Child-of-Planes's page

Hi, guys. To all my games: sorry I've been such a butt lately.

Basically, I was away from the internet for a while, but before and after that, I've been writing so much for work that PbP just felt like a chore. And I've come to realize that while I love my job, right now it's just not leaving me the time and creative energy I need forPbP, so, while I've sort of been sliding down that slope for a while, I figured I should actually tell all my games that I've gotta drop out.

Sorry to disappoint and potentially leave a bunch of people hanging at the end there, and I hope I was generally fun.

-Thunderbeard

Ahhhh sorry guys, travel got messy and I was without internet for a few days. I probably should've followed up on my phone, but too many games were updating and I got overwhelmed (and I didn't realize all the Rednalgames were back to updating quickly).

In general, though—my work has stepped up a *lot* over the last month and will be for the foreseeable future. I haven't joined any new games in a while, and I'm not planning to, but I might not be as attentive a player as I used to be. Let me know if this becomes problematic, as I'm trying to figure out which (or possibly all) games I still have time for.

With a rumbling of dirt, Child moved dug through the ground, bursting upwards to try and catch the leader from behind.

Attack (flanking): 1d20 + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 + 2 ⇒ (15) + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 + 2 = 29
Damage (nonlethal + 1d6 electric): 1d6 + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 1d6 ⇒ (5) + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + (6) = 30

The spirit that flowed through Child's body saw little reason to treat this as a fair fight, when the ambushers hadn't—but it didn't seem like much of a challenge, and so he decided to show off a bit.

"Isen, is this even worth our time?" he asked, taking care to pronounce the words slowly; and, brandishing his scimitar, drew the shield from his back as he sunk down into the ground until all that was visible was the sword and shield.

Casting Metamorphosis to gain burrow, then 5' stepping downwards. IIRC I think this counts as full cover? With shield, AC is 21 or 29 if full cover.

@Rednal: Oh, you're right. I forgot that it was a surprise round and I can't make a full attack, so ignore the ones after it. (and I don't have quick draw on this guy, so... uh...if it wasn't a surprise round it still doesn't matter)

Also I didn't get much sleep this week, the Scripps researchers I was "networking" with party hard

Wait, he had a weapon? I thought it was just glowing bare hands?

"Aagh!" Child screamed out. "Why did you have to make this painful, for yourself?"

And, drawing his scimitar, attempted to smack the leader (and anybody else nearby) with a weapon that suddenly crackled electrically.

Nonlethal champion power attack 2H scimitar 1 stamina: 1d20 + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 ⇒ (18) + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 = 30
Damage (nonlethal+1d6 electric): 1d6 + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 1d6 ⇒ (3) + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + (6) = 28

Confirm?: 1d20 + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 ⇒ (20) + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 = 31
Bonus damage: 1d6 + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 ⇒ (3) + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 = 22

Nonlethal champion power attack 2H scimitar 1 stamina: 1d20 + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 ⇒ (13) + 10 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 1 = 25
Damage (nonlethal+1d6 electric): 1d6 + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 1d6 ⇒ (6) + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + (4) = 29

Nonlethal champion power attack 2H scimitar 5 stamina: 1d20 + 5 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 5 ⇒ (4) + 5 - 2 + 2 + 1 + 5 = 15
Damage (nonlethal+1d6 electric): 1d6 + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 1d6 ⇒ (3) + 4 + 4 + 5 + 6 + (3) = 25

Heh, loving the tone here, everybody.

@Vincent: I'm guessing it's less of a trap, and more of a beat-down.

"No, you don't!" Child shouted, as he lunged forward to grab at the leader's glowing hand.

If he's in range, I'm trying to grapple him; otherwise, it's a short charge during which I draw a weapon and try to trip him. (in which case AC goes down to 16, but the attack is at +3)

Maneuver check, champion, medium surge: 1d20 + 9 + 2 + 1d6 ⇒ (10) + 9 + 2 + (1) = 22
CMD to escape, if it's a grapple, is only a 21

Seeing the others' tension and wondering if he had misses something, Child put a hand on his biggest sword hilt as he followed Isen into the tent.

Wait, they let a three-year-old near a horse? Those things can get pretty deadly...

Oh, I've never ridden a horse. Those things look scary.

Uhh these aren't necessarily the same Syaandi, that seems a bit of a stereotype... but Child can't speak Elali so we're all good.

Ugh. Have you ever ridden a camel before? It's sorta fun but SUPER uncomfortable, they don't have a level gait.

Heh, this kinda feels like "family takes vacation to foreign country, kids wanna stop at the first market stall they walk by on the sidewalk, parents are like 'uhh *this* stuff? really? we'll get souvenirs at the end of the trip...'"

Child carefully half-drew his giant, masterwork sword, and gestured to his magical sword and expensive bow, each of them likely more expensive than a whole pile of questionable carcasses. "We're not new to the road," he replied carefully, "Or scrounging for scraps. Save us some time and point out the good stuff?"

Child tried to glance at their weapons—both carried and for sale—and see if there was anything especially threatening lying around.

Perception: 1d20 + 11 ⇒ (2) + 11 = 13

"I'd be fine if none of us ever returned to the Burning Sands. I have set foot on nine worlds, including this one, and the world of my birth was by far the least friendly."

"My homeworld had camels," Child added in suggestion, after a bit of listening. "We had spirit-whisperers, and wise men, and traveling healers, but real magic was the provenance of the demon-born Aharias, skilled in curses and blood-sacrifice. And the demonic Sky Kings, and the Walkers of Planes, when they set foot on our sands for their own purposes."

"'Technology' is still a bit of an odd concept, but I suppose we had some—the merchants often carried intricate crossbows, and the Runed City of Kha was renowned for the sharpness of its steel."

Aaaagh this site's been lagging too much for me to post for like four days, am I the only one? Sorry for holding things up if so...

"Well... At least we technically freed some prisoners?" Child shrugged. "I'm not too fond on this as an 'emergency exit,' but it does beat spending the rest of my life around camels. Maybe we should move on, if the plasma's coming back."

"The elementals are trapped in the circle," Child informs the others. "Just stay back and we'll all be in no danger. But how badly do we want to free them? I could head back to town for supplies, just buy all their scrap metal, broken tools, and maybe a few crates to carry them in."

How far are we out of town? Child gets +17 to any exercise-related checks, which along with cure spells means I can easily run a three-minute mile, or continuously hustle at around 11 miles/hour, which means if the party's less than two hours out I can be there and back in under an hour.

Child frowned. "What about crafting supplies, Vincent? Any raw metal for making weapons? They haven't said whether they care about they type or quality of metal, rather than just the weight."

"Can you find more metal below the ground, brothers?" Child asked the elementals, again in Auran. "If you can sense it, I can burrow for it."

Child waved at the anvil as Vincent grabbed it.

"Great. We can buy a new one in the next town with a smithy, no problem."

"Uh... are some metals better than others?" Child asked, unsure of where this was going.

- - -

And, to the others, "They want to do something with metal. I think it's some sort of planar thing, these elementals seem to be trapped here and want to leave the plane..."

Oh whoops, this is on me.

"Hello, angry brothers!" Child shouted as he drifted downwards, in Auran, then Ignan. "Please do not eat us our our possessions!"

Diplomacy, Shard: 1d20 + 14 + 4 ⇒ (11) + 14 + 4 = 29

Child can't really see what's going on, but feel free to shout me down, I speak every elemental/planar langauge

Yeah, I might stay away from the front lines for a bit. Aegis won't go much higher for a *long* time—I'd be far better off just wearing full plate—but that cripples my ability to cast arcane spells and be sneaky (if I had spheres, I could just whirlwind assembly), so I'm trying to avoid it for a while, or maybe go for shield-and-sword combat.

Which means my options are

A) Delay entering Horizon Walker until level 8, which (for very complicated reasons) increases my AC by 2, which would get me up to 23/26 shielded AC at level 8, 23/27 at 9, and 25/29 at 10. None of those numbers are super great :/ but this is probably my best option, and Crystal Spaulders make it less terrible.

B) save up, craft an Armiger's Panoply and buy regular full plate armor. This means taking a standard action to get *out* of armor (not super terrible for mythic characters), and roughly the same AC but with extra goodies from not burning class abilities for it.

C) Just avoid melee combat or something. Maybe craft some obscure AC boosting items through nefarious means. At level 11 I can get hustle power and a +5 boost to AC through metamorphosing into a small armored humanoid as a move action because everything is shenanigans.

* * *

My big problem with ABP is that it seriously back-ends a lot of bonuses that frontline fighters/martials would otherwise prioritize; at level 17, for instance, AC goes up by 3, while at our level it goes up by 1 every 3 levels, and as a result ABP tends to down-power martial character. Which honestly is probably fine because martial characters are OP anyway, and gestalt balances all that out.

"Are we fighting?" Child called down from a hundred feet above, confused at the flashes of light.

You do have actual armor, Isen... which ABP could improve. You sure you wanna swap out for going totally unarmored and lose the opportunity to have enchanted armor effects and such?

Unless I'm mistaken, ABP can still let you use enchanted Bracers of Armor. But armor effects are... often lackluster.

Meanwhile I'm probably gonna need to eventually stop wearing my imaginary armor, because it's... not amazing.

Prescient Dodger is from SoP, and it applies only when unarmored.

"I guess? Let's not sit where it's too windy, though," Child suggested, and shot up about 100 feet into the sky to scan for anything peculiar in the area.

Perception (favored terrain): 1d20 + 9 + 2 ⇒ (20) + 9 + 2 = 31

Looks like party decision is to leave tomorrow. Sorry if I accidentally caused controversy. o.o

My darkvision is at least as good as any bandits. Just pointing out no character opinion.

Sure. Keep Watch is just on everyone else's spell list, so by the time it's economical it should be easy.

Hmm. Well uh... Child can't be tracked in favored terrain + flying, so with pass without trace, so uh, if you need someone who's triple-untrackable for no actual reason.

PwoT might be less important in an AP, but it's generally really nice when people think of it.

That said, uh... Keep Watch will be amazing in a few more levels, and with Wild Instinct, we'd wind up better at perception overnight than during the day.

Child, with his darkvision, was ready to leave town at any time of day, as the party preferred.

"Right, then. And I guess I'll just be napping until we're ready to leave."

Err... Horizon Walker will give me 2-3 favored terrains, depending on how far I take it—planning probably on Urban, Dungeon, and maybe one other (depending on where Jagladine/Klaven come from). The Favored Terrain I get from Trailblazer, though, can be changed with 8 hours of work. (And that's the one I'll adjust to each planet's climate)

It's not a huge boon, but it lets me shore up my terrible initiative score and mediocre perception—plus, it's yet another way in which Child realigns to his environment.

@Rednal: Is Desert the terrain we're in right now, or mountains, or plains?

Also just gonna point out that of my !70! special abilities, 2 have identical names but different functions (this will increase to 3 at level 7, and 4 at level 11)

Skills:
4 class:
+3 geography
+1 diplomacy

2 int:
+1 perception
+1 sense motive

1 bonus int:
+1 UMD (to 6 ranks in "headband")

1 favored:
+1 survival

2 campaign:
+1 jewelry
+1 trapper

2 background:
+2 geography
(apparently I'm currently 2 languages short so uhh.... let's say sylvan and protean)

**What terrain are we in right now? Is it primarily desert, plains, or mountains? I can swap this out with 8 hours of prep, but want to choose the main terrain we've been moving through

Them's some fast leveling! Still, always excited to hit a new level—6, 7, 8 and 9 each give me a ton of shiny new toys.

ABP: Int +2
(+2 power points, 6 skill ranks>Use Magic Device, new language>Abyssal)

Medium abilities (6):
Will save +1
Ref save +1

L1 spells known:
+1 medium spell (Mindlink—communicate 10 minutes of information in a single round, regardless of language)
+1 Hierophant spell (Cure Light)

L2 spells known:
+1 guardian spell (Paladin's Sacrifice)
+1 Hierophant spell (Cure Moderate>Silence) (my very favoritest spell!)

Spirit abilities, intermediate:
-Arcane Surge: As Archmage, gain 1 influence to increase level/DC of spell by 1
-Sudden Attack: As Champion, gain 1 attack/round at full BAB (functions as unchained flurry)
-Absorb Blow: As Guardian, gain DR/- and resist energy equal to level/2
-Energy Font: As Hierophant, channel 1+Cha/day and gain cure/inflict spells based on hierophant alignment
-Inspiring Call: As Marshall, spend standard action to give all allies +spirit bonus on either saves or attack/damage rolls
-Surprise Strike: As Trickster, gain a limited sneak attack (only against dex-denied) of 1d6/3 levels; all targets are flat-footed against first attack of day

Aegis Abilities (5)
BAB +1
Stamina +1
Trapfinding

Astral Suit:
+1 customization (remove 1x Speed, add Favored Terrain: Desert?)

"Right. So only a day or two. You don't have any maps for sale here, do you?"

"And if we get attacked by wildlife, there's always the camels..." Child mutters, mostly to himself.

Ready to head down the road once we're all leveled up.

Uh we never healed in-character, but yeah, I should probably top it back off.

Child's eyes flared white for just a second. "Three camels, not four," he responded too quickly, "...But I think those terms might be quite agreeable."

"Although," Child added, "We had previously discussed payment, which we'd be happy to continue to discuss over dinner."

Child shrugged. "He's probably gonna smell pretty bad in a bit. If you're worried, I can check for a ghost, but I think this thing's very completely gone."

I assume that by "head" you mean "bloody pile of bone splinters?"