Shadows of the Sand (Inactive)

Game Master caster4life

That works I was only thinking about separating Zaza from the group when I had made the post last night and didn't think about how the group should be separated at the time. At least she has plenty of cannon fodder to help.

Also, just wondering if we should be rolling perception checks to notice the fight or if that is something you are going to handle.

oiii, they got ze gud lootz!
...
Yeah, I am doing better.
Catching up and thinking about how to proceed.
Amari isn't going to do the questioning, but he is very good at catching lies or deceit, so I guess I should stick here for the time being as silent observer.
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Also: dips on that Wis band, probably together with Agaban :-)

How about you take the dex belt the goblin is wearing? ;)

Yeah for the time being that will probably be for the best.
Starting with lvl 4, I will be hugely wis based, but that's some time away, so DEX is good for the next time, that's true.

Lo and Agaban, you guys are going multiple days without posting. Amari and Zaza are doing great and keeping things moving forward but we need the whole Shadows team to work together on this. What's up? Is there something that I can change on my end or do we need to figure something else out? The agreed upon posting expectations are 1x/weekday and 1x/weekend.

Life has just been a little busy and haven't been checking as regularly after the website issues. Will be easier once we get the pace going again and will try to help push it along.

Also, while I wouldn't mind the headband and it gives me an additional 1st level spell but think that is the case for Lo and know Wis is also good for monks. I could also use either of the belts or amulet since they are all useful. Who will be the pack horse and keep the bag of holding though we technically don't know that is what it is.

Just wondering one needs spellcraft and detect magic to make attempts to identify right? Along with this what type of armor is the goblin wearing just seeing it as metal shirt but not sure what the stats would be for the armor, though would size be an issue since small to medium.

Edit: Hmm 14 to 16 for Lo doesn't do much so guessing the headband will be going to me unless Amari truly wants it. Though figure the +2 dex belt would be good for Amari, the +2 str belt going to Lo and the +1 armor to Zaza maybe to break these down unless we want to stack someone with multiple items.

Yes let's get things to a consistent pace.

You guys will have to appraise it to figure the metal shirt out.

Failed my attempt sadly and that is like knowledge checks where you only get 1 shot right?

@Agaban: Yeah, another 1st lvl spell sounds sexy plus, I don't need Wis THAT much until lvl 4 (at which point my atk is wis-based in addition to monk-defend and my main skills) ... so go for it :-)

Lo should get the Amulet of Natural Armor +1 since she's in the front line.

I can pick up the Wand of Mage Armor. If I take a point in Use Magic Device, I have a decent chance on using it on Serenity. I really should've thought about that sooner.

Does Agaban want the Staff of Beast Power? I think it's more versatile in his hands. I would mostly use it to cast Cat's Grace on Amari.

Currently unable to use the staff considering I need to be able to cast one of the spells first. Not sure that doesn't fall under the sell and divide up the gold but I've always been a little impartial to those spells.

Opps think I misread that for some reason thought it meant you had to have one of the spells ready to use a charge for some reason. Still not sure I have the ability to carry it currently since I was almost maxing out medium load without any loot.

I don't mind getting the amulet but if Amari gets it and the belt of Dex then he'd be 18 along with both of us.

Just noting that I didn't got any updates for those last gameplay posts.
No idea why though...

Crap like that happens all the time to me... When it's been suspiciously long, I just have to check.

The goblin isn't even speaking a language we understand, so this is pretty frustrating. It does seem like he understands Kelish, so you guys can try talking to him directly. I'll gladly assist in your conversations, including with die rolls. But I don't want us to get hung up here too long.

Plan A: Pain

Plan B: Let him go and follow him without getting caught. Maybe make it look like he cooperated toss him a little gold and a smile so his allies think he turned if he gets away.

Zaza, I understand that it can be frustrating. But how would one of you react in the same situation? This is your Taldane counterpart. It is going to be really hard, though not impossible, to break him. Because of that, the plot forward doesn't necessarily rely on breaking him, though it would certainly save a lot of time for him to give you all the answers.

I agree, it makes sense that he would resist mightily. Seems like Lo has the next natural step.

Figure either slow execution, bleed him some, or send back to HQ.

Not completely sure how my cleric would truly handle that since neutral but also believing this is his calling and sacrifices have to be made.

Kinda against freeing him because of his experience and the fact that he was so hard to find/follow during the fight that the catch and release policy would probably not work.

Also, if none of this works or offers a path forward the next part would be to go and try to figure out which commander has been compromised unless someone else has a way to determine the meeting location.

I believe our goal is to capture these spies alive if possible. So an execution is not my preferred end goal. Agree we should not let him go at all--he needs his hands and feet to be manacled and kept in a disabled or exhausted state at all times so he can't run (I think he's currently disabled at negative HP). Those probably should be our marching orders for the Fort once we leave.

At some point, the pain or threatened loss of life and limb would hopefully get us beyond basic intimidation rolls?

Yes I think you guys could break him in a few days if you were really determined to. Up to you how to proceed here.

Ahhh, I wish Gara could be here now^^
But I guess, it will be for the best if we just leave him here and get going.

We have a 50-50 chance to hit the right fort commander on first try, so let's just go.
Time is of essence and the goblins intel might grew old before we get it out of him anyway...
Will donIC tomorrow - weekend was looking due to a bachelor party I attended ...

That's assuming one of the fort commanders that is in debt took the bribe, which isn't certain. But we're going to have to be careful about dealing with future fort commanders so they don't send their troops at us.

So the first time at Fort Hashbaz, we saw a messenger spell sent via fox. We learned the fox travels 10 miles a day, so at most 40 miles away.

How fast does a hare travel in a day and a half? That might help us triangulate an anchibel location.

Also, how much to buy some camels for the road?

Normal price to purchase from the fort's quartermaster. 150 gp for a camel.

Okay, here's our new loot, and proposed assignments:

Bag of holding - Party
Belt of dex +2 - Amari
Mwk saps x 2 - Any takers?
Bear trap x 4 - Sell
10 ft pole - Sell
Waterskin x 4 - Sell
Mwk thieve's tools
Shiny metal shirt? - Zaza?
Staff of beast power - Sell for camels?
Belt of str +2 - Lo
Headband of wis +2 - Agaban
Amulet of nat armor +1 - Amari?
Wand of mage armor (10 charges) - Zaza

We should also buy some rations, let's say enough for 5 days travel.

Small-sized masterwork saps and shiny metal shirt, btw.

Oh, right, then we'll sell the saps, and shirt if we know its value. Any chance the shirt is mithral?
Appraise shirt: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (12) + 2 = 14

Yep. It's mithral.

Looks good.

Okay, then between selling the saps, the mithral chain shirt, and the thieves' tools, that's 851 gp.
Camels are 600 gp.
Rations for 4 people x 5 days x 0.5 each = 10gp.
Animal feed for 4 animals x 5 days is x 0.1 each = 2gp.
Hot weather outfits x 4 = 32gp.
Hot weather outfits x 3 = 24gp.
Total remaining: 215gp.

Anyone want to buy something?

Any chance there's a partial Wand of Endure Elements?

I have a Hot weather outfit already.

Gah deleted my post.

Already have a hot weather outfit.

Was also wanting to looking into some alchemical items since we have a bag of holding where we could potentially store them, along with some other miscellaneous items. Sadly cant access the reference document from work though so will have to try to find some time tonight to make a list.

Quick question since assuming we are about to have a visitor did we spend a night in the fort or did all that take place quickly enough that we are moving on same day...just wondering for spell purposes.

Up to you how much you rushed out of there. I'll update the current date accordingly.

Oh crap. I had a feeling.
And I have wasted my crit - meh :-(
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Do we have anything to slow him down and simply stroll off?
I have the feeling that we would not survive a direct engagement with this one...

Well have obscuring mist which I will probably open with that but not sure that will be enough.

Two quick questions for you Caster.

First does it appear full grown or youngling (cross fingers it isn't full grown)

Second how far into the gorge/ravine are we i.e. if we backtrack could we get back onto the plain where we can spread out and hopefully keep some distance.

It is a huge creature. Full grown. You are about a half hour into the ravine.

Note that I didn't roll initiative yet and even if I had this isn't necessarily a fight to the death situation. Seeing him, I suggest K arcana rolls to know about behirs.

Main question is, does it run faster than a camel?

You guys can try to run for it! Any sudden moves will result in an initiative roll but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Realistically, were you mounted or dismounted?

Mounted. We were in the act of withdrawing. My stealth post even states that Zaza was turning her camel around.

Yes but it can be a lot easier to turn a camel around, examine tracks, etc, when dismounted. We'll say mounted for now but next time we'll specify whether or not we dismount to look at tracks as it will be difficult to otherwise.

Just as an aside with the new bag of holding we have I wouldn't be against some of the alchemical weapons/remedies thinking

Thunderstone since we are fighting another caster
Shard gel or actual caltrops for isolating areas or retreats.
Lastly maybe some antitoxin or antiplague just to have on hand.

Just throwing these out there not sure if anyone has better ideas or if we are missing any useful items that we should add to our inventory.

I'm fine buying these items. Shall we make it official then? Do you want to keep it in your inventory, Agaban?

Does Agaban have a heal or channel to spare overnight? Otherwise I'll pop another CLW wand charge to heal myself up.

Figured they could go into the bag of holding sadly I cant carry anything else without dropping/moving other stuff around...reason I have 900+ gold but haven't really bought anything else due to weight.

Didn't have a channel left but had 1 spell for the day that could convert to a CLW sadly the domain spell isn't allowed for that aspect.

CLW: 1d8 + 2 ⇒ (3) + 2 = 5

If folks want to withdraw instead, we can do that. But want to give people the Inspire Courage bonus if we're going to fight.

At this point guess no reason to withdraw and sadly guess I get to great the snakes up close and personal.

Also, just FYI work got smart and blocked paizo now so wont be able to post from there anymore.

So how do we want to check the commander out - or even get to talk with him in the first place if we go in undercover?
- We could sneak into his rooms at night and check him out (but we just saw that our intimidation potential is not the greatest).
- We could try a honey-pod approach, offering additional payment for some additional 'little service' (e.g. re-routing patrol to another sector or something)
- Confront him with the same letter, trusting our good sense motive potential to check his reaction on it?
- ...?

Good considerations.

I think we need to gather facts and evidence. Figure out if some interesting characters came to the fort recently, see if he suddenly paid some debts or bought something unusually expensive, sneak into his room and do a careful search. Only after those avenues fail should we consider the direct confrontation / honeypot, and even then I wonder if we should just try the other fort. After all, finding nothing is evidence that we're at the wrong fort.

I apologize for the short notice, but I have a really crazy week of work that is happening. Please bot me. I'll be back next Wednesday.