Malovec's page

Some Updates to my sessions and to this thread:

1st, It is sad how Gary has bailed. I will at least say he left us with something pretty decent. It needed a lot of work and cobbling but it's decent enough. As far as the other kick starters I would be highly pissed.

2nd, One of the quirkiest things I did which I know among most of the RPG community isn't really thought of as a great thing is actually putting your players on the SLOW track. I did that through the majority of book 2 (from the beginning) and it really forces the players to work together (more so than they already do), it makes them really have to focus in on their resources and learn each other's skills.

I feel after moving them to medium and watching them gain exp a lot faster steals some of the shock and awe when they win. Not that I am still not giving them hell ;).

3rd, the update

So we started this last session Saturday (Nov 10th), and they were in the middle of the Golem fight. They had just cleared out most of the tower and started to fight the golems. Druid dropps a burning entanglement on them. They then start to fire on them through the murder holes. That only lasted for a round or 2, then the golems (little fudge on my part) smashed down the wall and started to fight the party. This is return let the entanglement spread through the rest of it's radius.

It wasn't too hard of a fight, the gunslinger made quick work of them, but at the same time the Sorcerer and Gunslinger got a crap load of wounds from the golems.

The way I did it was, I made separate wounds that they have to target to heal and make the caster level check. They probably spent half their CWL charges before they realize what was going on after an arcane/spellcraft knowledge check lol.

So as they beat them, and allow the bug bears passed they move foward.

I did what the book said though and tracked everything, I mean everything. I made them account for all kinds of stuff.

Knights - They first send their recruits minions (not from the book, just through organizational methods, low rank peons and peasant) and they get shredded.

So they fight them instead. The gunslinger is terrified, he is very low on HP and can't really be healed. The gunslinger wrecks the horses, and at that point it really is over, no sweat!

They take a few shots from arrows. No big deal.

Archers (replaced with gunslingers, called the Hackbutt Militia) - They hear a fire ring out as the hackbutts fire 24 rounds of ammunation with daylight cast on them, so the area is lit up like a christmas tree.

They decide to let the duergar handle it. As they make an action, it works, they win.

Then they get smacked by three fire balls (I upped it) and that wrecks a few of them but they heal back up, I toss them a couple high level potions and a scroll to get pass some of the cursed wounds.

Dwarven center - they of course send the duergar, they die, all is well.

Monks, they were going to fight but some of the players wanted it to go to a vote because they wanted to send vampires.

They send vampires. All is well

Archons - I originally was going to have 6 here, but returned it back to the default 2 (they are advanced however) They beat them but they almost lost their arcanist, gunslinger, and sorcerer. I allow my players even the ones who are going to die to not die until one whole round is passed giving people the chance to revive them. But it was very very close.

Flying Knights - Underwhelming fight they got a few hits off but the with the gunslinger and the sorcerer they made quick work of them.

The holy knights and priests (I doubled the priest from 4 to 8. and 4 of them already had divine power/favor whatever made them large sized) on.

They sent their generals (the people they assign under their organization in my session), and the vampires, and what ever else scrappers they had left. I had them roll ruthless actions and it wasn't terrible but as the book says this is supposed to be a fight for them so I met them half way.

They wiped out the holy warriors and 4 priests, the other 4 are on their way. Unfortunately for the party, they had time to get some control weather spells going and now this is happening to them:

i did let them keep half of their generals at half health. (medusa, nessian warhound, a former familiar imp, the golem, and trik.

Some of this is made up by me some is pfsrd stuff with 3rd party stuff:

Every turn:

1d4 Lethal Damage from Hail

Each 5ft Square requires 20 ft of movement speed. You can always move at least 1 5ft square as a full round action

Every Round roll d100.

d% Weather Behavior

01-20 Wind speed > 50 MPH | Check Size Medium | Blown Away Size Small

21-45 -8 to climb acrobatics fly perception | Flurry of Snow 20% Miss chance

46-70 Random lightning strike (ally or enemy) 10d8 Electricity Damage DC 18 Reflex for 1/2

71-85 Everyone gets hit with a chill spike on his or her turn. 10 Points of Non-Lethal Weather Cold Damage! Con Check of 10 + 1 for each previous roll for half.

86-100 All of the Above for the entire round.

If you aren't familiar with the checks

Ceatures cannot even walk with out succeeding at a DC 10 stength check, DC 20 fly check if you are flying.

Small creatures are knocked prone, roll 1d4x10 and take 2d6 points of non lethal damage unless a dc 15 strength check. Flying creatures are blown back 2d6x10 feet and take 2d6 points of non lethal damage unless DC 25 fly check is passed.

Wind speed can also make range impossible.

The priest however are equipped with items that let them move through the snow with no problem, see through the fog/concealment with no issue. They will however still take the hail damage and the cold damage, and are able to be knocked around and make str checks.

So as it stands they are down to pretty much 1st level slots in spaces, very few potions, half-ish health, and on the brink of destruction.

So: They stripped away what few class features wizard's had and then gave them back as class feats.

Remember, Paizo is now in the boat where WoTC were when they ditched 3.5 for 4th ed, except replace 3.5 with pathfinder 1st ed and replace 4th ed with 5th ed.

They have to play catch up, shore up their bottom line, and simplify the game to get more people playing because that's the market now. The days of complex RPGs are going away.

Right or Wrong, it's what Paizo is doing here. They will out right deny it or at the very least push out some clever PR word play as to how that isn't the case but I'm not falling for it.

Me? I'll stick with 1st ed, and enjoy it's handprint on the rpg walk of fame and watch as people come out the wood work with great ways to balance it.

My players are entering book 3 of way of the wicked.

I would really love to see an AP that expands WoTW into epic level play and then whatever the apex of that adventure becomes for those character, they literally become the arch villians of an AP that is set say 100 years later or more and you create heroes trying to undo all of it.

Sales low? Going to go the way of 5th edition and dumb down the game for the masses?

Going to give us a half ass way to convert our beloved games and characters? Leaving it up to us to make the choices?

Go ahead, please go the way of 5th edition D&D you traitors.

Bruno Mares wrote:

Just so glad that it's happening!

And hoping that there is no established levels for archetypes abilities like in Starfinder...

im hoping Archetypes work like Pathfinder than Starfinder.

lolololol

As if I didn't read it. Why do you think I'm pissed. Take off your rose colored glasses already.

I would like to state first something for want of a better word a disclaimer.

This feat gets a lot of heat attached to it, and I understand that. I noticed one of my players took a trait that gave a bonus to leadership, and since this is the first 100% PF sessions we are running, I told him, I'll allow it but lets talk it out.

He is also a GM, we usually take turns every 6-7 months or so running different sessions. So here is what we came up with, just want to know if you think it's fair.

+ The feat itself remains unchanged.

+ Cohorts will always use Heroic Array.

+ Followers will always use Standard.

+ Player controls mechanics and combat of cohorts, GM controls everything else.

+ Player controls everything else in regards to followers for purposes of skills and mechanics, and combat should they bring it, GM controls everything else.

+ Experience is handled as per feat.

+ Treasure is split between Cohort and Player, but player must be the one to bring it up with the group should they want their Cohort taking a share of the money. GM may also monitor this, if the Cohort seems to be getting neglected.

+ When a player says they want to take Leadership, GM will ask what role do you want this cohort to full-fill and was their a particular race?

+ GM creates NPC from scratch, and shows it to player, and player has 1 veto to have the GM go back and change it, proving the player gives helpful suggestions. Just saying no is not enough. (Example, Player was interested in attracting a ranged archer character, and DM provides monk, but player offers suggestion of fighter because he too is a fighter and is not as disciplined as a monk.)

+ From there, when a cohort levels, the player levels the cohort up.

+ Upon taking the leadership feat, GM is expect to have a cohort ready to go, before the player meets his or her next levels after taking the feat.

+ Should the Cohort die, and is not revived, New cohort is chosen with out regard to player interest, and must be provided by the GM before the player reaches the same spot in her next level. So if Cohort died half way to level 10, GM must provide new cohort before player reaches half way to level 11.

Way of the Wicked is an adventure path created by Fire Mountain Games.
Fire Mountain Products

My group just started on May 24th with this AP, and thus far are absolutely in love with it. I have created a blog dedicated to trying to fantasize or journal their adventure.

d20evil.blogspot.com

I'm trying to keep as much crunch out of it as I can and stick to the fluff and flavor for your reading. However if you want to know anything about the classes/archetypes/races just ask I will post about it on here :).

Entry 1: The Escape

Entry 2: First Blood

Entry 3: Hell Inside of Hell

Entry 4: The Final Trek

Next session is on June 7th, so stay tuned for that. :)