GM WhtKnt's Open Water - A Skull & Shackles Adventure Path

Game Master WhtKnt

1) Yes, she was able to secure some venom from the corpses. Let's say 2 doses of naga venom and 5 doses of wasp poison.

Naga: Poison (Ex) Poison—injury; save Fort DC 19; frequency 1/round for 6 rounds; effect 1d2 Con damage; cure 2 saves.
Wasp: Poison (Ex) Poison—injury; save Fort DC 18; frequency 1/round for 6 rounds; effect 1d2 Dexterity damage; cure 1 save.

2) Sure, why not?

3) Again, why not?

4) The ship was mounted with two ballistae, which Rickety would have left in place.

If nothing else, we can turn the naga hide into wondrous items (naga hide cloaks of resistance, for instance) which should look cool.

Trebuchets are a direct fire weapon, so Chumtooth and Satinder can each command one until we close ranks. Vic is all about indirect fire.

Also, we've got 800 gp to spare from ship construction discounts—which I would like to request be used to buy raw lumber and metal while we're on shore, enough for 2400 gp of stuff.

I would like to spend that as follows, if nobody else in the crew is opposed:

-35 gp of the initial cost for a scroll + scribing Crafter's Fortune into Dantes' spellbook. This will help us craft stuff much faster

-This leaves 2295 gp for lumber and metal...

-800 gp of lumber gets us a huge catapult, which Vic can craft while we're at sea.

-The remaining metal could be used to get everyone the masterwork armor and/or weapons of their choice. If we can pick up some darkwood, I can use it to make heavy shields with no armor-check penalty.

Vic, how do you want to split up the poison?

Oh, right, I forgot that I actually use poison. I'll take one dose of each, and you guys can split the rest.

Is anyone else wanting some of the poison? If not, I'll claim it to use with my blowgun.

I may not have internet access the weekend of the 4th, so if I go radio silent from Friday to Sunday, that is why. Just wanted to give the heads-up.

To Vic's question in the game play thread:

Basically, we would do profession (sailor), knowledge (local), and probably knowledge (geography, nobility, history) checks to find the best shipping lanes, then identify the make and nationality of any ship we encounter.

Then, we decide to attack it or not.

I suppose we could decided as a crew to either take them as they come, or seek out specific ships (Cheliaxan slavers, for example).

Chumtooth has the right of it. You have complete control over who you choose to attack, and in most cases, a successful Knowledge (local) or Knowledge (nobility) check will tell you what nationality the potential target is. Of course, if they happen to be a pirate, they may try to attack you!

Well then, let's get sailing!

Just curious, who were the two nightwatchmen who ended up fish-food? Were they crew from the Wormwood or green recruits from Rickety's?

Anyone heard from Satinder? It would suck if our captain was one of the ones eaten by the suahagin!

Satinder is here, just extremely busy with double shifts at work and preparing for a vacation in Turkey.

I'll try to catch up asap. DM, feel free to bot me. :)

So... I think we've all agreed on the plan of Chumtooth and Victoriana taking tonight's watch, while Satinder and Dantes wait in hiding?

Works for me!

"Wise, inspired and daring! As you command, captain."

Sounds like we are set.

Sorry, folks. Busy week. I'll try to get an update out today sometime.

Cap says she's busy and we should feel free to bot her—I think that's a consensus that we pursue this ship?

At least until it comes into seeing-their-flag range, and we can tell why they're fleeing. (Does someone else want to fire warning shots with the ballistae, or should I? I do get a pretty hefty -8 to hit with direct-fire siege weapons, which is why I've been spending downtime on crafting a catapult)

Of course, I thought of this after we left the Squibbs...

We should mount heavy crossbows on the rails: two fore, two aft, and two on either side. Our ingenious gnome could make swivel mounts for them where the crossbows could be removed and stowed when not in combat.

Since they are simple weapons, anyone on the crew could fire them with no problem.

As for the current situation, if I am reading the rules correctly, a shot with a ballista is at -4 for a medium-sized creature, plus another -4 for being exotic. With my DEX, that should be a -5. I can fire a shot at the boat, and see what happens.

Yeah... it's kind of a brutal penalty. The crossbow option is awesome, because we can leave them loaded, although we could also just hand them out to the crew. (I'm currently building a character for a campaign where we all get 20 level 2 minions, and my best idea so far is to buy them all war-trained lions, though I'm tempted to splurge for dire bats...)

Meanwhile, this is why I'm building catapults—as a gear gnome, I'm proficient with anything I build myself, and catapults let you add Knowledge (engineering) to your attack rolls. Unfortunately, with my crafting skill, it'll take just under three weeks at sea to craft a proper catapult (less if someone helps me, but I don't think our NPCs are trained in siege weapon crafting).

Also, we could get Chumtooth and Satinder some compound longbows, but that'll be a bit further down in the queue.

There will be an unforeseen delay in my moves. My computer went Tango-Uniform today and I lost everything. I will need a little time to get back on my feet. Stay posted and I'll update as soon as I can.

Thanks for letting us know. I hope things come back together soon for you.

Sorry lads, but indeed very busy and just returned from a Turkish holiday for a week so...

Trying to get back on track asap!

Going to GenCon next week. I will be out of contact from Tuesday, July 28 until Wednesday, Aug 5. We will continue upon my return.

Sounds good. Have a great time!

A note to all my active games: I'm in the process of preparing for my candidacy exam for the next few weeks, and I've decided to make a commitment to check my PbPs at most 1/day. I'll probably still be somewhat active, just, not as manic about it as usual.

Clearly, we are the best pirates.

<poke the dead dm> ^^

Suggested terms of employment for the crew of the Kiss of Vengeance:

"Everybody fights. Nobody quits. If you don't do your job, I'll kill you myself. Welcome aboard."

The best line in that wretched adaptation of a brilliant book.

I hated it when it first came out. Now, it falls in the So Bad, It's Hilarious category

I also am a fan of the book.

Yeah... they did pretty much completely change the whole point/premise of the story to try and shoehorn in a political message presented so poorly that I couldn't even tell what it was. Ah well.

What film? :)

How about my recruitment? Think it's in line with a decent captain? I'm trying to be a fearless and to-be-feared leader, but not be a total jack donkey at the same time ^^

Starship Troopers, and the recruitment works for me.

Yeah, the book was an amazing, biting and still relevant commentary on the military-industrial complex and the risks associated with over-glorification of the military.

The movie, more a cheesy (but sometimes fun) shoot 'em up scifi action flick.

Sure... but the book was also a rather prescient prediction of the challenges facing a heavily-technologized military and the changes that would cause to the lives of soldiers, and the movie was also a ham-fisted parody of pro-American propaganda.

Unless that guy has Dex as a dump stat, I missed the crit.

Bummer.

I guess it works out okay that I forgot the two-weapon fighting thing. It makes it appear that I was toying with/testing him.

Did we take the fish, too, or just the marine?

I assumed the fish aswell, unless I forgot to post this somewhere.

Also: good news: SEPTEMBER!! Lots of time for me again, hooray!!

Yep, and I just passed my candidacy exam, so things are good here again.

Okay, we have two ways to proceed from here. The AP has you sailing about, building up reputation and infamy by attacking ships. We can:

a) Play it out, going through numerous ship-to-ship battles, until you have gained sufficient infamy and plunder to advance, OR;

b) Gloss over the "hunting" parts of the adventure and just assume that you are progressing as necessary. If we go with this option, I will tell you how long you have been hunting and we will grant you a random amount if plunder and infamy.

Let me know which method you folks prefer. Note that, in either case, we will be playing out pertinent encounters. You will not be missing out on anything except lots of robbing vessels.

I wouldn't mind playing out one or two boardings (preferably ships with better cargo than fish). If anything, it would help us feel like our reputation is deserved and would give us the opportunity to recruit additional crew.

Hmm. Yeah... I'm guessing there's a lot of randomized encounters, maybe in several tiers; we could, say, try playing through one ship per tier, if that's how these things are written out.

Yeah, maybe a hybrid? Pick the ones that seem the most interesting and gloss over the rest? What says our captain?

I like the "Let's do the best ones and skim over the rest".

So... robbing *some* vessels, then.

Sounds good to me. Let's get to it!

The DM is out of office? :)

Sorry, been a busy weekend. Was at a con and had to run PFS all weekend.

Oh! Dragoncon? My friends have been snapchatting photos from that one all weekend.