Retrocon Cosmic Captive GM Thread (Inactive)

Game Master Tyranius

The three 'rounds' comprise a 'phase' which the text uses to describe the sorts of actions that are possible during each.
Mentioning that in your GM post might help avoid confusion on the part of the players.

Exactly! It is just broken down into rounds to make it a bit more understandable.

Got it. Thanks!

Questions re the Shattered Sanctum wards and puzzle.

1. Does a PC working to solve the orb puzzle need to make the Will save vs the Fear magic circle during each phase? If shaken in a prior phase, to subsequent fear effects stack in this encounter?

2. Regarding the counting and reporting of successes, I don't have a clear understanding of the text:

If a PC exceeds the check DC by 5 or more, count it as two successes .... After each of the puzzle-solving PCs has had a chance to make a check, count the PCs’ number of successes that round. If the PCs earned at least one success, report one success to HQ Staff. If the PCs earned a number of successes equal to half the number of PCs, report two successes. If the PCs earned a number of successes equal to the number of PCs, report three successes to HQ Staff.

Situation: 6 total PCs; 3 attempted to solve the puzzle; 1 failed and 2 succeeded, with one success exceeding the DC by 5 or more. So, the party earned 3 successes, which I reported.

However, looking at the text again, I wondered if I erred in the reporting. Given the situation I described, how am I to understand it. Should I have added an additional success, or maybe two?

3. Should we wait until the end of a phase to report all subsequent successes, or is it okay to report them as a PC succeeds. It might help get the hall to a required threshold faster, if we were to report them immediately. I'll wait till the end of the current phase to report, unless I hear otherwise from the Overseer GM.

1. Does a PC working to solve the orb puzzle need to make the Will save vs the Fear magic circle during each phase? If shaken in a prior phase, to subsequent fear effects stack in this encounter?

Yes, the player does unless the the fear circle has been destroyed. The shaken condition should only last until the end of the next encounter so by the time they do the puzzle again then it will be just wearing off. So you shouldn't get past shaken unless an enemy during the encounter has some ability to make it worse.

2. Regarding the counting and reporting of successes, I don't have a clear understanding of the text:

Yea that is worded poorly along with a few other past areas as you have already seen. Basically the players each try at the puzzle. Those successes are not the reportable ones but more of a tally.

So your first player beat the DC by more than 5 so that would be 2 success tallies. Your second PC just made the DC so that is one more equaling 3.

So now the number of reportable successes is determined based off of that. Your group earned 3 success tallies.You earned a number of successes that equals half the number of PC's and so would report 2 successes. 3 reportable successes would be if your group as a total achieved 6 success tallies during that round.

It is confusing since they use success twice for two different things. I'll change yours to 2 successes on the form. :). I hope this somewhat cleared it up. If not I'll try and come up witha bit better wording for it.

3. Should we wait until the end of a phase to report all subsequent successes, or is it okay to report them as a PC succeeds. It might help get the hall to a required threshold faster, if we were to report them immediately. I'll wait till the end of the current phase to report, unless I hear otherwise from the Overseer GM.

I would wait until the end of each phase as the max successes you can earn each round are 3. First you tally up the PC's success for that round which could be anywhere between 0-12 depending on if every PC rolls 5 over the DC. Then you use that range to determine your total number of reportable successes. For a group of 6, if the group as a whole earned 1-2 success tallies then you would report 1 reportable Success. If the group as a whole earned 3-5 success tallies then they would report 2 reportable successes. If the group as a whole earned 6-12 success tallies then you would report 3 reportable successes. At the end of each Phase of course.

Got it, thanks.

Follow up question:
Our slayer archer had made is Will save vs the Fear circle as he crossed to the orb to use Disable Device to help solve the puzzle in the preliminary phase. During the combat encounter, he remained where he was, using his bow to attack the guardians. There's no need for him to cross the magic circles again.

Does he need to make a new Will save in this phase?

If folks want to target the runes in the middle of combat, similar to an enemy, I would allow that as well.

The above got me thinking. Would the players be allowed to attempt to solve the puzzle orb during combat? My group has just decimated all the magic circles, and I suspect they might start working on the puzzle orb.

@Lorenzo- The runes would still affect him during the puzzle phase as they are connected to it.

@Kuey- nope cannot attempt to solve the puzzle during combat. Damaging the runes is one thing as it is a part of combat but the puzzle is far more complex in nature and the distraction of combat would be too much.

In between combat encounters in the Shattered Sanctum, can a PC make more than one attempt to solve the puzzle?

Solving the Puzzle Orb: In between combats, a PC can attempt to decipher one of the immense polyhedron’s many facets .... Other: In between combats, each PC has 2 additional rounds of actions that he can use to heal himself or others. He may perform these actions in addition to attempting a check against the magic circles or puzzle orb.

I think it's clear that a PC can only make one attempt to solve the puzzle during the interlude between combat encounters, but I thought I should check with the Overseer GM.

@Lorenzo- Each PC can either make a puzzle check or damage the runes during that phase though they can only do the one check per round.

FYI everybody - as seen on the Online Campaign page

On Saturday, February 16, starting at noon Pacific time, paizo.com be undergoing planned network updates. Our team estimates paizo.com downtime will last between approximately 2-4 hours. Updates or notes regarding the downtime will be posted here.

Thanks, nightdeath, for covering!

Event Reporting

Event name: RetroCon

Event number: 686,721

Boon rolls: each player (including each GM) rolls 1d20, 19 or 20 wins a boon. Each boon winner rolls 1d4 to see which boon. GMs need to include an email address for each boon winner in their reporting. Overseer and Backup GMs can roll in this thread.

Reporting: Retrocon Reporting Tool (Link)

Overseer Boon Roll: 1d20 ⇒ 10
Backup GM Nightdeath Boon Roll: 1d20 ⇒ 5
Backup GM Gimble Boon Roll: 1d20 ⇒ 15

No Boons for us.

It looks like there is no link (not in drop down box) in the reporting tool for 8-00??

I see one for the CCG, but not RPG.

Yup, I am bumping the originator of the form to get it added. :)

It's on the drop-down menu now.

When reporting boons won, they're not listed by number in the drop-down menu for boons, but only by name. Are they in sequence?

For example, is #4 'Mortic Transformation'?

I reported the session for the subtier 7-8 table.

The boons are in sequence

Thanks Tyranius and MorkXII!!!

Yes, HUGE thanks to Mork for helping with the ACG side of this monstrosity!

I'll add my thanks to fine efforts of our overseer team! Well done!

Thanks Tyranius and MorkXII. And thanks to our RPG friends for pulling off this special at the request of the ACG side. We really appreciate it and our players had a lot of fun.

Thanks, organizers, for putting together a great run.