Way of the Wicked

Game Master Megan Robertson

Hello, there!

I'm the Megan of whom Shalastar Lerin speaks. The Way of the Wicked AP is on my review pile, so I shall start reading it...

If you come to the conclusion that your DM is missing in action, or if Flykiller bobs up and says so, I would be prepared to step in if that is what you want.

I visit the Paizo boards daily, usually around 8am GMT (I am in the UK), and normally remember to let people know if I won't be by... I am out of work & job-hunting so sometimes disappear for an interview. When I get a job, the timing might vary but I still manage a daily visit (Shalastar may recall that last year I had a temporary lecturing post & still managed to DM, with the AP living on my USB drive...).

It will probably take about a week from you lot asking me to take over to actually restart the game, but that will give you recruiting time if you decide you need some fresh blood. Character requirements will remain unchanged if you wish to do some recruiting - I leave this to the party to manage, as you are the ones who will have to work with new characters!

Okay, consider this an official request from Shalastar to take over. We haven't heard from Flykiller since 1/9/13. And by Restart, I assume you mean transfer ownership.. :) There's a way to do that now, according to the Paizo boards. Or do you actually want to restart (i.e. start over at the beginning)? We thought we were near the end of the first encounter. I think we have at least one person out of town until later in January, so that will probably give us the time we need to get the recruitment going.

Oh, and Shalastar has the Lust Bloodline from Class Acts: Sorcerers. (That might be in your reviewed PDFs also).

Okay, so as I understand it, here is our current list of player characters:

Targi Silverspike, dwarf forgemistress (forgery, greed)
(Who is around, but does not have much time to post at the moment)
Tragen Blackmourne, aasimar antipladin (grave robbery, wrath)
(Who has gone out of town until Jan 20-something)
Shalastar Lerin, fetchling sorcerer of lust (sedition, lust)
Mordred Ozio, human cleric of Zyphus (grave robbery, sloth)
Jack Cross, dhampir cad (duel to the death, gluttony)

Our lost player characters are:

Treize Seischiro, elf spellblade (high treason, envy)
(He has not posted anything since Dec 28)
Kyrul, half elf ranger (high treason, pride)
(Who dropped out due to time reasons)

I will read your game thread and pick it up from where you are, if that suits. But I would like to hear from the other players that you would like to have me as your DM.

I do have Class Acts: Sorcerers no worries.

I'd love it if you would pick up this game Megan so consider this an official request from me.

I'm fine with continuing from where we are or starting over, we haven't really gotten that far anyway, whatever suits the flow better to fit in the replacements.

I'm fine with Megan stepping in.

Okay, so Tragen and Targi (How cute.) seem to both be out of commission for awhile. Tragen through the 28th. Targi is sometimes around but has some difficulty in finding time to post. We have a few submissions for new characters in the recruitment thread (I didn't even have to start a new one: shows how popular the game is.)

I suppose we will keep recruitment open until the 28th, when Tragen comes back and we can vote.

I am open to this transition, and I am perfectly content to start afresh or to continue as we are.

Have the potential newcomers been warned about the change in DM?

Happy to plan the restart for after 28 January, if that suits... let you all get sorted with extra personnel.

And thank you for asking me!

Yep. I said as much when I rejumped the recruitment thread.

No rogues applying, might be I'd need to step into that slot and change Jack. How long are we keeping recruitment open?

We didn't have one before either, Jack... :P. I kind of like you as a Cad. Maybe you can multiclass? Or does that break your original idea.

The original idea was cad 2/rogue 3/assassin ?/duelist ? so it wouldn't break the concept, Kyrul was our rogue and unlocking those shackles will become hard if we have no rogue.

Oh, I think it is easier to DMPC any still living members of the party and just introduce the new ones at a proper time, without starting the game over.

Yes, I'm happy with writing out existing but not-participating party members and bringing the new recruits in as fast as practicable.

Job interview tomorrow, expect me when you see me!

Is anyone else considering multiclassing? I'm pretty sure Shalastar is going to remain a solid sorcerer, as there is not really a prestige class that augments leadership or such in the Pathfinder rules.

There is the battle herald with his improved leadership class feature.

link.

Yeah, that's designed for cavalier/bards.

Okay, here is a list of our possible contenders: I recommend that we each choose the top three we'd like to replace the missing characters.

Vexis LaVayn, female human poisoner/inquisitor of deception (Pride, Forgery)
Herzog Hagruk, male half-orc sin-eater (inquisitor) (Pride, Slave-trading)
Jericho Fiendaxe, male human fighter (Pride, Pirate)
Sothya Zin, male elf bladebound (magus) (Envy, High Treason)
Jude Draxus, male human sound striker (bard) (Envy, Murder)
Preston Cornelius, male dhampir grave walker (witch) (Wrath and Lust, Consorting with Dark Powers)
Todin Lael, male human scroll scoundrel (rogue) (Pride, Fraud)

Shalastar's Vote:

1) Vexis LaVayn
2) Todin Lael
3) Sothya Zin

I'll try to give this a more thorough look through tonight but loving the ideas I've seen, I've spotted at least one for-sure for me at a glance but I'll have too give this all a closer look.

I'm back. I still have a lot of catching up to do with work and other games, but I'll try to have a look at the recruitment when I can.

We should restrict the choices to one Pride and one Envy, so that we have the full gambit of Sins though.

I'm going to abstain from this vote. I've looked them all over, they seem to be of decent quality. I don't care who we get.

Funnily enough I agree with your selection though my number 1 candidate is Todain.

No rush... let me know when you have made your minds up.

Just waiting on Targi and Tragen.

Hmmm, I'm liking both Todin and Vexis for Pride. Good stories and very strong candidates. The main issue for Vexis was that she is a "forger" without any ranks in Linguistics (the skill used for forgery), and we have two Clerics and an anti-paladin for the religious side of things. On the other hand, Todin's sheet probably shouldn't be showing armor and weapons since we ain't got 'em yet. I guess I'm leaning, very slightly towards Todin for Pride.

For Envy... with Jude, being a bard somewhat conflicts with Shalastar's Lust sorcerer (both being social, similar spell selection, etc.) although the performance aspects can add quite a bit to a large party, and I guess there would be another voice clamouring for Charisma items, lol. With Sothya, someone will be able to do something with portions of any spellbooks we find. Although on it's own, I would probably prefer Jude, I worry about the extensive conflicts with Shalastar's raison-d'etre. Thus, Sothya would get the nod from me.

So, that basically makes two votes for Todin in the pride place, and three votes for Sothya in the envy place, and one vote for Vexis in the pride place. I'm actually fine with either Todin or Vexis, but I was trying to balance out the gender element a little bit for some reason.

As for 'forging', she may not have been one of those who actually did the forging, but she probably worked for those who were, and when the organization was caught, she was lumped in with them. :P

Just waiting on Targi, who hopefully is still with us... :)

Overall I'm pleased with the applicants. Several stand out both for quality of submissions.

Vexis Lavayn: A strong story and an interesting route for character build makes her a compelling choice. A very dark campaign premise should provide many opportunities for a poisoner to shine.

Todin Lael: Sure, it's another charismatic character that might compete with Shal, but having some redundancy in a seven person party not only makes sense but also makes for amusing roleplaying. Todin fits his crime and his sin very nicely.

Jude Draxis: This character took a little while to grow on me, but in the end he proved rather endearing in his twisted crime spree. It's even more charisma, but who am I to complain? I'm the sort to organize all-bard tables of Pathfinder Society.

Any of these would meet my approval. I am confident that Tragen and Jack will [ig]nobly head our front line with Targi's supplementary boosts to everything they ever own, and the lively crowd of persuasive knaves will do whatever they will to great effect. To sum up:

Envy: Jude Draxis
Pride: Either Vexis Lavayn or Todin Lael

I'm actually with Tragen on this one. Jude Draxis feels more like a competitor than an ally. :P We would be fighting over Charisma enhancing items. But I'm open to whatever everyone else wants.

So out of the five of us:

Pride: Todin, 3 votes
Pride: Vexis, 2 votes
Envy: Sothya, 3 votes
Envy: Jude, 1 vote
And one abstaining.

It seems like Todin and Sothya are our winners. Agreed?

Agreed.

Todin reporting in. I'm very excited to be a part of this campaign! Any ideas for the introduction of Sothya and I?

I was thinking you all might be in one of the other cells (perhaps the guards knocked you unconscious or something)... but I'm open to suggestions from the others.

I think Megan, being the one with all the information, is best suited to find and 'in' but one of the cells or an adjacent prison block comes to mind. Maybe we'll intercept you as you're being brought into the cells as new prisoners to join us on death row.

OK, I shall sort something out and get things rolling in the next few days.

Thank you for inviting me to be your DM.

Thanks for agreeing to be our DM. I was very attached to this character. Foibles and all.

Indeed. The opportunity is much appreciated.

Sorry folks, if I'm still welcome then I'm here. I'm at school now, and doing that sort of thing on a tablet is a pain in the butt, so an alias will have to wait until I get home.

I'm Sotha, by the way.

Yes, Sotha's still in. :) Things have slowed down for now until the DM can catch up with where we are and familiarize herself with the characters.

I am here.

I hope to be ready in a few days... there's a fair bit of reading to do!

I hope to be ready in a few days... there's a fair bit of reading to do!

You may also wish to e-mail the Webmaster to gain custody of this gaming thread. That way you'll gain all editing powers over the campaign.

Thanks, I shall.

Bit busy this week. I'm a school governor & have two meetings. (UK school governors are a bit like a school board US, only each school has its own set of governors. We also have a county-wide body & I'm involved in that as well.) But you are not forgotten, I'm doing my reading...

Thanks for the update, Megan. We'll continue holding then. :P

Just a little bump, Megan. Hopefully you're caught up on everything soon.

Hopefully, there's not too much on your plate.

Everyone still here?

Yes... I think Megan's been swamped with work lately. Sometimes that happens. I'm surprised she hasn't told us herself. Her posting in her other games (I'm in one, but know others who are in two or three) has slowed down of late. I'm still holding out that she'll be available sometime soon, of course. :( If not, well... I guess I could hold out for another game, but I hope this works out as I have enjoyed Megan's Curse of the Crimson Throne, as this character was crafted with such an adult sensibility I doubt that it would be accepted in another Way of the Wicked Campaign. I'll try to send Megan a PM to see if everything's okay.

I'm still here... you are not forgotten... one or two bits to set up at this end...

Red five, standing by.

Now got this end set up - my D drive is a massive (1.5 terabyte) collection of RPG files with a web-style front end, so I've now got the Way of the Wicked AP set up therein, enables quick reference when sitting here GMing :)

I need to write the webmaster to have the threads renamed, check the precise bit you are at, and pick up the story from there including doing something about the new characters so that they are included in the gaol break.

The webmaster has effected the transfer, and we are good to go. Please betake yourselves to the game thread!

In other news, Book 6 of the AP has just turned up in the review pile. So I'm good to see it through to the end, assuming that you good folks wish it.

['Good' refering to the players not of course to their characters...]