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Kingmaker does not take place on any version of earth. Golarion, the planet it does take place on, uses the Absolom Reckoning calendar, in which it is the year 4710 at the time of the campaign.
In order to keep things straight paizo set the calendar to always be 47- with the last two digits being the last two digits of the current year. So currently it is 4714 in golarion, but when this AP came out in 2010 it was 4710.
The best source of info for this type of deep background is the inner sea world guide book if you want more info of this type. There are also plenty of wikis that host this type of info as well.
About the hexcrawl
You wrote :
You are about to engage in a time honoured dnd tradition, the hex crawl.
When you leave Oleg's someone needs to let me know which direction your group is going in and whether you are 'exploring' or 'travelling' this will determine the kinds of encounters you get and how long it takes.
So lets say we are in the homebase with 6 hexes around us. The hex above us is north and 1, then clockwise 2NE 3SE 4E 5W 6 NW? So far so correct?
I guess we have to go south and Natalya wanted to go SE so we would go to Hex 3 and explore there. So far so correct?
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OLegs is the north end of the map. This means there are only four directions you can head in. East, south east, south west and west. It is a peculiarity of hex maps that you cannot go directly north or south.
On a clock face your options are 1 o'clock, three o'clock, five o'clock, seven o'clock, nine o'clock and eleven o'clock.
So 5 o´clock would be South-East?
Well who will be point men?
Also waiting on the response if We are able to obtain one of the prisoners as a guide/groom...
I think we have chosen the next SE hex to explore
Please make perception checks?
Actually we did rest and start in the late afternoon.
Yep, though if we ever encounter the other players again you may want to keep track of times, they might still be at night or early morning when we are in afternoon.
Also, how do you do leveling?
That´s absolutly fine. At the moment we are just started, it should take quite a bit ;-)
does this mean all groups, or is it possible for some groups to level faster than others?
Also, I was expecting it to take a bit, but still wanted to know.
Hey all, out all day
Will post tonight, CWE can send his eagle to scout he has a good perception.
Good idea.
okay so about the math, I'm a curious as to why it took 3 hours and not 80 minutes?
Also, I looked up Kingmaker map for curiosity, it said one hex is 12 miles. 5280*12/80X6/60 = 80 minutes. 5280 feet in a mile. 12 miles. horses have a move speed of 40, but if all you do is move you can do two moves in one round thus move speed 80. Multiply this big (792) number by 6 since one round is 6 seconds, so this is how many seconds it took, while 792 is the number of rounds. Divide number of seconds by 60 and that is the number of minutes. I came up with 80. So I am curious to know why it took 3 hours.
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The short answer on why it took you guys 3 hours to travel the 12 miles from the trading post to the next hex is because the exploration rules say so.
You are riding horses with a movement speed of 50 through plains, and that takes 3 hours.
It's important to remember that this game is an abstraction, not a strict simulation. I'm not expert on horses but I know they do not move at a steady pace of 50 feet per six seconds for 80 minutes or for three hours non-stop. You go a little faster, you go a little slower, you give them a rest, maybe you let them run for a bit. Ultimately it averages out.
While you are only travelling and you are only moving through plains there are still no roads, no idea of what exactly is over the next little rise, some small amount of caution is still required. The terrain you are crossing is not as smooth as a map there are always little delays and small detours to make.
The end result of all these factors is that it take 3 hours to cross a hex while riding a horse with a movement speed of 50.
hey, sorry for the delay, so much going on..
I got a Toyota Camry (2007) wasn't too bad of a price, a little more than I was hoping but the only thing else we found was stick and we didn't want that.
anyway we headed out to the SE? I can post something and just put in whatever direction we decided upon.
Offtopic:A hybrid? I just know next car I buy will be a hybrid too. Can´t afford gas here at the moment! But they are pretty reliable cars.
Intopic: I think we start SE
At the moment we have 4 "quests" apart from exploring.
The Kobolds, Bandits, the fruits and the vegetables.
Deal with the Kobolds, they are in the kamelands. (Post at olegs)
Hunt for Bandits (Post at Olegs)
Gather some Bladeberrys for the Hermit Bokken who lives in a hut to the east.(Svetlana)
Gather some Moon Radish for Svetlana from the Forest. (Svetlana)
Now we could do some Knowledge Natur about the berrys and the Moon Radish
natayla, are we fulling exploring this hex, or we just exploring it a little then heading out?
The only thing about the quests dealing with killing things is that we have to beat the other groups to it. Otherwise we go to fight bandits only to find out another group might have already done that and we are late for the quest.
Natalya's intent is that we do fully explore as we go, at least initially. The advantage of picking the plains is that it takes less time than a forest hex to fully explore, which means we'll be mapping faster than the other groups and ensuring we encounter everything each hex has to offer. Additionally we'll have the best maps, which may prove useful if the patrons are in competition (which I presume they are...)
I understand your concern about getting to the bandits quickly, but there's every chance that if a group is not exploring a hex fully that they'll just ride on by an encampment anyway!
If the group as a whole would prefer to just barrel through the hexes till we hit (or get hit by) something then I will bow to your wishes.
Natalya sifts through her memories to try and remember if she has encountered or been told about BladeBerries or Radishes
Whoa. I missed a lot. I was expecting like a message from the GM or a post when these threads were up. I'm just glad someone finally decided to send me a link.
Edit: This is really hard, you guys have already left and mapped. Very hard to follow this thread and also map it.
Ah, Mardavig posted the split out threads in post #252 of the original 'The Kings' Patron' discussion thread.
Not a lot has happened travel-wise, it's a good time to swing by to catch up. We've moved exactly 1 hex, South-East of Oleg's, and all we have found is a creepy graveyard of bones...***cue eerie music and panning over to the gameplay thread...***
Well I think it is stated clearly by the GM that the bandit quest is one per group. The other 3 I think are first come first serve. And one should never forget the stolen lands are huge, there is such much what could be going on. And if we manage to be in good standing to the local resources we have an easier live doing exploration.
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I realize the worst vice is ad-vice, but I've found that if the GM rolls initiative for all relevant parties and the mobs, we can begin posting in groups (those before the mobs, the mobs, those after the mobs). In my experience, this makes the conflict go much faster via PBP.
Thus, if everyone had their stats showing like Initiative (which I think most of you do), the GM could do it pretty quickly.
Again, it is only a suggestion based upon what I've experienced.
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I agree that's probably the best way. I fell back into an, bad habit. I used to ask for init, and by providing it players gave their buy in for the combat. If the didn't init they could jump in on a subsequent round or simply pass and let those who were available proceed without them. That system has some benefits but the system you suggest probably has more merit.
I will roll init for any still absent and well proceed.
Natalya's intent is that we do fully explore as we go, at least initially. The advantage of picking the plains is that it takes less time than a forest hex to fully explore, which means we'll be mapping faster than the other groups and ensuring we encounter everything each hex has to offer. Additionally we'll have the best maps, which may prove useful if the patrons are in competition (which I presume they are...)
I understand your concern about getting to the bandits quickly, but there's every chance that if a group is not exploring a hex fully that they'll just ride on by an encampment anyway!
If the group as a whole would prefer to just barrel through the hexes till we hit (or get hit by) something then I will bow to your wishes.
Natalya sifts through her memories to try and remember if she has encountered or been told about BladeBerries or Radishes
[dice=knowledge (nature)]1d20+4
Yeah, sorry, our characters may be fighting or untrusting, or at least yours is, but I'm not meaning to offend the player anyway as that is unwarranted. Me and my friends in D&D 3.5 group often use the take 10 since it is usually the safe route, I'm use to a group were we gave suggestions on what to do to help each other. I'm use to people trying to help me roleplay my character inside and both outside combat. As far as getting to the bandits quickly if they beat us to it, they beat us to it. I was suggesting though that if we don't see the bandits, we'll know why. I do like the idea you have of balancing time management and exploring by doing what you did. Not exploring causes us to miss out, while too much exploring causes us to miss out.
Also, DM, if we ever had to get out of a Hex in hurry, like we pushed our horses to run, not have them drink a drop of water or ourselves, how much time would it take? Half the time, 3rd of the time? What would be the fortitude save? And would you allow it if we ever had to hurry?
Well to clarify things.
In your turn you have 2 options. Either do "a full-round action" or "a move and a standard action".
"Attack with ONE HAND" is a "standard" action.
To "RUN" is a full-round action.
Here is a link with possible things you can do!
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/combat#TOC-Action-Types
Hithil I'm trying to understand what kind of buff are you doing by touch to Natalya, it doesn't seem to be one of your's spell, so I suppose it's the Diviner's Fortune (Sp).
If I'm right in that case the insight bonus stacks with the morale bonus from Bless! :-)
Ok, I didn't open the spoiler, since it wasn't for Anton.
Good so it's sure that both buffs stack ;-)
Well Natalya KILL the spider!
I'm assuming right now we are one hex SE of olegs? Also I just caught what the DM said earlier about only 4 directions from Olegs, and a free version of the map shows Olegs isn't completely north. The free version shows there is 3 quaters of a hex above Olegs. In fact that entire row has 3/4 of a hex. So why is is that we could not have gone north(east/west) from Olegs?
I'm assuming right now we are one hex SE of olegs? Also I just caught what the DM said earlier about only 4 directions from Olegs, and a free version of the map shows Olegs isn't completely north. The free version shows there is 3 quaters of a hex above Olegs. In fact that entire row has 3/4 of a hex. So why is is that we could not have gone north(east/west) from Olegs?
So you haven't provided a link so presume you mean a map like this.
Initially I'd say if a GM says there are 4 different ways you can go, common sense would dictate you pick one of those 4 ways rather than argue about going in a different direction! Especially where there are no further map hexes to explore northwards, plus the roads in those hexes mean you've also in all likelihood come from that direction in the first place...
For any doubt about the area of the charter and the hexes we have to explore, I found this map.
The house is Oleg's trading post, and we have to explore the yellow area. The hexes with the road are already part of Brevoy, so we don't have to explore them.
Okay, makes sense on the map part. I just didn't understand why. I wasn't sure if the book had it slightly different the place would have just been barely in a different hex. I am going to be asking a lot of questions because I've never played an AP path or even done a hex crawl. Also for those reading the other threads, it's team fancy pants's trail, but we can't say that in character because we don't know that in character.
AT Anton, thanks for the exploration idea. Yeah, I didn't know why we couldn't explore up. Not that I would try to argue with any DM, I just don't understand a lot of things, so I have to ask question.
Okay, so another question I have is that the map goes offscreenmap
The obvious answer is that the trail came from another campaign map, but which one. I ask because I do feel some OCD urge to play the campaigns in order of the path.
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Just want to point out some odd facts about my character that might be important as we come up on encounters.
1) With the Divination specialty, Hithil has the Forewarned ability. It says "You can always act in the surprise round even if you fail to make a Perception roll to notice a foe, but you are still considered flat-footed until you take an action." So if something jumps out to attack us like that spider, we(er, you) should roll initiative to see if I still go first in the surprise round.
2) My familiar is a rat, who resides in my pocket. Besides the fortitude bonus it provides, it has SCENT, which basically gives it an automatic (no roll needed) detection of smells within 30'. The other thing is that the familiar has "Empathic Link (Su): The master has an empathic link with his familiar to a 1 mile distance. The master can communicate empathically with the familiar, but cannot see through its eyes. Because of the link's limited nature, only general emotions can be shared. The master has the same connection to an item or place that his familiar does."
As such, when the rat detects a scent of an enemy (no roll), I will get that general emotional information from the empathic link. While it is only a Rat, because it is a familiar it has a Intelligence of 2, same as a dog or a lion. So, the general emotional information should be things like danger/fear when smelling a large animal, a "familiar" emotion if smelling a friend of mine, or an "odd" emotion if the smell is from something strange like a smell from an outsider, or a "happy" emotion if he smelled food. Or if you like, the rat performs a specific "trick" like shaking when it smells something dangerous, which would be like a cell phone on vibrate mode.
Hence, the combination of Scent/Empathic link and being Forewarned, it is extremely difficult for an enemy to hide and get the jump on Hithil. Hithil should almost always be aware of something in the 30' area.
Is there a way to show a hex is explored. Like staking a claim, hangning notes to the trees, making little posts? Actually I assume we do something like that, otherwise mapping will be hard.
I usually mark the explored hex with a "V" in mine maps, but with hexographer I marked it with a "X".
Also, trying to make a "long term" plan of exploration.
We could explore going to West this hexes (listed with mine map coordination for simplicity):
Going straight West 04.02; 03.02; 02.02;
Then moving North-East 02.01, and then East 03.01, and then have a break going back to Oleg at east (04.01)
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I think miyuki meant in game, to avoid redoing work done by other parties.
I think leaving subtle but noticeable signs is doable, since exploring necessarily involves covering nearly all of a hex's ground. Thus far I've been letting people know if they've wandered onto another parties trail, but there's no reason you couldn't do something in game to make it definite.