Protectors of Golarion (Wrath of the Righteous AP)

Game Master Sensen

All right, scratch that post then, I'll try having Elliot full attack with the macro, here goes...

Cool. Deleted mine to prevent confusion.

Sorry, I should note I moved you to that square. You had to move more than 5 feet to get within range of range of the pink one.

Ah, ok. Np. I'll delete all attacks after the first.

You were within range of the first, but it was more heavily injured which is why I had you move to assist Merixia since Azira is on top of that one.

Good call. Though really it is moot either way. Meri can definitely knock that guy flat on their ass on her own without any backup too.

Posting with one hand: Thanks everyone. @Verene/Thesius go ahead and bot. Surgery went well. Waiting out recovery.

Great to hear your surgery went well and you already have some range of motion back, Elliot! I hope you continue to heal up fast.

Oh, they're intended to be unconscious, wounded, but not dying. Apologies.

Great, got it. Thanks GM. And yeah, tracking enemies that are dying instead of just unconscious would be a real pain.

I had forgotten about that bedroom Verene saw briefly when she tried to scry Staunton! If that's right next door to the office, we should definitely take a second to investigate it. As commander of Drezen, perhaps he'll have had notes on what they did with the Sword of Valor, or some kind of information that would be valuable to the Crusade overall.

And... Merixia did almost certainly already take down Pink. Good hustle, everyone! I love this group, everyone is so engaged. :)

All right, some good news: with the anaesthesia gone and the thumb out of the plaster with good enough range of motion, I can probably manage simple posts from the phone. Wouldn't be able to run Elliot through a combat with that but I should be able to then edit thepost upstairs by copy pasting the combat macro's into combat posts. Please don't expect fancy editing or citation but it should be good enough to avoid having to be botted.

Edit: Ah, Ninja'd by Thesius :) I'll save myself the trouble tonight then. Thanks again.

Yay, glad to hear everything went well!

Oof, lots of posts here, but I'm glad everything is settled. I think.

And I hope for your swift recovery, Elliot - having a hand you can't use sucks.

Are we just waiting on Azira's actions now?

Yes, I think so, but also the fight is basically over so we probably don't need to be in rounds anymore.

There is a reason I want to keep it in rounds for a bit longer. I'll give Azira a bit to post, but if not, I'll assume she tries to knock him out again.

Sorry I haven’t posted in a few days, work got crazy. I should have a post up this afternoon.

What does Thesius find behind the tapestry?

My preference would be the wand to get the prisoners out. It depends on how many charges it has but between Verene and Elliot we can easily recharge it over time.

Also Elliot will wait to see what Thesius finds but he would advise extreme caution since we know the area of the sword had mimics and they can disguise as anything.

Can't make a full post until later, but Thesius was simply looking behind the tapestry to determine what needs to be done to continue into the secret room.

In regard to how they leave, Thesius currently can use gaseous forms to navigate the way the arcane eye took the day prior.

To help with capacity limitations, we could potentially shove some of the knights into the Bag of Holding (Type III) that Merixia has depending on how full it is. I would not suggest leaving them in there for long, but they should be fine if placed in there before dimension dooring out, and then promptly removing them from said bag of holding.

Oh, right, behind the tapestry. You did ask about that. You would normally need Perception DC 30 to notice it, but I'll give a bonus for knowing it's there, so you automatically pass. It's a secret door - if you open it, I'll put it in for a post.

Thesius figures the false sword of valor is unlikely to go anywhere, while the documentation the others are mentioning is far more likely to.

Also, if they do have to leave in a rush, they could possible go directly into the secret room after Verene scouts it. Maybe even secure the secret door to prevent it from being opened.

All of the normal doors are able to be locked from the inside, so you can use them to keep people away, as well.

Since you have at least one of the keys, it'd mean that any of the non-demons would struggle to get into places.

Interesting thought. Seems like we're good to move to Staunton's room. Hopefully nothing comes up on the way.

Thesius is working to be thorough, but is also try to move as quickly as he can. So he's not necessarily going to advocate for taking our time to identify items while in the middle of enemy territory with a succubus running loose.

I vote we go back and fight the mimics before leaving. Thoughts?

I was under the impression Thesius is only done investigating the chest in that room. He would aim to search the rest of the room before noting they should probably make their way out. They've rescued who they can for now and have potentially relevant information to review with the book. Not to mention the items they found could prove to be of use moving forward as well.

There might be other loot in with the mimics... but reinforcements are either on their way or already there. Things might get dicey.

Also, I think we should take Staunton's head with us. It won't stop resurrection, but it'll definitely stop raise dead.

Yeah, good point Merixia. To succeed on Raise Dead they would need an intact body. If they have resurrection... well, then we realitstically couldn't really stop it :)

On the mimics, it seems very unlikely there is significant treasure there. Why would the demons and cultists leave it in a room that is specifically designed to be a trap for us? They already have the fake Sword of Valor there to lure us in. It just seems unneccesarily risky for very questionable gain.

Slipping through the tunnels, she finds her vision inside another room - this must be what Aron referred to. Though the room is totally unlit, her kobold-shape's senses allow her to pierce the gloom. There are a vast array of signs that this is her destination - for one, a metal rod on which hangs a magnificent banner depicting a sword before a sunburst is raised up in the hands of a statue of an armored woman to the north. This must be the Sword of Valor. Just south of the statue sits a gleaming alabaster altar. Another four statues flank the room, each wearing a real suit of metal armor, while to the south hangs a tattered red and gold tapestry.

This is what Verene knows for sure is in the room along with with the false Sword of Valor. Four suits of armor, a tattered tapestry, and an alabaster altar, which she didn't inspect for any compartments but potentially could have them, like the altar in the ghoul/nabasu chapel. She wasn't able to use detect magic on any of it, since we decided that would conflict with the arcane eye, but by Appraising the false Sword of Valor she determined it had some kind of magical properties. If there was anything more specific she would have noted at a glance, GM, Verene would have relayed it all.

If anyone can lift Staunton's body off the ground once wrapped in a sheet or blanket from his bed, they can take it along with them through the mythic dimension door, so we can definitely bring all of Staunton's remains along to try to foil raise dead. Although Merixia did also already use rest eternal, it's an opposed caster level check to overcome that, essentially.

Good thoughts.

There's nothing else that Verene noticed at a glance, but she clearly didn't notice the mimics themselves.

I'm not quite sure what everyone was wanting for next steps then.

For clarity, Thesius is for the following:
-Finish searching the room thoroughly for any additional things of note/hidden compartments
-Head out to report in, examine their findings, recuperate, and plan next steps

I am in favor of finishing a thorough search in the office here and then getting out to rest and report.

Ooh, armor… I hadn’t noticed that before. (Or I forgot, which is equally likely.) Tomorrow IG would be better, though.

Okay, seems like that's a majority for leaving. I don't like to post twice in a row in Gameplay, but I'll make a post to the effect that Verene uses mythic dimension door to transport us all out. See you all Monday.

Just wanted to confirm. We are supposed to have some downtime in game soon, correct? I've been wanting to retrain some of Thesius skills, but have been waiting for the proper time to do it. Unfortunately, retraining just gets more expensive as characters continue to level though.

Yes, though it'll probably be quite some time in real life, since Irabeth would very much like the Citadel seized before she lets you guys take some time off.

Absolutely. I figured that was the case, but didn't want to assume. Didn't think these changes entailed divine intervention like for Merixia, but would like to make them at some point.

Sorry for the double post. In regard to using the scales with the Oil of Life, I don't know that it will work as Oil of Life more specifically calls out sprinkling it upon a body.

Yes, it does say "a dead body" even though the resurrection and true resurrection spells require only a small bit of the creature to be resurrected. I guess that means it's more like raise dead but with no time limit on how long ago the creature can have died, and no restrictions about things like the creature having to not have been killed by a death effect or ever turned into an undead. Too bad. We were pretty sure Terendelev can't be resurrected by any means right now anyway, though.

New possibility - the scales are also artifacts, I believe (minor ones, but still). The might lack the resonance that an actual part of her corpse would.

... that's plausible, right? Forget that I didn't actually realize you only need a part for true resurrection, and it will function with a piece of any given body.

Whatever the case, you should probably not use it without preparation.

Re: oil of life, I think it works the way you decide it works, GM. I personally don't think the scales have stopped being part of her body though. But I also know it shouldn't matter either way for Terendelev, because of [spoilery reason we don't know about yet.]

Out of character, I very strongly feel that we should not needlessly destroy a valuable magic item that I'm almost certain we will be able to repurpose later. (You can cleanse it and turn it into a powerful good-aligned weapon in the Owlcat game. I think I put it on Sosiel since he uses glaives and benefited from the extra channeling.)

The only part that makes it really dangerous is the ability to summon a babau 1/day. GM, can I get clarity please on whether it can still do that if it's put into e.g. a wooden case designed for polearms? It would be great if we could box it up, toss it into extradimensional storage, and not worry about it for the moment.

If it's in extra dimensional storage, it definitely wouldn't be able to summon a babau in the material area. Its only senses are sight and hearing, so having it shut in a box would probably prevent it from summoning a babau when you open up the storage... Sure, I'd think it's fine.

Also, if you haven't mentioned the journal, you probably should...

Yeesh. I have no focus today, so no posts. Sorry. Normal posting should resume tomorrow, but I'll miss out on Monday. Some things coming up this week.

Hope all is well with you, GM.

Oh, thanks. Somehow I missed that post, Verene. Just a busy week last week, and kind of unpleasant. Mostly better now.

Also, if you haven't thought of asking Joran about any of this, you may want to. He did, after all, know his brother fairly well, and might have more insight into things.

Apologies for the delay. Been dealing with some stuff. Please don't hold up any further on my part and Thesius would have shared all of the information from those spoilers. I'll try to get up another post tonight, but don't want to prevent things from moving forward in the mean time.

I'm also sorry for the delay- work got crazy this week. I should be back to regular posting on Monday though.

Merixia is kind of numb to weirdness right now. Nonevil succubus? You know what, sure. Why not. Just roll with it or you'll break down screaming at the sheer absurdity of what is currently your life.

Not an unreasonable choice.

Okay, so I've got some bad news for everyone. I'm not sure how effectively I can continue doing all of the games I'm running. I've got a lot more going on nowadays than I used to, and juggling everything with the games that I'm running is getting harder and harder.

I've been wrestling with this difficulty for a while - since the end of 2024, but it's only going to get harder to get full, thoughtful posts in every weekday as I reengage with life once again. I'm not quite sure how I want to proceed, whether that's posting less often (which will definitely lose some of the momentum and engagement from everyone involved) to dropping some of the games that are ongoing (which isn't something I'm eager to do, either). If anyone has any thoughts, I welcome them.

Oh no, I'm sorry to hear you're overstretched, GM. The work of GMing three games at once (or maybe four counting your in-person game?) would be a lot for anyone. Of course, I really enjoy this game and don't want it to end. If you have to slow roll posting for a while, we'll understand. Do what is best for you.

I love this particular game, we have a really great group of people and an engaging story. If you need to slow the pace, that's fine. RL has to come first. Take care of yourself.

My apologies for my absence. I've been in a funk myself and been finding it hard to get caught back up. I will get a post up tomorrow.

While I hate the idea of seeing this game go, I totally get that. If possible, I would like to see it continue on even if it means slowing the pace. But overall, you're life has to take precedence.

Is there anything we can do from our end to help?