Tyrant's Grasp III: Last Watch

Game Master CrusaderWolf

Sorry for not being as fast on the posting lately, my spouse and I have started house shopping in a city with (IMO) a somewhat inflated housing market. Unfortunately a consequence of that is having to drop whatever my plans for the evening were and go do a viewing if a place looks interesting, before it disappears. Hate to have such a large expenditure be turned into a string of now-or-never propositions, but that's where we're at.

Best of luck!

Sorry for not being as fast on the posting lately, my spouse and I have started house shopping in a city with (IMO) a somewhat inflated housing market. Unfortunately a consequence of that is having to drop whatever my plans for the evening were and go do a viewing if a place looks interesting, before it disappears. Hate to have such a large expenditure be turned into a string of now-or-never propositions, but that's where we're at.

I clearly remember the point when house hunting went from being something fun to being a chore. Hope you find (and get) the right place soon.

Oof, good luck! No worries GM, please find a place to live :)

Just a heads up in case you haven't already seen it: Paizo has started another Humble Bundle deal. PDFs of a couple of dozen 1st edition splatbooks from the Campaign Setting and Player Companion lines with the theme of "Monster Lore," including the hardcover compilation of Book of the Damned. There's some good stuff here for a great price, if you don't already have it all.

Pathfinder Monster Lore Humble Bundle

Ooh, thanks Sanduro!

Freaking love these Humble Bundles and I'm extra geeky for monster lore :D

I love the idea of the witchgates! Were they a thing in the setting before this AP? Traps that teleport their victims into distant, inescapable death traps feels like a callback to a certain classic AD&D (1E) module involving another ancient undead wizard...

I've never played Carrion Crown so they might have been referenced in that AP, but I'd never heard of them before Tyrant's Grasp. I also love the concept though--Tar-Baphon ruled his empire for about 600 years and then waged total war for another 70 before being imprisoned, that's a lot of prep time for a very powerful wizard. You could tuck all kinds of weird experiments and nasty traps into that time.

Silvia, did you add back the 2hp you would have recovered while you slept?

Also, note for everyone - assuming a failed Treat Deadly Wounds check still consumes two uses from the healer's kit, we've cleaned out the kit we found in Roslar's Tomb. Sanduro can still attempt the checks, but will take a -4 penalty (which means taking 10 will no longer be an option).

That's two of my campaigns I'm doing phonetic accents in now. I must be channeling my inner Brian Jacques.

I did, thank you.

Ketra, you’re using up all the natural 20s! The dice generator will run out!

Garret has sussed out that the GM has a soft spot for puns, I see.

Hey all, I'm sure many of you are in a similar situation, but my posting rate is going to be very low from Thursday through Sunday. Should be back to normal starting on Monday though!

Have a great Christmas and New Years all!

I hope everyone enjoyed the holiday and weekend. I’m looking forward to getting back to this game because I am very curious about what’s up with the allegedly mad tooth fairy queen but also because I have been staring at the typo in my last post for Zsofia since Christmas Eve (“your” when I meant “you’re”) and it’s making me crazy. Only 12 more posts until we start a new page!

I have been staring at the typo in my last post for Zsofia since Christmas Eve (“your” when I meant “you’re”) and it’s making me crazy. Only 12 more posts until we start a new page!

Lol! That happens so often to me. I post late at night and then the next day see my own post and its riddled with weird errors.

Yep, I'm ready to continue when other folks are.

Just a heads-up but I'm having some trouble with my laptop's battery so I'm taking it to get a new one on Monday. The guy at the shop guestimated it could take anywhere from a couple of hours to a day or two.

I should still be able to update the games but it'll be slower. I'll keep you all posted!

Good luck GM! That's an odd time-frame for them to give you (in my non-expert/professional opinion)!

When I was younger I never understood why "May you live in interesting times" was considered a curse.

I hope you're all staying safe, wherever you are. It seems we are indeed living in interesting times.

You too, CW. I always thought as we got older, we were supposed to be able to put events into some perspective based on the history we've lived through, but honestly, it has been a while since I've been able to give or get any comfort from the analogies I can come up with.

My laptop is returned, finally! New GM post up later tonight :)

BTW, for anyone who is still having difficulty logging back in after yesterday's outage - clearing cookies for Paizo.com did wonders.

Sorry about the downtime on the forums - I arranged it to minimize the amount of catching up I'd have to do. :-P

Necrophidius!

These guys, along with gibbering mouthers, are the source of so much low-level Pathfinder trauma for me.

Oh no! What happened?

Really unfair feeling TPKs against both types of monsters, unpleasant on both sides of the table. Just bad evenings of play where no one has any fun and everyone leaves feeling annoyed. I think both monsters just have too many abilities that lock you out of playing the game or do too much. Necrophidius are particularly bad in that respect.

Here's hoping they aren't immune to Fire, as that is Garret's only first level spell other than Ear-Piercing Scream (which requires a Fort save so constructs are immune).

IME, the creature that gives me the feeling that Ketra has described is the Ankheg. Curse you faulty CR system! Cr 3 is one of those rough areas for low level characters.

Here's hoping they aren't immune to Fire, as that is Garret's only first level spell other than Ear-Piercing Scream (which requires a Fort save so constructs are immune).

Just for the record, I think that's true generally, but if it affects objects too, then constructs aren't immune. IIRC, it is the same with undead.

@Ketra - I don’t think I’ve encountered a gibbering mouther since the mid-1980s. You’ve come across one in a low-level Pathfinder game?!?

Looks like I moved my token last night before I realized that being the only active combatant in the room might be a bad idea and posted that I was going to hold until Wallace rolled his save. GM, I have moved the token back to where it was, but if you’d prefer I treat it like I took my fingers off the piece, I’m happy to place it back into the room where it was.

@Garret - It looks like Wallace is in the path of the door, so I think we’re stuck with the combat - it would take until next round to drag him out of the way so that the other can close it (assuming one of us is strong enough to drag him alone), and by that time the necrophidius would have plenty of time to go chomp chomp at us. I don’t suppose you have a mirror?

@GM - would Garret’s info about the gaze attack also say whether it’s a “save once and you’re immune for X time” or “save every round” kind of attack?

Also, are there any plants in the room? My one good battlefield control spell is highly situational...

Totally fine to have a takeback in the moment, especially if you posted to that effect.

2d4 rounds of no actions is honestly absurd, you're right. It's not shadow levels of "what the hell 3.X converted creatures" but it is any easy TPK given how difficult the DC is at this level.

For that reason, I'm going to exercise my fiat as all-powerful god-king of the universe and declare that the necrophidius leaves you staggered instead of Dazed, though still for the full six rounds. Does that seem reasonable? Otherwise in PBP we're looking at potentially weeks of people not getting to play in IRL time, even if you pull out a win.

It's good with me, lol.

For that reason, I'm going to exercise my fiat as all-powerful god-king of the universe and declare that the necrophidius leaves you staggered instead of Dazed, though still for the full six rounds. Does that seem reasonable? Otherwise in PBP we're looking at potentially weeks of people not getting to play in IRL time, even if you pull out a win.

Sounds reasonable to me. Do we want to start the stagger next round (ie. 1 round daze, X rounds stagger) or this one?

Zsofia and I approve!

Here's hoping they aren't immune to Fire, as that is Garret's only first level spell other than Ear-Piercing Scream (which requires a Fort save so constructs are immune).

Sounds good to me. I will post for Garret once I get the info on the opponent from his Knowledge Arcana check.

Nah, let's go ahead and take it from Round 1 since the whole party is up. Everyone except Sanduro and Garret are Staggered but otherwise you can all take actions in the existing initiative order.

Oh sheesh, I'm sorry Sanduro/Garret! I was/am not feeling my best and was concerned that I hadn't posted in a few days so rushed to get one up. Apologies for overlooking that you hadn't added your actions! Feel free to include Round 1 and 2

Great, thanks - my round 2 actions are in the spoilers. Hopefully Sanduro’s heal check is enough to boost Wallace’s save vs the poison.

I think I'm confused about the map. What is the small red circle between Wallace and Fangwinder? Is that the desk? Or is the desk the outline taking up 2-3 squares on the floor between Zsofia and the necrophidius?

Mechanically, my question is whether Zsofia can take a 5' step towards Fangwinder and still attack.

The little red circle is the Tooth Faerie Herald (I put little colored auras on the fairies so they'd be easier to see), he's got a red X on him too since he's bleeding out after Fangwinder's bite.

Yes to Zsofia getting a 5ft step to attack, the chair on the left isn't that substantial. Sorry about the blurry map!

@GM - you must think that I am a better person than I am, or that at least Sanduro is. Sanduro healed Wallace, not the herald. If the little jerk hasn't stabilized yet, Sanduro will cast stabilize on him.

Oh! Lol I think I saw Ketra's post asking about how the herald's status was and then yours and they kinda blurred together for me.

In that case we'll say he is -6hp and stable, and Wallace can have that healing :)

Garret had the wand with one charge he used at the end of the battle, but no potions of CLW on his character sheet. I may have forgotten to put it on there, though. I know we found some in the tomb and I don’t recall using any, but I am not sure.

I drank mine, I think the 5th one just went into our collective medkit.

Garret, you gave yours to Ketra.

The good news is that I must have been tired when I checked the loot sheet earlier; we should still have the last of the 5 cure light wounds potions, but according to the sheet, before we left the tomb we also found four potions of cure moderate wounds in the room with the crack the mites came through.

Lucky! According to my personal inventory sheet, I don't have any other healing items available. Maybe we use the CLW potion on the herald and then split the CMW potions between us?

Garret, you gave yours to Ketra.

The good news is that I must have been tired when I checked the loot sheet earlier; we should still have the last of the 5 cure light wounds potions, but according to the sheet, before we left the tomb we also found four potions of cure moderate wounds in the room with the crack the mites came through.

Thanks for doing the research, Sanduro. I know we returned most of the treasure, but I had forgotten about the CMW potions. I concur with Ketra's suggestion.

Works for me, although perhaps we should go with GM’s original assumption that Sanduro used The Word on the herald and give Wallace a chance at a better result from the potion? I just get nervous when our primary front-liner heads into what’s likely to be a tough combat already down 30-40%.

That's fine with me. I'm down some but I try to just stay the hell out of melee anyway.