With the introduction of figures that are exclusively from the video game, one almost has to wonder if Paizo isn't planning on making an "Anniversary Edition" of Kingmaker.... say with NEW material and updated rules......?
I think the check to cast a spell while under Source Severance is a concentration check so the DC for a 9th level spell is indeed 38, but Karzoug's bonus to the roll is +33 (caster level of 20, plut Int bonus of +13 - he has a 36 Int per AE p. 364.)
Still, that still makes it a failure 25% of the time - probably not a good feature for a character who's primary power is spell-casting. (Technically, I think Source Severance entered the dialogue as a pc tactic against Karzoug not a Karzoug tactic against the pc's.)
Well, it never mattered anyway. I used the magic jar trick, which confused the heck out the party. The final fight lasted five and a half hours. Karzoug died to an anti-magic field and a hellknight burying his glaive in the Ruinlord's chest, then riding him down into the lava below.
Only took four years and 86 sessions, but we finished!
Well, after four years and 86 sessions, my campaign finally came to a close last week. While there were lots of deaths, there was only one perma-death.
Name of PC: The Third Durriken
Class/Level: Fighter 13ish
Adventure: Sins of the Saviors
Catalyst: Death by snu-snu.
Story: He failed his save against all of the clones, was drawn into their bedroom where the door was locked, and drained, literally, over everything he had to give. He died with a smile on his face.
the giant army from Xin-Shalast invaded Varisia. My party took way too much downtime late in the game to craft (lots of Greed sin points), and Karzoug decided to start sending in scouting parties. When the party delayed again after creating the domineering weapons, Karzoug decided it was time to get serious, and used his apprentice to set up a teleport circle at the Stroval Stairs. Now there are two invading armies running around Varisia. One is besieging Kaer Maga, and the other just wiped Sandpoint off the map (after destroying all settlements in-between, and has their eyes set on Magnimar.
Good times
It's day 302 of the campaign. At day 365, it all ends, and Mhar Masif escapes.
I ended up having the Pit Fiend they saved in book 3(all religious characters were dead or unconscious at that point, Barbarian and witch freed him) swoop in and save the day. Promising to kill them, instead of saving them the next time they met.
Nice way to bring back an old face. My party killed their pit fiend.
The Arkhyst fight in my campaign took about four sessions between hit and run tactics on both sides. They eventually killed him, but only after he slew two party members. I had to rebuild him since I have 9 players. Vital Strike when it's tiered all the way up combined with Power Attack and Flyby Attack pretty much guaranteed a kill if he hit.
Alright, so here's my campaign, just to give you some ideas. I know I have one player who frequents these boards daily, but I trust him not to use OoC knowledge.
During Chapter 5, my party took 116 days of down time to craft. They'd dealt with the sinkhole problem, and decided that a 10k year old magic workshop could wait a few more days. At day 101, Karzoug decided to start sending out scouting parties of giants to probe for weak points in the Storval Plateau, and see if the Storval Stairs was the only way down to lower Varisia. The party was given hints of this throughout downtime, but ignored them.
When the party created the dominate weapons, Karzoug took great note, decided it was time to invade. He sent his apprentice, Khalib, out (decided he'd managed to learn how to leave the occlusion field since he was weaker and needed less time to regain all of his strength) with a larger group of giants, and they set up camp at the Storval Stairs, after taking out the Black Tower (missed the players by hours).
Once situated at the Stairs, the apprentice created a teleportation circle and started bringing in "the army". Quickly, a scouting party became a couple hundred giants, rune giants, and lamia of various types. Once this was done, the apprentice returned to Xin-Shalast.
Currently, Kaer Maga is under siege from the Storval Plateau, but holding since the remanents of the Black Arrows and dwarves from nearby Jagerhoff (?, going on memory here) are keeping the ogres from the nearby forest from attacking the south side.
The Storval Stairs is controlled by the giants, and they have swept down into Varisia. So far, Wolf's Ear, Ravenmore (again ?, due to not having a map in front of me), and Galduria have been destroyed, the last with some effort. Sandpoint is next, and probably won't survive. The Lord-Mayor of Magnimar was deposed in my campaign, and Magnimar is finally putting armies in the field.
The party is in Xin-Shalast, and slowly making their way towards the peaks, but has been distracted by attacking the Storm/Cloud giant military academy on the mountain side. We shall see if they survive. There is still every chance in my campaign that Mhar Massif will erupt and the Elder God will be released. Good times.
So continuing on Book 6 since a month ago, we have had two sessions.
Karzoug's army is on the march, and the party decided that crafting was more important than finding out what the army was all about. Plus they needed to figure out exactly WHERE Xin-Shalast was and HOW to get there (they completely forgot about asking Master Quink). Regardless of warnings, the party didn't bother investigating the army until it had split, most heading towards Kaer Maga, and a smaller group heading towards the Storval Stairs.
The smaller group at the Storval Stairs (after destroying the library at Jorgenfist on Karzoug's orders (party barely missed running into this group by minutes)), set up camp at the top of the stairs and contacted Khalib. He showed up and set up a teleportation circle to bring in the rest of the army. Once the army had formed (which took 3 days, again, in an attempt to give the party time to be proactive), they moved down into Varisia's lower plains.
So far....
1. Ravenmoor has been destroyed
2. Wolf's Ear has been destroyed
3. Lord-Mayor Grobaras has been deposed, and Mayor Deverin has taken his place.
4. The party has finally started to form an army to defend against the army
5. They found handout 6-1 and have moved on to the dwarven mining camp.
I have that book. I gave it to my fiance last year for Christmas. I'll have to take a look at it. I'll also have to grab my Shattered Star I.
This is going to be an interesting way to end a campaign, that's for sure. I'll continue to bounce ideas, as my party never comes to the boards outside of one player, and he knows how to stay quiet.
I'm not going to be so arrogant as to act like I have a completely mastery of the system
I do. I'm THAT awesome!
Seriously, though, ya'll are WAY too tense about this whole thing, IMHO. I've read the thread, and it seems to have devolved into a insult throwing session.
I was enjoying the original discussion (does color spray work in darkness....? Never thought about that).
As to the original questions….
Rapanuii wrote:
1. Color spray/Stun cause a Phantom Fungus inverted climbing on a ceiling fall off?
2. Does color spray make light?
3. Does color spray not work in total darkness?
1. No. Nowhere in the description of stun does it state that a creature collapses. (pg 568 of Core Rulebook). Also, under climb skill (pg. 91 of Core Rulebook) “a creature with a climb speed…can always choose to take a 10 even when rushed or threatened…” A phantom fungus has a climb speed of 20 ft. (Bestiary 3). I therefore posit that a Phantom Fungus, unless actually hit while stunned, would just hang from the ceiling and not threaten. It spends all of its very limited concentration on clinging to the ceiling as an instinctual reaction. But, all of this IS moot, as the fungus is a plant, and therefore immune to mind-affecting spells (Bestiary, pg 309).
2. By description, yes, but by definition of pattern under illusion (Core Rulebook pg 210), it doesn’t seem to matter, as the spell not only produces light (possibly), but also enters the mind of the victim (thus the mind-affecting descriptor).
3. By the information provided in answer 2, again, possible, but doesn’t matter. Also, in this way, color spray can affect dark-vision, which inherently doesn’t see colors, and theoretically could avoid the affect if it were ONLY based off of color.
In conclusion, IMHO, color spray would not stun the phantom fungus, as it is a plant and immune. A stunned climbing creature would NOT fall, unless they fail a Climb check. Color Spray does create momentary light but this is not necessary for the spell to take affect and is simply a visual display of the magic. Therefore, color spray would work in total darkness.
All of my players cry about being under equipped. If there was one table I could remove from Core, it'd be the wealth by level table. Drives me nuts! They handle whoop*ss on a regular basis, and still say that they're under powered. Your group almost makes mine sound like the Legion of Doom!
LOL! I figured you'd be on here, Darius. HE never promised the party a reward. The party ASSUMED he would pay them when he demanded that they retrieve his stuff. You just weren't there for that conversation, IIRC. The party has never really interracted with Scarnetti before then.
As to the town blaming the party, what do you expect?! You show up, warn them of an impending raid, and then leave. Raid occurs, you aren't there to help. And you never set up ANY system to allow them to contact you! The town got wiped! 10% killed or missing, and about 30% of the infrastructure destroyed, including almost the entire waterfront, the brand new cathedral, and the theater!
I just looked at what happens during crisis in real life when something like that occurs and acted accordingly. People want someone to blame. The party was an EASY patsy.
What alignment is the alchemist? I'm guessing N or CN.
I only allow Good or LN alignments in my game for this very reason. I hate to constrict players like that, but if they play their alignment, then there is really very little motivation for the PCs to help Sandpoint at that point.
As to your issue with the other player over the breastplate, I really like it! It sounds like you are doing a good job of making at an engaging adventure for your group (minus the alchemist, of course), and are doing a good job of tying in the pertinent NPCs.
I came to the realization a LOOOOONG time ago that these AP's are nothing more than general scripts. Players need to feel in control of their PCs' lives, and if they get railroaded all of the time, then it sucks. I just make sure that the rest of the world moves on around them, regardless of what they do or don't do. For instance, my PCs were not in town when Sandpoint got sacked. The sacking still occurred, and it was very bad. It's up to the PCs to fix the problem. They complained about the fact that they had no warning, but the fact was, they made assumptions based on the warnings and clues given, and were wrong. From what I am reading, you are doing an excellent job. Keep going!
Also, there's the whole "setting the scene" thing. Picture this.
When the party enters the area, they're surrounded by rows of corn sitting 2-4' up off the ground, with them walking a through a trench-like road between them. Suddenly, they start hearing screams and groans coming from around them. They are being hunted. The moon overhead is suddenly covered by clouds moving into the area, making everything shadowy illumination at best. Torches flutter and flicker, causing sparks to whirl in the air. The party, afraid to set the corn of fire and be surrounded in a firestorm, put the torches out and start lighting lanterns and breaking out sunrods. They hear movement from somewhere nearby (DC 15 to hear it, DC 20 to know direction, DC 22-25 to pinpoint). The first "scarecrow" attacks, screaming and leaping out of the corn (did you see the picture in the book! Use it!). The scarecrow leaps on a random surprised and flat-footed individual, burying the hapless victim in a tatter of straw and cloth (+2 charge, +1 for height advantage, +3 to attack totals a +6!). Make it a bite, and it's two Fort saves. As the party turns to deal with this first foe, ANOTHER strikes, from a different direction. Perhaps it does the same attack, or perhaps it tries to grapple someone and drag them screaming back into the corn to feed! Any horses, in the mean time, are going nuts from the smell of the blood and death! Players get thrown from their mounts, who tear off down the road into the night, only to get buried under another ghoul and go down screaming in the darkness!
It's all in the setting. I had my party terrified at first, then very nervous after that. I never described the ghouls in great detail, just straw, tattered clothes, glowing eyes, claws, and fang filled mouths. Since the party continued to hear activity, they never stopped and bothered to undress a scarecrow to see what it really was. By the time they got to the farmhouse, they knew it was ghouls, but they didn't know how many. The party assaulted the farm house and cleared it, but as they did, the rest of the pack had zeroed in on them. What started out as a house assault ended up being a scene from The Walking Dead, with the party barricading the house and fighting off waves of ravenous ghouls, some of whom climbed the walls and broke to the house through second story windows!
It's all in the setup. Terrify them. Shut your eyes and imagine being in the same situation. How many of us wouldn't be wetting our pants in fear? Terrify them.
I have the same issue with my group. But, honestly, I just rebuild the monsters using Hero Lab. Remember that your guys are the heroes. While we GMs need to have fun too, its our job to make sure they are having fun. And trust me, the game balance WILL shift. Book 5 and 6 are just mean. It's my understanding that most partys don't make it past page 350-someodd in the hard cover reprint.
My party has been mowing down almost everything I've thrown at them.... until they met the giants on their own turf. In the first battle, arrogance turned into three out of eight down and one dead. And that was just the intro battle.
Also, something I've learned is that the NPCs with 16-18+ intelligence are SMART. Meaning they will somehow know the party's weaknesses, and be prepared for them. I used to think of it as metagaming, but now I see it more along the lines of the Sherlock Holmes series, where through hyper-aware observation and logical conclusions, he was able to deduce ALL sorts of stuff about his enemies.
He scrys Sandpoint after the battle and notes the damage. Scorched strikes on rocks? Lightning. Melted store fronts? Acid. Big burn blasts? Fireballs. Giants cut to pieces? Melee slashing. Dragon riddled with arrows? Bow attacks.
Counter with energy resistance, stone skin or fly, and windwall or protection from arrows.
He successfully listens to NPCs talking through scry after the fight. Human paladins? Elf sorcerer? Half-orc ranger?
Appropriate bane arrows and weapons. Get sunder ready for those paladins and their weapons. Teach your guys snatch to grab holy symbols from clerics. Ways. There are ALWAYS ways.
Why shouldn't the NPCs be able to do the same. Mokmorian HAS to know that the PCs are coming. At this point, they have made themselves readily known. So he and his cohorts should be prepared appropriately. Represent his high intelligence correctly by making some preps to counter the PCs. Use their own tricks against them! A 20 intelligence HAS to count for something!
Stone giants rangers with a level in barbarian for rage + Enlarge person + improved critical and critical focus?! Create pit spells? Black tentacles?
There ARE ways. Legal ways. Logical ways. Hell, Mokmorian isn't dumb. Party comes in, have his guys have a preset signal set up to launch a firework. Giant encampments see firework, merge on fortress. Any party looking down into the valley to Jorgenfist should be TERRIFIED if they are at all smart. Over a hundred giants and mammoths! If they don't all have flight, they should understand that unless they are VERY smart and VERY quiet and VERY fast, they. Will. Die.
Sigh, this is what I get for going on travel and not checking the message board. Nynphaiel, it sounds like you have quite the problem. My initial gut response was cut your losses and find another group. But, the more I read through the boards, the more I realized that would be a bad response. In a lot of ways, your group sounds like my group when I first started running for them. It was rough. Very rough. And they schooled me HARD CORE. But, once I got a few campaigns under my belt, the tides turned, and they're pretty good now. I might reiterate what others said, but here's my take.
Nynphaiel wrote:
Help. Please. I'm begging.
I'm pretty sure my run of RotRL has been the most troubled run ever. I'm currently at the 3.1 version of it, after several players left the table (apparently, playing every other saturday was too much of a commitment to them). But finally, got the party. This weekend was the 3rd session, which ended up when they found Tsuto's letter.
You'll have some players who walk, especially if they're new to the group, or don't understand your style of play. I had one walk because he wrote into his character background that he was the favored nephew of the mayor. I guessed correctly that he wanted to use her to get whatever he wanted whenever he wanted. But, he gave me an excuse in his background to turn this against him, and didn't know how to handle it when I took all of those nifty toys he thought he was going to get away from him in the first five minutes of the session. Let's just say that Deverin is political and there was no way she'd risk her career over some upstart nephew who embarrassed her (in his write up!).
Point is, some players will walk. Some will stay. I had another player leave for real life reasons. He knows he's always welcome back at the table.
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The session was... problematic. Two of my players are Pathfinder DMs. Another player comes from D&D. And the fourth one comes from Vampire (where it seems it's OK if your PC is a sadistic a**hole, and nothing happens when you act as a jerk).
I don't allow metagaming at my table. I have ended campaigns over it. Regretfully, but necessary. I don't allow OoC knowledge, and no GM should, IMHO. As DM's, we think we know better. Being arrogant can come with the shield, and with your group build, a little of it might not be a bad idea. My group sense my weakness with 3rd ed when I started DMing for them (always ran 2nd before them), and took me for a ride.
I also have a Vampire LARPer at my table, though he's not like yours. Sorry about that. That sucks.
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The main issues (and the solutions I've came up so far) are next, but please, give me your opinion. At this point, anything helps.
1) They don't listen. Not to me, not among them. Not as players, nor as characters. They keep interrupting each other. Solution: no one can interrupt. It's a matter of respect, for God's sake. Be civilized, otherwise, you're out of the table for ten minutes.
LOL! Awesome! Sucks for the lack of respect, but I like the punishment!
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2) Meta-knowledge. Both the DM-players got knowledge from other sources. I'm dealing with this in two ways: some of it (the info they got wrong), I let them keep, until they find an NPC that laughs at them for having such ridiculous ideas. It has worked, so far. It has even made them more... humble. When they go too far, I tell them to stop using knowledge their characters don't have. It wasn't as succesful as the other solution.
Like I said, I have ended campaigns over this crap. This was the big one that made me want to say to find a new group. It really sounds like they have no respect for you, let alone respect as a DM.
Players don't understand the amount of time we GM/DM's take in game prep. Not until they step behind the shield. And it doesn't sound like that even works for your guys.
Just remember, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. If your players want to use OoC knowledge, you could always let the monsters do the same. I knew it sounds petty, and might not end well, but if they won't listen to you in any other way, slap them in the face with it.
What it all comes down to is respect. Respect for you. Respect for each other. Respect for the game and for the shield you sit behind. And it sounds like that is sorely lacking.
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3) Not enough meta-knowledge? The Vampire-player thinks he is the medieval Superman of this story. He wants to go alone to clean up the forests. He has a ranger. He has 10 hp. He is insane. Apparently, this is due to the lack of knowledge as how the system works. Not pretty sure how to handle this. Maybe explaining how this works? Also thought of talking about this from the character's perspective: why the heck would a foreigner that has just arrived to town go into a suicidal mission to clean the forests from goblins, which is also impossible?
This one has been covered pretty well. I always warn my players that there will be consequences for their actions. We'll get more into that with your 5th issue! Try taking him aside and explaining to him the game concepts. If that doesn't work, ask him to have a new character ready to go, and let him do what he wants. He will learn eventually, or find a new game.
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4) Ego. They have decided they know more. They are better experts in Thassilonian ruins than Brodert, they think they know better as how to rule the Militia... and the town. Seriously. The words 'they have no idea how to rule this town, we do' were said on the table. I'm thinking about trying to show them the big picture: they are newcomers, and don't know anything about the town, nor the NPCs. How can you judge anything without knowing it? Also, there is no motivation for the characters to do a lot more than to help people when they're being asked, and to try to figure out who was behind the goblin attack. I mean, do you really believe that if there was a dungeon in the lighthouse, which has been in the middle of the town the past 50 years, no one would have realised by now?
5) Alignment. One of the characters stabbed a militia member because they thought he was suspicious. Solution: they lost the discounts, have penalties to Diplomacy checks, and lost any privilege. They can't purchase in some stores. The only reason why the character wasn't send to prison, is because the other players intervened. Should I be harsher with this?
I'm going to cover these last two together. When these sorts of things happen, I tend to step back and try to look at the situation from the NPCs point of view. How would I feel if someone came into my town and started trying to push people around and tell them what to do? I'd push back. Hard.
Even if the players did save a bunch of people from goblins, that doesn't give them to right to run roughshod over the townsfolk. If necessary, I think the town might even form up a mob and try to run them out of town. Enough "low level" mooks can overbear, pin, and tie up the mightiest fighter.
The down side of this is that if it were to come to this, the campaign would be pretty much done. But, if the players continue along like they are, I don't see it going much further anyway. Eventually, most every AP is built on the premise that the players WANT to HELP the world they live in be a better place. RotRL is definitely built on that premise. If the players don't want to help, and just want to boss people around, there are AP's better suited to that style of play. The Shattered Star and Kingmaker series are both built for open alignment play. It may be time to shift to one of those and let them feel free to act more like they want to.
Best of luck in your campaign, and feel free to PM me with any other concerns. Like I said, I had to deal with issues just like these when I first started running my group. We've stuck together over the years anyway, and adapted to each other's play styles. Just remember, YOU are the DM, not them, and make sure that it's fun. Not just for them, but for you as well!
I did a sidebar adventure as well, but nothing like this. One of my players had gotten into a relationship with a waitress from the Fatman's Feedbag, and I decided, unbeknownst to him, that she was actually a Red Mantis assassin. While setting up to kill him, she was overwhelmed and killed by Aldren Foxglove, and became his subordinate partner.
Now that Aldren is dead (we are in chapter 4), shes a free roaming person, who has since stalked and killed the PC in question. Now shes shadowing the party. She's struck at them twice, once in the Clocktower fight, and again during the Siege on Sandpoint, though the party isn't aware of this one yet.
I've decided to allow the players to rebuild the NPCs some to use the new classes, with the stipulation that they are equiped as BASIC NPCs (low gold), and that I approve any build (no assassins with vorpal blades of giant bane).
Party is currently discussing whether to just allow the attack to happen and deal with the repercussions, as some people can't seem to grasp the concept of making a character that doesn't slaughter things in one shot (spoiled brats, they is!).
The attack has already occurred in the campaign. I was allowing them to try and mitigate damage. They really aren't mitigating. So, slaughter it will be. Guessing about 20% population death, and about 15-25% of the town destroyed, including the entire waterfront. It won't be pretty. It won't be good. And the party's reputation is GOING to suffer. A LOT.
Unless Arcane Sight says that the light emanating from the eyes is candle strength (ie. 5-ft. radius) or stronger, than no, the arcane sight spell would not be visable if the character was invisible. This also means, though, that the character cannot use the glow from his or her eyes as an emergency light source.
Plus, a permanent set of glowing eyes? Sounds like an awkward conversation starter to me, and worthy of a few pointed questions whenever the player goes someplace new...
There are always benefits, and penalties from actions that players do. It's up to us, the GMs, to remind them of that once in a while.
I really have to disagree. This is my first time playing an RPGA style format, and I have to admit that I was VERY hesitant. But, ingave it a fair shake and have really enjoyed it. I like the treasure distribution system and wish I could realistically put it in my campaign as my group suffers from the greed issue.
PCS is for fun. Just that, plain and simple. If someone wants to cheat, they'll find a way. Just enjoy it for what it is and have fun. It's up to the GMs to do their job properly and check their players. Expect them to do so and move on.
