Ahhh, Evy was the doll thing, that's why here was a disguise kit.' Einar nods his head in understanding, "Ahhh Evy was the creature that Hirah killed." Looking around the room Einar shrugs, "Not as much blood as you would think: The elemental bashed it. Hirah caught it on fire. I whacked it with a hammer and knocked a few teeth loose, but not a lot of blood. Then Mister Whiskers hit it with magic, and it was done." He thought for a moment. "Actually more blood when I skinned it." Looking at the large supply of hide. "Let us leave, we may be able to find a crafter who works with hide, there may be enough left to make you a belt so even if you didn't see the fight you can prove you were there when the dragon Longrivich died."
"Oh.But stories...!" Timmy looks considerably happier at the thought of getting a dragonhide belt made for him."Ok, I forgive you for not letting me watch the fight because you're giving me a new belt."
With the distraction of the Iron Guard riot, the party is able to make its way to the Market Square. The security barricades are unmanned due to the deployments to other parts of the city. The area surrounding the Market Square is now overgrown with a thick forest. The trees shrubs and undergrowth created have grown up into a dense maze that fills the market square.
The shops and homes of the Merchant's Quarter stop abruptly at a towering wall of evergreens that has burst through the snow-covered cobblestones of the city's streets. Ahead, the trees part to form a path winding into the dark forest that has replaced all sights and senses of the city around it.
Alvar, Hafnar, Daniella and Isakur are waiting at the entrance, as if they have already been expecting someone.
"And so, the exile returns. I told the Earl that exile would've been too good for you. But he didn't listen." Daniella snaps at Einar.
"We should have hung you until you were dead." Hafnar states.
"Never leave problems behind you, they'll always come to pester you later." Isakur answers sagely.
"Well, we get to fix him, for good. You'll be troubling the Earl no longer." Alvar growls angrily at Einar.
Mr. Whiskers looks perplexed by Einar's statement. "Do you mean it is sad because we had to kill it, or that the battle was so short?" he asks.
"You are too modest in this case, Einar. The damage that you and Hirah did was far more than what I did."
"Doll? I thought perhaps it was that undead creature -- an attic whisperer?" he says, looking to Crummock and Hirah for confirmation.
I'm not sure it is a good idea to give Timmy a belt of dragon hide -- especially one made from the hide of the former head of the guards. I will have to talk to Einar in private later about that.
Before they leave for the Market Square, Mr. Whiskers casts mage armor on himself.
Mr. Whiskers casts haste and then moves to cover.
Einar smiles at his friend Mister Whiskers, slapping him one the back. ”What’s sad is as much as I ranted about ‘humble hedge wizards’ that I’m glad as blazes you’re on our side!”
’Mister Whiskers got the kill.’ Einar shakes his head profusely ”No modesty at all, both Hirah and I landed powerful blows but it was your magic that killed it!”
Alvar takes a potion from his belt and drinks it, swelling to twice his size.
Daniella starts a rousing warchant, then throws shimmerimg dust on the entire party.
"Hear what's written on the wind.
We come to kill and kill again.
Our arrows fall like hail
Trample on the dead. - Ride through the
Gate of clouds - stand on the open step."
Isakur readies an action.
Hafnar blesses the party, then moves closer to Alvar.
Mr. Whiskers says something that might be a curse in a chittering language.
He then draws a wand and steps back a little bit.
And what can GM say except glitterdust?
Hirah moves up to the man (I have no idea who the hell any of these people are), Rages, triggers Bane, and attempts to cleave him in half.
Sorry, forgot to give descriptions of the characters in question. Alvar is wearing spiked chainmail, wielding a glaive, Hafnar is wearing full plate wielding a greatsword, Daniella is in a chainshirt and has her longspear out, Isakur is in white robes wielding a dagger.
Alvar swings his glaive at Hirah's feet, neatly sending her tumbling to the ground.
EDIT
Wait nvm, can I summon creatures inside her reach? There should be no issues with that right?
EDIT 2
Wait why is the map changing, they were not standing so close together before, what is happening.
Einar moves up, begins to rage, causing his Cambion ancestry to become very prominent.
He deals Alvar a heavy blow, breaking some ribs.
GM can we pause, why did they suddenly change position?
Alvar and that person next to them used to be in a position where I can stand on the left, and an enlarged Einar can stand on the right (but in the centre of the map so effectively side by side). It allows us both to get Amplified Rage and deny them the benefits of flanking. I then made my post, and then you changed their positions immediately after this and now the battlefield position I imagined would happen is now no longer possible.
-_-
So that sneaky stealth map edit just rendered my entire last turn basically pointless since the positioning that was possible, now isn't, and now I don't have an opportunity to cast.
Fine.
Round Two: Full Withdraw action (to basically where I was before this mess started)
Round Three: Summon.
Bot me then.
I am really angry as to how much I got screwed over with that stealth map edit, since I'll get flanked now on their turn (and attacked by both), which I had done my utmost to avoid, since I thought I'd be side by side with Einar, with all the benefits that would bring.
You informed me of the AOO (which I expected, because 20 foot reach), but NOT the map update, which is super important information since my action was dependent on where Einar stands, and I had no reason to suspect that you would actually change the map after a player had posted his own action + move. its right there in my action, where I stress how important my positioning is going to be with reference to Einar - and you thought. idk "well ok I'll just update the map, not tell her and hope she doesn't notice!"
My line of logic when I said "I dont care" was "well I don't mind taking that AoO, I'll still have Einar next to me, blocking a double team attack, making use of the -1 AoO, and still have Paired Opportunists + Amplified Rage active - I'm good". What I'm irritated about is that the map changed, Einar moved into a position I didn't expect, and then you throw a no retcon in my face the moment I discover the map had changed.
I feel this makes me justified to be at the very least, a tiny bit cross with you.
Einar asked me to bot him. And when I bot people, I do not go around taking unecessary AOOs.
I will retcon the movement even though I do not see the point of it.
And when I bot people, I do not go around taking unecessary AOOs.
And thats fine. I don't expect you, or anyone to take AoO's based on my tactical plan. I'm pointing out that when I made my post, I made it with all the information I had access to at that time, IE, that Einar and I would be next to each other, with no problems. The moment that wasn't feasible, then my action has to change, which is why I said at the beginning of my post,
"So the position on my map currently isn't exact until I know where Einar stands".
Reading between the lines, I was trying to say "hey, trying to move this combat forward, but help, I don't know where Einar stands, and he hasn't been moved / botted yet and I don't know if everyones waiting on me, so this is a conditional move for now"
Maybe I should have specified that I meant Hirah and Einar stand next to each other and mentioned the word horizontally immediately after, but again, when i made the post + action, certain information had not been mentioned - we didn't even know what weapons they had!
That is my failure to inform, I admit. But my nephew was coming in. I have retconed the movement, had you tripped in the right spot. It is my miscalculation in earlier post, should be one W and not north west. You knew you were taking an AOO, and chose to, so that's how it'll be.
Einar has like 4 x your reach while enlarged. If you wanted to run in to whack things, he does not need to follow you to take AOOs.
Crummock grins, and unleashes a ball of flame upon the opposing party.
Fine, then move Einar closer so that my point about us being "adjacent" (since its unclear due to 10 foot squares) still stands, which was the entire point of my initial post, staying adjacent - if that cannot happen (and doesn't force Einar to make an unfair AoO), then theres no point or reason to / for my movement.
A barrage of magic missiles strikes Crummock but he grits his teeth and finishes the spell.
Alvar falls to the ground, badly burnt by Crummock's fireball. It seems that Daniella, Hafnar are badly wounded by it as well. Isakur manages to dodge the worst of it.
Seeing the glaive-wielder go down, Crummock motions for Geist to go and attack.
With a snarl, Geist pounces forward.
Daniella moves up and shouts a sharp note at Einar.
Einar decides he's not distracted.
Hafnar drops his Greatsword, pulls out his longspear and then clutching his holy symbol at his belt and channels positive energy.
Alvar wakes up groggily, grabs a longspear and tries to stab Hirah with it.
Isakur continues to ready an action.
Einar smashes Alvar like an overripe melon then moves beside Hirah.
Bot me then.
I wasn't kidding about this. I still feel like you terribly exploited an action I took, when you were were well aware that relied on a number of conditional factors to succeed.
After the map error and bot so negatively affected my R1 action, I think its best you bot me for the duration for the encounter, to avoid anymore wasted actions. Either way, I'm still cross, and not up to make well informed decisions atm anyway, so its probably for the best - at least for the next 12 hours or so before I reset and move on.
I think if you either communicate the map had been edited or that there's not a single square Einar can stand that grants a teamwork bonus - then my action instantly gets pulled back and we don't have this discussion. There's pretty clear evidence that I'm unaware of the map change when I said I was fine taking the AoO so I don't appreciate you ignoring that fact.
As I said, I was fine taking the AoO, provided that Einar was in a position to trigger my ability to tank better. He wasn't and the moment you communicated that, you also said I couldn't retcon - and thats the definition of a screw over, and why I'm cross.
Like, all it needed was a 2sec post saying something like "my bad, my net screwed up and the maps updated, Einar cannot grant your teamworks feats so do you still want to take that AoO?"
Oh please, "use stronger language". You deliberately withheld information until after my post, and are fully aware my own post was as conditional as I could make it. You knew I couldn't make anything "concrete", until I knew where Einar was standing, and you knew that Einar would have to move at least some distance (according to your own post, Einar 'moved up') to attack. You cannot expect me to do an accurate reach calculation based on a map you kept stealth updating. Notify Me. Its not difficult.
Furthermore you actually have a history of botting me on Saturdays, around that time of the day, whenever we are in combat, to move things along. My posting options are "something vague", or you botting me, and honestly, the track record with botting me hasn't been that great. You don't have it both ways, either you want something quick and uncertain and conditional (ie today where there were large amounts of uncertainty in my post), or you give the time for someone to receive all relevant information (ie not botting me like on recent Saturdays), or alternatively, ensure they have all relevent information to begin with.
Next time, instead of me using "stronger language", why don't we try ensuring that the next time you stealth edit a map after a players tactical post, you notify them about it.
The easy solution is me just waiting till Einar posts when we are in same init order. It might cause more often those 8-10 hour delays you hate so much but at least I can be sure I'm getting up to date information.
Doesn't Einar move regardless? It would be a 10 foot move correct? Since a 5 foot step is not allowed in difficult terrain right?
So if hes moving 10 feet wouldn't that provoke from the person with 20 foot reach?
So if he moved, why can he not be adjacent? Either way, he is still provoking.
GM, Einar moved a minimum distance of 10 feet forward. This means that you provoke an AoO from the person with 20 foot reach.
So I have two questions
If he doesn't need to move to attack, then why did he?
If he does need to move, why didn't he take an AoO?
He needed to move.
Moving
Moving out of a threatened square usually provokes attacks of opportunity from threatening opponents. There are two common methods of avoiding such an attack—the 5-foot step and the withdraw action.
Einar has sufficient reach that he does not need to leave a threatened square to strike at Alvar.
EDIT
Actually an enlarged Einar still gives me an adjacent bonus if he moves one square diagonally up back when I took the AoO. its also potentially possible for me to take the long way around and hug the wall on the left and avoid AoO attempts based off this
Lets try to draw it in a simplified diagram down here.
A
B
C
D
G
X
X
X
E
A is Alvar, E is Einar. Einar has 20 ft reach as does Alvar. Alvar threatens square B,C,D,G around him. Einar walks to point G, smacks Alvar. He has not left any threatened squares, gets no
AOO.
Put yourself in Einar's position but you have only 5 ft reach. You must go to point B to hit Alvar. In which you would have left threatened squares G,C and B so Alvar can AOO you.
I'm pointing out by hugging the wall either I avoid an AoO myself from A, or - that being impossible - allows Einar to hug the wall to limit AoO's and still allow himself to be adjacent.
I'll say that since the map is unclear, and he's standing at the wall, there would be no way you could avoid the AOO.
Does that mean Einar can hug the wall, still abuse his 20 foot reach, and still remain adjacent to me, at the cost of me taking the AoO?
I think that the map being unclear just furthers my point that there was at least an expectation that there was a chance Einar could either avoid an AoO and be adjacent, or I avoid an AoO entirely.