I am not sure if I understand what has happened - has GM Nowruz decided not to participate after all?
I was wondering the same, Grenz. I agree with what Caprice pointed out. We want to make sure that the story is going to mesh with the established one and not make things harder, as has happened before. Noral, if you can answer what Caprice asked, we can work on a way to tie your new concept into the story.
Thanks for the comments everyone! Sorry, I really understood the message from Caprice as kind of a veto and I just did not want to push any further to complicate matters on your side. Sorry if I was to presumptuous!
But given the fact that you asked my to answer your specific questions, I will definitely give it a try:
So, to put that in a specific question, is the goal for everyone to play their characters and see what comes out, or for us to set a goal as a team and then figure ways to make our characters do something toward that goal?
I believe that these options are not mutually exclusive although for me it is much more important to work towards a goal as a team than to just play ones character without any consideration of the team dynamics and the overall goals of the campaign.
I want to be able to express my character's personality but a game has to be fun for all of the team so this should never be at the cost of any of the other characters or players.
I really want a harmonic atmosphere and I am playing RPG to immerse myself in a setting but the prerequisite is that the players have to be fair and kind and respectful to each other.
Fun is a bit of a generic wildcard and really doesn't help me understand you better. Do you mind actually answering the specific question I asked, cause right now I'm getting "I have a resume already prepared that I just tweak a few details" vibes.
I'm sorry if I'm wrong about that, but looking back through your posting history, I see a "Thank you for GMing" followed by a flurry of posts expressing interest in various recruitments.
I know well how hard it can be to get into games, so the shotgun approach is totally valid, but when you tell me "common history is important to really get into the setting" and then I look on your history and see "but I really have little clue about Eberron" on one of your recruitment posts, it feels like you're just giving me a pitch, rather than a person.
Caprice, please note that the "Noral" profile is usually the profile I use to just give a personal message so it is not representative of my posts. ;-)
Here a couple of characters I really like for your reference:
https://paizo.com/people/NuwaFeng
https://paizo.com/people/AnastasiaShoiMing
https://paizo.com/people/DjahanRuuh
https://paizo.com/people/IlvariaSyzrendross
And I definitely do not have a shotgun approach to recruiting but very carefully choose which campaigns I apply to based on research about the campaign or the GMs / players past contributions.
And I was referencing to my history on the boards because it is easy to just look at certain characters of mine and get a feeling for yourself regarding my play style. ;)
I hope this helps.
Thanks!
Well, I'm relatively happy with that answer, what do you guys think?
As I said before, I'm willing to try it.
I have no idea what he's planning to build, but you might point him at the various points in the discussion thread where we talked about the holes in the party skillset (IMO 1)healing, 2) knowledge & face skills and 3) utility spells.)
Khamul is on point, but I do not agree we need 'face skills' per se, unless you mean stuff like Bluff or Disguise - I have a +5 bonus to Diplomacy, and Idun has a +7. For me that is good enough. Not all bonuses need to be stacked to break the game's math :P
Apart from that, I think we have grilled Nowruz enough, so now we should give him/her a chance :)
Sounds fair. Noral, go ahead and get a character concept ready and post t up so we can get a look and we’ll go from there.
Perfect! Thanks!
Two questions GM:
1) I saw that the characters leveled to 4 a very long time ago. Are the characters leveling up to 5 soon so that I can start at level 5?
2) Do you use the wealth by level from character advancement for higher level characters coming in?
Have a great week everyone!
1. They will hit level 5 when they return from where they are, so go ahead and make yours at that level.
2. The characters do not have near as much stuff to meet the wealth by level guidelines, as treasure has not been found easily. That said, go ahead and do half of wealth by level to get yours up to speed.
Hello GM!
I think that the character is complete now.
How would you envision the integration of the character into the campaign?
I am currently writing the background and wanted to know if you have any ideas that I should include so that it fits to the storyline.
Thanks!
Hey! I just took a look at your character and it looks amazing!
However, personally I would prefer a less... Extreme character?
In broad strokes because I am at work, it would be nice if your build would leave 'room' for the other characters, as far as knowledges and role in the group. Bottom line, don't grab all knowledges and Diplomacy, and project them into the stratosphere, or our characters will become 'obsolete'. Not sure I am explaining this in the best way, but I hope it makes sense? :)
Ha ha ... I completely understand what you mean. :-D
I just thought that you guys were looking to fill some of the gaps of knowledges, healing, support and face skills.
I mean my character has 6 skill points per level and effectively knowledge skills and diplomacy as class skills so I can also decrease the skill ranks for face skills to knowledges but that is what a Lore Oracle is supposed to be good at. Everybody has their role, right? ;-)
My character definitely cannot fight so especially in battles Dora is only support, e.g. with healing plus life link so you all have to be shining.
Does that make sense?
Filling in gaps is perfectly fine in my book, completely taking over all of them is not fun though :/
I definitely do not want to decrease your fun!!
What would you propose me to do? I can also play another class.
Totally open for suggestions! ;-)
Hey, I tried to reduce skill point allocation to the different skills so that the max. bonus is +13. This is a skill focused character concept and not combat so I hope that works better?
–– SKILLS ––
• Bluff +13
• Diplomacy +13
• Heal +9
• Knowledge Arcana +13
• Knowledge Dungeoneering +13
• Knowledge Local +13
• Knowledge Nature +13
• Knowledge Planes +13
• Knowledge Religion +13
• Sense Motive +9
• Spellcraft +10
• UMD +13
30 skill points = 5 levels with 6 Skill Points per level (4 Oracle, Int + 2)
–– BACKGROUND SKILLS ––
• Craft Alchemy +6
• Knowledge: History +13
• Knowledge: Nobility +13
• Knowledge: Geography +13
• Knowledge: Engineering +13
• Linguistics +7
10 skill points => 5 levels with 2 Background Skill Points per level
I definitely do not want to decrease your fun!!
What would you propose me to do? I can also play another class.
Totally open for suggestions! ;-)
Please do not be offended with my suggestions - they are merely my personal preferences, and do not dictate in any way your character. I would:
- Not have 22 in Charisma;
- Not have Charisma to all Knowledge skills (maybe not the Lore mistery - is it relevant for your character concept?). If you take a better look, you will see we are not THAT bad with Knowledges as a group (Khamul is a min-maxer, so he may disagree with me here :P) - Idun has 4 or 5 decently covered, and I have got 2 or something. You can, for example:
- Focus on Knowledges the group does not have, or on other skills (even if not trained), depending on your concept.;
- Ok, perhaps overlap one knowledge if it was important to my concept - what is your fluff, out of curiosity?
- Put one point only in Diplo for starters? Play the part of the new arrival in Sandpoint. Play with Aid Another to the group who is already established in town, then increasing it as you wish if it makes sense for your character, and as you develop your personality ingame;
Please note my suggestions are very much tied with THIS game, the tone, power level, balance of current characters within Sandpoint, how we interact with NPCs, etc. You will notice most of what I am saying is aimed at placing us all in the same ‘ballpark’ as characters. Or so is my intention;
Last one, and this will maybe sound weird but - what character would YOU like to play in this game?
I am sure by now you are thinking this group is not as fun from the inside as it is from the outside. But you asked my opinion, so I am offering it :P
Thanks for your suggestions which really shows that you looked at the character. :-)
I believe that we are looking at it from different lenses.
You are looking at it in the sense of "competition" and "taking something away" because a character can do things better than other characters.
I see it as contribution and complementation. :-)
What is the issue of two characters having similar knowledges and both coming to the same conclusion?
What is the issue of characters having strengths and being better at certain areas?
Should others in the group be concerned because your character can rage and has a good to hit and damage? Because your character has high sense motive or acrobatics? I really do not think so - I am glad that your character is an asset to the team in these areas! ;-)
You are in my opinion focusing too much on knowledge skills and diplomacy with my proposed character which are only one part of the game - there are so many other skills that your existing characters excel at that my character could never do. And my character cannot compete with your group's combat prowess so it just shows that we are different and that is in my view a good thing. :-D
What do the others think?
I do not see it as contribution and complementation, because there is indeed no cooperation when my Knowledge is a +5 and yours is a +17. You will be rolling, and I will be watching. And this will happen for all Knowledges, in all situations. You will be rolling, and other characters will be watching. Always.
In a combat situation, many different things can be brought to the table - physical strength, dexterity, offensive spells, defensive spells, buffs, debuffs, knowledges, ranged attacks, melee attacks, the list goes on and on.
In social situations when you have a skill bonus which is leaps and bounds way above everyone else, then you will be the only one rolling, and effectively taking lead all the time. Others can also roll, and they can contribute with roleplay, but mechanically they are almost irrelevant when you weigh a bonus of +5 vs +17. And you have these kinds of values for almost all social and knowledge skills. So we will fall in the situation of - social situation? Let Dora handle it. Always.
So yes, I agree we are looking at it from different lenses :)
....(Khamul is a min-maxer, so he may disagree with me here :P)...
Hello Kettle, this is Pot... thy arse is as grimy as mine, if not more so...
and with that out of the way...
IMO, Dora's not too over-optimized.
The one things that's making the skills crazy is the circlet of Persuasion. Due to the lore oracle thing, she's getting the equivalent of a +6 stat item (that stacks with her +2 headband) on a total of 13 skills (without the lore oracle thing, it would be on 3 skills) and other rolls. This skill dominance will drop off with levels - she's only got 6 ranks to spread around (and I'm guessing 4 of those are pretty much spoken for - Bluff, Diplo, Sense Motive and UMD), and until she can get a +4 to CHA item (~ lvl 9), she's got no further boosts to that CHA (and even then, until about lvl 15, when inherent bonuses start showing up, the most she can add is another +2 by getting a +6 CHA item)
A not particularly optimized skill roll at lvl 5 is +11 (5 ranks +3 trained +3 stat); I'm going to be running an effective +15 disable device (5 ranks +3 trained +4 dex +1 trait +2 MW tools)... And unlike Grenz and Dora, the dice were less kind (Khamul worked out to 19 pt buy, and my math says Grenz is 30 pt buy and Dora is 31 pt buy).
Yes, Dora has knowledge and social skill dominance, but god help her if she has to climb, swim or sneak (effective -3, ps Dora, your ACP is -4 for MW Steel Lamellar, not -6) and only a +1 perception (the most rolled skill in the game) ... Not to mention she's a focused caster who's hopeless in a melee (almost as bad as a wizard).
Also, as it is, she has 9500 gp in permanent magic items (this I suspect is because she's getting all of them at 1/2 price from craft wondrous item), and I'm guessing a couple of 1000 gp of other stuff (potions and scrolls). Catch up our WBL and things will get closer.
Hello Kettle, this is Pot... thy arse is as grimy as mine, if not more so.......(Khamul is a min-maxer, so he may disagree with me here :P)...
Hahahahaha! I deserved that :P
Yes, Dora has knowledge and social skill dominance, but god help her if she has to climb, swim or sneak (effective -3, ps Dora, your ACP is -4 for MW Steel Lamellar, not -6) and only a +1 perception (the most rolled skill in the game) ... Not to mention she's a focused caster who's hopeless in a melee (almost as bad as a wizard).
Yes, but here I think we are comparing apples and pears - Dora will always have a role in a scuffle, and the need for individual Acrobatics, Climb or Swim will always have to be solved one way or another involving her character - she will not simply be sitting back while any of us climb or swim for her. I do not think it is the same with social skills.
And I will reinforce - I am not saying social skills should be dropped by the cahracter, I am simply saying room should be left for others - the fact Dora has an over the top bonus to Knowledge skills, does not necessarily means she needs to have ALL knowledge skills :D
I want us to still be able to say IC stuff like:
"Hey Grenz, you know a lot of peoople around Sandpoint - do you know this?" = Knowledge (Local)
"Hey Idun, you understand poultices and plants, do you know why I have this rash here (:D)?" = Knowledge (Nature)
(I would insert one for Khamul but you have ignored all Knowledge skills :P)
"Hey Grenz, you have good relation with Bethana at the Rusty Dragon, you speak with her" = Diplomacy
"Hey Khamul, you are in a good standing with the Mayor - you talk with her" = Diplomacy
Etc
Etc
Instead of always reverting to Dora for all of these, because it would mechanically not make sense to do it in any other way.
I ma not completely sure I am getting my point across clearly. In any case, I will shut up now :D
I think I'm ok with Dora's level of min-max.
When was the last time an enemy managed to deal damage to Grenz? Like, I know I've roleplayed in character that Idun thinks Grenz is literally invulnerable.
If Grenz didn't have to look out for the rest of the party, I think he could make a decent go at solo-ing every combat I've been here for by the enemy needing him to nat 3 on 3d6 to be hit.
I'm cool with, when I have a knowledge check that Dora's just better at, I roll my dice to see if I can aid another. That's fine with me. Most of my knowledges are background skills anyway cause they're mostly there for fluff and I don't expect much out of them.
Given how often we do a 'let's split up gang!' I can even justify to myself having skills other people have at higher levels. :P
In that case, it seems the majority has spoken. As it should be.
Thanks everyone. I appreciate the feedback. :-)
Just so you guys know, I am still reading through this so I can reply, but I have to get back to work.
So it looks like everyone has taken a look at Dora’s character. I am trying real hard not to add ‘the Explorer’ after her name. What stands out is that yes, as Grenz has mentioned, Dora will basically overtake the knowledge area, if we are looking at it from a meta gaming standpoint. From a story point however, I noted the Paranoid drawback. It will be more difficult for anyone to help her with anything. (DC15 to Aid Another). Plus, none of you actually know her yet or know what she knows. There is nothing stopping you from asking each other those same questions that Grenz mentioned, since you know each other well enough. When you meet Dora, we can see where it goes, but I assume that the paranoia will be played up a bit. On top of that, all of your knowledge is from cognitive learning. A lot of an oracle’s knowledge is divine influence. I can easily differentiate the two in game descriptions. Finally, thank you all for putting in your honest opinions. We have a good group going and I appreciate the work that you guys do to keep it that way. As far as Dora joining in, you guys have to finish where you are first. You will probably head back to Sandpoint soon and as such, Dora, we will need a background that ties you to Sandpoint or at least why you would come here ‘out of the blue’.
Thanks GM for your explanations! Totally makes sense.
I just thought about the drawback that I had chosen and I think that the 'Paranoid' drawback actually makes the integration into the group harder and at the same time makes Grenz's worries even more real as 'aid another' actions are less possible.
I have now written the background of the character and based on that I have decided to change the drawback to 'Overprotective'.
In your youth, you saw a younger friend or loved one suffer a grievous injury or die, and you blamed yourself for not having been there to help, even if there was nothing you could have done.
Effect: If one of your allies should fall unconscious from hit point damage, you take a –2 penalty on attack rolls and skill checks as long as you are farther than 10 feet away from your fallen ally.
Dora was born in the capital of Cheliax, the City of Thorns Egorian, as the unfortunate child of a Varisian Half-Elf slave.
Her mother had been forced to mate with summoned and controlled celestials from the planes of Nirvana just as an experiment - her mother and many, many other slaves were used as the toys of an Asmodean sorceress that regularly experimented by cross-breeding her tortured slaves with the planar creatures that the sorceress summoned to the material plane.
Dora’s mother was a broken woman and although she gave her three daughters true love and tried to secretly teach them about their roots in Sandpoint, she died too soon to prevent the Asmodean indoctrination that Dora and her sisters faced day to day.
As Egorian is the heart of the faith of Asmodeus, and the largest concentration of worshipers can be found there, the allegiance of the sorceress to the church of Asmodeus was not surprising, and this led to the young slaves of the sorceress to be tortured and ‘educated’ in the The Midnight Temple in Egorian.
Dora can still remember the Black Altar in the Temple of Asmodeus that resembled a devil with large wings and horns and which was the place where many of the slaves had to prove their ultimate loyalty by volunteering! The sacrifice of nine slaves were made to the deity at midnight on the first day of every ninth week. The wings closed around the sacrifices to hide the killing blow, and no corpse remained when they opened.
Although Dora was once clearly a worshiper of Asmodeus, seeing her ‘family members’ die week after week made her slowly lose the only faith she knew. Being asked to give up something dear as a sacrifice was too much to bear. It was during this time that one of the experiments that was conducted with her went wrong and left her arms and soul completely burnt. But it was also this incident that flooded her mind with memories and experiences that she had never experienced – almost as if a force grander than life had connected to Dora’s very being and made her see the history and lore of this world through the eyes of people long dead.
Maybe it was fate or maybe divine intervention but one day a concerted strike on the evil sorceress’ hideout led to the freedom of all slaves! The slaves were liberated and Dora and her sisters were able to see the world outside of the hell that they called life. It was initially hard for Dora and her sisters to reclaim their freedom but it was a dwarven follower of Chaldira Zuzaristan, Gundar Kargar, that was part of the group that liberated them that really took Dora and her sisters under his wing. Gundar over time became almost like a father because the sisters had simply never met anyone who opened their eyes and showed them the truth — that Asmodeus does not care for his followers, and that there are other deities, organizations and communities that do. This also led to Dora opening her eyes to the lessons of Chaldira that Gundar taught her.
In the years since their escape the sisters stayed together with Gundar in The Five Kings Mountains, the tall and imposing peaks that are the largest center of dwarven culture on or beneath Golarion. Although there were several occasions that separated the sisters, Dora was always very protective and wanted her sisters to remain near her.
In her youth, Dora saw so many younger friends suffer a grievous injury or die, and she blamed yourself for not having been there to help, even if there was nothing that she could have done. She definitely did not want to loose her sisters or Gundar! Only recently her sisters had a heartfelt desire to also seek their own paths and decided to separate which is still hard for Dora.
Dora does not know why but somehow her mind lately has been flooded with visions of her mother. Memories about her mother that she could not associate to anything that she knew. Dora is uncertain about what is going on, but she knows one thing: everything is pointing at Sandpoint, the birthplace of her mother, and this is her destination!
I hope that works?
That is a pretty well thought out Background for Dora, thanks. There are enough holes for me to fill in some details as we go along, but I think it can work. We can place you on the road to Sandpoint once the current heroes return. Let me ruminate on some ideas and we will go from there.
Thanks GM! I am looking forward to playing with you all!!! :-D
It's that time of year again. Merry Christmas to all and a Happy New Year. I am going on holidays, starting the 17th, and expect to be back for Jan 3ed 2023. Posting may be sporadic; feel free to bot me if needed.
Enjoy Khamul!
I will grab the opportunity to let you all know also I will be traveling from the 19th December through the 3rd January, visiting family and so forth. I expect to have some time for posting but... It is completely unpredictable :D
Feel free to bot me as needed!
Well, I promise not to get you two killed, I'm not going anywhere for the holidays. :P
Not going anywhere but enjoying home with family. Will update as needed, but hope everyone enjoys the holidays and we will see you in the next year!
Ok, it's Thursday night and Edeldhur (Grenz) last posted on Monday morning. Proposal : bot Grenz's perception check?
Looking forward to meeting you in game! ;-)
I hope nothing has happened to Edeldhur - it's been 3 weeks of silence (last post was Feb 6)...
Sorry for being slow to respond there, for some reason I wasn't seeing the new posts on my focused thing, they were showing up as read already.
That has been happening in a couple of my other games for some of my players too.
I messaged Grenz a couple days ago, but have not heard back yet. Hopefully he will get back to us soon.
Ok, given that we are getting close to back to Sandpoint and having Dora join, a) are we going to drop Grenz (the alternative is ShadowBloodmoon going to keep botting him) and b) are we going to hold a quicky recruitment to replace him?
I believe I mentioned this before, but it bears repeating. Due to my limited schedule, I am going to hold off on adding anyone else that doesn’t specifically request to be in this game, like Dora did. I will bot Grenz until either he returns or when we get back to Sandpoint. He can go back to the Temple of Blue Stones to train until such a time as his player comes back. That said, if you have someone in mind to invite, that’s up to you.
I am here! ;-)
Welcome! Looks like I may need to use Caprice mode even more often, with Grenz off the frontline.
1. They will hit level 5 when they return from where they are, so go ahead and make yours at that level.
...
@ShadowBloodmoon, should we be levelling up to 5?
I could join back up, but I didn't really offer cause I'm going to be slow at posting for a while. Still, I have detect magic.
Yes, now that you are back in town, you may spend time leveling to 5.
Roger that! Thanks. :)
Gosh, I'll have to remember where I was trying to go with this build. It's been awhile.
Done!
NG Male Halfling, Favored Class : Medium
Medium 5 (Fiendkeeper)
Init +4 = +4 (Dex)
Speed 20 ft
Defense
AC : 20 =10+ 4 (Dex) +4 (Armor) +1 (Shield)+1 (Size)
HP: 33 = 8 +4d8 = 20 + 5
Fort +3 = +1 (Medium 4) + 1 Con + 1 Racial
Ref + 6 = +1 (Medium 4) + 4 Dex + 1 Racial
Will + 5 = +4 (Medium 4) +1 Racial
CMD :16 = 10 + 3 (bab)+ 4 (dex)-1 (size)
Offense
Melee: ***
Ranged: ***
BAB : +3
CMB : +3 = +3 (BAB) +1 (Str) -1 (Size)
Psychic Spells
Knacks (L0, DC 11, */day, 5 Known): Guidance, Message, Read Magic, Stabilize, Detect Magic
L1 (DC 12, 1+1/day, 3 Known): Longarm, Hermean Potential, Calm Spirit
Stats
Str 12 = 14 -2 racial
Dex 18 = 15 +2 (racial)+1 (lvl 4)
Con 13 = 13
Int 12 = 12
Wis 11 = 11
Cha 13 = 11 + 2 racial
Feats : Spirit Focus : Champion (1st), Point Blank Shot (3ed), Precise Shot (5th)
Traits: Giant Slayer (Campaign), Highlander (Region), Trap Finder (Campaign), Occult Bargain (Drawback)
Skills (20 = 5*4+5 * 1(int)) (Ranks, skill roll. NOT INCLUDING ACP)
Perception (5 ranks +3 trained+1 Trait+4 Racial to detect danger)
Use Magic Device (5 ranks +3 trained)
Sense Motive (3 ranks +3 trained +1 Trait)
Stealth (3 ranks +3 trained + 4 Dex+4 Small+1 Trait)
Bluff (2 ranks +3 trained +1 Cha+1 Trait)
Ride (2 ranks +3 trained +4 dex +1 Trait)
Disable Device (5 ranks +3 trained +4 Dex+1 Trait)
Background Skills : (8= 5*2) (NOT INCLUDING ACP)
Handle Animal (5 ranks + 1 cha)
Linguistics (4ranks +3 trained +1 int)
Sleight of Hand (1 rank +3 trained +4 Dex)
Languages : Common, Halfling, Varisian, Grippli, Goblin, Giant, Shoanti
FCB : +1/3*5=+1 to the bonus the medium gains from its seance boon
I traded my feat at this level, and all my things trigger on even levels, so I think I get like, a social talent and startling appearance?
Mmm, with our new friend handling knowledge and social, I'll keep focusing on Alchemy then.
Added all my skills, still deciding on the new social talent.
I'm not sure I understand what's going on. Khamul suggested we split up, then Dora rolled aid like we're still together, have I got my order of operations mixed up?
I'm not sure I understand what's going on. Khamul suggested we split up, then Dora rolled aid like we're still together, have I got my order of operations mixed up?
Yes, I proposed splitting up. Dora posted several hours after I did, and apparently Dora has not split up...
She doesn’t have anywhere else to be so I hope that it’s okay to stay with you.