Congratulations to those selected! Go out there and show those hobgoblins what you're made of!
(Hopefully not literally....)
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Retsiji (John Woodford's half-orc alchemist) should be complete. Including gear, which was pretty tight.
This is John Woodford's alchemist. I still have to update the profile and equip him (which reminds me: x 10 = 40 gp. Wow, that's really awful.) Retsiji Background:
The Hold of Belkzen has a generally well-deserved reputation as a land unforgiving of weakness and not always hospitable to the clever. Born in the human slave pens of the Twisted Nail orcs, Retsiji was not strong enough and far too clever. He would have surely perished but for his talent for alchemy—using the crudest of tools, he could distill poisons from the vermin that infested the orc camp, and he had a knack for being unobserved. More than one full orc found themselves sickened or weakened by Retsiji's concoctions. And there was one who saw and recognized in him a kindred spirit (or at least possessed of similar talents): Skreed Gorewillow, an older half-orc. Gorewillow, already an accomplished alchemist himself, undertook to train the young Retsiji in the art, and when the orcs were going to finally wipe out the arrogant little town of Trunau, Retsiji went with his teacher to Freedom Town to recruit mercenaries.
Freedom Town was a shock to the Hold-raised half-orc, and something about the place appealed to him—the reality of a community of humans, half-orcs, and others living in something like peace opened a door inside him to a need he’d never known he had. And Trunau was even more so. Retsiji couldn’t bring himself to destroy that vibrant little settlement, and when Skreed left for a time to get more reinforcements Retsiji warned one of the militia leaders of the plot and fled south. (Unfortunately, Skreed killed the militia leader before he could spread the word…but that’s another story.) Retsiji was able to join a caravan that eventually arrived at the city of Skelt. His Hold-raised manners made it hard for him to make friends there at first, but his hard work and crafting skill eventually won him a place working in the mines as a toolmaker. The next two years were the best of the young half-orc’s life. The work was hard, but Molthune’s forces never pushed that far into Nirmathas, so although there were rumors of war to the south it didn’t intrude on his joy. Nothing lasts forever, though, and one day he was asked to travel to the dwarven citadel of Kraggodan…there was some issue with the shipments of tools and other supplies that could only be handled in person. Because the mountains were treacherous that time of year, he and his party went via the plains and entered the edge of the Chernasardo. That was where the Ironfang Legion found them. Half of the group was slain in the first moments of the ambush. With each death, Retsiji felt a little piece of himself die with them, and he marked their names in memory even though he was sure he’d follow them soon enough. In the heat of battle, he drank the mutagen he still carried with him (“for luck,” he always thought) and used every bomb he could make, each wounding or killing more than one hobgoblin. When the bombs were gone, he snatched up a dagger and went after the attackers. He would surely have died there but for the arrival of the Chernasado rangers, who drove off the attackers and saw to his wounds. After the hobgoblins had retreated, Retsiji walked the battlefield, finding the bodies of each of his companions, the molten core of rage that was his orcish heritage seething within him. Shalla. You’re remembered. Tayzin. You’re remembered. Actier. You’re remembered…. He found every one of them…all the while mourning not just his friends, but his time of peace. They took them away from me. They took this away from me. They.
Once he saw his friends’ bodies and belongings home to their families, he returned to the Fangwood. It took the rest of his money to equip himself to fight, and he was about to volunteer with a local mercenary group when the Ironfang Legion to all intents and purposes disappeared. Unable to face returning to Skelt, he settled in Phaendar, one of the larger villages in the area, and supported himself doing the odd bit of crafting while he patiently waited for the Legion to reappear. This time he would be ready. GM 2H: I checked PathfinderWiki and the Inner Sea World Guide before I wrote his background so I wouldn't contradict anything, and found that the Ironfang Legion disappeared some time before the AP starts. So I wrote that into his history as the reason why he settled in Phaendar. (I also dropped a reference to the Giantslayer AP, because the main villain of Part 1 is also a half-orc alchemist. It seemed to fit.)
You know what, Paeon? You can f@$* all the way off. I'm done here. ETA: Sorry, BD.
I'm fine with Retsiji in front...have been dealing with the impact of a sudden and unexpected departure at work. My boss quit Wednesday morning with no notice, and we're scrambling to figure out everything he was doing.
Retsiji glances down at the body as he stalks by. Freeze-dried meat. Not that desperate yet.
Retsiji fires as the creature crosses his sights.
Retsiji isn't looking in that direction. "Plenty of sense. Bet these idiots docked to the asteroid, found a couple of cocoons, and brought them on board. Cocoons open, akata out, and goodbye crew."
"Forget stealth. Anything in here will notice they've got air." The vesk follows Kris-7, reaction rifle in hand.
I'm good with that. As a further suggestion (one with the added benefit of not applying right away), since all sniper weapons in the core book are unwieldy, make Kris' use of the 'bolter also unwieldy.
Retsiji nods. "Can you lock the doors while we wait?"
Take it. Retsiji has enough ranged attacks. BTW, since we're not in combat you probably could have taken 10 on the Computers check.
The vesk's nostrils flare, and the spines of his crest raise. "I'm not asking what you remember. We have a minute or two. Query the ship's database."
Retsiji only has eyes for the exits, in case more of them show up. "Kris-7, Noah, Ed. Tell us more about these things. Now that you have some time to look them up."
The big vesk stows his laser and draws his reaction rifle. "Kris! GET DOWN!"
Definitely enjoying this. One minor comment, though: since the ship is still under vacuum, the fight should be really quiet. (Besides akata not generally communicating by sound...several years ago, I put them into a game I was running, and played up their silence and use of bioluminescence to communicate.)
Retsiji switches his laser to his left hand and aims a punch at the attacking akata.
Retsiji whirls to the right and fires, snarling.
His heavy laser at the ready, Retsiji advances into the apparent derelict vessel. Even though the airless interior transmits no sound of his passage, those near him can feel the reverberations of his footfalls through the deck plates.
"We don't need air. Let's go in this way, scout it out first, then repressurize if we need to."
Retsiji makes sure his gear is ready for a quick advance into the lock, then braces for impact.
It's a USian reference--assuming that there's more than one ship of the name in existence, we're going "To An Acreon in Heaven." As it were.
I'm ashamed to say how long it took me to get the wretched pun in the derelict ship's name.
"I don't want to leave the ship while she's out there."
Retsiji shrugs and runs a hand over the gunnery console. "This'd be easier."
Retsiji gives a sharklike grin. "Take the first choice."
Certain that the 'glider was going to keep on its flight vector, the vesk neatly puts a hypervelocity projectile where it would have been.
Retsiji hammers the console in frustration. "Get us a fix on its engines!"
Retsiji still can't get a clear shot at the artful dodger.
Retsiji growls, "Power to the engines! We can still finish them off."
Retsiji can't follow the enemy vessel through its evasive maneuvers.
Retsiji leads the target by too much when it slows unexpectedly.
Critical damage is also scored whenever the target starship’s hull takes damage that causes its total amount of damage to exceed its Critical Threshold (see page 292) or a multiple of that threshold. For example, a starship with 100 Hull Points and a Critical Threshold of 20 takes critical damage each time its total amount of Hull Point damage exceeds 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100 points (and so on). An individual attack does not need to deal more than 20 damage to score critical damage against this starship; it just needs to be the attack that pushes the starship’s total damage above a multiple of its Critical Threshold.
Just before Ed shoots, Retsiji calls out, "Target just off his port, and I'll nail him when he jumps!" Then the vesk fires where he figures the enemy will dodge to avoid the laser. "Perfect! We got him again!"
Why are they not overflying us? Distracted, Retsiji can't follow succes with success.
"Noah, where did we hit it? And is it trying to rebalance shields?"
Here's the relevant section on the EMP weapon property (emphasis mine): A weapon with this special property emits a beam of electromagnetic energy that does not deal damage to ships or shields, but plays havoc with a ship’s electronic systems. On a hit, an EMP weapon scrambles one of the target starship’s systems, determined randomly. This causes that system to act as if it had the glitching condition for 1d4 rounds. A system glitching in this way can be patched as normal, but if it takes critical damage, its glitching condition becomes constant until the system is patched or repaired (or takes further critical damage). Functioning shields are unaffected by EMP weapons and completely block an EMP weapon’s effects.
Retsiji snarls in satisfaction as the projectile tears into the smaller vessel. "How's THAT for a punch in the face?"
Retsiji puts a hypervelocity projectile into the near vicinity of the enemy vessel.
"Ed, take the laser. The glider has to get close to use its EMP weapon. That's your chance."
ISTM that ship-to-ship combat works much better on a tabletop. Trying to run it PbP is a major time suck, and that's time that mystics in particular aren't going to have a lot to do. Technomancers at least have a shot at Science Officer checks. ETA: the lack of rules for board and storm is also problematic for a game based on space opera.
Retsiji takes his first shot, which goes wide of the mark.
I'm guessing that either the base DC is actually 15, or when they wrote the example they thought it was 15.
The base frame is a 1/4 tier vehicle, but compared to the stock Ringworks Wanderer Hippocampus has twice the shields, a better computer, and the coilgun.
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