I think... I would probably vote for the latter option. But if the majority prefer the former then that's fine with me too. I just like the: "...he could arrive on the mission late..." bit. I feel like that would be the easiest.
And that shocks me he's been gone that long. It hadn't even occurred to me. I guess I've been too dang busy to notice. :P
I am good with him arriving when we need him. Hope he is okay.
A wizard is never late.....this Knight on the other hand....
I'm in favor of the 'arrive late' option as well.
I don’t work until the afternoon/evening tomorrow, so I’m going to wait until tomorrow morning to move us along onto the mission. That’ll give the Witness a little more time to chime (and just a little more time in case Gaius’ triumphant return is immanent).
Hi all. I want to apologize for my extended absence. First things first, I fully intend to keep up with the campaign if you’ll still have me. Second, I’ll offer an explanation. (Posting this to all of my currently active campaigns).
I wish I could say that there was one big thing, but instead it was a lot of small to medium things. Physical and mental health problems, almost 20% of my waking hours spent traveling in the last month and a half, some work-related woes, the stress of the holidays, internet outages, writer’s block, etc. In the few times that I had sufficient time and energy to even look at the Paizo boards, I found myself overwhelmed by the high number of new posts and was experiencing terrific guilt and anxiety about having missed so much. I have been composing this message for a couple of days now, trying to provide a semblance of apology.
And now I am trying to catch up in earnest.
Thank you for your patience with me, especially those who reached out here or on Discord. I tried my best to respond as I was able, but I know I missed some of you.
Lol- we're definitely glad to have you back, but your timing literally could not have been worse. We just had Gaius decide to go take care of something on his own while everyone else took a mission from the elves. If you want to dive back in immediately let me know and I'll get you back into it asap, but if you're open to it (or if it might even be helpful) you can get caught up on your other games first and then let me know when you're ready and I'll bring you back then. Whatever works best for you is fine, just let me know.
How long do you think we'll be in the portal this time, Arbiter? Just to figure out if it is a quick in and out or if it is going to be prolonged, to help figure out bringing Gaius back now.
Also LOVELY to have you back sir. I understand the intimidation a Lot of posts pose.
How long you're through the portal will depend a lot on how curious/thorough you all are. You could meet the bare minimum requirements of the mission just by casting a few spells and wind walking around some, and we could handle all that in just a handful of posts; or, you could explore and engage with whatever people and/or creatures you encounter and then we'd obviously be spending a lot more time on RP and whatnot (maybe even combat).
I can have Gaius show up outside the Tower late, that's not a huge deal, its just a matter of figuring out the timing, and the IC explanation of my he came back so quickly instead of trying to get the information he was after.
Dont feel bad at all. Never hesitate to take the breaks you need,self care is super important. Glad you are good.
As you all know, I don't like to move you on until at least one person (preferably two) actually posts an action to move us along, but I also don't want to fall into the trap (again) of slowing to a crawl because we're all trying to wait for people to post their buffs and whatnot. So, I'll wait until tomorrow morning for Maximus and/or the Witness to cast anything they might want, or to ask any additional questions, and then I'll shove you through the portal either way.
Tis a fine plan
yep yep
All good here. And the only spell Maximus casts every morning is Ant Haul. I love me some Ant Haul. :)
@Arbiter: How in the world did you put a spoiler within a spoiler? I did not think that was possible. It used to NOT be anyway. That's tripping. That blows my mind. :P
Lol- it’s been possible for a long time but it seems like not many people know how to do it. The main spoiler has to be named (you know, with = sign and the text for the spoiler label) and the spoiler inside it has to be unnamed (with just the spoiler tag and no =anything). IIRC, I think you can only do it once though (like, you can’t hide another spoiler inside the hidden spoiler, or hide more than one spoiler within the same spoiler), you’d have to double check that though.
So… anybody around?
Present!
Yep. Still here.
I’ll reach out Gavin and the Witness and see how they’re doing. In the meantime, I posted questions to both pairs- feel free to answer them if you’re interested in moving forward while we wait for them.
Oh my gosh! Man, that's my bad. I totally forgot about that. I saw it and planned on responding but just freaking flat-out forgot. Ugh. Absolute apologies, Arbiter.
The Witness has told me that he has some stuff going on IRL right now but he hopes to be able to post more regularly again beginning next week. In the meantime, please feel free to post assuming/as though he has telepathically shared the results of his knowledge checks with you all.
Sorry for the delay. I was violently ill the last couple days and now both of my kids have it, plus at least one of them has Covid. I think we might be past most of the gross stuff now so, hopefully, I’ll be able to get a post up tomorrow.
Hope to put up gameplay post tonight.
Sorry folks, super long day at work and now 8’m nodding off trying look up this guys stats (like 3 hours before I usually go to bed). I’ll get a post up as early tomorrow as I can.
Travelling for a bit, will do my best to keep up. Hope you get GREAT sleep
Sorry for the delay- I need to look up whether or not the guard’s readied action can interrupt Gavin’s (immediate action) spell, which will (iirc) affect whether or not Maximus hit. I’m having a little trouble finding that answer, especially since my kids had a snow day today and I’m trying to work from home with them running around. I should (hopefully) have an answer up tonight (along with an update on whether or not the captain remains a threat), so that Gavin and the Witness can post/finish their actions.
No worries. Filtering through the gajillion options W has from his attunements and mythic wild arcana is taking some time anyways :)
I read the negative levels bit too and don't see anything. Then looked at the normal vampire quickly to see if it might say otherwise and didn't see it either and nope. I did read that the energy drain is only with his slam attack or other natural weapons, but this guy is probably way beyond a normal vampire.
Yeah, a normal vampire can only energy drain with their slam attack but the captain does indeed have abilities beyond a normal vampire. Fortunately, he can still only do it once per round.
no worries, I got you.
Maximus and Lyra aren't flanking the vampire, are they? I don't believe so but I figured I'd ask just in case.
You both are attacking it but haven’t (or hadn’t last I checked) move to flank. You could do so by both taking 5’ steps, but then neither of you would actually be between the Vampire and Gavin; or, one of you could move behind him (with a move action, a mythic power to move as a swift action, or 2 separate 5’ steps in 2 separate rounds).
Made a mistake. The Haste attack from Maximus is actually an accumulated 41 instead of 43. For some reason I had him charging in herolabs and forgot to unclick it. My bad. (Obviously, all of his attacks should be 2 fewer but since only one potentially hit and all that...)
His AC is also actually 32/24 touch/28 FF.
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Memorizing gust of wind for three years finally pays off!
I've no idea which way to round on half of 33.
So my hit points are now at 197.5. :P
lol. When you make a save you get to round down, so you're at 198.
Should I know anything about the curse before taking my turn
?
It wasn’t technically a curse, I was trying to use the fluff to give a hint that he was using smite good against you. There’s no penalties to your rolls, but he gets bonuses to hit and damage against you and to his AC against your attacks.
Fluff is LOVELY, even if it is misunderstood :) I need to go back and figure up her hit points, since he is hitting like a brick and a half.
Gavin had you back to full after his heal spell, I’m pretty sure (thanks to the temporary hp you started with). So, I think you should only be down what he hit you for this round (which was still a lot, thanks to smite).
I don't mind fights being a little frustrating, but I hope it wasn't so frustrating that it became unfun. The captain does have the highest CR of anything you've fought so far, but (on paper at least) it looked (or still looks) like he's within a reasonable range of you. His hit points aren't much higher than Maximus' at all, but with DR, fast healing, and lay hands (or the anti-paladin version of it) he is very durable. Plus his AC is pretty high (though, if I'm being honest, it actually was a little higher and I rearranged his feats slightly when I saw how hard it was going to be for you to hit).
I think if you were a little bit more prepared that could have made a big difference. Something like stoneskin could have made a big difference in how much damage L&M were taking. If you'd had a chance to use buffs like alter self and/or monstrous physique before combat, that could have turned some of the near misses into hits. Obviously, if Gaius was here his inspire courage would have helped with hits and damage (and he would have added some extra damage output himself too).
Not unfun, just horrible rolling for me. And we went in with the plan to talk, not murder everyone. NEXT TIME, murder everyone. :)
The rolling could have gone better too, lol.
You could try some different tactics too- flanking could have made a difference on some of your attacks (though it can be hard to get that every round without spending a move action), or when Lyra's low on hit points she could switch to spring attacking and force the vampire to either attack Maximus (against whom he doesn't have any smite bonuses) or trade 1 attack per round while you both move around.
EDIT: Also, in the future, you could still go in with the plan to talk and then if you decide you want to kill someone (or something, depending on how you view undead) you could wait until you have a chance to prepare before attacking (possibly on a separate trip, or after achieving enough separation to buff in the mist or whatever)?
I did consider spring attack, but while lovely, it leaves her spellcasters more open, so I wasn't sure she would have done that, since defending Gavin and the Witness are one of her main goals.
Yeah, not unfun at all. I love a tough challenge like this. Forces us to use various tactics which is cool.
If I wouldn't roll like garbage then that would've helped. I rolled, like, 5 crits and couldn't confirm a single freaking one. So annoying. Out of 5 chances, you'd think I would've confirmed AT LEAST 1.
That's really all I was hoping for. Just one. But, couldn't get it done. Frustrating. What are you gonna do, you know? *shrugs*
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If I wouldn't roll like garbage then that would've helped.
Yeah, that was a rough series for both of you.
Crit confirm rolls included, Maximus’ average attack roll was under 10 (9.43 rounding to the hundredths decimal.) Lyra’s was actually worse (7.08) but she has that best of 2 sudden attack, and just a lot more attacks.
Max rolled 15+ on 6 of 21 attack rolls, while Lyra cracked 15 on 8 of 37 rolls.
This breakdown has been brought to you by my inability to fall asleep tonight.
That was Awesome, Witness! A statistical proof of why we sucked, lol :)
Gavin and Witness were spot on with support and countering magic, and hopefully saving us from being cut up into pieces.
The happy part is that we were not sent in here to kill him, just scout and we did do that well enough.
FYI I’m going to be traveling internationally April 3 - April 15, not sure how much time / cell reception I’ll have for posting.
Per the breakdown: Oh man, I didn't realize it was that bad. Ugh. What a beating.
Interesting breakdown by the way. I love those types of breakdowns.
@Lyra: Lol! @ "A statistical proof of why we sucked." Boy, that's well said. :)
Your Sudden Attacks and bypassing DR was the only thing that really hurt him. Max NEEDED one of those crits to even come close to helping you.
I was going to roll a save, Arbiter, but with Gavin's healing, I figure it's probably pointless now. Especially with the damage being so minor. :)