Kyle Smith 700's page

A bit of background - we'd just taken some time off from our other campaign that I'm GMing, in which a character died to a pretty unfair trap that was played straight out of the book. That game was put on hold for a break from brutality and so I could have the opportunity to modify what remains to be more like the adventures our group likes.

New campaign, Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition (some very small spoilers below). The GM is the player whose character died to the trap (he’s the primary GM for this group).

I'm playing a Half-Orc Witch. We're in Sandpoint for the Swallowtail festival. None of our characters knew each other yet. The festival is going on, characters enjoying the food and such, when suddenly, seven goblins appear from their hiding spots - three around my character.

GM rolls initiative for us in Combat Manager. I don't remember the exact order of initiative, but it went something like this:

1) Goblin. GM looks, sees its not one surrounding me, says, "f@+~!"
2) Goblin bard.
3) Player (orc barbarian)
4) Goblin. GM looks, sees its not one surrounding me, says, louder, "f&@&!"
5) Goblin. GM looks, sees its not one surrounding me, yells, "F*~$!"
6, 7, & 8) Goblins surrounding me. Miraculously only two hit, bringing my unarmored, flat-footed ass to 2 hp.
9) My turn. Withdraw, but still provoke from one goblin. That attack brings me to 0 hp. I manage to leave the combat. Not having cure light prepared, I return to my in room.

The next 1+ hour I sit out the game while the barbarian, cleric, and gunslinger deal with the rest of the goblin invasion (the rogue had also been reduced to 0 hp in the first round of combat and fled as well).

My character, having had no ties to Sandpoint, leaves the goblin-infested city, never to return. New character after the first round of combat in the adventure path.

After the session, I brought up him so obviously targeting me, the GM said, "I just wanted one to go before you so they'd have a chance to do something before you blasted them all."

Me: "Ummm...he was a witch. Witches don't blast. And he was FIRST LEVEL! How do you expect a first level arcane caster to blast 3 goblins in one round?"

GM: "Well, I don't know what witches do. I assumed you'd handle them easily."

He's actually a good GM, but this was a total brain fart on his part. He's since apologized for screwing up the encounter (for instance, the book says it should be 3 goblins in the first encounter, not 7).

I also wouldn't blow all of my end-career feats on maximizing crit-effects because there will a steadily increasing preponderance of opponents immune to crits. As a paladin you'll already be doing preposterous amounts of damage versus evil -- but the non-evil opponents you'll have the toughest time with are usually immune to crits (constructs, oozes, etc).

Constructs are not immune to critical hits. The only creatures that are naturally immune to them are oozes, and creatures with the swarm, elemental, aeon, or incorporeal subtype.

I've got three players in my game. Two of them have developed some back story and motivations for their characters, the other is a little more bland (mercenary who looks for work). For example, in our last game session, the characters had several weeks of downtime. The cleric used this time to help combat the growing disease plaguing the city, the sorcerer sought out a mentor to explain why she seemed to share a bond with a rat (her familiar). The fighter (mercenary) said, "I booze and look for work."

Now, there's definitely things I can develop with a fighter who does nothing but drink and look for mercenary work, but to me, that's just not a realistic character. I don't really want to award XP for individual roleplaying, because I want to keep the characters all at the same level.

Let me hasten to add that this player is not unimaginative in the least. When the characters have an active goal, he's usually the one coming up with creative solutions that I never anticipated. Outside the game, he's my go-to person when I want to bounce fiction ideas off somebody.

What can I do to encourage him to put a little more thought into his character's motivations and activities? Subtle solutions would be best, I think, so that he actively wants to do this, rather than having an attitude of, "I'll do it because my GM asks me to."

Thanks for any suggestions.

Yeah, I didn't really want the concept of a raging barbarian who rips trees out of the ground to throw them. It was the idea of a guy who carries multiple weapons and throws them, closing to melee 2h when he runs low on weapons.

So this isn't an optimal idea at all, but half the fun in creating characters is making oddball ones. I'm looking at making a character that would throw weapons a lot, but not your typical thrown weapons - he thinks they're too sissy. No, he throws his battleaxe, his warhammer, his lucerne hammer...pretty much whatever weapon he has on hand, he's gonna throw it.

Looking over the classes, the two options I see are Barbarian with Hurler archetype, or Fighter. I was hopeful when I saw the Hurler archetype, but the extent of its differences from the standard Barbarian is that thrown weapons get +10' range. Not exciting, and when I started building a Barbarian, he was extremely feat-starved. So, Fighter it is.

Human Fighter
Abilities (25 point buy)
Str 16
Dex 19 (+2 racial)
Con 14
Int 10
Wis 11
Cha 7

Feats: Throw Anything, Point Blank Shot, Deadly Aim.
Traits: Indomitable Faith, Skeptic (these don't really matter much. Not going to take Heirloom Weapon or Rich Parents)

Weapons: Battleaxe, Greataxe, Lance, Longspear, Lucerne Hammer, Warhammer
Armor: Chain Shirt

As this guy levelled up, he'd pick up Precise Shot, Rapid Shot, Quick Draw, Far Shot. His weapon training would focus on axes, and he'd narrow his weapon selection at that point. As quickly as possible, he'd get a +1 Throwing, Returning Battleaxe.

I think this guy would be pretty effective at low levels, but would really lose ground after awhile. The Returning weapon returns a full round after thrown, and only to the square it was thrown from, which means he's spending an awful lot of money on a weapon he can only get one attack with each round.

It's a fun concept, though.

Yes, crits would absolutely have to be confirmed to roll on the chart.

Good idea on the Fort save for Disembowel. I've included that. I'm liking the way the chart is looking now.

So, here's an alternate chart I worked up after reading the feedback:

d20 Critical Hit Chart.

It should be less brutal with less rerolling.

I will, of course, not introduce this without my player's agreement.

Wraithstrike: Not sure I know what you mean by "swingy."

Zhnov: The instant death is a lot less common than 1/100 swings. It requires a second d100 to result in 100 to confirm the beheading. Adding a Fort save (something like DC 10 + CR of attacker?) could be a good idea, though.

I like the idea of critical hit (and fumble) charts, but a fairly cursory search on Google didn't impress me with the free results, and I see no need to buy something like the Critonomicon when I can certainly come up with my own ideas. So I threw together a quick attempt at a slashing weapon critical hit chart that I think is fun and not too brutal. Before I spring this idea on my players, I'd like to get some feedback on the chart.

Critical Hit Chart

I plan on making separate charts for bludgeoning, piercing, ranged, and magic (touch attacks), as well as fumbles.

Comments? Criticisms?

If you have access to the Adventurer's Armory, you can take the trait Heirloom Weapon. It gives you a Masterwork weapon of any type at level 1 (you pay the normal cost of the weapon, so 75g for a longbow), and you're proficient with that specific weapon.

The biggest downside is you're only proficient with that one weapon. If it ever gets destroyed, you're out of luck. At least you can get it enchanted, since it's masterwork, though.

Yes, your CMD decreases by 2 because of the -4 penalty to Dexterity. While pinned you would lose any Dexterity bonus to AC, but note that it does NOT decrease your Dexterity and thus has no effect on CMD.

Incorrect. Per the rules on CMD (page 199 of the Core Rulebook):

Any penalties to a creature's AC also affect its CMD.

You can not hit a creature that you do not threaten.

Technically, not quite true. Whips do not threaten, and you can hit with them. Page 149 of the Core Rulebook (emphasis mine):

A whip deals no damage to any creature with an armor bonus of +1 or higher or a natural armor bonus of +3 or higher. The whip is treated as a melee weapon with 15-foot reach, though you don't threaten the area into which you can make an attack. In addition, unlike most other weapons with reach, you can use it against foes anywhere within your reach (including adjacent foes).

Two suggestions to replace minis:

Wooden alphabet beads

They're rather small, but the wide variety of letters can really help keep track of what's what. These don't work well for any creature larger than medium.

Corks

Very cheap and come in any size you can imagine. You can mark them up in any number of ways to signal what they are.

If a character has the Improved Feint feat, which, among other things, causes Feint to be a move action, can he, in one round, Feint (move action), Attack (standard action), and take a 5-foot-step?

The rule on a 5-foot-step is:

You can move 5 feet in any round when you don't perform any other kind of movement. Taking this 5-foot-step never provokes an attack of opportunity. You can't take more than one 5-foot-step in a round, and you can't take a 5-foot-step in the same round that you move any distance.

On the one hand, "perform any movement" somewhat implies using a move action, but it doesn't actually state "use a move action." Improved Feint is a move action, but does not involve movement.

Thoughts?