Way of the Wicked - the Fall of Andoran (Inactive)

Game Master increddibelly

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both seem viable plans.

Ill give you any spells I have girl, sorry for ur spellbook loss <3

I like the prisoner idea. I have no qualms about killing, but if we do that neither will the guards. If we appear to make a bloodless escape they might be a little gentler (of course we'll slit his throat at the end anyways)

Hey guys, going to busy today. I'll check in later tonight, earlier if I can. Whatever consensus is, I'm happy with it.

And about my spellbook... damn!

The most simple plan would be to go down, grab Blackerly, hold him hostage, then make a break for it. We can do whatever we want with Blackerly afterwards. That doesn't factor in looking for Talon's spellbook or getting any other resources though.

We only have an hour until the next watch so unless someone wants to stay behind and ambush them, or we all stay behind and wait until they come so we have another six hours, then we have no time for anything else because it gets extremely risky.

The longer we take, the more likely someone is going to notice something's off with Ron, or that the previous watches are missing. Dealing with Blackerly will also prevent the first since Ron is with them, the second is an acceptable risk.

We could split into multiple parties but that might be a DM's nightmare. :P

Here are some goals:

(a) Escape
(b) Find Talon's spellbook
(c) Find any other resources
(d) Deal with Blackerly (and somehow make Ron look competent)
(e) Find secret passages (for escape)

If we trust Ron to keep his cool for an hour, then getting rid of the latest watch is optimal. That gives us 6 more possible hours to work. That only needs a portion of our party so I suggest the remaining either go for (b), (c) or (d). (d) would lessen the risk of Ron giving us away, but has a high chance of badness if it fails. (b) is an unknown risk and splits the party by distance. We're assuming Talon's spellbook is in the warden's tower and we have little about the warden so we don't know how well we can handle him. (c) would have them still in the same building, not too far away, and gives us more resources to better handle anything in our way. There may be guards but it should be the least risky of the options.

Having Caladwhen cast Sleep at the poker game is optimal, because that means a swift and bloodless victory if all of them fail. If some fail, they should be easy enough to dispatch since we can block the exits and intimidate them into surrendering. They should be caught off-guard so I expect little resistance.

Therefore, I propose that half our party waits for the next watch to come in (I propose Sindran, Talon, and Grumblejack because they're the most distinctive) and bring them down. The other half disguises as guards and looks for resources we could use. After the time is up, meet up again, take note of new resources, then either all of us go for (d) or split up and take (b) and (d) fast.

I suggest all to (d), and assuming that goes well, proceed to (b) if we're confident enough, otherwise go to (a).

To make Ron look competent, assuming a bloodless victory, tying/chaining everyone down tight would be good except for Ron, whose bonds are loose and open so he can get out any time he wants, or with little effort, but with instructions to only get out and free the other guards once a certain duration of time has passed or when he hears the alarm being raised.

(e) is too risky since the passages might not even exist. If they are, they'd be extremely useful. Perhaps the Warden might know something . . . ?

Also note that Sindran is out of the loop, so to speak. He doesn't know anything until you tell him, and if you do tell him that would waste valuable time. If we go with the above plan, Talon can catch Sindran up while waiting for the guards. It's not a requirement though.

The others will decide what to do next. The above is just my suggestion. :P

Talon has a measure of respect for Sindran so he will quickly fill him in.

After us not so pretty fellas take out the guards we could wait up in Blackerlys chambers, getting my spellbook and Blackerly himself. Ask a few questions, get a hostage

The main problem is we don't know how long that poker game will last, and there's the chance that Ron will spill his guts. They're getting drunk there, presumably, and Blackerly is working some of his magic.

There's also the question of where exactly that poker game is. :-S If it's at the guardhouse, then tough luck getting into there. We'd have better chances waiting.

The spellbook is probably not in Blackerly's chambers (14/15) but in the Warden's tower (21). Though that doesn't mean we shouldn't search his chambers too. :P He probably has a load of stuff hidden, so that's where I'd suggest searching first since it isn't likely for anyone to be there.

I'll give you the location of the poker game. That's just typically something one of you would've asked. It takes place in the east gatehouse (3c I believe)

Ooh, thank ya.

Then I'd suggest doing Blackerly last since he'll probably be the most heavily guarded. Going to the Warden's Tower may be worth it, then back to his chambers to see if he's back. We'll be lucky if he is. If not, we either play the hostage card or burn the dog kennels, charge or window into (3c) and hold both the Warden and Blackerly hostage. Alternatively, our three more sneakier party members can get to the poker game without raising suspicion and take him hostage right there.

Or: charge right out, kill everything in our way. Hoo-hah.

By the way, that black squared away hole in (11) and (17) that seems to be connected. Is that a chimney or something?

I'd prefer to not just charge out, i feel like 80 guards just might drag us down.

We need to use this 1 time window smartly

yes, that'd be the chimney, 11 being the kitchens. Which reminds me, I still owe you a list of numbers + names.

1. Small guard house
2. The bridge
3. Gate House
3a Entryway
3b Western Gatehouse - ground floor
3c Eastern Gatehouse - ground floor
3d Western Gatehouse - level 2
3e Eastern Gatehouse - level 2 <------- poker game!
4. fountain
5. Garden
5a Belladonna shrub
6. Guard towers, battlements
6a privy.
7. kennel
8. great hall
9. barracks
10. mess hall
11. kitchen
12. armory
13. storeroom
14. sarge's office
15. sarge's quarters
16. stairwell
17 guardroom
18 cells
19 grumblejack's cell
20 interrogation room / visitor's room
21/22/23 three levels of warden tower.

Yeah, 80 people might make Sindran chip a nail. Do you know how hard it is to exfoliate with skin like his? *sass*

DM, ooh, cool. We can possibly bypass the hall and go through the chimney straight to the kitchens instead.

for ease of access, here is the map again.

also, Ron is going to check the roster to see when the supply cart to Veryston will leave. He'll have that info first thing in the morning.

It looks to me like you're worrying too much about surviving the prison break. A word of advice : it's no one's idea of a good time if we have a TPK in the first week (or ever, for that matter). So, chances are, you'll live, because that's more fun. I'm here to make things difficult for you, not impossible.

I'm mentioning this explicitly because the first group I played this AP with, got extremely frustrated at pretty much this point : You're in control, but a little hesitant to push on. I'd like to prevent the frustration on your side; let me know what I can do to help.

Fun is good! :D

I'm actually the opposite--not hesitant to push on, but hesitant to wait. Don't worry, Sindran has made his own plans and is cool with whatever the rest of the party decides as long as they don't get in his way.

Though how 'bout that empowered rod?

Though how 'bout that empowered rod?

There are too many jokes going through my head now, I'm having trouble to choose. However, are you familiar with the song "A wizard's staff has a knob on the end" ?

Sindran Eithe wrote:

Though how 'bout that empowered rod?

There are too many jokes going through my head now, I'm having trouble to choose. However, are you familiar with the song "A wizard's staff has a knob on the end" ?

Very little--thought it was part of a verse from The Ball of Ballyknure (AKA The Gathering of the Clans) until I found out it was Pratchett. Though I now consider myself newly initiated to the song. :P

And programmer/Computer Scientist jokes! Ha!

armory might be a good place to stop by, although it's probably heavily guarded.

i just had a brainstorm, what if we into the kitchen and made quite a mess? it's in the corner of the building, so the guards would have to divert attention to the fire/flood/caveman there, putting some out of our way

Looks like you're about to kill two guards. I'm going to need to see it happen though.

Sorry folks, busy day. Anyway, I put together a map. Warning, the quality of the map is limited, the resolution on the original was fairly low. I used our character avatars for tokens, and based positioning on the combat actions thus far.

Let me know what you think. Also increddibelly, if you have a higher resolution version of the map, that'd be great.

ok, HD maps will be for next time, for now we'll have to learn to love the compression artefacts :)

Hah, I realized I meant 18c instead of 18d but that's fine.

Also, if I recall correctly, each square is 10' x 10' so Grumblejack should occupy one square while the rest of us can have two person to one square comfortably.

No clue how to translate that into the map though. :P I don't even know how it's done on a tabletop. Darn nonstandard-sized squares.

Nobody is sneaking up on the rear, strangely. Talon and/or Arryn was going for K14, I think, for backstabz.

Correct, 10ft squares.
However, when you're running up to someone to stab 'en in the giblets, another few feet don't matter much to me. As long as you're staying near your speed, 3x 10ft squares for most, I don't care.

yeah....let me take that back. It's quite annoying not to be able to be specific as to what happens. So, each 10 ft square has 4 5ft squares in it, and I'm going to label them NW, NE, SW, SE.

My bad, didn't realize it was 10' squares. I'll see if I can fix it without making it look awful.

Nah, I should've given you a better map to start with. Next time, promise :)

@Arryn: Oh. Oh, wow, that is a low roll for your disguise. I'm sure Sindran would notice how . . . awful your disguise is. XD

From what I remember disguising as a different gender also gives you a negative modifier. And, uhh, it takes time to make a disguise but you usually can make a disguise roll again.

Please try again if DM allows, because we are so busted if anyone sees you. :P

I think it was mentioned earlier that each guard had a chain shirt. If so, then anyone who wants one can go grab one.

Well if I can get my hands on the bonus for humans DM was talking about, I might be able to rock it. Lets see, the disguise penalty for opposite gender is -2, so I'm only getting a bonus of one for the check all in all. I can't remember what the bonus was, but I swear dm said like +9 or something for humans disguised as guards, and for all intents and purposes, I'm human.

Just rerolled with disguise for a 17...

There's no serious time pressure so you can mess with the disguise until you're satisfied with it. That's pretty much the definition of take 20 ;)
I prefer waiving rolls away if it means reinforcing a character's key abilities. That's way more fun imho. Under pressure, I.e during initiative, that won't happen though - you'll have to get it right or deal with consequences :)

I'm going to avoid the Chain Shirt... seriously messes up Wizards. Is there an extra dagger though? I could use that; also just realized I can even make it my arcane bond weapon for an extra crowd control spell.

Edit: Nevermind, just read it takes 8 hours and 200g to create a new bond. Blah.

For now Cala, I fully realize this sucks balls. You still have your spells though, so you won't just yet need the spellbook.

I can give you any of my spells as well. They're all combat, but it should be nice

Hey guys, I tried to draw a picture of Arryn... can you tell me what you think?

Picture of Arryn Link

Looks good. I like the face. I think the ears are too elven though, when you're only half-elf.

I referred to the Core Rulebook for the ears, because I had the same idea, but it seemed they had large ears, but I think I'm gonna tone them down.

Oh, looked at some images of half-elves. It seems you're right, they do have ears like that. Odd since I was imagining them to be only a bit longer than human ears but still pointed.

You can just look at my profile, it should list them all. Assume I told you this in character

Huzzah!

Talon Dalkar (on spells) wrote:

You can just look at my profile, it should list them all. Assume I told you this in character

Huzzah!

Cala's spells are also on the profile page, but here they are for quick reference:

Cantrips Memorized
Detect Magic (1/1)
Light (1/1)
*Touch of Fatigue (1/1)

1st Level
*Cause Fear (1/1)
Charm Person (0/1)
Obscuring Mist (1/1)
Sleep (1/1)

* DC for Necromancy spells at +1 DC

I referred to the Core Rulebook for the ears, because I had the same idea, but it seemed they had large ears, but I think I'm gonna tone them down.

You have a lot of freedom when it comes to half breed races... it's really up to you how much or how little they take after their ancestors.

If, for example, you didn't want super prominent elven ears (unlike say Cala's), you could just reason that Arryn is several generations removed from her elven ancestors. That's the read I took from the Golarion campaign setting guide on their appearance anyway.

No worries. :D I just wanted to have an in-game reason for Sindran knowing what spells you guys could cast and asking you to cast them.

Arryn Lerash wrote:

I referred to the Core Rulebook for the ears, because I had the same idea, but it seemed they had large ears, but I think I'm gonna tone them down.

You have a lot of freedom when it comes to half breed races... it's really up to you how much or how little they take after their ancestors.

If, for example, you didn't want super prominent elven ears (unlike say Cala's), you could just reason that Arryn is several generations removed from her elven ancestors. That's the read I took from the Golarion campaign setting guide on their appearance anyway.

Oh, that makes sense.

I like the big ears either way :D

I don't have a scanner, so I had to take a photo of it and it didn't turn out to well... you can't see all the little details...

a friendly reminder - sleeping guards are considered helpless.
Also, please let me know if I'm dropping too many hints; I'm trying to keep the game active and snappy (and I feel fighting a hundred-nay-two-dozen identical guards is NOT snappy), but the last thing I'd want is to put you on a railroad track.

@DM: It's all good. I'm usually able to post earlier, but work is busy these days.

Also, to the others, I don't mean to hog the spotlight with Aerent. I (the player) thought Aerent and Arryn would have a bit more time scouting and be able to return upstairs before moving against the guards. Trying my best to get everyone involved again.

Hogging the spotlight is inevitable with scouts--they're going ahead after all. It's usually the time when the rest of the party roleplays, time to talk and plan.

S'no worries with me. I'm kind of a spotlight-hogger meself (do tell me if I'm pushing too strong).

It seems I have this funny habit of going to bed when you lot are rolling initiative. Such a cheap way to keep tension high ;)

Haha. What works, works.

If you guys want to work out a stealthier approach, you'll need to, ah, reach a compromise with Sindran. He's grumpy at acting nice and rational all night.

And I love the idea of him wielding a meat cleaver. Except he's not proficient with it and he gets a -4 to attack rolls in the first place and his strength is way horrible so it's an extremely bad weapon for him to be wielding.

But damn if he doesn't look badass.

Hey guys, tomorrow and for following weekdays I won't be able to post as much, at least not until around 4:00 PST, sorry, hope you understand. I'll try to post things Arryn would do the night before.

Aerent sighs and looks down. "Blackerly's game lasts another hour."

I thought so, but the watch switches at midnight if I recall.

OH. Yeah, now I get what you meant. Sindran's post said that Blackerly would be back any time now. @.@

*facepalm*