15 feet up, roger that. She doesn't need to be on the rooftree itself, I just want to keep close to a roof so she can move about up there even while under the effects of levitate. I'm not sure about giving the dretches a surprise round when we are originally aware of them, in general, but it is what it is.
I don't want to pull the conversation backwards, but I do want to make sure I understand the ruling/precedent being set here. So, alter self is going to work like disguise self from now, where the caster/target can only change into other forms of the same type? What happens if a monstrous humanoid casts it, do they turn into another monstrous humanoid or to a normally humanoid (and if the former, what separates that from monstrous physique)?
Azira has a point - this new rule would prevent Elliot and Azira from using the scale to turn into a halfling or goblin, for instance, which doesn't seem fair. I'm not sure there are any Small native outsiders, except like... halfling-base aasimar/tieflings? I just thought Merixia turning into an oread was a cool idea, but I suppose she could accomplish the same thing with a dwarf, half-orc, orc, etc.
Oh, I also forgot to add the damage bonus from Point-Blank Shot. So that's an additional +1 to both damage rolls, assuming the crit confirms.
Azira has a good point. I'll have to think more about it, but for the time being, I'll say that Merixia into an oread is acceptable. I'll get a more coherent answer out for you guys later today.
Okay, here's my thought: alter self can change its users into humanoids. However, I've already determined (but forgot) that it doesn't change the type/subtype of the creature in question. Thus, while I'll say that the oread thing can stick around for now, in the future, it'll be humanoids.
This is why Wendaug had favored target on Verene way back in the cultists' base, by the by. She had favored enemy for humans. I feel that it would be weird for alter self and other polymorph effects to prevent rangers' favored enemy from helping them figure out that this being was one of their favored enemies. That seems to be the point to one of the bonuses it gives on Sense Motive and such, after all.
Sound good to everyone?
So, a case could be made for using alter self to take the form of an aasimar, ifrit, oread, sylph, tiefling, or undine if you just like the cool factor of it. Each of those races has an alternate racial trait that makes them count as both native outsiders and humans (scion of humanity/mostly human/pass for human), so--in theory--you could keep alter self as written but have the option to take the form a planetouched race with the appropriate trait?
And, again, sorry for muddying the waters, I didn't mean it as an objection, I just wanted to make sure I understood how it would work.
Sure, I think that's reasonable enough. Though I would rule that such an alteration wouldn't provide the benefit of appearing as said race, because of what the trait entails. I'd also rule that that'd be the only alternate trait that alter self could mimic, because I don't want to keep track of even more such things.
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I see that I got ninja'd (I'm a slow typer).
@GM- I'm good with however you want to run it.
@everyone- I was playing a character for a while pretty recently who had a greater hat of disguise (which is an amazing item, btw) and I found it really helpful to keep these links handy:
alter self
polymorph rules
If we're going to be passing around the alter self scale, it might be worthwhile to copy them somewhere?
Whoops, wish I'd seen this before I posted. In the future Merixia will turn into a half-orc, then. From the spell description it looks like you get the +2 Str no matter what Medium form you pick. I just wanted something that would make sense in-universe.
Honestly, if it's an issue either way Elliot is fine just letting the others use the scale instead. He will go in with just shield and his +1 weapon enhancement from his arcane pool.
A Quick message to my PBP groups: I have an important deadline to meet for tomorrow and will/have been working the entire weekend to meet it. As such I will probably only post very short messages or not at all until tomorrow night, or the day after tomorrow once I’ve taken a bit of rest. Thanks in advance for your understanding. Please bot me if needed.
Hope things go well for you, Elliot!
Good luck, Elliot! I hope everything goes smoothly.
Good luck, Elliot!
Poor Anevia. I think Verene did mention wanting to give her first use of the levitation scale so she wouldn't be shooting through us, and the only confirmed use of the scale we have today is when Merixia was levitated up to the roof to deal with the quasit. We discussed using it at the first chasm today, but I think you ruled that with Elyda's help and the rope, we didn't actually need it for Anevia or Aravashnial there, GM. So in the pre-fight discussion, there likely would have been 2 out of 3 charges remaining. Not that it should change things now. That was an extremely lucky Fort save roll for Verene, on par with just barely not getting hit by Vagorg thanks to her mage armor.
Huh. Must've gotten confused with the use in the labyrinth against the dretches there, which was the day prior.
But yeah, I think everyone got fairly lucky there - Azira and Merixia weren't likely to fail, but our team isn't otherwise terribly Fort focused.
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Cleric saves for the win! This being a hostile environment AP in large part (Worldwound and the Abyss), I figured some extra points in Con would come in handy. Can't heal the rest of the party if you're passed out or vomiting from poison or disease.
Verene is right - the stinking cloud's vanished at the end of the dretches' last turn. I forgot about that, but their CL is only 2. I don't think it's impacted anyone's actions thus far.
Though, uh, I guess I'll say that the roof that Merixia and the dretch are standing on is actually overhead for them (a little overhang or some such), because I forgot the actual map when I put the dretch there.
If you want to interrogate the dretch, remember that they're actually quite dumb. It'll also become able to act in another 8 rounds, so you'll have some time to decide to finish it if you wish.
Verene might or might not know this, but dretches also can't understand any languages but Abyssal, and can't speak at all - although they can communicate telepathically with Abyssal-speaking creatures within 100 feet. Even if they knew anything useful, which seems dubious, getting that info from an Int 5 creature under such circumstances might be... challenging.
Quite. I'd say that with her previous roll, she might know that they're pretty dumb, but probably hasn't remembered that they can't speak/don't understand anything but Abyssal.
Mind you, speaking to them in Abyssal would still probably be the most logical choice.
I'll give it until tomorrow if anyone wants to discuss what just happened. If not, let me know and I'll move us forwards tonight.
Good to move on here.
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Post will be forthcoming in a couple hours. I'll need some time to prepare it, 'cause it's gonna be fairly large, unless my guess is wrong.
In the image you linked it looks like Irabeth has symbols of Iomedae on her armor... do I know her at all?
(I don't expect to know everyone but I thought if she was an Iomedaean paladin or melee cleric or something we may have had some contact.)
She is, in fact, a paladin. Azira probably hasn't met her, but she's heard of her - she fought an attempted act of demonic sabotage on the wardstone a year ago. The saboteur, Staunton Vhane, was thought to be a member in good standing of the crusade, and it was only her intervention that prevented it.
Azira's pretty sure that she's a recent arrival in Kenabres, relatively speaking - she didn't grow up here. Irabeth is also a member of the Eagle Watch, a group of crusaders who worked to hunt down demonic cultists in the city.
Has it been long enough that the alter self spell wore off?
Uh, not quite, actually. There's still probably at least ten minutes remaining, unless you want to dismiss it. Good point, I'd forgotten about that. Perhaps, then, he thinks she looks familiar - which would be why he didn't talk to her.
I'm giving Thesius a few hours to get his introduction in, but if not, I'll have Irabeth reply - not a huge deal, as she probably won't make huge progress in the conversation.
Has anyone heard from Thesius at all? It's been a week since his last post.
Oh, shoot, it has? I'll reach out to him via PM, then.
Sorry, been a long week. We’re working on getting my mom and two youngest siblings moved to a new house. Thankfully they are moving closer, but it’s about an hour to get there to help her to start, so it’s been a lot of driving.
I’m planning on getting caught up tonight and start posting regularly again.
Glad to hear that you're okay, Thesius! Moving house is tough. I hope your mom and siblings are happy in their new home. :)
Yes, indeed. Hope things settle down for you.
In case anyone forgot/wasn't aware... I really don't like the Hellknights. On virtually any level. There're maybe three orders I can vaguely accept, but overall, they offend me. So, uh, don't expect any particularly sympathetic Hellknights. Misguided armigers, perhaps.
But seriously, Hellknights could go happily off to their namesake, and I would not miss them at all.
Still going to be a bit busy this week, but should start settling down after. I will check back in again tomorrow. Need to get some sleep before getting up early for work.
Don't worry, I hate Hellknights and so does Merixia. She's just pragmatic enough to pick the lesser evil in times of emergency. (And hey, watching them react to a tiefling priestess of the empyreal lord most well known for leading sorties into Hell should be entertaining!)
Good to hear from you, Thesius. I hope the move goes as well as possible.
I just realized I forgot to explicitly state that Verene went back and picked up the two glaives she dropped before the dretch fight, but she definitely would not have forgotten about them (like I did.)
Re: Hellknights, I can see why they aesthetically appeal to some people, especially heavy metal and grimdark fantasy fiction fans, but I think they're a bit silly. Of course, I feel that way about a fair number of things in the default Golarion setting, including: elves being aliens; the "Dark Fate" that spontaneously turns some elves into drow; the entire nations of Galt, Numeria and Alkenstar; and the goddess Calistria (and in 2e, Nocticula.) But the nice thing about such a kitchen-sink setting is that you can kind of just spend time in the places you think are cool and ignore the rest. :)
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Re: Hellknights, I can see why they aesthetically appeal to some people, especially heavy metal and grimdark fantasy fiction fans, but I think they're a bit silly. Of course, I feel that way about a fair number of things in the default Golarion setting, including: elves being aliens; the "Dark Fate" that spontaneously turns some elves into drow; the entire nations of Galt, Numeria and Alkenstar; and the goddess Calistria (and in 2e, Nocticula.) But the nice thing about such a kitchen-sink setting is that you can kind of just spend time in the places you think are cool and ignore the rest. :)
Yeah, I'm not a fan of Numeria either. Don't get your pulp sci-fi in my fantasy! Alkenstar is cool if you want a "gunslingers in an apocalyptic wasteland" vibe, but it's definitely a different feel from the rest of the setting. Galt basically exists so the PCs can be Big Damn Heroes and save the nation. Like the Worldwound but with more politics and less demons. :P
As you said, though, we can play in the parts we like and ignore those we don't. There are some players who don't like Wrath of the Righteous because they prefer more moral nuance and less smiting of evil. Me, I get enough moral nuance IRL. Sometimes you just want a clearly defined target and a license to kill.
Oh, I didn't put this in the post and the editing window has closed, but Verene can and will pay for the food she mentioned.
I like Wrath of the Righteous because one of its big things is redemption, despite the current unavailability of that - I think it'll be more practical henceforth, as you have a base of operations, by the way.
So, what's being sold? It will be, unfortunately, at 50% price. You could roll Diplomacy to haggle, I suppose, but the Abadarans are pretty firm (if fair) on their prices.
You can also buy a variety of things, though the supplies are somewhat limited.
Sorry, post will come tomorrow, got a little busy today.
No worries, GM. As far as selling, here's my proposal:
- ¹gold dwarven clan ring from huecuva (do we need to find dwarves specifically for this?)
- ¹²unholy symbol of Baphomet x1
- ¹²wooden unholy symbols of Baphomet x5
- ¹²obsidian unholy symbol of Baphomet x1
- ¹²wooden unholy symbol of Deskari x1
- ¹²bejeweled book of prayers to Baphomet x1
- banded mail x1
- heavy steel shield x1
- shortswords x2
- masterwork glaives x4
- ¹+1 obsidian ranseur (with other magic properties) x1
Not selling, but hopefully leaving here to save on weight:
- Gold dragon bone bracers
- Gold dragon hide armor
¹ = probably needs to be appraised
² = needs to be sold to a good church(?)
Feel free to chime in with any changes, everyone. I would say sell the pouch of gems but my understanding is that they can just be treated like currency instead since they're exchangeable for whatever the listed value is rather than 50% (as per the Ultimate Equipment rulebook.)
A dwarf might know the clan from which the ring originated.
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Oh, right. In terms of buying, you can assume that anything costing 100 gp or less is readily available for purchase, and that anything beyond that up to a maximum of 2,500 gp has a 75% chance of being available for sale.
There's a fair few low-level clerics of various gods of good and law - Sarenrae, Shelyn, Desna. Erastil, Torag, and of course, Abadar. The goodly ones offer healing for free, including ability damage, so Thesius and Verene are off the hook on the ability damage front.
Ooh, would you guys be interested in going in together on a wand of CLW if one is available?
Sure. I think we have kind of a lot of CLW potions at the moment, but it doesn't hurt to have backup.
Shield is also a good option for a wand for spellcasters at this level, and we have about 3000 gp just in cash/fungibles already, before selling any of what we've collected aboveground. Elliot, Verene and Thesius could probably benefit a lot from a wand of shield. What say you, guys?
Actually, I changed my mind: if the maximum that we have a 75% shot to be able to buy is 2,500 gp or below, I think the first priority is a bag of holding type I. We can definitely afford it if one is available, and might be able to also get at least one of those wands, once we sell off all or most of the above list of items. We're not a high-Strength party, and the bag of holding would make our lives a lot easier, especially Merixia's, just in terms of having to make fewer decisions as players about what gear to take and what to ditch.
Yesterday was a lot of moving and I'm getting ready to head out again to do some more shortly. I'll be back on tonight to get caught up and respond again. Sorry for the wait and feel free to move Thesius in the meantime. Thankfully we got the big stuff moved yesterday, so now it's more small stuff and getting stuff set up for my mom.