Peter Acs's page

Hi all,

I have a character build that is aiming for Swashbuckler(Inspired Blade) 5/Monk (Karmic Monk) 2 and I'd like to know how the following abilities interact.

Opportune Parry and Riposte (Ex): At 1st level, when an opponent makes a melee attack against the swashbuckler, she can spend 1 panache point and expend a use of an attack of opportunity to attempt to parry that attack. The swashbuckler makes an attack roll as if she were making an attack of opportunity; for each size category the attacking creature is larger than the swashbuckler, the swashbuckler takes a –2 penalty on this roll. If her result is greater than the attacking creature’s result, the creature’s attack automatically misses. The swashbuckler must declare the use of this ability after the creature’s attack is announced, but before its attack roll is made. Upon performing a successful parry and if she has at least 1 panache point, the swashbuckler can as an immediate action make an attack against the creature whose attack she parried, provided that creature is within her reach. This deed’s cost cannot be reduced by any ability or effect that reduces the number of panache points a deed costs.

Karmic Strike (Su): At 1st level, a karmic monk gains bonuses against creatures that attack him first. If a creature the karmic monk has not attacked within the past 24 hours makes an attack roll against the karmic monk or casts an offensive spell that affects the karmic monk, the karmic monk receives a +2 bonus on attack rolls and damage rolls against that creature. If the karmic monk hits such a target, this bonus lasts until the end of the karmic monk’s turn (or until the beginning of the karmic monk’s next turn, if it isn’t his turn). Otherwise, the bonus against a particular creature lasts for 1 minute after the creature’s last attack against the karmic monk. This ability replaces stunning fist.

So the simple question is, if my character parries an initial attack from a creature which would trigger Karmic Strike, do I get the +2 hit/damage bonus on (A) the parry and (B) the riposte?

Personally, my players have found the shuttle aboard the Dusklight which happens to be powered by solar panels and they can hook this up to a lab using a power relay to provide a steady source of power, at least during the day.

On the other hand, they 'recharged' the aurora using multiple charges of lightning bolt which fried basically everything and then they detonated the ruins with explosives just to be sure. So no labs for them yet...

Thank you for the advice. Believe me, I want the players to succeed!

Having murdered their way through the tower there isn't much left of potential guards though! Other than the three befriended Azers and one of the two Apprentices, the tower has been emptied. It's possible that the Azers would be used as the guards?

Would the remaining Apprentice even know to take the PCs to the dungeon below, given that Xoud had not appeared to them for seven years for whatever reason? Maybe it would just lock them in one of the labs instead.

I do like the idea of Xoud trying to harvest the player's brains though...

In terms of outside resources they also have:

Meyanda, who has been levelled up a couple of times and is currently guarding the Dusklight's escape pod for them whilst they ascend the tower. Although they have no direct means of contact for her.

Longdreamer, who can presumably communicate with the PCs whilst they are imprisoned as it is implied that it can try and communicate with Nargin also.

Three Azers who are currently busy looting what they need from the tower before departing for Torch. They would have seen the PCs being dragged through and been pretending to be busy.

Wouldn't that destroy the current personality of Meyanda? Why would she consent to what amounts to her murder? Of course if the PCs are evil then there is no problem.

Not necessarily. I don't see why the two consciousnesses couldn't share a body, at least temporarily.

So things went a bit awry and the party piled into the fight with the two robotic apprentices without fully being prepared.

One-by-one they were knocked unconscious by the apprentices, although they managed to blow one apart using their EMP Pistol.

The remaining apprentice drags them down to the dungeon below and, after some appropriate gloating, throws them into the central 'Hive Mind Research' cell for safe-keeping. After stripping their equipment of course. Having confronted the party twice already and knowing they are powerful casters, Xoud surely wouldn't let them recover spells through peaceful rest overnight (and in fact will use its Spectral Miasma to heal up the damage it has taken from the helpless PCs). WIth the Arcanist the spellbook can simply be taken away, but can Xoud stop the Druid from regaining their allotment of spells?

How does the party of a Druid, Gunslinger, Arcanist and Barbarian escape this predicament?

I'm thinking that Nargin could be instrumental in their escape, but how so?

As an update, and after a bit of a delay, the players are now part way into the Choking Tower itself.

During the raid on Hellion's lair, the party's cleric was accidentally killed by the rogue's impromptu explosives trap (leftover from the attack on the array), and at the end of that chapter the rogue's player sadly moved away from our area so we were down two characters.

The replacement characters, who were both Iadenveigh locals but somewhat outsiders in the community, were introduced to the surviving party members by Meyanda as 'elite robot hunters' that could solve Iadenveigh's mutation problem in exchange for the thing known as 'Casandalee' which they believed was somewhere near the town. Meyanda camped outside of town throughout this portion of the adventure.

In the aurora, I decided that all the androids would be the same model as Meyanda, albeit heavily disfigured and Seerath is effectively a clone of Meyanda but with blue instead of purple accents. Even the fleshes have Meyanda-esque features. This helped clue the players into the purpose of the facility.

Going forwards, the party will find Casandalee's body to be built in the same style again which will tie Meyanda in more closely to the overall plot and will (possibly) lead to them installing Casandalee's memories and personality into Meyanda's body. Plus I like the idea that the reason Casandalee fled to the Aurora is because she instinctively knew of her birthplace.

Hello all,

Just hoping for a quick clarification. Is it permitted for a character to make use of a Buckler, Swordmaster's Flair, Fencing Grace feat and the Stylish Riposte feat at the same time?

This seems like it would be intended, and thematic, but the wording isn't entirely consistent.

Fencing Grace:
Presumably this has the same errata as Slashing Grace, as it uses the same wording. In which case "[Fencing] Grace does not allow most shields, but bucklers work because they don’t occupy the hand.

Swordmaster's Flair:
This item has errata: Swordmaster’s flair should have a sentence added to it that says “Carrying a swordmaster’s flair counts as having that hand free for the purpose of abilities that require a free hand, though you still can’t hold another object in that hand.”

Stylish Riposte:
You can use these tricks only while wearing light or no armor, wielding a light or one-handed manufactured weapon in one hand, and holding nothing in your off hand.

So, is having a 'free hand' or an 'unoccupied hand' synonymous with 'holding nothing in your off hand'?

Thanks all for your assistance, I just thought I'd drop back in to give an update.

I decided to go with Hellion punishing Meyanda for her failure by having her chained up in the Holding Chambers of the Receiver Array (area N4) where she had sustained herself using Create Water, Purify Food and Drink and a couple of dying chokers that she was locked up with. Her belongings were in a lockbox in the Rhu-Chalik's nest.

She had been tormented by the Rhu-Chalik for a couple of weeks by the time the PCs found her, which combined with Hellion withdrawing his blessing from her resulted in the loss of her cleric levels. Instead I made her up as a Ranger 1/Oracle 6 (Powerless Prophecy, Revelations: Defy Elements, Dust to Dust and Erosion Touch) as she sees apocalyptic visions of a new Iron God achieving true divinity and feeling that she can do nothing to stop it. Whilst she could have escaped at any time, which she proves by turning her shackles to rust, she saw no point in it as she was incapable of altering the future and so was resigned to her fate.

The party convinced her that there was a path to redemption and had her detonate the explosives set on the Receiver Array as a symbol for making a new start. They smuggled her back to Dinvaya's chapel where she had agreed to help them plan their attack on Hellion after a good night's rest. Dinvaya was not pleased about having her there, but they talked her around.

They then met with Redtooth and blurted out that they had captured a Lord of Rust defector. Redtooth wanted to know her location (pretty much to put her through a kangaroo court and execute her) but most of the party were unwilling to give up her current location. The Gunslinger and Rogue argued about it, with the Gunslinger eventually storming off and the Rogue telling Redtooth where she was held in order to curry favour with her gang and secure her support for the assault on the arena. Unknown to him the Gunslinger returned to the Chapel, gave Meyanda her weapons back (again!) along with whatever travelling kit he could find and led her out of Scrapwall via Marrow's escape tunnel.

Meyanda promised to help in whatever way they can, and the two of them arranged a way for her to get in contact with the party if needed. I'm going to use this as the hook to get the party to investigate Iadenveigh as Meyanda follows up on Hellion's hunch that Casandalee may have ended up there.

A similar idea to what I am toying with for one of my characters is her offering her body as a Transport for Casandalees memories. Again, this would enable a much more active role for Casandalee AND you have the nice roleplaying/Moral challenge of what do two souls in one body mean, especially as they are destined for godhood.

I like this idea for sure, and it's something I'll definitely keep on the table as a possibility!

So why is the reactor turned off below Torch? Aren't any of the PCs willing or able to restore power? I don't see Torch being OK with their livelihood being stripped away by a psychotic zealot like Meyanda. Surely Khonnir and Brother Kyte could get it running again. Did I miss something in an earlier post?

Ah, the reactor isn't 'off' as such, it's just back to its regular state of malfunctioning and venting via the torch. I guess from the point of view of the townsfolk it's now 'on' again, but it's no longer powering the ship.

Peter Acs, what happened in your game with Sanvil Trett? If he's still active I could totally see him getting in touch with Meyanda and trying to sell her on an alliance with the Technic League. Mind you, if she's as honest with him as she was with the PCs it will be a setup so that he can find out about this Hellion entity, who is obviously a threat to the League.

The party were pretty sure that Sanvil was stealing form them and/or spying on them, but couldn't muster enough proof about him before he skipped town. He didn't get much physical evidence of what they'd found though, so it remains to be seen whether the Technic League will intervene based on his findings or not.

I am still at a loss to understand how the players came up with this insane idea. I might understand the players not wanting to see her executed, but letting her go?

You and me both! They decided that it was too risky to keep her as if word got out to the Technic League that there was an android being harboured in the town then it might cause them difficulties.

I thought they would give her the chop asap and she was quite resigned to the idea of being martyred for her god.

First, I don't understand why the council would be OK with letting her go. This seems like a horrible mischaracterization when dealing with someone that literally cut off the livelihood of the entire town. But, that's all water under the bridge at this point.

The council was strongly against letting her go and the party leaned heavily on diplomacy to convince them. They had some leverage over them due to their successful mission and gave convincing speeches.

Garmen weighed in pretty heavily on Meyanda's side as well, as he thought it could be lucrative to get her free and he holds some sway due to the money he's owed. With Garmen, the players put two and two together to make five. They realised that Sanvil was likely a spy of some kind but decided not to investigate the warehouse as any enemy of the Technic League is a friend of theirs! So they are actually on quite good terms with Garmen and suspect nothing of his involvement.

She's definitely going to show up again, and overall she's made the best of a (very) bad situation. Hopefully Hellion has taken out his anger on someone else by the time she gets home...

What would be the most interesting way to encounter Meyanda again?

Thank you for all the interesting ideas. She did actually suggest going legit with the party and sorting out a 'timeshare' on the reactor whereby she sends power to Scrapwall by night and they use the torch by day. It was turned down as the players don't much like the idea of Hellion trying to usher in an age of machines...

I like the idea that she has headed to the Choking Tower or to the Technic League to try and find an alternative source of power. It would also lead the party to meeting up with her later after she's been cut off from Hellion's influence for some time.

Hi all, I'm running Iron gods for the first time and need a bit of advice.

My players have agreed to let Meyanda go back to Scrapwall (along with her pistol and the disabled/disconnected power transmitter from the reactor). They held a court session with the Torch council in which they convinced them that letting her go was the best course of action.

This is despite the fact that she is completely unrepentant, refuses to engage with the human members of the party and has outright told them that she will go back to Hellion to continue the work of trying to usher in an age of machines. She has been unwaveringly blunt with them. She convinced the party cleric that letting her go would be a professional courtesy.

The only things she had going for her is that she is helping them get the reactor going long enough to re-power the decontamination chamber and heal Khonnir, and that she said that turning off the torch was nothing personal against the residents of the town and that she hadn't gone out of her way to hurt anybody. Which is technically true.

So now that she's safely going back to Scrapwall and Torch is on high alert against future such incursions, what would she do next?