Tora no Senaka - The Back of the Tiger (Inactive)

Game Master Dreaming Warforged

Dorked up. I looked at the creation cost for the Metamagic Rod. So scratch that.

287+1500=1787

Change bag of holding to the waaaaay better handy haversack.

1787+2500-2000=2287

Does anybody have some free cash that they don't want to spend?

I will sell the pearl of power (+500) which means that I need only 213 to get the 3000 needed for the metamagic rod. I am planning to use the rod to cast protection from elements on everyone and mage armor on raith and sorin. (it isn't really a combat tool, more for buffing)

I've got the only two permanent magic items; I'm willing to throw in part of my share to help anyone else get stuff they have their eye on. Busy at work and presiding over justice; I'll have Pavel's purchases accounted for soon.

And here's Garand's shopping list for GM approval (once items are approved, I'll adjust his sheet for any changes to AC / combat stats / saves;

@Sorin; He will contribute 250 gp. to the 'buy Sorin a rod of metamagic' fund, but would like to store about 44 lbs of cold weather crap in his haversack (4 extra sets of cold weather clothing and snowshoes, in case we run into survivors / people who need to be rescued and don't have appropriate clothing).

He has *not* counted in the 900 gp. from the half-share of Raith's gem, as I want to be sure that happened before I spend it.

@ Garand, thanks! That should help out immesurably.

Do you want to focus on healing items for the "Raith" fund?

@ Garand, thanks! That should help out immeasurably.

Do you want to focus on healing items for the "Raith" fund?

1800 gp. could buy a cloak of resistance +1 (1000 gp) and, uh, something else.

We can have it emblazoned with Ameiko's family crest or something (before being enchanted, obviously, since I wouldn't recommend taking a embroidery needle to an already magical cloak and possibly ruining it...) so that he'll be more likely to wear it.

Maybe a scabbard of honing, as well, for his temple sword / chicken sword? (sharpens a weapon stored in it for 1 minute, giving it a +1 to damage on its first attack. 500 gp.)

Set: All good.

Izumi's shopping list:

Might add to this, but gotta get back to work at the moment.

4670 total.
- 2,100 gp for a +1 mithral chain shirt
2,570 remaining.
Question:

Metamagic Rod bought.

All good!

Please note I'll be away from Friday to Monday, with little or no access to Internet.

+1 mithral chain shirt- 2,100 gp
+1 cloak of resistance- 1,000 gp
1,570 gp remaining
- 50 gp, mwk backpack
- 900 gp 3 potions of cure moderate wounds
620 gp remaining

And is there a tattooist in Jol or would I be more likely to find a good one in Karlsgard?

The best ones will be in the capital.

Metamagic Rod bought.

Garand was thinking of getting one for himself, as well, but I decided that armor and shield would be more useful right now. The lesser extend rods are just too darn useful!

Izumi will also supply the wagon with 250gp of raw materials for crafting, leaving him with 14gp

Crafting up to Kalsgard (making a Masterwork Greataxe). A masterwork Greataxe costs 320gp. Crafting it uses 1/3, therefore 106.6gp. Crafting supplies left in the wagon: 143.4gp
Craft check (Greataxe, DC15, 200sp): 1d20 + 11 - 2 ⇒ (13) + 11 - 2 = 22 (22*15 = 330, crafting complete)
Craft check (Masterwork, DC20, 3000sp): 1d20 + 11 - 2 ⇒ (16) + 11 - 2 = 25 (25*20 = 500sp, out of 3000 needed. 17% done)

Raith, I am assuming from the tactical setup that we are in a proxy battle. I am making this supposition because according to CB half the raiders went to us (20) the rest went to the wagons, but we don't have the wagons displayed, nor, from the description, are we between the wagons and the raiders. If we win the battle in a reasonable amount of time we will be able to lend our aid to our comrades and defeat them. But we are very few, and if they get us in the open, 20 of them will be able to surround (every enemy gets a flank attack) us and cut us down. If we present a smaller front, they will not be able to surround us, and we will be able to focus on cutting them down quicker.

I'll go along with this due to the medium. I understand there are limitations in the interaction.

But this is not how I would have set a camp up. I certainly wouldn't be letting the character we're supposed to be protecting who is carrying the powerful magical seal camp away from us. It's fairly easy to use the wagons as a barricade against the Ulfen and fight with our backs to them, so they cannot easily surround us. I'm hoping the other group is at least doing that. I'm assuming a skilled caravan leader like Sandru knows how to set his wagons in a defensive position. I certainly would have if we were face to face with Celestial and we would be fighting with our backs to the wagons holding gaps and working with the other guards.

Now we're cut off from the group about to be standing on a bridge fighting a battle against a pack of raiders that could be distracting us while the main body goes after the others and steals the seal. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

I'm going to trust Celestial on this one and assume he knows we're not this stupid and isn't setting us up to look stupid like for example us showing back up to camp and Ameiko has been kidnapped with the seal. I'll assume he is doing the best he can with this medium.

But it isn't very tactically intelligent to have your battle force separated when you have both the advantage of higher ground so your enemy is fighting up a hill and barricades like wagons. It's like we're purposefully splitting our force and weakening our position. Uncomfortable to say the least.

But I'll go with it for now and hope Celestial isn't setting us up to look like foolish guards incapable of defending the caravan properly.

Ahahah! You're right Raith. I'm not thinking you're stupid. No, I'm struggling with how best to deal with fights involving the caravan and the seven or so NPCs. It's challenging for sure. All these encounters though areresolved woth the NPCs faring as well as you, even if it makes little sense. I'm really open to suggestions!

Now that I think of it, I could have drawn a few wagons.

I've read again all the comments. You are all right. I should have put some wagons.

Here's what I suggest. Since all this round was spent moving and casting buffs, we can easily start the round again, but this time with a caravan on the map.

I've put two wagons, that would be part of the circle.

Reviewed Map

We'd start the round with this map instead of the other one. But first let me know what you think.

Thanks for the understanding, Celestial.

Not trying to be a pain, just ensure we're doing our job. If you have wagons, you usually set them up in a defensive manner. If you leave the wagons when facing raiders, you lost the battle because they got what they want. It doesn't do us much good to be on the bridge while the Ulfen rob our wagons, burn what's left, slaughter everyone on them, and steal Ameiko and the seal.

I'm not sure what the module says. But as a player I saw it one of two ways:

1. They're going after our wagons for the loot. Slaughtering us is secondary. If that is the case, leaving the wagons defeats the purpose of their defense.

2. This is a planned assault intended to acquire Ameiko and recover the Seal. So separating us from the wagons and isolating Ameiko to be acquired would have been a huge mistake on our part.

I know this is a tough medium. But we have to do our jobs as far caravan and NPC defense. Moving to the bridge didn't seem like the best course of action.

I'd prefer to keep the wagons at our back and defend them.

That's enough wagon information on the map to do what we need to do.

This is difficult encounter to run: when I ran it, I played all 40 of the raiders vs. the entire caravan, including all the NPCs, including Kelda and a couple others of my own creation. While it was very difficult to run, especially with about 50 or so NPCs to keep track of, it was quite rewarding to see how the players reacted to the NPCs (Shalelu ended up carrying the day, saving both Ameiko and Ameiko's brother, one of the PCs).

I also understand why Celestial set it up this way, and with the wagons now I think it makes more sense. The bridge was just a way to even out the numbers, but now we can use the wagons. I've no problem with restarting the round with the wagons where they are in the reviewed map.

2. This is a planned assault intended to acquire Ameiko and recover the Seal. So separating us from the wagons and isolating Ameiko to be acquired would have been a huge mistake on our part.

That was my assumption, which is why Garand shouted to Shalelu to keep an eye out for the crow-shifter (assuming it is an oni or something in crow form, and not just a crow...) to hop down and attempt to grab Ameiko / the Seal during the distraction of the raider attack.

I definitely prefer us sticking to guarding the caravan, rather than attempting to hold the bridge (if we'd camped the caravan *on* the bridge, that would have been all tactically brilliant and stuff, but we didn't think of that). :)

Plus you'd get some heat for Monday morning traffic on the bridge to Kalsgard. The very first traffic jam in the history of Golarion!

Now THERE's where our luck has been hiding all this time. 3 potential crits this round :D

Please note I'll be away from Friday until Monday, with limited or no access to a computer.

Could you all please get back to the line. At least one raider is about to come over and sack me, nobody is close enough for me to cast any more bull strengths and if you aren't in the line I can't cast an effective enlarge person.

grumble grumble

Pretty sure Ulfen 10 is dead after that hit Sorin, so you should be at least relatively safe for 1 round, while we get back in line.

I figure it is best for Raith to move to the back with less enemies to protect Sorin. He does less damage and tends to hit less, but has a higher AC and can move faster and through enemy squares with Acrobatics. With Garand's Shield Other on, he should be able to stay up quite a while and hold the back, especially if he starts using ki points to boost AC. Pavel, Izumi, and the bear can concentrate on killing enemies and holding the gap between the wagons. Garand can maybe stand with Raith and take a few swings to add damage and bring the enemies down faster.

Funky new thread / dot / focus behavior is making it more challenging than before to find threads, so feel free to send me a private message if I lag at some point.

A random samurai poem for Izumi;

Ten thousand times, the cherry blossom spirals to the ground
Ten thousand times, my blade cuts the air as I hone my skills
Ten thousand times, my body falls to the ground, as my spirit rises to the heavens

I like it.

I noticed the dotting problems too. I have "(1 new)" tags that won't go away.

Please note I'll be away from Thursday to Monday, without any real access to a computer.

Very interesting post.

Very interesting post.

An interesting read. Definitely something to consider for a non-PBP environment, where the players can better coordinate who is going to be in the the group (instead of getting lumped together with anyone else who posted first, or had the more compelling backstory, or whatever).

We've got a couple of hammers (Pavel and Izumi) and the rest of us don't specifically fit the roles defined (or, at least, haven't yet used those sorts of tactics). Sorin's got grease and glitterdust, so could replicate some of the sample wizards controller-y / anvil functions. I'm not sure that Garand or Raith, as designed, could fit any of those roles.

Speaking of our Hammers, still no news from Izumi or Pavel? I'll PM them.

Hey! I'm here- just haven't really had much to add to the discussion.

Great! Sorry about that.

I'm not sure that Garand or Raith, as designed, could fit any of those roles.

I did a little more pondering of these notions, and can work on adjusting Garand's spell selection to have more buffs like bless and prayer (which seem to be the only things he can do that fit with the thread's suggestions, although I think that command and cause fear can also make halfway decent soft control options, by forcing foes to disengage and possibly provoke AoOs in the process).

I'm not sure Monks will ever fit into these sorts of 'optimal party role' situations, and that this is at least part of the reason why there are so many threads about them sucking, because they don't slot neatly into the DPS / controller / healer-buffer roles. Whether that's a flaw in the design of the Monk, or a short-sighted view of 'optimal party roles' is up to the viewer, I suppose. Perhaps Maddigan / Raith has some thoughts on the matter.

[Tark has some thoughts about using maneuvers to fill that role, but I haven't really seen that work yet, in practice.]

Honestly I think that, as was said on other threads, that the effort to reduce character concepts to their base is both good and bad. Good in that it may help a struggling character to find a niche in which they can thrive, bad in that it is reductionist, ignores story and character and forces the concepts towards a simple hack-and-slash.

I think monks are extremely useful and versitile mobility fighters. Raith can practically cruise across a battlefield unharmed, smack people in the wayyyy back and come back to our side without getting winded. He can position himself wherever he wants to get flanking bonuses and he has a cool concept.

TaxkXT is one of the school that focuses on combat and defeating the combat system rather than simply enjoying the whole game.

I agree that slots can spoil the story. I find the grid of analysis to look at the game from one angle. But as Sorin said, the other angles are also important, if not more important.

Each player and GM has preferences and priorities. We should need grids for the other angles too.

TaxkXT is one of the school that focuses on combat and defeating the combat system rather than simply enjoying the whole game.

I think it's a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy, in that newer players, or older players that have simply never played a 3.X/PF Monk before (like myself, whose last Monk was when Oriental Adventures came out, in 1st edition...), read these analysis on various forums and come to the conclusion that their Monk is underperforming or 'not getting the job done' or whatever, because it isn't square pegging into one of three very specific round holes that we call 'roles.'

[And that's not even getting into 'roles' that don't really matter when the blades come out. 'Skillmonkey' or 'Face' isn't a useful combat role, unless you have classes like the Bard or 3.5's Archivist or Green Ronin's Monster Hunter, who can turn skill checks into meaningful combat bonuses, or a hypothetical class that can use social skills (like Intimidate or Bluff) to effectively mass demoralize or mass feint or something.]

So the player who may have been having a perfectly good time is now disheartened, or discouraged before even giving the monk a try, or, possibly most annoying of all, being actively discouraged from playing a monk by other players in his group / at his table who have bought into this 'monks are worthless 'cause they don't fill my very specific view of what a class needs to contribute' message.

And then the noise gets loud enough that it 'travels upstairs' and impressionable game developers start looking for ways to make all of the classes do the exact same thing, and lock them into very tightly defined roles of hitter-of-things and controller-of-actions and granter-of-bonuses and whatnot, and we have a very different game...

It kind of feels 'arms-racy' to me. Instead of encounters being tailored by a GM to suit a party that *isn't* totally optimized, it feels like the messageboard advice is to design the most optimized thing we can, to 'beat' the GM's encounters as efficiently as possible, as if any such arms race between players and GMs could ever end in the players favor...

On the other hand, I did just completely trash my character concept of a Druid because I felt that the AP / encounter design was brutally reinforcing the 'you must have a Cleric or fail at life' party design philosophy, so I'm hardly standing my ground here. :)

LOL! You can always change your mind back!

LOL! You can always change your mind back!

Nah.

The game-as-theorized-about-on-messageboards is that Druids are crazy OP, 'cause they they are full casters that can eat faces.

The game-as-played-in-my-experience is that Druids kind of fail to adequately lock down any 'role' and don't get enough actions in a round to take advantage of all that theorycrafted versatility.

Flavorwise, I hugely love Druids. Optimization wise, a Bard is gonna have better spells, more control utility and, thanks to bardic inspiration, fill that 'arm' role of buffer / damage multiplier.

And yeah, I went there. Bards better fit the arm/anvil/hammer troika than Druidzilla.

Main problem with the monk has more to do with the reality that most campaigns don't et much past level 5 to 10. Monks don't start showing their power until higher level. At low level having a +3 save versus a +1 save doesn't mean much. But once you get to high levels and start facing harsh spells and special abilities, having a +12 in all saves starts to help a lot. As do all the special abilities as well as the extra attacks.

Monks are backloaded characters. I figure we're doing an adventure path and might reach high level. We had two warriors types. I figure I had the time to work my way up until effective.

I've seen high level monks in action. They can be quite impressive. I find them enjoyable to play due to their versatility. A fighter often can't stealth, doesn't have much of a perception, and gets hammered by will save spells until they obtain a magic item of some kind to counter them. Allows you to be more involved in other than combat encounters.

Ha, I just noticed that I'm gaming with Tark in another PbP. Glad I didn't say anything too awkward about his hammer/anvil/arm concept!

:)

:) lol...that would have been awkward!

I'll be away for a few days. Should be back Sunday night. Probably no internet.

This medium is extremely difficult for a back and forth posting a few times day to conduct an investigation and a bunch of social skill rolls. We may ask one or two questions to progress the story and it takes two days to answer a question or two asked by each of us. Then we're spending a week on interaction and social skills none of us are particularly built for.

I would prefer you assume we're doing what we're supposed to do to get the story moving and ask us for social skill roles as needed. Narrate events like finding an inn and asking about town directing us in the appropriate direction.

It's way too difficult to engage in the usual back and forth we would over a table to roleplay moving around a town or settlement or doing in-depth social interaction, especially so with five of us (well, four now).

If you want to do the back and forth, I'd prefer we have one of us engage in the back and forth interaction to speed up posting. You can assume Raith is watching over Ameiko and will do what is asked of him that helps our mission.

At least that's my take on why it has slowed down. I have no idea what to do ask or do next to get things rolling. Seems like we're waiting for a direction to go in. Exploring a hole town quarter by quarter would take us weeks at the pace we post.

Good comments and suggestions! What are the others thinking?