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Good <Time of Day>! I'm a player, doing some planning ahead for a level 1 Dhampir Wizard, and have a question for those who have played/run Blood Lords, that I hope to have answered in a mostly spoiler free fashion: Given the Catharsis Trigger of "An enemy makes you frightened." Is this something that a PC would find Useful or Rarely triggered? Thanks!
Hi folks! I'm preparing for my End Game fights, for a high powered party, and I'm not satisfied with how my Karzoug is turning out. Any suggestions would be appreciated My party is level 22, mythic 2, and while I can temporarily drop a player here or there, and scare the party occasionally, this is after more than a few hours of heavy upgrading and customization. I've been running this game for ... several years, and want the end fight to be suitably epic. There has been mention of a 20/mr10 Karzoug off and on over the years, but I haven't been able to find one. Mostly at this point I'm looking for suggestions for spells/mythic abilities. Things I'm allowing myself. Yes. I'm mostly familiar with Dreamscarred Press's work, as I make heavy use of Psionics, and have started making light use of Path of War. As it might prompt some ideas:
Major party weakness: No real access to dispel magic.
Other Optional Rules in effect that might change things: Automatic Bonus Progression, Skill Unlocks. Budget? Out the window. We've established that we won't be meeting again this month, due to scheduling conflicts (This is why it's been ... something like 6? 8? years since we've started this AP, and we're finally right outside the last door) Due to things the party has done, I fully intend to one up this fight, with a Mhar fight, so I'll need to redo THOSE stats later as well, and haven't even started looking at them. Stat wise, I can handle fiddling to make DC's, Attack Bonuses, AC/Saves etc, but nothing I've tetrised in for spells/mythic abilities seems to fit my needs, other than Mythic Timestop, and Wall of Suppression. Any assistance would be appreciated.
a year and a bit ago, I built a widget to help my homebrew game for the playtest, that would create a rough estimate of what a higher level version of a creature would look like. Today, I have created a widget that CURRENTLY will allow you use the handy dandy rules to build your own Monster of any given level. This requires you to have read and understand the preview presented in the Paizo Blog. In the future, I have a (pipedream), where it will allow you to pull up a monster, look at it's stats, and then use that to advance it to a new level of your choice. I have started that dream by entering a few -1 monsters into a new tab based on what's available on 2e.aonprd.com, and plan on continuing to do so. Note: Some things are my best guesses, as they don't match perfectly. (When the options are +0 or +2, a +1 doesn't quite fit either.) The in progress Pathfinder Monster Builder can be found here. I welcome comments, feedback, and/or suggestions that I look at someone else's work. To Use: Please make a copy! This may require that you are signed into any google account. Then, items in green are drop downs. Select as you see fit, and items in Aqua, will update based on your choices. Enjoy! 
First and foremost: I'm the GM. In the next session or two, the party (Level 3) will be attending a wedding, and the groom (an Aldori trained bard) has splashing out "serious" cash, to "rent" a pair of Scabbards of the Merciful Duelist, that will cause any weapon placed in them, to only do Nonlethal damage for X rounds, for some exhibition style duels as part of the celebrations. The question, is that I'm going to guess that the party will want to own their own down the line, and I'd like to be prepared. How much would YOU make it cost? Things I've looked at that are relevant: The spell effect in question, L2 a similar (+1) weapon enchantment effect A permanent magic item, 3/day 3rd level spell A similar effect, permanent magic item, 1/day, 3rd level spell a permanent magic item, no daily limits. Altered 3rd level spell effect My thoughts, is that it's less potent than temporarily granting the merciful ability, (no +1d6), Less potent than the varied 3rd level spell effects, and that I don't REALLY want to have too low of a caster level or uses per day, if I'm going to have a mini-tourney effect. While I was brainstorming, I feature-creeped up of some other things, like: When sheathed, it casts a targeted dispel magic on the user, and glows a color (white?), if it successfully cleanses all temporary buffs. Buffing AFTER you're entering the lists might be useful depending on the duelist, but no pre-gaming. That seems like a good effect for a 'greater' version. Spitballing the price, I don't want it to be much cheaper than 5k, and 16k seems like too much for a basic version especially when compared to the above, but possibly OK for a greater. In case anyone is curious, the party is playing through Kingmaker, and one of the players is hoping to open an Aldori school in kingdom.
I have a small favor to ask. TLDR: What Iconics have been produced to date in the Playtest environment, and where can I find them?
I have not been running or playing Doomsday Dawn, focusing on prepping to run a homebrew game, and while I tripped over the Level 5 set of Iconics in the Resonance Test, that was it. While I can/most likely will, end up building some 'Iconics' to suit my needs, I was hoping to find a handful that I could use as a baseline, and build up as needed from there. Unofficial copies work pretty much just as well as Official copies, for reference. Thank you for your time.
I'm running a homebrew game, under playtest rules via Roll20, starting at level 10. Below, in no particular order, are some thoughts and experiences. Note, there's at least one semi spoiler, should this be read by one of my players if this looks super familiar. After today's game, the Paladin and Sorcerer stuck around, and the following was stated by one, with agreement from the other. (Phrasing might not be perfect, but it's more than close enough.) I think this the most important part of my findings. "I was initially uncertain, but I think that in play, that things were much better/smoother than I expected."
I offered to prebuild PC's, and 4 of the 6 players took me up on the offer, with a late addition starting to dive in, and not being able to finish before the first scheduled game, asking for help. I have the following: 2 fighters (1 short bow, 1 dual Sawtooth Sabres), Paladin (Sarenrae, both Shield & Sword Spirits, CG), Sorcerer (Fey), Rogue and Bard. We play ... infrequently, and have spent most of the playtest so far in character creation / session 0 talks. Skills. As I built most of the PC's I noticed ... that the skill sets of the party had major overlaps and gaps. Like, 3 PC's have Master Stealth and Acrobatics, and no one has more than trained in most knowledges ... and the poor bard has more than a few trained skills, and Master Performance and Occultism, and that's ... it. I mean, I did it to him, but I feel like I did him a disservice. Retributive Strike did not come into play in Session 1 (Pre 1.6). Today's session, it came into play several times, and one of the attacks that triggered it, I maxed damage. had rolled 3d4's (-1, since I didn't update my critter's strength, probably like I should have). The Paladin (and the attack victim, the Sorcerer) was quite pleased. I had built the Paladin to take advantage of both Sword and Shield spirits, so he was able to take advantage of both Shield Warden and Shield of Reckoning, so even if I had upped it's strength... I'd likely have still done no damage due to shield DR (8,Spellguard shield, with Pld augments) I used a widget I built to level some Kobold's to 6, 7 and 9. To adjust damage, I simply added 2 dice to their attacks, and left the negative str mod, instead of mathing out what new dice to use. The 6's died quickly, the 7's not so much. Oddly, the 7's and 9's died at about the same rate. The party took a fairly serious amount of damage from the dozen odd Kobolds they've killed, and have a serious threat still to come. As I've not run any of the playtest campaign, I don't have the same knowledge of encounter balancing for the new system, so I built some safety nets in play. The mini-dungeon they are in consists of a trio of traps, a baker's dozen APL-4's, a half dozen or so -3's, 4 -1's, a +1 boss, and a Surprise Spoiler:
+3 encounter that I've somewhat hinted at. I half expect that the surpise will drop the party, but I will learn how to proceed with the rest of the campaign. Things I'm less sold on current implementation. Hero Points as is. For my home games I play with Hero Points, and I feel they add something. As the game is played over Roll20, I can't hand out any for out of character things, so I've been awarding 1 base, and 1 for on time arrivals, and others as the game progresses for cool/nifty things. Thus far? They've barely been used. The problem is that the ONLY 1 point usage, is death related, and while I've drained the party to about half health in a drawn out running fight, no one's dropped yet. So, no one could use it. The 2 point re-roll was used twice, by two different players in game 1. Game 2, no points were used at all, as one player put it, he doesn't roll dice, he makes THEM (me) roll, as he's a CC specc'd sorcerer, with a few blasts for good measure, along with an allotment of Whimsy. XP. A Simple CR -4 trap is.... 2 XP. How do I split 2 XP six ways? How about a CR -3 for 3 xp? A complex -2, at 20, is a useful number. I've found that I'm awarding more xp on a session basis, than I'm awarding on an encounter basis. Lets break it down this way. A Full on, Super, do not use encounter for 6 PC's, is 240 XP. split, that's 40 XP each. (Assuming I do divide this, which I believe is implied by the adjustments for party size) Versus 5 to 6 Minor accomplishment awards, 2 to 3 medium, and 0 to 1 major xp award. Works out to 50~60 + 60 to 90 and 0 to 80. Unlike the combat xp, there is no adjustment for party size, so I'm guessing that it's a straight award to each player. 40 for a nearly impossible fight vs 110 to 150 for accomplishing in session goals, depending on how the game progresses. I mapped out a path for a decently long campaign. I sat down and started to tally up xp for set piece encounters. Divided 6 ways, it totaled around 500 xp each. Made a stab in the dark on how many sessions it would take for an experience group of ton topic gamers (not what I have, but it's ok), and came up with at least as much xp from just session expectations. For me personally and looking ahead. Well, realistically, I play too infrequently to start a 2nd ed game for the next 4~8 years, unless the group I'm running for this playtest becomes a long term thing. (Which is possible) But, I see some promise in the system, and have enjoyed MANY hours with 1st ed, that I'll do at least something to try and improve the final product.
While most people are focused on the prebuilt Doomsday Dawn, I thought I'd take a crack at running a homebrew game using the available rules. I had ideas, I had players and then I took a look at the Bestiary. I didn't have enough different monsters for a Level 10 adventure. So, I made a thing. Credit where it's due: Mostly to LuniasM and his amazing work collating all the bestiary values into a coherent whole, as well as a few other things, as well as being inspired by more than a few others who have been happily creating content here on the boards. Now: Due to the nature of the limited data, there are points where my tool is a little rough. Namely things like extra attack types and L0 monsters. If the base creature didn't HAVE something, the resulting output is a little ... odd. How To Use:
Step 1. On the left, in green, is a list of levels, and a single monster next to them. Find your "base creature" level, then select your "Base Creature" from the drop down menu for it's given level. Step 2. Also in green is Source Level. Enter the level that your "base creature" is. Step 3: Below Source Level is "Add Level". Enter the value that brings your "Base Creature" up to where you need it. Step 4: Review the results in Orange. There are 3 output fields, as I created 3 ways to calculate the new values. Each has their strengths. Step 5: Select the output value to use based on your understanding of the "Base Creatures" usage, and what the party can handle. NOTE: Anything +/- 4 from the average result level is marked in a different color automatically. This is to draw your attention, and ask: Is this actually a good idea to use? Roonie is not responsible for any accidental TPK's as a result of selecting the wrong value to use. Example! I need Level 10 Kobolds! Step1Example: Kobold Warriors are L0. <Finds L0, selects Kobold Warrior in the Drop Down menu.> Step2Example: <Enters 0 in the Source Level field> STep3Example: <Enters 10 in the Add Level Field> Step4Example: <Review the results> Step5Example: I'll use the HP from Option 2, and the Save's/Skills from Option 1. That's safest for my party. I'll ignore Option 3, because well, my base creature is Level 0, and that results in some /0 moments. Now that you've sat through all of that babble and exposition, without further ado! The Adjuster! It's not a trap. I promise. This promise does not extend to any party on the other side of the table. I will be encouraging my party to fill out the survey midway through the playtest, and again near the end.
The Item levels for Elven and Mithral Chain do not seem to mesh between the description for special materials, and the treasure tables. The Mithral Chain and Elven Chain under special non magic treasures table list item levels 7, and 15 for the Master and Legendary qualities on page 356. The Treasure List table on 352 lists item level 12, and 353 shows item level 19. The raw costs seem to imply level 12 and 19, not 7 and 15. |
