Woodsmoke's Reign of Winter

Game Master Woodsmoke

Welcome aboard indeed. Glad to have you, Chaunce. A ranger is a fine fit, and I am generally good with any Paizo-published subclasses/archetypes if you see one that seems interesting to you.

This campaign and subsequent replacement PCs have all done an 18-point buy rather than the standard 20 point buy, as over the course of the campaign they have taken up the mantles of Baba Yaga's riders (humorously down to 1 each for the three; Geedra the Black Rider, Skane the Red, and Byakko the White). There are no more riders to convey a special bonus onto you, but I don't want you to feel lagging behind, so you can also do the 18 point buy for stats and have an additional +2 you can put into any score. This would be in addition to the ability points granted for levels 4 and 8. So basically: 18 point buy, two floating +1s, and a floating +2.

Rather than do the standard wealth for a higher level character as put forth in the rules, I like to look at the average GP-worth of items the party has and grant you that, as by the rules a freshly made higher level character will have much better/more gear than a naturally leveled one due to the new PC having immediate access to character-perfect gear. I'll take a look over that and give you a GP amount you can use to procure your equipment.

Other than that, no worries if these mid levels are newer for you. Feel free to ask any questions or anything on board or in PM at any time. 80% of my playgroup offline is basically all brand new players so I have no problem giving time for people to get into the swing of things. And offline is 5e at that; pathfinder is a jump more convoluted with all of the numbers and modifiers, so there's definitely a learning curve as the levels increase.

Feel free to take a look at the player's guide for this adventure path for some ideas/basics. You get 2 traits, and 1 of them can be from this guide if you wish.

Other than that, go ahead and send me a PM with some character info and I can help get you plugged into the goings on.

Looking forward to playing with you.

Also, thanks for the reminder Geedra, I need to fix up Krosh as well, lol.

Heya WS, Enii (see profile, Str isn't updated) actually has a point into the climb skill for a +8 bonus as it's actually a 'class skill' apparently. Byakko also has some emergency flying if they're touching when he casts it... I'm down to try climbing but obviously a big cat on stone, rope and pitons isn't the same as a tree in the jungle. If she's able to make attempts I'll give it a go.

Also semi-related can I cast Paragon Surge on Enii as a Share Spell ability? Pretty wild interaction but it does say regardless of her qualifying for type. To make matters even more wild... Sure Grasp is a feat requiring a point in climb which Enii has... but Byakko doesn't... lol

I just realized that krosh has had Fly prepared the whole time, lol. He can cast that on Enii to make things a bit easier if you'd like. You're right about climbving a straight half mile on a stone statue isn't quite the same as climbing a tree, so this might be the best option lol.

Don't see any reason why Paragon Surge wouldn't work with share spells!

Yea Enii will take a hit of fly if it's on offer...

Sounds good, we will go with Krosh hitting her with the fly spell. That leaves Geedra and and her flying and the rest climbing. I was thinking other people seem spooked to climb as they hadnt posted until posting this I remembered Geedra was flying and I am controlling Mithas, lol. I'll get a post up today with Krosh and Mithas' attempts and we'll see if Skane gets his up.

FYI all - my work has ramped up this week, so might be closer to weekend before I get clear enough to post. Please bot our Vikingr as necessary.

Hey there Chaunce, just checking in to see if you are still with us and interested in joining. I did send you a PM with some info but I know those are very easy to overlook with the way this website is laid out. Let us know! :)

Caught him IRL... Think he'll get back to ya shortly.

Busy kickoff to the working week gang - bot Skäne as necessary until I clear my feet :)

More work headaches o'er the weekend folks... planning on taking some time off in a week or so, might be then before I get the energy to really focus on posting. Appreciate the patience - Woodsmoke if you can bot Skäne as needbe please.

Thanks for the Fortune Hex there Geedra, I'm not exactly clear on how that works, can I just reroll any roll that round or do I have to pick a roll to possibly re-roll?

Which reminds me WS... I'll use my own Misfortune on the satyr in front of me if it looks to hit me with something this round...

I think you have to decide ahead of time. I haven’t looked it up in years, lol.

Yep. You must decide to use the ability before the first roll is made, per spell description.

No worries Skäne, we've all been there. I always appreciate your guys' patience as well.

If i miss anything in the combat when I'm posting feel free to remind me; I'm bound to overlook something running the enemies and 2.5 PCs, lol.

Apologies all, post incoming today.

Survived a third wave of layoffs at my company this week, but my boss did not.. so I'm in the "do your job but also your boss's job" mode at present.

Man that's rough... take your time chief.

Yep, take your time and congrats on continuing employment!

Oof... Sorry to hear that, take your time.

Thanks guys. Glad the week is over. I have a new boss now, so that's helpful. I'm training him of course but it's been somewhat of a load off. I'll get us back on track.

Byakko don't forget Geedra extended her hex on you so you can reroll that AoO! ;)

Ahh dang I didn't see the above post... Gonna assume the moment has passed.

Glad things are looking up at work!

You can still take the reroll if you want, no problem.

Hey guys. Never did pin down Byakko's pal for coming aboard (no worries!), so I have in fact recruited someone from my offline D&D group to join up. He has some pathfinder experience though no PbP experience, but I'm sure he will adapt to the nuances of playing on the forums. He's rolled up a new rogue to replace our boy Mithas; I'll look to inject him into the gameplay thread soon & will have him post in here as well.

Sounds awesome, GM!

Hello, everyone! I look forward to not knowing what I am doing!

Welcome to the squad!

Welcome Silas :) et al - apologies for the radio silence - have had a rough time of it of late - long story short we occupy my sister-in-law's farm cottage and have renovated it/improved to a high standard - my wife works in her sisters cattery business adjacent to the premises in lieu of rent. All was well until her sister announced she was suddenly closing the business at end of the year - we were in discussion to potentially buy her cottage and stay on in our home but that relationship has broken down and just last week her sister and mother announced they want us to leave :(

So cue a week of house-hunting/morgage arranging and family angst. All this was stirred up by her brother who is visiting from Dubai with his family. We all get on great but he's an opinionated guy who always seems eager to tell folk how to run their lives. His mum and sister listen to him and as such we've been stiffed. I'm not renowned for my suffering of fools so cross words have been exchanged... families eh...

We'll be fine, but its been an emotional brutal week for my wife (who feels ostracised by her family who she's selflessly devoted to) and the impending dread of leaving a home we love and have made our own creeping up and derailing us day-to-day.

Mentally I've not been at the races at all, but with a week off work now I'm hoping to recharge and re-engage with my gaming. Regardless appreciate the patience and apologies for any discontent caused.

Skäne, sorry to hear about the familial woes. I've experienced the sort of sudden shift in relations when it comes to money and property (I was once poised to buy a property owned as a trust by my grandmother and her 3 siblings. They were going to sell it to me as is for a very agreeable sum until one of the siblings succumbed to the avarice and refused in order to instead sell it for a much higher price in an inflated market - caused much strife among mt great aunts and uncles). I understand the mire.

Certainly hope you find new and better arrangements soon and are not too painfully disrupted. Worry not about the game - we will continue and Skäne will persist with us. Same goes for everyone; all players will ever have a spot at my table regardless of any adjustments to their frequency. Oft times our offline lives must take precedent. I'm also ever grateful for the patience of this group when I myself have slipped out of habitual posting. But we've been pushing forward in this game for 10 years now despite the setbacks and rotation of players so I am not worried.

Well wishes to you and your wife, I hope she will be able to reconcile with her family, or else not be plagued with guilt should you all end up having to forge a different path for yourselves. Take whatever time you need, and I will do my best to not sully Skäne's honor as a DMPC should the need arise.

Cheers WS - appreciate the candour and caring words.

We're in this maelstrom of property scouting, viewings... got our mortgage approved though, so now its a waiting game for that property which will be our new home.

Still we're mentally and spiritually drained so not much left in the tank for naught much else :(

Downside is I'm back at work and returned to the usual sh!tshow that welcomes me from time off. I'm also trying to manage a job remotely in Mozambique, using personnel that have only seen our equipment in training - never actually used at well site. Have a duty of care and we're running a remote support centre with them which means in addition to my usual work need to focus on them...

This is literally how I'm feeling at the moment!

Hopefully all will be clearer by the weekend, but might not... will rejoin/post when I can - however know Skäne is in good hands :)

Hope the housing market and process is better across the pond then it is in the US! Good luck to you, hope you find something great that will ease the sting of the chaos.

Take care and try not to get too burnt out with work. I started a new job this week myself and it's been a weird change and I've been feeling off from it.

Take your time, we'll be here

Hey team, including Silas (welcome!), hope things will settle out net positive for everyone (Like J-Park at the box office, NOT like for poor Dr Malcolm...) Happy we're still rolling, would certainly miss Byakko et al so thanks for keeping us moving WS, Geedra!

So after a mad 3 weeks of viewings and reading til we're cross-eyed of house reports... we found some shortlisted options. The best of these was right at the top end of our budget but was lovely... we popped in an offer at the asking price (fully anticipating being kicked back for a higher offer)... and it was accepted!!!!! Whoooot!

Pending legal paperwork and financials we shall get the ownership of our new home on October 15th... talk about a whirlwind!

Appreciate the patience all.

Congrats! Hopefully that's a load of stress off of your shoulders. Not that the physical act of moving is any fun but it's a lot less of an ordeal than the whole process of securing the home. Glad you found a place you like.

I'm (very) slowly poring over the pages of the campaign to bring all of the loot up to snuff. I know I did it once a while back so hopefully using that as a starting point will cut out some of the work. I know Mithas was tracking some of the stuff so I just want to make sure all is accounted for in physical goods and currency and all. I'm sure there are magic items in your possession that aren't allocated or being used or anything so it'll be good to take a new stock of everything and see what all is at your disposal. I'm going to redo the campaign info tab and try to make it a living document with whatever you guys come across.

Cheers WS - yeah been a mad few weeks - the scars of which will heal, but it'll be in our own hus, at our own pace.

Once I'm ensconced in my new abode I'll have a home office/study (read geek station) - hopefully have more time and inclination and if so will likely take on the quarter mastering duties (did it once before for Shackled City AP here on the boards). You've enough on your plate herding us in the right direction lol.

I know I threw a few things in the handy haversack but it was way back during the Pipers section so... It is on the character sheet but I think I've fallen off adding things that aren't in direct use by the cat duo.

Congrats on the House!

@Byakko: PM'd you mate - and replied in your dice thread.

Hey gang - apologies on the delayed posts. Work's been a chore - new systems going live in a week and no-one has been formally trained yet has created angst, topped off by news I'm moving from our bespoke building (and my operations office) to parent company's run down building in an open plan bullpen.

Our house move gains momentum ahead of 21st Oct move in date (we get the keys the week before) so lots of change for someone whose not a fan of change lol. Bear with if I'm spent and post rate dips while I get my bearings.

Cheers WS - yeah been a mad few weeks - the scars of which will heal, but it'll be in our own hus, at our own pace.

Once I'm ensconced in my new abode I'll have a home office/study (read geek station) - hopefully have more time and inclination and if so will likely take on the quarter mastering duties (did it once before for Shackled City AP here on the boards). You've enough on your plate herding us in the right direction lol.

Sounds good, friend. I won't oppose anyone wanting to take up the role, surely! I'll still continue my effort of compiling everything up until now to get things squared up; I've a long weekend next weekend for the old birthday so I plan on getting it finished up then.

Updated the campaign tab with the new loot list. It should be everything you guys have picked up that hasn't been claimed by someone/is recorded on their sheet.

Next goal is to get up a dramatis personae with all of the (importantish) NPCs you've encountered in your adventures.

You are the best, Woodsmoke!

Haha, hardly! But the campaign tab now has a list of NPCs and short blurbs on them and an important info spoiler that I will add to for yours guys' quick reference to pertinent bits of information you pick up.

Noice! Will have to do another reminder sesh for myself about those raven's riddles but glad for them for sure!

I'm not sure it ever dawned on me that I just happened to gain the white rider mantle but given Enii and the moon... Fate was guiding me when I made this PC methinks, hah!

Hey team, tried putting a post together but I'm recovering from a hernia repair and the pain meds aren't making it easy... Will try and get a proper post up this weekend but feel free to bot.

Oof, no fun Byakko! Hope you have a speedy recovery. No worries, take your time.

Also, I'll be working from home for the rest of the year, so I'll be much more available to keep things lively and moving :)

Okay, I scanned through the last few pages of the gameplay thread and I have to admit, I’m not sure exactly what we are looking for from this place. I know Geedra would like to get her spellcasting curse lifted but GM’s post from when it happened basically said it wouldn’t be lifted until we left the place by my reading.

No worries, this is kind of a convoluted adventure path even at a table, let alone in a a PbP.

Basically Baba Yaga in her infinite wisdom and planning left a breadcrumb trail for her Riders if anything was to ever happen to her and she disappeared. It was ascertainable that something did indeed happen to her when she didn't return for her removal of the current Whitethrone Queen and installation of a new one which she has done every 100 years for 1000+ years. The Riders are charged with following these breadcrumbs in the form of keys that when placed in the Dancing hut cauldron take the Hut and the Riders on the next step of this trail.

The original keys were given to you what feels like eons ago by the Black Rider. Putting those keys in the hut brought you to Iobaria and ultimately Artrosa where the next set of keys are. The ravens' riddles in the campaign info tab give some hint as to the nature of the keys. But that's your main reason to be here - to find the keys for the hut to continue your Riders' quest to find Baba Yaga as only she can stop the machinations of the usurper Queen Elvanna.

Not sure what kind of diplomacy I'm after here..

This adventure is just really weird. My biggest pain with adventure paths is that sometimes they are just so focused on the structure or machination of the adventure/lore/behind the scenes stuff that it actually spites the players/characters. There are sometimes I read portions of these books and it's just the most self-congratulatory "look how cool and interesting I am" passages from the authors...like a high school kid writing edge poetry or something. Like, there will be one paragraph of player-presented information about a given NPC or story beat but then 8 paragraphs of "the players will assume this but really this is only happening because of that which in turn is because of this but they will never know that because of this other thing and plus there's this fourth thing that has to do with the third thing and now let me lore dump this reasoning to you that never matters because as I said the players specifically CANNOT know about it because of things 2 and 5." This sort of stuff is really prevalent in this adventure and if anything I think it makes it harder for a DM to run because you are left trying to find ways to explain apparently inexplicable things and give players something to work with while the adventure itself fights you in doing that.

I ran this adventure path in an offline group once as well (this was the last book we did before that playgroup fizzled) and it was hard in person to and I ended up just having to take a lot of liberties because the players were so confused. The adventure path really has this heavy hand in trying to force a "the players and their characters are too dumb to even hope to possibly comprehend the machinations of Baba Yaga" vibe which I just don't think makes for a great experience. I haven't read the last 3 books in this path yet but I hope they do a bit better in these regards.

The Jadrenka stuff is probably some of the most confusing in the book. The book point blank says that she will never reveal to the PCs who she is or that she is the Warden or anything, and is forbidden to help them because of she does actively help them than her pacts with Baba Yaga are broken and she loses all of her powers and status as the Warden...but nowhere else does it explain this pact or why that is part of the pact or how it makes sense...and it specifically doesn't make sense because the party are the g%**%~n riders of Baba Yaga. I understand not wanting to have her help the party directly because she's powerful and would trivialize a lot of stuff, and that they want some of this adventure to remain enigmatic with the raven riddles and all, but I feel like they could come up with a better reason than "she's not allowed to because I said so." The book pretty much assumes that every room you come to you will just kill whatever enemy there is and doesn't really touch on "what if they talk to this person" so I guess it also assumes that you'll never have any interactions with anyone else about the Warden? (other than Caigreal who tries to maneuver you against her...but if you do act against her you kind of just break the adventure for yourselves?).

Anyway didn't mean to go off there, my ultimate point is if you are ever feeling lost, confused, or frustrated with this adventure, I'm right there with you, lol. I'm trying to ease the pains by being a bit more straightforward with some things.

You are doing a great job, GM. Any alterations you need to make to the adventure are perfectly fine by me!

I'll admit to feeling a bit lost but I'm not intending for it to come out in Byakko WS so I apologize if that's how it read. I'm still enjoying the interactions and you helping us move around without completely murder hoboing.

I honestly just wasn't really sure which Diplomacy angle to take. We've got a target, happy to roll towards that, I appreciate you keeping us on the trail and if the module really does get that convoluted, well... I don't mind a bit of rail car action.

(AP casts Mass Confusion)...

I'm there with you all - pretty lost, and not 100% sure on what we're doing and who we're doing it to lol.

Honestly WS, like Geedra says you're doing a sterling job chief - reshape the AP and encounters as much as you see fit mate, we'll likely be all the better for it!

You're good Byakko, it just got me thinking of the path as a whole and I wanted to make sure no one felt bad for feeling confused at any point. Plus it's harder to follow on PbP when 1 day ago in game was a month ago in playtime. I appreciate the kind words from everyone regardless. Maybe one day if we're all still kickin around here I can run a homebrew for you all.

I also made a post in the gameplay thread when I made the discussion thread post...but the boards disagree. Getting another one up now.