Enrico Marcellano's page

I've thought about it and I think a big part of the draw for me for this game was the dynamic between the two groups and having a chance for conflict between the two parties. Now that we've removed that part, I think that's been a big contributor to my lack of motivation. I'm sorry to put everyone in a bind, but I'm going to have to withdraw from the campaign. I wish you good luck in finding a replacement, and thanks DM CCD for running this!

Master, huh? Has a nice ring to it, but what would that old wizard say... Enrico says, following Thoril.

DM CCD, can you please take us off of active players in the Chaos Party thread?

Just go to the Campaign Info tab and click "Edit this campaign". Scroll down, find the list of active players and uncheck the boxes next to our name.

This will stop us from getting the updates when new posts are there. Thanks!

Sorry if this seems a bit much, but I don't really see a way where this ends well, and even if it does, more confrontations are bound to occur. I won't if many people disagree, but I think the best thing to do is to just make the campaigns separate.

This seems like a good idea. We all game to have fun, not argue with people over the internet.

Good luck to Team Chaos!

Manny--sorry you didn't get to mind control me! Maybe next time. :-)

Yep, that'd be good to snipe hurt guys.

From what I've seen of other PbP games, in combat, everyone states their intended actions in whatever order they happen to post, and THEN the GM resolves those actions in initiative order. Saves anyone having to wait on posting. I assumed that was what was happening here.

And please, lets not let the PVP become personal

Well, that way poses problems for PbP because sometimes an action invalidates another. Suppose I say I'm attacking Kandoo but Thoril goes first and drops him. Now my turn is just wasted, or I have to redo it. That's why I think it's best to go in order, even if it's slower.

This is even more true in PvP as you could be subconsciously influenced by seeing the other people's actions, even if you're trying not to metagame.

I also second your comment that we should avoid personal attacks!

I had assumed Kandoo was delaying as Meilu and the others tried diplomacy. Sorry for any confusion. On my turn, should I reroll my attack (and the will save after Manny's turn) or should I keep both of the rolls?

Please allow me to recap: we roll initiative, but God knows what for, since it's clearly not being followed. I am attacked - the attacks misses, yet people keep talking as to make friends. At this moment, I'm still waiting for answer from the GM and I notice the map has we all in a line: my group, conveniently, is all crammed, while the other group is all neatly organized with distance between themselves as if ready for the combat they didn't know it was coming, and conveniently their group head is right by me, in a place I can't either charge or go around. The GM finally responds, yay! Not before someone else responds for him, beforehand, that in front of us we have the first group in the world where everybody carries a torch (yet, at the same they use two-handed weapons and cast spells). Following the out of initiative mess, another dude runs from the back, the map magically changed to allow him a spot in front of me to attack me (lol!). More than that, readied actions are triggered out of order and he crits the hell out of me with a falcata, the weapon of choice of his elves ancestors (wtf? Lol). Well, that's promising! Did I miss anything?

I would be happy to respond to all of your points.

We all chose to use light sources because the GM told us that each light source has a 5 ft radius. So we each used one and spread out in a line so as to create an area that we can see. I hardly think this gives us an advantage, but merely somewhat levels the playing field for our group with one darkvision character to three darkvision on your team. My light is a sunrod tucked into his belt. The other two casters have light spells and Thoril is a monk who carries nothing in his hands.

The Law group both posted actions and readied actions. The Chaos group was attacked and chose to try to diplomatize instead of responding to our fight. I waited multiple days to allow people to take their turns that had initiative higher than me (including you) and you didn't do anything. The GM prompted us to act, so I took my turn. All of your answers (what were we wearing, what was our light source, map please) were all answered.

As for your concerns about the map--we had no map, so I offered to provide one. However, I don't have the module. So I put our group in the stated formation, and I said on the thread:

Hey guys! Here's hoping we all survive, but with the terrain and inhabitants I think Chaos has a distinct advantage. We should've brought some hellknight initiates or something with us :-) The map link is in my sig. Everyone can edit. This way DM CCD can draw in what the map looks like. I put our marching order and the door (blue line), but I didn't know the Chaos marching order. I also made up a picture for Karist since he didn't have one.

Bolded for emphasis. I assumed you were going to put your own marching order. When the map changed, I also assumed that the GM had put your correct marching order (since he was the one who changed the map and moved things). So what's your beef with that?

Finally, I don't appreciate your (in my opinion, childish) remark about my character build choice. Enrico is a half-elf from Taldor. I thought it was appropriate that the weapon of his ancestors was a falcata. Is Ancestral Arms fluff-wise supposed to be an elven weapon? Perhaps, but my build is legal. And it's supremely suboptimal, by the way. I just wanted to try out a fun character build. I could have very easily made a half-orc two-handed bloodrager or barbarian who would have hit you for even more with a PA greatsword crit. So don't knock my perfectly viable, fun attempt at a character, because you got dealt an unlucky crit. You're using a Hobgoblin AntiPaladin. Almost all of them are LE, but you wanted the racial benefits, right? Does that about sum it up?

Anyway, I thought it was strange that your group was still trying to use diplomacy after we attacked you. For our part, we were instantly attacked by a goblin before we entered the Spire and we saw it flee to get help. We then a short time later run into a group with three goblins. Of course we're going to attack. Our characters don't know that you have PC levels.

This is why I was worried about signing up for this game. PvP brings out the worst in people and often makes it not fun, but I thought I'd give it a try and see if this one would be different.

Karist, I just changed your token on the map to match your profile picture.

So Corath, my attack should trigger your shield spell and also Thoril's attack.

So Thoril, you should actually get your ready action and another turn before I go (and try to attack you, not that you know that's going to happen, though I suppose our casters could Spellcraft it and shout a warning).

How do you guys think we should proceed?

If Corath could enlarge Thoril he should be able to grapple and pin any of the three.

Who do we try to take out next? The caster is going to be trouble if he keeps hitting me with Murderous Command. Any suggestions?

WS: 1d20 + 0 + 2 ⇒ (7) + 0 + 2 = 9

Ruh Roh

Enrico's eyes glaze over as he tightens the grip on his sword.

My initial attack should have triggered both Thoril and Corath's readied actions, so Thoril's attack vs Assassi should technically occur before your spell is cast (not that it really matters). Oh, and the map is in my sig.

Sorry to be the one to start the PvP, but before we even entered the Spire we were attacked by a goblin who then ran away to alert his friends. Very shortly after that we now run into 3 gobbos, I just don't see Enrico trying to negotiate peacefully in the goblin lair. So...

Enough talk, I only trust a goblin to cut my throat while I sleep, or burn a building to the ground. I'm not taking any chances here, Enrico says, sliding up alongside Thoril. He swings his curved blade at the most heavily-armed opponent, striking quickly.

Move: 15 ft

Swift: Mindful Dodge if I trigger any readied actions.

Free: Switch Falcata to two-handed grip

Free: Switch back to one-handed grip

Note: If I am attacked before my turn I will use Mindful Dodge

So that is 31 damage on Kandoo. Uh, sorry? :-/

I put the tokens on the map, but I didn't know the chaos party's formation. They are likely in a different order, and they may be spread out. The blue line is to indicate where the door is.

Our formation is correct, though, as it gives us the best visibility from our individual light sources. I don't know if the corridor we're in is even that long, though. We'll need CCD to draw in where the walls are (and the chaos party needs to update their marching order).

Karist, if you want a different token for your guy I can swap it. You'd just have to pick an image for your profile.

Enrico Marcellano wrote:

We should've brought some hellknight initiates or something with us :-)

Gee, thanks. :p

Hey, no disrespect! I was talking about bringing along some NPCs to even the numbers :-)

Honestly, we're stuck between a rock and a hard place. The main entrance is loaded with goblins and we can't see past the limits of Thoril's darkvision. Now we have the rival party ahead of us. If we just close the door and try to flee we could have enemies on both sides of us, or allow them to go rouse the goblins and bring more enemies against us.

It might be in our best interest to try to hit them hard enough to make them not want to mess with us. I would say we could try diplomacy, but with three of their number being goblins/hobgoblins, I don't see much reason IC for me to try...

Well, regardless of whether or not you close the door, I think you should hit their front-liner first. I mean, you have the initiative and so it's vs FF AC. Maybe you can hit one and Karist can telekinetic fist the same one and drop one of their team before they go. Then they're on the defensive, you know?

Maybe hit one and retreat a bit? We have to wait to see their marching order (I setup a map).

Hey guys! Here's hoping we all survive, but with the terrain and inhabitants I think Chaos has a distinct advantage. We should've brought some hellknight initiates or something with us :-) The map link is in my sig. Everyone can edit. This way DM CCD can draw in what the map looks like. I put our marching order and the door (blue line), but I didn't know the Chaos marching order. I also made up a picture for Karist since he didn't have one.

Should we do all of this encounter in one of the two threads with both parties, or are we sticking with separate threads? One thread might be easier. I can try to put up a map tonight if that would help.

Init: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (10) + 2 = 12

The door leads to a rough tunnel which leads north to a smooth walled room with some half-melted chunks of green glass scattered about and a door in each direction. The door to the north is a pair of double doors. The entire ruins seems to be made out of the green glass. The most important, strange, and frightening aspect of the ruins, perhaps, is that all your light shrinks to a 5-foot radius. Darkvision still works fine.

Thoril hears footsteps from behind the double doors, but no other things of interest.

Thoril also hears some clanking noises from the north door.

I am confused--when you say there is a door in "each direction", do you mean N, W, and E (with the door to the south being where we came from), or do you mean there's a door NW, N, NE, etc? I'm also confused because you say the northern doors are the double doors, but then you said separately that there are footsteps from the double doors and clanking from the north door. Does this mean clanking and footsteps from behind the same set of double doors?

Enrico motions to Thoril to open the double doors.

Since it looks like we are about to roll init, may I offer some advice? What I do when I GM a PbP is I put all of the party's init mods in my profile (typed out with the dice macros). So any time there is a fight, I just post the init rolls for the party along with the monsters. That way I can say: Thoril and Enrico up now or something instead of waiting for everyone to post init. Just a thought.

I don't know what's going on in here, but we're going to be in serious trouble if we have to fight goblins in the dark. Luckily, I have an idea--everyone use your own light and let's travel single file. That should give us some room to work with.

Considering the matter settled, Enrico strikes a sunrod and tucks it into his belt.

If we spread out 10 ft from each other and each have a light source, we should be able to illuminate a lot of the corridor. We can put Thoril in front since he has darkvision.

x
Thoril
x
x
Enrico
x
x
Corath
x
x
Karist
x

x = 5 ft, that effectively illuminates 60 ft for all of us, plus 55 ft past that for Thoril (darkvision). If the corridor ever shortens up we can shorten our distance apart to 5 ft. Sound good?

Blast! I don't want to chase after him in the dark. Let's take the other door and see if we can get then to think we were scared off.

Enrico charges into the fray, trying to cut down the goblin's mount.

Charge: 1d20 + 4 + 2 ⇒ (12) + 4 + 2 = 18

Damage: 1d8 + 3 ⇒ (3) + 3 = 6

AC: 15--if the goblin dog has a readied action to attack, I'll use mindful dodge vs his attack, which gives me a +4 bonus (this will use my swift action). Either way, I will use mindful dodge if I get attacked before my next turn. I'll use it against the dog first, or against the archer if the dog doesn't attack me. This will give me AC 19 for one attack.

Shouldn'the guy noticing us trigger an init roll? We were aware of him, so why did he get a surprise round with no Init roll? :-/

INIT: 1d20 + 2 ⇒ (3) + 2 = 5

Alright, I'll start us off!

Enrico sneaks toward the hidden door, blade in hand.

Stealth: 1d20 + 1 + 5 ⇒ (9) + 1 + 5 = 15

Agreed, but if it does see us we can't let it escape. One goblin is a nuisance. But those things breed by the dozen. Enrico does not attempt to hide the look of revulsion on his face.

The only thing worse than finding guards in a place like this... Enrico says, drawing his sword.

...is not finding them. Do you see anything? He keeps a sharp eye out for anything dangerous.

Aid another on Thoril's perception: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (15) + 6 = 21

GM, just to let you know--unless I say otherwise, I will use Mindful dodge on the first melee attack directed at me each round.

Any man or woman who can pull their own weight is welcome. Four seems good--we want to make sure we get our fair share of profits. Let's settle up here and head out. I'm ready when you are. With that, Enrico downs his drink and heads toward the door.

Ready?

"Karist, assistant to Master Royst, the sage willing to pay for information on the Spire, Karist took the hand and shook it. "This subtle crier is Enrico Marcellano."

Karist turned back to his seat and his hard cider taking another deep swig and smiled at the half-elf.

Say what you will, but it worked, didn't it? I'm not about to tip toe around to find people who may want to join us. From what I've heard, the Spire is dangerous. We need men of action, people who won't shirk from danger. Welcome aboard, Corath. I can't help you with any Hellknight business, but we can always use some magic on our side. Just make sure you keep up. Whaddya say, Karist? Are we good, or do we need more allies?

Corath, any chance you'd be willing to memorize Open/Close as one of your cantrips? I have ok perception and DD for level 1, and it'll get better when I can get MW armor and MW thieves' tools, but for now, just being able to open doors from a distance might save us a lot of healing down the road (triggering traps while we're back at a safe distance). What say you?

Thoril, you ready to jump in with us?

This one is curious indeed--a mix of deference and sarcasm. He should make for entertaining company, at the least, Enrico muses, stepping into the tavern.

He signals to the barkeep and plops into a chair, unceremoniously. Taking a sip, he clears his throat and speaks over the din.

Us two are heading into the Spire, mapping it out for some easy coin. Anybody else looking for work?

"Yes, your skills would be very useful. So far, no one else has arrived, yet I feel confident more will come. There is also an item that I think you will find useful. The sage heads back to his laboratory, then comes back with the green shard. "I have been studying this, and have determined that this is in fact, a shard of the emerald spire. It has magical properties that go far beyond what one would expect, however. Each level of the spire has its own sigil. By holding this, touching the spire, and visualizing one of the sigils, someone can teleport themselves and one other person to the level of the sigil." He hands it to Karist.

Hmm, I missed this post originally.

Enrico nods in respect at the wizard's gift.

"Thank Master Royst, we will use it wisely in our explorations." Karist slipped the shard into a pouch and set about quickly gathering together the few things he owned. He tucked them into a pack and left it by the door. "I will return and take these with me before we leave."

He turned to Enrico as he grabbed his quarter staff and slipped his sickle into his belt. "Now, if I am to be your tour guide about town, I suspect you can pay for those services."

He walked through the door and out into the street and turned to the half-elf, "Well are you coming, or do I need to hold your hand?"

He continued onward in the direction of the Juliver Arms, one of the inns in the Fort.

Ha, ha! Lead on then! The swordsman laughs loudly and in earnest, clapping the apprentice on the back. After they walk for a bit in silence, he asks quietly: So, do you think you can use that gemstone without getting either of us killed?

If I have to babysit your errand boy I expect an extra half-share, Enrico says to Royst. He then gestures to Karist.

Well come along, then. I'm good, but not that good. We'll need a few more to accompany us. Do you know your way around town?

Thoril-Reedbank sends someone to go get the wizard, who comes quickly. "So I understand you were interested in finding the wizards?"

Karist"Excellent! I'll come immediately." The sage hurries to the front door where he greets Enrico. "You are an adventurer looking to map the spire? Excellent! I'll pay you for each level you map, starting at 100 gp, going up to at least 10,000 for the last."
yeah, this guy's ridiculously wealthy.

Enrico raises his eyebrows at the man's enthusiasm.

Very well, I thought there would be some sort of demonstration of my skills required. So, who else will be accompanying me?

Thoril, either your contact or ours could refer one of us to the other. That probably would be easiest to bring us together.

Karist shook his head in disbelief at the man's approach.

"Well, I can check with him to see if he in fact is need of help, or rather was looking for help that would be useful, if I could but ask you name and that you stay here for a moment longer?" Karist smiled politely and stares at the man leaning inwards.

He moved his left hand to the back of the door in case he needed to close it while he relayed the information to the Sage.

The Taldan rolls his eyes, but stays put. He chuckles derisively: If he wasn't looking to hire, why would I come here? Sure, go and fetch him. The name's Enrico, though I doubt he's heard of me. I'm not from around here.

For starters you can open the door, or at the least stop barring my way, the half-elf says, brushing his hair away from his eyes.

I'm looking for Mr. Royst--heard he needs a few...enterprising folks to map out the Spire. Now that I'm here, he needs one less. So, are you going to take me to him, or what?

The swordsman leans forward a bit, tapping his foot and apparently a bit annoyed at having to wait.

Dotting!

Option 4 seems like a good choice. Karist could be his apprentice and Enrico could be a hired merc.

DM, can I post in the gameplay thread to dot this thread in my campaigns? It's possible the other players don't know the discussion thread is open. I can PM them next time I get on my computer.

Howdy, Team Law!

Enrico hails from Taldor and is a mercenary, a sword-for-hire who left home because of a family tragedy that he considers himself responsible for.

I think it would be interesting if we were all assembled for a specific purpose to go to the Emerald Spire. So maybe we haven't known each other for long, but someone hired us?

What do you guys all think?

Ah, you're right. So 4 on 4, then? :-)

The teams look pretty fair to me. Sure Chaos doesn't have an arcane caster, but they have three divine casters. DM, are you willing to run with 5 on 5?

Yeah, sure let's do that. I would have preferred to have all the roles but I'm not getting much interest for this, and it won't spell absolute doom for a party if they don't have the roles. So I'll wait a few days to see if there's any more intrest and then we'll start, say on Thursday.

Edit: there are quite a few traps, so having someone with disable would be nice, so it's fine if you take that trait.

Ok, done. I see Enrico as more of a mercenary anyway and one who has a certain code, so lawful is probably better. He now has both perception and Disable Device, so I present him as the "skill" role for the Lawful team.

Go team Lawful!

How badly do you want all of the roles filled out? I can be the "skill monkey" for the law team if you prefer.

I don't have disable device, but I do have perception. If you really want the skill guy to have disable device, would you consider letting me take the trait from Mummy's Mask that lets you disable magical traps like a rogue?

Personally, I think it would be cool to just roll with 4 or 5 characters apiece on each team disregarding traditional roles and just see what people come up with.

This is mbauers--here's my Lore Warden Fighter submission for the Chaotic team. He is deceptively tanky with his weapon trick feat and should contribute some useful skills (and a little magic with UMD) outside of combat as well.

Congrats everybody, and thanks GM for considering me and taking the time to review all the submissions.

It stings a little that there was a different Lore Warden selected, and that no divine casters were chosen and my original submission was a cleric--makes me think I had a shot, hehe. But the chosen 5 are great, so I can't complain.

So--anybody else here have the Book and want to DM? ;-)

Anybody else obsessively checking the thread? By me posting this, did I just give false hope that the results were posted? Mwa ha ha!

Here's an example of my profile formatting. Yeah, it's time consuming, but once it's done I think it's helpful.

Ghivinus Varth wrote:

'Nother question I just thought of: How do you run Appraise checks to guess the value items? So often it's rendered useless by DMs (me included, hah) but I'd like to know if I need to invest a rank in it or not.

I typically just handwave it for run-of-the-mill loot. It's not a particularly important skill in my games.

Enrico Marcellano wrote:

Along the same lines--GM, how frequently do you use combat maneuvers with your npcs? I'm investing some of my build in CMD (human FC bonus, for example). I've done so in the past and I've seen that some GMs don't make use of maneuvers very often. I generally do from both a player and GM perspective.

That is for me to know and you to find out! (Enough that you won't regret having a good CMD.)

Good to know! I swapped out Appraise for Knowledge (Nobility)--I figure a mercenary would want to know a little about their employers.

'Nother question I just thought of: How do you run Appraise checks to guess the value items? So often it's rendered useless by DMs (me included, hah) but I'd like to know if I need to invest a rank in it or not.

I actually had the same question! I don't really incorporate appraise very much even in the games I run, but I gave it to Enrico because he's a mercenary and it made sense. But I could always put that rank somewhere else if we're going to handwave Appraise like most other games. :-)

Along the same lines--GM, how frequently do you use combat maneuvers with your npcs? I'm investing some of my build in CMD (human FC bonus, for example). I've done so in the past and I've seen that some GMs don't make use of maneuvers very often. I generally do from both a player and GM perspective.

Enrico is all squared away except for maybe adding a little more about his ties to Longacre.

In terms of party role I see him as melee control (with maneuvers) as well as being a decently mobile tank. I think he'd be a good flanking buddy with the rogue. I'm hoping he can also help out of combat with lots of skills, including UMD. Thanks for considering me!