Ready to go. I've never used the actual campaign thing here like this....it's pretty nifty. Well played, C.
If someone needs to play something and you get more judged, I can switch over. Either way, I'm happy to do whatever I can.
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Ready to go. I've never used the actual campaign thing here like this....it's pretty nifty. Well played, C.
If someone needs to play something and you get more judged, I can switch over. Either way, I'm happy to do whatever I can.
At this point we need judges.
I am hoping the other will move over here and post so we can confirm who is still "in"
Since the first encounter is waves i will be saving my spells for healing incase we need it.
lets work out what everyone is doing, i believe our monk tank was planning on getting all up in the goblins face so i can flank for him, however i am not sure on the capabilities of our other two party members so before we commit to anything solid i would like to see builds.
if we have another melee character to flank with the monk i would be doing different things compared to me being his only flanking buddy, if there are a lot of SoS spells flying about my rerolls will be better spent on those and i can just swing away with my morningstar.
my build is in my profile but just to break it down for you, moderate melee ability, poor ranged ability, high ac, high hp, lots of healing, provides/forces rerolls, has bless and fear to cast when needed, lots of 0th level spells, good diplomacy score.
I believe the profile should reflect the proper character sheet for Boghu.
Yes, he works best while up in the grill on enemies. He only has javelins because I cannot abide a PC with NO ranged combat capability. It's like not carrying a dagger.
I believe the profile should reflect the proper character sheet for Boghu.
Yes, he works best while up in the grill on enemies. He only has javelins because I cannot abide a PC with NO ranged combat capability. It's like not carrying a dagger.
looks like a good build, could you post a stat block spoiler in your description since your link doesn't seem, to work. be nice to know his AC/hp/saves etc without having to stat them myself :p
any reason for javlins insted of shuriken? you can't flurry javlins can you?
having put some thought into it i think the oracle at level 5+ with misfortune, fortune and divine interference will be the MVP every encounter.
forcing/giving 2 rerolls a day to everything nearby is easily one of the best things any character can do,
failed a SoS save? reroll it...
npc passed vs SoS? reroll it...
when the oracle picks up divine intererence after gearing up with a few combat feats then the party should never be critted unless there is a huge ammount of attack rolls coming their way or they are really unlucky (straight 20 rerolled to a straight 20 is unlikely, even if your critting 15-20 is still unlikely that you will crit threat and then reroll another crit threat). even if an NPC survives long enough to get off 3 critical threats the first 2 are negated by fortune/misfortune and then any further critical threats can be rerolled with a negative modifier with divine interference by sacrificing a spell slot.
even a god wizard cannot really compare to the power of rerolls, they are the only way to smooth combat so that over an adventuring career one bad roll doesn't wipe your character out.
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Just because I see this coming up and it is going to be a key part of this discussion, a few issues.
First consumables.
If you say you will use something consumable (like a scroll) make sure you remove it going forward.
If it is a 50/50 thing, we can discuss it here and have it go to judge rulings.
This is just as important for potions as it is for scrolls/wands/etc.
Second, treasure.
I'm going to post the potential treasure from each encounter here after each wrap up and let you all discuss who gets what and how it is divided as a party. Disputes can be adjudicated by the judges, items sold go for 1/2 unless anyone objects.
This work for everyone?
Just because I see this coming up and it is going to be a key part of this discussion, a few issues.
First consumables.
If you say you will use something consumable (like a scroll) make sure you remove it going forward.
If it is a 50/50 thing, we can discuss it here and have it go to judge rulings.
This is just as important for potions as it is for scrolls/wands/etc.
Second, treasure.
I'm going to post the potential treasure from each encounter here after each wrap up and let you all discuss who gets what and how it is divided as a party. Disputes can be adjudicated by the judges, items sold go for 1/2 unless anyone objects.
This work for everyone?
yes thats fair, could you also post how long the party spends "inactive" after a set of encounters for the purposes of craftying (i miss typed that cause i've had a few beers and i like it so its staying), also could you also post any social encounters or investigation portions of the ap so the wizard has the opportunity to mess with spell lists.
we will also need to discuss the availability of items for sale as the wizard will want to buy spells and other paty memebers may also want to pick up things like cloaks or rings etc.
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The next encounter day is actually social encounter heavy. I am going to post the skill check DC's and general descriptions.
I will make sure I post the time gaps between encounters (If I forget, just ask in the discussion). I believe the next set of events happens over about a week, most of which you will be able to craft and such (it is three mostly not-combat events with enough XP to take everyone to level 2)
As to purchase, I’m going to go by the guidelines for city size in the Core Rulebook (460-461) and Gamemastery guide, unless there is a specific note in the city section. Sandpoint is a small town, fairly soon you’ll be in a city, but then you are going out into the wilderness for a bit.
Encounter Day 1 Loot
Leather armor X 11
Dogslicer X 11
Studded leather X 2
Shortbow with 20 arrows X 2
Whip
Short sword
Potion of cure light wounds
Small wooden shield
Shortbow with 20 arrows
Mwk horsechopper
20 gp
The next encounter day is actually social encounter heavy. I am going to post the skill check DC's and general descriptions.
I will make sure I post the time gaps between encounters (If I forget, just ask in the discussion). I believe the next set of events happens over about a week, most of which you will be able to craft and such (it is three mostly not-combat events with enough XP to take everyone to level 2)
As to purchase, I’m going to go by the guidelines for city size in the Core Rulebook (460-461) and Gamemastery guide, unless there is a specific note in the city section. Sandpoint is a small town, fairly soon you’ll be in a city, but then you are going out into the wilderness for a bit.
Encounter Day 1 Loot
Leather armor X 11
Dogslicer X 11
Studded leather X 2
Shortbow with 20 arrows X 2
Whip
Short sword
Potion of cure light wounds
Small wooden shield
Shortbow with 20 arrows
Mwk horsechopper
20 gp
my suggestion is sell it all, make a party kit fund and buy a happy stick asap, and get the wizard to craft a few buff scrolls for the group. i'd also like the pc's to post any specific buffs they would like in here as the wizard will quite happily pick up spells and create scrolls of buffs at 5% discount if you want them.
Immediate problem as a judge: I can grade the party easily, but with the same player playing a re-roll based oracle and a SoS wizard......how the heck am I supposed to determine who is more important in a combat, if the wizard is providing the spells and the oracle is the one who makes sure they stick? If that's the oracle's main shtick, it's unfair to penalize him for basically being a helperbot, but it's also unfair to give the wizard too much credit for his spells if it's just playing off the oracle's ability to make them stick...
Just sayin...I know it's my job in this project, and I will sally forth as such, but.....gahhhh.
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Immediate problem as a judge: I can grade the party easily, but with the same player playing a re-roll based oracle and a SoS wizard......how the heck am I supposed to determine who is more important in a combat, if the wizard is providing the spells and the oracle is the one who makes sure they stick? If that's the oracle's main shtick, it's unfair to penalize him for basically being a helperbot, but it's also unfair to give the wizard too much credit for his spells if it's just playing off the oracle's ability to make them stick...
Just sayin...I know it's my job in this project, and I will sally forth as such, but.....gahhhh.
Here is my advice.
Take it an encounter at a time. If the re-roll is awesome, how many times will it be awesome relative to how many encounters the party has that day. Same with SoS. The players are going to tell you what they plan to do, it is your job to decide if it is a) viable and b) valuable.
Think about what they are fighting/doing and if that character will get/need time to set up. What are the saves for the things they are fighting. What are the players saves against what they are fighting.
For example in the 4th encounter day, there is going to be a creature with spell resistance and immunity to mind effects who has dark vision in the middle of a cave. How the players deal with that is the game, particularly since they will have no way of knowing such a creature is coming in the game.
That encounter has advantages and disadvantages for certain classes, just as the invisible quasit in that same encounter day.
Remember that they can't do all the cool stuff all day, and guess (or read) when they would do it and decide how that fits into the whole day.
If you are awesome for one encounter because of the re-roll or SoS, but you may very likely die before you get there...
Those are my 2 cents.
Immediate problem as a judge: I can grade the party easily, but with the same player playing a re-roll based oracle and a SoS wizard......how the heck am I supposed to determine who is more important in a combat, if the wizard is providing the spells and the oracle is the one who makes sure they stick? If that's the oracle's main shtick, it's unfair to penalize him for basically being a helperbot, but it's also unfair to give the wizard too much credit for his spells if it's just playing off the oracle's ability to make them stick...
Just sayin...I know it's my job in this project, and I will sally forth as such, but.....gahhhh.
As the player of both the oracle and the wizard i can see your problem, i actually made a post about it a little further up.
The way i see it is the oracle is a facilitator that works pretty much all the time, it heals and the rerolls not only get the PC's out of sticky situations but also help their best abilities to land when they need them most. The wizard on the other hand is less specialised and will have a broad range of abilities to call on to try to mitigate any problems the PC's have in encounters by making the situation more favourable for the PC's, eg. glitterdusting the quasit (not sure what he would do about the darkvision creature in a dark cave but we'll cross that when we come to it).
My advice for grading them would be if the wizard can end the encounter with the help of SoS rerolls but the oracle provides the rerolls rate the oracle higher, rerolls are very powerful options. If it makes it easier to judge think about what would happen if the wizard was run by an entirely different person but did the exact same thing, the oracle would still be providing rerolls and the wizard would still be casting save or suck spells, it would just be two different players working together.
Also consider what might happen when Abraham's sorcerer gets some SoS spells as well and the oracle has two opportunities to take advantage of forcing SoS save rerolls, the wizard might spend more time casting buffs then as he will have access to higher level spells faster.
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Immediate problem as a judge: I can grade the party easily, but with the same player playing a re-roll based oracle and a SoS wizard......how the heck am I supposed to determine who is more important in a combat, if the wizard is providing the spells and the oracle is the one who makes sure they stick? If that's the oracle's main shtick, it's unfair to penalize him for basically being a helperbot, but it's also unfair to give the wizard too much credit for his spells if it's just playing off the oracle's ability to make them stick...
Just sayin...I know it's my job in this project, and I will sally forth as such, but.....gahhhh.
As the player of both the oracle and the wizard i can see your problem, i actually made a post about it a little further up.
The way i see it is the oracle is a facilitator that works pretty much all the time, it heals and the rerolls not only get the PC's out of sticky situations but also help their best abilities to land when they need them most. The wizard on the other hand is less specialised and will have a broad range of abilities to call on to try to mitigate any problems the PC's have in encounters by making the situation more favourable for the PC's, eg. glitterdusting the quasit (not sure what he would do about the darkvision creature in a dark cave but we'll cross that when we come to it).
My advice for grading them would be if the wizard can end the encounter with the help of SoS rerolls but the oracle provides the rerolls rate the oracle higher, rerolls are very powerful options. If it makes it easier to judge think about what would happen if the wizard was run by an entirely different person but did the exact same thing, the oracle would still be providing rerolls and the wizard would still be casting save or suck spells, it would just be two different players working together.
Fundimentally, this is the experiment. The reason I want it to be ranking each of them is I want the players to be competitive with each other. I hope they will point out where they are "better" and even be so bold to occasionally point out where others are "worse".
Yes it is great the oracle can get someone to re-roll. But it is once a day to someone within 30 feet (with all the problems of a bunched group) and it is a re-roll, not an autowin.
It is a boon, but it is also problematic that the oracle can't really pull out weapons, potions, scrolls or wands (not to mention random malevolent noises can be problematic for being sneaky...)and the entire party is going to have to learn celestial to speak with them in combat.
As to SoS spells, keep in mind the blocks of what they are fighting and what the caster is going to have to do with economy of action in mind.
Igo has done a good job of building a wizard with decent AC and hit points at first level, but if forced to do scroll attacks, they aren't realistically going to do anything.
I hope players are going to be competitive with each other in the descriptions and in the discussion. It is challenging that one player has two characters, but hopefully Egoish will compare them for value with each other.
If I were looking at the first combat and I were a judge I would think:
The wizard is taking a standard in the first round to put up mage armor, and the ranged touch spells aren't doing much, if it even hits (goblins have pretty good touch AC). He'll be awesome with the color spray and grease if the goblins are bunched, but given the layout I'm not sure they would be, and otherwise he is not very effective offensively. Solid defensively, particularly for a wizard.
The oracle's bless is helpful, and the heals are going to be a boon, but not providing much offensively other than cause fear and has reduced mobility.
The monk is a bit underwhelming at this point relative to a martial class, but he is the most likely of the group to hit and he is one hit killing pretty much anything. But honestly, I'm a bit underwhelmed by the build at this point, as you can't flurry with the falcion, and the 12 in Intelligence seems somewhat wasted. If I had built it, I would have taken the intelligence down to 10, the dex down to 12 and bumped the wisdom up to 16. AC stays the same, stunning fist DC (and uses) increases. But it isn't my build, we'll see where he goes with it.
I would say this group is slightly below average for this particular encounter (so far) grading them a C-. They don't have anyone well built to remove hit points, so this is going to be a relatively long slog.
Just to speak out against the long slog, the oracle hits a goblin on an 11 (50%) while blessed and flanking so on an average damage roll kills the goblin (7.5 average damage).
without seeing abrahams full build its also worth while remembering that his sage bloodline touch attack hits on an 11 or better depending on his stats (50%+) and deals 4.5 damage on average (2/3 of a goblin).
the wizard hits on an 11 (50%) and deals 2 damage on average (1/3 of a goblin) which finishes a goblin off after the sorc has hit it or if the oracle gets a low damage roll. if he enlarges someone (the oracle) then the damage increases and the goblins provoke AoO's for moving into combat.
from what i understand about the monk he kills a goblin outright with minimum damage and hits about 70% of the time with bless and flanking or 95% of the time if they are prone due to grease or true strike trip.
with that in mind i think over the whole encounter (11? standard goblins) we should take 2 rounds to kill the first 3, then 4 rounds to kill the second 4 and the bard, and then <4 rounds to kill the last 4 with the ranger due to colour spray hitting more than just the ranger.
i would predict that over 2 rounds the first wave would either not land a hit or cause minor damage due to forced rerolls, the second wave would probably hit 2-3 times due to the bard and the number of attacks coming the pc's way, the last wave would either fluff due to the SoS or hit 2-3 times as well. overall i expect the PC's would take around 12-18 points of damage, depending on flanking and how long it took to kill the bard, and for the fight to last between 8 and 16 rounds depending on the time between waves.
the bard and the ranger will be dealt with via none hp means anyway and while i am also quite suprised that the monk is using a falchion rather than flurrying i think in this fight it is probably more effective to falchion anyway, also i cannot see his full sheet sill so i cannot really comment on area's i would improve him.
of the three characters that have posted so far i would rank them;
oracle, due to buffs, heals, flanking and ability to damage
monk, due to damage but needing heavy supprt in the form of flanking
wizard, due to SoS spells and not needing much support to survive
in comparison to other classes in their role;
oracle, great healing, good survivability excellent utility, i'd rank this better than a cleric at doing its job in the party. slightly worse than a paladin at damage but better overall. a bard would be an interesting slot in at this level but i still think the oracle is overall better. healing witch would not be as able to join the front line and would leave the monk painfully exposed by himself. conclusion, the oracle in this configuration is a powerful character at low levels able to do many things well and provides a resource (rerolls) others cannot but does have its drawbacks (curse etc).
monk, good damage, moderate to hit, not sure on AC but probably not huge. figher would probably hit more often. paladin would be more survivable and would be able to outright kill either the bard or the ranger easily. melee ranger would be interesting and probably more effective with favoured enemy goblin but would be weaker as we leveled. cavalier with a couple of builds could be as effective as the monk if not slightly more effective. conclusion, the monk is weaker at first level than other tanky classes in my opinion, this may change with level.
wizard, poor damage, decent ac and hp, good spells but limited uses. sorcerer could have more recasts of SoS spells but less defense. witch would have a reusable hex which would be awesome. bard would be an all round decent character at level 1. summoner would have a pet to use at all times and add more to dpr. conclusion, at lower level the wizard is weaker than many of the other options depending on the situations you find yourself in, a well crafted character with a different arcane class could probably out perform the wizard at these levels at the possible expense of survivability, this will probably change as the wizard gets access to higher level spells.
edit: abraham hasn't posted a full build or in the game play portion as yet but looking at his build outline i think he will be the least useful person in this particular fight, at first level he will only have 1 spell which he is thinking of taking as vanish. he will be able to survive quite easily but other than adding his sage bloodline touch attack to the fight (which is quite powerful at level 1) he will be unable to make a contribution as powerful overall as the save or suck spells from the wizard, the damage of the monk or the support of the oracle. however he is building for the rogue slot as a sorcerer with a very interesting build so we can forgive the skill monkey for not performing amazingly in the very first combat.
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oracle, due to buffs, heals, flanking and ability to damage
monk, due to damage but needing heavy supprt in the form of flanking
wizard, due to SoS spells and not needing much support to survive
Agree 100% with this ranking.
This whole post is exactly what I personally am looking for from the judges for analysis. I hope they bring different approaches and values to the judgement, but how you described is how I would break it down if I were a judge.
The judges should feel free to discuss here prior to posting the "official" verdict they are making.
And again, we have two more slots for judges if anyone wants to recruit someone.
oracle, due to buffs, heals, flanking and ability to damage
monk, due to damage but needing heavy supprt in the form of flanking
wizard, due to SoS spells and not needing much support to survive
Agree 100% with this ranking.
This whole post is exactly what I personally am looking for from the judges for analysis. I hope they bring different approaches and values to the judgement, but how you described is how I would break it down if I were a judge.
The judges should feel free to discuss here prior to posting the "official" verdict they are making.
And again, we have two more slots for judges if anyone wants to recruit someone.
one thing i would note is that i felt a bit bad ranking both of my own characters higher than the monk, however i think that both the monk and the wizard are very close to each other in terms of power at this level. both of them suffer compared to other classes of their type due to either limited resources (wizard) or limited statistics (monk).
if we actually played out the encounter at a table with dice i think that the monk could horribly fluff his rolls and do very little or have a string of great rolls and destroy all the goblins easily, by the same score the wizard could hit a load of goblins with grease/colour spray and end the encounter before it starts or just spend his time providing a flank for the monk and fighting to stay alive.
i ranked the monk higher since he is carrying a larger load in being the parties primary damage dealer as well as tank but once again if the goblins wiff their rolls and the oracle doesn't have to heal with good dice the oracle could carry the party damage as well and the monk might not get a look in.
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oracle, due to buffs, heals, flanking and ability to damage
monk, due to damage but needing heavy supprt in the form of flanking
wizard, due to SoS spells and not needing much support to survive
Agree 100% with this ranking.
This whole post is exactly what I personally am looking for from the judges for analysis. I hope they bring different approaches and values to the judgement, but how you described is how I would break it down if I were a judge.
The judges should feel free to discuss here prior to posting the "official" verdict they are making.
And again, we have two more slots for judges if anyone wants to recruit someone.
one thing i would note is that i felt a bit bad ranking both of my own characters higher than the monk, however i think that both the monk and the wizard are very close to each other in terms of power at this level. both of them suffer compared to other classes of their type due to either limited resources (wizard) or limited statistics (monk).
if we actually played out the encounter at a table with dice i think that the monk could horribly fluff his rolls and do very little or have a string of great rolls and destroy all the goblins easily, by the same score the wizard could hit a load of goblins with grease/colour spray and end the encounter before it starts or just spend his time providing a flank for the monk and fighting to stay alive.
i ranked the monk higher since he is carrying a larger load in being the parties primary damage dealer as well as tank but once again if the goblins wiff their rolls and the oracle doesn't have to heal with good dice the oracle could carry the party damage as well and the monk might not get a look in.
Which is why you and I are not judges. You are here to prove your position about Wizards and Oracles. I am here because I think this is a fair experiment to disprove it.
I would love to have run the monk (that was my original plan) and I have a position with regards to monks (and martial classes) that you disagree with.
My hope is that the judges don't have the same pre-dispositions. I am going to be arguing my position in the discussion, but it would be unfair for me to judge, since we all know my feelings already.
I personally think you are underestimating the length of the battle, as the casters lose a round and the area is very spread out, meaning party separation is very likely.
But I'm not a judge. That is for them to decide.
I'm guessing Abraham won't post his until monday, so this is the perfect time to hash these things out with the judges, and for the judges to talk among themselves about the layout of the encounter and such.
At the end of the day, I hope all sides and players advocate strongly for their positions, and that the judges try to look at each encounter day honestly and give a ranking based on that day.
you have me at something of a disadvantage ciretose as i do not know what the map area looks like.
party separation isn't something thats normally very likely at all unless there are enviromental effects such as pits or one player decides to go running off by himself.
what do you mean the casters lose a round?
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There is no map, per say. The encounter happens during a festival in the middle of downtown sandpoint and the various goblin "waves" are actually encounters at different points in the city.
It is a small town, but the events are divided between streets in what is supposed to be a series of battles in a larger conflict.
Getting you access to the books would be helpful.
If your wizard is casting mage armor, that is a standard action. Same if the Oracle is casting bless. During that round, you are "losing" a round of goblin killing to do something else.
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Just as an aside:
Monk was built with an "actual play" type of idea. He is not uber-optimized, for that particular reason.
The 12 Int was to allow for skill use, and every flurry attack I've seen at 1st level was either complete overkill or total failure.
Once he gets up in levels a bit, I think he will start to shine a bit more.
Remember, high-speed, good 1st strike capability, darkvision, and orc ferocity make for a survivable, flexible character.
Now, I typically wouldn't expect the party's Monk to take on the role of Tank/DPS by himself, but it is what it is.
Note: once we get some cash & I can afford it, will get a Pearl of Power 1 & a Lesser Rod of Extend Spell, allowing the Wizard to cast Mage Armor on himself & me, extended, for all-day +4 AC.
Edit: character sheet now in profile page, as well as repaired link.
I appreciate the clarification guys.
I'll tell you right now that as a Pathfinder player it is my opinion that the best characters end fights faster. So, as ciretose mentioned, my predisposition in terms of grading is going to be biased in the sense that I want to see what the characters can do to end fights.
In Pathfinder, the longer a fight goes on, the more it is the players who are at a disadvantage. All of the NPCs' resources are expendable, as are the NPCs themselves, whereas the opposite is true of the PCs. The more rounds per fight, the more resources expended and greater chance of death. So, as fair warning, that's where I will basically be approaching judging from. Healing is useful, but I dread seeing a player use an action in combat for it. Buffs are fantastic, too...but I am much more biased toward buffs that can be cast before combat and last through multiple encounters. Otherwise, as Ciretose already mentioned, you're wasting actions, which extends the fight, which leads to higher %chance of death and further wasted resources. SoS stuff is feast or famine, and largely based on whether or not you have the stuff prepared and the Knowledge to use the right spells on the right enemies. I will be taking Knowledge skills into consideration when looking at SoS and prior campaign experiences, as I consider it metagame to know which creatures have low will saves vs. high fort without an in game reason.
I'll get into more detail as we go, but that's my major bias when it comes to how I judge effectiveness in PF. I just thought it would be good to post that as a judge, so you guys know where I'm coming from.
fair play with the monk, i think even an over optimised monk would have trouble at 1st level due to the way they work. the monk we have seems effective but he does seem to need more support than a similar fighter build would require.
if the encounters are seperate then they are not "waves", they are 3 distinct individual encounters. is the time between the encounters measured in rounds? mins? hours? whats to stop the party from finding a 10ft wide side street and forcing the goblins to come to them other than the gm not providing a side street? whats to stop the players kicking in the door of a building and using the front room as a defensive position?
losing a round is subjective, its only losing a round if its a combat round, the diviner gets to cast his in the suprise round for example and you posted that the encounters were a "complete surprise" so the diviner doesn't lose a round, the oracle is only casting bless as the second fight looks about to start so unless the party are totally suprised by the second set of encounters in a "larger battle" then i cannot see how he can lose a round to something he sees coming from quite a way away.
I appreciate the clarification guys.
I'll tell you right now that as a Pathfinder player it is my opinion that the best characters end fights faster. So, as ciretose mentioned, my predisposition in terms of grading is going to be biased in the sense that I want to see what the characters can do to end fights.
In Pathfinder, the longer a fight goes on, the more it is the players who are at a disadvantage. All of the NPCs' resources are expendable, as are the NPCs themselves, whereas the opposite is true of the PCs. The more rounds per fight, the more resources expended and greater chance of death. So, as fair warning, that's where I will basically be approaching judging from. Healing is useful, but I dread seeing a player use an action in combat for it. Buffs are fantastic, too...but I am much more biased toward buffs that can be cast before combat and last through multiple encounters. Otherwise, as Ciretose already mentioned, you're wasting actions, which extends the fight, which leads to higher %chance of death and further wasted resources. SoS stuff is feast or famine, and largely based on whether or not you have the stuff prepared and the Knowledge to use the right spells on the right enemies. I will be taking Knowledge skills into consideration when looking at SoS and prior campaign experiences, as I consider it metagame to know which creatures have low will saves vs. high fort without an in game reason.
I'll get into more detail as we go, but that's my major bias when it comes to how I judge effectiveness in PF. I just thought it would be good to post that as a judge, so you guys know where I'm coming from.
one thing to remember is that either the wizard or the oracle requires a 14+ to hit, thats about a 30% hit chance and the goblins will not be focusing their attacks. unless the party get really bogged down with a bad string on dice rolls (which the oracle is designed to help avoid) the goblins will have trouble hitting the party and on average the party kills 1.5 goblins per turn.
That's good as a party to kill 1.5 goblins per round (ideally you would kill more), but when it comes to judging individuals I will be looking at how much they contribute to winning the encounter as fast as possible. I will of course factor in help avoiding casualties and providing effective control and such, but the greatest weight is how quickly the encounter can be ended. That's jut me, which is why we have multiple judges.
To answer your question about the encounter, unless you're sacrificing other citizens, you can't just go to one place and wait. It is more waves than separate encounters. When I ran through it, we stayed in initiative the whole time, though this could vary from GM to GM.
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To answer your question about the encounter, unless you're sacrificing other citizens, you can't just go to one place and wait. It is more waves than separate encounters. When I ran through it, we stayed in initiative the whole time, though this could vary from GM to GM.
Same experience here.
Judges should feel free to add to my description of the encounter her in the discussion thread if you feel that you are going to focus on things I didn't mention in enough detail.
I'm trying to walk the line between good summary and wall of text.
That's good as a party to kill 1.5 goblins per round (ideally you would kill more), but when it comes to judging individuals I will be looking at how much they contribute to winning the encounter as fast as possible. I will of course factor in help avoiding casualties and providing effective control and such, but the greatest weight is how quickly the encounter can be ended. That's jut me, which is why we have multiple judges.
To answer your question about the encounter, unless you're sacrificing other citizens, you can't just go to one place and wait. It is more waves than separate encounters. When I ran through it, we stayed in initiative the whole time, though this could vary from GM to GM.
My confusion comes with this usage of the word "waves". In my experience waves come to the PC's weather they move or not, ie. the first 3 goblins pin you in place, then when they die then next 4 come in with the bard, then when they die the next lot come in with the ranger with very small breaks between them.
In a situation like you have described the most sensible solution would be to find a defensible position and hole up to force the goblins to attack you on your terms, ie. over a patch of greased floor. Saving citizens is a noble persuit that many good parties would fall into but a neutral party is just as likely to decide that the citizens are a lost cause and its too dangerous to move around trying to save every orphan, an evil party would definately not care about the citizens and might even use them as cover.
Another thing to note is that an average party made up of cleric/fighter/rogue/wizard or a similar build would actually on average have the figher killing goblins about as fast as our monk unless he had the cleave feat or happened to be a twf build, the cleric would be on par with the oracle, the wizard would obviously be similar and the rogue PC would probably do slightly more damage than the sorcerer as long as he had a flanking buddy but his to hit would be severly crippled due to not targetting touch AC.
The only way that another group could reliably kill more than 1.5 goblins a round is if there were an archer or twf present to produce more attacks, in the case of say a fighter archer he would be getting an extra shot at a lower to hit bonus and not taking advantage of flanking or prone targets so would probably kill 0.66 of a goblin a round compared to the monks 0.5 goblins a round and would also not be "tanking", if that fighter were insted a twf build he would be able to get his stats to a point that he hit half the time and killed a goblin with each hit so bringing the kills up to 1 per round compared to the monks 0.5 goblins per round but he would still need just as much support in the terms of healing/buffing/flanking as the monk itself.
Were the monk flurrying rather than swinging a falchion he could take an enlarge person buff from the wizard and swing away with flanking and bless up twice a round killing a goblin 50% of the time with each swing and match the fighters damage output quite handily, but with him using a falchion that kills a goblin on its minimum damage there is no point using enlarge to make him overkill the 1 goblin that he hits. as well as that his AoO's would probably answer for another few goblins over the turns.
If there were a pure rogue in the party he would have a relatively poor to hit modifier but if he were a twf build he would still be taking advantage of bless and flanking and probably be mincing through goblins while flanking with a fighter twf build, indeed if there were a twf fighter and a twf rogue the oracle and wizard could flank for one each and might be able to up the numbers of goblins killed per round to 2 or even 2.5 but those builds would be different versions of tank and trapfinder optimised for combat, one thing to note is that the monk is a good character but has different strengths than a fighter (touch ac, saves) and the sorcerer abraham is building doesn't have the rogues sneak attacks but as it levels will (in my opinion) become a much more useful character compared to a standard rogue due to spellcasting being generally better than a static +Xd6 damage per hit.
I do not agree that killing things faster is always the best way, the game is about taking HP down to zero and anything with a single HP left is still just as threatening as if it had full HP, but if your taking no damage in return the ammount of time you spend wading through the sea of goblins is irrelevant. Resource consumption is in my opinion the best way to measure a parties effectiveness, if a party kills everyhing in 3 rounds but blows its load for the day then walks into a random encounter and dies its a less effective party than one that uses half its resources and spends 10 rounds dealing with the combat. As long as the results are the same (all goblins dead) then the best judge is what you had to use to get it done.
One last thing about clustering up, at lower levels its often best to cluster up as there are far fewer aoe effects flying around and the ones that are available (burning hands and colour spray are the most popular) you can often see coming and spread out to avoid. the benefits you gain from having easily healing, easier buffing, better flanking protection outweight the risks of aoe damage. Even up to level 5 getting hit by a fireball isn't exactly a huge problem (5d6 damage = 17.5) as its probably about 1/4 of the wizards hp by that level.
You're in the middle of a giant festival, and goblins come in from every angle. You're treated to three episodic encounters that happen really closely together. To be honest, if you ran away and holed up as a defensive measure, you'd pretty much screw over huge plot points of the adventure path right from the start. The whole idea is that the party fights off goblins and helps rescue a central figure who is a returning NPC. Were the party to ignore this so that they could run and hide, it would take a bunch of DM adjudication to figure it all out. This isn't a play by post game, we're just gauging effectiveness in some encounters. The point isn't to say "Well I see the encounter here....but that's not the encounter I want to go through as I would do XXXXX instead." That's just not helpful to the whole idea, as far as I can tell, of what we're trying to do.
I appreciate your detailed write-up on party chemistry. It's duly noted. That said, I don't compare things to a "baseline" of fighter-cleric-wizard-rogue. I agree on the resource consumption, and it's my point that the longer a fight goes on, the more resources are expended, typically. Obviously, if a group completely locks down the enemies with very few resources expended, and takes a little longer to kill them, then that is pretty darn good. It's my personal experience and belief that killing fast is the best defense in 3.5 and Pathfinder. The more turns an enemy gets, the more trouble you're in, and, likely, the more resources you're going to be expending.
Either way, I'm just letting you know my school of thought when it comes to judging encounters.
You're in the middle of a giant festival, and goblins come in from every angle. You're treated to three episodic encounters that happen really closely together. To be honest, if you ran away and holed up as a defensive measure, you'd pretty much screw over huge plot points of the adventure path right from the start. The whole idea is that the party fights off goblins and helps rescue a central figure who is a returning NPC. Were the party to ignore this so that they could run and hide, it would take a bunch of DM adjudication to figure it all out. This isn't a play by post game, we're just gauging effectiveness in some encounters. The point isn't to say "Well I see the encounter here....but that's not the encounter I want to go through as I would do XXXXX instead." That's just not helpful to the whole idea, as far as I can tell, of what we're trying to do.
I appreciate your detailed write-up on party chemistry. It's duly noted. That said, I don't compare things to a "baseline" of fighter-cleric-wizard-rogue. I agree on the resource consumption, and it's my point that the longer a fight goes on, the more resources are expended, typically. Obviously, if a group completely locks down the enemies with very few resources expended, and takes a little longer to kill them, then that is pretty darn good. It's my personal experience and belief that killing fast is the best defense in 3.5 and Pathfinder. The more turns an enemy gets, the more trouble you're in, and, likely, the more resources you're going to be expending.
Either way, I'm just letting you know my school of thought when it comes to judging encounters.
The point is to gauge how effective certain characters can be in certain circumstances, now if your going to dismiss simple tactics that a character may use then you are infact forcing that character into your own preconcieved notion of what they should do and how they should do it.
I am not calling into question your abilities as a judge or even your assertion that the party would not be able to hole up and take a defensive position. I am however unsure if you should be making decisions based on what a party should do rather than what they would do.
Right on, man. The circumstances we're gauging are detailed in the book as certain encounters. As it's not play by post, I don't think we're going to be rewriting the encounters.
I'm not forcing anyone into any actions, but the AP WILL DO THAT. The whole thing with an AP is that it's a pre-written story. You ARE railroaded, that's what APs do. If I were DMing this for you, it would be different as I can adjust to your tactics, re-write the story, and generally encourage outside the box creativity. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's not what we're doing here.
If I'm wrong, I apologize. I would never want to tell people what they have to do in an RPG.
Right on, man. The circumstances we're gauging are detailed in the book as certain encounters. As it's not play by post, I don't think we're going to be rewriting the encounters.
I'm not forcing anyone into any actions, but the AP WILL DO THAT. The whole thing with an AP is that it's a pre-written story. You ARE railroaded, that's what APs do. If I were DMing this for you, it would be different as I can adjust to your tactics, re-write the story, and generally encourage outside the box creativity. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's not what we're doing here.
If I'm wrong, I apologize. I would never want to tell people what they have to do in an RPG.
Oh, the AP will try to force the players into doing certain things, but as you probably well know from gming yourself, players often do not do what you expect them to do.
Weather or not the AP allows for it i think we should spare some thought in the judgements of ways the players would go about doing something rather than how the AP expects it to pan out, no plan survives contact with the enemy and in this case the enemy is the party.
Judging how effective certain characters are in each situation will not be easy, especially in such an abstract system, but i just wanted to give all the judges a moment to think about the would vs the should of playing a game like pathfinder.
I agree 100%. As we're trying to judge classes, and not players, I think it will be important to stick to the script, so to speak, and try to get a feel for how the classes handle/contribute to the different encounters. We're really just using RotRL to get a set of encounters to work with so that we can judge how classes fare. In that sense, we need to just plug the classes in against the encounters. Now, if I were rating PLAYERS, then I'd agree that every option should be open in terms of player choice.
One other thing i would like to mention, i do agree that killing things is a measure of how successful a party can be. However one thing to remember is that the roll of killing things invariably falls to the fighter types these days with other party members providing minor damage and support.
Once again not having a go at the monk spec but if this party were made up of a two weapon warrior, a rerolls orcale, a control wizard and a skill monkey then the enlarged, blessed, flanking, weapon focus fighter would be mincing the encounters by himself and probably deserve the no1 position in the rankings as the other party members made it easier for him to do what he already does well.
The monk has no problems putting the goblins down but his number of sucessful hits is suffering due to lack of flurry, which means that he needs even more support than the fighter to sucessfully land the hits to one shot goblins. As well as that the contribution of both the wizard and the sorcerer would be higher with a shortsword wielding fighter in the party as while he may not one hit goblins with his shortsword strikes the touch attack finishers would be more valuable as he is not overkilling the goblins on each attack.
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One other thing i would like to mention, i do agree that killing things is a measure of how successful a party can be. However one thing to remember is that the roll of killing things invariably falls to the fighter types these days with other party members providing minor damage and support.
Once again not having a go at the monk spec but if this party were made up of a two weapon warrior, a rerolls orcale, a control wizard and a skill monkey then the enlarged, blessed, flanking, weapon focus fighter would be mincing the encounters by himself and probably deserve the no1 position in the rankings as the other party members made it easier for him to do what he already does well.
The monk has no problems putting the goblins down but his number of sucessful hits is suffering due to lack of flurry, which means that he needs even more support than the fighter to sucessfully land the hits to one shot goblins. As well as that the contribution of both the wizard and the sorcerer would be higher with a shortsword wielding fighter in the party as while he may not one hit goblins with his shortsword strikes the touch attack finishers would be more valuable as he is not overkilling the goblins on each attack.
The lack of flurry is a player choice at this point that I am assuming will change later.
Once Abraham posts today we'll get the results of the first encounter, move forward to the second set and be done with level one comparisons.
The lack of flurry is a player choice at this point that I am assuming will change later.
Once Abraham posts today we'll get the results of the first encounter, move forward to the second set and be done with level one comparisons.
indeed, i don't think any of the classes we've chosen do particularly well at level 1. we should see a marked improvement for them all as we move up.
In a test about optimisation we really should be picking on sub optimal choices and against the basic goblins not flurrying is actually a sub optimal choice.
AC 16 with 6 hp, falchion +3 to hit 2d4+5 damage,
hits on a 13 so 40% of the time he kills a goblin.
flurry +2/+2 to hit d6+3 damage,
hits on a 14 so 35% of the time he hits, 66% of the time he kills a goblin.
due to the second attack he has around 50% chance of killing a goblin if he uses flurry compared to a 40% chance with the falchion, he also has about a 10% chance of killing 2 goblins a round while flurrying compared to a 0% chance to kill 2 goblins with the falchion.
changing the to hit bonus via bless and flanking only plays further in favour of flurrying.
The lack of flurry is a player choice at this point that I am assuming will change later.
Once Abraham posts today we'll get the results of the first encounter, move forward to the second set and be done with level one comparisons.
indeed, i don't think any of the classes we've chosen do particularly well at level 1. we should see a marked improvement for them all as we move up.
In a test about optimisation we really should be picking on sub optimal choices and against the basic goblins not flurrying is actually a sub optimal choice.
AC 16 with 6 hp, falchion +3 to hit 2d4+5 damage,
hits on a 13 so 40% of the time he kills a goblin.flurry +2/+2 to hit d6+3 damage,
hits on a 14 so 35% of the time he hits, 66% of the time he kills a goblin.due to the second attack he has around 50% chance of killing a goblin if he uses flurry compared to a 40% chance with the falchion, he also has about a 10% chance of killing 2 goblins a round while flurrying compared to a 0% chance to kill 2 goblins with the falchion.
changing the to hit bonus via bless and flanking only plays further in favour of flurrying.
He still retains the ability to flurry on the chance that he gets a full attack and/or is adjacent to 2 goblins, depending on how a party is spread and with only 3 goblins on the field (and with the liklihood of needing to move) the use of the falchion with a higher attack bonus is arguably a better choice than monk weapons or bare fists.
He still retains the ability to flurry on the chance that he gets a full attack and/or is adjacent to 2 goblins, depending on how a party is spread and with only 3 goblins on the field (and with the liklihood of needing to move) the use of the falchion with a higher attack bonus is arguably a better choice than monk weapons or bare fists.The lack of flurry is a player choice at this point that I am assuming will change later.
Once Abraham posts today we'll get the results of the first encounter, move forward to the second set and be done with level one comparisons.
indeed, i don't think any of the classes we've chosen do particularly well at level 1. we should see a marked improvement for them all as we move up.
In a test about optimisation we really should be picking on sub optimal choices and against the basic goblins not flurrying is actually a sub optimal choice.
AC 16 with 6 hp, falchion +3 to hit 2d4+5 damage,
hits on a 13 so 40% of the time he kills a goblin.flurry +2/+2 to hit d6+3 damage,
hits on a 14 so 35% of the time he hits, 66% of the time he kills a goblin.due to the second attack he has around 50% chance of killing a goblin if he uses flurry compared to a 40% chance with the falchion, he also has about a 10% chance of killing 2 goblins a round while flurrying compared to a 0% chance to kill 2 goblins with the falchion.
changing the to hit bonus via bless and flanking only plays further in favour of flurrying.
Other than the fact you quoted the maths of the situation and ignored it, how is it that one chance to hit at 40% can be arguably better than 2 chances to hit at 35%?
If he cannot get a full attack then the falchion does have a better attack bonus there is no doubt of that, but in that case he should arguably be using shuriken (insted of javlins which he cannot flurry) to get a full attack in at range and would on average heavily wound a goblin for one of the arcane casters to finish off with a touch attack.
There is an optimisation guide by TM which doesn't provide the math but is accurate with regards to its assessments, flurrying is better than not flurrying unless you need to roll 19 or more to hit when not flurrying and in that situation your probably better using an alternate way of dealing with the problem.
Edit: someone sent me a helpful formula so i'm going to post exact math for you since i couldn't be bothered to work it all out yesterday and that may be where the problem has arisen.
falchion +3 (2d4+4,18-20/x2) vs AC 16, 6hp
hits on 13 (40%) kills on minumin damage = 40% kill rate
flurry +2/+2 (d6+3,x2) vs AC 16, 6hp (much more complicated)
hits on 14 (35%) kills on 3+ (66%) = (1-(.65*.65))=57.75% hit chance, (.35*.35)=12.25% chance of 2 hits. 66% of those hits will kill so, this is a very complicated bit and i think it may need checking as i am not sure my math is correct...
.35*.66=.231 (chance for a single attack to hit and kill)
1-.231=.769 (chance for single attack to miss or not kill)
.769*.769=.591361 (chance for both to miss or not kill)
1-.591361=.408639 (chance for one hit and one kill from both attacks)
chance to kill a single goblin 40.8639%
.231*.231=.053361 (chance for two kills)
chance to kill two goblins in one round 5.3361%
.35*.33=.1155 (chance for a single attack to hit and wound)
1-.1155=.8845 (chance for single attack to miss)
.8845*.8845=.78234025 (chance for both to miss)
1-.78234025=.21765975 (chance for one hit and wound)
chance to hit but not kill a single goblin 21.765975%
.1155*.1155=.01334025 (chance for two hits and wounds)
chance to hit but not kill two goblins in one round 1.334025%
overall chance to cause damage to a single goblin 57.75%
overall chance to cause damage to two goblins in one round 12.25%
conclusion: not quite as cut and dry as i thought in the first place but flurrying is still a better option overall than falchion vs goblins, i won't post the math for flanking and bless but the advantage of flurry gets higher the higher your to hit bonus is.
with all the buffs available (bless/flank etc) the falchion monk kills a goblin 55% of the time.
with enlarge and all the other buffs the flurry monk kills a goblins 75% of the time with a 25% chance of killing two in a round.
this is all relative to the ease with which the monk can get a full attack but i hope it demonstrated the difference between flurrying and not flurrying, and why i am still a big supporter of shuriken.
@ Egoish: I was adovocating the use of the falchion on the grounds that it has a higher chance of hitting and killing than bare fists when needing to move, hence the bit about retaining the ability to flurry if he can full attack. Shuriken may or may not always be a good option depending on conditions, like many options. I did not recommend the use of the falchion over a FoB. More later, posting from a mobile device now. Typing is difficult and slow.
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Again, this Monk was NOT designed with ultra-optimization in mind.
Rather, he is designed to "get the job done", whether that be sneaking around, extracting information from enemies, gathering intelligence, leading the party through the wilderness, escaping melee/ranged threats, countering spellcasters, and serving as the main melee guy in a pinch.
Seeing as how he's the ONLY melee guy, that last role is going to have to take greater precedence, which will come into fruition as he levels up.
Re: flurry vs. non-flurry. While I am aware of DPR calcuations, and more than capable of running such numbers through Excel, this violates the idea of "viable" vs. "non-viable" characters.
If, in order to present a significant asset to the group, a Monk requires cutting-edge optimization (a premise I do not believe to be true), then the class is unsuitable as written, and needs changes.
Instead, if a Monk is capable of adding valuable abilities/filling necessary "roles" in a party, WITHOUT needing cutting-edge optimization, it is a viable character without the class being changed.
That's the crux of this "experiment", no?
Again, this Monk was NOT designed with ultra-optimization in mind.
Rather, he is designed to "get the job done", whether that be sneaking around, extracting information from enemies, gathering intelligence, leading the party through the wilderness, escaping melee/ranged threats, countering spellcasters, and serving as the main melee guy in a pinch.
Seeing as how he's the ONLY melee guy, that last role is going to have to take greater precedence, which will come into fruition as he levels up.
Re: flurry vs. non-flurry. While I am aware of DPR calcuations, and more than capable of running such numbers through Excel, this violates the idea of "viable" vs. "non-viable" characters.
If, in order to present a significant asset to the group, a Monk requires cutting-edge optimization (a premise I do not believe to be true), then the class is unsuitable as written, and needs changes.
Instead, if a Monk is capable of adding valuable abilities/filling necessary "roles" in a party, WITHOUT needing cutting-edge optimization, it is a viable character without the class being changed.
That's the crux of this "experiment", no?
In practice i agree with you, however in this theory crafting enviroment which is going to be steeped with personal opinion as even the judges will have preconceptions which they cannot overcome when ranking the characters then the monk (or oracle or sorcerer or wizard) doing things in a sub optimal way may skew the results of the experiment to seem like the monk is underpowered when infact some poor choices were made which resulted in him being less effective than he could be.
If we were sat around my gaming table and i was gming or playing and i saw another player rock up with the monk you have written i'd be happy, its not insane, its got a good skill set and as you say it can fill a variety of roles. At the moment we're talking about the choice of to flurry or not, not the feat selection or skills of the character, just weather its chosen attack form could do more damage and warrant a higher place in the rankings or compare it to an equal level fighter.
I think that a TWF fighter would be doing about the same as a flurrying monk so i am a firm believer that your monk is on par with an equal level fighter, someone raised the comment that our party seemed to be slow at killing things and i attempted to refute that point, i do not believe we are any slower at killing things than a standard party made up of any other 4 classes unless they were all martial.
I'll quite happily wait for the judges decicions then discuss them in depth but i had already posted mine and my one observation was that the monk was just a damage dealer at the moment and wasn't excellent at it (not that i thought a fighter would be much better) but that by taking advantage of his own class abilities combined with the buffs provided by other party members would could create a whole more synergistic and powerful than the sum of its parts (ie. large 10ft reach AoO generating flankingblessedflurrying autogoblinkilling monster, who ignores the damage being generated by the goblins and gets healed).
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large 10ft reach AoO generating flankingblessedflurrying autogoblinkilling monster, who ignores the damage being generated by the goblins and gets healed).
Oh indeedy.
Honestly, the Flurry vs. single attack bit is a personal bias...I so very often see the flurry fail to land a single blow, especially at low levels.
If the party "gels" and begins to focus buffs/tactics, then I think everything will work smoother, but that's hardly to be expected for
1: the first encounter of an AP
2: 1st level characters
3: who may or may not even know who one another are.
After a reasonable time (like, after the players figure out what the other players are like, and what the other characters can do), it seems natural that IG behavior will change. For example, with bless going and someone to flank, there's no reason NOT to flurry, since the To Hit is even higher than the single falchion hit.
Judges, you're up.
Post your rankings in Gameplay, when all the judges have posted I will post the current averages and the next encounter day.
My rankings are up. Lemme know if there are any issues.
Considering Sylvanite pretty much hit the nail on the head it almost feels unnecessary for me to post. I'll put up something in depth this evening after I've mulled it over some more, but it will more than likely end the same as his (or possibly her's, I don't know).
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Hopefully the other judges will check in so I know they are still here, I'm only going to let it sit open for a day before moving to the next encounter day.
If players want to prep, the next encounter day will be the side encounters:
- Goblin Ranger trapped in the house (CR Goblin Ranger hiding)
- Barmaid tricks hero into helping clear rats, only to be found by father as she attempts to seduce you.
- Boar hunt with local noble.
If you have the book and you want to provide details you think are important for judges and players to consider, feel free.
After these, the players will level for the glassworks encounter day
My rankings are up. Lemme know if there are any issues.Judges, you're up.
Post your rankings in Gameplay, when all the judges have posted I will post the current averages and the next encounter day.
I think your rankings are accurate, i'd also love to rate the monk higher than the oracle since he is the only one doing real damage but he does need a lot of support to get those hits in.
The arcane casters performed and were judged about the same as i expected them to be at first level, but then we all know that 1st level is a tought spot for all arcane casters other than maybe witches.
If you find the time Sylvanite would you post a little comparison to other classes just in your opinion, i think the characters performed as you said above average for their level but what do you think could have been more effective and received an A+ grade?
Ciretose, could you provide a little more info on the encounter day? A breakdown of how the goblin ranger trapped in the house encounter goes down cause tbh it just sounds like a flank and spank encounter(not even worth writing up), specific skill checks that might be useful in the barmaid(female oracle diplomacy on the father saves the day or do we need to colour spray him?), boar hunt(do we need to make skill checks, etc), doesn't have to be an in depth of each encounter but enough to get an idea of what things we will need.
Since the characters are set now its just a matter of plugging them into the encounter and if we're not changing from level 1 i don't think much else will change with tactics.
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My rankings are up. Lemme know if there are any issues.Judges, you're up.
Post your rankings in Gameplay, when all the judges have posted I will post the current averages and the next encounter day.
I think your rankings are accurate, i'd also love to rate the monk higher than the oracle since he is the only one doing real damage but he does need a lot of support to get those hits in.
The arcane casters performed and were judged about the same as i expected them to be at first level, but then we all know that 1st level is a tought spot for all arcane casters other than maybe witches.
If you find the time Sylvanite would you post a little comparison to other classes just in your opinion, i think the characters performed as you said above average for their level but what do you think could have been more effective and received an A+ grade?
Ciretose, could you provide a little more info on the encounter day? A breakdown of how the goblin ranger trapped in the house encounter goes down cause tbh it just sounds like a flank and spank encounter(not even worth writing up), specific skill checks that might be useful in the barmaid(female oracle diplomacy on the father saves the day or do we need to colour spray him?), boar hunt(do we need to make skill checks, etc), doesn't have to be an in depth of each encounter but enough to get an idea of what things we will need.
Since the characters are set now its just a matter of plugging them into the encounter and if we're not changing from level 1 i don't think much else will change with tactics.
The formal post will be very detailed, but it will also be my perspective so I was hoping the judges could describe how they view it (I believe all the judges have the books...at least I hope they do...)
This is one of the more "social" encounter days in the AP, as I was looking at how it will likely block out, this will be one of the few that isn't a clearly defined "things to do".
More or less, it is killing a few days in town getting to know people, with a few small side quests, one of which requires diplomacy/bluff type checks.
heh, well i suspect the wizard will be anti social but the oracle and sorcerer will get to shine. not sure about the monk, i doubt the father would want to fight the half orc though...
The sorcerer isn't going to shine on social encounters, as he's a Sage sorcerer. However when it comes to tricks, traps, and skill based shenanigans or general magic he should be fine. His future spell list isn't going to be combat strong per se, but it will include plenty of spells I think will see a lot of play.
Part of how useful he'll be is just how the out of combat stuff ends up playing out. We have the sort of party that could easily end up being stealth and strike force oriented.