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It just feels extremely disjointed to me to battle through Castle Korvosa only to take another journey out to some remote location for the finale. Korvosa's fate hangs in the balance, so having it resolved elsewhere just doesn't feel right. And there's nothing really special about the Sunken Queen - no puzzles or traps, just several pretty meaningless encounters.

And don't get me started on the final room! The culmination to the entire AP is a 30 x 30 featureless room with a pool of blood? No room to maneuver, columns or ledges to hide behind, etc. It was just a disappointing final setting for me. I'm using the Save vs. Cave Bloodshrine.

Also, in my campaign, Ileosa has started the ritual and citizens are randomly dropping dead one per minute, leaving desiccated corpses drained of all blood, as she claims another soul, so there's an element of urgency. And when all is said and done they can (hopefully) emerge triumphant from the castle to the newly liberated city!


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Skeld wrote:


Scarwall is covered by unhallow.

Dimensional anchor has been attached to the unhallow.

Dimensional anchor "completely blocks extradimensional travel".

Rope trick allows users to travel to an extradimensional space.

If rope trick allows travel to an extradimensional space and dimensional anchor blocks extradimensional travel, then dimensional anchor blocks rope trick.

-Skeld

Nice! Thank you very much!


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Snapshot wrote:
Seems wrote:

Does anyone have a workaround for the import problem in the Android version? I have Combat Manager installed on my Tab S3 after my laptop bit the big one, and several months ago I had no problem importing cmpt files. Now, however, I can't browse for files outside the immediate Combat Manager directory, and I can't move the cmpt files into that directory. So, I have no way to open my files.

Any suggestions would be much appreciated!

Kyle is working on some Android issues I have added this to his list

Excellent - thanks for the great work!


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There's no substitute for preparation. Read the module, re-read it, then re-read it again! Seriously, the better you know all the information, the better you'll be able to respond to the unexpected. I try to prepare about 150% of what I anticipate they'll actually accomplish, that way if they skip something or resolve it faster than expected, you're not floundering for material.

Also, there's a lot to be said for just rolling with it and letting actions have consequences. You can't anticipate everything, so accept that they may do something unusual and not stick to the script, and that's okay! It's their story, let them run with it!

As an example, in Curse of the Crimson Throne, the PCs were supposed to wipe out a bunch of rebellious wererats that were suspected of spreading a plague (they weren't). I had a big combat all planned out, including my preconfigured file for my Combat Manager app and an impressive battlemap of their lair printed out and mounted to foam board.

But, my players were determined to resolve things diplomatically, and through some excellent Diplomacy checks, including a natural 20, they were able to get the info they needed and convince the wererats to stand down. Instead of several combats and 2 hours of gameplay, the whole situation was resolved in about 15 minutes. But the players were so damned proud of themselves for not spilling blood unnecessarily, and now hope to use them as allies against the real enemy.

If you lay out enough info but the PCs insist on ignoring it or going in another direction, that's okay too! Just make sure they know how their decisions change things - it gives them agency and makes them feel more empowered, even if they screw up. I once had a group trying to save a city from an imminent explosion devolve into bickering over strategy as I periodically described the rapdily deteriorating situation. After giving them 30 minutes to argue, I started counting out loud from 10 down to zero. When I hit zero, I had the explosion go off and 1/3 of the residents were killed. They felt awful when they realized they could have saved everyone but didn't. Not what was supposed to happen, but again, actions have consequences.


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Honestly, don't twist yourself into contortions over something they're going to learn anyway. Does it really matter when they find out the Queen is evil? They have a paladin, so that's going to help them in certain ways, and just let it play out however it does. That can be really hard sometimes (I was really hoping my Party would strike an alliance with Glorio, and they want nothing to do with Laori) but it's their story, just roll with it.


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To clarify, I'm currently a drow 4th level Oath of Vengeance, Tempered Champion Paladin, using a bastard sword two-handed (favored weapon of Ragathiel). Still wearing lamellar steel armor, because that's all I can afford just now!

20 point build:

16
14
12
10
8
16

Looking at the following for feats:

1. Power Attack (taken)
3. Extra Lay on Hands (taken)
4. Weapon Focus (Tempered Champion)
5. Furious Focus
7. Antagonize
8. Weapon Specialization (Tempered Champion)
9. Improved Critical
11. Skill Focus, Diplomacy
12. Greater Weapon Focus (Tempered Champion)
13. Eldritch Heritage
15. Improved Eldritch Heritage
16. Greater Weapon Specialization (Tempered Champion)
17. Greater Eldritch Heritage
19. Toughness

For Mythic, I'm looking at the Guardian path:

Tier 1:
Absorb Blow
Fast Healing
Mythic Paragon

Tier 2:
Legendary Weapon (Powerful, Returning, Intelligent)

Tier 3:
Fast Healing
Extra Path Ability: Legendary Weapon (Foe-Biting, Powerful, Unstoppable Strike)

Tier 4:
Armored Might

Tier 5:
Earth Protection
Mythic Power Attack

The DM told us we'll pick up 1 mythic tier at the end of each book, so we will only have 5 tiers going into book 6. My goal is to provide consistent damage with good survivability. Offense will be primarily from my extra smites from Oath of Vengeance's Channel Wrath ability combined with Legendary Weapon's Foe-Biting power. Survivability will come from Absorb Blow, Fast Healing, and Lay on Hands. Will probably pump some more points into CON. Again, don't need to be OP, just want to hold my own and be fun to play.


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FadetoBlack wrote:
I have looked everywhere I can think of and I can't find anything on this. Does anyone know if the Sklar Quah Sun Shaman in book 4 has a canonical level anywhere?

On page 226 of the anniversary edition, section D4 lists the Sun Shaman as a "male venerable human shaman of lore 14". This info wasn't included in the original Chapter 4, A History of Ashes.

Hope this helps!


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So I'm getting ready to start A History of Ashes next week and I'm a little underwhelmed at the Cinderlands. You have this potentially fabulous environment with the first (and really only) opportunity for wilderness exploration and there's no sense of danger. There's no guidance on how to navigate and survive the Cinderlands, other than conveniently being provided with boneslayer guides once they get to the Kallow Mounds. While spells like Create Water make desert travel much less hazardous, there are all sorts of other dangers from both creatures and the environment. For example, things get much more interesting if they're fleeing a sandstorm or get ambushed by monsters and some of the Party's horses get killed. Not mention dealing with heat, battles while crossing ravines, etc.

To try and fill this gap, I've been looking at Frog God Games' "Dunes of Desolation", which is a fabulous guide for desert adventuring. I'm combining it with AngryGM's wilderness travel tips to try and make things more exciting.

Also, some of the options for gaining respect seem just a little ho-hum. Go to what is basically a one-room temple and kill a monster. After dealing with the havero, the rest of the Thrallkeepers' Acropolis seems kind of tedious. Would love to hear any suggestions for making this whole part of the adventure more interesting. (And for the record, I do like the sound of the Cindermaw and the Trial of the Totem encounters).

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!


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Well that was a lot of fun. The Party emerged from the labyrinth to find Glorio waiting for them. Despite failing to kill Meliya, he offered to let them leave with Vencarlo but not the seneschal, as long as they pledged to help him overthrow the Queen and replace the grasping nobles with enlightened rulership. As expected, they replied they weren't about to replace one tyrant with another and promptly attacked. They were surprised, and a little relieved, when they hit him with an empowered fireball and he snarled and turned into Bahor.

I have a large Party, so I buffed the encounter with four girallon hiding in the trees and a stone golem (the Chamidu statue), and very nearly killed two of the Party. But as the tide turned against him, Glorio escaped, promising revenge. He has reinforcements and supplies arriving from Vudra in 2 weeks, so by the time the Party gets back from the Cinderlands he will have a strong force in Old Korvosa to help make a play for the throne during the last two chapters.


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NobodysHome wrote:

I just don't have the heart to mention that, as an evil outsider, waiting 50-60 years for her to pass on so he can seize absolute control of the city is well within his acceptable parameters...

That's just beautiful!

He will give them a hard sell that, whatever their differences, they must band together for the "common good" to defeat the "illegitimate, tyrant Queen!" His case is supported by the fact that I have him running the equivalent of a soup kitchen on his palace grounds for Old Korvosa's poor, who are starving due to the quarantine, so he doesn't seem THAT bad! But my PCs take slights very personally, and want to stomp whoever crosses them, so I can see them turning against him even though it might be in their long-term interests to ally with him.

I think he's a fascinating character. My Glorio wants power not for wealth or glory, but because it's his place, his destiny, to rule. He has no qualms about eliminating anyone who gets in his way, but he'll take care of the people, not because he cares about them, but because they're his power base and it's the smart thing to do. He has no shortage of gold, so spreading a little wealth around for the commoners is a small price to pay for their support.


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So I'm about 3/4 through the game and I've decided that, although I've enjoyed the game and want it to succeed, for the time being I'm going to quit my play through, wait a couple of months for the bugs to be fixed, and then restart.

The game has a ton of potential, but there are just too many game-breaking and non-game-breaking bugs at this point - broken quests, feats/abilities that don't work, weird difficulty spikes that bear no relation to the core rules. (Overall, I don't mind the difficulty. It's challenging, and that's good, but it feels very "cheaty" when monsters have absurdly inflated stats.)

The kingdom management mechanics need to be majorly tweaked and better documented. Several times I would start a project only to be hit with a debilitating event requiring that particular advisor, and no way to reassign that advisor. You shouldn't have to rely on save scumming to work around bad game design. Once you get the larger, 2-space buildings (e.g., mage tower), you can't rotate them to fit them in the available space on your building grid. Individually, you could probably shrug your shoulders over any of these and move on, but cumulatively they're just a drag on the gaming experience.

Owlcat seems to be committed to fixing things, but it's pretty clear this needed at least a couple more months of testing and fixing. It's disappointing, but hopefully over the Christmas holidays I can start over and play it all the way through.


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I modified most of the Book 2 quests to make them matter more to the overall plot:

1. Cressida mentioned that the Party could either investigate the plague ship or the rumors of wererats spreading the plague with rat swarms coming up from the sewers.

2. They first went to the plague ship, where they found the dead captain, but with only a tattoo of Urgathoa (no mention of Andaisin). There was suspiciously no cages or containers that might contain rats or the plague.

3. Vencarlo introduced the Party to Eries Yelloweyes, who led them to the wererat lair. They adamantly pursued a diplomatic approach with Griggiz and, with a natural 20 diplomacy role, managed to get him to show a letter of support from Andisain, promising weapons and supplies to the wererats in exchange for using their rat swarms as a diversion.

4. Responding to reports of blood-drained corpses outside Giottori's Toys (whom they happened to have previously visited) they killed the vampire swarm and Giotorri-turned-into-a-wight. In his shop they found a pile of suspicious, newly-minted coins that Giotorri had obviously set aside and been examining.

5. Carowyn Manor was actually an exercise by Rolth, with Jolistina's help, to test a new strain of the plague on the nobles, who served as a convenient test-group. When they captured Jolistina, she went on about how all of Rolth's time was taken up by those weird doctors who just didn't appreciate his talents!

6. I dropped the whole Vendra side quest, it just didn't seem to add anything.

This is actually where we left off, so the Party is now going to talk to Cressida about the doctors and Davaelus (whom they also met), and she will point them towards the Hospice.

Slightly different from the official plot, but not drastically so, and it has furthered their interest in all the intrigue and different players.


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Duamatef wrote:

Well, you could also say that while it isn't provable, the casting might have been seen by one or two individuals.

That information could come in handy later on for some NPC.. either as blackmail or something to put the "authorities" onto them and take the PC's attention off of the NPC.

I could see Boule, for example, keeping that tidbit handy for later if the PC's uncover certain documents........

I like that! I love intrigue-driven plots so that's a great idea.

BTW, I've decided to tie in some the "middle missions" as follows: in the Direption they'll find the evidence of Urgathoa but not Andaisin. Instead, the wererat rebellion is another element of Andaisin's deception, and the wererats' lair contains letters promising weapons and supplies if Girrigz and his followers drive rat swarms into the city to add to the chaos. Finally, poor Giotorri (whom they already happened to visit in their exploration of the city) has been passed some of the tainted coins and his discerning eye caught there's something wrong with them. If the Party explores his workshop, they'll find his stash of coins has been sorted into two piles, with a magnifying glass still out on his desk.

Thanks again for your responses!


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RumpinRufus wrote:

Harrow Card Reading Cheat Sheet

Image version / Google Docs version

Goal: Make it easier and faster to perform live Harrow card readings.

Usage: Print out the 3 sheets, and place them somewhere convenient (like behind your GM screen.) Each sheet has two suits. In each suit, the placement of the card indicates the card's alignment. So, by seeing the suit and alignment of the card, you know exactly where you can find it on the cheat sheet (e.g., you draw The Winged Serpent and see it is the LG card of Stars. So you look at the Stars page, and look at the top-left cell because the card is LG.) Regular text are typical interpretations, and italicized text are possible interpretations of misaligned cards.

Quite ingenious! Will definitely be using these. My group has only run one session and trying to do a good Harrow reading with Zellara was more stressful than I imagined! Thanks for the helping hand!


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generaltwig wrote:

Just discovered this fantastic program. What is the best way to prepare a number of different encounters ahead of time that you can easily switch to when PCs stumble across them? It's easy to quickly search for and add a single monster to a combat.. but can you do it with a specific group of monsters? Many thanks!

I have to disagree with Warped Savant, as I find it extremely useful to set up all my encounters in advance, particularly since I usually make adjustments to most monsters. I import whatever monsters I need, set up the links between those using the same initiative, and click on the Save button at the top of the Monsters window. When it's time to run the combat I simply load the applicable file and I'm ready to go.

Not quite sure what you mean about searching for a group of monsters. If you're looking for all the ogres, simply enter "ogre" in the search bar and it will pull up every monster with ogre in its name.


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I'm running two campaigns, one an AP and the other a 4-module campaign. Both will last at least another year and I certainly don't want to bother with conversion. I left D&D for Pathfinder specifically because it offered a stable, ongoing system based on D&D 3.5. I really have no desire to change that.


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Wow, this just breaks my heart. Pathfinder's raison d'etre is that it represented a stable, ongoing system based on a "perfected" version of D&D 3.5. I briefly tried D&D 4E but quickly decided Pathfinder was the way to go. I'll look over the new system, but I expect I'll become one of the "1E loyalists" and stop investing in Pathfinder.


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Thanks for the great info - much appreciated! I'm leaning towards Crimson Throne - it sounds a little more varied and it would be an easier transition from their existing adventure. I do like the sound of Barzillai Thrune, though!


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Hi all,

As an addendum to my earlier discussion, could anyone familiar with both APs recommend one over the other, or perhaps highlight the key differences? I know the basic plots are similar (urban-centered, plot to overthrow oppressive ruler), but that's about it.

Thanks in advance for any info!


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I generally like the new look, but a couple of quick reactions:

- the fonts are too small. Some of us are closer to 50 than 15....

- cannot pull up any of the AP specific pages from http://paizo.com/store/pathfinder/adventures/adventurePath. Clicking on an AP link simply takes you to paizo.com

- overall responsiveness does not seem to be significantly improved, it's still pretty sluggish.


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I generally like the new look, but it would be great if we could resize the font. Some of us are closer to 50 than 15....


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Well, looking this over, I probably have to agree with Chess Pwn and Derklord, strictly in terms of their application of the rule. But, thinking of it practically, it still doesn't seem logical why a Strength blessing bonus somehow negates a magic weapon bonus, for example. To me, they're different types of bonuses. It just doesn't pass the sniff test with me.

Thanks all for weighing in!


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Good grief, guys! Every time I try to browse the website it is abysmally slow. It's particularly frustrating when trying to research adventure modules. I'll load up 3rd level adventures, for example, then sort by average customer review, select an adventure to look at, go back to the adventure list, resort them, then rinse and repeat. Each click takes at least 15 seconds, sometimes significantly longer. It doesn't sound like much, but when you add them all up the waiting is excruciating and really discourages me from spending too much time browsing. (And yes, I have Fios with a typical download speed of 150MB. I don't have problems like this with any other website.)

Please fix this!

P.S. - I'm using Chrome 58.0.3029.110 (64-bit)