DrSnooze's page

Glad to hear the Runesmith's getting more options, but I'm a little surprised to not hear anything about having trouble with their hands being full.

Definitely agree here! Hopefully it's something they're looking at even if they didn't specifically mention it in this post. It was very awkward having weapon and shield stuff in class features while also still needing your hands free.

I'm late to the thread, but I'd love to see "vaguely linked" adventure paths. For example, I'm running Outlaws of Alkenstar now, and I'm probably going to run a completely unrelated Fists of the Ruby Phoenix next. I'd love it if there was another related AP, like something that happens in or around Alkenstar even if it's not directly linked to Outlaws. A stand-alone AP that could have some easy links to another AP. Or better yet, multiple APs so you can mix and match a bit.

To me, the big problem with the "silver bullet" idea is that saving throws are too high. The worst feeling as a player is having the perfect spell for the exact situation you're in, and then watching it fizzle because the bad guy made a saving throw. As a martial, missing still isn't fun, but if you miss you can just swing again next round. With a Wizard, you only have a certain number of spells, and you probably don't have that exact spell prepped more than once. It's incredibly disappointing to experience this as a player.

The tradeoff is supposed to be that you're doing subpar damage most of the time, but a few times a session it's your time to shine. When these moments are rare, not being able to shine is a bad feeling.

I'd ignore the warnings against the magical slumber, for several reasons

First, as the GM you have the license to start the game however you see fit. You're basically allowing them to play what would be the beginning narration of the game before actually starting the game, ala Fallout 4(speaking of which, this sounds a lot like a Pathfinder take on Fallout 3).

Second, deities, even minor ones, trapped in a decrepit temple have the ability to put mortals into pretty much state they want to. Should they foresee some great calamity that only the heroes can stop at some later time, then a long winter's nap is warranted and highly possible.

I kind of like the bones of your story, though I'd ditch Golarion and make my own world, to better tie in the elements of the story. Tie in the waters to a creation myth, to make a single source (for later purifying). Have the Orcs and other monsters be servants of some evil that has been locked in battle with the "Mother Water" since time began, which is why they poison the water and are also immune to its effects (or maybe they're not and the constant exposure to the tainted waters is what makes Orcs and other monsters). Carrying the last bit of "True Water" given to them at the ancient and forgotten temple/spring, they must then purify the waters they come across and defeat those who would try and stop them from eventually reaching the Mother Water and breaking the curse once and for all.

This here is the core of what I'm going for. The part that I've outlined is just an intro of sorts, setting the table for the triumphant return of the heroes. The deity of choice knew what was coming and couldn't stop it, so he/she sheltered the PCs away so they could fix it after it happened.

I wanted to do some "pre-apocalypse" stuff so they can get to know people and have some ties to the world that was. Finding out what happened to people they knew, rescuing them, etc.

I was definitely going for some mythical "source of all water" thing atop the mountain. Of course with modern understanding of how things work, that doesn't make sense, but this is a fantasy setting. If there's a deity who helps crops grow, creates monsters, corrupts humans to do evil, then it's not really so crazy that there's a "source" of water somewhere. I'm also thinking about making the "decanter" dispense cure potions in some limited capacity, to get rid of the "wand of cure light" concept (which I dislike) and also gives it some intrinsic value so they don't just discard it.

Maybe it's not an Orc shaman who's behind it all, maybe it's some sort of wizard or something. Doesn't really matter, it could be anything.

So what if my players don't want to board the Empire of Bones and instead stick to the plan from book 5? Or board the Stellar Degenerator and try and use it to shoot down the Empire of Bones?

I understand that an AP can't account for everything, but a sidebar about these options would have been nice.

All that aside, seems like an epic ending to the story!

Honestly I have a hard time believing that any party will decide on their own to try to board the Empire of Bones. It's such a ludicrous idea that I doubt most groups will even consider it, let alone actually decide to do it without heavy GM intervention. I ran this with my group last week, and they had planned on going through the gate to get to the Stellar Degenerator, which is by far the most reasonable thing to do. Perhaps figure out how to use the weapon to destroy the Empire of Bones, or stick with the original plan and crash it into a star.

Even if they don't want to do that (I told them the Corpse Fleet had managed to get between them and the gate somehow, which already stretched the bounds of believability) then why would they think it's safe for them to try to board the capital ship? And if they do, why would they believe that the five of them could even pilot a ship larger than Absalom Station?

In the end, I had to railroad them into boarding the Empire of Bones. They hadn't even mentioned it as a possibility, and I told them that's where the adventure wanted them to go. It was awkward and very disappointing.

I've used HLO for managing my Starfinder character, as a player. Honestly, it was very convenient to have access to my characters on all my devices (home pc, work pc, laptop, phone).

I think the online format has potential, it's just very limited right now.

Except I used DropBox with HeroLab Classic to do exactly this, until Lone Wolf removed DropBox support just before they released their online-only model. So no, they won't be getting any more of my money.

I ran the Goblin Pyros encounter this evening, where the party fought three goblin warriors and the warchanter. I had downloaded the goblin song audio, and decided to play it (loudly) on repeat until the warchanter died. This drove my players nuts, because they were already sick of it by the second time it looped. They really wanted to kill the warchanter to make it stop. As soon as he fell, I turned off the goblin song, which they heartily celebrated.

This was exactly the effect I was hoping for! I recommend doing this if you're running this AP. :)

My experience so far has been that the strategy changes a lot depending on the size of the party. With smaller parties (1-3 players), the Blessings deck isn't really an issue. It's not difficult to get through all the locations before the Blessings deck runs out. The challenge is keeping your characters alive, because defeating the various challenges is tough. Healing is important to keep your decks full.

With larger parties (4+), this is less of an issue because you can help each other a lot, and with proper scouting it's not hard to match skills to challenges. I find that we rarely lose a challenge with a large group, and healing is only used a 2-3 times total in a scenario. But the Blessings deck becomes a problem, so you have to use as many blessings and allies as possible to explore as much as you can. Use Detect Magic, Detect Evil, etc. as often as they come up.

I'm not interested in metal figures myself. I've made my own pawns and used FFG stands for them.

What I would purchase in an instant would be a single collection of the prepainted minis covering all of the playable characters. I had taken a quick look at grabbing what was available - few (2?) weren't available at all and another few (2?) were rare and had gotten quite expensive so I didn't go that route.

This has been mentioned before by several people, including myself. I would love to buy a set of all 11 minis that are used in this game.

As hinted at above, I think this is a missed opportunity to sell a bunch of minis. If you had a set of all 11 iconic prepainted minis, I'd buy them in a heartbeat so we could use them for this game.