Search Posts
I have heard great things from the Temple of Elemental Evil adventure and I noticed you don't have a gnome bard yet. I have always thought of the gnome bard as a classic staple of D&D. If there is room, sign me up. I can post 1/day and have facebook. I'm more than comfortable being the party face/skill monkey if needed.
It is 15 pt buy and like Nidoran I love to be involved with the character creation process (maybe too much!). It does feel like they are 6 manning it (The druid has a Roc animal companion) but is it really ok to make the CR higher knowing it'll boost their XP gain? Last night's naval combat was more of the same cakewalk but with a tragic (from my standpoint) twist. I ran the Upon the Famished Mane encounter but knowing those 6 marines were that much puppy chow I added a "Hellknight Signifier". In reality it was just a lv 7 Spellbreaker Inquisitor I set up without any actual Hellknight prestige class levels. The PC's were on a job for Helise Solu (Senghor's rather corrupt leader) and had been ordered to sink the Famished Mane with all hands.
Again, storywise I am able to spin intrigue without an issue but the combat went like this... According to the setup, the PC's get a surprise round in addition to being able to sail up alongside the Mane with no shots being fire. So they get one action to board. The PC's see a hellknight on deck and begin to freak out. Witch cast's web, samourai barely makes it on deck by swinging over using the rigging, druid starts Call Lightning, summoner picks nose while cat gets on deck. Round 1:
Round 2:
Round 3:
Round 4:
I would normally just chalk it up to bad luck...but this KEEPS HAPPENING. The PC's have the devil's luck and my mooks get really bad rolls. The Signifier failed her perception to join the surprise round AND got a nat 2 on her Intiative. Maybe I'm just cursed?
I am having a very similar problem as Nidoran. I am DMing a live weekly group for S&SH but they have made combat rather trivial. I admit to being something of a cakewalk DM as I don't like seeing characters with dynamic backstories die but perhaps I've overdone it? Group setup:
Hero Points:
I am using hero points as a guard against insta-deaths and I like their use. The issue lies in their not coming anywhere near death, nor do they ever feel the need to use them so they just keep accumulating. I believe they are all sitting with maximum hero points atm. Plot Twist Cards:
I am using plot twist cards to promote roleplaying in my somewhat roll-playing heavy group. They haven't worked as well as I like because it just seems to give them a "get-out-of-this-specific-situation-free" card and they only vaguely touch on WHY that card is being played. I may have to take them out entirely. My first example is Bonewrack Isle. My PC's fought the blood bugs all at once, summoned dolphins and invaded the caves at high tide. Despite each grindylow squad having a grindlylow cleric and a TWF ranger to support the 4 or so other normal grindylow the PCs emerged victorious and nearly unscathed. The trap failed to catch even one of them, the devilfish got one lucky crit before being reduced to less than half HP by echolocating dolphins and a blindly swinging samourai. They enter the throne room, web everyone, sleep and coup de grace the Whale, finish off the devilfish while sending summons to kill the ghasts. The queen couldn't even target the PC's due to the web and was forced to retreat through a secret passage she had in an attempt to fight again another day. They are taking time to replenish their air supply between combats and the samourai has the heart of the sea trait. You're looking at the above and thinking Ok, they got lucky and had a really good plan. Nothing broken here. Because the summoner has the Ghol-Gan archaeologist trait and an Indiana Jones kinda background I had the secret passage actually be a dangerously fluctuating, stationary Ghol Gan relic that can teleport short distances but with a risk of random magic (used wild magic table from magic of the Inner Sea) and risk of mis-teleportation. Queen teleports onto Man's Promise (rolled randomly for it) and Plugg is now aware that he might have potential invaders. He also suspects (correctly) that the PC's might be behind this and drugs all of the friendlies on board with the remains of the oil of taggit. So It's just the PC's vs. plugg and about 12 others. This prevents the advantage of the PC's surprising Plugg in his own cabin. They then proceed to board the Man's Promise (tilly and sandara are the only ones to get mistransported) and slay everyone on deck despite a magic missile wielding crewmember in the crow's nest, 6-8 mook pirates using flanking maneuvers, a catapult sized alchemist fire lobbed at the samourai, a lv 5 Rahadoumi Summoner with a TWF flying biped eidolon and Mr. plugg successfully disarming the samourai at least twice. Their healer (the Witch) got brought to neg HP once during this encounter and the samourai was maybe half hp. They iron-manned all of this in one in-game day! this is the closest I have come so far to actually making a challenging encounter for them. We are in book 2 and loving the roleplay that's developed in Senghor but the boarding combats I'm not even running now because there is no point in them facing 6 chelish marines that are supposedly CR 6 (they are LV 5 atm). They hardly ever hit (Samourai's AC is 18 the Cat is 24 when it has mage armor cast on it) and the 1d8+3 or 1d6+3 damage when they get lucky hardly dings their HP. Lowest HP of the group is the cat at 30 HP. Can't bypass the fighters becasue they'll provoke AoO's which one shot them. Can't just focus fire the healer because he has more HP than the fighter. Are the naval boarding encounters supposed to be cakewalk? Should I actually have all of the Book 2 naval combats happen on the same day to wear them down and force them to spend resources? Do I just increase the CR of everything (and therefore give them more equivalent XP and rocket them to next level?). My experience in PFS have all been much more challenging and very likely to kill characters and I was expecting that from arguably the deadliest AP I've read about.
The next campaign i plan to run will be with pathfinder rules and I's really like to use your products to help with the overall experience. however, approximately two weeks ago i attempted to purchase for the first time through Paizo.com and my debit card was declined. I checked, double-checked, and triple-checked my information but every single attempt I made was declined. After reading one of the similar forum posts in the messageboards I realized my bank address was still my old address and i believe paizo had my new address. So I changed them both to my new address (It will be listed in my address page now)and tried again, but to no avail. Realizing that I still had several "false" orders pending in my bank account I simply waited for the three days to drop the hold from my bank before finally trying again tonight (5/7/2013). Still declining my debit card. I have more than enough funds for the purchase, and I've tried every iteration of adding punctuation after my middle initial, or after the abbreviation of APT but I am at a loss. Unless you are able to fix this, I may not be able to deliver these goods to my players in time. :(
|
