Protectors of Golarion (Wrath of the Righteous AP)

Game Master Sensen

I have now played the first few big areas of Owlcat's Wrath of the Righteous, and I have the following to report: 1) the Slumber hex is flipping crazy broken and every witch should take it no exceptions; 2) I kind of wish I had made Verene a witch, except making a pact with any greater Power wouldn't fit with her flavor. :)

My apologies for the delay. Family drama arose and I'm now at my mother's for the time being. I'll check back in tomorrow. Thank you for botting for me.

No worries, Thesius - these things happen, after all.

For my part, I won't be able to post on Thursday - it'll be a bit of a day for me, so apologies in advance.

I promise that their AC's pretty awful! You guys have just been rolling pretty poorly. xD

Yeah, the dice are not cooperating with my desire for drama this time.

I'll give Elliot another couple hours to post before botting him.

No problem, and thanks for the bot. We had a family birthday celebration yesterday which went on longer than expected, followed by a long day of work. Haven't really had much of a chance to post. Should be back on track tomorrow.

Well Thesius hit, but will he crit? Also, I noted his attack should be up one from what you used from the Alter Self spell.

I will agree with Verene’s earlier assessment of the slumber hex in the video game. I was running two people with it for a bit. I’m currently playing around with turning a horse into a dragon with something around a 60 strength.

I really like the witch hexes in general. I wish the other casters had similarly useful cantrips. For the wotr game i always would like to have one in my party but the rest of their spell list feels a bit lacklustre to me, and unfortunately they seem a bit underpowered compared to party buffing classes.

Blast, I forgot to act for Anevia and Aravashnial. Ah, well. Maybe I'll toss Anevia's shot in on my next post. Given her luck thus far, I don't think it would change things. xD

For the sake of clarity, Verene - I'd have allowed the strategy to have an effect (dependent on her save, of course), because that's the sort of creative thinking I like seeing in spell use.

Poor Leona, by the way. She accomplished literally nothing the whole combat, and failed both the saves that she tried to make.

I guess she wasn't ready to fight a bunch of crusaders.

Poor thing :(

Wanted to drop a note, my infact son is going through another (fortunately relatively simple) surgery tomorrow and my wife and I are taking turns keeping him company. Put next to work it means my writing time will be very limited the next two to three days.

@Worldwound GM I'll send you a PM soon as I wanted to discuss something on a different topic.

Best of wishes for your son, Elliot.

Wishing your son well for tomorrow's surgery, Elliot.

Hope your son’s surgery goes well and he recovers quickly!

I hope the surgery goes well. Crossing my fingers for you!

I hope the surgery goes well and he makes a full and speedy recovery.

Sorry for the late post, I spent most of the day cleaning. What I wouldn't give to have prestidigitation in real life!

13/17 HP will have to do for now. Merixia only has one non-domain spell and one channel left. Ah, the joys of pre-wand of CLW combat. Maybe if we get really lucky, one will turn up in the loot from this place.

We'll see if something can be arranged - mind you, in a place like this, it's doubtful there's a fully charged wand of, well, anything. But it's possible that there's one with a handful of charges.

Interesting Story Feat for you all to consider for 3rd level - Vengeful Banisher. It fits the themes of the AP quite well (unsurprisingly, given that it was published in the Demon Hunter's Handbook which was published in concert with the AP), and it's flavorful and quite likely useful!

@Thesius: You’re at full HP now, Merixia made sure to get you in her Channel Energy earlier. :)

As Elyda is stepping out of the mist, does that mean the others of us are on the ladder?

Verene and Merixia are on the ladder. The other two are not yet on the ladder - rather in the room upstairs waiting their turn.

Am I understanding it correctly that the first set of three arrows shot at Elyda were the surprise round? And then the second Wenduag arrow, which missed, is taking place in the first round of regular combat?

The first three were readied actions by the traitors. The last one was the surprise round, though I suppose you could argue it either way. I'll have to figure that out when I'm more aware tomorrow - as it stands, it is currently the surprise round, and the first three were readied actions. I may have mishandled the rules there, but I'll figure that out come tomorrow morning.

We did get lucky here so it wouldn't change anything, but for the future, I don't think it's possible to have readied actions and then a surprise round, because readying an action can't technically take place outside of your turn in the initiative order, once that has been determined. It would be a surprise round only. I had never looked this up before, but I guess that makes sense.

Yeah, that makes more sense as I think about it more coherently. But yes, it didn't matter in this case, fortunately.

While Verene's quite correct that light is important to be prepared for, in this case, her worries are probably not a huge deal - Anevia can cast light in the meantime. Also, I don't think alter self actually removes low-light vision, so Thesius still has that, despite appearing human.

I'll give it another hour or so before botting Elyda, just so we can keep moving. I think her player's probably (hopefully) asleep at this hour, but I want to give it just a bit before I post.

Sounds good. Definitely one of those things that comes with players being in different time zones. I'll check back in later again today. I've been keeping an eye out, which is much easier now that I'm back home.

How far down does the ladder go? I was trying to figure it out.

It's about a 20 foot descent from top to bottom.

Also, Elliot: I forgot this myself, but daze only affects humanoids (of 4 HD or less), which the traitors aren't. So in the future it won't affect them - or the demons or tieflings you encounter. Sucks, I know, but there you go.

Any response from Aravashnial? He can whisper back as part of the message spell.

Well, that makes things rather rough for me, yes. Also kind of terrifying to know these enemies all have 5 HD or more.

Any response from Aravashnial? He can whisper back as part of the message spell.

Oops. I missed that it was from the spell, I thought it was just a whisper. I'll get on that next post.

Elliot: They actually don't have more than 4 HD. Rather, they're monstrous humanoids, so they don't get hit with the spell effect.

Ohh. Okay, that makes sense.

I'd say make a Bluff check, Verene, but none of them understand Common... so they don't know she's claimed to be summoning something. The effect is mostly the same, though!

So does the yellow-lined one look dead? To a casual glance, I know I would need a Heal check to be sure.

Oh! Well, even if Verene had known that, speaking in Hallit all of a sudden would only have been more suspicious, I would think. :)

P.S. Verene's AC is 22 until her next turn, not 18 as in the status spoiler. 3 Dex, 4 mage armor, 1 size, 4 dodge.

Yes, Merixia, they do look dead. Well, at least, they're not getting up any time soon.

And oops, yes. It probably won't change much, but you're correct, Verene.

For the record, I've been using this set of diagrams to inform my understanding of areas of effect in spellcasting, because it is easy to refer to and reproduced directly from the Core Rulebook, page 215.

Huh, that's not how I'd've imagined doing 30-foot cones, but it doesn't seem unreasonable, I suppose.

Does Aravashnial's summon happen soon?

Also: dang, that was a rough set of saves. Elliot's spells are actually tougher to resist than normal, so how does this keep happening? :(

Oops. I meant to have that come in. I'll put it in as acting after Thesius, then.

The resistance to the spell's partly that his spells have been targeting Will saves, for the most part, and the recent enemies have decent will saves. This past turn's, though... I have no explanation there.

Yeah, that's rough. Again. :(

So... this is perhaps a good moment to mention I've been thinking about rerolling Elliot to a character with more martial capacity. Originally I was thinking about replacing him entirely as I haven't found him that fun to play or useful in combats, and in a group with both another full arcane caster and a bard it feels like he doesn't have a niche to fill either in or out of combat. I know that it might get better *eventually* when he gets third level or higher spells, but that's a very long way off. Might be my inexperience from trying to level an arcane caster from level 1 too. Maybe if I'd been a human with point blank and precise shot It wouldn't be so bad.

The replacement character would probably be a dwarf fighter and/or bloodrager focussing on teamwork feats and tanking with a reach weapon. Background would resolve around being a cheerful forced conscript of sorts for Kenabres. This would however mean Elliot will fade into the background at some point and continue as a social support of sorts for the group, barring unfortunate circumstances.

Alternatively, I've been considering rerolling him as a magus and continuing as Elliot. They have virtually the same spell list at lower levels as actual casters so that his actions can remain fairly coherent aside from the teleport. Maybe there's a story somewhere in where he loses faith in arcane magic and tries to blend in to a more mundane approach from now. Seeing his main spell fail four times in a row might be such a moment.

If anyone has any thoughts on this, I'd welcome any advice. I've dicussed it with the GM through PM's, and his advice was to ask the others as well even if only so that others could prepare a reaction to this in case Elliot was switched out. And, it is your game as well, of course :)

make a bladebound magus

More seriously, make whatever makes you happiest.

I really like Elliot as a character, so I’m voting for the magus. It would also allow more consistency storywise. But if you’re just not happy with him no matter what, do what’s fun for you!

And yes, I usually make full arcane casters human if I’m starting at 1st level for precisely this reason. Precise Shot makes combat easier at low levels. Unless the DM is using Elephant in the Room rules, which are great for all kinds of characters.

Oh no! I love Elliot as a character too, and would be sorry to see him go. But you should definitely do what makes you most happy to play. The idea of respeccing as a magus is interesting and could really work for RP reasons if you wanted it to. But I'm sure the party could also incorporate a cheerful dwarf melee type, if that appeals more. It's always good to have a mix of personality types in the group.

To the larger point, full casters, especially with sorcerer-type spell progression, can definitely feel a bit underpowered at low levels. Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards, and all that. And I've wondered more than once myself if I made a mistake taking Improved Initiative and Combat Casting as feats on Verene to start, instead of Point-Blank + Precise Shot. I don't think Combat Casting has been relevant even once, for instance, though Improved Initiative is obviously good on anyone.