Merry Christmas, Bask Brigade!
May Santa bring you much XP.
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Insect? That's right! Lueck eats insects. This centipede has got be looking like the largest buffet this grippli has ever seen! With a few refrigeration spells, we could possibly set Lueck up with boxed lunches for weeks. Though I guess we'd better first resolve who is eating who, exactly...
This is pretty serious minutia, but just for when we hit the actual initiative round, Seben has Animal Focus (Tiger) going, so instead of the usual +2 she will have a mighty +3.
You're so negative! How about a little balance in that review? 3 1/2 Stars - * * * 1/2 "Interactive walls provide much entertainment. Constant heart rate acceleration takes care of the morning workout. Would recommend, but primarily for divine spellcasters with a positive attitude who are ready for anything."
I'm drifting into metagaming here, since Seben needs to level before she gets Knowledge (Religion), but maybe we can piggyback off of Indus's successful roll? If so, the standard operating procedure here is to have the cleric drop multiple channels to blast the thing with positive energy. CLW from our wands might also work, but I think we need to-hit rolls for that (which is kinda weird) so channels are probably better. Lueck's chance to shine once more? Then the bad news is that, even if successful, it just disables the haunt, meaning we can bypass it but we're sort of then trapped inside the compound. Maybe we can find the haunt's bones and sanctify them or something to lay the haunt to rest permanently. So much for battling the millipede at range. . .
Apparently Seben has not spent a lot of time on the study of giant carrion eating insects. . . . Seben just understands the real academic pursuit is to sub-specialize in beetles. Fascinating creatures really.(In fact, Wikipedia tells me it has its own branch of study called Coleopterology. Smart lad, that Wikipedia.)
And now I'm away again for a couple weeks... Feel free to DM PC Seben.
Raises segmented tarsi. (Though I see I misspelt Phrip as Frip above - sorry, been a while.)
Hey Frip! No need to give up on that sword just yet, unless you don't want it. If I follow it right, the cost is 2,000 and it drops to 1,500 if we do the Gather Information check and get the man a new dog (for which we have a +2 Aid Another bonus currently). I'm thinking Indus gets his Plovers to help and we're there. I have 1,300 gp I could lend you to buy the sword - it helps the party. But if you're not into it, no worries.
Enjoy Legoland! I am going to be pretty off-grid as well myself for another week (molting season). Look forward to catching up. Enjoy that summer all!
Gonna be AFK for almost a week. Don't conquer the planar world without me!
P.P.S. Love the bucket photo. Now we need Jace to generate an AI image of Lueck's bucket moment for posterity!
Yikes! Best wishes for your wife's health! A speedy recovery to you both! P.S. Seben's shopping trip will be more restrained than originally planned. Save those pennies. She'll pick up an ioun torch (75 gp) and a sleeves of many garments (200 gp). That last one sounds fun. Might get a neat post or two out of that.
How does the shopping work? Are we able to purchase magical items at list prices?
Am I right that we're hand waiving it and sales of goods/magic items are 50% list price? Or do we need to get our party face to haggle etc.?
OK! We're selling the armor. It just makes me look fat anyways. (And I will learn how to blanch arrows. . .)
Loot talk! Thanks! Assuming we have to sell at half price or other discounted price, I would think we would want to keep the new potions of darkvision and lesser restoration. Did Sobek take Con damage? Would he benefit from just drinking the potion of lesser restoration? Same thing with the Silversheen flasks. That’s something we could always use and will cost us more to buy. Anyone have any interest in that magic padded armor? I think we see how much we can get for it. But if the price drops too far, at some point we should consider keeping it. It’s better than what Seben has now, but if we can get a good price it might be more cost efficient for her to use her share of the proceeds to buy masterwork leather. The initiative bonus is unique though and could be handy for someone. I didn’t really see Seben as a spear-wielder, but I think she should keep that +1 masterwork spear for now. It's coming in handy. On that note, Seben will also happily take the 10 cold iron arrows – happy to split them if anyone else wants some.
My last minute instructions for Seben. The AC on the cobra is high. Both Clive and the Sacred Ibis will both resort to Aid Another and they want to give the buff to the same person, ideally a heavy damage dealer who can pierce DR (hardness?): Diorio or Indus. Seben might not be a terrible backup, now that she's buffed and will do 2d6+1 with her bow. She'll be flexible, but currently plans to shoot to max out the duration of the gravity bow. (I think Clive gets to return home after one more turn.) The Sacred Ibis won't use Flyby attack if the cobra has its AoO available. He'll just land and use Aid Another instead. He'll retreat if he gets low on HP using a withdraw action. Have fun guys!
Just a heads up, I am going to be away from the 19th to the 27th and I am unsure of my ability to log in. Go raid that tomb for me!
Sweet! (The instructions are on the side of the can!)
Um, er... urp! So! If I have it right, when we looted the would-be tomb raiders who fell to their death down the shaft, we found some potions but also two alchemist fires. I remember making a crack at that time that this must mean swarms-are-a-coming. I was a bit premature at the time, but those alchemist fires would be quite handy right about now. I just did a little digging to try to figure out who among us actually has them. Hopefully I am wrong and will be corrected, but I saw a reference to both flasks being given to Sobek. However, he subsequently clarified he didn't want anything as he didn't have carrying capacity. At that point the potions were redistributed, but in my brilliance not the alchemist fire. Currently, the alchemist fire appears on that helpful loot sheet without anyone attached to them. So, uh, does that mean we, like, left them behind? That seems unlikely. If nothing else, the flasks have more street value than most of the stuff we're carrying around. Perhaps we could distribute them to two random PCs? Seben would certainly volunteer, but that smacks a bit of convenience now. The current smaller but cuddlier version of the Sacred Ibis has the 'bombard' trick and would be great for dropping alchemist fire on ground-based swarms in a future encounter. There must be an Apocalypse Now joke in there somewhere.
Just a heads-up, I am also going to be away and off grid until next week (fulfilling my duties for the Beetle Protection Society). Feel free to NPC Seben, if needed. Have a good one, guys!
Licking guidance > standard guidance.
Holy crap, Bruno! Double natural 20's! A 1-in-400 chance. Story Time! (...Again!) I used to play with a group with a weird house rule. It's a rule I know floats around at a few tables at least. The rule is this: If a player ever rolls a natural 20 twice in a row on a 'to-hit' roll, they would be permitted to roll a third time. A third natural 20 equals an auto kill, full stop. (A roll of 1-19 is meaningless.) It wouldn't matter in this case as, as you would think would often be the case, the red beetle is already dead from the crit to begin with, but we always tried for the bragging rights associated with the 1-in-8000 chance. Remarkably, and I wouldn't blame you if you didn't believe this part, I've actually seen it happen twice. Maybe that exposes that I've spent too much time rolling plastic dice. The first time I was a player in a high-level one-shot. Another player at the table pulled it off against the BBEG, an actual Balor. It was a two-weapon fighter making a full-attack. It was round 2, and a bit anti-climatic, but everybody was so stunned it didn't matter. Great end to a great game. The second time it went horribly wrong. I was DMing an Adventure Path (Age of Worms, anybody remember that?). I rolled a natural 20 and then rolled a second natural 20 when I was confirming a crossbow shot from a lowly minion against a PC. The player insisted I roll the third roll, and that the rule had to cut both ways. I should have refused. Of course I got the 20. That was a bummer. I really liked that character... I've been opposed to that house rule ever since, randomness is rarely in the PCs favor. But if you want to add a visceral uncertainty to a game, there's always that.
It takes a true prima donna to get the Cores Rules rewritten to your liking... As for attacking the remaining beetle, it has partial cover vs anyone in the squares adjacent to Indus and Total Cover vs all other squares. Ah! That makes it even easier. I think the correct thing to do is to use Aid Another to buff Indus' AC (er, or rather, the red beetle's next target) then. I'll get a post out, but in the meantime, it won't be affected if Diorio or Luek go ahead. If they take both the squares and/or end the combat that's good too.
Woah! Speak of the celebrity devil himself!
Going for the changed man card, eh? . . . Well you can start by signing the BPS* petition to have the adventure reprinted. I mean it will take a while to scrub all the offending copies off of eBay. But the digital .pdf's should be fixable immediately. *Beetle Preservation Society
Jace, If a PC, say hypothetically, Diorio or Luek were to take up a position one square east of Indus, am I right that they would be able to strike the beetle? Or is it obstructed? Assuming an attack from that square is possible, I'd like the Sacred Ibis to fly to the square west of Indus and do the Aid Another thing he's now got going on and confer the +2 attack bonus. The tricky part is, I don't know which of Indus or Luek is going to go into that square, and by the time I find out, they will have already rolled to attack. I'm discovering this Aid Another interacts a bit unusually in this scenario with the communal initiative system. It seems like an unintended effect that I would need to make a guess with a 50% chance. What I'd like to do is have the Sacred Ibis confer its Aid bonus on whoever next attacks the red beetle north of Indus from the eastern square. But I don't think the rule as written really provides for that. Does that make sense? Possible? (All this and watch the ibis will flub its Aid roll...OR one of Luek or Diorio will take that space to the West of Indus and it's academic anyway, but that would be a good thing too.)
I understand, Phrip. You too have just been placed in the awkward and near-impossible position of having to role-play a character who doesn't necessarily appreciate the greatness of beetles. I understand all too well. Sadly, I am not sure Clive's family will. Rest assured, I will be holding Mr. Jim Groves accountable for his crimes.
Or is he... MIGHTY BEETLE SHELL ARMOR Aura Conjuration, Abjuration; CL100; Price If you have to ask...; Weight None of your business, you fat shamer DESCRIPTION When the bearer suffers a critical hit from a melee attack, the offending wielder's weapon is immediately destroyed. Additionally, the attacker feels a pang of regret of having attempted to assault so magnificent a creature and reconsiders their life choices.
A high-pitched SQEEEEEEEAK is heard. It is the sound of The Beetle scratching Diorio's name off his Christmas card list. Hmmph!
I will indeed lodge a complaint with Mr. Groves. Fun Fact trivia: The original Bestiary contained a description of the shell of the "Beetle, Giant". The entry's author got fancy and described one of the many colors of the shell as vermilion. The typesetter made a reading error, and inadvertently listed the Beetle, Giant as "Vermin". Pretty funny stuff, eh? And then to compound it, they accidentally put a dash next to the Beetle's Intelligence stat, removing the exceedingly high number that was supposed to be in its place. Took a while for Paizo to get the correction out and a lot of gaming vets still have such mismatched copies. I bet they probably go for a lot on E-Bay as curiosities.
Fair?? You fiend! You would put the party in a situation in which they might very well have to murder innocent beetles? Glowing beetles with hopes and dreams? What kind of monster are you? Hopefully this impending encounter is one of the diplomatic variety, one in which the party experiences one of the great wonders of Golarion. But failing that, I know who I'll be rooting for. (All good with the search defaults)
Before I forget again, this was an awesome line by the way: Angered by the sudden assault of both blade and water, the sandling rises up to it’s full 10 ft height and issues a long, hoarse challenge that sounds like a bucket of gravel poured down a stone chute. Great audio image. Was that one of the AI assists you were talking about, or is it just some cool GM description? Love it, either way.
I noted that you took Flyby attack. You should be aware that your movement still provokes AoO when using that, so apply with care. LOL! Thanks! I still remember it doesn't work the way I originally thought: like a Spring Attack feat. Piranha Strike is lower on the wish list now. It doesn't add quite as much value with the new build as I don't think the Sacred Ibis should be looking to base opponents very often. I think the Sacred Ibis is now more of an Aid Another companion than an independent damage dealer (he has a 25% chance of doing zero damage). My brilliant plan is to use Animal Focus (snake) to try to survive the AoO. We'll see how that goes. A friend of mine tells me Flyby Attack was designed to be added to dragons. It let's them get off their breath attack in mid-flight and since they are 50 feet away AoO is not an issue. Makes sense. All I need now, is to get me a breath weapon. How hard can it be?
I think I may actually have played that scenario as a wee teenager - at least I remember waking up in a dungeon with little equipment. Good times! I remember everyone was converting their loin cloths into improvised slings with rocks. A lot of naked PCs. That too was considered hilarious. Actually, Seben really could have used a sling for blunt damage in this encounter. Lesson learned. In the future she will pack one. Won't combine with gravity bow though...
You got it!
Story time! The sandling first appeared in a 1st Edition module called "A4: The Dungeons of the Slave Lords." I had that module and ran it for some school buds at least a couple of times back in the day. If you're familiar with it at all, it was pretty innovative for its time, as the PCs all start as escaped prisoners with no weapons or equipment (nothing but loin cloths and, bizarrely, a collection of scrolls you can't read in the dark...) Anyways, the sandling is really quite challenging in such circumstances, but almost universally all of my players landed on a solution: pee on the thing! In hindsight, this is what elementary school kids are destined to come up with. I remember: (1) we all thought this was hysterical at the time; and (2) trying to come up with mechanics for this. Shockingly, this scenario wasn't covered in significant depth by the rules.
It looks like Indus can use the mwk quickdraw/scarab shield so let's give that to him. Seben will carry the mwk spear and I'll add that to her sheet. But she'll be happy to sell it later and put the money in the party pool.
Lore Warden is awesome! If/when we exit the tomb, Seben will get a Craft (bowyer/fletcher) check going to restring the bow. If I am right that nobody can use it due to the Strength requirement, we'd probably just sell it. Can anybody use that quickdraw shield? Seben would take it if nobody else wants it, as it could be handy in a pinch--and it obviously looks cool. I mean, beetles rock, am I right? But since she's primarily a shooter, if somebody else is actually running some kind of sword and board routine I would think they should have priority. And I'd be open to just selling it too if it’s worth more that way. Subject to any objections, Seben would also take the masterwork spear for use in the tomb as her melee weapon, but I’d be content to sell it and put the funds in the party pool after we exit. You guys are probably way ahead of me on this, but I would guess there are clues in the notes to the mistress’ tomb that could be of use in a future exploration. So we should either hang on to those, or only sell them to a merchant who will agree to let us peak at them later if we need to (such as the Tooth and Hookah guy).
Yeah - the Brigade is so stacked for healing! I see Luek is an incredible healer. We may have an average Strength score of like... 12, but we can certainly recover from a punch. I do think Damage Reduction is a problem, for Seben at least. I just got a really lucky damage roll. I'll eventually need to look into a spell or feat for that. (There's an Ap for that somewhere!) Assuming Sobek doesn't deal with the last warrior, I'll delay until after Diorio and Luek get another turn in. I feel like they may be itching to get their slay on. They just need the dice roller to cooperate.
Well my plan for that +5 composite longbow has been dashed. Subject to any further trades or changes anyone wants to make, here is the record of who presently has what potion: Luek - potion of neutralize poison
I don't feel too strongly about it guys, so no worries if anyone wants a change.
Oh, great divine Gods of Old, We humbly beseech you in your eternal wisdom, That you may see fit to bestow us with your blessed and infinite guidance, ...So that we can accurately determine the street value of some junk we just stole out of some dude's basement. Sincerely, Your eternal humble servants, The Smok'n Bask Brigade. Seriously, this is the best spell evah!
Dang it! Luke just took back the lead on the guidance battle! Quick! Somebody perform a skill check!
Fantastic! Just in the interest of putting something out there, how's this? Luek - potion of neutralize poison
Happy to trade things around! I see Sobek has a pretty awesome healing source as well, so there's some redundancy, but the dude deserves some treas-a. Seben will just take the +5 brilliant energy composite longbow which has been left unguarded in the room to the south and we'll call it even.
Seben can temporarily simulate darkvision in a pinch with a class ability, so it probably has slightly higher value in the hands of Diorio or Indus, I think. For the cure light wounds potions? Sobek? Diorio? Seben also has a few charges on a happy stick, so there are likely others ahead of her in priority. Speaking of healing, what are Diorio's hit points at? I don't think he got to full.
. Hey thanks! Just gave it a read. I think Seben better resist temptation. While I dig the idea of having natural poison on an arrow or two, and her Survival skill is pretty decent, as I follow the math, there is roughly a 10% chance she will poison herself in the process, possibly as many as three times.It would be cool to try as it's something I've never done before, but I'd best leave the injuring of Seben to the opposition...
Well that didn't age well...
I'm going to predict that once the wheel is rolled away, a swarm comes pouring out. That way Seben's arrow will be nice and useless...
Dude! Your art of the other adventuring parties is off the hook! We're spoiled here.
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