GM Xavier Kahlvet's Passing the Torch—Low Tier (Inactive)

Game Master KingTreyIII

Peter has fairly high skill checks (perception, knowledge and stealth being the main ones, to come up) but certainly below Arnaut’s skills in the 40s, so I wouldn’t mind it since it stacks. If you want it thats fine too.

This archon is getting on my nerves. I can see his point, and I don’t really have any suggestion to counter his orders other than what we’ve already tried. Anyone else have any good ideas?

I'm fine with whoever getting the ioun stone, and anything that saves me math with this character is fine with me. I think inquisitors are the most math intensive characters in the game.

I'm fine with whoever getting the ioun stone, and anything that saves me math with this character is fine with me. I think inquisitors are the most math intensive characters in the game.

My investigator with an inspire die of 1d8+4 who adds twice that to damage when used on attack rolls would disagree.

If the ioun stone effectively doesn’t add to attack or damage rolls, probably the best it could go towards would be someone who doesn’t already have that stone (or it’s cracked version) for saving throws. All of us are decently skilled at this level, so that’s a difficult thing to base a judgement on. But nobody likes their allies failing saving throws.

Oh, yes, Arnaut does have the cracked version for saving throws.

I also have it for saves, I was assuming at this level we all did.

I mean, we assumed that everyone had a +5 cloak of resistance, but some folks (*cough*Zanice*cough*) proved us wrong, so... ;-D

Merry Christmas, folks! Because of the holiday, I’m going to be staying off of my PbPs in favor of being with my family, and I expect the same from you all. Go and be with your family, open presents, and however it is you spend the yuletide; we’ll be here when you get back.

Marta - A.K.A. Telmar So-Melnop wrote:

I'm fine with whoever getting the ioun stone, and anything that saves me math with this character is fine with me. I think inquisitors are the most math intensive characters in the game.

My investigator with an inspire die of 1d8+4 who adds twice that to damage when used on attack rolls would disagree.

I don't know. These are the various bonuses I have to deal with half of which are conditional which is the real pain:

greater magic weapon
heroism
hunter's blessing
bane
dragon ferocity (different bonuses for first strike just to complicate things)
judgment
outflank
keen edge
precise strike
ring of tactical precision
forceful strike
resounding blow
del. gloves
holy weapon

plus all the common ones like strength, power attack, and external enhancements like inspire, haste, etc. But I didn't count those ecause everyone has to deal with them.

From a dealing with thieves perspective - are we just planning to intimidate or do we want to get more complex? Bellamin has a +13 Intimidate untrained with Heroism, but I'm guessing one or both of the bards will be much higher.

I’m assuming one of our bards can do a decent cease and desist with intimidate (Marta can also do intimidate) or fascinate -> suggestion so I’ll wait for their posts.

An animate dream (or simply Marta and Hendric) should be able to kill them if they don’t have magical weapons if we need a more violent solution for some reason.

Calm emotions might make it so we can try talking with them, since it specifically calls out suppressing fear effects. Arnaut’s a bit busy, but perhaps someone else can talk our last one down?

You are aware that being fascinated means that they can’t take any actions, including the free action to speak, right?

Yep - I'm mostly worried about the the one that got away from the Fascinate effect. So (as I understand it), we have eight thieves a-calm'ed, seven scoundrels watching, six Seekers seeking, and a tiefling in a pear tree. Does that sound about right, or am I missing something?

Five animate dreams...

four hooves a beating,
three fireballs,
two bards a singing

I have no idea what we do with these fascinated guys, or the non fascinated one.

Retrieve the relics from them? If nothing else, it lets us ready some actions to disable them.

Fluffy's faster than they are. Heck, we're all faster than they are with a 60ft fly speed. They can't get far.

No offense to the GM, but that is a pretty dumb mechanic on the part of the author. If there are only eight, why not just run it as a combat?

Trying to make it quicker to resolve, I guess?

Will defer to others on how to handle the other groups of thieves. Sir Hendric can charge and knock one out, probably. But there could be some better solutions.

Drat. I had thought that since the only component of the spell is a word and because the only command I gave was to drop, that it would hardly be considered violent. So, all the thieves escaped with the relics?

I mean, there's a few relics on the ground when the unconscious thieves dropped them, but yeah, they more or less escaped with the relics.

I can try Deep Slumber, but one casting will only hit 10HD of targets, and guessing that won't be more than one or two of these guys. I don't really have a non-lethal method of crowd control. I have a scroll of Dimensional Anchor, but not Mass, so it's single target only.

Our best bet is probably massive damage. If I want to blow a SM 7 I can do 1d3+1 X 77 (average pounce damage), if they’re evil it’ll go up a bit. I wasn’t expecting them to run instantly, the big question is do we want to use finite resources to stop them fleeing like that, or is simply stopping them good enough.

I thought a high DC confusion was a strong play, because they’d likely get confusion locked on each other.

An alternative strategy would be to use stinking cloud. If they fail Marta and Hendric can pick them off. Its a low cost strategy that I am all for.

Oh my gosh! Totally random, but I found a much better image for Shemis! (I just didn't know that that image was full-sized; I thought it was only a head shot). So...Character Profiles Updated

Without Spellcraft, it’s near-impossible to tell whether someone is casting message or fireball. Hence, all spellcasting is inherently considered violent for these purposes.

If the only component is a single word, I'm not sure they would even know a spell was being cast without spellcraft until it took effect. Please explain how they would know. I suspect you have a reason, but it escapes me.

Arnaut wrote:

Without Spellcraft, it’s near-impossible to tell whether someone is casting message or fireball. Hence, all spellcasting is inherently considered violent for these purposes.

If the only component is a single word, I'm not sure they would even know a spell was being cast without spellcraft until it took effect. Please explain how they would know. I suspect you have a reason, but it escapes me.

Spellcasting is universally obvious. Unless very specific abilities are at play, casting a spell always has an obvious magical manifestation that, even to the uninitiated, shows that a spellcaster is casting a spell.

Or, to use a different argument, nowhere in the spell command does it say that the verbal component is a single word (the command's command), just that the command is a part of the spell, meaning that the incantation (the verbal component) still needed to be done. In this circumstance, how Marta actually cast the spell was along the lines of "Abracadabra alakazam DROP!"

*Rubs Eyes* *Double-Checks wording of spell* *Double-Checks Scenario* Well…I think Thomas Jefferson says my reaction best.

With a single spell and a chorus of discord, the thieves all simultaneously fall.

And as the scenario is written, if the party pacifies a group of thieves then there’s at least one person to interrogate, so if Arnaut wants to just use a second wall of sound for the third group then I can just hand-wave that last one. That said, that wall of sound did just flat-out kill at least half of these guys.

Gonna say that at least one of this group of thieves is just 3 cure light wand charges away from being conscious—assuming you all want to interrogate him, of course.

Well, that was more effective than anticipated. What does the group think? Rinse and repeat or try something else?

May as well do that again.

I had no idea that spell was that powerful.

To be clear, you all can interrogate this group of thieves; they just didn’t give you all time to properly intimidate/diplomacy them prior to them trying to make a break for it.

Gonna say that at least one of this group of thieves is just 3 cure light wand charges away from being conscious—assuming you all want to interrogate him, of course.

I definitely think we should question at least 1 now... we have that fully charged with wand.

Me too. Were any party members injured by the Wall of Sound?

Marta has Intimidate +34 and diplomacy +15. She will take a back seat to anyone with better skills. Surprisingly, even with a +34 (after heroism), I have seen that exceeded, particularly by bards.

In this circumstance, how Marta actually cast the spell was along the lines of "Abracadabra alakazam DROP!"

Thanks, that was actually very helpful.

Bellamin has +13 Intimidate with Heroism (untrained) and +26 Diplomacy. Happy to assist or take the lead if needed, but I suspect both Bards will be substantially higher.

Sir Hendric has a +16 Diplomacy and a +29 Sense Motive (+36 against a Bluff).

But I do not think they will try to Bluff us. They may well have been told that they are retrieving the relics for safekeeping. And may even believe that. Lying to your operatives is the best way to counter mind-reading or truth-divining magic.

Good point. If they even bothered to worry about capture. Torch might, but not our erstwhile decemvirate leader whom I expect is not expecting a future with the society after this.

Seeing as there does not appear to be anyone against it, Arnaut can use wall of sound against the third group as well.

And regarding the gathering of information, Arnaut loves making friends. He's such a charming person, wouldn't you say? And I'm sure whoever he gives the royal treatment to wouldn't want to hide anything from their dear friend Arnaut. He's the most trustworthy, honest, caring (and let's not forget, best-looking) person you've ever met. X-D

Sounds like a plan, I think you should post something to that effect in gameplay Arnaut.

Alright. A big apology to everybody involved: my holiday season went from a gentle walk to hectic in about 30 minutes, and didn't calm down until my flight touched down back home late Saturday. I should be back to regular posting.

Sorry again!

Oops. I mis-remembered the scenario being referenced. Jordan has NOT put arrows in Zurnzal's gut.

Not that he wouldn't have deserved it.

Fluffy is large by the way, though she still has only 5ft reach. I've indicated as much on the map.

I like how we get emotionally invested in stories and characters.

“He is reanimating all former pathfinders, lied to you, and is working towards the whispering tyrants goals”

“Cool, bad guy, we’ll stop him”

“He also compelled Janira to her likely death”

“This guy needs to die, he is the worst of the worst.”

Also, assuming what Janira said wasn’t fluff, we should watch out for his Sword, it is either the focus of, or independently capable of a caster level 19 dominate, which doesn’t sound great.

Magic Circle Against Evil would seem a good precaution, or at least Protection from Evil on the most vulnerable of us (like Sentry).

Sir Hendric will try to Disarm the sword if he can, and if he gets that opportunity it would be good to have someone ready to pick it up. And throw it in an extradimensional space of some sort.

Death affect, so there's nothing I can do about it and my Talisman of Life's Breath won't matter?

Does it matter that Bellamin has constant See Invisibility from his Spectral Shroud? Asking as the language from the Death Attack seem to indicate otherwise?

Assassin

The death attack fails if the target detects the assassin or recognizes the assassin as an enemy

He also needed to use 3 rounds to study me before using the Death Attack ability. Did he do that through the fog? If he's within it, as mentioned, I have constant See Invisibility.

You see, that’s really awkward wording because you detected him in the middle of his action to attack you, but you couldn’t make the surprise round because he was sneaking out of your line of sight and rolled a really high Stealth check. Also yes, he studied you through the fog because of reasons.

I knew we were facing an assassin and chose haste over particulate form, which was very dumb on my part.

Sorry Bellamin.

Do you have a dream journal or anything else?

We’ll, I guess whats next is we kill him back... Unless others feel like talking after that.

I’ll be honest, I’m half-tempted to let Peter retcon cast particulate form based solely on the fact that I’m very unsure of how to rule this situation given what Bellamin brought up and at least with that spell active I could properly adjudicate that the death attack didn’t go off because of no sneak attack.

Ah screw it, I really don’t want to have to make a GM call on that; Peter, I’ll let you retcon the summon monster/haste to instead cast particulate form if you do wish.

Thank you, I would be happy to.

Then I shall hold off on the snark aimed at Zuzzy until the scene is reset.

Then I shall hold off on the snark aimed at Zuzzy until the scene is reset.

I'm sorry? The scene is the exact same, just that Bellamin isn't dead.

Excellent...

This has to be the most confusing encounter I’ve had in pfs.

“Lets kill one of them and then negotiate “

It makes no sense.
Yes, with an astonishing amount of diamond, death can be reversed. But that is not a trivial expense even at our level, and such resources would better be used fighting the Whispering Tyrant than undoing Zurnzal's idiocy.

My guess is the scenario author wanted to show off what a badass Zurnzal is without having the PCs really have to kill him. So he gets to murder a PC and then say it's no big deal.

I will do whatever the party wants to do here.

It’s a valid way to put pressure on the PCs to acquiesce to his request. By removing one PC “instantly”, Zurnzal makes the prospect of a violent encounter much less enticing to the Seekers as they would be starting the encounter already at a significant disadvantage. That’s his angle here - he knows there’s a solution for his “negotiating tactic” in the room and freely shares that knowledge, so clearly he doesn’t mean for the death to be permanent if the Seekers agree to his proposal.