive.)
I've been playing 'classic' hero types forom 2nd edition. With Ralph I want to play a different type of 'hero' character. Some GMs take some time to adjust. :)
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It will be easier to question his corpse via speak with dead, but the map seems to be confirm that Adril had plans for Montrose. If my guess is right, the 'TM' on the map stands for Teppin Montrose, and if Adril did really kill Montrose, then the other initials on the map are initials of other people Adril had plans for.
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It looks like we have 2 objectives now.
1. Retrieve the Pale Maiden. This one is comparatively easy.
2. We need to investigate Adril Hestram and either clear his name or renounce and denounce him. Otherwise this lodge will not be able to survive in Galt.
Yup! We should look to all the side. But the map is weird. We should looked at Corentyn when this is finised.
It seem that the attack was just a coincidence.
But the the diadem is the thing that tackle me the most.
This is a very special item. Why it need it? Why he didn't have on him?
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I realise that the questions I am asking may allow us to bypass alot of hazards, but that was the point of going through all that trouble to capture the leader alive, and since we succeeded I think we deserve that information. :)
Especially if the Red Raven accepts my deduction that Teppin Montrose was himself a close ally of the Pathfinder Society and would not have wanted him to make an enemy of us.
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I am beginning to suspect the Montrose was himself a Pathfinder agent and Hestram wanted Montrose to surrender something to him some discovery or artifact instead of giving it to the Society, and when Montrose kept refusing, Hestram murdered him for it. But I doubt Eliza or Osprey will admit it, which probably means whatever Hestram stole from Montrose was incredibly valuable and maybe even damaging to the Society.
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I am not concluding anything yet. But I am creating and testing hypotheses because that is how you actively uncover information, instead of just hoping that things fall into your lap. Because when you uncover the right information some fights can be over before they even begin.
My latest questions should allow me to come up with some sort of plan for how we approach the encounter at the Montrose estate. It doesn't look like we have much in terms of stealth or diplomacy, but we might be able to make a plan around Koraq's impressive grappling ability to go straight for some key person and capture him, and hence avoid a bigger fight. Or if the current owner of the Montrose estate does not know about the Red Raven's forces using part if his estate as a hideout, we gain an extra bargaining chip against the Red Raven's forces, or we might get some allies if we need to fight them directly.
Once we get the answers to my latest questions, we can discuss how we want to approach the estate. Now that we know the situation is political, we need to be careful about how we do things.
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Long post coming up tomorrow
No problem. This makes me happy because it means that at least one of my questions has gotten us interesting information we can use, and we will have a better idea about what we need to do when we get to Montrose's estate.
We should be able to proceed to the next bit of action very soon.