The Varisian/Mage's Tattoo isn't from the rulebooks I automatically allow, so we'd have to discuss that one first.
The supplementary info write-ups are nearly done, but an important tidbit is a change in how we're going to approach money. I've always thought it was stupid that Pathfinder/D&D technically have lower denominations of currency but never, ever bother using them because adventurers are always so rich. Thus, most prices you'll encounter in Eldreon are based in copper or silver pieces - gold is only used commonly by the rich, which you are not (yet). This means that yes, most prices you'll find in other rulebooks are going to be useless for this game. I apologize for the inconvenience, but the anal retentive part of my brain simply can't handle the inconsistency in Pathfinder/DND economics and thus I must try and fix it. (or at least give it a semblance of internal consistency). I'm going to try and put up as many baseline lists and such as I can, and you can always ask what kind of prices you might expect for various items.
As a comparison, you can imagine that the average unskilled laborer earns something like 1 silver piece per week, and that it usually costs about that same amount to feed and house a single person for a week (at the cheapest costs and comfort levels and before accounting for things like families living together).
As far as money that your characters had on you, I'm happy to simply change "gold pieces" to "silver pieces" and take it from there. You can keep all gear and such, I'm not going to try and bother with having you re-buy your gear at the new price basis.
Well, that makes the decision easier :)
There are actually not many feats that seem to represent making deals for more power. Was a bit surprising.
Adventurers ARE rich. You might want to look at the rules in Unchained for reducing the Christmas Tree effect. I had a GM give us treasure in cp once. We had to hire a cart to move it. Actually led to good roleplaying (there was a good reason for the treasure to be in cp).
I sort of assumed most people really use 'Livestock' as a trade good. A cow is worth 10gp. Owning fifty cows and some land was supposed to make you comfortably middle class, I believe. That's about 500gp. Let's assume the farm is also 500gp. That's HALF the cost of a +1 sword.
i.e. if your party of three third level guys find a +1 sword and one dies, there's enough money (in theory) for both of you to retire!
I've always justified it as thinking some smart alec wizard found a way to find/make gold easily, and flooded the market until gold became the standard.
I was in a game where the GM just pushed everything 'down' a denomination.
so a cow (normally 10gp) costs a gold sovereign (1gp)
a goat (normally 1gp) costs a silver dollar (1sp)
a lb of iron (normally 1sp) costs a copper penny (1cp).
I don't think he bothered with denominations below that. If you wanted to buy a single chicken (normally 2cp) I think you and the seller negotiated extra goods until you reached a copper penny - so it was "5 chickens 'a' penny!"
He didn't go higher, because once you started carrying enough money to buy a house you were probably doing it with promisary notes, jewelry, or ingots (a one pound iron ingot was worth 500 'normal' gps)
I think x7 is probably more realistic, but this made it easy to change all the Pathfinder prices without having players' coin purses lightly encumbering them, or letting them use gold as a building material.
That said, if you've the sort of mind that likes rebuilding medieval economic systems, then go for it - I have that sort of mind myself. I find the existence of magic is what distorts them in interesting ways.
Have you read the Downtime rules in Ultimate Campaign?
Ah. Rolling for HP, my old nemesis. We meet again...
Edit: Yes! A 3!
Hmm - Mercy, you were saying that it might be possible to follow the Dwarven Wizard's path, but that it was in your hands.
Is there any clues Tyrus has as to how to position himself to do so? Guessing it's going to be high level to actually do it.
Second: is Sclupture, or Painting, a craft? Vaguely considering knocking up a shrine... and now's the time to get the skill...
(Edit)Third: is it possible to purchase a healer's kit or alchemy lab? What sort of skill is used to make these?
If the past few posts have taught me anything it is that skill points are very important. And since the DM said we were still in a state of change I was wondering if I could change from Dervish dance focus to Fencing Grace? I wasn't aware of the feat before but it is far superior in that I don't have to tie up some skill points in a skill I gain no benefit from. The rapier is finesse-able and has the same stats as the scimitar so now I have a decent chance to hit. All I have to do is change Weapon Focus to Rapier and take Fencing Grace as my third level feat and viola, I can hold my own in combat.
Also:
Average too. Our group is far too squishy with no healer.
Hey!
In all seriousness, this is something I've been moving Tyrus into.
I recognise 1d10+6 isn't as good as 2d8+5 (which a cleric could do), but it isn't too bad, and should be able to get people above 0. Tyrus can also restore HP using Heal, given time (theoretically 10 a day, I think). Can also scribe scrolls of False Life if we need to (and have money...)
One of my worries is that if we go to recruitment and get a 'real healer', Tyrus will be out of a niche.
I've actually considered asking Mercy if I can switch over to the hideously awful Life subschool of Necromancy, in order to get a tiny bit better at healing. Would that be a good idea?
Right, this was the loot:
20 does of healing lotions (post 297)
Tyrus used two lotions on healing people that night (so 18 left)
potion of Cure Light Wounds (post 280)
potion of Cure Moderate Wounds (post 280)
Unknown transmutation potion (post 280)
4 doses of Mensha (post 271)
3 does left.
Who has what? Luca has the Mensha. Would make sense for him to have the healing lotions, I guess.
Probably makes sense for other people to have the potions.
So if I am not mistaken here is what we have:
...
Dwarven book on alchemy
ink
I had forgotten all about this... Presumably it belonged to the Wizard.
We also have a plant that may no longer be useful. Given what it's connected to, that may be for the best. XD
Yeah, trying to reform the economics while balancing the ease and consistency is tough. I'm also slowly designing my own RPG system, and it's much easier to design thing from the ground up rather than try to modify them in-place to fit new strictures and still sit well with the rest of the original rules.
Love the "gave players treasure in CP" thing. Very inventive, and I'm sure was a blast watching the players work through that one. And no, I haven't read any of Ultimate Campaign.
Whaaaaaat? You don't want to dance anymore? Shame. Anyway, Fencing Grace and Dervish Dance seem pretty comparable otherwise, so yeah I'll allow it.
I rather like that you guys don't have a "real" healer. I designed most of the new rules around the idea that magical healing should be more rare and have trade-offs, and now I'm thinking of simply limiting the possibility of Divine classes altogether. ;) I know, I'm cruel.
However, I also do realize that this makes the game harder and less forgiving, and while entirely thematic with me it might not help the game be fun. That said...
The Life subschool doesn't seem so bad. The healing ability seems modest enough that it won't break the dynamic I'm going for, and it certainly fits with your character. I'll allow it.
No longer useful? Oh, ye of little faith...
As I said, "may". XD We knew it could be used with what we WERE doing - with unknown effects - but nothing else about what it may or may not be capable of. For now, I've mentally classified it as "loot, one, of future interest".
Indeed. And you can also continue to study it, though the related Know and Spellcraft DC's are fairly high. It's meant to be a long-term project of sorts.
Thinking on it... I'd like to have him transition in game, and I'd like to see how much of a difference False Life makes before adding more. The thing Tyrus didn't have was quick healing. That's no longer true. I think it might be enough, given our 'tank' uses summoned hps.
That works just as well. Retraining is an option, though for anything major I might tweak the requirements a bit - still, you don't need to wait to level up to make changes to your build in these cases.
I'm just waiting on Dante and Tyrus to finalize their leveling before I move us along, plus the extra time gives Dante space to work out computer troubles.
In any case, unless you guys have other things you want to do on the island, I'll be jumping us straight to your arrival in the port city.
Oh, trust me, Luca is quite happy to leave the drunk pirates behind. XD I'm ready to go to the port anytime.
Oh, sorry - I was waiting on the craft question (I've gone glassblowing), loot distribution (Yllaine might want some), and whether we could get a healing kit or alchemy lab.
Sheet is at this doc and I'll copy it across as soon as I can get it finalised.
Skills, feats, saves, hp are all done. Just equipment to go.
Oops, my bad - completely forgot to answer you on those.
1) Yes, both sculpture and painting would be crafts. Glassblowing sounds like fun as well, though it certainly isn't the kind of thing you could do without a specialized set of equipment.
2) Healing kits and various alchemical apparatus would be commonly available in any sizable city, which is where you'll be going. You'll be able to buy them as soon as we start up again, basically.
3) Loot distribution is of course a question you guys must answer amongst yourself. Yllaine and Lara are not actually leaving the island with you guys. Also, Yllaine's family is super rich (and unlike your compatriots, she hasn't been kicked out for whatever reasons) so I don't think she much cares about loot. :)
Black blade comes alive level 3. How should we do this?
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Been wondering about that myself. Since the black blade is technically an intelligent NPC (and thus technically under my control as the GM) I want its purposes to be initially unknown to Dante so that I introduce them later (about time I got my storytelling hooks into you! ;) ) but within that framework I'm open to most anything. Maybe you could post your own preferences and ideas or PM them to me? Alternately, if you would rather I be in more overt overall "control" of the blade, I'll post the awakening myself, and from there on it will be an NPC that only Dante is aware of (unless he tells the others about it).
Well, I know the books have several ways of doing things. Fluffy could bring it to Dante the next time it's summoned, it could be found lying on the ship somewhere, his existing blade could spontaneously 'awaken'... I am curious to see what it ends up being. XD
1) Yes, both sculpture and painting would be crafts. Glassblowing sounds like fun as well, though it certainly isn't the kind of thing you could do without a specialized set of equipment.
Oh, sorry - I wasn't sure on painting and calligraphy, but glass-blowing seemed a safe bet. I don't really know much about it - I thought it was a tube and a fire.
2) Healing kits and various alchemical apparatus would be commonly available in any sizable city, which is where you'll be going. You'll be able to buy them as soon as we start up again, basically.
Cool :)
3) Loot distribution is of course a question you guys must answer amongst yourself. Yllaine and Lara are not actually leaving the island with you guys. Also, Yllaine's family is super rich (and unlike your compatriots, she hasn't been kicked out for whatever reasons) so I don't think she much cares about loot. :)
Right - then unless someone objects...
Tyrus: 18 doses of healing lotions (post 297), dwarven Spellbook, 24spLuca: 3 doses of Mensha (post 271), potion of Cure Light Wounds (post 280),Unknown transmutation potion (post 280), 24sp
Dante: potion of Cure Moderate Wounds (post 280), dwarven alchemy book, 24sp
one 'lucky' sp to split three ways.
I'm assuming we're all reading from the same books.
Mercy: would you be okay if we said Silver Sovereigns (ss) instead of silver pieces (sp)? Or something? I can see us getting confused at some point in the future if we use 'sp' for the book costs and the new system.
I believe Luca also picked up a Pewter/Silver bracelet awhile back.
Book costs? New system? I have no problem using whatever terminology we want, but don't understand your points.
Also, yes, Luca found a bracelet in the goblin caves. Don't think you ever used an appraise check on it, so you have no idea of value as of yet.
Hmmm - okay. I forsee at some point a discussion where I say something like "I would like Tyrus to try to find an <item>. It is in <paizo book> at <cost>gp." Sadly, It's likely to end up as part of a big list like <item> <book> <cost>gp.
I can see you then look at the list, work out the cost in items and state a new <translated cost>.
My worry is that if <cost> and <translated cost> have the same units (like gp) then I'll get confused, probably when I look back through six month old posts to update my character sheet...
Admittedly an additional factor for me is that "gold pieces, silver pieces and copper pieces" has all the pizzazz of Diablo I. I like Silver Dollars, Sovereigns, Pennies, Ducats... real world type monetary names!
Ah, gotcha. And a good thought. Ideally I'm going to be putting up all the "average" prices into a price guide specific to this campaign, but no doubt some would slip through the cracks. And I'm all for discarding the "thin fantasy" terms of "<money> pieces" as well.
This mixes historical regions somewhat, but how about:
copper pieces = pennies
silver pieces = ducats
gold pieces = crowns
I didn't want to use both sovereigns and crowns, and crowns is much easier to type. Open to other suggestions for ducats, though that is rather fun to say... "dollar" might be simpler to use, but feels so modern. Up to you guys, really.
Luca: *Busy practicing the Elder Sign* Maybe this will help. DX
Computer's back. Yay.
Congratulations Dante! Must be a relief :)
Luca: Remember not so call up that which you cannot put down!
Don't worry, I've been listening to good advice.
I've added a couple permanant links to the top. The first is to read-only (for you) docs with information on Eldreon. I'll be adding to that link, but right now it only has stuff on Languages, Money, and a currently-blank doc on crafting.
The Notes document is something you can edit. It's basically meant as a place for you to jot down quick notes and thoughts that you are okay with being public. I'll try and use it (in the 'GM area', please don't write in that part) to keep track of important NPC's and other knowledge we don't want to forget about in the course of play.
As for the economy, aside from the basic equipment lists (which are quite different than Pathfinder norms) I'm thinking I might keep magic items costs roughly the same, because enough of the "rebalancing" will come from the other side - namely, that it will be harder for you to GET money in my game than in most others. Add in the fact that magic items are harder to come by as well and maybe I don't need to change the costs drastically.
For crafting, I'm still finalizing a lot of that, as I'm divided over how much I want to change things. Now that Tyrus appears to be a glassblower I'll have to make sure I find the tweaks I want to make, but we'll treat non-magical crafting as standard Pathfinder for now.
Regarding Languages: You can treat any language you learned from your intelligence bonus at character creation as starting as Fluent level. Please remember to mark the level a language is at in your character sheet.
As always, speak up with any comments or questions. I'll be moving us along in a bit!
Okay, now we've moved on, is it possible to ask what was up with Kris?
Crafting side: forget Glassblowing! Tyrus' Alchemy is incredible. You're far more likely to find him using that. Glassblowing should help build labs and vials though.
Y'know, for a three person party we have a lot of other voices. I can see a future day where 'we' all get knocked out and our NPCs have to save the day... :)
Well... Fluffy doesn't stay when Luca's unconscious... XD Not yet, at least. I think there's SOMETHING that allows it for a little while.
It would, however, be kind of funny to see Fluffy running through an enemy base, carrying Dante's sword in its mouth, and wearing an acid-shooting Torble on its head as it breaks all of us out of trouble or something.
Well now that just has to happen.
And seeing as you may very well eventually return to the island/interact with Kris again, I don't think I'll do the reveal-all to you. I will however, say that he wasn't "in love" with Lianna, as you seemed to believe (and that made perfect sense, but no).
(also, I forgot to say that the doc links are under the Campaign Info tab)
Tyrus was the spouse of a mid-to-high level wizard. Upper upper middle class. 73sp is pocket change.
Part of what was so hard for him is that when he was divorced he was unable to pay the rent on his house and so forth. He's basically ended up homeless and destitute. He gave pretty much everything he had for the boat trip.
Sure, he understands now he'll be eating turnip soup for breakfast, with turnip pie for lunch and maybe a nice roast turnip for dinner... but he's used to much better, and that's the budgeting he's always done. I mean, look at his appraise skill!
Plus, given we're ALL ex-nobility type people, I imagine we're feeling pretty damn poor, right now.
Plus, if we are stuck supporting the other prisoners even turnips are going to start looking expensive.
On the bright side, magic generally sells - and we're all casters, too. XD I suppose we could work together and maybe try to open some kind of business, rather than being traveling murderhobos... having Fluffy eventually craft stuff might help, too.
Of course, I doubt our GM built this world just to have us plop down in a town and never leave... XD But given our characters' overall preferences, I feel like they might be interested in at least finding a large city and trying to get some stability in their lives.
By the way, for converting money... should I convert directly (1 GP to 1 SP) or equivalently (1 GP to 100 SP)?
I... hadn't considered that. It does actually make a strange sense. Without clues to track down, settling down and researching in libraries might actually be the most useful thing Tyrus - at least - could do.
For the money that your characters possessed already, convert directly: 1 gp = 1 sp, or maybe 1 gp = 1 ducat if we're going to use the other terminology. I still want to find a different word than ducat...
And indeed, you are quite able to do whatever you want, including settling down if that's the idea. If we're going to turn this into a Pathfinder business sim, I'm sure I can find some challenge in it. ;) Also, time can pass quite quickly if we start doing crafting and business-dealings type stuff which tends to pass a week or weeks at a time, so you can have a long stretch of stability for your characters that goes by quite quickly for the players.
Just so you know, Fluffy's not out right now...
Whenever it is then.
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Luca, uh, kind of doesn't want to walk into town with an alien monstrosity at her heels. XD
... A conversation between the amoral servant of an alien power and a self-righteous talking sword. This is going to get weird. Also, it might be best to have that conversation on the side in spoilers with each other, if you like, so that we can move on in the meantime.
We can definitely move on - and get back to that conversation whenever Fluffy actually gets called up again.
...Which I should probably arrange for in the near future, if only so the sword can try to get some answers.
Or nothing at all. I ca imagine him being all self righteous and indignant and not being able to understand a word.
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Fluffy must really trust us to let us guard you in a brand new town where we aren't the hero's.
It's closer to "we can still quick-summon versus anything that hurts her, and it's more practical to not show the locals something to be afraid of". It's not really trust, per se... XD
Fluffy takes a minute and all the summons take a full round. That is not a quick-summon to me.
Yeah, sadly, Luca doesn't have the Master Summoner's normal quick-summon anymore. v.v Just when she's hurt or hit by a Fear effect.
Hmmm, I think we're getting the ship and shore conversations tangled. Probably doesn't matter, except we'd be unlikely to have some of these conversations around seven civilians!