SilentThunder's page

Bark doesn't solve problems. Big monsters do not eat bark so they become bigger and scarier. Honestly, this questions bugs me most in this AP.

I have to roleplay Irrisen differently from now. In Irrisen is plenty of food I say, but people are poor and weak and have to fight for feed. Have to fight with soil and some kind of greenhouses, have to fight with witches for rights, have to fight with monsters so people could tame them. Not scary tundra, but hard to live taiga.

I think of Irrisen more like Wild West with deserts, where people manage to cattle and crop in better lands. So like people have to find solutions.

Have to make Irrisen environment less scarier than it's sounds in the book. People will only eat a bark only if they can't produce decent amount of food.

Made some fantasy tamed animals like crossbreeded camel and moose or crossbreeded giraffe and lama. This is fun way to make new animals. We all saw Avatar: The Last Airbender.

And Nadya Petska is not just a hunter in my games, but hunter and ranch owner and breeder.

I gave to the troll warpriest one level. I think he might survive couple of rounds. Moss troll will be hiding in campaign as a tree, so he could actually ambush my party.

My party is 5 players, level 3. I make encounter as APL+4

Since I run Reign of Winter there is remade atomie oracle who will summon hawks and small ice elemental and thunderstone. Some feys 1/2 CR. There is one simple non-magic trap.

But difficult terrain where 75% of movement speed reduced should be pain in a ass.

Do you think I should stick with regular rules especially for this encounter, so I can make some attacks of opportunity with moss troll?

Thank you for you thought.

But I'm still want to breathe some life into this idea where big boss with powerful swings are avoidable with proper movement. Maybe not this encounter, but still.

Hi, guys!
I want to change my boss fights something like dark souls/devil may cry series. I want to change how battle works. And I'm sorry for my poor grammar!

For example, let's take large monster with 10 reach with spear I will use in Reign of Winter. Moss troll

I write for him 5 different attack animation and almost all of them are AoE. I make the boss fighter with AoE attacks hitting everyone's AC.
Here comes my thought how to balance and how to dodge those attack.
I will always give almost obvious hint what next attack my boss will use. No attacks of opportunity made by the boss. I will force my PCs move around him who are in melee.

So I tell to my group that moss troll is about to hit in left direction in the end of his turn. So moss troll waves with spear 10ft cone hitting anyone's AC on his next turn.

I tell my players the troll realeses left hand and threathnes area to the left of him. Moss troll hitting 15ft cone with claw and then bites target he managed to hit 10ft attack.

I can make not that obvious full-round attack by saying that the troll is about to bite PC, but he also attacks 10ft line on right after bit attack.

Moss troll can surprise my ranged PCs with semi-charge attack that will cause attack of opportunity from PCs but the troll will hit everyone in line while he runs.

5th attack is placed if critical score is made with spear of Manhunting. I just full-round with available attacks.
And please remember that all AoE attacks are claimed by me round before. So this is really debatable kind of topic. And I really need your opinion and help. And I really hope non of my players uses reddit.
Maybe PCs will get all troll's moves and will avoid them easily. So there is distraction placed by paizo in encounter. Atomie oracle and difficult terrain - 1 squares cost 4 squares of movement.
And again please excuse my language skills,

Misha

SilentThunder wrote:

...I took Reign of Winter because our party is whole russian...

I wish I could see Reign being run for actual Russians. It was Santa Claus who gave the kids presents in Narnia.

We have Grandfather Moroz instead of Santa!

The next fight will be with Teb Knotten and journey before was a little bit stressful because of damage reduction. We lack of magic skills in our party. Only cleric is spellcaster. Do you guys gave some weapons that bypass DR or how you delt with this?

DR is really frustrating at this point and my party of gunslinger, unchained barbarian, unchained rogue and cleric is 500 exp away from 3rd level! Medium exp progression.

Our last session was the worst only because of DR.

It's like ice mephit does little damage but survives for next 30 minutes of irl gaming because fast healing and DR/magic.

PS. Giant Weasel set cleric to -15 hp with full round attack. Gave to GWeasel ability to rage from Dire Weasel. Coudn't use it because was afraid to kill one more PC.

Sun Rod completly changes ambush encounter with Izoze and elemental to complete player's advantage.

Hi, guys!

My party took 2nd level after saving lady Argentea and I scale encounters afterwards. I'm thinking to add template to guardian doll. Do you have any ideas what template to add?

I took Reign of Winter because our party is whole russian and I thought it could be witty to introduce to players Baba Yaga, winter witch, dancing hut. But after two sessions I started to feel that if introduce those things players will just laugh and smile and definitely lose fairy tale feeling. Mostly because every russian kid knows about Baba Yaga and how she lives in the hut with chicken legs and players will suspect that grandmother Yaga is evil from a start.

So I found solution recently. I will force fairy tale even more by shadow puppet session.

This idea I definitely saw on reddit somewhere. I plan to make shadow puppet session with Black Rider and portal and crow swarm and how mighty champions meet with Irrisen, but I have to drop somehow some combat rules and to simple them.

Rohkar Cindren have scroll of animate dead (10HD). Does Rohkar uses scroll to animate as much as possible zombies from dead allies? Can Rohkar use variant zombies?

I took mounts directly from 3 riders.
Go to link.

Edit: This is 666th post in this topic. I'm sorry I won this thread ((:

I was speaking not about just mounts but 3 riders have mounts as 13 cl Phantom steed.

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/p/phantom-steed

Duration 1 hour/level (D)
A phantom steed has a speed of 20 feet per two caster levels, to a maximum of 100 feet at 10th level.
They do not attack.

I was bringing this to the discussion but I'm not sure how to scale them properly. PCs might get that at 4th level. So 40 ft movement. It's kinda ok.

Maybe at further levels those mounts could become even more anime. Like summoning a digimon or summoning them for 1 attack like in final fantasy 8 (: Or like "Amidamaru into the sword!" ((: I'm kidding.

You remember when Aslan in Narnia gave presents to kids? (I think it was Aslan, do not remember). And every gift was special and matching every personality. I think a lot of Narnia when I prepare AP for my games.

3 riders can summon large mounts. So maybe to give players mounts, each with different ability? This is like not really original idea, but if players will attach to their unique mounts, give them names and treat them as pets, this is best for DM.

17 sesseions to complete 4th chapter? Oh man. This is like if we will play each weak once and every weak it will take to complete 1st book 4+ months.
I think I will lose environmental rules to speed up the game.

We have 4 players in our party. 5th will join later.

>Encouraging your PCs to plan their actions out ahead of time while other players are doing their turns may speed things along... but good luck with that! :D

Actually, simple and good advice. We have 2 players who do not think ahead and I didn't notice that before.

Thank you guys for good info!

So yesterday (hi cap yesterday!) we managed to play some encounters. If 1st session was about introduction and roleplay, but in 2nd was all about encounters. I didn't changed anything in encounters. I know people say they had party killed there but I encouraged my players to play smart and to make decent builds or you'll die.

I have few questions, guys. We played for 4 hours and players only ended encounter with talking stag. We had almost each fight for 1 hour. How do you handle? How much time it took at your table? Encounter with the stag took like 40 mins while I really tried to speed up the pace of our game.

If safely returned to Heldren, Lady Argentea is profuse in her thanks, and rewards her rescuers with a purse of 500 gp.

Is it 500 gp for each player or 500 gp for whole party?

The wedding is a nice idea to start the story off - it's a better way to bring together a group of adventurers without making them all start in the village (which I don't like).

I'm not sure about making Heldren with a feudal land, it's supposed to be the happier place before you go up to Irrisen. They're supposed to be very different. But, if it works for you then go for it!

Heldren was happy place indeed (: It's about small people who handle well despite past wars and past hungers and unstable border and questionable leaders. Wedding was a good example of this.

I'm pretty sure that Qadira took Taldor's lands like 100 years ago or something. I wanted to feel it fresh so some of my players fought in this war with losing as result.

The thing is why Heldren is feudal land but it's not a bad thing at all. Owner of these lands did well with improving village's life. I know I said rotten bureaucracy but this how Taldor at this moment works and as storyteller I feel I should make the world spin.
Wedding was not just for RP but players had impact on wedding's ending as well. We had mini games/mini quests. I just wanted to make players feel that when they will leave Heldren it will be part of theirs history, that they accomplished something. And I don't want to make any places so my players could think "nah. it's just was a place we were passing through. nothing special".

Irrisen will be different certainly.

And again sorry for my language skills. I'm pretty sure I have mistakes here and there.

Found about bark:

Frequent hunting parties scour the tundra, bringing in what little they can find or kill, but most peasant meals consist of winteryew gruel: a thin, tasteless concoction made from boiling bark and seeds gathered from a small grove of winteryew trees outside the village.

We started recently playing Reign of Winter. My 1st masteting experience after 6 years of silence. I'm not native eng speaker but I really want to share some stories how campaign started and want I changed.

So we have 3 experienced players and I invited my close friend to join us. So 4 players. Never expected that how much new player can join the flow of the game. I'm really proud that I met such great players (always played with newbies before who killed npcs on sight for exp or something like that).

What I changed in Heldren:

I changed completely the village. It should feel like feudalism with rotten bureaucracy and titles. So I have a titular councilor (let's imagine this is good title) who owns these lands. I left the same npcs who were introduced in book thou like gold-teethed dwarf and elven female who runs apothecary.

We started from wedding. Bride and her husband were meeting guests. Each player's hero was introduced differently. And players started to show theirs heroes. This is really great thing to introduce heroes to players and in the same time I introduce world of Golarion to players.

We had mini RP games maybe I will talk about later if you curious. Those wedding games were great for atmosphere.

Since we have gunslinger it pushed me a idea that I want to play in 17th of our century. Just between dialogues and events I told to my players about one boy who brags about his dad in Oppara and that his dad is cannoneer. Just small things that tell about country and people.

Our barbarian is taldane. And fought in war where Qadira won southern lands from Taldor. He was slave back there but after one more loss Taldor had reforms so no more slaves. Taldane government should have opposition.

I believe that Taldor which I imagine in my game should have revolution with blood and magic soon. I gave that information for another player who is 136 aged dhampir cleric of Abadar. And I gave rank to him. He is like noble and stayed at titular councilor's manor. Small things but that gives to players some info how world works.

Are you still here? (: Cause like I use google translate for some words (: Bear with me.

Gunslinger tiefling from Ustalav came with dhampir's company. And knife master rogue with trapfinding but bonus to conceal a dagger. Rogue was introduced to the game as fakir since player stated that his half-elf from circus with his fellow mime dwarf. And he ACTUALLY did great with a show. For next 10 minuted he took the main role of the game.

Players did some games in this wedding and helped to bride's mother with drunk mime. I want to share more but I'm afraid with my clunky language I can't talk too much and do not want to cause you weary.

And only then RoW starts.

World is really important to me and I find Golarion like a clay, paizo gives some good tools for imagination.

PS. Yeah (: Too much text. Sorry (:

But outside the Whitethrone. What people eat in Walsby? If there is a rabbit in a forest then that one rabbit have to eat something as well. I really do not enjoy that authors put something like food is hard to find so +5 DC to survival for hunting and nothing specific.

Think it should be like Mark Watney from The Martian. Greenhouses and tilling. I have funny feel about this.

I can't treat Irrisen as tundra or I risk to lose unfriendly environment feel.

Hi, guys!

How people survive there in Irrisen? I mean what food do they eat? If they hunt beasts what food beasts eat then? I mean what plants are there suitable for eating?

Irrisen seems to me it's not like tundra. There are no seasons of the year.

Help me out to answer these questions.