Traskus's page

Alright, so as I said in subject, I am a player that wants to see the story of WotR through to the end and am looking for a group and, equally important, gm who share the same zeal. Prefer PbP but if times and schedules can be worked out I'll do roll20 or discord etc.

Full disclosure I've had several false starts in this campaign as both player and gm but each time I've tried things have fallen apart before getting into the meat of the story. With that said I will avoid using any previous knowledge or experience for an advantage.

With that said, I'd be more than happy to help out q prospective gm in any way that I can, even purchasing the pdfs of the books if needed.

Alright let me start off by saying that I don't consider myself an inexperienced GM but I've been put into a situation where I'm not 100% certain of how to handle a game I was asked to run.

I was asked to run an adventure path for my local group of players and because of extenuating circumstances I can't use the usual method of splitting the group and alternating weeks. So, I've wound up with a table of 9-10 players.

We started last week and I started to notice a trend, the party was simply curb-stomping every single intro encounter even the ones designed to be more challenging at the beginning. And while I don't mind them beating the encounters, the game will quickly become stale if I do nothing to attempt to find a middle ground because they are killing enemies before they get to act half the time. Again, don't want to be the killer gm in this game but when there is a challenge I want it to be a legitimate challenge.

What I'm thinking of doing is maxing hit die for all enemies the party encounter and giving slight buffs to make them tougher or doubling the size of the encounters. But my concern is overshooting in the other direction while I am attempting to correct.

For ease here is what I generally have:
A human wordcaster sorcerer
a kitsune druid
A fighter/rogue archer (not sure on race)
Aasimar Oracle
Orc Sacred Grimoire Inquisitor
Human Monk of the Open Palm
Skinwalker Feral Hunter
Orc Paladin
Human? Cleric

Alright this question was posed to me last night after a local PFS gathering and although I handled it in a way that I felt was appropriate but I was curious what the rest of the community thought about the issue.

So the situation stemmed from a S happens moment when the BBEG crits the paladin of the party with 2 nat 20s and puts him well below his Con score. The player didn't have enough prestige or cash on hand to bring the character back so its recorded as dead.

However, at this point another player suggested the party sells off all of the pre-gens gear to buy a raise dead spell for the paladin. Now I know the rules state that you can do this in the instance of the pre-gen dying but what about to save another character?

My thoughts are this: The pre-gen is brought in to allow someone without a level appropriate character to play and should be viewed as a character in their own right and are not just a slush fund for the party to use at their whim.

At the same time I see their point of view to an extent in that a pre-gens stuff all goes away at the end of the adventure and no one ever has to worry about tracking it and the parties at the store usually decide to use the pre-gens consumables before their own which I have allowed in the past and no one really wants a character to die to just a fluke of luck even though it happens.

So I am curious what the community thinks about this issue and about pre-gens in general. And should I have allowed them to sell all of the gear for the raise dead?

Okay I am looking for some ideas for a couple of Feats for my new Dragon character.

Due to real life schedules some of my gaming group has been pulled away from the table and during the meantime the GM has decided to run a side story of our campaign featuring the dragons of his world. He has framed it as similar to a Council of Wyrms game and we have all built dragons.

We all started with Adult dragons of various types that we chose, I specifically went Silver and we added 1d10 class levels to it or spend 2 levels to age up to a maximum of Old. I chose to take the 6 levels of Paladin to kind of fit with the story.

After building it, mostly to the Adult Silver Dragon in the Bestiary, I noticed a pair of feats (Iron will and Lightning Reflexes) which I found didn't do that much for me (Fort: 36 Reflex: 26 WILL: 35 without them) and was wondering if there might be some suggestions as to what would be good replacements for those feats.

As of right now I have: Flyby Attack, Hover, Improved Initiative, Multiattack, Weapon Focus (Bite), Power Attack, Leadership, Improved Natural Armor, Toughness, Vital Strike.

I was thinking about possibly a skill focus but the one things I would take it in (Diplomacy or Knowledge Religion) I have high enough ranks in to succeed at all checks unless I roll a Nat 1 (auto-fail) so it didn't seem to be the right choice.

I think the GM would prefer to keep things to the main books, ie CRB, APG, UC, UM, UE, Bestiary 1. So if you have any suggestions please let me know!

Okay, I just got the urge to share the story below because it was just so funny to the group and because I was wondering who else might have such similar stories.

Alright a little background, I'm running a home-brew game based loosely on an old video game with my usual group of players. They are in the middle of a dungeon trying to stop the bad guy from creating an army of undead.

Just to change from the hack-and-slash mode the game has gone I decided to mix things up a little bit and throw a puzzle or two in there. In my preparation I decided to create a Sphinx construct in the dungeon to play a game of riddles with the players or to provide a fight if they failed the questions.

Okay so the group comes down upon the Sphinx room and see the statue guarding one of the exits from the room. Detecting magic and with successful spellcraft and Knowledge checks they can guess it is a construct and will activate upon approach. At this point the group consisted of a Witch, a Cleric, a Barbarian, and a Rogue (the Paladin and Wizard were absent). I gave them a minute to discuss outside of the room and the conversation between the Cleric and Witch went something like this.

Cleric: Witch you have Intelligence, I have Wisdom, we both have Charisma we should be able to think our way out of this problem.

Witch and Cleric: Barbarian do not speak!

With that done they approach the Sphinx which activates and informs them they need to answer 5 (1d6+1) riddles to pass and if they answered incorrectly they would be kitty chow.

Questions for the curious:

Question #1:
The Present does not interest me,
only of the past I write.
Stony words they claw in me,
I fill the young with fright
Look at me and feel sad,
Then slowly turn your head
Well meet again when times are bad
I'll crown you when you're dead.

Question #2:
The commonest of soldiers found where rival armies meet;
He'll charge or hold the line, and never will retreat.

Question #3:
I have a beak at front
I have feather on end
I kill without peck
I fly without wings
But alone or in a group, I kill strong men.

Question #4: (Because I had to)
Here I stand in a corner
Many maidens have worked my shaft
In and Out until the sweat
Until I give forth white cream
What am I?

Okay at this point they struggled on the 2nd one and got the others pretty quickly but they had managed to get every question right without having to roll any checks. So, as a reward I'm thinking I will make the last one easy. And only one riddle stands out to me as an easy Sphinx question so I ask it.

Question #5
What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the afternoon and three legs in the evening?

Before anyone else could answer the person playing the Barbarian jumps up and says excitedly. "I know this one." And before anyone could say anything to stop him he proceeds to give this answer:

Barbarian: The old man with the walker has for legs because of the walker, the middle-aged man is walking on two feet..

At this point both the cleric and witch are rolling initiative and face-palming while I am laughing hysterically because of just the reactions around the table. It would have been bad enough if the shenanigans ended here but it gets worse.

So Sphinx gets initiative in the first round and pounces the Barbarian. The cleric seeing the hallway the Sphinx had been guarding was now exposed decides to use his Mythic ability and sprint down the hallway 50ft..setting off 5 traps (2 poisoned bolts each trap) as he did so failing his save and taking 3 points of CON damage. He calls back to the group informing them about the trap (which had a reset).

Witch runs up and grabs a hold of the rogue and Barbarian and casts Dimension door down the hallway. Sphinx attacks again and but the group manages to get to a 5 foot hallway even though the Witch is still within the Sphinx's reach. The witch decides to attempt to Acrobatics down the hallway trying to travel the 25 feet of trapped space without triggering the traps. Fails and subsequently gets plucked with a bunch of bolts and being a witch fails her fortitude save vs Poison and starts losing CON (my evil GM dice kept rolling 5/6 on d3s). Needless to say the witch goes down quickly but being nice I give the player a Breath of Life which restores the lost health and saves the character albeit at a 1 CON.

Okay so that is my story anyone else have a similar one of where one small misstep starts to snowball out of control like that?

Okay the basis for my question may require a little exposition but the basis of the question is aimed more at event coordinators and the VL/VCs out there: what advice would you give to someone organizing a group after a period of intense disorganization?

I have been playing pathfinder society since right after the start of season 5. In that year I've mostly been between two of the local gamestores. The first of which has stopped hosting the events because of lack of consistent interest but the second store is where my question is focused.

When I started two people were running the games and organizing the weekly play..but then the real world reared it's ugly heAd and they had to pull back in February. Since then the group has kept going but fell into a horrid state of disorganization: gms being forced to run blind, failures to report, lack of a fair grasp of society rules, etc. As you might imagine this made the sessions quite a headache to run and play in. It wasn't until about June maybe July that we got together to try and fix this. We have worked out a system for when people are gming but it is far from perfect. I was given the task of reporting all the current sessions we are running and of splitting some of the duties of an event organizer and I was wondering if some more experienced people might have some advise

Okay we ran The Paths We Choose at our weekly Society game in Little Rock last night and I'm looking at the chronicle sheet for the game and I wanted a bit of clarification (just so I can be absolutely certain that I won't be a cheater maccheaty-face). And the second is about technical difficulties with reporting.

Question #1:
Boon #2 New Recruits: "Your faction's success enables it to recruit and train new members. You may designate one newly created PC under your Pathfinder Society number who shares your faction as a new recruit. This additional training grants that PC one of the faction's traits as a bonus trait, though the PC cannot have more than one faction trait. You must include a copy of this Chronicle sheet with the new PC's records, though that PC gains no additional boons, equipment, or wealth from this Chronicle sheet."

This means 1 new character of my choosing gets a third trait that has to be a faction trait right?

Question #2:
I'm also in charge of reporting the scenarios for our group and every time I select the scenario and hit 'Save Changes' or 'Update' it is deselected and so I'm having issues reporting the scenario. Is anyone else having this issue and possibly have a fix?

Okay, as the title of the thread says I am new to GMing and I have already found that it is an entirely different beast sitting behind the screen than on the player side of it. I've come across a few situations in this that I really had no idea how to respond as a GM to some of their ideas.

My group of four players (myself included) has decided to run through Rise of the Runelords together and switch off GMs for each book so no one has to GM for the entire campaign. I drew the first book (Burnt Offerings) and before I go any further I feel that I should place a warning that there may be some spoilers ahead.

Two situations, in particular, come to mind. The first is in the Catacombs of Wrath part of the first book. The party allowed Erylium to escape from the initial encounter (which they had gone to almost immediately) and she later ambushed them in the room with Koruvus. With all of her spells activated the PCs were struggling to lay a hand on her. The Paladin who had used smite on her earlier couldn't even seem to hit her. After several rounds the Rogue takes down Koruvus and I mention that Erylium seems to be about to flee. On the initiative the Paladin decides to remove his cloak and attempt to grapple/entangle Erylium in it. Unsure of how to respond I allowed it to go forward telling the Paladin that if he wishes to attempt it he will need to make a reflex save to avoid stepping on one of the lids on the floor and falling 20 feet like the cleric already had. He agrees and makes his grapple check and beats her CMD significantly but ends up falling in the hole with her. The scene goes downhill quickly as he (while getting attacked by a zombie) proceeds to pin and then use rope to tie her up.

The second involves a more absurd scenario at Thisletop. The group had already killed the druid and his animal companion before fighting the other group of goblins and taking one of them alive. While the Paladin was away from the table the group questioned the goblin getting what information it had. And learning what was at the bottom of the hole the group came up with the idea to use their three 50ft segments of hemp rope to tie up the goblin along with several swords and to make a make-shift fishhook and lower the goblin down the roaring hole to get the Bunyip from its lair up to them. When the Paladin came back they had already secured the goblin below and told the Paladin to pull on the line they secured to some trees and proceeded to make opposed strength checks to pull the creature up from its lair. Not having any idea how to respond to the idea of "Goblin Fishing" I made them roll a survival check followed by I offered them a craft Trap or Profession Fisherman to actually make it.

So I'm asking for input from other GMs to see how you might respond to a party who insists on such measures that aren't covered in the rules?

Okay, as the title of the thread says I am new to GMing and I have already found that it is an entirely different beast sitting behind the screen than on the player side of it. I've come across a few situations in this that I really had no idea how to respond as a GM to some of their ideas.

My group of four players (myself included) has decided to run through Rise of the Runelords together and switch off GMs for each book so no one has to GM for the entire campaign. I drew the first book (Burnt Offerings) and before I go any further I feel that I should place a warning that there may be some spoilers ahead.

Two situations, in particular, come to mind. The first is in the Catacombs of Wrath part of the first book. The party allowed Erylium to escape from the initial encounter (which they had gone to almost immediately) and she later ambushed them in the room with Koruvus. With all of her spells activated the PCs were struggling to lay a hand on her. The Paladin who had used smite on her earlier couldn't even seem to hit her. After several rounds the Rogue takes down Koruvus and I mention that Erylium seems to be about to flee. On the initiative the Paladin decides to remove his cloak and attempt to grapple/entangle Erylium in it. Unsure of how to respond I allowed it to go forward telling the Paladin that if he wishes to attempt it he will need to make a reflex save to avoid stepping on one of the lids on the floor and falling 20 feet like the cleric already had. He agrees and makes his grapple check and beats her CMD significantly but ends up falling in the hole with her. The scene goes downhill quickly as he (while getting attacked by a zombie) proceeds to pin and then use rope to tie her up.

The second involves a more absurd scenario at Thisletop. The group had already killed the druid and his animal companion before fighting the other group of goblins and taking one of them alive. While the Paladin was away from the table the group questioned the goblin getting what information it had. And learning what was at the bottom of the hole the group came up with the idea to use their three 50ft segments of hemp rope to tie up the goblin along with several swords and to make a make-shift fishhook and lower the goblin down the roaring hole to get the Bunyip from its lair up to them. When the Paladin came back they had already secured the goblin below and told the Paladin to pull on the line they secured to some trees and proceeded to make opposed strength checks to pull the creature up from its lair. Not having any idea how to respond to the idea of "Goblin Fishing" I made them roll a survival check followed by I offered them a craft Trap or Profession Fisherman to actually make it.

So I'm asking for input from other GMs to see how you might respond to a party who insists on such measures that aren't covered in the rules?

I would like to play in a Rise of the Runelords or one of the other adventure paths (excluding Shattered Star or Legacy of Fire). I have played Pathfinder since June of 2013 o I have some experience with the game and have a good grasp of most of the rules.

I am set up on roll20 and on Skype. I have a headset, mic, and webcam if necessary.