Revival of the Runelords

Game Master Cellion

Communal resist energy is on deck for the dragon.

Kellek, we'll be using the map of Sandpoint for large scale tactical considerations. I've created a copy of it and added it to the maps slides on page 2. If you'd like, you can start annotating it with your intended preparations.

Sandpoint is a town of some 1250 ish people, though it has only 14 total town guards (which explains why adventurers were so direly needed when trouble arose back in Book 1!). Of the remaining, only another dozen are trained fighters, including Rig, Shalelu, Hemlock, Ameiko, and several unnamed locals that were once adventurers, mercenaries or guards but are no longer pursuing that life. Some large portion of the remainder could potentially take up arms, but would be untrained commoners.

We could also consider sending for help from Magnimar—as part of reporting the success of our mission, of course.

This is beside the point, but 14 professional guards for a town of over 1200 is a bit over 1% of the population. Police in the US are about 0.2% of the population assuming 700k officers (exact numbers vary year by year), so it seems like a reasonable number to me. They're just not intended to handle the kind of things an AP throws out there :)

RE: Contacting Magnimar, spell prep, clearing forest, constructing fortifications, etc Lots of great ideas. Don't feel shy about posting and roleplaying out how you do them in gameplay while also drawing them up on the map. Once I have at least one action from everyone, I'll tie everything together with some narration, then we'll see if the raid is here, or if you have time for additional prep.

Anyone have an idea of what coin we have since our last stay in Magnimar? Guiness would like to make some purchases but is pretty low on coin if we didn’t get any or have anything to sell since we left Magnimar…

Sorry for the delay, folks, I haven't been feeling great the last couple days. I'll try and get a real post in tomorrow.

Sorry. My one day off in the last two weeks, Sunday, was really, really, really busy (catching up on everything else, like buying food for the house, sleep, holiday stuff, etc....). I'll have something up later tonight/tomorrow morning after I get a chance to actually look at the map the Cellion posted last week. ;)

Very sorry for being MIA. Took me a while to start feeling better and so it was hard to get back to all my games.

Kellek is going to spend all of his time in his magical lodge, drinking bitter coffee and researching spells/inscribing scrolls. I'll try and get a list/time-frame together ASAP. Wish me luck.

I'll get the map marked up after work, sorry for falling off a bit there

Well that didn't happen. I realized today at 5:33 AM that I really don't have time to figure out the ^*&^%#@ $%$Y&(y$(* Pathfinder rules for how to craft items the way I want them to turn out. What's the the ability modifier of the minimum ability score needed to cast that level of spell, if I'm 10th level and the spell normally scales up with levels. How does Kellek's Varisian Tattoo effect the final CL? WHO THE ^$@% KNOWS!

So instead Kellek'll just waste company money on spell research development. Since I doubt anyone in town has a scroll of bestow curse lying around. Alternatively he makes a note to memorize teleport twice the next day they are in town and teleports to a bigger city, or magical school (Magnimar, Riddleport, Korvosa, Oz, Hogworts, wherever) buy one and then immediately transcribe it.

Two more days until I get my 3rd day off work this month! XD

I'm sure others are in a similar situation, but Fri-Sun I'll be out of town for family holiday stuff, posting will be sporadic at best for me. Happy holidays to all who celebrate!

Merry Christmas all! I'll be taking it slow the next couple of days, but will kick back into gear on Monday.

Hopefully we'll hear from Colvyn and Kellek by then so we can kick this event into gear.

Even if we don't hear from Colvyn and Kellek, I'll move us forward tomorrow, with the assumption that they join you guys at the northern gate.

This event is likely to be quite involved and lengthy, with a lot of decisions to make beyond just making attacks. As a result, I'm hoping folks will be active and I won't have to skip or double-up anyone's actions. However, judging from the last month or so, I'm guessing that won't be the case. The general activity level in this game has been pretty low.

In order to keep up some semblance of pace and momentum, I've been thinking about how to handle this event. How would you guys prefer to do this:
- Should we aim for a once-per-two-days posting rate before anyone gets skipped/doubled-up?
- Should we stick to a once-per-day posting rate, skipping folks that don't act, and then tune down the combats to suit a party not firing on all cylinders?
- We handwave a lot of the raid to boil it down to a simpler combat or two?
- Some other suggestion.

My preference would be, of course, to have everyone step up and post at least once a day so this discussion becomes moot. Looking through the posting rate, though, I would say that is unlikely. Kellek has posted about his crazy work schedule, and Colvyn has been incommunicado for a couple of weeks, but I don’t know why. Hopefully these are both temporary effects, but real life bites sometimes.

This is too good a campaign and heroic story to allow to languish due to low posting rates. I say we go full out and set up to post every day or two (24 or 48 hour opportunity from DM’s last post), though I would like to hear from our recently absent friends first on their possible participation level if we can.

I, too, would like to step up our posting rate (and I take full responsibility for my own slacking lately) back to the 1-a-day as much as possible, though of course like Guiness says real life happens.

If that's not doable I think a 48hr bot policy is reasonable.

Gotcha Guiness and Kargas. I'd definitely like to hear from the other three before I adhere to some strict rules.

With how complex fights get at high levels, and with me not knowing the current state of everyone's non-hp resources, it's not practical for me to bot people unless they have only the simplest of options available. So its either get skipped, get skipped but be allowed to "make up" the missed turn, or we wait for people to post.

If we wanted to stick to 1/day, would you prefer things are tuned down so that some folks can be skipped without making fights much harder?

Still watching the discussion thread in hopes people will check in...

I'll try to step back up. I was relatively unplugged for the holidays, but those are over now. As for my non-HP resources, I do my best to have those always tracked on my sheet (crossing spells out as they're used, that sort of thing).

Sorry for the absence, the holidays were far from being the relaxing time that I was hoping. Instead I had to deal with stress and anxiety. I'm in a better place, but taking one day at a time.

That sucks Colvyn. Glad to hear that things are getting better for you.

Guiness was weaving in and out of trees to use them for cover, then taunting the giants, so it is reasonable to assume he was roughly face level with them, maybe a bit higher while in the trees. Breaking out into the open road and calling down the archers, he would want to have stayed low enough to taunt the giants but high enough to not be between the archers and the giants, though I didn’t directly specify that. Maybe we roll some Wisdom-related check?

For them surrounding him, if he ends up being low enough to be adjacent to them, does he get an AOO as they try to surround him? I expect the restriction of running only in a straight line means they couldn’t come up around behind him and fully box him in unless they ran under him, in which case he could escape by withdrawing upwards.

Let me know what you want to do. I’ll probably have him withdraw upwards and assess the battle as his action, for he only knows about this one giant group so far, and he is concerned that Colvyn hasn’t peppered them with arrows or Kellek hasn’t fireballed them now that he brought them out into the open. Once he sees the other groups, he will have to recalibrate his approach.

The giants are big and Guiness is relatively small, so you don't have too much to worry about providing cover to the giants from the town's defenders. I'll leave it up to you (no need for a Wisdom-based check) to determine whether Guiness would have stayed low to the ground.

As for surrounding him, I kept it somewhat vague because I wasn't sure how far up you are. If you're just above the ground, then potentially you could have an AoO while they run underneath you. If you're higher up, obviously no AoOs due to not having any in reach. If you're at ground level, then they would have simply angled themselves to run in a way that keeps you in their reach while evading your own (this of course wouldn't be a full surround because they can't be directly between you and the gate). Again, I'll leave it up too you.

Kind of you. I’ll say Guiness was above their heads but not far, so them running up on him is within their reach but not his. This will cause him to need to use the Withdraw action to avoid a bevy of AOO’s. I’ll post soon.

Wow! Three stone giant groups and a dragon on the way! This is getting ugly fast! Guiness has posted for his turn, trying to hold the northern gate...How tall is the wall compared to the giant's height? Would Guiness need to put his back to the wall to be able to strike them, or are the giants tall enough for Guiness to attack them while standing on the wall?

Walls would be 10ft tall, so they would be able to reach you while you stand on top (as well as reaching the archers!), but you'd be able to reach them too.

Wow! Three stone giant groups and a dragon on the way! This is getting ugly fast! Guiness has posted for his turn, trying to hold the northern gate...How tall is the wall compared to the giant's height? Would Guiness need to put his back to the wall to be able to strike them, or are the giants tall enough for Guiness to attack them while standing on the wall?

Pathfinder stone giants are about 12' tall, and on tip toes they could probably reach up about another 6'. So it's probably a pull up (DC 15 climb check) or less for them to scale the wall.

This was Paizo's original homage to the old D&D Against the Giants series, staring the only core, "lesser giants" that that series didn't use.

Thanks! In that case, Guiness will land on the wall in the center of the giant’s path at the end of his movement and prepare to encourage Alpha Company…

This is fun! Feeling a little nervous with several bands of giants converging and a dragon on the way, but having the whole town as a battlemap is great!

This is fun! Feeling a little nervous with several bands of giants converging and a dragon on the way, but having the whole town as a battlemap is great!

Yeah, I love this part! It's such a change of pace from typical small-scale engagements and it gives characters an incredible chance to flex abilities and spells they ordinarily wouldn't.

Kellek, Guiness is in a Defensive Stance right now, and though he has a fly spell active on him, his movement rate is far below that of the dragon. Reading the details, I realize he can’t use the “run” action with the fly spell, and I have also been doing his speed wrong since he is in heavy armor. If there is something specific Kellek wants Guiness to do about the dragon with that loud yell, he’ll need to communicate that before he vanishes.

The mental image of a huge brawl of dinosaurs, giants, and super bears makes me happy :) Pathfinder: great game, or greatest game?

Kellek, Guiness is in a Defensive Stance right now, and though he has a fly spell active on him, his movement rate is far below that of the dragon. Reading the details, I realize he can’t use the “run” action with the fly spell, and I have also been doing his speed wrong since he is in heavy armor. If there is something specific Kellek wants Guiness to do about the dragon with that loud yell, he’ll need to communicate that before he vanishes.

I think of that, but at this point a loud yell could be picked up by the dragon's keen sense of hearing, so Kellek is relying upon Guiness (and possibly Kargas) to do what comes naturally. ;)

What Kellek really needs a minimum of two rounds, and a lot of low dice rolls.

Pathfinder: great game, or greatest game?

I'll give you that Pathfinder 1st edition is the greatest d20 game... though the layout of their rule books (and bloat of said rules) leaves a bit to be desired. But you can do similar things in other games like Mayfair Games' DC Heroes (2nd or 3rd edition). I once had a horde of (Robotech) Invid inorganics appear in a modern city center thanks to the time/space manipulations of the main bad guy, and the group's superheroes had to fight them, while protecting the citizenry. That game featured our own superheroes, supervillains, our own renegade time lords (from Doctor Who), the plane of Hell, wishes, the hag Baba Yaga, the Native American Coyote God, Imperial Space Marine-style humanoid prairie dogs, and Robotech mecha--because who doesn't want to play a superhero flying up to meet an orbiting Zentraedi flotilla ship dispersing mecha into the atmosphere? Superhero games in general are pretty decent for wildly different scales of play because of the way that comic books work, but DC Heroes (again 2nd-3rd edition) has thus far in my opinion done it best.

I also kinda like games that take one thing and run with it. Call of Cthulhu for horror for instance (just being a GM reading those books gives me tingles of anticipation), any of the World of Darkness (2nd edition) books, Ghostbusters International (and it's previous form as just Ghostbusters--these were the original version West End Games d6 game system, both books were developed by the same guys who wrote Call of Cthulhu! These books are hilarious to read), Palladium Games' old TMNT series of games (make your own mutant animal hero team--You want kick-boxing crazed killer kangaroos? Real Kung-Fu Pandas, or Commando Coyotes?--YOU GOT IT!), etc.... I even like plain old skool colorful box D&D (Better than AD&D! thank you). In that game you always knew when you were dealing with a dwarf you were dealing with a dwarf, and that's it... unless he was a doppelganger in disguise. ;)

I played the DC Heroes game a while back, had a total blast with it. It was around the time I was really into the show Heroes, so I made a character fully built into copying powers. Made for a great one-two with our group's speedster, especially if the villain of the week was a real tank.

GM, do the dino HP amounts account for their DR 5/lawful?

During its movement, does the dragon get any closer to Guiness? He is thinking of trying to get in the dragon’s face and distract it—especially away from the bunched-up crowd to the south in the square that would be very vulnerable to a Draconic breath weapon…

The dragon did get closer, but isn't heading right for Guiness. Seems to be going west-to-east right now.

Does Guiness have a good view of the group E giants, and are they still at the edge of the top of the cliff? Thinking a diving bull rush might be fun...

Guiness had always planned to stay on or near the ground to fight the oncoming ground forces, but there are so many and so scattered that his 40' flying speed is really making it hard for him to engage the bad guys--and the dragon may be beyond his ability to keep up with unless it is grounded somehow...

Working on it....

@Guiness: You definitely have a good view of the group E giants and the way is clear for a bull rush.

@Kellek: Looks close enough to me. You're able to reach with a single 60ft fly move.

Fair enough. I will be patient and see what happens this round with Kellek and Kargas. If the dragon is grounded, I can probably reach it with a charge (double speed going towards the ground) and if not, Guiness can charge the lead giant using the same increased descending speed).

At the very very least it won't be this round, unless it attempts to hover, assuming it doesn't just have the feat) and doesn't make the check.

So I did a bit of investigation, and reading the bull rush rules (which apply to bull rush as a standard action or in place of an attack at the end of a charge) it seems you can move with the rushee if you make the roll and have movement left.

Looking at Charge, it is pretty clear that movement stops once you get to the closest square from which you can attack. So my thinking after looking at both is that the text in Bull Rush should have been split up to Bull Rushing as an action (may move with rushee if you have movement left in your move action distance) and Bull Rush as part of a charge (charge ends movement, may not move with).

That being said, let’s just have Guiness double move (80 feet) towards the dragon, flying at constant altitude this round. If he had the movement speed and feats to support that maneuver, it would have been epically good or bad, but the rules just don’t seem to allow him to attempt it in a way that won’t get him easily killed.

FWIW Guiness, after reading your explanation, I was leaning toward letting you go for it this once, since it's a pretty cool maneuver.

Well, bad decisions always make better stories. Let's do it and see how badly it hurts...

;o)

Well, bad decisions always make better stories. Let's do it and see how badly it hurts...

;o)

Could be worse. ;p

Kargas may be down, but that dragon is taking bleed damage so we'll see who gets the last laugh!

Forgot to mention: if the dragon attacks and gets through the mirror images, Kargas will use Windy Escape