Nivek's page

Another, not quite cheap, option is Reaper's Darkthrall Cultist set -> link

Though not obvious from the Paizo entry, there are nine figures in this set. Only 2-3 sculpts/poses in the set though, so it's best to paint them slightly differently.

Hope that helps.

Also, not official, but my interpretation is that the shadowdancer is really scary in dim light!

With "Hide In Plain Sight", the character can hide even while being observed as long as he's within 10' of dim light.

I would allow only the first attack per round to count as "stealthed" since the Stealth skill specifically calls out hiding after a ranged attack, calling it "Sniping".

At most I would require a 5' step.

To counter this, have monsters with full darkvision or set encounters where there's no dim light. Otherwise, I think you have to prepare for lots of sneak attack damage.

Really ?
But Magic Weapon is a Transmutation spell. This is not the way to make a magic weapon anymore ?

You can make a weapon temporarily magic with that spell. Add permanence and it's almost a "real" magic weapon. However, the real method is defined here:

Magic Item Creation

This shows how these items respond to Detect Magic:

Magic Items overview

(All links from the PRD)

Crimson Jester wrote:

option #4 }

please explain your reasoning?

We waste a lot of time and energy finding, investigating, and nominating candidates that never even see a vote. Seems pretty wasteful to me, even before you look at the big picture: Deliberately slowing the operation of government to a crawl seems self-evidently inefficient.

Need to read up on the discussions of the Founders. Slowing the process is/was exactly the point. If they can pass anything within a very short amount of time, they can rally the public to get nearly anything passed. Filibuster and the other procedures were added to filter out "kneejerk reactions".

Personally, I'd rather have a procedure where a bill has to be passed in one of the chambers (either House or Senate) and then has to delay 3 months for public inspection before it can be looked at in the opposite chamber.

I'd like to see bills only deal with a single topic too. So what if they have to pass thousands of bills per year? There's no difference in that & passing a single bill with thousands of items hidden within.

LOL.

A player in my partially-homebrew campaign won't be happy. I'll admit the giant version appeared to be a bit too good; mostly due to the oddities of 3.5E grapple. I think I'll have to house-rule this to be a giant one also.

Anybody figured out those stats yet? (yes, I'm just that lazy! ;)

In the PPRG, the size of the snake isn't completely clear.

If the user throws the rod to the ground (a standard action), it grows to become a constrictor snake by the end of the round.

Was this an intentional reduction from the 3.5E version? (emphasis mine)

If the user throws the rod to the ground (a standard action), it grows to become a giant constrictor snake by the end of the round.

Now that we have the bestiary (well, the pdf anyway), the regular constrictor is a medium (CR2) snake. Should the Giant Template be applied?

If not, is the rod really worth it's 13k gp value? A standard +1/+1 quarterstaff should be in the 4k gp range (2k for each side's +1 bonus).

That leaves about 9k gp for a snake that can't constrict anything bigger than a halfling.

Am I missing something?

Joe Sixpack wrote:

Honestly, there are lots of people who do call the education system socialist because it is funded by tax money.

Well, I would like to meet one of them, because I've never met anyone who honestly held that opinion before. Where can I find one of these people?

Do they hang around at militia meetings with birthers & flat-earthers?

Raises hand. I'm such a person. My family choses to homeschool our two children. We pay for it all on our own on top of the ~$8k/year in property taxes that mostly go to state-run education. Why? Because the State of GA is LAST in the nation in most rankings! I grew up in that system & saw how crappy it was (and it's much worse now! I've tutored kids 10 years behind me, it's truly remarkable how little they are expected to learn/know).

My kids will never darken the door of a public school while I am alive.

And before the accusations fly, they are getting first rate education - my 8yo daughter is doing math that I didn't see until 7th grade (who did 15 digit addition/subtraction in 2nd grade, Hmm?); she's studied dinosaurs, history of China, Ancient Rome, and the Dark Ages. And she's just about to go into 3rd grade where she'll start US History. She's learning the guitar and is fascinated by LEGO Mindstorms.

Is she a super-learner? Yes....just like 99% of all kids are before the system sucks it out of them!

/thread-jack. Hazel, contact me off-thread if you wish to discuss further.

I detest all of the "hidden" taxes that drain from our paychecks in the hopes we won't notice. I fully support "The FairTax" which would remove all Federal taxes currently enacted & replace them with a far more simple/loophole-free consumption tax. Then those that have more (or at least those that spend more) pay the greater share of taxes. It also encourages savings, because it's not taxed until the money is spent. I encourage all to review The FairTax - it's configured to handle those near/below the proverty level by giving "prebates" monthly to all citizens (thus illegals that buy things pay into the system, but don't get that money back).

I am a staunch conservative. I think the Fed has assumed powers it was never intended to have. The Constitution details the very limited powers the People grant to the Fed, all other powers are withheld by the people or granted to the many States.

If Maine or Hawaii wants to provide "free" healthcare, fine they may. But as soon as they run their budgets into the ground, don't come begging for my earned income to pay for it!

We have a right to pursue happiness, which does include health. We are NOT guarenteed happiness/health at the expense of other's property. When the people feel they can take from one to give to themselves, property rights eventually erode to meaninglessness.

Yes, there is fear mongering & slander going on...on both sides. We need to slow this train down, give a truly open forum to all of the solutions, and have time to choose the best one. Personally, I think the Fed should stay out of it, but if such "must" be done, we should try the various methods at the State level first - for 5 years or so. If pure market solutions fail, its only one State. If pure socialist methods fail, it's only one (other) State.

If we screw this up on the Federal level, it will remain bad for generations.

I'm one on the strongly opposed camp, for a variety of reasons.

It's called "universal health care", but we already have that. Anyone that goes into an ER must be treated regardless of their ability to pay. That's already part of the law for life threatening injuries/illness.

So what we are really talking about here is RISK MANAGEMENT via insurance.

Thus the government, in its "infinite" "wisdom" decides that I don't know how to best care for myself or my family. Instead of allowing me the Freedom of use of my own property (earned income), some bureaucrat will decide for me. I see very little to garner trust in the current administration's spending restraint (same for the last one, for that matter), so when the plan ends up with costs 5x,10x,50x what they currently project they'll just pillage more of my property!

I prefer a Free Market solution. Remove the regulation that prevents healthcare service providers from advertising their prices. Force insurance companies to reimburse patients, not pay doctors directly.

These two steps would allow consumers to shop for treatment, driving down costs just like competition does for every other product/service. Having patients pay their doctors directly prevents insurance fraud (one of the listed causes of cost inflation) and helps reduce usage of services for unnecessary issues (common colds can't be treated, so stop wasting money going to the doc for sniffles).

Last year I started getting them frequently. Turns out something is messed up with my ears (pressure in inner ear) & that jump starts them if I do anything to make it worse (loud noise of a lawnmower, concert, etc & I'll have one within 2 days). After research, I believe I've had them all my life though - strong chemical odors & certain foods would give me screaming headaches that only abated after long sleeps. Regular headache meds wouldn't touch them at all.

However in the last year, I've had GREAT success with a migraine drug called Imitrex. Even the low dose (25mm) version kicks it out within 30 minutes. I still feel sort of hung over for another 10-12 hours, but the migraine goes away. Some folks it works wonders for & some it does nothing. Also the dosage can vary wildly. It's a bit hit or miss/trial-error to figure out what will work for you.

I don't get truly intense pain & have never gotten the visual aura effects you describe (My Mom does though). I had one instance where my hands tingled/itched about 45 minutes before the pain hit, but that's not usual for me. Generally I just get to a phase where I'm VERY slow thinking - instead of reading words, I get "fascinated" by the individual letters & can't expand my focus or concentrate enough to understand words. I get really angry during these events too (Sorry kids). I'm also very sound-sensitive too. And for some reason, when I'm in one, I deny that it's a migraine. My wife has to suggest I go take the meds & I get really mad at her...but she's always been right about it when she spoke up.

Be "glad" you have the aura that happens before it really gets going...you can use that as a queue to take the blocker medication & stop it before it gets worse.

I've had some of the fluorescent lights removed above my cube at work. I also use only dark backgrounds (less eye strain for me) on my monitor. I am a programmer, so I can't get away from the computer too often.

Drink more water, avoid caffeine, etc etc.

But do see a doctor about them. It's treatable; they have some new drugs in the last 2-3 years that might help.

I hope you can find something to combat it. It sucks having your own brain fighting you. Good Luck!

Other threads on these 'boards have talked about how our society tends to blast poor service & ignore good service.

Well, I just wanted to publicly thank Alison for not only fixing my (minor) issues but doing so very quickly!

It's obvious that REAL customer service is one of the core ideas of Paizo's business plan. Great products! Great service! My only complaint is not having enough hobby budget to send to you!

Thank Y'all! It *IS* appreciated!

(Just for those that might wonder, the MAIN issue I experienced was that I didn't get an email with tracking info for a just-shipped order. It PROBABLY got eaten by some spam filter gone awry, but Alison still dealt with such tedium quickly & completely!)

Here's something from one of the stay home Dads...

I know you said you can't afford for your wife to stay home, but make sure and do a real cost analysis. My wife and I ended up ahead by me staying home and not putting our kids in daycare. Mind you, we also sold our car, because we only needed it for me to go to work, and that saved us a bundle.

Ditto this, except my wife is the stay at home. It *IS* tough at first financially, but once the lifestyle adjustments click in place (less eating out, maybe even less house, maybe less car (number &/or type)), it's not THAT bad.

Daycare will eat a LOT of money fast. I saw a stat back in 1998 that said that daycare for 2 kids, car expenses, clothes, eating out, etc caused by 2 people working equated to take home pay of about $30k/year. So if one of you is making less than that, you are costing more by working than staying home. Inflation since '98 has probably made the numbers even worse.

Seriously, run REAL numbers on how much it costs. You have to include taxes and be realistic about how much you can change your spending. But we found we actually save MORE with her home than with her working (and she started the 'at home' thing prior to kids due to downsizing. She was right at that $30k mark in '99.

I don't mean to sound like I doubt you. If you've found you can't do it, you can't. No bash intended. However, I've talked to a lot of folks that marvel that we can manage it & find that they won't really check their budgets to see.

Also, cloth diapers are much cheaper in the long run than disposable, and despite what you might think they are by and large easier and less stinky to deal with under most circumstances than disposable. If you have a washing machine you can buy your own and wash them at home, if not, even a diaper delivery service is usually cheaper than disposable (and you don't have to be the one to wash them then).

We mostly used a brand called Fuzzi Buns, but cloth diaper technology is advancing faster than computer memory capacity right now.

We couldn't abide the idea of dealing with that much poo. You are supposed to flush most of it...and I'm sorry but early the kid makes stuff more akin to paving tar than normal poo!

Still, we have friends that just raved about cloth & the services.

Anyway, congrats on the new addition to the family! It's an amazing thing. Nothing I've ever done has been so difficult, nor so rewarding.
Enjoy! Take insane numbers of pictures, they can change by the millisecond the first few weeks!

Sara Palin wrote:

Al-Qaida terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America ... he's worried that someone won't read them their rights?

emphasis mine.

....

She probably didn't mean it the way it sounded, I can grant her that. I don't care what others have said about it only being a right of American citizens or whatever. It doesn't matter to me. That issue is more about being human than American. I believe that you should grant people their basic rights whether it's a law or not.

In my undecided view she shouldn't have said that.

And yes, one comment can make a difference in what people think.

There is a HUGE difference in acknowledging someone's inherent Rights/Freedoms and reading them the Miranda Warning while on a battlefield. I thought her choice of words was precise, but perhaps it was too subtle a difference?

The Dems want to make a War into a "Police Action" & treat people that run planes into buildings as mere criminals. They aren't planning mass jaywalking; they want to destroy our Nation & subject any that survive to a life without ANY freedoms!

If we catch them on US soil, it may be appropriate to handle them via the criminal courts, perhaps. However, if they are on an active battlefield, firing on US Solders or captured after such a fight, I see *NO* reason to treat them like anything other than Prisoners of War. POWs are to be treated humanely, but aren't subject to the same rules as your local police officer has to follow when you run a redlight.

Make your own laws and stick by them.

By this I mean make your own personal guidelines, your own set of rules that governs your behaviour. Then follow them 100%. Your morals are ambiguous, so you can look upon 'good' and 'evil' acts with the same indifference.

I "second" this idea. I'm playing a LN dwarven fighter that was initially based on John Wayne's character in "The Shootist".

Wayne's character in that movie is an aged gunfighter with the motto: "I won't be wronged. I won't be insulted. I won't be laid a-hand on. I don't do these things to other people, and I require the same from them." Those that break this code quickly get shot. He doesn't shoot anyone in the back though.

Set down on paper a set of personal rules, a code of honor, if you will. Then NEVER violate it. What is allowed in that code might be viewed as good or evil; doesn't matter your character is Neutral. The only "wrong" is breaking that code.

Paul,

I just found this thread. I'm sitting across from my wife & she thought I'd lost my mind. I was laughing so hard I couldn't breath & tears were rolling. Took me 5 minutes or more to get control of myself! That's the funniest thing I've read in years, maybe ever!

Thanks for the tale, I needed a good laugh! Sorry for your pain though!

First let me say that you, your wife, & your baby are in our prayers!

Second, I have to admit that what I've been through PALES compared to what you are experiencing now. Please forgive any cliches that I will now spout....

Mostly, I want to say that you are doing the right things. You are in a hospital you trust, but you aren't bowing to every whim of the doctors. Also you are keeping them reminded of things said/done previously. And you are venting to neutral parties instead of blasting those that you need to provide help!

It is indeed frustrating to have the medical staff messing up or in some way needing you to get them to think. Yes, it is their job. Sadly, that's exactly the problem - they have 50-100 patients all with serious issues. The human brain can't do constant crisis-mode for long, & these truly caring folks slip up & make mistakes.

Do your best to remain civil. Come here & call us the names you want to call the doc's.

Try to "cat nap" when you can; it may not feel like it, but those milliseconds of sleep do keep you sane & sort of functional.

Keep up your own strength. It's easy to try to ignore yourself when all this stress hits. But you need to have nutrition too...even more than normal due to all this stress! Try to limit caffine. Get plenty of water. (I was so stressed a month before my 1st was born, I brewed up a kidney stone. Don't do that!)

Tell your wife you love her often. Hold her hand. Studies show that touch helps healing.

Keep us posted as you can, but seek rest first.

Oh and as far as the X-ray goes: I got zapped by a 1971 vintage machine, that's how Mom found out I was cooking. I was a good bit less far along than 17 weeks. I'll be 37 in a few months, nothing yet! "X-rays == Cancer" is over hyped. Especially the vastly lower dose they use now.

I think I'm stuck too.

Sorry for the bother!

We're working to get more, but we're not sure how long it will take.

Can the status on all of the Pathfinder mini's be set to "Backorder"? I'd like to throw in an order for several of them (this Lamia mini for one) but can't due to the "currently unavailable" status.

Please?

I don't mind if it takes a while to get them in. I'm concerned that if I don't get backorder in, I will miss when they do come available again.

Thanks in advance!

Has this one already sold out? It's showing as "currently unavailable", but some folks have gotten it already.

Hope I didn't miss the only "print" run...

Wha...?

::Checks::

D'OH!

::Fixes previous mistake::

Whatever do you mean?!? I never made any mistake! If you check, you will see that the proper book is exactly where it belongs in your sidecart!

It has always been there. Of course!

:)

Yep, everythings happy now! I must have been hallucinating, I guess!

;^)

Thanks Cosmo!

Nivek wrote:

Order #935616. Same thing - PF9, minus Gazetteer.

I will get a copy in with your next subscription shipment.

Thanks,
cos

Thanks Cosmo! (just noticed that having this avatar makes me look angry & being terse above didn't help... ;^)

I just checked my SideCart & it looks like you put in another copy of PF9. Sorry if I was unclear - I got PF9 today, just not the Gaz. Don't want y'all sending the wrong one.

Thanks a lot! Sorry for the problems.

ktm

Order #935616. Same thing - PF9, minus Gazetteer.

I raised a few goats too -- did you know goats are the best friends of horses? They calm them down.

Some of my favorite childhood memories is our goat chasing my mother around the well...

Our neighbor had horses. They would reach over the fence, and the goat would caper about. My Mom said she was showing off. I didn't quite get that at the time! 8-o

None of our goats would threaten either of my parents. The first one, a male, was very gentle; he never butted anyone his entire life. The female we got much later just knew better!

She'd play/fight with me though...caught me flat-footed (in ever sense of that term) and headbutted me in the knee, I thought it was broken for several minutes, but just hyper-extended it!

I don't have enough room to have any now. Too bad, it's a great experience for kids to grow up with kids (oh man, that's bad even for me!)

I think if you raise them from kids, they can get really attached.

I've (or really my parents) raised a couple goats. They are very loyal animals. They are smarter than often given credit for & don't eat everything as depicted in cartoons. They WILL nibble/taste nearly anything, but not eat it. They are actually VERY picky eaters!

They make surprisingly good watchdogs! They bleat if anyone comes nearby that they don't know. Whatever they view as "their territory" will be watched carefully...until nap time!

I'd place them somewhere between cats and dogs on the independence-vs-affection scale. They are affectionate, but they can have strong personalities. One of our goats didn't like children (anything smaller than me, the goat would try to attack!), but the other goat we had adored the attention.

Males need to be neutered fairly young or they will develop musk...and the reek that gives off is bad enough to peel paint! Pepper spray burns less!

Their hooves have to be cared for much like a horses'. In nature, they move about on rocks or otherwise keep them worn down. We pen them up & then have to cut off the hoof parts as they grow (think: trimming two giant toe nails per foot. No it's nastier than that).

Due to the hooves thing, room for them to exercise/play, and just to reduce the feed costs, I'd not recommend getting a goat unless you have more than 1/2 acre to dedicate to their pen. They will eat flowering plants & even the bark off fruit trees.

Wow, this is likely my longest post on Paizo ever ...and it's about goats. That's just disturbing....

I'm in.

Actually likely to buy 4 copies of the Beta & at least one of the Final.

So...I don't know what that does to the counts...Sorry.

1) No. My gaming group has decided to stick with 3.5E.

2) I'd drop any subscription to 4E-specific material.

3) I'm locked already, so I'm in for the 3.5E ride!

I really hate the idea of having to drop subscriptions - I like sending you guys money! I might transfer my spending to Planet Stories, but so far I've not had enough reading time to justify buying the novels.

Before the 4E announcement, I bought everything WotC produced. I've bought NOTHING since then. I've been spending a bit more with Paizo Pathfinder & GameMastery, but enjoying them greatly. If I have to drop my subscriptions, I'll divert at least some hobby money into miniatures and such. Paizo will get at least some cut of that spending.

Let's say we decide to go with a different edition than the one you intend to play. If your subscription came with a downloadable "conversion guide" file for your preferred system, with all of the correct stat blocks and rules for the adventure, would that convince you to keep up your subscription?

That would certainly make the decision much more difficult.

I won't be playing 4E. At all. So having a book that defaults to 4E, but has a conversion to 3.5...well, I'd probably buy 1-3 to test the quality.

Since "Paizo == quality game products", that likely means I'd stay with it even after 4E.

At the 4E announcement, my gaming group discussed it & decided to remain 3.5E. I've seen almost nothing about 4E that I like.

I greatly respect you, Mr. Mona, and all of Paizo. You've earned that respect with open, reasonable customer service and very high quality products. This very thread proves that folks at Paizo care about their customers' happiness!

I don't see that same concern for customer satisfaction from WotC. The apparent attitude from what's been presented is beyond "PR blundering". It's wholehearted arrogance. WotC/Hasbro management appears to believe that we are all drooling sycophants & will drink whatever "kool-aid" they produce! Quality has been poor for over a year (likely because all of the resources were working on 4E? And they still don't have decent previews?).

I was concerned with Paizo's stability when the magazines were killed. Paizo has made a great set of products, however, and I'm happy to support them. At least while they remain 3.5E compatible.

If you find that you have to move to 4E for financial/business reasons, I trust you enough to "know" you'll say just that here. I respect that. If such a parting must come, I'll do what I can to support Paizo in other ways (mini's perhaps).

I got a "D" in Conduct in 8th grade Social(ist) Studies because of gaming. I talked to the teacher ahead of time, pointed out the kids that would be playing, enforced strictly her rule that all work must be complete before we had any "free time", even coached/mentored a couple of the kids to help them get over issues they had with learning the material....and she still wrote us all up for "playing THAT game". My Mom actually had to calm ME down & didn't punish me at all.

Ahh...the beauty of Home Schooling is looking ever more promising.

We do homeschool, so if the "teacher" calls me out on something I really am in trouble! On the other hand, the "parent-teacher conferences" can be a lot more fun! ;^)

B.

I've discussed it with my gaming group & no one is interested in converting.

I'm the only one even casually keeping up with the marketing disaster that is WotC "news" about 4E. I don't know whether it's the poor handling or that the material is unappealling.

At most, I'll review the 4E SRD (if/when it comes out openly, I won't be subscribing to the DDI). If that looks amazingly good, I'll attempt a short "playtest". If I can run a game well from the SRD, we might swap. But if I actually can run from that, I probably won't BUY the books.

While my group runs primarily home-brew campaigns, when I DM a game, I dip moderately into pregenerated products (thus my subscriptions).

At this point I am stongly hoping that Pathfinder retains support for 3.5E in some fashion.

FYI: Thundarr runs on Boomerang channel every night (2:30am or so).

Fatespinner:

If you haven't already, look at Pogre's thread on the ENWorld messageboards -> LINK. He's collected juat about all of the info imaginable in that thread!

Also look at the Reaper Mini site for "The Craft" area which has lots of articles on mini painting. Especially look at the Let It Flow article! That page made a HUGE difference in the quality of my painting (from really sad to just pitiable, but still that's improvement! Right? ;^)

I spent the money on the Vallejo paints. Quality paint does make a difference - the good stuff uses a LOT of finely ground pigment so that thining the paint really works. If you go with Vallejo look on their website for their how-to articles (you want to thin their paint a LOT more than 1-1 usually). There are other high quality paints (Master Series is supposed to be great too).

I recommend spending money on good brushes above all other priorities though. If you limit yourself to crappy brushes, you'll get poor results no matter how good a painter you are! Again look at the review sites. Treat your brushes well & they'll last "forever", treat them badly & they'll ruin hours of work!

Hope that helps some.

Thanks for the great run!

You guys have & will continue to be the best, true-est D&D material available!

In order to damage the book inside, someone would have to maul it pretty good.

Oh man! I hope my mail carrier doesn't see this! She'll take it as a personal challenge!

;^)

It's very likely just a static charge (as said before).

At my first (real) job, we had a vendor of ESD (Electro-Static Discharge) Protection gear come in to give a presentation.

Unprotected electrical components can be killed by a mere 20 volt static discharge. If you can HEAR a discharge, it's at least 1000 volts. If you see it an arc, it's over 2000 volts. A discharge that can throw an arc more than about half an inch is probably over 10,000 volts!

Generally electronic devices are built so that any static discharges are fed through the case or some other metal pathway in such a way that it won't hurt the components. If you've got a cheap device or are just able to store large amount of static charge, you might be overcoming it's protection features.

NEVER touch the pins on your cell phone adapters (where it plugs in for data transfers and/or recharge. While these areas SHOULD be protected, that protection is only finite & can be reduced by repeated ESD hits. It might survive the first hit or even the first 100. Worse, transistors have a nasty habit of not dying COMPLETELY but just flaking out on you later. Makes determining a cause really tough!

As devices get smaller, protection circuits tend to get weaker.

While I don't recall killing devices, I can draw a powerful static arc. Especiall on "Casual Fridays"?!? Apparently has something to do with my shoes. All I have to do is sit down in my office chair, stand straight up (no/minimal sliding on fabric & no foot dragging on carpet), and I can pull a 0.25-0.5 inch arc everytime.

Seek metal handrails and other sources of "Ground" & frequently discharge. Again, it takes VERY little voltage to damage modern electronics. Far less than you can feel.

Another thing that can work: Increase the humidity. You can actually dump static charge into humid air just like touching a metal ground.

</electrical engineering geek-isms>

So, I have a question for you regarding Pathfinder minis. Would you (and anybody else can chime in too) be interested in minis if they were the traditional metal, unpainted sort? I can get that kind of mini done MUCH faster than trying to go the prepainted plastic route.

-Lisa

I *much* prefer the "good ole" metal mini's!!

The few (very few) prepainted plastics used in our group look really bad! Out of the box all of the swords & other pointy bits were bent & attempts to fix them led to cracked paint. And the paint commonly missed the feature it was aimed at. All round low quality.

*PERHAPS* WotC fixed these issues later (these were bought early in the pre-painted offerings), but we've not bothered to risk investing in any others to find out.

I'm not against plastic as a material - some of the GW plastics are VERY detailed. That's great. It's the cheap looking paint AND poor details that make us avoid the D&D Minis. And the cost. And the random boxes.

PLEASE don't release the mini's in random packs. I really hate that! I'm ok with having certain ones only available through the GameMastery sets (get the mini's with the adventure), but just don't randomize.

Thanks for asking for our input! Your company really understands customer relations!

Kevin.

p.s. I also like the new goblins, especially the backstory stuff! And I also keep thinking "crud, I gotta wait until September?!?!"

I'm confused by the cost/pricing of the "Battle Visor" attached component. Anyone know how they calculated it?

It's component spells are "Greater Arcane Sight" and "See Invisible". However, the listed CL is 5th. Uh, how? Greater Arcane Sight is a 7th level Wizard-only spell; doesn't that require a 13th level caster as a minimum?

The text lists the item with a Price of 55,000 gp & a construction cost of 27,500 gp, 2200 XP, & 55 days.

I understand that pricing is more an art than a science, but this seems to be more than 50% of the value the DMG's guidelines indicate.

What "mark up" is needed to make such an item "general use" (not a warforged component, but a regular item usable by anyone)?

Thoughts?

Thanks for the (quick!) replies!

It's the lair of a kobold "tribe", so the PCs *should* be expecting traps. I doubt they will actually fall in.

The Kobold leader will have access to Craft Wondrous Item, so the illusion will be a permanent effect/magic item. Thus the other reason I needed to know which spell to use -> cost!

Again, thanks for the help!

I've seen mentions of such nasty traps before, but never a full write-up.

I want a rather deep pit trap "covered" by an illusion of a normal floor. What would the search DCs and CR be for such a combination?

Also which Illusion spell would be needed? (I'm sure Illusory Wall would work, but would any of the lower level ones?)

Thanks for the help!

For these types of questions, I always consult the DndIndex:

http://www.juicymango.co.uk/dndindex/

A quick search reveals that neither the Dao or Marid has been updated.

Anyone have contact with the operator/owner of that site? It's been "locked up" for a few weeks now.

Great resourse! I used it a lot.

However, in round three, when the spell allows you to detect the "surface thoughts of any mind in the area," the "target’s Will save prevents you from reading its thoughts." I would rule that, even if a vampire's immunities did not apply for the first two rounds, it would here. The fact that the target gets a Will save is what leads me to that conclusion.

It's not a significant part of the adventure, just mentioned as a potential problem with the stated beginning of the adventure.

Mainly, I asked because I thought I'd been doing such wrong!

Your ruling is how I thought it would work as well (although I might have been more strict, not allowing even Rounds 1 & 2).

Thanks.

I have a question about Dungeon 126's Vampires in Waterdeep adventure (not sure if that was the correct title, I don't have it in front of me).

Not to spoil anything, I'll summarize thus:

Does the Detect Thoughts spell work on intelligent undead, like a Vampire?

The adventure seems to indicate that it can, but I thought undead were immune to mind-affecting spells. Detect Thoughts is listed as "mind-affecting, divination".

From the SRD3.5 there appears to be an opening for it to work: Divination isn't one of the types listed in the Undead entry.

Just curious how other people handle this. Thanks.

I did have one other concern about the new stat blocks... their size.

Squid

Agree totally. I just got #126 & had a lot of trouble finding them (they blend with the rest of the normal text == BAD!). They also tend to be so long that they span columns & I think even pages. That's REALLY bad. I need it all in one place for it to be useable at the table.

All the more reason to publish the NPC and monster stats as part of the online supplement to the game.

Second this as well!

I would like to see ALL the monster/NPC statblocks in Dungeon magazine in the back of the magazine...all of them + published online in an online supplement. Running the AP has made it very annoying to have to keep flipping between pages to look up the NPC's...why not put them all in one place?

ABSOLUTELY!

The Sunless Citadel module did this VERY well. A flag in the module's location entry told you which NPC was there & how they would interact when encountered. Stat blocks were grouped at the end! I photocopied these so I could write on them as the encounter occurred. If an NPC died, it got crossed out. If it moved to a new area, I just wrote it down on the stat block page! Easy!

My only disagreement with Farewell2kings is that I'd like the block to be at the end of EACH adventure. Then when I go to make my "at the table" copy, I only get the NPCs appropriate to that adventure. I don't want to grab the wrong line & use some 26th level bad from an epic encounter!

They already group the new monsters & magic items at the end. Why not all the stat blocks?

Having it all in one place also makes it easier to handle NPC interactions that span game sessions. You have your notes all in one spot instead of across the entire adventure text.

If the new statblocks are here to stay due to DMG II or Wizards or whatever--use smaller font??

Again, ditto!

If you are stuck with them, ok, I'll adapt.

But I really hate them. Too much white space, line-wraps in really awkward places, no distinction from regular text all add up to making them really hard to read & thus use.

To be brutally honest, the first time I saw them my reaction was "wow, Wizards is having to pad page count by making stat blocks 10 times longer?"

Granted, the old blocks were too tightly packed, but this goes too far the other way.

/rant

ktm