I believe only Enos has Knowledge (Dungeoneering).
If he sees the affliction, he can identify a remedy (two of which Ian can do by himself).
Ian has a third option that doesn't even require knowing how to fight green slime; his Nimbus of Light can cure 1d4 ability damage, which at least buys him some time.
Sorry, I’ve been to busy to attempt an intelligent in-game post. Right now, I think I’m still blind in the room - is that correct? Hearing Dadna’s weapon whistling through the air as she attacks?
No, Ardriel dispelled the Darkness.
My lack of posting has plenty to do with the situation in game. There is very little I can do. I don't have darkvision, I have burned both of my dispel magic scrolls (and I can't use Wild Arcana to cast from spell slots, since I can't cast level 3 spells). I can't see the target, so I can't use smite evil on it. As far as I can tell, I can either: A)leave the room and hold the door closed from outside so this thing can't run elsewhere in the fort, or B) attempt to use Perception checks to locate the enemy, and chuck a glitterdust in their direction on the off-chance I manage to blind it or make it easier to see.
If anyone has a better idea, I'm all ears. But as of right now, that's about the extent of my usefulness.
Aravashniel found a Potion of Darkvision for us (here)
If Ardriel drinks that, he can join the fight.
Ardriel has Ghost Salt Arrows which may be important in this battle, since Shadow Demons are incorporeal.
Once Ian's Daylight is in range of the demon, we'll all be able to see it. It would then most likely try the Telekinesis trick again to hurl the sword out of the room, so someone should close the doors after coming back in.
I'm not carrying the potion of darkvision. If whoever has it gives it to me, I'll drink it and then I can join the fight.
As we didn't specify who had the potion, it would most likely be you or Ian as you are the two without Darkvision.
If you want to say that Ian has it, you could cast a spell or do something else this round and maybe he can get it to you next round.
But I believe everyone else has acted this round so it is down to you to do whatever you think best.
There have been several times I've had no idea what to have Ian do, So I posted an action the best I could.
No offense Ardriel, but even if you delay or take a 'defensive stance' we can keep the game moving along. Our last post in game was Tuesday. We chatted here in discussion, but we're waiting for your post in game.
Honestly, I don't think anyone claimed the potion, I know Ian doesn't have it. If having the potion will help you make an educated post in game retcon Ardriel having the potion.
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I'm aware, thank you. I didn't know if anyone had the potion on their sheet, and thus needed to give it to me. If no one claimed it, then we'll say it's in my inventory and I'll just drink the potion.
I do not think that this pre-3.X opaque rules approach works well for PF. Given the importance of build decisions in post-3.X games, we as players need clarity on the mechanics being used against us so that we can bolster our defenses as we level. That clarity is given in part by knowing if the attack was a Will save or a CMB check and roughly how difficult it was. This is true in any PF game, even moreso when we have immediate actions to use in our defense. With opaque rules we simply have no way of knowing if the problem is that we are neglecting certain defenses, or if the DCs are just so hopelessly beyond us that it is pointless to try to get better. Right now the Shadow Demon is 2-for-2 on its TK trick, so do we have a glaring weakness we should fix? Even if just bad luck, feats like Improved Iron Will can address that. Build decisions are a part of 3.X in a way that they were not in pre-3.X games.
If this were at an actual tabletop game, you would have called for a Will save and Enos would have rolled it. He would know how well he did, and be able to judge if it was worth using Surge or not. This new method not only deprives us of information we need for leveling, it interrupts the flow of the game - because if Enos decides to use Surge and succeeds, suddenly we have to retcon actions. Right now he doesn't even know which of his pre-rolled Will saves is being applied.
I would ask that you go back to the way you were doing things before. Call for saves when needed, and preferably let us know the DC. I don't think there is anything wrong with us being able to use Surge intelligently. Certainly in pre-3.X games you knew what you needed to save, and I don't think making that mysterious is beneficial. There is enough in this campaign that is just insanely difficult for our party to handle. I don't think that putting us all in the dark about the abilities used against us will in any way add to the enjoyment.
I know there's a lot of frustration around at the moment. I'm not trying to add to it. But this change takes away one little bit of agency we might have, in this frustrating fight where we are so thoroughly ill-equipped. I do think things can improve a lot once we get Legendary Item spellcasting with our next tier.
maybe a dumb question, but if Enos used his actions to come back wouldn't he have picked up the sword at the beginning of this round? If not can he drop it as an immediate action so it's not dragged into the pit again?
I almost stopped and said you failed do you want to surge? Then I thought for a moment and figured it's not going to make a difference, it's going to waste his mythic point and it's going to waste time. He rolled a 1 on it.
I had a real long thought about his actions this round and finally decided that getting rid of daylight was what was most important. So I went and looked at Enos' rolls and then looked at what roll Enos was on and that turned out to be a 1. Into the pit he went. If it had been a different roll the demon would have failed to toss him in. Just for the record I think, without going through it all, he is 3 for 4. I believe he tried twice to get the banner from Leothar and failed. I think every success was on a 1.
Your saves, more often than not, right now put you within surge of a DC if you fail. If he had rolled a 2 and failed I probably would have stopped and asked if he wanted to roll even if it couldn't change the outcome.
If we were playing at a table you would never know the DC of anything nor the AC. For most you would make a roll say the result and be told if you pass or fail and then decide if you want to surge. Some I would make behind the screen and only tell you the result if you succeed. That is not just saves but certain skill checks too. For the interest of time I have not been doing that up to this point and I am only doing it for this battle. It may pop up again in future battles but it will be specific not general. This was never intended to be a permanent change. If you fail a save against an illusion you will never know you even made the save. I feel asking you to roll and then saying "never mind" breaks the suspense of the thing. I guess at this point though the cat is out of the bag and if I ask for rolls up front again you will know illusions are at work.
Spending mythic points on surges should have an amount of risk involved, you shouldn't know "oh I missed by 2 I'll surge" or "I missed by 8, I won't surge".
I am trying to speed the game up some and still retain some of the mystery to it. I think the unknown is part of the fun in a game. Maybe I am wrong. Above all I want the game to be fun and to continue. Games that slow down die. I just lost the DM for my Carrion Crown game in part 3 book 5. I know you guys want to complete this AP. I know you want to have fun. So do I.
Ian, I went with what Enos said he did and didn't go back to check if his retcon was possible; ie I haven't counted the actions. A lot of my posts, especially early in the day are right before I go to do something and don't have much time so I might miss something like someone not having the actions to do something they way they typed it. I might not. I will say this if the sword was on the floor it would be in the pit no save; unattended items get no save.
That is great information to have. Thank you for your response.
Thanks for the answer, obviously I've no idea what's happening
I find it weird that as paladins we are immune to disease but a condition that can be killed with remove disease still affects us. I see nothing that indicates it's not the case, but it's still weird.
Unfortunately, because I am immune to disease and cannot use my lay on hands for anyone else, I did not take the remove disease mercy - I mean, when would I use it, right? Right?
No complaints about how this went down. I literally predicted it, in fact, though I did hope my roll would have been sufficient.
Now if someone would just light me on fire, all would be well.
I thought it was weird as well when I read it. It isn't a disease, it's an environmental hazard, but can be killed by Cure Disease. Same goes for molds if I recall. There is no hard and fast on what identifies it either. It is a natural thing but also a dungeon hazard.
That's cool, he had to move 15 ft, his regular speed is 20 ft. so he went 10 ft and 5 ft. in the beginning of the next round he will levitate down, then start moving to help Enos.
I'll look up how long the scale can levitate, but even then, it has one more charge available.
Sadly with darkness in the room where everyone else is, Ian may be the 'fastest' one getting to Enos.
A question about mechanics, Ian will use a move action to lower the 20 ft to the ground at the edge of the pit. If his uses his second move action to jump back into the pit towards the sound of Enos voice can he reactivate the scale before he actually hits the slime?
Also, since his acrobatics is so poor, once he jumps will he continue angling towards Enos or will he begin to drop straight down?
Why not just use the scale to levitate Enos?
You fell through the illusionary pit floor, you have irrefutable proof it is an illusion, so you should be able to see through it. And it is not dark where you are.
I don’t know that you get automatic success against the illusion even when you logically know what it is. Bonus, yes; auto-succeed, no. IMHO. It can continue to provide a screen.
That said, does the illusion work both ways? Can I see up even if he can’t see down?
"A character faced with proof that an illusion isn’t real needs no saving throw."
here
Why not just use the scale to levitate Enos?
That's what I'm thinking. Can I use the third time to cast levitate on Enos, if I can see him? Or do I need to levitate down to him? I'm happy to cast levitate on him if I can see him.
the Range is personal or close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels) wit the pit being 30 ft deep is Ian Close enough? Can he jump out, levitate near Enos then cast it on him? Or would the second levitate end when the third one is activated?
You both saved against the illusion and know it isn't real. You still can not see through it. This doesn't stop you from levitating through it. You levitated up through it.
I feel completely out of my depth trying to figure out how to use the spell levitate, so if these are dumb questions I'm sorry. Once Ian's feet are back on the ground can he move normally with the levitation spell in play? Or does he need to cancel the levitation spell. I'm planning on jumping back into the pit and levitating before he hits the slime, then casting levitate on Enos using scales the third and final use of Levitate. Is that possible?
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You can walk as a move action and levitate as a move action. So basically walk off and levitate down 20 feet.
I have seen no provision where you can't use the scale on two people at the same time. You can cast it on two different people. It takes 1 move action to levitate a person up to 20 feet. So this round walk off levitate down 20 feet. Next round activate scale. Levitate Enos up 20 feet. You don't need to worry about range with the scale indoors. I don't think you know the caster level.
Thanks DM Trawets, I feel like such a noob. I should have stopped rising as soon as I knew he was being tossed into the pit, but I didn't think of it.
"A character faced with proof that an illusion isn’t real needs no saving throw."
here
Shrug. I may rule differently at my table than you. All good.
Apparently you can cast an aimed spell someplace you can't see. I don't agree with it but that looks like the rules.
Glitterdust targets an area (10' radius spread), not a single creature. I believe the rules state that as long as you have line of effect to the area, you can cast an area spell in that area. Its effects are also not subject to Concealment, since it doesn't have a to-hit roll.
You can only go 10 feet forward.
I am also confused on this. My speed is 35 feet - I thought that if I can't see I can only move half speed (17.5, rounded down to 15 feet). Did I run into something?
You are still aiming the spell at a point, I wasn't implying it was aimed at a creature. What you are saying is consistent with what I read, I just don't agree with it. If you can't see where you want a spell to go off how are you going to get it there exactly.
Thought it was obvious since you got attacked; you ran into something.
I'll move this to the game thread once we have a plan.
Enos, Ian is below the illusion so he can see you. I my math is right He's 20 ft up and 15 ft from you. He'll be able to cast levitate on you and move you up 20 ft. The question becomes how to get Ian close enough to Enos to LoH and get rid of disease. Any ideas? Obviously, we can levitate up to the ceiling, (three rounds) then maneuver our way to each other, on the fourth round, but that may be too long :(
Enos has made his weapon (well, Ian's) Flaming which he knows can also kill the green slime.
Enos has made his weapon (well, Ian's) Flaming which he knows can also kill the green slime.
I know, I think he asked if he can burn the slime off of himself somewhere, I just don't remember the answer.
I don't want to make a move action related to him, without making sure I know what the plan is.
Thought it was obvious since you got attacked; you ran into something.
Actually, it wasn't. You didn't say I ran into something, just that I only moved 10 feet toward the door. That's why I was confused - I wanted to make sure I didn't miss any other effect that I was under.
EDIT: For the most recent attack, if Ardriel is facing the door, did he feel the attacks coming from his left side or his right side?
This is one of those strange rules things. You didn't run into anything but you can't be in the same square as something else. How do you know you ran into an incorporeal creature? Sorry I wasn't clearer.
Right side.
Enos has made his weapon (well, Ian's) Flaming which he knows can also kill the green slime.I know, I think he asked if he can burn the slime off of himself somewhere, I just don't remember the answer.
I don't want to make a move action related to him, without making sure I know what the plan is.
If you can lift me out of the slime, I will start applying the sword to myself. I should be able to ‘kill’ a 5’ square in a round and I have some healing and fire resistance to mitigate the damage I take.
Leothar readies to attack the demon if he sees it. He will take a 5' step as part of this readied action if necessary (and remember that he has 10' reach).I had forgotten to specify that I would switch my Smite to this Shadow Demon if the first one dropped, so I might need to reactivate Smite. He should be able to do that in conjunction with his readied attack.
You can perform one or more free actions while taking another action normally.You can take a swift action anytime you would normally be allowed to take a free action.
You can ready a standard action, a move action, a swift action, or a free action. To do so, specify the action you will take and the conditions under which you will take it. Then, anytime before your next action, you may take the readied action in response to that condition...
You can take a 5-foot step as part of your readied action, but only if you don't otherwise move any distance during the round.
Just so we are clear in the future as it makes no difference here, you can ready 1 of the 4 actions. The parts you quoted apply to when it is your turn not a readied action. Ready action has it own rules. It allows you to ready a standard action or a move action or a swift action or a free action. I have added the ors here for clarity. Smite Evil hoards is not an action at all.
Cool I hope you roll high!
My understanding is that if you were within 30 ft of Ian anytime the 'spell' was running you would have had the healing. I would assume that when Ian lowered himself back down you would have been withing 30 ft. If not, then when Ardriel started pulling towards the him.
I just didn't want you to forget about it :)
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At least even numbers keep the math easy.
@DM, in a battle that is such a painful and tedious slog, it is very discouraging to have my turn wasted by GM fiat. If you were going to rule my proposed action to be entirely ineffective - a ruling that I strongly disagree with but it is your prerogative - I would have at least appreciated a warning to the effect of "I would rule that as not having any mechanical benefit. Do you want to do something else?"
Or do you think it makes the game more enjoyable to spring such a ruling on your players unexpectedly?
I just continually feel that I don't understand how to play this game the way that you want us to play it.
From now on I will ask you how you are going to rule before I commit to doing anything that is mechanically unclear.
There are no rules for how holding someone down on the shoulder interacts with a telekinetic spell so I had to make a decision. If you want to call that GM fiat, fine, everything I do is GM fiat. Have you pushed down on something on a table and had it skitter off across the table. A downward force isn't going to have any effect on a horizontal force. That is why I ruled that way.
As far as doing things that are mechanically unclear I will let you know I have a philosophy of "You can attempt anything." That doesn't mean anything will work. You won't know until you try. If you don't try things you don't know the answer to you won't learn anything.
There have been numerous times in this AP, including this fight where someone has done something that I know isn't going to have any positive effect. Should I stop them and say you can't do that it isn't going to work?
I get that this fight is frustrating. There is nothing this demon would like to do more than to tear you to shreds, but he knows if he stands up to the lot of you in a straight up fight he is going to lose quickly (probably 2-3 rounds). You found a way to make that happen, daylight. He found a way to counteract that, telekinesis. You need to find a way to counteract that. There is at least one way maybe more. I think you know already that if you get that daylight spell in the middle of the room this fight is over quick.
Yeah, I really would appreciate being notified that, in your interpretation, an action that makes sense by IC logic will not work by game mechanics as you understand them.
Note I said Leothar was grabbing Ardriel by the shoulder, not pushing him downwards. Leothar is 9' tall right now, his hands are huge. A hand like that wrapped around an elf's slight build would definitely be exerting force that would prevent or at least impair lateral movement. It was your interpretation that Leothar was pushing downward when that's not what I posted. You envisioned the scene far differently than what I wrote.
Leothar isn't brilliant but he isn't stupid. If the way you interpret my intended action for him is "utterly futile and useless" then you are interpreting it wrong. Because I am not intending to do utterly futile and useless things.
Anyway, as I said, I will ask how you are going to rule before I try to do anything even slightly creative in the future. And if you aren't going to give answers in that regard, then unfortunately I won't be able to try anything creative.
I feel ya, Leothar. I’m not having much fun right now, either. I doubt Dadna has been, but hopefully she can take advantage of the light.
I'm an idiot, I skimmed the question and thought you asked if Ian was at ground level yet...
Ardriel is down 30 ft right?
40 feet from ground level. It's 10 foot down to the illusion and 30 feet from there to floor.
I have my own levitation scale. I'll get myself back up, don't waste your action, Ian.
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You want him in aura range for the free lesser restoration.
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Congratulations for defeating a mythic foe! This gains you your third mythic tier.
MYTHIC TIER 3
* Mythic Power: 3 plus double your mythic tier (9x per day)
* Recuperation (Ex)
At 3rd tier, you are restored to full hit points after 8 hours of rest so long as you aren’t dead. In addition, by expending one use of mythic power and resting for 1 hour, you regain a number of hit points equal to half your full hit points (up to a maximum of your full hit points) and regain the use of any class features that are limited to a certain number of uses per day (such as barbarian rage, bardic performance, spells per day, and so on). This rest is treated as 8 hours of sleep for such abilities. This rest doesn’t refresh uses of mythic power or any mythic abilities that are limited to a number of times per day.
* HP: +4 (hierophant)
* Mythic Ability: Legendary Item
- Intelligent - Spellcasting (The caster level for these spells is equal to double the bonded creature’s tier. The save DC for these spells is equal to 10 + the spell level + the bonded creature’s tier.) (Inquisitor Spell List)
- 5pts of spells: 1x See Invisibility (2pts) 1x Dimensional Anchor
* Mythic Feat: Power Attack
----
Thoughts:
Lvl 9 Power Attack is normally +9 damage. With mythic, it becomes +13. That's a nice little bump. However, the big deal is that on a critical hit, the damage is doubled before it is multiplied. A Dorn Dergar is only x2 and crits on a 20. But still....
Damage is 1d10+20 (normal)
It goes to 2d10+40 (vital strike)
And I believe that a crit then becomes 4d10+80. That...is really nice.
Finally, for a mythic point, she can ignore penalties on melee attack rolls for 1 minute. Because we aren't allowed to take furious focus, for her that means +3 to hit. She can also use fighting defensively, which normally is -4 hit and +3 Dodge AC. With the mythic point, that to-hit is ignored. So it is a very useful option, even if it does compete with other uses for limited mythic points.
Besides for that, I had wanted to take a hierophant healing ability. But our group already has a plethora of healing. What we don't have is an ability to see invisible enemies, nor a way to keep enemies from fleeing. At tier 4, she will be able to do dimensional anchor 3x day, which should make it even more useful in ensuring that important enemies can't get away.
MYTHIC TIER 3
* Mythic Feat: Power Attack
----
Finally, for a mythic point, she can ignore penalties on melee attack rolls for 1 minute. Because we aren't allowed to take furious focus, for her that means +3 to hit. She can also use fighting defensively, which normally is -4 hit and +3 Dodge AC. With the...
The ignoring penalties on melee attacks is specific to the Power Attack penalty not all melee attack penalties. It is not spending the mythic point that removes the penalty but spending the mythic point when activating power attack.
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Are we allowed to use non-Core spell lists for early access to spells via mythic item casting? Hunter spell list might have some good gems. Or Summoner.
The low CL of legendary item casting does hurt us. Anything with SR is going to laugh off a CL6 Dimensional Anchor. When I thought that legendary item casting would be able to patch holes for us, I overestimated how fast we would gain tiers. I might look to some no-SR utility and problem-solving spells, because that is our biggest failing.
This thread provides some guidelines of what characters should be able to handle at various levels, and by and large, we cannot. We are terrible at anything other than a straight fight and healing damage (well, we are all immune to haunts, that's nice).
Flying foes? We have very limited ranged capability, and no flight.
Incorporeal foes? Glad we have (to date) dodged those specters or wraiths in the dungeon.
Level drain? We have no Death Ward and no Restoration.
Underwater areas? We have no ability to deal with that.
Swarms? Leothar has a Swarmbane Clasp.
Deeper Darkness? Ian's Daylight is just 1/day.
Fog/mist? Echolocation isn't Core, nor are Goz masks, Greater Blind-Fight, Blinded Blade Style, nor Stone Sense, so we would be screwed. Gust of Wind could work. We don't have it.
Locks? DC 40 is crazy. But it's apparently what the AP calls for. Our Core options to boost checks further are limited, but there are a few.
We are far less versatile than our all-fighter Ironfang party. Core-only feats/items/spells, no VMC, no PRCs mean that we are very limited in what we can do. And, this AP demands "solve this problem with magic" far more often than Ironfang does. We certainly haven't hit any DC 40 locks there. Nor Deeper Darkness.
If we were to look at this as an experiment, answering the question "Can a Core + Mythic party of paladins overcome the challenges of this AP?" then I would say based on this book the answer is unequivocally NO. I would quit this campaign and declare it a failure. That whole dungeon was terrible, just one thing after another showing what we cannot handle. Wall of Force! Stinking Cloud! Deeper Darkness! Crazy DC locks and traps! But, I have some hope that things might get better as our Mythic abilities improve... we are just getting tiers slower than I'd have thought. I was overly optimistic at the outset at how much mythic item spellcasting would help.
I, for one, plan to ask for a lot more non-Core options on a case-by-case basis; I'm not going to try to limit myself to Core anymore. Non-Core opens up a lot of ways for a party lacking a primary caster to solve problems; I think that is a good innovation.
Core contains the element of the game that the GM hates: Mythic Vital Strike. The GM has posted about his hatred of this option in other threads. GM, I strongly suggest asking Dadna to swap it out and rebuild. When I GM, I do not wish to be forced to accommodate options that I hate. Maybe it isn't your intention, but it feels like it is bleeding over into other parts of the game; because direct combat is so easy for us, you are going 110% to make sure that everything else is super-frustrating. That doesn't average out to "reasonably challenging." I would much rather dial back our strengths in direct damage and boost our capabilities in problem-solving.
So to Dadna I say, please don't take Mythic Power Attack. Rocket tag kills campaigns and it kills game systems. The GM is going to respond to your increased damage output by, at the very least, upping monster HP, making it a pointless arms race. The optimization treadmill. I myself would like to retrain out Mythic Power Attack and tone down my offense in favor of boosting defense. Given the way the GM runs a game, dealing more damage is only going to give the monsters more HP.
And to the GM, I'm asking to do a complete rebuild of Leothar, with much less focus on offense and much more on versatility and defense (with several requests for non-Core options that I will identify). I don't want you to have to increase enemy stats. I hate the optimization treadmill so much.
When the GM has expressed frustration with how easy direct combat is for us, I think the appropriate response is to tone down the offense. And when this dungeon illuminating our failings so repeatedly, I think it the appropriate response is to cover those.
This was an exceptionally frustrating dungeon. I wish to continue in the campaign and these are my suggestions for what would make it better. I will continue even if all of my ideas are rejected... but I had these thoughts for a while and wanted to post them once we had finished the combat.