OMB's Bonekeep 1 - Nostalgiacon! (Inactive)

Game Master James Martin

Boon?: 1d20 ⇒ 12 OOC texted added so the forum doesn't think my post is spam

Hmmm, spoilers gained a grey background today.

They have indeed. I'm not a fan, it's not easier to read. Wonder if they put anything about it on the website tech threads?

Unrelated to that - this combat is more complex than a lot of tier 10-11 fights I've seen!

I have forgotten how much Pathfinder 1st edition knowledge I have already filed away in mental boxes for storage. So many hours devoted to this system and it burned me out about three years ago. I had moved on and really hadn't noticed how much.

NostalgiaCon ends March 6th. I will report this game at that point. Go ahead and roll any dayjob checks you have.

The Prayer that Mun cast might affect the rat demons' attack rolls and damage. Combined with Bodyguard, it may be enough for Red's first attack to miss. But I think Mun needs to roll an SR check to affect the demons and alchemist with Prayer.

For reference, you guys managed to trigger two CR 10 encounters at once - the golem and the alchemist and her hench-demons. You guys did pretty well against them and I'm 75% sure you would have been able to win without character death.

Still working on chronicles. Work has been... busy recently.

Wow! I agree, I think we had the alchemist in trouble :)

How was that pair of encounters set up? It looks like one big open room - does the alchemist watch from hiding or something?

And good going, team! We were pretty solid I thought.

Yes, the alchemist watches from hiding for 10 rounds, then intervenes.

Yes, the alchemist watches from hiding for 10 rounds, then intervenes.

Really?

That is so disappointing.

I thought Bonekeep was supposed to be tough.

Giving NPCs stupid tactics so that the PCs can win is one of Paizo's worst habits, and it comes up in quite a few scenarios.

I had expected that she would have supported the golem in combat, and so taking her out quickly was important.

Not regretting that plan. Feels a lot better than relying on the scenario's lousy NPC tactics to survive.

Thanks OMB!

I shall have to try harder to find something that can trigger Pig's Deathless Zealot feats. ;)

Aroden, I agree. It was written for a simpler time, when the APG had only just come out and there were many less feats, spells and options in the mix. If it were written today, with the benefit of all that 1st edition eventually came to be, I think it would be much different and much deadlier.

Way to go guys I thought we did a great job and I had a lot of fun playing with you all! I have to admit I got worried there for a minute between an almost insta death from a slime and that last round of hits I took lol I'm impressed with how we managed it all and the Arcane Eye bit was MVP for sure!

I agree on the Arcane Eye. That was the first time I have seen it used in PFS play, online or in person.

I'm glad the Arcane Eye was useful. The occultist in my War for the Crown game uses a similar ability every time we come to a dungeon.

This is obviously a tough scenario, and I'm not denying that.

The rat demons seemed to have a very high AC, good attacks, and that disease cloud. Clouds can be lethal, especially if combined with Echolocation or Tremorsense (I ran such a scenario once). A wand of Gust of Wind might be a good purchase for Aroden.

I don't think the enemies needed better stats or more splatbooks to be deadlier.

And I don't think our post-APG resources helped us all that much - nearly every spell Aroden cast was Core, and a barbarian with a potion of Enlarge Person could have done pretty much what Khugron did. Poh's contributions might have been harder to emulate, but Bodyguard was in the APG.

I do think that you could have a more exciting challenge with less powerful enemies that have better tactics. Something other than a BBEG sitting around and just watching for 10 rounds.

Facing clever synergistic tactics, rather than just higher numbers, lets players know that they too can try that instead of just trying to stack bonuses higher.

Anyway, because of our tactics, the BBEG didn't end up wasting 10 of her turns, and for that I am grateful. I am not disappointed in the challenge of the scenario as we actually played it.

The chronicles are here! Let me know if anything needs altering. Otherwise, thanks for playing and I'll set this to inactive by Friday.

Thanks!

Question about the Bonekeep Malady "boon" - is it understood that if no boxes are checked, this "boon" has no impact on the PC?

Chronicle looks good, thanks.

I take it that the GP award is based on the number of encounters completed, hence was set by the approach taken to run this in PbP?

I certainly hope that there are further runs of the Bonekeep scenarios on these boards, and I'd love Poh to complete the series. I'd also be keen to run them if the GM stars barrier is lifted. (Since I pretty much only GM in PbP it's going to be a long while before I get up to 4 stars).

Chronicle looks good.

If PbP leadership decides to allow Bonekeep in the future, then I will hold off on playing Aroden again - one more scenario and he would level out of Bonekeep 2.

Poh's in the same boat as Aroden, so I'm also keen to hear campaign leadership's decision.

Unless the boxes are checked (and I just uploaded a new Pig chronicle to reflect his brush with disease) then you can safely ignore that boon.

I would also be curious to have a "peek behind the curtain" with regards to the special timekeeping that was done for this scenario; is there anything that can be shared now that the scenario is done?

I'm curious what the normal, live time limit is supposed to be. :)

The usual time limit is a scenario block at a con, usually 4 hours. For PbP it was a room limit. Once you hit half the rooms, it was concluded.