Jehova's Arena (Test) (Inactive)

Game Master Jehova

NAY! I AM HERE! AND I HAVE RULES, JUST GIVE ME A FEW MINUTES. I SHALL BE POSTING THESE AND YOU ALL SHALL READ THEM AND GIVE SOME FEEDBACK, THEN I SHALL THROW THEM IN A GOOGLE DOC AND GET TO WORK CREATING THE NEW THREAD.

Also, the submissions I have fully received are:

Avenath - Zouh
Eben - Rolg
Kurama - Vatale
mbauers - Shigeharu

I have not fully and thoroughly scoured these for mistakes yet, however.

Vironus, I have your submission but it needs a few more things tweaked. Please check your inbox.

But yeah, rule things will be here shortly.

@mbauers, rules are complete-ish, I'm just figuring out how I want to structure out of combat interaction and the division of things between different sections of the main thread. I'll prioritize posting what I have here over making it perfect, so we can do collaboraty things. You're welcome to do randomizy or practice fight things, but I'd prefer to hold off on our first round of real fights until the new thread is up (that should be soon, though).

Very cool. I will consider myself CAPSLOCKED into patience. :D

And i'm very happy to be one of the first 4 to have a character sheet in. Does that give me a "Founder" title to my Arena credentials? :)

Yes yes indeed, all of you practice round people get special badge things (ooh that's a good idea, there should be some sort of achievements, so people can get prizes without them affecting gameplay... must think of ideas...)

By the way, having gone about filling out Kailin's stat submittal, at least one thing (besides the lack of capitalization... :/ ) stood out at me.

My life has been crazy recently as well, and poor Bruno has suffered for it. He will be finished, however, as soon as I am able!

Thanks Darkwolf, I've made the changes you suggested (including adding more capitals >.>).

If you've already submitted a character don't worry about changing anything now unless you really want to, just take a look at the skills template next time you update.

And Choon, no worries, the thread isn't even up yet :P

(So good @ deadlines).

And character submitted.
This build was really complex. More so to write down. I had to use all the possible tricks to get it to work. Good luck for reviewing it Jehova :-)

Should all be fine now.

Re-submitting him 3-4 times is a pain haha, because when you think you've finally got it, there's still more for you to change, but then I guess that's because you structure things fairly differently to me. :p

Jehova, I sent you a pm with my character last week. I will send it again.

Thanks Darkwolf, I've made the changes you suggested (including adding more capitals >.>).

Yay, I'm contributing! Anywho, still need to fill out the form for Sunahl, but should be ready for submittal soon.

THE PATHFINDER PITS

We've all seen the endless flame wars about the comparative power of different classes. We've seen the DPR Olympics and other optimization challenges, we've seen many broken builds and many people screeching their merits or detriments at one another all across the internet. It's time to put some of these theories to the test, and to have a bone-splinteringly good time doing so.

So welcome to the Pathfinder Pits!

WHAT IS THIS?

The Pathfinder Pits are a place for ongoing optimized play-by-post PvP. Everyone is welcome to create a character and jump on board, but only an elite few will ascend through the ranks, attaining much glory and bragging rights. The characters who join will be matched randomly against other characters of their level in single combat. Those who win gain reputation, advancing in wealth and level and generally being better than other people. Those who lose suffer a drop in reputation and are resurrected by the mysterious forces in control of the pits in order to redeem themselves or die (even more) trying.

I want to make it clear before you read any further that this is a hardcore sort of 'campaign'. You may have opportunities to role-play, and everyone should have some amount of backstory and flavor for their character, but if you're not also a powerful and versatile one-on-one combatant you may find yourself frustrated. That said, there's nothing to stop you from re-rolling as often as you'd like and jumping back into the pits with a better build, so go ahead and get creative!

The gameplay rules for the pits are as strict as I can make them, with the intent that nobody will have a victory taken from them by any sort of biased judgment call or unnecessary house-rule. I want to keep all rules as close to the intended and accepted Pathfinder rules as possible, so that if someone else were to take over arbitration their rulings would be the same. This may mean you can't do some really cool thing because it's not technically in the rules, and for that I apologize, but when it comes to PvP the rules are quite important. As in Pathfinder Society, there is no crafting, teaching animals tricks, or leadership, but pretty much all other aspects of the game are left unchanged, giving players as many building blocks as possible to create powerful characters.

If you plan on making a character and jumping in, I recommend at least scanning through the advancement and gameplay rules beforehand, to make sure everything will work as you expect it to once you're in The Pits.

CREATING A PIT FIGHTER

Pit fighters begin at 3rd level. A player may only have a single character at each level at a given time, but feel free to retire a character and create a new one at any time. No matter your previous record in the arena, any new character starts at 3rd level. You may have multiple characters so long as none of them are the same level.

Only Paizo published material is allowed when creating a pit fighter. Anything used should be findable through The SRD, PRD, or Archives of Nethys (fills in some holes in the SRD). This is to allow an even playing field among those who own differing numbers of books. These regulations are in addition to any stricter restrictions on material below. If you have questions on something's legality, shoot me a PM, but please don't ask me about third party material, it's simply not allowed.

— Abilities

Pit fighters are created using 25 point buy. No score may be dropped lower than a 7 or boosted above an 18 before racial modifiers. A pit fighter may be of any (adult) age, but they take neither penalties nor gain bonuses for being old. Here is a nice place to fiddle with point buy.

— Races

Race can determine a great deal of what a pit fighter is capable of, especially at lower levels. There should be as much room as possible to choose the perfect race for a given build, but some races are impractically unbalancing and are not allowed.

— Classes

All classes, be they core, base, alternate, or prestige, are allowed in the pits. All archetypes are legal, and multiple archetypes may be stacked together provided they do not conflict in any way. Alternate classes may take archetypes from the class on which they were based (and vice versa), so long as they have each of the replaced abilities at the relevant level (a Ninja may take the Scout archetype, for example). As in Pathfinder Society gameplay, some classes are altered as a result of crafting, animal training, and leadership being disallowed.

— Feats and Traits

Item Creation, Performance, and Achievement feats are not allowed in the Pits. All other feats from legal sources are fair game. Campaign Traits are not allowed in the arena. Any other traits from legal sources should be fine, but keep in mind that there may be prerequisites that a character is incapable of fulfilling (pit fighters may not be members of the Pathfinder Society). Any feats or traits that require a certain place of origin or religious affiliation must be consistent with other feats, traits, and classes.

— Skills

There are no restrictions on skills or their usage in the arena, though those such as Forgery or Swim will be pretty useless in most situations. Any out of combat interaction between characters will be minimally regulated, so there may be more room here to make use of skills. Otherwise, keep in mind any prestige class prerequisites you may need to meet down the road.

— Alignment

There are no alignment restrictions in the pits. Though the killing of intelligent humanoids for reputation and profit is a fairly evil past time, defeating an enemy in one on one combat is somewhat more honorable than many methods, and hey, nobody stays dead.

— Hit Points

Pit fighters follow the PFS method of hit point determination. Each character receives full hit points for their first level, and for each following level they receive half of their hit die, rounded up. This means that at each level after first a Wizard would gain 4 hit points, a Cleric 5, Fighter 6, and Barbarian 7. An animal companion or other non-player combatant receives one half of their hit die each level (including first), rounded down, recalculated at each new level.

— Equipment

Pit fighters begin with 4,500 gp worth of gear. Items may be bought and sold freely between matches for their listed price. There is no haggling, and sell prices are equal to buy prices. Living creatures are not legal for purchase in the pits, and no living creature besides a player character may enter the arena with the exception of those gained through class features. A pit fighter may spend no more than 10% of his or her current wealth on consumable items, but there are no further restrictions on the percentage of wealth that may be spent on a given type of item or items. All items must be purchased at full price and in the usual quantity (meaning you must buy 20 Whistling Arrows if you want any, and wands must be fully charged upon their purchase), but they may be sold back at full price for whatever percentage of use remains (you can sell back a wand with 25 charges remaining for exactly half of its listed price). Keep in mind that past a certain threshold, consumable resources that are used up in combat will permanently subtract from a character's wealth. See the Wealth section for more information on consumables.

— Character Submission

Any character is welcome in the arena, so long as they are mechanically legal. No character will be turned away for poor flavor or an unoptimized build, and as soon as a character is properly submitted and confirmed to be legal they will be put into the pool for fights. Keep in mind that the player is responsible for their character's legality. The characters will be reviewed when they are received, and anything the reviewer notices will need to be fixed before the character is accepted, but if the reviewer misses something that later makes a difference, the player is responsible (and may suffer a fight loss and/or Reputation penalty if things are screwed up too badly). Just double check your sheets, and you'll be fine. If there's anything you have a rules question on, send me a message. Here is the template for sending in a character. This should be filled out in plaintext and messaged to Pit Administration. Feel free to personally keep track of your character data wherever and however you choose, but for character submission the above template must be used. Each character must be resubmitted when changed in any way (primarily when leveling up), so keep a copy of the filled-out template to edit and send in when necessary. Hopefully Bungles is a good enough example for showing where to put information, but if you have any questions on the template, send me (not Administration) a message. Animal companions, familiars, eidolons, etc. should have their own stat block sent with their master's.

ADVANCEMENT

— Reputation

Instead of gaining experience for defeating foes, pit fighters go up in Reputation with each successful bout, and down in reputation upon failure (death). When one character kills another, he or she gains an amount of Reputation equal to the defeated foe's level. The beaten character loses an equal amount of Reputation. The number of equal-leveled opponents one needs to defeat to level up is always three, though losing fights between victories will drop your Reputation back down and require more total victories for advancement. When a pit fighter has enough Reputation to advance a new level, he or she loses all accumulated Reputation from the previous level and permanently gains the level. It is not possible to lose a level due to losses of reputation, nor can a pit fighters reputation drop below zero. Losing further fights when possessing no Reputation will not drop you lower than you are, though your win/loss ration will suffer.

The following chart shows the total amount of Reputation needed to advance from the given level. Remember, the amount of Reputation gained is always the opponent's level. Unless your character is challenging or being challenged by characters of different levels, this will stay quite simple.

— Wealth

Wealth in the pits is based only off of a character's current level. There is no change in wealth between fights unless a character has gained a new level from acquiring Reputation, or has used up wealth in combat. Wealth for each level is the average wealth for a character midway through that level based on the Pathfinder Wealth by Level Chart.

As mentioned in character creation, a pit fighter may not spend more than 10% of his or her wealth on consumable items. If a character uses up consumables in a fight that do not exceed 5% of his or her total wealth, the expended wealth is reimbursed at the end of the fight. Anything used up over the 5% limit is forever subtracted from the gladiator's total wealth. Any items sundered or otherwise destroyed without their owner's intent or consent will also be reimbursed after the match, unless this is a possible side effect of normal use (use fragile equipment at your own risk).

GAMEPLAY

— The Pit

Here is the current map of the pit. All squares that aren't dark stone are fully navigable, and the pit floor is hard packed dirt and sand. The rough-hewn stone of the pillars and the pit walls rises 25 ft. above the floor, up to an observation and seating area where spectators can safely watch the bloodshed. There is an invisible field of force preventing anything from rising above the lip of the pit, keeping the audience safe and limiting vertical movement above the ground to 25 ft. upwards. The stone of the pillars and walls also extends 25 ft. down past the pit's bottom to a second floor made of stone. The stone floor, walls, and pillars are coated by the same force that covers the mouth of the pit. The stone ignores any attempts at damage or manipulation, and is considered a perfectly sheer, smooth surface (unclimbable without magical aid). When combat begins, the entrances of the pit seal, and do not reopen until the outcome of the match has been decided.

— Combat Rules

Combat in the Pits is no different from that in a normal Pathfinder campaign, except that your enemies will be much more powerful and intelligent and there will be no fudging of dice rolls by your friendly GM to keep you alive. There are no major mechanical changes to the fighting gameplay; everything is meant to be as close to 'generic' Pathfinder as possible, though the set-up for the fights is somewhat nonstandard. Each combatant begins at one of the two doors leading into the pit, at the north or south. The combatant who is first in alphabetical order enters from the north, and his or her opponent from the south. Combatants begin in the left-hand square of their entrance (A11 in the north, L10 in the south). Any companions who are with a combatant in the arena (restricted to class ability companions only) begin at their master's right-hand side. When a match starts, each pit fighter confirms his or her location and the location of any companions, and then rolls initiative. Combat itself begins with a shared surprise round, where neither combatant may take more than a single move or standard action (as well as any allowed swift or free actions). The highest initiative combatant starts the match off by taking his or her surprise round actions (even if they merely delay until next round), and then the fight is underway. Past the surprise round, all actions occur exactly as they would in regular Pathfinder gameplay, unless extraordinarily strange things come up that simply must be house-ruled, in which case they will be added to this document.

— Combat Posting

Posts in combat need to convey all relevant information, preferably cinematically in addition to mechanically. For this reason, it is necessary to post both in-character text detailing what your character's obvious actions consist of, as well as posting a mechanical out of character explanation. It's also a good idea to post the round number at the beginning of each post, so everyone is clear when the fight has moved on (since some posts may be in reaction to something on the same round). Any dice rolling necessary should be done in spoilers. Note that since the arbiter has access to the character sheets, it's alright to only post a roll itself and not any modifiers, though most rolls will need their results publicly posted.

Here's an example of a fairly standard turn:

Round 4

Brutus bellows loudly, beating his free fist on his manly pectorals while shaking his axe in the air. Saliva splashes from his fanged mouth, and his already beady eyes narrow into slits. He moves in closer to his foe, bringing his hand back to the haft and making a savage swing with the weapon before lunging at the magician with his teeth.

Rage, five-foot step to E09, full attack on Jenkins the Squishy.

Arbiter Only:

Greataxe: 1d20 + 10 ⇒ (7) + 10 = 17
Bite: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (15) + 5 = 20

Greataxe Damage: 1d12 + 10 ⇒ (12) + 10 = 22
Bite Damage: 1d1d4 + 3 ⇒ (1) + 3 = 4

Greataxe 17 to hit, 22 damage. Bite 20 to hit, 4 damage.

— Etiquette

This is intended to be a friendly place to smash one another into dust and try out crazily optimized character ideas. The fights are meant to be competitive, but also friendly, with no permanent character deaths and everyone getting as many chances at glory as they desire. Keeping this in mind, please don't make winning the absolute most important part of your arena adventures; no matter how long you've spent crafting the perfect character there can always be those terrible rolls or horrible match-ups that lead to a loss. This is part of being involved in an arena and it's expected that anyone planning on fighting will be able to accept even the 'unfair' losses with honor, dignity, a minimum of sulking etc. Note that this does not mean your pit fighter can't be pissy about losing, just make sure that most of the whining stays in-character.

Also, please refrain from peeking in other players' spoilers. If you just cannot help yourself you'd better be very sure any information gained doesn't affect your character's actions in combat, because meta-gamed knowledge is the height of dishonorability in PvP. Remember that you can always PM your more secretive actions to the Arbiter if you wish.

OUTSIDE THE PIT

— Logistics

The current plan is that these rules, all maps, and any other necessary information will be posted in the Campaign Info Tab, along with permanent links to each of the Pits.

The combat for the Pathfinder Pits will be held in several different threads, each considered to be one of the pits. There can only be one fight in a given pit at a time, so if there are enough people to fill them all up, new pits will be opened. It's conceivable that in the future there will be new kinds of pits with different layouts, and also possible that older pits will be retired. Links to the gameplay threads will be posted publicly in the discussion thread when fights are assigned. The gameplay thread will be used for in-character but out-of-combat interaction between pit fighters (more on this below). The discussion thread is for questions, concerns, and comments not related to recruitment, and for official fight match-ups. The recruitment thread is only for recruiting and recruitment discussion.

Fights will be assigned randomly between pit fighters of equal levels, and the paired-off combatants will each be given a pit. Randomization will not occur if there are fewer than five combatants ready for a battle, unless there are fewer than five active combatants of that level total. Challenges may be made within the arena, but they must be broken up by assigned fights (no combatant may participate in a challenge two battles in a row). Challenge fights are no different from the normal kind except that they may be between pit fighters of any level, and the combatants must mutually agree to the match.

— Out-of-Combat Gameplay

Even pit fighters can't spend all day hacking one another to bits, and since fights don't run more than once a day and last only a few minutes (if that), downtime is inevitable. The main gameplay thread is a place for characters to relax. Here they can have actual conversations or attempt to genetically engineer super-camels, all that stuff that there's no time for in combat. There's a great deal of freedom for pit fighters, and the pit facilities are immense and exhaustive. There are libraries, laboratories, sparring areas, kitchens, gardens, empty rooms, and pretty much anyplace else a pit fighter might want to spend time while not killing and/or dying. The only restrictions during downtimes are that the pit fighters must not interfere with other combatants in any permanent way (there are very extensive wards against such things), and they must not leave the facility. This part of gameplay is not particularly moderated; go nuts, but keep it in character.

— Setting and Story

The Pits exist somewhere on or in Golarion, as far as anyone knows. None of the pit fighters can quite recall their journey to the pits, but they have all come of their own free will, to prove themselves against one another, to gain the love of the crowd and the respect of their peers. The arena is never lacking in audience; the fights are watched by crowds from every social group and race. Peasants, nobles, soldiers, and scholars, humans, elves, dwarves, and orcs, all of them shout and cheer and wager as the fighters clash on the sand. It is rumored that as a someone rises through the pit ranks he or she may gain the attention of more notable audiences, but no one is able remember the last time a pit fighter achieved such status.

Who or what is running the entire operation is also somewhat of a mystery. The Pits are incredibly well-funded, and have access to some very powerful magic when it comes to keeping them running. It's difficult to fathom the reason for The Pits existence in the first place considering its apparently already infinite budget and lack of entrance fees for audiences. The external facilities are run by seemingly normal staff of every race. They cook, clean, run the various facilities, and provide equipment for combatants, but none of them seem to have an idea of who is at the top of the operation...

Comments and criticism and such welcome and encouraged. There've got to be some things we've discussed but I didn't include there, so this would be the time to let me know that :D

Stuff like the blindness/invisibility discussion will be in a final subsection called Further Arbitration / Houserules or something.

All looks good, though fo you ever plan to include Arena gimmicks such as caged tigers, weapons and nets laying about etc?

not to be that guy but, whats the point of leaving random weapons around? most combatants will have a finely tuned set of weapons they will use and carry an enchanted version of. Though I am all in favor of angry animal cages.

The point is that this is a Gladiatorial arena, and quite often in history, weapons were left/placed in arenas for combatants to use in their fights, with members of the crowd also able to throw in weapons to their favourite fighters.

Sometimes tigers were released into the arena along with other things. A lot went on inside of the arena in real life history, and I was asking because I just feel that personally that would be an awesome addition to the arena.

The point is it's not for your specific character. It's for anyone who chooses to wield such a weapon, wants to please the crowd by fighting differently or whatever other reason there might be.

Including weapons that would benefit specific people would be meta-gaming. In history, new Gladiators entered the arena every day. Weapons and other items were just left strewn about in the arena to increase excitement and aid whoever decided to use such items/equipment.

The new draft looks good to me! Two questions (well, one and the other is probably gonna be a PM).

This arena doesn't cap at 12, does it? I assume not and the fact that 12 is the cutoff in advancement/wealth tables is just to conserve space, but figure I should double check. Otherwise, Kailin might not get all the abilities he'd really want :<

And the second question pertains to interpretation of Eidolon rules, so I'll PM that... although it might be worth posting here just for a wider group of minds thinking about it. Guess we'll just see if it's easy to resolve or not.

The arena does not cap at 12, that is just the cutoff point for the tables for now, with the assumption that it will take some time to start hitting that sort of level.

Very well written, Jehova. Good freaking job!

And then I saw…

Campaign Traits are not allowed in the arena.

Booooooo!

There's one small adjustment to Rolg incoming. It'll be easy enough to incorporate, though. (There goes Optimistic Gambler and persistent Rage rounds)

Regarding the tossing in weapons or loosing tigers stuff: I get where you're coming from, CaptainCortez, but the reality that this arena only roughly represents the historical arena you're talking about. From my understanding those weapons were tossed out because often the participants in any given arena might or might not walk in armed (much less trained) to fight. This arena is built around elite combat specialists who have specific techniques and combat styles in mind. Combat specialists who are also highly funded to walk into the fight equipped with the gear that will help them succeed.. the likelihood that Rolg will ever pick up some random longsword tossed in the sand is slim to none. He's had a hella-bad day when he chooses that over his hand-picked personal arsenal.

That said, I'm not against it; I just don't think it would get used much.

Though, I will say, it did occur to me that in the fight between Rolg and Aurum, having waves of Dire Tigers rush us when the crowds got bored would have made that fight much, much more exciting! (and i would whole-heartedly support any DM who put that type of mechanism in play in the arena) :D

I get what you mean, but say someone disarms you or sunders your weapon and they decide to block you from picking your weapon back up?

You have other options.

My guy is focused specifically on dual wielding, but he's not against using anything he can find if unable to use what he's trained himself to use.

It just adds diversity is all, and isn't really a game breaking mechanic, because it's just finding weapons that are strewn about the place. Still, it might be cooler to have that kind of thing in the higher levelled arenas, where you'll have crowds.

Stupidly long PM sent to Jehova. Contingent on response, Sunahl should be ready soon, hopefully, and once he's ready, all is good.

Also, I'm in agreement with Eben. This isn't exactly a historical coliseum, and while those ideas could be cool, certainly, they also add a lot of difficulties.

Edit: I like lists.

• There are many many weapons in the game, and finding one amidst the battlefield requires a good deal of oversight - such as what it is and where it is located, adding to the amount of preparation that falls to the GM or adding some other kind of method for determining this, which adds to the complexity of the rules.
  
• It also benefits some people more than others. Spellcasters who aren't trained in anything but simple weapons and probably won't use any weapons at all are not benefited by them being around, but if they have a spell to disarm their opponent, suddenly all they're doing is wasting their turn + a spell, and their opponent only wastes a turn picking up another weapon (Admittedly, this falls on them, be they spellcaster or just someone who makes a disarm attempt. If there were weapons strewn about and they decided to go for a disarm, that's probably their fault for making a silly choice, unless getting rid of their preferred weapon would be very useful.)
  
• Releasing tigers into the arena will definitely favor the people with high AC and the ability to stand up to them in close combat, much more than the squishy wizard who plans for single combat (unless they can fly or something, in which case it just gives someone who can't get away a bunch of tigers to deal with). Not to mention it puts a lot more work on the Arbiter to run them.
  
• In regards to the disarming thing also, there's a benefit of carrying backup weapons, I guess. Being suitably prepared for multiple situations seems like something that falls to the player.

As I said, I don't think they sound that bad, but it definitely adds a lot of extra work for the GM and further upsets balance to an extent (admittedly, there are other things that do that too, such as simply the size of the arena). So I do think it could be neat, but I don't know if I think it really would be for the best, in an arena that is at least trying to be as balanced for combatants as possible and to require relatively little outside adjudication.

Just my thoughts :P

Edited a number of times, I don't even

Good news: Bruno's basic stats are done and I have him in the template.
Bad news: I still need to equip him. Bruno naked is not a pretty sight. Not even Esmeralda wants to see that.

But at least I made progress!

I like the thematic change to Reputation, and i think it's smart to clear someone's Reputation slate when they hit a new level. Means they can keep whatever level they attain and have a fair shot at continuing their climb even if a few fights go poorly for them.

Good job on that.

In response to the weapons and tigers discussion, neither are planned for the immediate future, though the likelihood of seeing monsters in the pits at some point is higher than peasants chucking mundane swords down at the fighters. If nobody has any big issues with the current rules (sorry about the campaign traits thing, Rolg), I'll put them up in a brand new swanky Pathfinder Pits post and we'll get underway this evening o_____o;;

Yay!

And no sweating the Pathfinder Traits thing. I waffled on using it anyway, thinking, 'It's kind of cheese,' even to myself. But in the end decided this was the place for cheese if one existed.

I'll just put that trait to some other good use. :)

here here!
Pathfinder Pits away!!

Campaign traits can be... kinda silly.

It's also difficult to justify them outside of their campaigns, even if they'd give you infinite wealth.

Now I HAVE to finish Bruno tonight. I'll do my best. Even if he doesn't make it he will be along to mess up people's days soon. :)

Also, as we create a new recruitment thread and get underway with the Pathfinder Pits, feel free to invite anyone else you think might enjoy it, from any other PbP games or even the Real World. Starting things off strong with the new thread will be helpful for getting a nice large pool or combatants (which is important for meaningful advancement).

I know my brother (dbauers) expressed interest earlier. I'll give him a reminder to submit his character soon.

yup, i know what im making. just need to fill it out according to the template. hopefully i can finish tonight.

@ bauers: You know, I was gonna ask about that when I saw both of your names together :P

Anywho, sidestepped the issue I was having with Sunahl by changing, um... a lot of things, but I like his new look better overall. So, Kailin and Sunahl are complete (barring any errors somewhere) and sent in.

And, now I need to go update their appearance, methinks (Sunahl without a doubt).

I'd still need to know about the spellbook things before I can finish Kirk (mostly: how much is it to add a spell?). I'd also need to know if I can direct a flaming sphere down a created pit (basically without seeing where it goes exactly) :)

Okay, descriptive appearance for the two is all updated. Yeesh, listing all the equipment is gonna be difficult when people get bunches of things, huh? He doesn't even have much and those item listings are somewhat verbose. Ah well. Also, I tried to make it clear in Sunahl's description, but settled on ooc text to make it more plain what his base form is. He kind of looks like all of them >_>

Anyway, should I go ahead and remove their previous match history, since those are kind of not part of this now?

From the bottom up:

• Yes, any previous arena records will be wiped clean, everyone starts fresh at 3rd level.

• It's fine to just kinda say which direction you're sending a sphere, though you may not know if it hits people.

• I had originally been requiring casters to pay full scroll price to copy down new spells, but seeing as spells must be prepared before battles are even assigned, I don't feel that having a wide pool of spells from which to prepare is particularly broken, so I am fine having spells be bought for add-to-book price. Keep in mind, however, that since you are not able to sell spells back they will eat into your consumables budget.

• @Darkwolf, sorry for not responding to the Sunahl questions yet, I do have answers for those, though you may not need them anymore.

• I think I managed to not realize there were two bauerses, or else I just missed you, d. Welcome aboard if I didn't already say that!

I'm good to go when you guys are! :)

• @Darkwolf, sorry for not responding to the Sunahl questions yet, I do have answers for those, though you may not need them anymore.

No problem. You are correct, I likely do not need them now, but as it is something that could come up for others, I imagine it's still good to figure them out. And okie doke, will go clear out Kailin's match history. I'm psyched for new matches with these guys though, I think they should hopefully both wreak a bit more havoc :)

updating Bruno and Esmeralda's gear now. will be submitted soon

Submitted. finally.. Phew.

Submitted. finally.. Phew.

I am excited to see Bruno preform some more charge splatting

k, working on some gear stuff, and i want to make sure i have the consumables clause correct in my mind.

i get that the buy and sell price is the same. i get that something like a wand can be resold for whatever value it should have.

heres where im confused. suppose i have a level 1 wand, and the only consumables i use are two charges from the wand. i know the rules state that i could sell that wand for 720 after my match, but could i instead just "refill" the wand, because the 30 gp i used is less than the 5% cap? or does that only apply to things that are entirely used up, like scrolls, potions, etc?

Alrighty, looks like we have the following gladiators ready to go:

Avenath - Zouh
CaptainCortez - Vironus
Choon - Bruno
Darkwolf117 - Kailin
Eben al'Jol - Rolg
imimrtl - Durgrosh
kurama314 - Vatale
Llaelian - Liane
mbauers - Shigeharu

I also have received Elmer from Billybrainpan, waiting on a few revisions.

@ dbauers, the way I'm imagining the refunds for consumables is that after each fight you receive an amount of gold equal to what you could have sold the expended consumable for, up to a maximum of the refund limit. This would mean that you would receive an amount of gold equal to what you'd have gotten if you sold a wand containing number of charges you used up. You can either pocket this gold and continue using your depleted wand, or sell the wand and purchase a new one using the money gained from its sale + the money just gained from the expended charges. So long as you don't use up more than your limit, you'll be refunded the exact price of your used-up resources, and can begin each fight with an identical gear list to the last.

The reason for the 'only buy full wands' rule is to prevent stuff like someone purchasing a wand of high above their level that contains only a single charge, and then UMDing it to great effect (and likely no cost).

In response to my own previous post where I said that spells copied to a spellbook count as consumables: forget I said that, it's dumb. What I meant was that they are a permanent investment, and so will be subtracted from your total wealth whenever you go to buy gear (the same as if you never sold back any other item). They do not count towards your consumable limit, and the 5% and 10% limits are always determined from full potential (not actual) wealth.

Just a quickie because I can't remember the rules for this, but if I'm within 5 feet of someone with a reach weapon, can they not attack me if that's their only form of offense?

Correct, but a 5' step (which is a free action) makes them capable of attacking with thier reach weapon.

Before we start, I had a question about some tactics I've seen used and that I was considering using myself.

From the PRD:

Weapon Cord: Weapon cords are 2-foot-long leather straps that attach your weapon to your wrist. If you drop your weapon or are disarmed, you can recover it as a swift action, and it never moves any further away from you than an adjacent square. However, you cannot switch to a different weapon without first untying the cord (a full-round action) or cutting it (a move action or an attack, hardness 0, 0 hp). Unlike a locked gauntlet, you can still use a hand with a weapon cord, though a dangling weapon may interfere with finer actions.

IMO, that mean you cannot, if you are using two weapons, release one weapon to strike two handed with the second, then catch back the second. Would you agree with that?

I was still interested in joining in myself. I'll work on getting you a character by the end of the night, but my week is a bit swamped with preparation for an anime convention this weekend.

I think you have a bit of time, Hirtz. Jehova has been pushing things forward (which is very exciting), but the official recruitment/discussion/game thread aren't up yet. So you have a bit of time still.

(though i'm secretly hoping you don't really have much time)

I think you have a bit of time, Hirtz. Jehova has been pushing things forward (which is very exciting), but the official recruitment/discussion/game thread aren't up yet. So you have a bit of time still.

(though i'm secretly hoping you don't really have much time)

Because you fear the monster that I will build? :P

Yep. :D

... or I just want to get Rolg into an official fight. But your reason sounds better.

Elinora is submitted, hopefully without too many errors. :)

Oh hey, sorry, looks like the forum ate my announcement post, but THE THREAD ACTUALLY HAS BEEN UP SINCE LAST NIGHT (I totally stuck to that deadline).