@Maggs: Halli would kill the hand, no question there. Eating it, however, well, Halli isn't exactly picky, but she does have standards, and the undead leave a foul aftertaste in her mouth. ;)
@Everyone: Feel free to throw ideas for what happened on the last mission at me! I like Maggs' idea and I'll be adding it in when I get it written up.
Re: Backgrounds
I think given how cagey some of us are being about where we come from, perhaps we should do something like what I've seen done in another game I recently got into and put some information in spoilers to see what we know/have picked up about each other if we want to roll. It's similar to the rumors GM of Rust wanted us to do, but this would be things that we've let slip and others remember or have picked up on.
So, maybe something like this?
Joanna's been with the guild for around four years now. She started out in Darius Felder's party since he sponsored her membership. After proving herself in a few missions, she was reassigned to a different party. Up until six or seven months ago, she had been bounced from one party to the next as openings for a skilled fighter opened up and she could fill the gap until someone more permanent could be found. When Drask's party was in need of another sword, she was transferred and has remained since.
Joanna spends a lot of her time drawing and painting during the day and singing, playing, and dancing in the evenings when she's in town. When not visiting the livelier taverns, she can be found talking with Drask about art, culture, music, and more.
Her accent, while Taldane, is not from around the area of Zimar, though it sounds similar to those that some aristocrats passing through the city have.
On the few occasions when her party has needed to travel by boat, she has managed to get them free passage on one of the ships in port.
She speaks with a northern aristocratic accent, but it has shades of dialect spoken in the foothills of the Fog Peaks.
Joanna is definitely hiding something, but only Darius Felder seems to know anything about it, and he isn't talking.
Hey I like that idea. I was working on something similar just for my own notes anyway, so I'll turn it into something like this. For the giggles I might add impossibly high diplomacy checks, paired with more reasonable knowledge checks. The Drake clan is a frightening and mysterious lot, but there's at least one event that reasonably well-informed people will likely have heard rumors about.
I can't wait to see what you've come up with. :)
And as an FYI, I've added one more rumor for Joanna.
Joanna is an incompetent leech. Look at how many parties have kicked her out! (False. Joanna's long been used to fill in gaps in parties until a permanent member was assigned. She's not the most skilled adventurer, but she's far from incompetent.)
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@Jo, despite sharing stats with crawling hands (minus mark quarry), the Hand's Detachment familiar isn't undead! It's a magical beast, like a wizard's pet cat or Teladora's cockroach
Ah, then no taste at all. :P
Ah yes, the most magical of beasts, the cockroach!
I'm really tired and I've been writing for ages now forgive me.
@Joanna
I really like that. I think anyone who's been around for as long as Joanna has should get a small bonus, maybe a +1 for every year, half year, something like that, since it's natural to learn about your coworkers whether you want to or not.
Also, big update.
That Docs has almost everything that's been compiled about the House so far from the campus layout, guild history, and members that I came up with and NPCs that you all came up with. Commenting is enabled and I took some liberties cause I got carried away, so if there's anything you don't like about what I added or something is different from what you pictured, let me know!
I've also updated the link in the Campaign header to that one so you don't have to search for it every time you want to look at it.
Fun fact: I've been thinking about the Drake family for over a decade now. They were originally the antagonists in an old 3.5 homebrew campaign I was working on in college. There was even almost a novel about them at one point. If you were to ask me directly, player to player, about them (and if I didn't take a cue from Byron and just lie) I could damn near drown you in information about them.
I can't promise everything will make total sense in current canon, and am actually really open to feedback on any details you notice as we play and I reveal more about Byron's backstory. Like the fact that, in my DC checks, I'm going to be completely unable to supply the name of a town that the Drakes are from--I just don't know Pathfinder or even DnD geography well enough anymore to pick a place that works for what their story needs.
@Byron: I'm always willing to give things a read, and if you want feedback, I'm more than happy to help. :)
As for figuring out where the Drakes are from, do what I do, find a nice spot on the map and say, "Here! I shall build my domain for my imaginary friends and they shall rule with an iron fist!" :P
In all seriousness, you can just come up with a name and figure out where the town is later. If it changes, then it changes. I don't think anyone's going to hold that against you.
@GM Rusty: Neat! I just read through it and I see two things missing. First is anything on Hesla, and second is Odessa. You're gonna make Jo cry if you forget about her best friend and convenient hostage like that. ;)
I am expecting little to no time available today due to my work schedule, please GMPC me as needed.
@Joanna
I added Hesla this morning before I read this, but yes I did! In my defense, life?
Man, I hope that one works.
I'll add Odessa in soon.
@Everyone
I haven't had the chance to look through everyone's sheets for more than a glance, but could y'all give me a quick rundown of what I can expect from your characters in combat? I'd appreciate it. I'll have time to do deep dives into characters later in the week. Something similar to Joanna's first post here in Discussion.
Party Role: Jo and Halli are meant to be a hammer and anvil. They're fairly tough and can hit pretty hard. Where Joanna is really going to excel is against strong fiends, undead, and cultists. I plan on taking some feats to help her hit more like a truck with her sword. While she can heal, most of it is probably going to be used to keep her up and fighting.
Outside of combat, Jo is an okay face, but might be better at being a distraction. She's reasonably stealthy and has a number of perform skills that could be useful to draw attention when needed. She shouldn't have too much of an issue getting into position. Honestly, most of her skills are for fluff, and the 2+int skill points is hurting a bit. Most of her skills only have 1 rank in them.
Just a quick blurb is fine. If you've posted something similar elsewhere, then my bad. Life is hectic.
Byron has 22 int and 14 dex, and surprisingly decent defences. He carries a swordcane which he can do 1d6+4 with in a pinch, but mostly it acts as his primary evocation implement. He deals heaps of shock damage with 2nd and 3rd level spells, and has stabilize, cure light, cure moderste, and cure serious wounds.
The Occultist also gets implement powers, which are like spells I can use something called focus points to. Most of them are minor, but I can cast energy ray and/or energy blast 14 times a day, plus some other battlefield control effects like creating rough terrain.
So lots of ranged and melee spell damage, a decent ampunt of healing, summon monster 3, a ghost horse I can ring up, and then some f@~&ery type magic. If I'm swinging my swordcabe for d6s Imeither being arrogant, or I'm in trouble :v
Come to think of it, my spells are so weird and varied I might just publically post the sheet I keep them in so people can keep track of what I can and can't do.
I haven't had the chance to look through everyone's sheets for more than a glance, but could y'all give me a quick rundown of what I can expect from your characters in combat?
Drask Umbra
In Combat: Drask is here to turn enemies into piles of meat. He uses slayer talents to pick up two-weapon fighting feats without meeting their dex prerequisites, and projects his own shadow doubles to act as flanking partners to get sneak attack off. He's shockingly mobile for his size and it's hard to keep him from moving about the battlefield as he pleases, and his shadow doubles act as mirror images that make it hard to target him. In a pinch he can use his shield of swings feat combined with fighting defensively to bump his AC up to 27 if he needs to stall out a fight. Overall Drask is an offensive melee build with probably the highest reliable single-target DPS in the party.
Out of Combat: Drask makes an excellent scout. Despite being a monstrous strength-based warrior, he adds +18 to both perception and stealth. He can get around obstacles with acrobatics/climb/swim, is good enough at heal checks to help stabilize people, has survival and is pretty good at tracking, and has a reasonably good sense motive check. Don't expect him to actively intimidate anybody, not only is he mechanically terrible at it, he also doesn't like to do it.
In Combat, Maggs is about battlefield control, affecting terrain, planting swarms under people that ain't being actively dealt with, sending her many hands out to do auto damage and distract spellcasters. She'll largely stay away from the front lines but might cast party buffs before or during combat.
Out of Combat, she has the Trapfinding trait from Mummy's Mask so despite a lack of stealth will be able to do rogue shit, finding and disabling magic and mundane traps, she'll be backup healing (ver minimally rn rn but when a wand happens), and her hand is VERY stealthy, matching Drask's 18, and thru an archetype, also gets DD as a class skill, so could ride Drask's shoulder during scouting and pick locks or disarm traps in a pinch.
Hyacinth is a mesmerist who uses various aromas to influence people instead of stares. In combat, she will be close to the front lines, debilitating foes (penalties to Will saves, attacks, and spell save DCs) and providing flanking bonuses. She has lots of tricks up her sleeves, including giving allies mirror images and invisibility. She can also provide minor healing and ability restoration with the fruits she grows, and she can remove some negative conditions with sweet scents.
Out of combat, she has stupendous social skills, but not much else!
Thank you to those who have answered so far!
T-Minus 3 hours(ish) until start!
Then I'll be posting ushering forth a new era in the form of the beginning of your meeting with Layla! If you'd like to get any posts in before then, feel free. If there are any things left unsaid after I post, feel free to put it in a spoiler to finish up any conversations.
I'm pretty excited, honestly. I'd post it now if it weren't for the fact I don't want to cut anyone off.
I've updated my profile--a link to my character sheet on mythweavers is now under the homepage url part. I'll post again tomorrow. So tired my eyes hurt right now.
Just for reference, in case this knowledge will ever be useful, I'm going to make a habit of keeping notes about my dice rolls in the "description" section down at the bottom of that sheet, so you can have an idea of what successes and fails I have and get kind of a clue about what my upcoming post might entail when I can't be contacted directly.
I've updated my profile--a link to my character sheet on mythweavers is now under the homepage url part. I'll post again tomorrow. So tired my eyes hurt right now.
Just for reference, in case this knowledge will ever be useful, I'm going to make a habit of keeping notes about my dice rolls in the "description" section down at the bottom of that sheet, so you can have an idea of what successes and fails I have and get kind of a clue about what my upcoming post might entail when I can't be contacted directly.
Disregard this--I was tired and I did not understand that the dice markup actually does an RNG calc, so there's literally no reason for me to have to take notes about rolls.
Side note, as The New Guy, I'm really impressed with how well these forums facilitate PbP. The whole reason I was confused about dice was because I didn't expect the dice markup to actually do an rng calculation. I thought it was just visual to make the stated results of rolls stand out better. This is really neat.
C R O A T O A N .
I've no further questions for Mom.
Also ready to move forward!
Samesies
Onward!
My kid woke up right as I finished reading Rust's post. So here's what I'mma do:
1. Try to think up ways I can use my knowledge skills to gain us some kind of advantage.
2. Make those rolls and add a little narrative to justify them.
3. Head to the docks so we can go whenever we're all ready. @Rust, when I get that post up you can just tell me if the rolls did anything at the same time you move us along, no need to do separate posts for my checks since I'm sure everyone is as eager as I am to get. . .rolling /dadjoke
Long live the dad jokes! ;)
Also, sorry all for the silence yesterday. Didn't have a chance to post before 11:15 last night and I was too tired to think of anything to write.
No stress, it happens.
I'm donezo btw. I vote we try boating our way up. Boats are fun.
Just grabbing my stuff and Halli. I still need to update the hero lab file with my final equipment, but none of it will be adventuring gear besides the hot and cold weather outfits. I'll do that tomorrow since it's late and I don't wanna fire up the desktop just for that right now.
Oh man cold weather outfit is a smart investment probably
I got stuck doing home improvement stuff, so I haven't gotten a chance to post. It's a good assumption that my weekend posting is pretty sparse, but I make up for it during the week.
Okay, sheet has been updated.
And yeah, given where we are, I think both hot and cold weather gear is a good idea.
I might be able to conjure us ghost horses, I just remembered. You folks don't have to wait for me to make a decision as a group but I might be able to conjure phantom mounts for us. I have a ppwer, I just don't remember if my class lets me cast it mass-style or not at this level and can't check at work.
Two days vs a day and a half, I'm largely ambivalent. If forced for a vote I vote for boat.
I'll be following Jo's lead and buying hot and cold weather gear.
Wow that journey is a lot shorter than I was expecting both by boat and horse. I like the image of us on camel or horseback (and wolfback for Joanna) better than us on a riverboat personally, especially if we can get our mounts for free, on credit or loan or, without disclosure, steal them.
Sadly, Byron, the Mind Steed power doesn't last terribly long for overland travel and is limited to a single beast.
@ Maggs I thought so. I had it confused for another ability I either almost took or can take or. . .I forget frankly. Kind of a pointless offer, I'm just trying to make more of an effort to remember non-combat oriented spells and powers than I usually do.
I vote boat though, for mild suspicion that something interesting might happen on the way.
So it looks like we're gonna get on a boat. I personally don't care if we volunteer for guard doody to make it cheaper. I have about 250gp leftoverso I'll cover us. I feel like if a river boat costs us that much or more we screwed up and deserve to get ripped off :v
It'll be easy to find work as guards, not like we wouldn't defend ourselves if necessary anyways.
Yup, I've got some ideas on how to get the price down. Just need to see how lucky Jo is. ;)
Nice roll, Jo. I'll still cover the cost, or at least most of it. I need 30 gold leftover to try and bribe an outsider when we arrive, but I can't imagine it'll cost us 220 anyway.
Damn, sorry! This game wasn't showing me notifications of new posts. I'll catch up as soon as I can.
No worries. Glad to have you still with us. :)
Hey all, I'm traveling, speaking at the launch party for a literary review I'm featured within, please feel free to move without me, sorry for my unavailability, I'll be back home Tuesday but hopefully I'll be able to get some posts in in the meantime.
Just for the sake of clarity, I'm here, just sorta waiting for things to happen.
Indeed, I am also here and ready to move forward!
Congrats, Lobster! That's great to hear!
And, sorry, my time's been a bit sparse. I'll get something up later today!
I will be out of town from 12/18 through 12/26, with limited or no internet access for much of that time. Normal posting will resume when I return on Monday, 12/27. Please bot me as necessary.
Came into work and it was super busy, work the whole day kind of day. I'll get my post up this evening (est) at the latest. I'll probably be posting a little slower than usual given the holidays, so I hope everyone will please be patient with me and each other!
Well your first mistake was going to work :v
I'm sure we'll be fine. Like I told you the other day, I was worried that my weird, restrictive schedule would see me holding everyone up pretty frequently, so the slower pace is actually kind of a relief for me so far.
To all of my games:
As predicted with the holidays coming up, my posting will become sporadic until the new year rolls around. I will still be checking in at infrequent times, but I cannot commit to checking daily. Please ping me on Discord if a response is needed, or GMPC me as necessary.
I'm going to abstain from posting for a few days. Pick it back up next Monday since that's 3/5 down for the holidays. That way no one is worried about posting and everyone can enjoy their holidays.
Sorry all, been busy the past several days and haven't had a chance to sit down and post. I'll try to catch up over the long weekend coming up. Boot as needed until then.
Still alive. Cold's kicking my butt. Will post when able.
@Joanna
S'alright, take your time and get better.
@Everyone
We now have a Roll 20 to dive into. There's nothing in it yet, but it's best to get these things done early. Let me know if you'd like to use your profile pictures from here as your tokens or if you'd rather something else. For those who are posting mobile, let us know in OOC tags and I'll move your character for you.