LOL! I love that spell but rarely have it prepared. The range/area is usually too small.... But with the Arcane Bond letting me pick any spell known, it made it easy. Now I just hope I survive what comes next!
Nah this is where all the melee goes past you and engages the enemy on their turf
I will be leaving tomorrow afternoon for vacation, until September 4th. I think I'll be able to keep up with the game via my phone but I have been warned the cell service where I'll be most of the time might be inconsistent. If at any point you are all waiting on me, please feel free to bot me. I'll keep bloodrage going until the end of combat so I don't have to fight with fatigue, other than that its just swinging the hammer.
Enjoy your vacation! The game will be here when you get back!
Have a good trip, and thank you for the heads up!
Hey everyone, sorry for the slow posting lately. Lost my job over the summer, but this week I was able to start work on a couple different projects, and getting started on that has really eaten into my energy levels. Things are smoothing out, though, and I'll have a post up later tonight.
Yuppers; we know the feeling. We just switched jobs and shifts. We are working midnights now....this is a rough week...lol.
I feel you, facing cutdowns at work, but they haven't said who yet... woooohooo life in a time of COVID-19.
No worries. Things are suddenly hectic on my side too.
Hey everybody, I'd like to do a bit of a vibe check, see how folks feel about how things are going.
For the encounters, I've been trying to make things challenging but still fun/interesting. If folks are okay with sharing, I would like to know what has been working for you, and what hasn't.
Doing good. I think we're starting to get a feel for how we work as a team. I trust you to rebalance things as needed to keep us challenged, sometimes that might be doubling the number of mooks we fight sometimes that's applying templates to enemies. I'm surprised that we've maintained 7 players, usually in my other games we've lost a few by now. That's a good sign that we're engaged in the game.
Don't be afraid to bloody my nose or even brutally murder me. I have another character lined up and ready to go if need be.
I think it's been a good balance so far, enough to make us use up resources but not enough to seriously endanger any of us. I'd rather none of us were brutally murdered. ;)
I happen to agree with both of my table mates...lol! You are doing a marvelous job!
I think its going great! I think the lots of enemies in the previous room was a nice touch, and this last one was tough!
We do have a lot of melee, so I made a tactical move and then couldn't close after the first round, but that was also on me (In this past fight)
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I am also enjoying the game a lot. This excess melee is indeed providing a tactical challenge, which is good.
I'm still learning my character, but I feel that he fits in the game. I'm actually enjoying the healing part. Basically I never miss my abilities and my targets never resist my spells, heh!
Also, I am quite intrigued by the story as well.
I’m enjoying things too, thanks (again) for picking this up!
Doing pretty good. You haven't let me sneak by and flank much so my attacks have only been slightly effective due to luck! :)
It's fun so you are doing GREAT! Thanks for taking up the challenge!
Thank you, I'm glad to hear everyone is having fun! I think so far I've had the most fun with throwing heaps of enemies at you, especially the big brawl with the guards. I've tried out some templates on a few enemies but the results were decidedly meh.
Lol- don't base too much on what Greta can one shot at this level- her damage won't scale as fast as thing's hit points.
Oh, don't worry, none of the templated creatures got one-shot. The last one you fought got a template because ordinarily I'd throw in some mooks to even it out but there were some pretty good reasons for her to be alone. Unfortunately, in order for her to not get instantly killed by a 7 player party, her AC got bumped up so high that characters missed on nat 19s, even with buffs. Even as the GM it felt cheap and unsatisfying, and if I was Tristan in that situation I'd be pretty annoyed.
If I could go back and do it again I'd probably just level her up a bit more, so she'd have interesting things to do beyond "have big numbers."
I was only surprised; definitely not annoyed...lol.
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When I have to increase the difficulty of encounters without putting in too strong enemies, I usually just increase the HP pool. Like I have a multiplier for each party. If they're stronger than usual, I multiply the HPs by 1.5 or 2. I once multiplied the HPs by 3 when the party was full of minmaxers. It's fun because the challenge is similar, but the players get some sense of urgency since the antagonist's turn is dangerous and they have to get them down fast.
Adding more enemies is something I find hard to balance because of action economy. Increasing their level is something I don't do often, because they sometimes get access to stuff the players might not be able to overcome, such as DR, invisibility or save or suck spells.
I think you're doing a great job!
I have run (and am running) a few higher powered games and I tend to do pretty much exactly what Massielo described. I try to mix it up once in a while too though, something like a really difficult to hit opponent (like the one we just fought) or a caster who has a bunch of minions that on their own aren’t really much of a threat but make it hard to get to the caster. Those are a bit harder to balance but can be memorable.
Feel free to fudge the numbers, I know I frequently do. It usually takes a pretty on the ball player to notice. But my favorite tactic for an overpowered group in an AP is to hold them back 1 level. It can be tricky with the timing.
Always remember that the enemy has the home turf advantage. If they frequently need to defend their area they likely have traps placed where they know to avoid. It doesn't even have to be a fancy trap! Let the big, bad warrior with a huge sword come charging in, and step onto the weak board that breaks under him. Charge ended and a high Dex/Acrobatics roll to not go prone. Another roll to drop the weapon? Sometimes stuff like that makes the encounters practically funny!
Working midnights now; I shall post in the morning.
GM, Massielo moved into my square which he probably did because he couldn't see me. How did you want to rule that mechanics wise? RAW I thinking he just fails to enter my square. I always thought that was weird for a 5ft area. Squeezing?
Oh, hmm. I did miss that. I think for right now we'll say that Junior is squeezing in that particular square (until he moves), but Massielo is probably pretty unaware of Junior's presence. I'm open to thoughts from everyone on the best way to handle that sort of thing.
Right normally you can't end your movement in the same square as another creature unless you're two size categories different or are tiny or smaller. I think you end up in the last valid square. Even if that's where you started your movement, say 30ft away.
Junior is invisible in a mosh pit, Massielo sees an open space and pushes his was to Junior's square, making his overrun attempt. Opps I'm invisible, Massielo is shuntes all the way back to the edge of the pit.
I figure Hold Person. I am happy with the Round; soaking up AoOs will be his job...lol.
Yes but the GM allowed it in this instance. Normally you can move through my square if I allow it but you can't end your movement in my square even if I wanted you there, say for a slow dance. Not allowing this is one if my pet peeves with pathfinder. When I'm GMing I usually allow it but count both parties as squeezing.
We're past it in any case since I moved out of the square.
For comparison my cubicle at work is about 5x5 I can fit a desk, myself and 3 other coworkers standing uncomfortably close in it without touching. If I wanted an HR violation I could cram at least 4 more coworkers in the space.
Nope. Your token was neatly on top of mine. I had a hell of a time moving this morning because when I was trying to move your token off of mine it kept resizing instead, I was on mobile.
Possibly you missed it because I added 50% transparency to indicate that I was invisible?
No worries. You can join me in my square any time you want. The slow dance is optional.
And it let me complain about something that I don't like within the system. Which is my second favorite part about the hobby, other than you know playing.
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I loved the comment about an HR violation for squeezing 8 people into a cube! Can I say.... NERD!
Oh wait! I'm betting that most of us accept that word as praise!
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Hey everyone, kind of a rough day today, I will have a post up tomorrow. Thanks for your patience.
Been there. Take an 8 hour nap or two. I'd rather you take a break than get burned out, having a blast and its worth a wait.
What Junior said. Better to move slow when we need to and keep playing than to burn out trying to push when we shouldn't and end up scrapping the game.
Hey does anyone have the original template for the loot sheet we're using, kind of want to steal it for my "in person" game. Thanks!
Lol, I'll ask the creator if he has a generic one. I think he's gone through a couple of updates since then so it might work a little differently.
Thanks! Much appreciated :D
Like THE CREATOR; impressive!
I asked the creator and he hasn't got back to me yet. He's usually pretty busy between his kid and work so I don't want to pressure him. I made a copy of the most recent in use version of it, you'd have to clear out the personalization, which may or may not take some knowledge of how sheets formulas work. Link