Mith'aj the Tactful's page

"I'm here today for a... business meeting... with an old acquaintance. I thought I might take the opportunity to look in on the current Bearer of the Fifth. I've been away for some little while, so I didn't think it would be Zeldana Eutropia any more. Still, you can imagine my surprise when the cards showed me you'd be here today. Coincidence is the secret thread that binds the world together."

Coincidence, indeed. "I've been away for some little while" ... well, there's always a price.

Hey all, I have to take a hiatus from the game. Due to health issues, I had to postpone my final exam to early Feb. Add in family issues, and things are pretty stressful right now -- I don't have the time to contribute. If you need to replace me, please feel free.

If you haven't replaced me, perhaps I'll join back in in the future, if you would accept it.

Hope all are doing well.

-M

Fortuitous I logged back into Paizo today - I'm all for continuing! However, I am defending my Ph.D. on November 2, and currently in the End Game. Constant writing/prepping publications. It is likely I will require some/lots of botting between now and then.

Stay safe, Doug. We want you back alive (and incidentally continuing to GM, but that's far less important than 'back alive').

+1

On travel for work (have been for a few days) until the 21st, please bot me as necessary. Nameless is fully rested and has full spells, etc.

Ugh. When you re-read a post you wrote and determine that you should really proofread to make it more coherent and less repetitive ...

Sorry all, unexpected absence. Back tomorrow.

Nameless has 4 points of SAN loss (38/42), currently.

Oracle with No Name:

Oracle 1 -> Oracle 2

HP(1d8 + 1 favclass): 1d8 + 1 ⇒ (6) + 1 = 7
+1 BAB
+1 Will Save

Spells:

0th: 4 known -> 5 known
0th gained: *Mending

1st: 4/day -> 5/day
1st gained: *Unseen Servant (Occult Mystery)

* - both unrecalled due to fugue state (DMDM?)

Skills:

(4 Oracle + 1 Human + 1 INT = 6 skill points)
+2 Heal -- taking notes from watching Yordan (after bumbling her way through keeping him from bleeding out)
+1 Knowledge (Dungeoneering) -- creepy abominations all around
+1 Knowledge (Geography) -- has been wracking her brain to recall anything about their current location/country
+1 Knowledge (Religion)
+1 Perception -- paranoia growing? paranoia growing.

The campaign is great, no complaints here. Time is becoming more restricted as I'm on the long crunch to d-day (dissertation day), but I'm attempting to get on and post when I can.

Toned down the inner voices shtick as it was going to be laborious to keep up at that pace, and lost the novelty (if there was any); having one of them eaten/tortured by yellow man by the lake was a good excuse to mostly silence them. Spirit guide should still be a fun time when a different spirit manifests itself daily and influences my words and actions instead of being disembodied entities. Similar to Kyleen, I find playing an amnesiac difficult, but a fine challenge. I've basically decided Nameless has repressed the fact that She Can't Remember, and is just in let's-get-out-of-here-alive mode.

@DM_DM: How do you feel about the way things are going?

Oh, no, another victim of the horrible Ceiling Monster!

Everyone failed their Perception checks. RIP.

Have we lost baron/Vitae?

ORACLE WITH NO NAME

CLW: 1d8+1

Posting for the Oracle since she has not posted since last Saturday.

Thanks for botting, I was out of town at a conference until yesterday (as posted above).

However, trying to keep things honest here - I had no spells. OwNN used her last CLW on Fritz the previous night, before attempting to sleep. I didn't get a rested state due to the Dreamlands/Hooded Thing, so I have no spells at all.

What to do?

EDIT: Maybe the natural 20 on Heal in the gameplay thread can mimic a CLW, if DMDM is feeling generous ... ?

On work travel for conference next week, and prepping for said conference. If I don't get a chance to post, please bot me as required.

Will return on 29th.

No worries, we'll be here.

Nowruz partying, DMDM?

Checking in, big deadline tomorrow and Paizo board issues have kept me silent past couple of days. Resuming normal(ish) activity Soon(TM).

If it ain't peer-reviewed, I haven't put eyes on it in the last year to year-and-a-half. Ye gods. I just realized I haven't read anything for pleasure in over a year ...

Expensive, but these are relevant to our present situation.

Or that could spawn an near-infinite number of malevolent whatever-they-ares.

Rocksauce had some inkling of what was in the mirror, or she wouldn't have been prepared with the mammoth. That, or she knew something about the mechanics of what would happen and that shattering the mirror would stop it.

We're being toyed with - she's having fun and exploring, and we're inconsequential yet convenient tools. I don't think that warrants killing/attacking, as she's likely mentally ill - perhaps highly ill, going by the doctor's exclamation. Which, when/if he calms down, maybe we can ask more about.

However, our characters - tired and stressed as they are - might have something to say to her about it. Nameless, for one, is interested to see if Rocksauce can actually hear The Voices, so while she is not happy about being manipulated she's not up for attacking the girl.

Speaking of tired and stressed, let's get to the chapel ASAP.

After, you know, none of us are melting and praising.

My favorite setting was/is the Planescape setting in 2nd Ed AD&D. Devils (baatezu) and demons (tanar'ri) embroiled in the Blood War which spans across the planes, with the daemons (yugoloths) arbitrating, manipulating and coordinating deals with both sides to their own benefit. There was so much flavor there, and I didn't think the Blood War background was too restrictive on how you could set up individual planar personalities or encounters; it was very much a strong underlying driver for many interesting scenarios (as conflict often is).

Sigil was also pretty amazing, in concept. It turned the game into a high-magic, high-politics (faction politics) plane-hopping adventure with which you could do so much. And the Lady of Pain ... well, let's not speak of her.

Some folks converted the 2nd Ed. version to 3.0/3.5 after WotC dropped it. You can find it here:

http://mimir.planewalker.com/sections/30-35-pscs

And intro to the conversion/history here:

http://mimir.planewalker.com/sites/default/files/chapter1.pdf

We may lose the chance - either he's slaughtered/subjugated - or it may be like the Upside Down: a distorted, mirrored reality. In which case, we could come across him again in another location with a mirror.

I'm wondering if we say the thing, and accept him into this reality, if he just comes through, we smash the mirror and that's that? Or, is that inviting everything on the other side to this reality? Or is he a spirit who will literally try to possess us?

I'm all for getting answers from him, but also for getting to "safety".

I think that you misunderstood me. I think that for most of the spell, (and a large number of the spells are divine), it is the beliefs of the deity that really govern whether you can use a spell. If the spells have the "evil" descriptor (which was added a sort of an afterthought a few years ago), then deities with opposed faiths are simply not going to allow them.

The material components are simply that, material components. However, for many evil spells, the method of obtaining them require an evil, or at least less then ethical methodology.

I didn't know the descriptor was added more recently - good to know!

Also, I wondered about why you brought up divine influence, I suppose I was not clear that I am focusing from the point of view of arcane casting (nothing to do with Oracle), therefore removing all external influence on morality. Assume there's no divine influence, purely a discussion about the magic itself, cast by an arcane caster. If one involves the divine, then absolutely there are consequences if the caster can even get access somehow (item, scroll, etc.).

1) Introduce Infernal Healing to power hungry mortals, recipients have Baatezu bloodlines
2) Recipients populate the Prime Material with Nine Hells tieflings
3) ???
4) Profit from All The Souls

(Yes, I'm mixing editions/cosmologies above. Deal with it!)

So, if I understand your position: in the case of infernal healing you believe that the (evil) modifier indicates more about the mechanics behind the spell (material components) and context related to those mechanics, instead of any intangible evil ties to actually invoking the spell itself? Does that apply to all (evil) spells? What about Protection From Good?

The way I see it, Pathfinder isn't the real world. In our reality, the kidneys of my (alleged) murder victims cannot - solely due to their presence in my handy dandy transport cooler - influence my thoughts and actions. Yes, the act of harvesting them against the will of their previous grower/owner is certainly evil in either reality, regardless of the intent to use them for healing or in a tasty pie recipe.

That being said, intent matters for a lot in Pathfinder. That supports the view that we've both suggested, that the act itself of casting a spell doesn't make someone 'evil'. However, in a reality where metaphysical-physical feedback occurs via magical means, carrying demon kidneys might corrupt you simply due to their extraplanar, primordial evil 'radiation', if you will. If that's given, is every (evil)-labeled spell solely due to the context related to the casting (like the blood example in your post) or due to metaphysical/magical links between the spells and nefarious, universal forces? Couldn't saying the words in the (V) component, and the gestures in the (S) component, of Protection From Good could simply unleash/infect with evil inherent to that reality that has been written into the Laws of Creation?

Yes, this is abstract and not RAW stuff, I'm just curious on points of view.

So, here's a fun one that I've seen bandied about on the boards, and I am curious about what you folks have to say about it.

Does casting spells with an (Evil) modifier alter your alignment? I cast Infernal Healing to save someone's life (oh, let's say an innocent young child). Do I slide down the scale towards depravity because I happened to have/purchase/looted from a devil I slew/stolen an obscure component - vial of evil blood - on me? Does using that blood to invoke an 'evil' spell make me less 'good'?

It's not so simple to me. I say no, the act does not affect character alignment -- only if the spell is cast with evil intent. However, I could cede a 'yes' answer as the Pathfinder reality -- being one in which metaphysical concepts absolutely infuse and directly alter/influence the physical world -- is not our known reality. Just harboring a vial of devil blood in one's pack could, I suppose, have unintended effects on personality/sanity and action.

Thoughts? Too trite a topic?

TBH I always kind of ignore alignment and try to stick to a specific set of themes/attitudes instead with a character. I'm not a big fan of the alignment mechanic compared to more modern alternatives.

Yes, that's what I'm doing, basically. It can mostly be framed within the PF alignment system rules, and so I'll couch the development in that language as closely as I can. It's more about the concept behind the character for me. I'm not going to instigate unwanted PvP or disharmony in any party - unless that's an Officially Sanctioned and Discussed Thing (TM) that supports the narrative.

I always found Chaotic Neutral to be a very slippery slope for players.

Although I do remember 2 intelligent players from 1st Ed, a Drow Fighter and a Deep Gnome Thief, who played the Alignment perfectly in the Ravenloft setting.

Agreed, it's often viewed as a license to 'do what I want and damn the consequences/other players' which harms campaigns. Not my plan to play it that way; my thoughts are that as her sanity gets low (if it gets low) she'll retreat into herself and become much more insular and will give more credence to the will of her spirits (and they run the gamut in alignments) than exerting her own will and doing 'good'. That being said, maybe she would shift into TN instead of CN since the spirits' tugs would be equivalent in all directions. But, there are 6(!) other players, so everyone's interactions will feed into this planned development.

This also assumes that she survives ...

Sorry, all - hard deadline + medical emergency has kept me tied up. Will resume more frequent posting soon.

Didn't someone send an assassin after Nimpy?

Yeah, that's what I was referencing above, re: one or more of you nix-ed him being in 2nd PbP with the Special Plot Points.

BTW, as a lurker for the DMDM Way of the Wicked PbPs from early in the first one, my main disappointment (aside from the overall story not being finished) was not getting to see the carefully orchestrated Revenge of Nimpy. The fact that (I believe) one or more of you chose to nix him from the second PbP - a wise choice as players - was hurtful. HURTFUL. Along with Doctor Moon, Nymphotis Cleadhoe was one of my favorite NPCs from that storyline.

"To lose one character to being critted by a boss is a misfortune. To lose two in a row smacks of carelessness."

-- Oscar Wilde, or someone

Yikes. Burn unit to the corner of Bref Ave. & Xenfal Way.

@DMRaven - would love to, don't have the time to focus on another game. Will read and follow, for sure, though (if on public board).

West coast, writing dissertation, applying to postdoc positions. Hectic time, but I can post usually once per day - with bursts here and there.

Sherkov is in the AP, but not until later (if memory serves) - DMDM took some well-received creative liberties.

Regarding ponies: As a lurker extraordinaire, I, for one ...

Judge was innocent. (How often is /that/ said?)

Or another doppleganger.

STOP IT.

My understanding as of this post is that Kyleen is out of heals/1st level spells.

As for the healing components, the troll styptic was a single dose - used to pull Yordan back from death, and I believe the other components take healing checks/time to rest to work.

I only have one CLW at the moment, and Nameless is at 6/9 HP. I believe Yordan merits the first heal, if we wish to use it.

Should we save it? Heal the (de)Ranger? Thoughts?

Dude. Respectfully.

That's pretty sick. Dude.

If you are referring to the Hellraiser scene, yeah. It's more Katapesh/Zon-Kuthon than Wherever-We-Are/Lovecraft, but there's a puzzle box thing.

Apropos of nothing.

After looking through the first few pages of Awful Hospital, I find your statement ... unlikely.

So..either that box is a Secret Chest with Mrakala's spellbook or it will release a Nightshade into our existence. Knowing DMDM, it's a nightshade.

Let me open it anyway!

DM_DM has such sights to show you.

Thanks for sharing.

After reading a bit, I like the stylized art and the frenetic lettering, though paneling is a bit awkward at least in the early comics. It reminds me somewhat of Scott Pilgrim with the band vs. band vibe, though with female leads. Also, it seems to lack the constant video game references ...

In return, I recommend to everyone: A couple of older, complete comics I really dig (heh) are Freakangels (Warren Ellis++) and Digger (Ursula Vernon). I mainlined both of those.

Do tell, which one?

Quote:

Blue Mosque

Envy, envy, envy...

No kidding! What a beautiful location (or I assume it to be as I've not been ...)

I'm betting those lumps in the furnace are just burnt and charred meat. Likely humanoid in nature.

Poor bastards. I'm just hoping they don't start moving.

MannyGoblin wrote:

Use Jolt on blood samples to find the phony

Hopefully that doesn't work :]

Oh, I don't know ... it doesn't look that bad ... Technically heated copper in this clip, but same premise.

If we need some Lovecraftian flavor/inspiration here, look no further than deep sea fishing.

I have no problems. In fact, I'll share the healer's kits and alchemy stuffs I have with you since you have higher healing than me (I plan to take a rank or two next level.) We'll then have some healing capabilities spread around a bit.

If you want, take from my pack:

2 doses of smelling salts
1 dose of Allnight
1 dose of Bloodblock
Healer's Kit x 2

Yeah, that was my initial aim for detect magic in this post, but I get the feeling DMDM didn't want it to be that easy (he deflected with a glowing shiny) so I didn't pursue it.

edit - Also, I cast light earlier, here is the unlock for that.

Light: 1d100 ⇒ 17

edit2 - booyah.

Mith'aj the Tactful wrote:

Speaking of torture, I just realized I haven't been rolling the 50% failure condition for spellcasting with Fugue 0. DMDM - is that something we should be rolling with each spell, or tell you we attempt a cast and let you roll?

Yes -- I was meaning to remind you about that.

Meaning we should roll the 50% and choose low/high when we want to cast? Low is typically what I choose, and in the order I cast them:

Command: 1d100 ⇒ 99
Detect Magic: 1d100 ⇒ 21
Stabilize: 1d100 ⇒ 99
Cure Light Wounds: 1d100 ⇒ 2

edit - So Command failed on Butcher and is still locked away. Stabilize failed and is locked away but styptic healed the prone Yordan. Other two succeeded and are now freed. Sheet has been updated with marks noting which are still locked away in memory.