BlueMonkey's page

I'm pretty sure wild shape works the same way regardless of your starting size. Small-sized druids (like Halflings) don't get "smaller wild shape", so Large-sized druids shouldn't get "larger wild shape".

"Races of the Wild" has racial substitution levels for a halfling druid which give 'undersized wild shape'. This reduces the halfling druid's wild shape sizes by 1. So the halfling druid to Small or Tiny animals at 5th level, Tiny-Medium at 8th, Diminutive-Medium at 11th, and Diminutive-Large at 15th.

I thought I had read something similar for large creatures. I can apply the same idead, 'oversized wild shape' for this half-ogre druid and just increase all of his wild shapes by one size category, but I thought I'd read something 'official' somewhere. Maybe it was in Dragon (or Dungeon) magazine. Or maybe not.

Anyway, thanks!

One of my players is a half-ogre druid and they just levelled up and gained wild shape. Now wild shape is assumed to be for small or medium druids, so they can transform into small or medium animals (HD up to the druid's level). Now as a Large creature, would this druid start wild shape being able to transform into medium or large animals, but limited by his current druid level (5th). There seem to be enough medium or large animals with 5 HD or less to give him some variety.

I vaguely recall reading something about Large druids and wild shape, but I can't seem to find said information in any of the 3.5 books I have nor on any of the messageboards. If anyone know what I'm talking about and can point to a source...

Thanks,
BM

In a past campaign, I played a character that was bitten by a wererat and neither my character nor the rest of the party figured it out for quite a long time. Strange murders we attributed to the enemies we were hunting. The strange dreams didn't seem so out of the ordinary because the DM liked to frequently give us all strange dreams as portents or with no meaning whatsoever. Our DM had us do "DM rolls", rolling a d20 for an unknown reason, which it turned out were to see if my character could keep control or not. Eventually when we figured it out, the challenge was resisting the change when it was unavoidable. Changing voluntarily was not an option because I didn't want my PC to become evil. But the DM really enjoyed tempting me with situations that the hybrid form would fare better.

I totally understand the threat of having your alignment change as an afflicted lycanthrope. More than thinking of it as becoming an 'evil' creature, it is giving into one's natural instincts. Depending on the type, that might be different, but with most of the ones that are listed as 'evil' and are carnivorous, that tends to be feeding on and satiating oneself with whatever feasible prey is at hand. Afflicted lycanthropes work this way, though natural ones, I'd be more flexible with, since they'd have had much more time to handle their powers and desires. Afflicted ones are dealing with a sudden change and that it affects alignment makes sense to me.

What my character did and what I recommend is the Moon Guardian prestige class from the WotC free web enhancement, "More Divinity", from the Complete Divine. It is a prestige class for divine casters, but I see no reason why you couldn't tweak it make at least the 1st level open to anyone, or cut out the levels that give bonuses to divine spellcasting and just leave it as a 3-level prestige class. Even taking just one level of this prestige class allows a PC to maintain some control of their new state. You can keep your alignment and change voluntarily, and you can take ranks in Control Shape.

My PC only took one level in this class to keep some control, but decided to take a new path devout his life to hunting down other evil lycanthropes and curing them if they were afflicted or slaying them if they were natural ones.

Wow, that worked perfectly. And that was very clear. Thanks!

Has anyone printed out any of the AoW supplements to size for use with miniatures? For some of the larger fights, I thought it'd be nice use parts of the unmarked maps blownup to size, but I am burning through way too much paper and ink trying to get the resizing right. Has anyone tried this successfully, and if so, what percent did you use? A percent for any of the AoW online supplements would be nice, but for the Sodden Hold maps from Dungeon 127 in particular....

Any help appreciated.
Thanks,
BM

We've been playing for nearly a year with our group about every other saturday from @7:00 - midnight. We're all in our mid to late thirties and only three of us have children. I'm the DM and I'll be starting the first part of "The Champion's Belt" this saturday.

That sounds similar to our group, except we only play once a month and are just halfway through Blackwall Keep. We started in June of 2005 and we've had a lot of player changes as people get busy and quit or new folks join the group.

I'm looking for a Dungeon (I think) article that had tables for rolling up random characteristics for magical staves...anyone happen to know what issue that was?

Also, I know there was a similar article for potions in #125, and for scrolls in #133, but was there ever one that did the same for characteristics of wands?

Thanks,
BluMo

I'll say this:

The position where the "T" shows up isn't important.

Infer from that what you will. :P

Oh man, I've been working at this for a long time and I just got it. It is definitely one of those things that make you want to curse yourself for not figuring it out earlier. I was REALLY, REALLY overthinking... Thanks, the last 2 hints helped me FINALLY figure it out.

Good luck to everyone else who was as stumped as I was.

BM

While this is correct, it doesn't actually matter whether you call a particular frequency of light Violet, Purple, or even Lilac. Technically, you could solve this puzzle even if you only spoke French, Portuguese, or Pig Latin.

Hrgh.

BM

I've tried putting in the first letter of each colour, forwards and back, and in some other combinations. I've also tried putting in numbers based on where the colours are positioned. I've even tried combining the two. Nothing I try seems to work. I think some of us (like myself) need another clue because I'm pretty sure I'm not going to solve this puzzle with the little information that's available.

Cheers to that! Yeah, I've tried the same. I was convinced that rearranging the letters from 'equinox' by assigning them colors or numbers based on their positions was the answer, but everything I have tried there as well doesn't seem to work. Another hint would be very cool.

...I don't follow the previous bit about "treating the grouping of trilithons in the center as one unit"... I hate to ask, but does anyone know what that means...?

BM

Man, I love puzzles like this, but this one's really got me stumped. I'm going to be really upset if it turns out to be one of those puzzles that doesn't actually have an answer...

http://titanic-games.com/???????

I don't think you actually click any combination of colors, I think you enter the results into the website in place of the ?s. The "???????" is the 7-digit code that the colors or their numbers reveal, right? I tried the same color and number combinations there that Tensor tried...but nothing.

Any other hints...? I'd like to think I am warm, but all I got to show is - You have not found the key.

BM

It's kind of funny reading how all of you campaigns went (or are going). We played FoF a couple of years ago and I remember it being incredibly difficult as a player.

Our party fared alright up until the ogre and his wolves. With a series of bad rolls by us and criticals by the ogre, the entire party was leveled, but instead on killing them took them as captives. We had to escape and evade the orcs and ogre and find our equipment before we could get our revenge. Later in the Glitterhame we struck a deal with the dwarves, but then broke it. Again, we fared very poorly and the dwarves beat us into submission. Only our rogue escaped and, after much negotiation, was able to bargain for our release with his brand-new mithral chain shirt and a fair bit of coin. The final fight with dwarves was very memorable.

The troglodytes were a dilemma for us as well. Our party was also split on what to do with them and in the end struck a shaky deal to leave the females and young alone with the promise they'd do the same. A kind of mutual avoidance. In the end they were the only things left alive in the Forge.

Idalla tried to deceive us, then kill us before fleeing. Honestly I never really understood her role (nor what she was) until reading this thread.

The black dragon fight was also memorable in it's tactics. It sprayed the wizard (me) with acid, then proceeded to knock our cleric and fighters into the water. Since everyone had medium or heavy armor, they all almost drowned. It also took this time to pick up the cleric's magically-flaming holy symbol and drop in the deeper end of the pool where it quickly sunk out of sight. While the others struggled to swim to the shore and climb out, the dragon focused on killing the wizard. He was only saved by the fact that the dragon turned to one of the fighters when he finally got out of the pool. We were finally able to kill the creature when it tried to flee.

A lot of these moments we made more memorable by the fact that we had 2 DMs running the bigger fights - One playing the role of the impartial DM and the other playing the creature itself.

But after getting captured and humiliated several times we did almost give up on the Forge. There was a LOT of frustration there, but in the end we came out alright.

Dunno if that helps your next session, but that's how ours went.

BM

EDIT: I just thought of this....climbing shoes are hard toed and the arch of the shoe is very rigid allowing the narrow firm part of the shoe to be wedged into cracks in the rock to enable you to climb easier. Which in form, hooves could match that profile.

You know, that's a good point. I hadn't thought of that, but it makes sense. I'd been thinking more along the lines that being a biped on hooves one might be at a disadvantage in those situations. I guess the disadvantages are negligible and probably not worth the effort of making them up and applying them in game. Though, I was thinking the same thing with Move Silently, some kind of padded shoes seemed to make sense for muffling the sound to avoid any penalties to the check.

Thanks,
BM

I don't usually have non-standard PCs in our games, but I let this one go because it gave me lots of room for interesting social encounters between adventures. I have a player who is playing a minotaur in our campaign. I'm using the Savage Species progressions to keep him balanced with the other players, but I have had some situations involving skill checks. In particular, ones like Climb, Move Silently, and Swim. I thought I'd seen something posted here before about similar issues with centaur PCs, but I'm not sure. I am making it up as I go, but any advice?

I imagine climbing would be difficult with hooves. Balance might be as well, but horses and the like don't seem to have any special penalties. Moving silently isn't an issue for me, except when the players are inside, trying to sneak around on polished stone floors. Swim seems like it probably wouldn't suffer any penalties, seeming as many hooved animals can swin enough to keep themselves afloat.

Alright, any suggestions are appreciated...

Later,
BM

We started AoW a couple of monthes ago in the World of Greyhawk 595 CY. Our party is 5 members and usually 1 mercenary NPC for muscle.

- LN male human ranger 2 from the Pomarj-occupied lands of the Wild Coast - eventually planning to go Justicar, but for now a member of the local garrison in DL with plans to become DL's next sheriff.
- NG male halfling rogue 2 from Elmshire.
- CN female human rogue 2 from DL, but schooled in Nellix - usually pretends to be a bard or cleric of Lydia until someone in the party needs healing...
- CN male gnome bard 2 (with 2 starting flaws) from a very small clan of highland gnomes in the NE cairns - a wild, barbaric and interesting character all around. Plans to go barbarian for a while.
- LN female human cleric of Wee Jas 2 from DL.
- usually hires on a another local DL fighter, scout, or warrior for added muscle.

We have had some side adventures already, but the party is still in the Whispering Cairn, trying to find the last lantern to open up the rest of the tomb.

Forget it, I received my Dungeon #124 today and can figure out the shipping time. Thanks.

I'm not sure why everyone thinks that we at Paizo have any control over the way the mail is handled by the various worldwide postal systems. We ship all the magazines out at the same time, in the same wrapper, and at the same rate. If your magazine shows up ripped or torn or not at all, it's not our fault...it's the postal system(s) fault. We are more than happy to send out replacement copies for those folks that are unfortunate enough to fall into these catergories.

I wish we could send all our issues out in stiff envelopes via first class but it's just too cost prohibitive. Maybe in the future we'll be able to have "Hubs" in other areas similar to what we have in Europe to help cut down on the amount of postal exposure inflicted on each issue.

Hi Jeff,

Actually I just started my subscription and this is my first issue of Dungeon, so I was kinda hoping for your best guestimate of when I might receive it. I noticed that everyone from the States and Europe posts when they get theirs and asks for replacement copies after some amount of time, I am just wondering if/when I should do the same.

I was figuring it'd take about a month, since that's about how long surface packages normally take to arrive. But they guy from Australia has me kinda worried now...

Any estimates...?

BM

Any estimates of when Dungeon 124 might hit Japan, or Asia...?

Mine also shipped 5/17 and Europe seems to have gotten theirs, so I am guessing I am next.

If it helps, when I order from the shop, the goods arrive about 10-14 days later. I am guessing the subscriptions are shipped at a slower rate though.

Waiting almost-patiently,
BM

We are still waiting in Australia :0(>

It's painful reading all the posts!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Andrew

Yeah, I KNOW!!

BM

My interpretation is that the object remains shrunk until it is dispelled or the spell duration expires (5 days I think, but I would have to look it up). The PC is able to cast it as many times a day as he has 2nd level spell slots. His plan is to carry up to 5 items at all times, and to just recast the spell on the object before the duration expires. It is one of the prerequisite spells to have if he later wants to make a Robe of Useful Items. He is tracking his timing, and I trust him to be truthful with it. I think another interesting variation might be to have the item remain shrunken for 1d4+1 days and have the dm make the roll and not tell him the result. That could make the spell more dangerous for the PC but it would be just another thing for the DM to keep track of. It could make for some funny or nailbiting gameplay though!

In our campaign, I am playing an elf rogue/wizard who has this spell. So far our DM has been pretty strick about the use of it. Because the discription says that you can shrink boulders and a bonfire and fuel, I HAVE tried doing both (and even the holy water and acid...). The boulders were easy, but he ruled that I couldn't throw them for reasons similar to what some of you mentioned above. The bonfire he allowed, but each time I've done it I do take damage and must success on my Concentration checks. With a bonfire, the damage hasn't been so bad. The probelm with the acid was the damage and I seem to fail my Concentration saves each time...so I've pretty much given up on that. Holy water has been an issue because of the cost, since I am not a priest and we don't have one in our party.

But things like water have posed the problem of the area. You couldn't shrink 4 cubic feet out of a lake, because the body as a whole is much greater. Doors and support beams have posed the same problem, because they are usually connected somehow and not free-standing. I suppose that shrinking a door could work and it might bust off it's hinges in the process and even a support beam if it is a separate piece. But that is the kind of material you might only find in the crudest of mines and dungeons. Other ones we've tried have been large rectangular boards of spikes, large stone blocks for blocking doorways, and things like wagons. Of course no matter what the wizard shrinks, an always looming threat is the that the items unshrink. My companions forgot about my shrunken bonfire as they lugged my corpse back to town for a resurrection and it was only luck that it wasn't on my body when it expired and unshrunk. But also, things like impact hits on my backpack and falling have triggered these items to unshrink before.

Honestly it's been fun using this spell and seeing what the DM allows. Throwing shrunken boulders and unshrinking them before they hit does seem a bit unfair though. But that said, if the DM allows it, it is only fair that the bad guys might use similar tactics. And of course, making it interesting and unpredictable makes it that much more fun.

Anyways, that's my two cents...

I don't know if this really qualifies as General Discussion, but that seems to fit best... I was wondering if anyone could point me in the right direction for information about the assassination of the King of Keoland in the Living Greyhawk Campaign. I do not play the Living Greyhawk Campaign, but I try to use the ongoing events in our group's campaign. Sometimes these play a background role, other times they are directly tied into the party's adventuring. That said, several months ago there was something mentioned on the Keoland LG website about the king being killed by an assassin. But the website sadly has not updated the news dispatch section in well over 3 years...aside from that tidbit of the king being killed. Seeing as the characters all hail from Keoland, I would like to possibly include this event. So does anyone know more about this, or can point me to a place that does. I thought WotC were going to take up updating the websites and letting folks know what is going on in the LG Campaign? Maybe I heard wrong. Anyways, Thanks in advance if you can help me out.

Does anyone know where I can find information on a wizard using Craft (bookbinding) to create her spellbook? Or any suggestions on how to handle doing this? Like how long it might take or how much it might cost...? I know it's been addressed somewhere, and I have a feeling I've read something about it, but I can't seem to find where or what. Any advice appreciated...

I don't know the real reason it changed. But I have a practical example from a game I played in. We had a druid in our party in 3.0. He had with him at all times, a menagerie of animals. Everytime his initiative came up We would all go to the bathroom or order a pizza. Then a half hour later his turn would end with oh and I'll fire my sling. He would have his 3 bats, two snakes and wolf all attack and he would never use his druid spells. It was just annoying. The animals weren't even very effective either. The Beastmaster prestige class allows for you to get up to 5 animal companions over 10 levels by sacrificing almost all of your druid abilities. The beastmaster almost seems to me to fit the ranger better. The difference between this and 3.5 though, is the beastmaster actually allows you to get decent animal companions. You could have your most powerful ones be wolves and tigers. Then your less powerful animals be dogs or birds. The less powerful might not be sueful in combat, but can always use aid...

That makes sense, I guess a lot of animal companions would really bog down combat. I just liked the idea of having several animal companions. Then I guess the Beastmaster is the way to go. Having several tiered animal companions and of course the tradeoffs for having more than just one makes it more interesting. I'll check it out. Thanks! Beastmaster was in the Complete Warrior, am I right?

Yes, certain prestige classes in 3.5 allow more than one animal companion. IIRC, Complete Adventurer actually includes a feat that allows a similar situation (as previously described) to the Beastmaster by allowing multiple companions, but I may be mistaken.

OK, thanks. And there's a feat in Complete Adventurer that also allows this? I don't have the 3.0 books, so I don't know, but was this an option in the 3.0 rules? If so, why did it change? Just curious.

I have noticed in some older 3.0 modules and articles from WotC that sometimes non-prestige classes druids or rangers had more than one animal companion at a time. Is this a 3.0 thing? Because I cannot find anything about it in the 3.5 core books. Did this change in 3.5 or is this something druids and rangers can still do? Or is it now something that only Beastmasters or other prestige classes can do?

Sorry for the confusion. We do.

If you add the items to the cart, and proceed through the checkout process to the Order Confirmation Page, you can view the shipping amount for your address.

I suggested contacting customer service under the assumption that BlueMonkey does not have a credit card number to enter and therefore cannot reach the confirmation page.

kind regards,
-rob

Thanks Rob, simple but helpful. Problem solved. I guess I need to be a bit more trusting... Though it might help if their was some international shipping rates info printed somewhere on the website other than the final confirmation page of checkout. Just an idea.

Actually I have emailed customer service about this a couple of times and received no response.

As for just proceeding to checkout, that's fine, but I never get a shipping cost up to the point it asks for a credit card number. Now some places have LARGE international fees on top of standard international shipping fees. At that point what might have been pretty reasonable could no longer be worth it.

I wanted to order some back issues and get them shipped to Japan, but I cannot find shipping rates anywhere on the website. With shipping, a Dragon subscription is basically double the US cost for me. Is it the same for back issues, basically double the list price to get my total with shipping...? Can anyone let me know or point me in the right direction? Thanks in advance...