GM Quirk's AGAINST THE AEON THRONE

Game Master Quirk, Private Eye

Sorry for the delay in posting. I have a conference at work this week that I am part of, so I have worked additional hours. With any luck, you'll see something from me tomorrow, possibly including botting Sevens and Neap if necessary.

Had some internet problems this weekend. I'll be back to posting tomorrow.

I'm in a new teaching term. My classes are in the evening, M-TH, so most of my posts during the week will come early in the day or not at all.

Chiaiese: casting that spell will give the Azlanti leader an attack of opportunity, possibly ruining the spell (and causing a great deal of damage, potentially). Do you want to take a 5' step to the red X first?

Probably should.

If Duncan survives, he'll will want that curve blade, even though he'll have to spend a feat to be able to wield advanced melee weapons. That thing is potent. Makes his sword cane look like a tooth pick. I'd love to know what the magic enhancement bonus is and whether any of her feats or abilities contribute to that high attack and damage bonus.

Apologies for being absent a while, we'll blame the holidays.

And now to make an effort to save Duncan!

EDIT: Argh, thats probably not going to do enough. Is there a way to use a resolve or stamina point to boost the attack roll, or reroll it?

Apologies for being absent a while, we'll blame the holidays.

And now to make an effort to save Duncan!

EDIT: Argh, thats probably not going to do enough. Is there a way to use a resolve or stamina point to boost the attack roll, or reroll it?

It is indeed a miss, as I noted in game play.

There generally aren't any ways to re-roll an attack.

One thing I really should be doing is awarding more "bottle caps." A bottle cap is an award for superior role playing or clever ideas within the game. A bottle cap gives a re-roll for virtually any D20 roll--to hit, saving throws, skill checks, etc. See slide 12.

I'll try to be better about handing out a few more. This is a tough encounter, but they'll get tougher.

If Duncan survives, he'll will want that curve blade, even though he'll have to spend a feat to be able to wield advanced melee weapons. That thing is potent. Makes his sword cane look like a tooth pick. I'd love to know what the magic enhancement bonus is and whether any of her feats or abilities contribute to that high attack and damage bonus.

This sword really is a nice item. It's a "curved blade," so you'll need to use a feat to use it, as it's an advanced melee weapon. It does have a couple of cool weapon fusions on it.

As far as the math goes on her to hit and damage rolls, well...Starfinder math is very fuzzy. I will tell you that she is a CR 4 opponent, and THE boss of this adventure. Hell--she's on the cover of the adventure.

Stay the course, you guys are doing well. I do bet that I'll take down at least one more of you before this all over though!

Speaking of bottle caps, let's give Thak one for using Cubber to steal the Azlanti's knife.

I do bet that I'll take down at least one more of you before this all over though!

I'm easy prey, although that's now a total of 30 points of damage Chiaiese has inflicted against the queen bee.

At work presently, but Neap had been trying to hinder and save his magics for emergency heals, This does seem like an emergency now.

That's really good news, Neap! If you have to choose, keep Duncan on his feet. Chiaiese is about tapped out.

Speaking of bottle caps, let's give Thak one for using Cubber to steal the Azlanti's knife.

Thank you!! (And Cubber thanks you too.)

The dice have punished me for being blindsided by Thanksgiving and the holiday overall :/

Hope you all had a good time!

So if this runs the full 1 minute, one could regain 10 stamina points. Duncan would move within the cloud once the battle ends and stay there to regain stamina, although it's likely not a big issue now that the fighting is over. Thanks.

I obviously have a big information dump incoming here. I'll be sure to get to it tomorrow at some point. I have had a long weekend, as we are replacing flooring in our family room. This turned out to be a bigger job than we first though. I had to replace one of the floor boards that had some water damage. It was a pain. The good news is that we have broke the back of this job, and we should have the rest of the floor laid by the end of the week. I also have a bit of dry wall repair to do, but hopefully I'll stay on top of that.

The other bit of news I would like to share is that I'll be starting to run this adventure as an in-person activity for teens at the library where I work. On Tuesday nights I have been running D&D for about 18 months. I recently began running some Starfinder as a short diversion for my table 14-15 year olds until I was to start a new campaign first of the year.

They have begged me to continue the Starfinder, so I am going to run Against the Aeon Throne. This first adventure is perfect for these kids, especially considering the fact that we only have about 90 minutes each week to play. I think the short missions you guys were on early in the adventure will work very well for that.

I'll be sure to let you all know how it's going. So far, we have talked about characters. Charlie wants to be a Lashunta Ace Pilot operative. P.J. wants to be an Ysoki Outlaw Solarian. Max wants to be a Human mercenary soldier. Toby will be an Android envoy.

They L-O-V-E loved starship combat in the short campaign I am running currently. I think the opening combat against the Azlanti drones should be right up their alley.

SPEAKING OF STARSHIP COMBAT, I need to check in with all of you regarding what's next. There is a starship combat coming up. Honestly, I love starship combat, but I'm not sure it's the best way for this play by post group to use our time. I don't want to ignore it, but I think I may boil it down to a couple of narrative posts, with a chance for all of you to chime in between my two posts.

Is that okay with all of you? If at least a few of you are into trying the combat, I'm game.

Let us know if we can make ship upgrades (if we haven't already).

Also, will we be leveling up? If so, when?

I like starship battles. I've been in enough to know the options and enjoy deciding what role to take when there are options.

The one thing I've observed with PBP starship battles, some decisions have to be made at certain points and sometimes things move along before someone gets to posting the role desired. We should have default roles laid out for cases where we need to keep things moving.

Someone else can rebuild the ship. Personally I'm not a fan of starship combat in pbp. In my experience it mostly tedious and I can't wait for it to be over.

Let us know if we can make ship upgrades (if we haven't already).

Also, will we be leveling up? If so, when?

I like starship battles. I've been in enough to know the options and enjoy deciding what role to take when there are options.

The one thing I've observed with PBP starship battles, some decisions have to be made at certain points and sometimes things move along before someone gets to posting the role desired. We should have default roles laid out for cases where we need to keep things moving.

Yes, Duncan, if you are game to upgrade the ship, you may do so. Make it a tier 2 for now, though you may want to start considering what tier 3 will look like. Please see slide 18 for a place to start. Assume that Aibretta and the others back at Madelon's landing will have been working on that for you.

I'm still uncertain if we'll actually do the starship battle, other than making a couple of narrative posts. Interested in everyone's thoughts. We'll do this democratically: if four of you really want to do the starship combat, I will cheerfully conduct it.

The other option is to do a couple of narrative posts, then be on the the search for Cedona.

IMPORTANT: YES! Duncan, Sevens, and Neap should all level up at this point. That will put all 6 of you at level 3. Yoro, Thak, and Chiaiese, I'll be leveling the three of you a little sooner than the others, but I am hoping to get all of you on the same schedule at some point. Maybe by the end of the next book.

I wanted to post this yesterday, but forgot.

I like hearing your stories about rpgs in libraries. Thank you for sharing them.

I have only pbp experience when it comes to Starfinder. I want to like starship combat. I think there's a lot of potential for narrative fun with the various systems. I don't understand why starship combat doesn't work as well as PC combat. Maybe the phases disrupts the familiarity of initiative order? Maybe knowing that the PCs are essentially sitting in a chair fiddling with buttons and controls doesn't feel heroic? I don't know. It seems that starship combat takes an extra long time via pbp compared to normal combat which I think compounds the problem of many people not liking it. Starship combat works in literature and films, so it should work here too.

Oh and adding this today, GM Quirk if it helps with encounter balance(or if it makes the bookkeeping easier for you), I have no problem if Yoromishtali gains the next level at the same time as Duncan, Sevens, and Neap.

Oh thank goodness, level 3 should at least make me a little more useful than just 'extra shooter'. I think I get class abilities that'll help.

I've never done starship combat before, so I have no idea how to weigh in on the subject currently and will defer to my peers.

Hmmm.. which class? Mystic or Nanocyte?

I can skip starship combat.
Unlucky rolls can ruin things, but that's more strategic than anything, and can usually be handwaved by three opposing dice rolls, as I've not yet seen a bad/neutral/good ending that resulted in the ship being destroyed and a TPK in an AP.

Originally I was enthusiastic about space combat. That was based on the assumption that the ships were aware of each other and entered the map from opposite sides, which would allow for clever tactics to come into play. But in most of these engagements we begin the battle within short range, eliminating players' ability to control the action and putting a greater dependency on dicebot. That can be feast or famine. I don't think The Picard Maneuver is possible in this system, so it should work more like submarine warfare in two dimensions.

It seems like half the Roles are just filler. Science Officer? Engineer? Captain, even! If you're not shooting or piloting you're not doing much.

I'd like to upgrade the ship, even if we vote to speed through the ship to ship combat coming up. It may be important if for no other reason to have some features that can be used while traveling to the next destination. Ships with the right technical or mystical labs can allow PCs to construct equipment and create magic items if they have the right skills/feats.

I'm up for playing out the space battle. Maybe the GM can come up with some ways to speed things up by making standard rolls for people for things like firing weapons and other engineering feats that are pretty standard. Maybe at the start of a new round, everyone can post what they'd like to do and the GM can move the ships and determine the game mechanical side of things. The players that have options about which role to take can announce what they'd like to do and then the GM can 'bot the action, with the PCs posting their RP reactions and actions for color.

Assuming the PC ship is capable of defeating other ship(s), the GM can play things to the point where the winner is clear to see and then handwave the conclusion.

I won't have a chance to upgrade the ship or level Duncan up until the weekend. This is end of one term and start of a new term time, so PBP has to take a back seat to work for a few days.

I'll go with the group on starship combat.

I've never done it with an online game; for in-person games, I'm not really a fan of it .

Doing it all as narrative is find by me, as are whatever cool ideas GM Q has.

I had some time while my students were taking their final last night and did a rough draft of the starship upgrade. I found I actually had to downgrade some systems to have the ship come in under 75 build points. I'll post the details so people can comment and make suggestions for improvement.

I'll be busy with work for the next day or two, however, so it will have to wait a bit.

Anyone taking the AG armor?

I think I have decided what to do with this pending starship combat: skip it altogether. As I reviewed the book, I have realized that it's not at all necessary when it comes to the plot. It's the starship that initially dropped off the Azlanti, then returned to take Cedona and this Rune Drive back to Azlanti space.

Anyway, they'll be gone for a while. Perhaps you can spend some time working with the colonists to have the lasers on the old barracks building up and running to defend the colony for when an Azlanti ship inevitably returns.

I think we WILL need to have a couple of Starship combats in the future (though probably not anytime soon, if you play your cards right). You'll all want to be thinking about roles and skills you'll need for that to work. Remember, we definitely need a halfway decent pilot, and I think you'll want an engineer. Of course you'll want a couple of gunners, but the other roles can be a little more flexible.

Meanwhile, Duncan, you may upgrade the ship to TIER 3.

The rest of you may continue to role play, and think about heading back to the settlement.

Okay. I made a few mistakes in the first draft, so I corrected those and have the Tier 2 version. I'll work on the Tier 3 for the future.

I peaked at the source book and the starship battle has one important consequence relating to obtaining a transponder code to get past Azlanti checkpoints. I expect there are other ways to achieve this.

I still have to level up, so I'll try to do that this weekend.

I added a link at the bottom of Duncan's profile to an editable pdf of the Tier 2 version of the starship. I've proposed the ship be named (or renamed) the Nova Cedona.

Hey all

Will be slower than usual to catch up with things, tested positive for covid this friday and have been dealing with that, do not recommend.

Will have some prep work for leveling and assisting in getting the ship leveled up, may look I to multiclassing to give Sevens a bit more usefulness in battle.

Stay safe and healthy

Hope you feel better soon. I'm slammed for the next day or two, but should get leveled up soon.

I hope you feel better soon, Sevens. Don't worry too much about posting. Things will slow down here for a few days as you all decide how to proceed.

Speaking of which, the colonists will be reaching out soon to find out how things are going

Regarding the transponder:

Aibretta made some recordings of transmissions when the Azlanti ship landed or was in orbit. It should suffice for at least flying NEAR Azlanti space. After that, you may need to make other arrangements...

I'll be leveling Duncan up soon. I've been busy but things are slowing down now.

Weird being sick at one of the busiest times of the year, forgot it was going to be Xmas in a bit over a week.

I think the worst is over, just feeling really tired. I'll have a general idea on how Sevens will level up soon.

The idea that just assaulting a prison is something that many characters may not have a desire to do is a good point, and thank you for recognizing it. The AP presumes that the MacGuffin(Cedona) is sufficient motivation, when it might not really be enough in some cases.

I've leveled Duncan up on paper, but it may take a day or two to get the profile updated.

He gains 6 SP, 6 HP, 0 RP, 1 BAB, 1 Fort save, his operative's edge goes up to +2, his move increases by 10, his trick attack bonus damage increases to 1d8, he gains the feat Advanced Melee weapons (so he can use that nice curve blade we found), and adds Weapon specialization for advanced melee weapons. He gets 12 more skill ranks. Since he's putting a rank into culture, he'll add the Breneri language from Thak.

Haven't quite gotten leveling finished, but at least the worst of covid has passed. Just in time for Xmas!

So I'm still a Starfinder noob and I'm just going to ask outright - is multiclassing a good idea?

Sevens, glad you are feeling better.

I have a bout with illness the past few days as well. I don't think it's covid, but it's certainly at least a bad head cold. Congestion, body aches, and a bit of a fever the first night. Missed Christmas at my Mom's yesterday, as I didn't want to get anyone else sick. Also took the day off of work today.

I think things are looking up. Still a little stuffy, but all in all I'm feeling better.

I would like to let you all know that I intend to slow down posting for the next couple of weeks. I Know many of us probably have lots of family plans, and may even be traveling. Now, there is no reason to not post AT ALL, but know that there is no pressure to post until about Jan. 2nd.

I think that if any of you do post over the next couple of days, it might be nice get a consensus on whether you're going on this rescue mission. Madelon, Aibretta, and the others will help you however they can.

I guess I should also remind all of you that since we are finishing one book and getting ready to start another book, I want to give each of you an opportunity to bow out. I think it is fair to ask each of you to do your best to commit to a given book, but not any further than that. If this seems like a good time for any of you to decide to step away, I understand.

On the other hand, we are on the cusp of a journey into very unfriendly space! I'm sure most of you are curious about what exactly will happen here, and I can't wait for some of the twists and turns to be revealed to you.

I'm having a great time reading this new book, and there are some moments that I hope will be memorable for all of us.

I'm also reviewing the first book, as I'll be starting it with at least four teens the first of the year. One really cool thing I can do for this in-person game is bring in some of my 3D printing. I am printing several minis and lots of scenery for Nakondis and the colony. I'll try to post some pics in the slides when I reveal all of the pre-fab houses I have printed.

FINALLY, I want to wish each of you a Merry Christmas and happy holidays!

I think this is Chiaiese' stop. You run a great game, GM Quirk, but my enthusiasm for Starfinder generally has dropped off this year and I don't want to continue to be a drag on this excellent campaign.

Thanks to all and have fun!

You'll be missed, Chiaiese!

Thanks for playing, and happy holidays to you and yours!!

I appreciate that. This is a great group - honestly one of the best I've played with.

Take care.

Chiaiese, we will miss you. I appreciate the time you put into this game.

I may keep your character on as an NPC background player. She was an interesting character.

I've been kicking around the idea of switching characters.

Mostly because an Azlanti prison is not where a spacefaring photographer that's been infected(?) by nanites is willing to comfortably go, even for a great friend like Cedona. Not to mention that the photos and layout of the Royal Venture is something that is likely to garner a lot of credits and attention from the right parties.

Contracting a mercenary (Half-Orc {Battle Medic} Special Ops Soldier) that is more than willing to engage with something like that is something that should be relatively easy, especially on this "border space" that they are in right now, and the potential outcome of their success.

Alternately, it could be now that Goldenarms(Android {Biotechnician} Biohacker) gets a "vacation" order from Elizabet Lorena to service a favor owed to Cedona, and is arriving at this pivotal point. If someone can pilot, I can swap them out with Neap becoming occupied by the data and bowing out.

Chiaiese you weren't a drag on the campaign at all, but I understand if you want to stop. Thank you for your player character and excellent posts. I hope you find a game that you enjoy more. Take care and see you around the forums.

And Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all.

I've been kicking around the idea of switching characters.

Mostly because an Azlanti prison is not where a spacefaring photographer that's been infected(?) by nanites is willing to comfortably go, even for a great friend like Cedona. Not to mention that the photos and layout of the Royal Venture is something that is likely to garner a lot of credits and attention from the right parties.

Contracting a mercenary (Half-Orc {Battle Medic} Special Ops Soldier) that is more than willing to engage with something like that is something that should be relatively easy, especially on this "border space" that they are in right now, and the potential outcome of their success.

Alternately, it could be now that Goldenarms(Android {Biotechnician} Biohacker) gets a "vacation" order from Elizabet Lorena to service a favor owed to Cedona, and is arriving at this pivotal point. If someone can pilot, I can swap them out with Neap becoming occupied by the data and bowing out.

Well, obviously I want you to be able to play a character you find fulfilling. I agree that Neap might be a reluctant adventurer, and may not relish heading into hostile space to find someone.

THAT SAID, there may be some opportunities for role playing a character like Neap would very much enjoy. Without giving too much away, there is a surprising stop you'll be making before you set down on the prison moon.

In the end, I open to Neap remaining on Nakondis to help rebuild and provide some measure of security for the colony. In this case, you could make a character who may be one of the colonists. Perhaps someone who was injured by the Azlanti and would like revenge!

Another option would be a more exotic alien from this location you'll be making a stop at. If this is something you would go for, we can exchange a couple of PM's.

I appreciate that. This is a great group - honestly one of the best I've played with.

Take care.

Sorry to see you go but glad to team up with you in another campaign.

Duncan's profile is updated for level 3. He has added the officer's curve blade and a taclash.

Do we have any credits to use for new equipment, maybe purchasing from someone on the colony? Did we get any credits near the end?

Sorry to see you go but glad to team up with you in another campaign.

I hope so. That one guy is kinda notorious for being a dink.

Anywho...

@GM, is it possible to mark me as inactive and still use Chiaiese as an npc? (which I'm totally fine with)