Malusiocus's page

I had created a thread asking players about what should be in a Code of Conduct for players playing at the gaming table. Now I want to know what sorts of things should be included in a Code of Conduct for the characters in an adventuring party.

Let's go with players.

I play with a wide variety of players who usually all have different experiences they want out of the game. What are some rules and guidelines that could be put in a Code of Conduct for the party?

So the two reasons I'm using the Iconics are because their character sheet is very self-explanatory and goes over all of their abilities which is extremely helpful in introducing new players to the game. Also, the players all chose their classes and they don't want to change.

So I'm introducing Pathfinder to a few of my friends. To save time I'm bypassing character creation and just giving them the pre-made iconics character sheet from the Paizo.com. The first thing I noticed when looking over the iconics is how extremely suboptimal they appear to be. Now I wouldn't have a problem if they were all equally suboptimal, as I would just lower the difficulty of the overall session. The problem arises from some characters just lacking in diversity. The gnome druid looked rather sad in comparison to the fighter and that was even with the animal companion. The party consists of the iconic bard, druid, fighter, ranger, rogue, sorcerer, and wizard. What can I do to balance out the party?

Wow, thanks so much. We use Google Hangout with Roll20 so we do get some face action. I'm not too familiar with some of the macros on the site or how to set those up, but I think that they will help a huge load.

So I just started a new campaign on Roll20 with some friends I had met at uni. Now the group was rather large with 8 people showing up. Though I felt like I had prepared quite a bit for the session, I was having trouble getting the game to move forward. Had one group of people sharing a computer, and I constantly kept forgetting that certain players were there as I couldn't see their faces, which resulted in some players not getting nearly enough screentime.

Does anyone have any tricks to run large groups? I know many will say that I shouldn't and I should break the group up into two groups, but I don't think that's an option at this point. Any other advice on the matter?

Still can't contact her, so for now let's assume that she will either go melee or ranged. Would a TWF shillelagh build work for a druid?

Yep, everyone is starting at level 1. No clue if she is going archery or melee. I will try to clarify this later.

Alright, so I'm running a new campaign with a new group who are new to pathfinder. I was able partake in the character creation of most of the group, so I can confidently say that group is pretty optimized. Now I have been informed that there is another player joining the campaign who already has some strict ideas of what she wants her character to be after reading the srd.

She wants her character to be a elf nature fang druid with a wolf animal companion. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to contact this player myself to see exactly what she had in mind.

So in the meantime, let's assume that this all this player is looking for in her character. How do I optimize this kind of character?

All of our party is currently level 1 right now and consists of a

half-orc invulnerable barbarian
elven evocation wizard
elven sorcerer with the sage bloodline
TWF human slayer
Melee Tactician from Psionic Unleashed
Aasimar Life Oracle who wants to solely be a buff and band-aid character
Infernal Sorcerer that will be doing who knows what.

Large group, I know. I can't really do anything about it right now, but I'm expecting that everyone won't be able to attend every session.

Follow Up;

Just had our second session last night and thanks to the advice I've gotten on this forum I think I'm getting a handle on our characters. Player who got himself killed by seducing guards got his second character killed by walking through the shady districts of Korvosa alone on a dark night and unnecessarily interacted with a character who had a wheelbarrow covering a tarp. It's hard to say more without giving details away, but this wheelbarrow character shouldn't have even appeared in the AP yet and the party doesn't actually face him until the second book, so little need to say it, but this player lost his second character and is finally starting to get the picture that the way he is playing is going to result in a lot of dead characters.

I have also started using hero points as a sort of reward system in the party for doing things I think are admirable, whether that means being altruistic toward your party or just altruistic in general. By doing this, I've gotten the dumb as bricks anti-paladin to start being a party player.

Like the forum suggested, I also talked with our group about behavior and what kind of character behavior is frowned upon in game, why we don't like that behavior, and what would be a good alternative.

I think one of our problem players learned his lesson as he sent a text out last night to everyone in our group apologizing for his last two character's behavior and how he's going to try to be more party oriented with his new character.

Thanks forum for your advice!

Follow Up:

Ended up running the second session last night and it seems to be going well. Slowly turning my player's alignment as the game is progressing. Thanks for all your advice so far!

Malusiocus wrote:

So I just recently started my modified CotCT campaign with an evil party. First session in, one of our players already got himself killed by trying to poison and seduce some city guards, and dealing two damage to them with a coup de grace with a bladed fan on one of the guards she brought back to her room. I had some really good roles for the poisoned, half-drunk guard and both ended up dead by the end of the battle.

To avoid slowing down the campaign, the majority of our players opted to have our problem player just use the same character sheet and have them play the twin sister. Unfortunately, scumbag player is playing this character the exact same way and almost got himself killed twice more in the same session.

So obviously he has fun playing his character in a certain fashion, though his play style can be disruptive. Should I punish him for playing his characters in a reckless fashion, or adjust the campaign so that he can do so?

Well his actions are bring attention to the Party. use PEER pressure to Reign him in after a Vicious fight with a Wandering Paladin and his Cohorts.

Also Not every person is a good fit for every Campaign. Are other players complaining yet??

There are other players who I can tell are starting to get irritated with it, but really don't like speaking up about these issues. If she ever decides to actually confront me with her annoyances, then I will have a little more power to do something about it.

Right now I'm also having issues on trying to keep some of the more... conservative characters from also avoiding punishment. The "turnip" anti-paladin just murdered a guy that they brought to the sewers in the presence of the whole party. I plan on there being consequences for this but I'm struggling finding ways to only punish the problem players instead of the whole party.

But how do I send one or two of these characters to jail without sending the whole party. I mean if the whole party witnesses the crime and says nothing about it, they can be viewed as accomplices. Likewise, if one character tries to report it to the authorities, then it just creates unneeded animosity towards that player from the other players.

On the other hand, punishing the whole party for things that stupid players do might encourage the party to quickly discipline or dispose of misbehaving characters. I already plan on having some of the Korvosan guards recognize that one of the characters in the party looks exactly like a women who died and was a suspect in the death of two other guards. Which will probably also draw unwanted attention towards the players. I'm kind of stuck on what the right approach to this problem is without sitting down with my party and telling them how to act. I would much prefer that they learn this stuff for themselves.

I hadn't intended to run the CotCT with an evil party, but my party ended up deciding to be evil after I had gotten everything ready. Unfortunately, most of them are doing really stupid s&*& so I figure they will either learn fast or die off quickly.

I ended the last session with one of our players getting his wisdom score dropped to a flat 4 as he decided to min-max and ended up with a dimwitted anti-paladin who really likes pickles and has done a good job of pissing off one of the clerics at the Temple of Asmodeus and another character who has his heart set on literally re-creating Batman who is lawful evil, never takes off his bat suit and quotes Batman movies constantly.

The only character that I expect to live through the whole campaign is our Infernal bloodline sorcerer who really didn't want to be part of an evil party in the first place. I'm hoping that the party learns soon that they need to get their act together if they want to survive this AP quickly, or else I think I'm going to end up with a lot of frustrated players.

So I just recently started my modified CotCT campaign with an evil party. First session in, one of our players already got himself killed by trying to poison and seduce some city guards, and dealing two damage to them with a coup de grace with a bladed fan on one of the guards she brought back to her room. I had some really good roles for the poisoned, half-drunk guard and both ended up dead by the end of the battle.

To avoid slowing down the campaign, the majority of our players opted to have our problem player just use the same character sheet and have them play the twin sister. Unfortunately, scumbag player is playing this character the exact same way and almost got himself killed twice more in the same session.

So obviously he has fun playing his character in a certain fashion, though his play style can be disruptive. Should I punish him for playing his characters in a reckless fashion, or adjust the campaign so that he can do so?

You guys basically nailed it. There main motive is to basically seize Korvosa for themselves. My main concern is how their evilness is going to change the interactions between who the campaign intends to be their allies and who the campaign intends to be their enemies.

I tried to at least restrict them by not allowing CN, CE, and NE characters into the campaign, but this is still going to put them at odds with some of their major intended allies.

Fortunately, there are really only two players I really have to worry about reeking hell on the town. It sounds like the possibility of this turning out well is higher than I thought.

So I'm going to be DMing Curse of the Crimson Throne and so beforehand I wanted to know a little bit about our parties composition as the group I'm playing with tend to be a bit unorthodox. I have learned that my whole party will be more or less evil, and I know that once they have an idea like that in their head, they're going to go through with it whether I say yes or no.

I've been a lurker on these threads for awhile so I know that the most frequent solutions to these problems is that I either suggest switching campaigns to one more suited to their desires or I simply talk with my group and tell them what will and will not work in this campaign.

I'm wondering if there are any alternative solutions. All of the players have backgrounds that tie into the campaign quite well and I want to make sure that they are enjoying themselves as much as I am. What are some of my options to make this all work?

Malusiocus wrote:

Blackened curse as his primary and the shattered minds curse as his secondary.

Do you mean Shattered Self? I can't seem to find any curse called "shattered minds", and even Shattered Self is not an oracle curse. Unless you have special permission, you have to choose a curse off the oracle curses list.

I mean the shattered psyche curse, which is from the occultist adventurer's playtest.

11 STR 12 DEX 13 CON 14 INT 14 WIS and 13 CHA

Im not sure what you mean by +2 to whatever stat plus race,

When WE roll stats we do 3d6, with an additional +2 to any stat, PLUS any racial adjustments,

But I made that up, and am not aware of other groups doing that, is that what you mean?

If I had these stats, why my generation method,

I would make a Elf Kensai Magus.

I would take 2 levels of sohei monk for evasion and mounted skirmisher.
it's up to you if you use temple sword as you main weapon…i usually just ignore flurry unless I'm unarmed, I prefer Katana (In MY version of Golarion, there is no "oriental" characters per se… Japanese classes weapons and armor are of elven origin.)

so 6th Level Black Blade Kensai/2nd Level Sohei monk.

13 Str 14 Dex 12 con (with level 4 +1) 17 int (with level 8 +1) 14 wis and 13 cha.

You get AC from both Kensai INT and monk WIS and DEX (so +7 to ac)

Plus you can cast mount for all sorts of mounted skirmisher shenanigans (which gives new depth to mobility in combat as a magus)

I could also have a decent amount of fun as a Martial Master fighter with these stats. Maybe something with the dwarven racial cleave chain.

The +2 to stats is referring to the extra ability point you receive upon reaching level 4 and the other extra ability point received upon reaching level 8. I'll look into the Kensai Magus.

So far I've decided on Dual-Cursed Life Oracle with the Blackened curse as his primary and the shattered minds curse as his secondary. I think this should be able to accomplish what is needed. Thank you guys for all your help so far!

Kolokotroni wrote:

My advice? Dont play with a dm that punishes you for dying.

Actually, I would consider that to be serious advice.

Not your fault you died (at least I'm assuming it wasn't, you didn't do something extremely stupid that you're not telling us about, did you?), so why should you be punished twice for it?

Stand up for yourself, man! Flat out tell him you want to be able to make the character you want to play, just the same as everybody else has. Let you use your own point buy, or roll for your own stats, and assign them as you like, just like everybody else.

Otherwise? You're not playing, his game is down a player, and one of the ones thats left isn't reliable. He can either pull the stick out of his butt, or he can let his game die. Then one of you can be the GM instead.

Sorry, I just have zero respect or patience for bad GMs that try to be controlling over everything like that. His job as the GM is to make the game fun. If you aren't having fun the way he's doing it, then he is failing as a GM.

I'm honestly ok with the whole penalty for death thing. Otherwise, our other players in the group would just recreate their character and give them a name that was similar to their dead character and say the new character is related to the old character. I'm ok with this new system, I like to be challenged and branch out to play characters I haven't played before. We had some really frustrating instances in the past, so this method is preferred.

Also, if you could post builds with your suggestions, that would be great!

Ugh, that stat spread is awful. I was going to recommend a control-based Dark Tapestry Oracle but I doubt that would be viable with such low charisma.

I could boost the charisma up to 18 if I went with a middle-age aasimar with the Immortal Spark Alternate Racial Trait. I would like to hear how you would go about a Dark Tapestry Oracle as it seems like that theme would fit in well with our current party.

I like the Fire Bard build and I'll play around with it a bit. It looks really fun, but I need to make sure that I'll be able to survive with it.

Extra cleric is a possibility. I currently have a wonderful Life Oracle build that should be able to heal better then a cleric. I also have a Mystic Theurge Build that isn't the most optimized, but should still help fill the role of a healer and a caster.

I won't be able to play a magus, as that was my last character who died and I have to switch classes.

I'm coming in at level 8. I have yet to determine how much wealth my new character will start out with and the DM said that he would figure it out at the session. We probably intend to go through the whole campaign so we would stop at any level between 17 and 19. A druid might be nice, but I don't know how my stats are looking for wild-shaping business stuff.

So our Rise of the Runelord Party is level 8 and our party composition is pretty messed up. We have a rogue who has tried to focus on both melee and range, a ninja who focuses on melee, a blaster caster sylph sorcerer, and an undead lord cleric who has been pretty irregular in showing up to our games.

I feel like our party is lacking an actual close range fighter type, a intelligence-based caster, and a healer. I just died last session which has given me the opportunity to re-roll a new character. Problem is, our DM penalizes you for dying so I wasn't able to choose where my stats were placed.

So I need to make a 8th level character to balance our party, but the problem is this character will have base-stats of 11 STR 12 DEX 13 CON 14 INT 14 WIS and 13 CHA not including the +2 to whatever stat and race bonuses . Any and all advice is appreciated as I have to whip up this character by tomorrow.

I had a friend submit an custom archtype he would like to add to a Barbarian. I am unsure how balanced this archtype is and whether I should allow it. I'll copy/paste the doc he sent to me.

Cold Rager
Some warriors are born to wield a sword in their hands. Instead of flying into a rage, these men fall into a sort of trance, their minds calculating their opponents actions several seconds before they occur. Instead of beating their enemies to pulp, they coldly cut them down from the direction they least expect.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency
Cold Ragers are proficient with all simple and martial weapons and light and medium armor, but not shields.

Rage (combat trance)
A barbarian can call upon inner reserves of strength and ferocity, granting her additional combat prowess. Starting at 1st level, a barbarian can rage for a number of rounds per day equal to 4 + her Constitution modifier. At each level after 1st, she can rage for 2 additional rounds. Temporary increases to Constitution, such as those gained from rage and spells like bear's endurance, do not increase the total number of rounds that a barbarian can rage per day. A barbarian can enter rage as a free action. The total number of rounds of rage per day is renewed after resting for 8 hours, although these hours do not need to be consecutive.

While raging, the Cold Rager gets a +2 focus bonus to strength, AC, and combat maneuvers. While in rage, a Cold Rager cannot use any Charisma, Dexterity, or Intelligence based skills (except Acrobatics, Fly, Intimidate, and Ride and any combat maneuvers) or any ability that requires patience or concentration.

A barbarian can end her rage as a free action and is fatigued after rage for a number of rounds equal to 2 times the number of rounds spent in the rage. A barbarian cannot enter a new rage while fatigued or exhausted but can otherwise enter rage multiple times during a single encounter or combat. If a barbarian falls unconscious, her rage immediately ends, placing her in peril of death.

Trap Sense (economic movement)
At 3rd level, a cold rager can make a 5 foot step in the middle of a full-round attack action. This ability increased by 5 feet every three barbarian levels thereafter (6th, 9th, 12th, 15th, and 18th level). A cold ranger can move and attack in any combination. This movement provokes attacks of opportunity as normal, but she can still make an acrobatics check to avoid provoking them

Greater rage
Rage Bonuses increase to +3

Mighty rage
Rage bonuses increase to +4

Rage powers
Use basic powers, but with DM permission to tailor them to arch class

I'm not sure how game changing this Economic Movement class feature is and if it balances out to the reduction of rage bonuses. Can I get any thoughts? Should I have posted this to the Advice board instead?

So far, I made sure Gaedran Lamm lived so the PC's still have a motive to stay in the city, but aside physically restraining them I can't think of any better ways to do this.

So I'm running a Curse of the Crimson Throne campaign and my players tried to book it out of Korvosa on the initial night of a certain character's death. It made sense to do this, but I was afraid if they ran out they wouldn't come back. I had the Hellknights from Citadel Vraid ordered to not let anyone across the bridges. Now does this make sense? I reasoned it out in my mind that the city would like to limit access of who comes and goes from the city until things settle down, but I'm not sure how much sense this actually makes. Would there have been any better way of keeping my players in the city aside from telling them to stay in the city?

The one thing I have learned in my D&D games is the importance of detailed descriptions. It may temporarily slow down the game to describe every nook and cranny in detail, but not adding enough detail leads players to ask lots of clarifying questions. More importantly, it helps immerse the players in the environment. My problem is that I can never find words to describe buildings. There is so much architectural terminology that I am unfamiliar with, but it key to describing any real structure in my games and I'm wondering if there is a site or source I can use to brush up on my terminology. Currently running a CotCT campaign, which takes place mostly in a cityscape so knowing my architectural terms is key. Can I get any help?

How have others presented cities in their campaigns? Has anyone played a campaign with a truly memorable and immersive city setting?

Are there ways to incorporate all this town fluff without making it all seemed forced?

So I'm currently running a Curse of the Crimson Throne campaign and I am having difficulties making the city feel like a city. The PC's in my campaign more or less fast travel to whatever location they are going to, which seems to destroy the whole giant metropolitan vibe I feel Korvosa should have. Now I have the Guide to Korvosa so it's not an issue of adding more unique buildings and landmarks to the city, but other ways of adding a feeling of depth and vastness to this rich area without boring my players and making city travel tedious. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Well there are more traits and feats. Another trait that comes to mind is the Wayang Spellhunter from the Dragon Empires Primer which should stack with Magical Lineage as it is a different regional trait as opposed to a magical one. I know that there is also Spell Perfection, which would definitely help, though that is not a low-level feat. Those are the ones that come to mind off the top of my head, I may be back later to add more to the list.

Hmm, now I've added witch doctor to my list of characters... Still undecided though.

I'll look into it. I'm somewhat split between this, a barbarian, and a mystic theurge as our party also lacks a utility caster.

Anti-paladin won't help in the long run because I can't foresee us fighting any good creatures, which means that the anti-paladin's smite good ability would be a complete waste.

So I may be creating a new character for a party I am currently in, though I have no idea what to create. The current party is level 8 and composed of

A sylph elemental sorcerer who is has demonstrated to be more of a blaster type
A undead lord cleric
A rogue who is focused on archery
A ninja who is focused on melee

Let's avoid 3rd party classes and for the sake of avoiding party too much conflict in the party, paladin is out of the question. I have thought of a cleric of some sort, but I am unsure if we will need a frontline fighter with all the undead present. What should I choose?

Our DM never really expanded upon Turtleback Ferry. It almost sounded like it was a town that shouldn't be there. The DM doesn't really seem to be taking it seriously as the necromancer (aside from burning down a school and killing a few children in the process), also tried to kidnap the teacher there. The only things that the citizens do is give us bad looks every now and then. It really feels like no one in town really cares.

This would probably be really ideal and if I can convince him to do this, that would be wonderful. If I can't pull this off, any other suggestions?

So I think our party for Rise of the Runelord is near the point where some of our characters will have to die or just suddenly switch alignments out of nowhere for us to cooperate. Essentially, we have a rogue who claims to be chaotic evil who keeps most of the loot he finds secret from the party and he's been doing a pretty good job of it in-game, an undead lord cleric of Urgothoa who joined our party late and ended up with a large sum of money due to getting the amount of money he should have as a level 6 character while the rest of the party has been way behind the character wealth limit. Then we have our ninja catfolk who is on the line between chaotic evil who seems to be in cahoots with the necromancer and finally me as LN magus/monk who worships Asmodeus and a CG Sylph sorcerer.

So this is the whole situation that played out last night.

Essentially, we are at the point where my super lawful character is going to feel obligated to kill this guy off and it may come to a part split as both the ninja and the necromancer are wanted men in Magnimar for killing a few town guards. I'm most confident that I would lose if things came down to an all out fight, and frankly that wouldn't be the worst situation as I could just roll up a character with the right alignment for this party. What I'm afraid of is killing one of these player characters and then having them just creating another bad character to come back into the game and kill me for some BS reason and for this to become a personal thing. I should also note that I am kind of the outsider in this group as I was originally brought in by the DM who is a good friend of mine, but the other three evil members in the party are all high school buddies of his. Now I've become pretty good friends with these guys, but I have a feeling that things will get messy if I kill off a character of theirs.

So what should I do? I know I'm going to get a lot of people wanting me to talk to the DM about this, but I'm pretty sure he knows what is going on and is just leaving it to the players to figure out. I talked to some players letting them know that my character would feel a moral obligation to kill them and they seemed to take this somewhat personally with retorts like "You seriously think you can win against all of us?" I know people are also going to suggest that I find another group, but aside from these few things, I've really enjoyed this group for the most part and the number of readily available friends I have who play Pathfinder regularly are non-existent aside from these guys. Any other advice?

5gp/rd x 10rds/min =50gp/min
50gp/min x 60min/hr =3000gp/hr
3000gp/hr x 24hr/day = 72,000gp/day

Still a lot of money though. I expect the value of gold in your local region to go down significantly as you start to spend this all.

The character is playable as it, I just didn't really have any idea on how to progress it from here. I'm acting as the party tank as of now and was wondering what line of feats I should progress with.

It's appreciated, though I don't think I'll be able to rebuild unfortunately.

Alright, so I never planned this character all the way through and I'm starting to realize that this was a mistake. I'm wondering how I should build my character from here.

Yes, it sounds like you have tried to confront him on these issues and he is unwilling to change. I think a ban is justified

The only other two I know of are Korada and Lythertida from Chronicles of the Righteous. Both of these guys are Empyreal Lords though so I'm not sure if they count.

\I'm guessing you have Combat Casting though, since you're a Magus and all, and you excel as Casting Defensively.

I actually do not have Combat Casting. I figure I'm going to be getting some concentration check bonuses later on as I level so I haven't taken the feat. I mainly just fight defensively and cast using spell strike. If I provoke an AoO I have my Crane Style activated so I can give myself the +4 to AC on one attack made against me. I realize that this is only against one attack, but my AC is already pretty good and I can usually dodge most attacks made against me.

So someone was asking about my character in particular and here he is.

I would like to introduce another character into the party to balance it out. A Dual-Cursed Life Oracle who could do damage and provide healing. Here are her stats.

To those of you advising I let the party die. I wouldn't mind that happening, though our DM has intervened a few times in campaigns to prevent people from dying so it might be hard for a total TPK. In reality, I can just see them remaking their characters so I don't know if a TPK would fix the situation. It really comes down to the players wanting to change which I don't really see happening. This is the reason I started this thread so I could see what I could do on my part as I don't think I can do a good job convincing everyone else to change the way they plan if the DM comes to the rescue when the going gets tough.

Now I will be the first to acknowledge that our party made a lot of stupid mistakes. Unfortunately, I don't think this will be the last time they make stupid mistakes. So I'm wondering what I can do better mechanics-wise to prevent some of these situations from happening again.

Party Composition

My character: Monk Master of Many Styles 2/ Magus 3 Quarterstaff Master: Big focus on using crane style for defense while dealing out the damage.
Sylph Sorcerer 5: Not really sure what she's going for yet as she has been locked down or disabled each time we get into combat.
Dwarf Barbarian 5: Likes to hit things with his Greataxe.
Catfolk Ninja 5: Amazing stats, but has also been blinded and hasn't bothered to get that healed yet.

So what can I do on my end to make an encounter like this survivable without Infernal Intervention. I've already prepared the spells Shield and Vanish for my spells for the day so that should buy me some time to get some of those essential buffs down to start dealing with the large amounts of baddies. All suggestions appreciated!