GM Abraham's Emerald Spire

Game Master Abraham Z.

Found something today. My search-foo seems better after some rest.

So yes, the false life is affected. I think you're right about the writer of this module having something against buffs.

Ah, very helpful. Thanks.

I'm hesitant to bot Dolgar's attacks - I've never played an inquisitor and I don't really have time right now to figure out his character's options. If he hasn't posted by tomorrow do any of you want to take a stab at botting him? We can also just wait until he has more bandwidth to post and not worry about our pace - that's fine with me - but as a reminder, I'll be entirely offline after Oct. 21 and probably won't be able to resume normal posting until mid-December (I get back on Dec. 3 but I expect there will be at least a week of just taking care of life business). At this point I think it's very unlikely that we'll finish the level by Oct. 21 (I guess I was overly optimistic!) so we are likely in for an extended pause regardless. Thoughts?

My very first character is an Inquisitor. I can take a stab at it. Please add heroism to the spells he has active.

AFAIK, speed weapons do not grant the haste's +1 bonus to hit. But if the GM is happy running it like that, please let me know and I'll adjust Jey's attacks next round.

Beats me. I just figured it works like haste.

My very first character is an Inquisitor. I can take a stab at it. Please add heroism to the spells he has active.

For Dolgar? Heroism is already in his entry in the status block.

AFAIK, speed weapons do not grant the haste's +1 bonus to hit. But if the GM is happy running it like that, please let me know and I'll adjust Jey's attacks next round.

Agreed. No +1, just an extra attack.

@GM: there's an argument that by RAW, nothing says an incorporeal creature can bypass the regular rules dictating that a creature cannot occupy same square as an another unless there's a 3-size difference. For certain, they cannot bypass force effects like Jey's shield spell, and I've seen other examples that any amount of deflection would prevent such intrusion. Let me know how you'd like to proceed.

Also depends on whether there is room above. It is a bit of a pain to do a map with overlapping characters, so most of the time it is avoided. But he did say passing through them.

How high are the ceilings in the room anyway?

@GM: there's an argument that by RAW, nothing says an incorporeal creature can bypass the regular rules dictating that a creature cannot occupy same square as an another unless there's a 3-size difference. For certain, they cannot bypass force effects like Jey's shield spell, and I've seen other examples that any amount of deflection would prevent such intrusion. Let me know how you'd like to proceed.

Interesting. I had never run into this before. To keep things simple, I'll say that Blue moved to flank with Yanda as a move action rather than a 5' step. It's got plenty of movement so this should be possible. Correction: not possible because of Jey's shield spell and the prohibition on moving entirely through the solid area without staying next to the wall... Ok, INSTEAD, Blue moves to attack Shiva. I'll use the previously posted attack (dropping Blue's second attack since it is moving) but with Shiva as the target instead of Yanda (and without the miss chance due to being adjacent). Note that I'm writing this before I look at the actual die rolls to see what the implications will be for maximum fairness. Also, Jey gets to take an AoO against Blue as it moves away from him.

Ugh. I started doing the retcon, having Blue move to attack Śiva and then I realized that Śiva isn't even there yet. Bah humbug. Let me figure out what works...

Ok, simplest solution, Blue just moves around Jey to attack Yanda but without flanking. Sorry for the confusion.

...

Oy what a mess that was. I think I've got it all solved in the fairest way possible. I used Jey's first attack for his AoO to see if that would take Blue off the board before his attack against Yanda. It nearly did but not quite. So Blue's first attack against Yanda still went forward but after that Blue was destoryed by Jey's spirits at the start of his turn. So Blue is gone and Jey still has their actions.

Hope that all makes sense and thanks for your patience as I sorted it out!

Also depends on whether there is room above. It is a bit of a pain to do a map with overlapping characters, so most of the time it is avoided. But he did say passing through them.

How high are the ceilings in the room anyway?

Ceilings are 20' high and the pit is 40' deep.

Thanks for sorting all that out. What a pain!

Hey everyone, no response so far from Dolgar's player to my DM. We'll finish out this fight (thanks, Yanda, for botting Dolgar) and then pause the action while I go offline for 6 weeks (sorry if this is inconvenient - this game has already had too many delays - my fault!). When I get back we'll see if Dolgar has resurfaced and/or consider whether to recruit some reinforcements. If anyone is unhappy with this plan let me know and I'll be happy to release your character back into the wild (no xp or gold for what you've completed so far though) - I will say that this level is, in my opinion, possibly the best and most interesting and challenging of the entire spire.

Enjoy your cruise!

Enjoy your cruise!

Lol! Six week silent meditation retreat - like a cruise except inside my own mind! :-)

Hey y'all, will one of you ping the game play thread a couple of times in November so that the game doesn't disappear from everyone's active lists? As noted, I won't have internet access Oct. 22 to Dec. 3.

By the way, good work handling that room - potentially a *very* challenging encounter, especially in a caster-heavy party. The fireballs that are triggered by the Dispel Magic effect are 1d6 per spell level, so when I played it we had a very rough time, nearly a TPK.

Token post to keep things active. About a month until we jump back in.

Hey there, just a quick note to let you know that I’m back. Probably a few days to catch up on things but just wanted to let you know. Hope all’s well with all of you.

All's well here. Ready to take another pounding.

Ready when you are. Hope you had a good trip!

Hey everyone, no response so far from Dolgar's player to my DM.

I heard through the grapevine that life has gotten in the way, been looking for signs of return for my own table but nothing yet.

GM Abraham wrote:

Hey everyone, no response so far from Dolgar's player to my DM.

I heard through the grapevine that life has gotten in the way, been looking for signs of return for my own table but nothing yet.

That's too bad... I'll contact customer service in a few days to get the campaign notifications turned off then.

My bad, I meant about Dolgar's player.

Ah, understood. I haven't heard from GM Abraham either since his return though...

Sorry everyone. I'm back and will be resuming play but I've just been busy catching up: 2500 new emails in my inbox! Yikes.

I did reach out to Dolgar's player once again just in case they had resumed checking but no response so before we can start playing again we'll need to recruit one or two new players.

Good idea. Thanks for the update!

Hey y'all. Still playing catch-up and holiday season yada yada but just wanted to let you know that I went ahead and posted in the Flaxseed recruitment thread to try to get some new player(s). Once we have one or two replacements we'll get going again (subject, of course, to y'all's availability during the holidays).

I'm always available :)

Ready whenever

So a suli, a sylph, and two oreads walk into a dungeon...

So a suli, a sylph, and two oreads walk into a dungeon...

Sounds like we're trying to be the planeteers

shaventalz wrote:

So a suli, a sylph, and two oreads walk into a dungeon...

Sounds like we're trying to be the planeteers

Well, Onjatan does do earth and fire. Sylph for wind, but who's water and heart?

Onjatan would nominate his familiar for heart, but he's biased (and Araga would hate it.)

Shiva Parashurama wrote:

shaventalz wrote:

So a suli, a sylph, and two oreads walk into a dungeon...

Sounds like we're trying to be the planeteers

Well, Onjatan does earth and fire. Sylph for wind, but who's water and heart?

Onjatan would nominate his familiar for heart, but he's biased (and Araga would hate it.)

"Please no."

Suli is either heart or the captain, never entirely sure which.

Well, Onjatan does do earth and fire. Sylph for wind, but who's water and heart?

Yanda may be a Sylph, but as an alchemist she does more fire that wind.

Ok sorry for the slow restart but I'm finally ready to get us going again (and, as usual, once we are rolling along we should be able to maintain a normal pace).

A couple of things before I reveal what is behind the door:

Onjatan, please add your token to the map on slide 1 (and you all should discuss marching order - who is opening the door?). Also, please fill in your Init, Perception, and Saves modifiers on slide 2, as well as any conditional modifiers that apply to those.

Also, Onjatan, if there are buffs from spells/items/boons/abilities/etc. that you would have activated when you arrived in the dungeon, please tell me what they are, along with their durations.

Lastly, for everyone, swapping Onjatan in for Dolgar requires a little hand-waving because, as you may recall, you are all locked in to this dungeon level. Strictly speaking, there was no way for Dolgar to have left and no way for Onjatan to enter after the door was locked. I'm going to handle this by just saying that Onjatan was with you from the start, and Dolgar wasn't. Hope this makes sense and let me know if you have any questions.

I'll go ahead and post the next encounter once we are all ready. And thanks again for your patience!

Onjatan, please add your token to the map on slide 1 (and you all should discuss marching order - who is opening the door?).

Token is present. Given that Onjatan has 20' move and prefers melee, he should probably be near-ish the front. I don't know what your order has been until now.

Also, please fill in your Init, Perception, and Saves modifiers on slide 2, as well as any conditional modifiers that apply to those.

Static modifiers are done. He's got several once-per-scenario types of bonuses he's collected, but those aren't always active. He also has +2 AC vs rays, and there's nowhere to note that.

Allies should note that Onjatan has the Stoic Dignity trait. He has a 10' aura of +1 vs mind-affecting effects unless he's already suffering from that effect.

Also, Onjatan, if there are buffs from spells/items/boons/abilities/etc. that you would have activated when you arrived in the dungeon, please tell me what they are, along with their durations.

I've also noted them in the "active spells and effects" section of his character page.

How much in-game time has the party generally spent on each floor so far? If less than an hour per floor, Onjatan might stock up on antiplagues and antitoxins to drink before we kick the door in.

Lastly, for everyone, swapping Onjatan in for Dolgar requires a little hand-waving because, as you may recall, you are all locked in to this dungeon level. Strictly speaking, there was no way for Dolgar to have left and no way for Onjatan to enter after the door was locked. I'm going to handle this by just saying that Onjatan was with you from the start, and Dolgar wasn't. Hope this makes sense and let me know if you have any questions.

How "locked in" are we talking? Should I be prepared for several levels of healing and food?

Static modifiers are done. He's got several once-per-scenario types of bonuses he's collected, but those aren't always active. He also has +2 AC vs rays, and there's nowhere to note that.

Check out Yanda's Fort save. After the roll, she has an OOC add on that says +6 vs. poisons, +1 vs. acid and cold, lesser talisman of freedom, greater pentacle talisman (2nd save). That is how you would note special ST bonuses. There are other examples on slide 2 like that.

shaventalz wrote:

Static modifiers are done. He's got several once-per-scenario types of bonuses he's collected, but those aren't always active. He also has +2 AC vs rays, and there's nowhere to note that.

Check out Yanda's Fort save. After the roll, she has an OOC add on that says +6 vs. poisons, +1 vs. acid and cold, lesser talisman of freedom, greater pentacle talisman (2nd save). That is how you would note special ST bonuses. There are other examples on slide 2 like that.

I read that as "always has additional +1 vs acid and cold". I've got some of those, but I'm talking about the type of thing that says "once per scenario, may add +2 on a save vs a fire effect."

You can still add that to the suffix and hope that the GM asks you before making a save, or you can provide conditions for when you will use it. That is always an issue with choices like that though.

How much in-game time has the party generally spent on each floor so far? If less than an hour per floor, Onjatan might stock up on antiplagues and antitoxins to drink before we kick the door in.

I think most levels have been completed in an hour or three of 'in-game' time. This level is unusual in having the 8 hour time dilation trap. When I played it the GM commented that he thought the author of this level (all the levels of the Spire have different authors) had decided they were tired of how 'prepared' pathfinders all were! :-)

How "locked in" are we talking? Should I be prepared for several levels of healing and food?

No, just for this one level. How long might you stay on this level? Well, if Yarrix has her way, for all eternity... :-)

You can still add that to the suffix and hope that the GM asks you before making a save, or you can provide conditions for when you will use it. That is always an issue with choices like that though.

Most of the time my habit is to roll saves for the PCs - I find that it speeds things up considerably. But I'm usually willing to retcon if needed, especially if there was a particular ability that you feel you would have used prior to the dice being thrown. Sometimes I'll also put the result in a spoiler to give you a chance to consider whether you want to use any special abilities before you look at the results. My goal is to try to simulate the decision making process at a real-time face to face table, while also not bogging us down unbearably.

shaventalz wrote:

How "locked in" are we talking? Should I be prepared for several levels of healing and food?

No, just for this one level. How long might you stay on this level? Well, if Yarrix has her way, for all eternity... :-)

Got it. In that case, I'll pick up one extra antitoxin and four antiplagues (needed more of those for Araga anyway, it looks like.)

Onjatan will drink an antitoxin and an antiplague just before we start, and Araga will drink an antiplague (her subtype gives poison immunity). Then, after that gets wiped and we meet the party, they'll drink again.

Do you want another entry for Onjatan's familiar on slide #2?

Hey everyone, we've had an inquiry from another potential player. I'm inclined to add them - any objections?

GM Abraham wrote:

shaventalz wrote:

How "locked in" are we talking? Should I be prepared for several levels of healing and food?

No, just for this one level. How long might you stay on this level? Well, if Yarrix has her way, for all eternity... :-)

Got it. In that case, I'll pick up one extra antitoxin and four antiplagues (needed more of those for Araga anyway, it looks like.)

Onjatan will drink an antitoxin and an antiplague just before we start, and Araga will drink an antiplague (her subtype gives poison immunity). Then, after that gets wiped and we meet the party, they'll drink again.

Do you want another entry for Onjatan's familiar on slide #2?

Yes please.