ZEITGEIST (Inactive)

Game Master Whack-a-Rogue

Curses, I know the solution to this puzzle... but there's no way that Alice does, and I don't want to spoil it.

@Alice: if nobody knows the answer, feel free to spoil it. I'm pretty sure this is something Jebediah (or any high-INT PC) could figure out.
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SoM Update: a rough draft document's been revealed that highlights one class and two spheres.

The Armiger infuses weapons with sphere talents and gets to make AoOs when cycling through them. It gets Quick Draw that eventually becomes a free action. Looks pretty cool.

The Athletics sphere deals with running, jumping, climbing, and swimming. Investment can give you a climb and/or swim speed, the ability to wall jump, wall running (a la Prince of Persia), and the ability to climb on enemies.

The Sniping sphere is (obviously) focused on making a single powerful ranged attack each round. Range penalties are reduced, and you roll extra damage dice that stack with Vital Strike. Investment lets you ignore partial cover/concealment, perform ranged combat maneuvers, and designate a location as your threatened area.

I'll wait a bit first, so that those who like puzzles can have a go at it.

Similarly, I've seen this puzzle before and remember the solution. I'll give it a day before Ellena blurts it out indelicately - assuming no-one else has a nice in-character way of solving it.

Are the strings on the portals fixed in a straight line or can they be curved like an actual string?

They're regular strings, but I didn't have a better way to show that on the graphic. Feel free to change the picture if it helps you. :-)

Don't think I've come across this particular puzzle before, but it was easy enough. I'll leave it for others to have a go on for now. It works ok with straight lines, though if I was doing it on paper I probably would have ended up curving the lines; on a computer you can simply move portals and/or towers about until you get a straight line, on paper it's difficult to move portals and towers once you've drawn them, so you have to curve the line to compensate.

The Sniping Sphere intruiges me, as a character with the Unreasonably Big Gun build.

And, again, while I can argue High Intelligence, I know the puzzle 'cos I read the book, so...

Yeah that's the thing with puzzles like this. It's a test of the players, not the characters.

The person playing the Int 20 wizard can't solve it if the player isn't good at these.

The Int 8 barbarian's player is going to feel inclined to not answer to separate player knowledge from character knowledge.

I get the idea, but it's actually counter immersive.

That being said I'll give it a shot.

Yeah, I know. In this particular case, it's only being used to show Jierre's personality and make an important point. Completion is not necessary. :-)

If it's 3 dimensional it's easy, if they're all on the same plane it's impossible with straight lines.

;-)

Not impossible.

Generally, passing the stream through the tower is not allowed. It's a simple problem of topology, demonstrably impossible. Towers and portals are supposed to me adimensional material points.
In this case, I guess it's used as a Kobayashi Maru.

Alice is correct; the puzzle is impossible if you're working in two dimensions. However, Jebediah's solution works if you make the final stream go OVER the tower. XD

Gameplay update will be up as soon as I get it typed. For the record, there were three possible responses.
- Give up
- Realize the puzzle is impossible to solve
- Change the rules (your choice)

Let me know what equipment you requisition. Once you're ready to proceed, tell me, and we'll move on to meeting the infiltration team and boarding the ship.

Currently thinking 1x Bandages of Rapid Recovery,a cold-iron dagger, and several sets of handcuffs. Ellena has little-to-no UMD skills, so I'd suggest someone else requisition a Wand of Infernal Healing, and would it be possible to pool our requisition funds for a pair of mage-cuffs?

I suggest we each pitch in 150gp for a CLW or Infernal Healing (although it's evil) wand.
Also, I thought CLW potions were 25gp, my bad, I've amended.

Regular handcuffs are standard-issue. You were given mage cuffs during the opening scene due to fact that King Aodhan would be present - thus warranting extra security. For this mission, you're authorized for one set of mage cuffs, but any extra will come out of your expense fund.

Get a club (iirc they're free) or somesuch.

Since the Unreasonably Big Gun is ready, can I trade in the bow and arrows I was using? I'll need the pennies for ammo.

As for shopping items...just the one. A Beneficial Bandolier.

Guys, don't forget we will be there for up to 3 days. We will need food and water and tents; while we should be able to forage for some of it that will take time out of our mission so it would be better to bring it with us.

Who is carrying the scrolls? I suggest we divvy them up between us somehow as they can be used by anyone.

OK, I'm getting

That will leave just over 150gp which is enough for the wand as Alice Suggested.

Since the Unreasonably Big Gun is ready, can I trade in the bow and arrows I was using? I'll need the pennies for ammo.

As for shopping items...just the one. A Beneficial Bandolier.

Why do I get the feeling that you're now the sniper with the .50 cal ?

If Miselle is dumping all of her requisitions into a Bandolier, then the money needed for a CLW wand rises to 187.5 gp. So I'm changing my shopping list to

I can carry the healing wand since it's on my spell list and I'm not likely to be too much in the thick of melee

I agree with the gun-toters carrying the silence scrolls and whoever is likely to enter a room first carrying the pyrotechnics to use as flashbangs.

OK, Jeb has removed the small tent and one of the antitoxins. That saves 60gp, more than enough to cover the extra 37.5gp for the wand.

and now I've added 2x flasks of acid to mop up the excess.

Whoops, I didn't consider the needs to buy a wand. Sorry for putting the burden on you guys! Next time we get an allowance increase I'll make sure to grab a spare.

And yes, the basic idea is the anti-everything rifle. Since it's range means I'll almost always be hitting touch AC, I might even hit things now and then this level!

Maybe.

I haven't even had time off from work stuff enough to get a shopping list together, but I don't mind putting forth the gold for the wand. I'm getting one of those bandoliers as soon as I have enough personal funds to do so!

@Azaghal: Not a problem: work comes first. I've had a rather busy week, myself, so not having to worry about moving forward in this campaign has been nice. XD If you're still not ready after another day or two, I'll go ahead and start the next scene.

@Everyone Else: Your shopping lists look fine. We'll move on once Azaghal is set.

@Azaghal: you have 190 gp of personal funds, you could put them towards requisitioning both the part of the wand and the Bandolier. Then, hopefully, you could buy it off with our next payday (perhaps getting back your 190 gp).
Otherwise I can adjust my purchases and cover for you (especially if you can give me some bullets you craft with Gunsmith).

Nah, I think your idea works better. I wasn't considering that I could just put it toward requisitioning the wand and bandolier, then pay them off later, but that will be more than adequate. I'll just adjust my available funds as needed for now. Thanks for the suggestion!

Yeah so I'm coming to realize as she grows into her role as supernatural Investogator/Interrogator just how fitting the name Spooky will become. You don't get to take your secrets to the grave.

Glad that you like the nickname :)

About the shared items, here's what I suggest:
pyrotechnics - Corynne, Jebediah, Miselle, Azaghal, to be used before me and Ellena charge into any necessary room
silence - Azaghal and Miselle, to be used to muffle firearms or to cover one of the melee fighters against spellcasters
passwall - Anyone. We'll likely use them situationally.

I'm good with that distribution. I'll add one of the flasbangs pyrotechnics scrolls to my sheet along with the wand.

Are we doing CLW or Infernal Healing?

Infernal healing is more bang for your buck, though I'm uncertain of it's providence in the world of Zeitgeist.

There's also the Detecting as evil while it's working.

And the generally discomforting evil flavour. Alice's alright with any of the two, though.

Why not Celestial Healing? All the awesome of Infernal Healing with all the glowing skin and regular bowel movements of Cure Light Wounds!

Nope. nowhere near as good.

Infernal is fast healing 1 for 1 minute = 10 rounds=10hp

Celestial healing is fast healing 1 for 1 round /2 levels. It'd have to be created by a 20th level caster to be as good.

I know it's stupid but that's how they wrote the spells.

Cure light wounds, however, might be best for our level, since it's less effective out of combat, but can be used in combat in a pinch.

Also useful on the off chance we encounter undead

That distribution seems good to me; as mentioned in my post, if there's anyone who would like an extra sunrod, I think it would be a good idea for Az to re-distribute his two; darkvision kinda makes them unnecessary.

Jeb already had a bunch of sunrods. He kind of collects little stuff like that.

I'm happy with the distribution, and I'm in favour of CLW for it's utility and flavour (and because I don't believe there should be an Arcane spell that's better than a divine at healing). I will add pyrotechnics to my possessions.

I will happily take one.

CLW it is. I couldn't see out bosses being all that cool with Infernal healing's icky factor, and registering as evil, even for one minute might cause problems.

That being said, Celestial healing is @#$$%@ed up! Think about the material component. Who's selling vials of angel blood? It would take a hell of a lot of vetting for me to trust that source.

And if you're using holy water, that's a damned expensive 1st level spell!

I have it on good authority that angel blood, Dwarven rum, and a bit of lime make an excellent cocktail.