Pathfinder ACG #8-00: Cosmic Captive (Table 2) [TIER 1-3] (Inactive)

Game Master Hawkmoon269

Haha no problem. Yes the preview will show you what the result will be. This brings out a good point that we hadn't mentioned before about cheating...

You'll notice as you do preview posts that the Paizo boards will always keep track of the order that dice were rolled in, and keep the results in the same order. So, if you do a check like this:

Inserted during preview: 1d10 ⇒ 4
Combat 14: 1d10 + 1d6 + 3 ⇒ (7) + (4) + 3 = 14

And hit Preview, it'll show you this result:
Combat 14: 1d10 + 1d6 + 3 ⇒ (4) + (4) + 3 = 11

BUT If you then insert another 1d10 before that original check, like I'm going to do now during the preview, you'll end up with something like this:
Inserted during preview: 1d10 ⇒ 4
Combat 14: 1d10 + 1d6 + 3 ⇒ (7) + (4) + 3 = 14

As you can see, it kept that 4 I originally rolled as the first d10 result, then rolled a NEW d10 with a result of 7, which changed my overall check result.

For this reason, PLEASE never insert dice rolls in the middle of your turn. If you need to re-roll a die, ALWAYS put the re-roll farther down in the post, with this format:

Re-roll Combat 14: 1d10 + 1d6 + 3 ⇒ (6) + (3) + 3 = 12

Actually, that is a great question. It was something I thought of mentioning but forgot about.

When I play, I usually keep previewing my own turn until it is complete. The rolls stay. However... they stay for the order. For example, this scenario has you rolling 1d4 every turn. Let's pretend you forgot to do that. Instead, you play Cure. You get 1d4+1 -> 3+1 = 4.

Then you remember, you forgot the scenario d4. So you edit your post and put 1d4 in before you played the Cure. What will happen is the 1d4 for the scenario will result in a 3 and your Cure will get a new result.

With that in mind, don't cheat. If you forgot to do something, just say you forgot something and add it after the stuff you've already done. If it invalidates stuff you already did, put strikethrough through what you already did and redo what you need to redo.

Also, the site has been a bit on the unreliable side lately. I know from experience that if the site crashes in the midst of your turn and you previewed stuff, when it is restored it might not give you the same results for your (new) post. So, another option is to actually submit the post as you go and keep editing it. That way, whatever you see is committed. You can add ...Still taking my turn... at the bottom until your final edit.

I'm sure you will all get really comfortable with it after a few turns. That is how it was for me. It felt really foreign until a few turns into my first scenario this way, then it all clicked.

EDIT: See, CMB knows the same stuff.

One more example to show. When the locations have cards, the will look like this (don't worry, these aren't the real cards from the Canyon, so you can click on them):

-----
Canyon
At This Location: When you encounter a non-henchman, non-villain monster from a location deck, each other character at this location summons and encounters that monster.
When Closing: Encounter and acquire the bottom card of the blessings deck.
When Permanently Closed: On closing and at the end of your turn, shuffle each location.
M:3 Ba:3 W:1 Sp:0 Ar:1 I:0 Al:1 Bl:0 ?:1

---

See how the first card gives away the card name? I'll do that if you do something like Spyglass or Augury and know what the card is already.

Now, obviously you can cheat and look at all the cards. But you can also cheat in the physical version of the game and look at all the cards. So we are just going to trust that you aren't that kind of person.

Again, I think this will all be more clear once we start rolling.

Hey Hawk, I beat you to the first post! (You know this is gonna become a competition to see which table can get things done faster, right? :-P)

I blame work. I should have just taken the day off. Someone call me at 2:30 and says "I just need 30 minutes of your time." And I'm still talking to them now. But I slipped over to post.

Ok. Our first scenario post is up and ready. Excited to see you all conquer this.

Yikes, that turn was brutal, I always forget how rough it is at tier 1 with no static bonuses. The whimsy of fate and my bad luck at rolling dice are shown off in their majesty.

Should I just update my post with my hand reset, or create a new post?

EDIT: Nevermind, I can't edit. My post must be too old. I'll create a new one.

Hey does anyone know if I can reveal the Vulture and then pass him as the damage?

Here's the power text:
When you are dealt damage, reveal this card to give a card you would discard as damage to a random other character instead.

Discard this card to explore your location.

Maybe we can play pass the Vulture, although that starts feeling like it's the most unlucky vulture in the world...but at this point I'd rather him than us.

I'd say you can. The was the consensus here as well.

I'd say you can. The was the consensus here as well.

Well that will be my strategy for this. Should help a bit with the start of turn damage, especially if we get a little lucky. Too bad it's random. =)

Yep, reveal-and-trade the Vulture is an excellent strategy for dealing with that start-of-turn lightning damage. :)

Yay, we're back online!

★ - OVERSEER ANNOUNCEMENT - ★

Hey all, GM Hmm here. There’s been a crazy site outage going on for most Paizo users. For some reason I can get in while connected to mobile, so I’m just letting you know what is going on. Your GMs are trying to get back in and will post as soon as they are able.

Thanks for your patience!

Hmm

I was having problems from home last night and this morning, but when I got to work, everything was working great. I thought paizo.com was back and we would be ready to go again, but maybe it's just me... :/

Same for me. I thought the issues were over, but apparently not for everyone... :(

The issue seems to be dependent on the ISP and the specific route your internet connection takes on the way to Paizo's site. It also only impacts http pages, not https.

We appear to be up and running again.

Excellent, working for me again too.

What stinks is that I know Leaun was trying to post but couldn't. It is now 7:50 PM in the Netherlands, so the outage ate up a good chunk of the day there. Hopefully we can get things churning again though.

Wow, I thought I lost my post - it took probably 2-3 minutes to 'Submit Post', and then the page timed out.

But after a couple of minutes, the website loaded and the post was there after all. Phew!

...Although, if I had been forced to re-roll those checks, I guess I wouldn't be too sad :)

Great work everyone, in beating the first scenario. It looked grim halfway through, but Alase's scouting really pulled is through. Also, Andrew, mad props for the detail and structure of your posts. They help so much in making this game go smooth!

Wow, yeah, that was an amazing rally in the back half of that scenario. Really didn't think we were going to pull it off considering how much damage we all were taking and how little progress we were making at the sites.

That close two and split up strategy worked well for us, luck was on our side, and I'm going to say Vulture might be my new favorite ally. Poor guy took several hits for us. =)

I'll also second the nice work on keeping this all organized Andrew, definitely makes it easier on us.

Andrew, the close text seemed to indicate we had to make a choice for the next scenario. Is there actually two different scenario paths to go here or was that a flavor thing?

Yeah, it is going really well I think, especially considering the obstacle the site is being.

Unfortunately, it looks like porting to another site won't be an option. I can't find anywhere that the bbcode tags would work. Specifically, a spoiler tag where you can "name" the spoiler button. That is pretty vital for keeping the cards in the locations obvious. I don't think having that be a long list of simply

Andrew, the close text seemed to indicate we had to make a choice for the next scenario. Is there actually two different scenario paths to go here or was that a flavor thing?

It really does make a difference. The next few scenarios depend on which way you choose to go.

It really does make a difference. The next few scenarios depend on which way you choose to go.

Wow, that's kind of crazy. I don't think I care, but ideally I'd like to see both options. Would be cool if we took one way and the other table took the other.

That's up to them. That is what happened by chance when I played it. Cartmanbeck is having them decide now even though they aren't quite done yet. That way he can prep it even if the site is unavailable. If we wanted, we could wait and see what they choose then take the other. But then we might be waiting on them just so we can start, which isn't required of us (i.e. we don't have to be on the same scenario right now).

The cool thing is that if you don't play one then you can play the special again and try to get your table to choose the other option. The RPG tables are also having to choose which path they take as their part of the special.

Also, I'd like to say that I have never really put any effort into roleplaying the ACG, but when you all got started with it, I felt that I should give it a try. And it was a lot of fun, so thank you all for that! :)

I would agree that it'd be cool to have the two tables take separate paths and give the players the chance to see both sets of scenarios by peeking between threads. So, whatever direction you guys choose, I'll recommend to my players to go the other way. :)

Hi all, sorry for realizing late that the discussions tab is located here.

I liked playing this scenario PbP very much and the roleplaying is fun to do.

Great game to defeat that Stone Eater Enchanter like this, I was uncertain if I wasted to much turns.

Now to the deep freeze... ;)

After we win this scenario, I need to pick a power feat. And I'm having a very hard time deciding. Any suggestions?

Man. Those are both great. I think I'd go with the first one too. The big help from the second would be automatic spell recharge, but I don't think you are struggling much with that. Being able to not shuffle a few times would would have been helpful when you spotted a henchman or villain. I think that happened a few times during the first scenario.

It did, which is why its my first choice. :)

I would lean toward the second one personally, because of the Spell and Ally recharge. I'm all about powers that let you recharge stuff when you wouldn't normally. :)

In a vacuum, I'd think the same way. But, for spells you are basically moving from "might be recharged" to "will be recharged" which is only a slight improvement, especially if you are making your recharge checks. Now, allies sounds awesome. But how many allies do you have that you'll be discarding during a check? If it isn't a lot, you aren't going to get much mileage out of that. And I'd want to know how we got into that vacuum.

Plus, the faster the table finds the villain/henchmen, the further ahead of cartmanbeck's table we get!

Both of my current Allies have recharge powers, and only two of my five spells can be played directly on a check and then discarded (Eloquence wouldn't benefit from that power, right?) but it would open up other options for the future.

Correct. Eloquence wouldn't benefit. While you could play it during the check, you display it to play it during the check.

So, in the end, I am very glad I *couldn't* play Tonbarse for Arabundi, because I would have been in very real trouble dealing with the Oracle of Iovo.

I can only draw Tonbarse at the beginning or end of my turn, which would be after revealing and encountering that Oracle in the blessings deck. So Tonbarse would have been stuck at the Collapsing Bridge, and I would have been punching the Oracle. :)

Tonbarse is going to have to stay with me this entire scenario, so it might make sense for me to join up with someone else so that I can help out more.

So, in the end, I am very glad I *couldn't* play Tonbarse for Arabundi, because I would have been in very real trouble dealing with the Oracle of Iovo.

I can only draw Tonbarse at the beginning or end of my turn, which would be after revealing and encountering that Oracle in the blessings deck. So Tonbarse would have been stuck at the Collapsing Bridge, and I would have been punching the Oracle. :)

Tonbarse is going to have to stay with me this entire scenario, so it might make sense for me to join up with someone else so that I can help out more.

Thank you for finding the answer to that. I'm always having difficulties with yes/no displaying cards when a character encounters something.

Like when a wizard can display Strength and then hit the monster with a Club, but he can't display Brilliance and then hit the monster with a Force Missile. But the same wizard can cast a Toxid Cloud when he encounters a monster and then chooses whether to hit it with a Club (unlikely) or with a Force Missile.

About picking your power feat, I would also go with the first one :)

Personally I love the idea of adding the may shuffle to the scouting power. The spell/ally addition to the recharge look like a great upgrade, but scouting is so helpful and the ability to scout and shuffle or not is huge.

Like when a wizard can display Strength and then hit the monster with a Club, but he can't display Brilliance and then hit the monster with a Force Missile. But the same wizard can cast a Toxid Cloud when he encounters a monsters and then choose whether to hit it with a Club (unlikely) or with a Force Missile.

This because of this rule:

Encountering a Card ... Characters may only play cards or use powers that relate to each step (or relate to cards played or powers used in that step). Each character may play no more than 1 card of each type during each step; for example, a character may play no more than 1 blessing while attempting a check, though multiple characters could each play 1 blessing.

Once the encounter starts, those rules are in effect. So, then you start going through the steps of the encounter:

Encountering a Card
Apply any effects that happen when you encounter a card.
You play Toxic Cloud here because it says "Display this card when a character encounters a bane" so it is play "when you encounter". It counts as your 1 spell during this step. You can't play Brilliance because it doesn't say "when you encounter" (or something similar) to trigger that it relates to this step.

Apply any evasion effects.

Apply any effects that happen before you act.

Attempt the check.
Like the other steps, you can play only 1 card of each type. If you play Force Missile, you can't play another during this step because that would be 2 spells. But if you play a Club, then you can play Strength since that would be 1 weapon and 1 spell during the step. And playing the Club means you are making a Strength check, so the Strength spell relates to the check.

Attempt the next check, if needed.

Apply any effects that happen after you act.

Resolve the encounter.
--end encounter--

The Alase/Tonbarse problem is one of order. The first part of the turn is this:

Advance the Blessings Deck: At the start of your turn, discard the top card from the blessings deck faceup onto the top of the blessings discard pile. ... After advancing the blessings deck, apply any other effects that happen at the start of your turn.

So, in a normal turn, Alase discard the top card from the blessings discard pile then is apply to apply any effects that happen at the start of the turn (i.e. draw Tonbarse). But our scenario says this: "When Oracle of Iovo is discarded from the blessings deck, summon and encounter it."

Let's insert that into the Advance the Blessings Deck paragraph and see what we get.

Advance the Blessings Deck: At the start of your turn, discard the top card from the blessings deck faceup onto the top of the blessings discard pile. (When Oracle of Iovo is discarded from the blessings deck, summon and encounter it.) After advancing the blessings deck, apply any other effects that happen at the start of your turn.

Since the scenario power is triggered the moment the Oracle of Iovo is discarded from the blessings deck, it happens before the sentence about applying other effects that happen at the start of your turn. So, it happens before Alase can pick up Tonbarse.

I hope that makes sense and is helpful. These are the kinds of things that become tricky to understand. But in PACG there is usually a pretty rigid order where it is important to go step by step. Most of the time, the steps are simple and intuitive. But some times things get inserted in the middle of a step, like in this case. And that is when they get tricky to understand.

I was looking at Alase's role card, and that issue with Tonbarse gets resolved with the God Caller role.

[]When you encounter a card and Tonbarse is displayed, you may display him at your location.

So, if I had Tonbarse at another location when I encountered a monster in the blessings deck, I'd be able to move and use him. Not helpful in this adventure, but might be some day for me.

Having now played a scenario with Alase, and looking at her role cards again, I'm now realizing how amazing she could become. She basically becomes a scouting/recharging fiend!

Since the scenario power is triggered the moment the Oracle of Iovo is discarded from the blessings deck, it happens before the sentence about applying other effects that happen at the start of your turn. So, it happens before Alase can pick up Tonbarse.

That does make sense and is helpful, thank you :)

Yeah, this is one of the reasons I was a bit amazed when people in my play group were so enamored with Zetha. I thought Alase looked amazing, especially for people who like scouting and aiding others. Zetha is cool, but Alase powers match my play style so much better. It's fantastic seeing her in play. =)

Wow, so many posts in one hour.

I'm struggling a bit to keep up today. My last post was made in haste, which made me miss the Veteran aspect. Probably should have just tanked the check, would have saved some blessings. Sorry, folks.

Eh. I think that beating them is important enough that throwing 2 blessings at it is worth it. The group seems to be doing fine. 2/6 locations closed. And Mill is getting to be a small deck. That doesn't seem likely to be open much longer.

Just an FYI: Tomorrow afternoon I'm traveling then I'm spending the rest of Thursday and Friday camping with my family. There is WiFi there, so I'll still be updating things, just probably not quite so regularly. I'll make sure you have lots of info to play with out me. I can even draw a bunch of random boons in case of chests or what not. We come home on Saturday morning, which is also Free RPG Day. I'm stopping by a store in the morning. Remember, you can pick up the Reepazo promo character at participating retailers. You can find one here: http://www.freerpgday.com/stores.htm

They will be available on the site for purchase sometime after that.

SHORT VERSION: I'll be a little less regular from:
UTC: 6/15/17 4:00 PM (EDT: 6/15/17 12:00 PM PDT: 6/15/17 9:00 AM CEST: 6/15/17 6:00 PM)
Until:
UTC: 6/17/17 7:00 PM (EDT: 6/17/17 3:00 PM PDT: 6/17/17 12:00 PM CEST: 6/17/17 9:00 PM)
But weekends are always a little bit less regular anyway.

Also, I wanted to say, you are way exceeding the "1 post per day" expectation that we set. Thanks for being so active. It really helps and makes the game more fun (at least for me).

Just so you all know, I have class tomorrow. I'm hoping I'll be able to post prior to class, but otherwise I'm probably going to be offline a good chunk of tomorrow. I'll probably be able to answer quick questions during breaks, but crafting a turn post probably won't happen once class starts. I'm heading for home after class, so I should be able to take at least the one turn minimum post. =)

Something Hawkmoon said made me calculate it, and we are indeed going at a crazy pace. The conversion between PbP and RL is 1 day per 5 minutes. That means we almost completed two games within 35 minutes. :D