Jehova's Arena (Test) (Inactive)

Game Master Jehova

Not at all mr. Narcissist. Just be forewarned that this is the testing phase of this particular arena. We're bug-huntin' for now, so feel free to strain the rules. Actual arena to follow.

The more the merrier, just try to give a quick read-through of the posts so far on this thread so you know what you'll need to start. Any input on the current rules or the way the fights have gone so far is also welcome.

Here's an idea:
For testing purposes (not in the real arena), when one character levels, they all do. Therefore, at the end of the eighth match, all characters would advance to second level. This may speed up the rate at which experiences and data can be gathered as well as prevent available character starvation at higher levels.
I would also say, restricted to general group, so 1's would level, but 5's wouldn't and vice versa.

What do you think?

This could be good since, with only so many people readily available, a level 2 wouldn't really have any matching opponents.

However, I'm not sure if we plan on characters occasionally break level norms? That is, having a level 1 and a level 2 go at it, or if it's supposed to stick to the same level regardless (admittedly, the difference between 1 and 2 is fairly big, compared to the difference between 5 and 6).

If we plan to occasionally match up different levels to see if the lower leveled opponents can still fight their higher counterparts, then we may want to stick with the progression as it's planned for the real arena.

Otherwise though, we can have the level 2 person simply move to inactive and the player picks up a new level 1, as the real arena would. I can see merit for either way of doing things.

Indeed. It's a trade off between more variety in testing classes at low levels and testing at higher levels. Now I see why games take months (or years) of testing to balance properly.

I like the idea of everyone going up, at least to level 2. I'm seriously considering having everyone start at level 2 in the actual arena, for purposes of more variety in builds (multiclassing possible), allowing classes to start with some of their main cool things (rage powers, ranger bonus feat, rogue talents, divine grace, etc.), and giving a bit more funding for the guy who wants a composite longbow, or heavy armor.

A potential problem with simply leveling current characters up is that the fighters who advance in levels should really only be the ones that can consistently win their fights. Artificially boosting characters will give a skewed idea of how the battles will be going, as even the mechanically weaker builds will have somehow advanced. I really am interested in this being a sort of a Solo Combat Optimization Olympics, to see how effective all of these characters that are theorized about actually fare against other strong opponents, though I think we would need significantly more players to make that happen. On the other hand, there's no restriction on having multiple active characters at once, so long as they are not of the same level, so with 7 players there could conceivably always be 7 lowest-level characters, regardless of what's going on higher up.

For now, I plan to advance each currently active level 1 character to level 2 once fights seven and eight are done. If anyone wants to change things up, feel free to throw in a new level 1 and he or she will be bumped up with the rest.

As for characters of different levels fighting, the original rules have a whole system set up for randomly assigning battles to different players, and if players want to fight someone other than a randomly assigned opponent, they must make a challenge, which must be willingly accepted in order for that fight to occur. Challenges can be between characters of any level, rewards are based only on the level of the defeated party (a 6th level character would gain 1VP and 300 gp from killing a first level character).

Ooh, just had another good logistics idea, if someone loses a match due to severe arena freeze, they are put into automatic suspension until their player reactivates them, to keep them from being in the random pool. The random pairing of combatants will also only work if there are enough people playing to make it possible.

*Ahem*, I (and also Bruno) made a pretty big uh oh in his fight with Amarkys, attacking three rounds in a row with a reach weapon against an enemy only 5 feet away. This is one of those things that would have been rather important to catch before the fight ended (especially since Bruno won with those lance strikes), but nobody did. First of all, I am right that this was not a legal thing, yes? There's no special allowance for using lances mounted that keeps them from being reach weapons, as far as I know. Secondly, this is a great thing to have happen in the testing phase, so we can establish a game plan for big woopsies. Since I'm GMing this, I feel a certain amount of responsibility for letting players know 'that's technically against the rules, sorry', and I'd rather not pin all the blame on the player for something like this (I'm speaking more of real arena, I trust we can all work something out for now without much hassle).

The basic sort of options I see would be to take Bruno's winnings and give them to Amarkys, or else to rewind and have the battle restart from before the first illegal action. Both of these cause problems when the player has already gained the winnings and is now on to another fight, so if anyone has any ideas on a more catch-all method of dealing with problems like this (potentially several matches after-the-fact), please let me know. Another option might be to assume that if absolutely nobody caught the mistake, it wasn't that big a deal, and having everything continue as usual.

Hmm... Well, in the case of Bruno vs. Amarkys, I'd doubt it would probably make a huge difference (as Bruno probably could 5-foot step back before making his attack, then being at the correct range).

For bigger issues that might completely alter the fight though, I'm not sure.

A possibility might be that you let it stand in the meantime (if the player is currently involved in other fights), but then institute a rematch between the two players. If the same person wins, then there's no change (i.e. no added loss of VP/Gold for the loser and no benefits for the winner), while if they lose the rematch then it is as if the other person had won the first time (they get the VP/Gold they would have had, and are recouped the amount they lost, vice versa for the opponent).

Er, actually, I suppose it would make more sense to do the whole VP/Gold fixing right from the start, and then rematch, but yeah, same idea.

A possibility at least.

I honestly say just let it stand. Say the 5-Foot Steps are implied.

This time we won't be having any rematches or reshuffling of rewards, I'll think about possibilities for the future.

EDIT: Azaelas, you're also up right now vs. the monkey-monk, if you didn't know.

Ya, wow. Way to know your character, self.
I would like to apologise to Amarkys for this. It is possible that I could have lost the match with that. Granted, my modifiers for my pick aren't very different from my lance on a standard attack, but it could have made a difference if any of those strikes were 1 or 2 above his AC.

I'm big enough of a Dwarf to say it: My bad.

As for something like this, I say split the reward for gold in half, and award a VP to the looser. Basically split the pot down the middle (winner looses half the earned gold). The winner did win, after all, and who would say no to a VP and a bit of gold as compensation?

Also are you wielding the Lance 1 or 2 Handed?

& Dagnabit. I am building a Level 5 and am playing in 1 other campaign, running the AotG, & hoping to play in a LotR Campaign.

So give me a second.

One handed.

I'm playing in two other campaigns and a tabletop + planning that group's next campaign. I feel your pain.

Dark Voodoo rituals. :P
Since the cat's out of the bag on my modifier:

Ya, wow. Way to know your character, self.

It's cool, I almost dazed your camel (which doesn't work).

Azaelas, didn't mean to rush you, just wanted to be sure you had seen that you were in a fight at all, since we're on the next page of the thread now :P

People have been posting pretty frequently, so I've tried to be keeping the pace going as others seem to set it, but it's not meant to necessarily be an every few hours thing.

Dark Voodoo rituals. :P

Since the cat's out of the bag on my modifier:
** spoiler omitted **

Sorry it didn't save my edit that had it spoilered.

@Jehova: It isn't a problem. I am just getting annoyed at figuring out how to handle the AotG.

A super awesome trait that I give Choon an internet high-five for using. Also, who been nosin' round them spoilers?

Man, people are just whispering everywhere, huh?

Those whispers could give something away. :)

Now, if you suddenly hear us giggling you probably have something to worry about. :P

Yuuuup, sorry for the long spoilered convo in your fight, there was confusion :P

Mwahahahahahahahaha

I really love figuring out everyone's classes.

Aye, that should be a fun part of this type of game, so let's all try to keep things hush hush.

It's late here. I'll check back in the morning. Have a good night guys.

Take care Choon.

& Jehova give the Hairy Ape the Victory.

Alright, Azaelas, I'll take that to mean you would also not like to be paired up again right now. Now I need to figure out how forfeiting works in-game...

I'm also off to dreamland in the next half hour.

Just say I haven't recovered completely.

& I think for a while I will sit out of combat.

Woops, too late, you got asploded.

Hey, Jehova. Can I re-activate Rolg? I'm definitely going to be testing him over Tommy fo rthe time being.

If yu'd prefer I wait unitl the Tommy match is over, I can do that.

Let me know.

Also, i'm kicking around ideas for a level 5. possibly just advancing Rolg, but also considering doing something different to bring some variety to the test.

Rolg vs. the monkey? :D

Very well! Rolg vs. The Monkey will be put up on my lunch break.

Cool. I look forward to it, then. :)

We doing this level 2 now? I know exactly what I want to give my little monkey.

I think Jehova is having us level wiht our actual wins. So both Rolg and Charan are still level 1 (though we both have 1 VP... 2 more VP's and you gain a level).

I like the idea of everyone going up, at least to level 2. I'm seriously considering having everyone start at level 2 in the actual arena, for purposes of more variety in builds (multiclassing possible), allowing classes to start with some of their main cool things (rage powers, ranger bonus feat, rogue talents, divine grace, etc.), and giving a bit more funding for the guy who wants a composite longbow, or heavy armor.

A potential problem with simply leveling current characters up is that the fighters who advance in levels should really only be the ones that can consistently win their fights. Artificially boosting characters will give a skewed idea of how the battles will be going, as even the mechanically weaker builds will have somehow advanced. I really am interested in this being a sort of a Solo Combat Optimization Olympics, to see how effective all of these characters that are theorized about actually fare against other strong opponents, though I think we would need significantly more players to make that happen. On the other hand, there's no restriction on having multiple active characters at once, so long as they are not of the same level, so with 7 players there could conceivably always be 7 lowest-level characters, regardless of what's going on higher up.

For now, I plan to advance each currently active level 1 character to level 2 once fights seven and eight are done. If anyone wants to change things up, feel free to throw in a new level 1 and he or she will be bumped up with the rest.

As for characters of different levels fighting, the original rules have a whole system set up for randomly assigning battles to different players, and if players want to fight someone other than a randomly assigned opponent, they must make a challenge, which must be willingly accepted in order for that fight to occur. Challenges can be between characters of any level, rewards are based only on the level of the defeated party (a 6th level character would gain 1VP and 300 gp from killing a first level...

This is what made me wonder. I believe my lastfight was the seventh. Will ours be the Eighth or the Ninth?

Yes, we're going to be going with level two, since this will be fight nine.
This is the first of the level two fights, any from now on will be starting at second, so go ahead and start advancin', post should be up soon.

Excellent, i'll kick Rolg up to level 2 for the fight, then. :D

What should we assume in terms of wealth?

WBL for second, as Pathfinder rules.

Sweet. My favorite time is leveling time. :)

Right, I think I'm ready to go. I hope I haven't missed the thread being posted. :P

Alright, Fight the Ninth!

Sorry for not making it during my break, I didn't end up having much of one.

I'll be a couple of hours before my next post, so don't wait up. :/

Alright, so if I'm understanding things correctly, we are all going up to level 2? Seeing as my fight is pretty much done, barring a gory finish, should I start statting up Kyrian 2.0?