Rubius Halfbeard's page

No worries to answer this, GM. Just hoping you're doing fine.

Spell craft aid to others to ID the sphere: 1d20 + 13 ⇒ (11) + 13 = 24

My turn will depend significantly on whether we can IF that sphere and know how it works.

+2/+2 against hill giants! Thanks, Dvalin. All the way since level 3, that's the first time it came up. I didn't worry about it bc I thought it was just +1 to hit but wow... *Evil chuckles*

The archons aren't on the map but have been flying forward a bit every round. I am also 5 ft stepping but getting around the spike stones and the fact that it's only a 5 ft step is slowing me down. :P But I have plenty of range.

Apologies. Missed last round by mistake somehow.

Rubius continues firing from the back while stepping closer to keep up a little. The archons continue their own reign of terror and Tawny ferociously attacks the giant in front of him then, if it falls, moves to the next one, sniffing his way through the darkness.

58 archon damage then 49, 48, 49, 48, 46 from Rubius. 87 from Tawny to the giant in front of him. Then 60 from archons and 117, 48, 42, 41, 52 from Rubius and Tawny just moves.

Yikes. Hopefully not. The descriptive text sounded like he was getting hit but not injured...

The spellcasters are really doing us all a lot of favors. BoF, deeper darkness, inspire courage, etc. It's all fantastic. We're really shredding these CR 7 grunts. Now I'm wondering when the boss comes... Hopefully he's not as immune to arrows as the descriptive text suggested...

Rubius and the lantern archons keep firing, focusing on the giants outside the killbox and keeping there from being too much heat on the rampaging Tawny. The archons keep up their deadly efficiency while Rubius fires with discipline. One of the giants threatens Tawny and Rubius shoots it right through the eye, killing it instantly.

I put an orange rectangle around three giants. Those are my priorities from closest to Tawny to furthest.

Chunks of damage are 75 from archons then arrows are 44, 51, 105, 35, 48. Tawny does 79 damage to the giant he pounces on. But his charge provokes this time since he doesn't have total concealment and he doesn't have reach.

Rubius' lantern archons and his arrows keep focusing on giants further up and back in the force, devastating them from out of the darkness. Tawny encounters a giant by accident in the darkness and luckily manages to land most of his attacks.

87 dam from archons. 227 dam from Rubius arrows. 78 dam to the giant in the darkness with Tawny from Tawny.

They did before the battle! Everyone, roll your d8+3 temp hp!

I mentioned this but didn't roll yet.
Rubius temp hp: 1d8 + 3 ⇒ (4) + 3 = 7
Tawny temp hp: 1d8 + 3 ⇒ (2) + 3 = 5

The nat 1 auto-miss rule is really plaguing me this battle. For example, the lantern archons hit touch ac 13 on a nat 1 thanks to loads of buffs. Hill giants normally have touch ac 8 but the archon still misses. :'(

The archons and Rubius keep firing at the next couple of giants further up the hill, aided by the darkness. Tawny, however, can't see in the darkness so Rubius directs him around the stones and up a ledge so he can attack again soon.

I was about to say alternating shield wall and get him would be my choice as well. Props to Dvalin for that and the darkness.

Haha. Yeah I noticed and fixed that. I'll check and make sure the edit went through.

Edit: It went through but still looks weird because I made the fix at the bottom of my rolls to avoid reordering other dice rolls.

Yum. Hunter's blessing, inspire courage, blessing of fervor, etc. This is gonna be a fun turn in a target rich environment.

Tawny pounces forward and tears into a giant ferociously.

Rubius shouts to the lantern archons to focus their fire on a giant a little ways uphill. Excitedly, the four celestial creatures buzz around while firing powerful light rays into the giant. But one of them gets bumped and the thrown off shot is innacurate it startles Rubius and makes him send one of his arrows straight into the dirt. But he focuses his other shots, dealing death from a distance to the giants.

TLDR: Rubius and the archons target the giant I've outlined purple first. Then orange. Then cyan. Probably 58 untyped damage from the lantern archons. Probably 180 magical piercing and cold damage from Rubius.

Tawny probably does 94 damage to the one near him and grapples.

Everyone, tactical acumen from me. So any time positioning like flanking, high ground, cover, etc would give you a bonus to hit or AC, you get an additional +1 insight to that bonus. Also, everyone gets aid from my lantern archons.

GM, is the ambient light level right now bright or normal light?

I'm seriously hoping the spellcasters can save our buts here. We need some deeper darkness, confusion, conjured walls, or something to keep the giants from absolutely wrecking us with thrown rocks as soon as they get a turn.

I'll delay myself, my summons, and Tawny until after the spellcasters so I can get with their program.

Rubius nods. "He seems a right trouble. Let's end him."

Encouraging heroism would definitely be awesome for myself or Tawny. I can cast heroism on the other either way.

Yeah I would guess we have to go with the army. A couple levels would make a BIG difference for trying to fight a CR 22.

Gage: Encouraging good hope? That would be pretty boss.

Rubius squints up at the dragon, somewhat skeptical that something so large could be real.

Will save to disbelieve, if applicable: 1d20 + 16 + 2 ⇒ (10) + 16 + 2 = 28

Dvalin: Can you prep a darkness or two? Could be very useful in Dwarves vs. Giants.

Rubius listens carefully as Prince Nim proclaims his deep loyalty to the good of Gold Peak. Personally, Rubius suspects the prince might be more concerned about his own power and security.

Sense motive: 1d20 + 27 ⇒ (4) + 27 = 31

Musing over the night's events, Rubius unstrings his bow and sleeps back to back with Tawny.

Rubius nods fiercely to back up what Dvalin was saying. "Aye! Sneaking about at night with a kobold and devil don't inspire confidence! Not ta mention Kragg asked them to explain themselves first but they just summoned that nasty devil instead!"

Diplomacy aid: 1d20 - 3 ⇒ (20) - 3 = 17

Tawny's CMD is 30 but unfortunately that's still enough for the bone devil to break free. If only I had put one deflection bonus on him. :( My aether elementals do have blindsense 60, though, so I will take my turn assuming that the bone devil is still somewhere in range.

Rubius converses rapidly with the aether elementals in guttural syllables.

Rocks fly through the air toward a specific location. Rubius launches a volley of arrows there and Tawny leaps on the spot while Rubius shouts to the other dwarves "That's where it is!" He also adds "We should probably take one alive to find out what in the Nine Hells this is about..."

I was about to mention Gage's +2 to saves against fear. That makes Tawny's save a 19. It's also making me glad I had Tawny take iron will.

Rubius lifts the tent flap again (move action) and moves into the tent (5 ft step). Then he summons some elementals to help him attack.

The elementals send rock after rock at the kobold.

Tawny, meanwhile, tears at the bone devil as much as he can.

Probably 47 damage to bone devil before DR and 42 to grapple. Idk how much damage from the aether elementals to the kobold.

Tawny will save: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (3) + 7 = 10
Tawny will save: 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (3) + 7 = 10 10 damage to Tawny.
Rubius will save: 1d20 + 17 ⇒ (5) + 17 = 22 2 damage to Rubius.

Rubius knows these dwarves, if they are dwarves, are not the real threat but thst lies inside the ice dome. He enhances his bow for the devil, opens the tent for Tawny, and casts a spell.

Swift action to bane devils. Standard to cast divine power on Tawny. Move to hold the tent up for him. He can't charge but can move and attack.

Bite: 1d20 + 17 ⇒ (12) + 17 = 29
Grab: 1d20 + 23 ⇒ (2) + 23 = 25
Damage: 1d8 + 17 ⇒ (3) + 17 = 20

I'm wondering about the tent opening since it's important for where my large animal companion can pounce.

Where's the tent opening on there? Is the wall of ice the smaller blue circle?

Perception: 1d20 + 27 ⇒ (8) + 27 = 35
Stealth w guidance: 1d20 + 22 + 1 ⇒ (11) + 22 + 1 = 34

Rubius moves over first, keeping it quiet as he reinforces Kragg.

Kragg's got the hot dice! Keep it going!

Rubius nods and proceeds to whistle and work about the camp. He does, however, keep his sharp eyes alert and tries to get a read on the strange dwarf as he wanders off.

Perception: 1d20 + 27 ⇒ (12) + 27 = 39
Sense motive: 1d20 + 27 ⇒ (18) + 27 = 45

Right. We might need multiple options. Also, we could launch a small strike at night if we so choose, though that may lose the benefit of the mass combat distraction.

Since we are dwarves fighting giants, darkness would be fantastic. Gage knows what I'm talking about from when we stormed a giant keep in darkness spells in another game. Do any of us have some darkness spells?

Rubius nods as well, patting the large mountain lion. "It's just me and Tawny, and the lot of ya. We're ready to go."

Rubius scratches his halfbeard, gingerly leaving the scars on the other half of his face alone. In a low tone, he adds "Well I want to make sure the right kind of Dwarf finds King Dak if it comes to it. I'd hate for there to be an 'accident' leaving Nim the grieving heir. So let's be in the thick of saving the king, I say."

Rubius is ready to go join the battle. Or do we want to deal with the leader of the Dark Brothers mercenaries? Doesn't seem key right now.

Sensing a desire for a peaceful retirement, Rubius nods "As long as you are peaceful, you can retire at Gold Peak or somewhere else."

A bit of retcon:

On the way back to Gold Peak, Rubius talks to the prisoner. "Alright now. We're not gonna kill ya no matter what ya answer. But are ya really with child? Is that dragon the father? What are your goals now that he's dead?"

sense motive with guidance for whatever she says: 1d20 + 26 + 1 ⇒ (10) + 26 + 1 = 37

Lots of options so we probably need to start nailing some things down to avoid analysis paralysis. I'm going to initiate a conversation with Lady Hail and see if we can pin that down. Hopefully that's ok.

Good points, Dvalin! It seems we have been lax in wrapping up loose ends. A bad thing to be right before leaving for war...

Getting excited about the 13 kingdoms game! Looks like we'll have a full roster to select from, though it wouldn't hurt to have extras so kings can be selective. At this point, I'm genuinely unsure which of my characters I would most like to play.

2 days of crafting spent on Gage!

I can put in X days of work on a project then finish it next time we get downtime. I just can't try to do two projects at once is all.

Yes I can happily upgrade somebody's cloak or make a new one. Just lmk.

Oxnard, the recruitment looks really interesting and my schedule has been freeing up some but I still need to carefully weigh whether or not I can apply. Let me know if you decide on Discord as that would be a big plus for me. I'd be happy to show you around one of my Discord games if you want to get a sense for how things work there. Here's a brief list of my pros and cons of Discord compared to Paizo:

Pros:
1. I've never seen Discord go down but Paizo crashes semi-regularly for unpredictable lengths of time.
2. Discord is far less clunky and buggy overall. Posts don't get eaten nearly as easily as they do on Paizo.
3. You can get phone notifications from Discord. I play too many Discord games for that to work but it's handy for those in a small enough number of games.
4. Discord has a mobile app that makes it REALLY easy to post from phone on a bathroom break, etc.
5. The rolling and other syntax are much easier on discord. I could just type "d20+8 perception" instead of "perception: 1d20 + 8 ⇒ (18) + 8 = 26"
6. No 1hr edit window on posts!

Cons:
1. Discord doesn't have a built-in alias function so if you want different photos for different servers you have to use a workaround.
2. Most of the PBP community we are connected to is on Paizo. There is a vibrant PBP PF community on Discord but I'm not well connected to them.

Rubius keeps a sharp ear out whenever he is in town to try to overhear any talk of what prompted the Stormhammers to find and free Prince Nim.

Agreed that Discord would be a good forum for this. I've moved as many of my games as I can to Discord. The simple fact that you can get notifications to your phone when people post in a certain channel makes it easier for fast gameplay.

Yes it's that 14K gp number per dwarf.

If you want something from the loot pile, just subtract its sell value from the amount of cash you want. So it's more efficient to grab stuff from the loot pile than sell it because, at best, we can craft at sale price and only for wondrous items.

Example: Someone claims the +4 cloak of resistance. That has a sell price of 8K gp. So their share becomes ~6K gp+1 cloak of resistance (+4).

I spend 11 days crafting my stuff and have 10 days left to craft/upgrade things.

Rubius wasn't the most socially smooth fellow but he knew how to enjoy his time back in Gold Peak. He invited Tramontane to his small cabin on the outskirts of town where he ordered ale delivered by the cask and spent his days making belts, headbands, and sashes out of the hides of some of the great beasts they had felled. One headband he made from a small strip of dragon's skin he inscribed with owls. Another notable item was a sash inscribed with claws made from the hide of one of the they had killed.