My Final Way (Inactive)

Game Master Big OM

Please describe your plan to me before we move on.

You know from earlier on that the guards don't walk in to the cells together, one always stays behind ready to sound the alarm.

Grumblejacks cell is open with bar as wall, not as open as yours but still open, one could try to hide in the corner closest to the door.

Plan A: I suggest two and ogre to create ruckus from within cells, two behind door to engage/grapple each guard. The three of us rush from cells to reinforce. That is a bit direct especially for us non-combat types.

Plan B:So an alternate would be, a dogpile on the guard, silent if we can. A quick disguise, and the "guard" returns but fails to secure door behind him. Or if notsosilent, escapes the clutches to rush back/through the jail door.
We follow right after dealing with #1. The escaped "guard" insists on alerting the barracks while guard#2 turns his back to bar the door which did not quite close from the approaching prisoners.

Plan A all or nothing
Plan B w/options. Tends to play to our strengths.

Hmm...Lucia would probably go with Plan B with a caveat that during the dogpile she'll try to charm the guard outside with a Spellsong, since I think that'll disguise the fact that he had to make a saving throw from him.

Ah crap. Just thought of something.
1) we never checked the door leading out of the jail cells. Could be unlocked.
2) There is a window item on the veil. We could just put it on the door OR on the jailwall leading to the conference room where Tin met Tiadora. Rush them with the chairs as makeshift weapons from an unexpected quarter. I wonder if they bother to lock the cells with no one in them. Let me look at the map.

Big Om posted it somewhere.

I'd kind of like to save the window as an ace in the hole...if you'll pardon the horrible joke there. We know we probably can get through the outer door somehow, but we don't really know how we're getting out of the prison.

I agree with reserving the window. Will post later today, was my birthday yesterday.

Just say the word on whether we're ready to go.

I disagree. Or rather Tin, is busy trying to recall whether or not the doors are even locked outside the cellblock. Certainly, the use of the window into the conference room from the unused cell is very sneaky. And gets us within reach of two guards with surprise, far better than inviting them into the spiders' parlor so to speak.

Yes, I agree the window is a sort of ace in the hole. I have to ask, how many times did a useful item never get used waiting for the perfect moment?
OOC Caveat: Is it a metaplay? yes. I just lost a character in another campaign due to stinginess.
IC Caveat: Tin tries to avoid scrutiny until it is unavoidable. She will advocate the use of window for an element of surprise on her terms. Avoiding potentially locked doors and alert guards plays right into her personality. She will insist on this.

Slevin's take is that we don't know what we have to get past to get outside the prison itself. Uing the windoe to get the drop on the guards is useless if we're still trapped inside what is essentially a fortress, and they can take their time hunting us.

Pretty much agreed - it's much better put to use making an actual exit that no one's going to check because they don't know it's there than to gain a momentary advantage that plainly isn't needed and screws us over on getting a potentially valuable resource (one charmed guard.)

I take it you haven't reached a decision yet, let me know when you have.

Ok. We roll with the manacle fakeout.
Tin's action is to lead the ogre back to the cage, show him it remains unlocked then returns to her place within the cell. Let the breakout begin.

And unless there's objection, I suppose that's your cue Big OM.

Could you spell it out for me what you want to do, I am bit unsure.

Fun stuff.
1) ogre and us return to our respective cells, pretend we are still shackled. There may be a skill check involved, probably Bluff.
2) The doors are shut but remain unlocked.
3) Lucia sings a song not appropriate for prisoners facing death or long term hard labor in the salt mines. The others provide the backup chorus.
4) Ambush if they enter or exit the cell to rush/overrun the guard(s) if they don't.
5) Then, with comfy chairs, fluffy pillows and chocolates, encourage them to answer our questions. That is, of course, assuming they are not so overcome with joy(or some other debilitating condition), they become speechless.

That sounds about right (If you were waiting on everyone else to weigh in.)

No I am just a little late because of exam preparations.

Ooh ooohh Lucia is charming the guard.
Do I:
1) CDG? Thereby ensuring Lucia rages against me as player and my PC as proxy. Not to mention pushing back any progress we might've made if successful. Not to mention losing a hard-won temp ally.
2) Support her efforts by running interference making sure Mr.Grumpy and Drowsy does not ruin these efforts.
3) Wonder where the other guard is? For I distinctly heard a second voice.

Actually, Lucia was going for the other one, which I believe can be seen, so he won't call for help while this one's being beaten down.

Ah. Glad you clarified that, because I was under a different impression. Something we and Om should know. ;-)

So: 1)Guard rattling our cage getting antsy and discovered unlocked cell.
2)Lucia charming the reclusive guard guarding the rattling guard.
3)Initiative? Actions? Slevin, Ogre, Lana and Tin.

I must say I have never seen this solution before to the initial escape, either in the other games I run or in the ones I follow. I need a little time to find the appropriate response. Well done.

Well, it seems the obvious sort of thing to do once you can spellcast right in front of the guards and have them not realize it. At least to me.

Lani? Remember what I said about killing the charm targets? *Smiles sweetly* *Eyes-glowing-red*

I think you need to be clear on who is the charm target.

I was also mostly kidding.

I was actually thinking of knocking him out, regardless best to have the guards where we can pounce on them if the dice gods spit on us.

Well, that doesn't seem to be happening so far - even if he has a 16 Wisdom based on Lucia's roll, he can't make the opposed check so he's going to be helping us with his watch buddy. My vote would be to try to get some info out of him, then try to persuade him to throw himself on the swords of the other guar - I mean, to buy his beloved siren a precious few moments to escape from her wrongful imprisonment.

And if he won't do it, gut him. Can't be too attached to temporary minions, after all.

The minute we have one guard down, Slevin will take his appearance.

*Pokepokes*

Geez, more than 13 HP? These guys are tough. Not sure how we're expected to manage two of them with just a couple of daggers, even though the charm (obviously) helped tremendously.

I might have misunderstood something. The guards have 13 hp. in this case he has lost 10 to normal damage, how does it work with the 3 non-lethal.

I might not be able to post tomorrow?

Basically, they stack.

When non-lethal damage equals current HP, you're staggered and can only take a move or standard action, although you don't lose more HP if you take a standard.

When non-lethal damage exceeds current HP, you're unconscious and any excess is converted to lethal damage.

Sigh. I hate charmed opponents.

Look at it this way - in this campaign you don't have to feel bad about stabbing them in the back when they don't do what you want. ^^

Screw this next round I'm killing him. Either with a weapon or giving him to Grumblejack.

As I understand:
Tin encourages Lani and Lucia to depart with charmed guard to main guard room. Get him out of sight and out of mind for what is coming next. They can question him there without distraction.

Tin will strip the dead guard, while Slevin casts disguise and probably dons the guard's uniform and accessories. He indicated from previous posts he will take that guard's place and support Lani and Lucia with their questioning of the charmed guard.

Tin will fetch the ogre to observe the Slevin donning the uniform, and encourage Grumblejack to drag the body to the ogre's former cell. Tin will act as the Ogre's handler, she is not sure the appearance of Grumblejack will allow the guard to throw off the charm. So she will delay the ogre a bit, allow him a little recreation time with the body if he is so inclined.

Look, I thought I made it perfectly clear that this is how my character's going to operate - if you had an objection the time to do so was back then, not at this point. If you're just going to piss and moan about this every damn encounter, then I'm out.

I'm not, it wan't pissing and moaning at all, just a comment. In fact later on when characters can be dominated it will be the most useful weapon the party has, right now when a charmed character can only be controlled so far it's a bit limiting simply because nobody wants to be the jackass that's contantly breaking the charm. As such it kind of leaves everyone with their hands in thier pockets waiting for the charmer to exert control.

That's fine to a point, but at some point, it's gonna give way to a more effective tactic. It has nothing to do with the way you're playing your character, which is actually perfect.

More a muttering as to the limitations of the Charm person spell. You're in control until eitehr he's completely under control, not charmed anymore, or other guards show up.

Charm makes him your friend, not ours, so anything we do at all other than sitting in our cells will likely be seen as a hostile action and make him either call for help or break the spell.

Ball's in your court, the comment was more of an expression of being limited in the current scenario.That's all.

Right. I admit I was probably trying to skip a few steps in a format where a conversation doesn't take three weeks for the sake of expediency there, and now I'm waiting on the results.

Hence the statement there. We're unjustly imprisoned and branded, you guys are my friends and I trust this is true, so we're going to have to break out and some violence is needed. Made the Charisma check because this is pretty far fetched and I realize it, wait for the Wisdom check, if he doesn't buy it, oh well.

We probably can't count on being able to just ambush everyone working in the place if this works, but we can still get on with things.

Prioritize our goals. Ask your questions. I suggest due to PBP delays, we ask all the questions and BigOm answers or weaves them into an eloquent conversation.

Tin will be playing tiddlywinks with the ogre Grumblejack and directing questions of her own to the big lug.

Questions I'd like the guard to answer. 1) Other guards on staff, 2)What are their locations. 3) Armory location. 4) What is best way to depart prison? 5)Which doors are usually locked?

That sounds like a great suggestion Tin, lets do that. Write any questions here in this thread and I'll try and answer them in character.

I must admit this whole charm thing is new to me, it never came up in any games I have played before, so I am open to hints, suggestions and correction if I break the rules.

Personally, and based on some of the dev comments (for example, the guard thing Selvin was complaining about is way off base - yes, a charmed victim will fight your battles for you on the basis of the charisma check) my take would be the classic, fairy tale "Love Spell" (generally) minus the amorous overtones (unless that would be in character.) While it can be fought off by the strong-willed and won't get them to do /everything/ they'll still find excuses to try to keep you happy within the limits of their ability.

Or, if you want a short version, anything that would be in the realm of a Diplomacy check, they'll probably do without a fight. If you can't convince them regardless of the Diplomacy check, but would still work as a Suggestion, it requires the Charisma check (which will generally be easier for most people to pass than the Will save FOR Suggestion). Anything outside the realm of the Suggestion spell won't be done, and you can't mess with their perceptions (The classic "The pool of acid is water and wouldn't a swim be nice?" thing) and probably breaks the charm.

My point being that it's not as if you need to keep making the checks the way it's often run. That "Retries not allowed" thing works both ways, and if a charmed guard won't fight his fellow guards we can figure that out now rather than having to act as if he might turn on us at any second.

I'll be on the road for the next couple of weeks. I expect WiFi will be found almost anywhere nowadays (hotel/McD's/Starbucks/local NSA undercover van) but my posting will not be as prompt. Thank you for your understanding.

No problem, mine has been somewhat spoddy as well.

Holy Moly. Cell phones have poor reception(one bouncing bar) here and as for WiFi, well, mouse click then get a beer, consume at leisurely pace, page loads at the half beer point. I'll be lucky to load Paizo. It took 38 minutes to get to this point where I could post. Nothing else. No other websites active etc. I'll test again at night when most of the area is asleep.

Please feel free to DM bot Tin Jasha. I think I already posted my proposed actions but for clarity sake:
1) Tin will act as a handler for the Ogre, holding himback when stealth is preferred, encouraging violent rampages as tactics call for it.
2) She'll 5-10' teleport to flank, full defense and channel if appropriate.
3) She will channel Inflict Wounds only if three or more sacrificial guards are in range. Then she'll channel until they are dead or begging for Asmoedeus's blessing.

Her priorities are to gear up, then escape. BUT... if we are wreaking havoc in our favor, she really wants to leave this prison an unmanned charnel house. "Leave no enemy behind."

;-)

Hey all, just spent the last 48 hrs dealing with being hacked, getting rid of intrusions, re-securing home network and changing every password, reissuing credit cards etc. Should be back up to speed tomorrow.

No worries Slevin.

To everyone I am going on an impromptu mini vacation and will be gone from Monday to Thursday or Friday.

Gah. Lousy weekend along with work really eating up my time.

Also, the spell lasts a full hour, and it's been (at most) five minutes. It's got awhile. Now I just need to think of some questions.