Sorry for the radio silence, summer, kids, minimal free time, etc.
@Xanos: Sorry, I forgot to reply regarding the availability of animals for capture in the forest and swamp. Tigers, crocodiles and bears would all be available in the area.
Thanks.
Xanos, couple of questions:
Can either of your hands activate a wand? Also, exactly how intelligent are they??
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Lefty can. It has a +10 Use Magic Device. So, it can't reliably do it in combat, but when there's no time pressure it can.
They are both pretty smart. Lefty has an 8 int. Righty has a 4.
So they can both understand anything you say, and they can both read and write, but Righty isn't going to be winning any spelling bees or chess matches.
I'm thinking of handing Lefty my fireball wand, and having it come with me when I go meet the elves. Would it be able to understand 'if things go poorly, blast them?' or something similar?
I have fire res 10, meaning I can survive even on a failed save.
Works for me. I really think you should wait to meet with them until after our full group is assembled.
I don't think we have that kind of time, seemed their arrival was more imminent than the day+ it would take for the away team to return.
That's why I'm thinking hiding might be the best option. If we disguise our tracks and hunker down they might pass right by us and keep looking.
If they come inside the Horn, then yeah, we need to deal with them, but until then I think we should avoid them.
Did a little investigating (being an investigator and all) to see if we crossed paths with Jurak in the campaign and just didn't recall. My search turned up this post during our combat earlier on. It looks like Jurak is probably the treant, but I didn't see any place in character where it actually used its name.
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It was the Treant guys - we never actually learned its name, but GMFang's combat spoilers were headed up as Jurak.
As for the longears... Kill 'em all!
Hey Xanos,
Was looking over your CS for shenanigans planning, and the 'unlearned books and spells' spoiler doesn't open.
Wasn't sure if it was supposed to or not, just wanted to give ya a heads up.
It's empty right now. It had the spells from the last spellbook we looted. I removed things from that spoiler as I learned them and moved them to my own spellbook.
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Hey Everyone, I'm away for the next twelve days in Florida - going to Disney World for the first time!
I won't be able to check my games while I'm away so I'm on pause until the 10th (or possibly the 11th if I'm too jet-lagged!).
Please feel free to bot me as the situation requires! :)
Have fun!
Giving it some serious thought, I believe I may have a way for the three of us at the Horn to eliminate the elves(should it come to that). However, it will depend on the answers to the following:
Fang:
What, exactly, is the terrain around and leading up to the Horn? If there's a picture of the area, that would be awesome, but a solid description would do as well.
Also, how many combat capable(as in able to fight, not possessing martial class levels) Boggards are there, and will they take orders from us?
Finally, we have a full day before the elves reach the horn, yeah?
Xanos:
You beautiful, vile bastard, what sorts of debuffing spells and abilities do you have?
Aside from your hands, what undead minions are currently at your disposal?
Molasbar:
Basically, same question. What are your exact strengths?
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Playing Pathfinder again live with a group of rather smart, crafty fellow players, really gets your imagination flowing in all the right directions. <evil grin>
Giving it some serious thought, I believe I may have a way for the three of us at the Horn to eliminate the elves(should it come to that). However, it will depend on the answers to the following:
b]Molasbar[/b]:
Basically, same question. What are your exact strengths?
Think of Molasbar as a classic rogue with a very unclassic build. His spells are mostly self buffs. Good skills and can hit for decent damage. He can UMD too if that helps in planning.
My combat useful spell loadout right now is-
Glitterdust
Web
Spiked Pit
Stinking Cloud
Enervation
Black Tentacles
All of Xanos' minions are listed here.
3 Bloody Skeleton Archers
3 Bloody Burning Boggard Skeleton Archers
1 Flaming Swarming Beheaded (the chief)
Also 4 more crawling claws that haven't been added to the alias yet.
If I pull some cash from the party fund I could animate the Treant or the Minotaur
I think we still have a "break token call tiadora" item. It might be a good idea to call her in to get the rest of the team back to base.
I think we should be at full power for this fight, and also making half the group wait while we fight for weeks is b~@&+#@+.
While it's not great that we get this fight and they do not, that's the problem with splitting the group. Also, perhaps Fang has an encounter for them we don't know about.
Depending on the answers to the above questions for Fang, we might be easily able to get out the the elves on our own.
And, Ima be honest, part of me kinda wants to pull this off without the 'muscle' to simply prove that while we might not be stronger than the vampires, we are certainly smarter and much more devious...
I don't think there's ever been any doubt that we're smarter. Poor Sari has Albrekt pulling down her average. ;)
I mostly just don't want to leave them out because it wouldn't be any fun for them. If Fang has some kind of plan for two encounters at the same time or something, fine. I just don't want them to have to sit on their thumbs.
He said shorthanded
*snicker*
Well, once Fang replies, I will lay out my battle plan, and we'll go from there.
I don't think there's ever been any doubt that we're smarter. Poor Sari has Albrekt pulling down her average. ;)
I mostly just don't want to leave them out because it wouldn't be any fun for them. If Fang has some kind of plan for two encounters at the same time or something, fine. I just don't want them to have to sit on their thumbs.
Oh, that reminds me,
I have to pick my 3rd level spell. I get suggestion as a bonus bloodline, any ideas what I should learn?
When I play sorcerers I pretty much always pick the Shadow spells. Shadow Enchantment is the 3rd level one. Not ideal for combat, but adds pretty much unmatched non-combat versatility to a character.
Oh, that reminds me,
I have to pick my 3rd level spell. I get suggestion as a bonus bloodline, any ideas what I should learn?
Either Ash Storm or Fireball would be my suggestions (and fit thematically with your infernal bloodline).
Waves of Blood if you want to help a vampiric brother out :)
Waves of Blood seems cool, but I'm missing how that would help out my vampiric brethren.
Was being funny - we'd have 1 round to lap up all the blood! Feeding frenzy!
Haste and Fireball are always good. I like Slow as well, especially when paired with haste.
I don't have a really player friendly map of the area. The description is as follows "The northern Caer Bryr is a temperate rainforest richly blessed with rain fall and broadleaf trees. The trees here are tall and broad. The thick-trunked baobab tree, unusual in such a wet clime, is common here and grows to enormous size. It is not uncommon to see trees hundreds of feet tall with trunks twenty feet across. To walk into the deep Briar is to enter the domain of giants.
Every flat surface is covered with brilliant green moss and lichens in every hue. Mushrooms of a million sorts proliferate and crowd every fallen log. Small animal life is dense -- squirrels, voles, mice and white-faced ghost monkeys. Birds dwell here in endless variety and dazzling panoramas of plumage are everywhere on display."
THe area is based on a real region in China, just google ‘li jiang karst’ if you want to get a better feel for the environment.
As for other geographical features, within a couple of square miles of the horn are another two dozen or so stone spires, a lake and a river, which breaks into a multitude of streams before becoming a salt marsh. Let me know if you are looking for anything specific.
I believe there are somewhere in the order of 18 or so boggards left. None have class levels, with the exception of the shaman.
Ok perfect.
So, here's my battle plan:
Haruk disguises himself as a lost, beaten down, tired traveler. He'll attempt to dissuade the elves to leave, which will hopefully work.
If not,
He'll have called the Accuser Devil prior to them showing up. It will hover above them and, once things go poorly, will cast grease, which can cover up to 4 or so of the elves.
At this point, Lefty will cast fireball from the wand, which Haruk has some resistance to.
Meanwhile, the boggards will have hidden in the swampy, jungly area on the sides of the path/road to the Horn, and will unleash their croak. Fang, if we wear ear plugs, would we still be affected?
As for Xanos undead, we can easily hide them nearby as well, and have them ambush the elves.
I can also cast invisibility on the old necromancer, keeping him completely hidden so he can unleash his best debuff spell without being seen.
Same with Molasbar, though his stealth is pretty solid on it's own.
Basically, the idea is to trap the elves in a classic killbox, and murder their faces, should things go south.
I like it. We may want to have the undead stay and guard the entrance to the horn while we are gone, so we don't have someone or something go in while we are dealing with the elves.
The idea would be for Haruk to meet them more or less at the entrance. He'll look pretty road worn, and I'm thinking of having him use a sack for a blanket to make to help heighten the illusion. He'll be 'asleep' when they arrive.
I think it is reasonable that you could plug your ears to block out the effects of croak, but I imagine that it would render you basically deaf, along with the associated penalties.
The suggested ambush seems fairly workable. There is a fair bit of standing water near the horn itself, so that might be the most practical place to set up the ambush.
Before moving forward, I'd like Xanos to chime in, since he's the other PC here, aside from Molasbar.
GM, do we have another "summon Tiadora" charm? I was under the impression that we had two (one from before the Ballentyne mission, one from before this one).
I'm down for the ambush, but if we have a way of getting the whole group together first, I want to do that.
Couple of things:
Has Grumblejack shown up yet? He would be a huge advantage for us, pun intended, lol.
Also, if we are down to one summon charm, is this the best moment to use it, should we not get others later? We're still pretty early in the campaign, and it might be better to save it, no?
We can have her bring us another one.
Might be entertaining for a bit from a story perspective. Xanos is entertaining when hes mad. He'd Un-Vamp himself as quick as he could though. (Yes, he can do that)
re:Summoning token: You have one of them. The other one was used to signal the fall of Ballantine. This was given to you to use to let cardinal Thorn know when you have collected the Tears of Achlys or have anything crucial to report. He's the one who sends Tiadora as a messenger. If you use it, there's no guarantee that you'll get any real help.
Re: Grumblejack: Let's say he's been delivered. He's currently statted as a standard ogre. Since he's arrived he's been mostly keeping to himself, wandering about the complex looking a little confused. If asked, he says that the everthing feels familiar here. It's like he's been here before and that this is where he belongs. He can't really explain more than that, but he feels it 'in his bones'.
Re: elves: Evasion and deception are also possibilities here.
I guess there's not really a reasonable way to get the rest of the team back before the ambush.
Away team, are you folks ok wit sitting a fight out?
Is Grumblejack just a base CR 3 Orge, or does he have sort of class levels?
As he's my cohort, would I have sort of say in his build/progression?
@HomeTeam: Yup I'm good sitting this out. Like I said will be fun to recover your arrow bristled corpses afterward to see how you operate without the 3 of us.
For Der Glory of Das Knotten!
@haruk: Grumblejack is able 'evolve' in the horn. It's not actually complicated to initiate normally and doesn't take anytime. I would usually just describe it narratively, but the current situation in the horn makes that difficult.
Anywho, based on the comparables in the bestiary, an ogre is around a level 8 cohort and yes you would be in charge of deciding his level progression from there. After his change, his base CR doubles, so it might complicate things depending on your leadership level and whether he's gained any other levels in the interim.
Xanos, my twisted, warped, clever bastard of a friend. Since we're not able to get back the away team, doth thou have anything extra to add to my above plan??
Note, again, I am going to first attempt deception, as it's kinda Haruk's specialty.
My plan will only be enacted should deceiving them fail.