klofft's page

From page 27: "There are intentionally fewer rings than there are expected PCs, since this forces them to be creative in their initial entrance into the occluding field, but if you’d rather hand out more rings so the PCs aren’t forced to use Sihedron medallions or other forms of magic to protect against the field’s effects, feel free to do so."

The rings don't protect against the no air part. That has to do with altitude, not the field.

How did your party deal with the lack of air in the death zone around the Pinnacle of Avarice?

It's bad enough that my players sold all their "evil" Sihedron medallions, so they only have 3 rings for 6 characters assaulting the place, but the air problem is proving even more daunting.

How did your groups handle it? How strictly did you enforce it?

Let them do it, have them attacked by the flying creatures. Once they get up to the top (Presuming they survive getting there, I know it would have killed our party trying straight away), then they're facing the end part of the adventure, a level early. Hopefully they'll see sense and fall back to the city.

Plus - are your players going to ignore a fraking city made of Gold? What sort of adventurers are they! ;)

Thanks for that. As for the last, my players are playing real goody-two-shoes-types, so this is all about saving the world for them. :)

(Not surprisingly, the players are sometimes not so noble as their characters in their metagame dialogue!)

My party has just defeated the cloud giants guarding the road to Xin-Shalast. They've learned from Svevenka that the top of the mountain is guarded by a magical shield. They want to check it out. So they've been using a combination of Wind Walk and Control Weather to move around with incredible speed and relative safety.

They have not seen the city yet, but their plan is to fly in and over the city, and all the way to the top of the mountain to investigate, bypassing everything below them.

Now, aside from the fact that the occlusion field is a worthwhile hazard in itself, I'm concerned about them "blowing through" the rest of the city.

On the one hand, I don't want to squelch their legitimate use of the resources they have (after all, that's some fairly heavy magic they've used to get this trick), and I've already warned them that the range of Control Weather means the city is already aware that something major is going on (it's Fall in my game, and the temp is now around 40-50 degrees F at the top of the mountain).

But some part of me says this is just too easy. Am I wrong?

I did look over the denizens of the city, and it does seem that the kuchrimas would attack, as would the dragon. The giant army might ineffectually throw rocks, and the ice devil might give pursuit. After all, the party is not invisible or "stealthy" in any way. Is that the way to go then: send enough aerial problems their way to make them turn back or land and hide? Or should I let them succeed in their scouting mission, but have the city on full alert (such as that is)?

Thoughts?

klofft wrote:

What am I missing here? Because this seems like an instant kill zone.

The mirrors release 2 copies of the one PC who is standing between them, not 2 copies of every PC in the party.

So presumably they fall for it once and then realize that they shouldn't look in the mirrors, right?

Hello all. I'm hoping someone gets to see this and can help me out before my next session in a couple days.

The mirrors of opposition in the Pride section: they release 2 duplicates of each party member to fight them.

How is an encounter with 8 12th level characters an EL 14 encounter? And this can happen up to 3 times?

What am I missing here? Because this seems like an instant kill zone.

Thanks in advance.

Can someone help me and keep me from having to re-read the first 4 parts again?

At what point (hypothetically) do our heroes learn about the opposition schools in Thassilonian magic?

My players are in Runeforge and they have deduced that they don't need to visit everywhere, but they think they need to clear out the entire Greed area, which will actually profit them very little towards their purpose in Runeforge. I want to encourage them towards Pride and Lust, ideally by reminding the characters of something they may already know.

I don't remember if it's lost in their notes, and I don't remember when (or even if) they ever uncovered that information.

Thanks in advance!
C

Man, this place is rough!

My poor players went to Sloth first, got whacked by the air effects, ran away, and then spent an hour trying to figure out how to get to the "real" Sloth area, taking damage over and over, before one of them suggested they try a different path.

So they chose Wrath...yeesh. Am I reading the story correctly in thinking that Wrath is kind of intended for later in their investigations? That final fight is really dangerous.

[For the record, my party:
Half-Elf Paragon 3/Fighter 6/Outcast Champion 3
Cleric of Pelor 9/Radiant Servant of Pelor 3
Cleric of Pelor 11
Paladin of Altua 11
Factotum 11
Sorcerer 6/Holy Scourge 2 (cohort)

The 11th level cleric and Factotum are an encounter away from 12th level.]

Is there a safe place to rest in Runeforge? Would they be interrupted if they slept in the central hub? Or do they need to clean a niche in Envy or some such to find safety?

Thanks for the insights!
C

To their credit, when they left the complex the first time, they re-entered by a different method. So while there were more giants inside, they didn't run into too many of them.

Ultimately, they went forward and found Mokmurian. We are on round 11 and the fight is only about 1/3 over. So far, only the loss of a cohort. Mokmurian's battlefield control is making things very difficult for them, but the party's saves have kept them from the worst of M.'s offensive spells, and his melee ability is not super-scary since his damage is so low.

Thanks. Those Conna ideas are cool. This helps a lot.

I'm running my group through the end of Fortress of the Stone Giants right now.

They have just finished with the Hounds of Tindalos and have no idea that Mokmurian is waiting for them in the next room.

The party healer is largely spent and suffered Wisdom damage earlier. They lost one party member (of 6) to the forgefiend. The artillery sorcerer is down to low-level spells only. The only thing really going for them is that they are all at decent hit point levels.

Not even knowing how close they are to the end, they are talking about trying to find someplace to hole up and recover. They've retreated from the fortress once already and they think (probably correctly) that they can't escape and hope to get back in so easily. Yet, as DM, I know there's really no safe place for them inside now that Mokmurian knows they are here and close. (And they never met Conna.)

Advice on how I should handle this? Mokmurian and a couple wounded Hounds will likely take them apart right now, but honestly, they're a powerful party and if they are allowed to rest for a night, the opposite will probably occur. How can I make this both "fair" and exciting?

Thanks in advance.

How did you handle the spell choices for the Raid on Sandpoint? I'm using the "one year passes" hook to start the adventure, which means my party is in town to celebrate Goblin Day. As such, the spellcasters would realistically NOT have their combat game on in spell selection. Yet, without that, they'll do horribly against the raid.

Any ideas besides handwaving it away and saying, "Prepare for a fight?"

Fair enough. Then you have created extra work for yourself! :)

But I also thought James had said that the fort collected taxes from Turtleback, which could be a more immediate source of income for the fort.

Either way, I think it comes down to whether you want this to be an accounting problem or a plot element. Both are totally viable choices. Normally, I'm a DM who likes a little accounting in his game, but I quickly sized up the immensity of this situation and decided I liked it better as a plot element: get to the story, move on, don't worry about the gp (which are often in short supply with my group - they give away a lot and don't go crazy with searches in dungeons).

But if you want the accounting, do a search here on Fort Rannick. There are a few old threads here and at least one has hard numbers in it.

Good luck!
C

I'm in the same life-situation as you. If it doesn't offend your sense of balance, might I suggest:

The money offered by taxes is enough to slowly rebuild and ultimately maintain the fort with a zero profit for the PCs.

There. Accounting done.

aeglos wrote:

Moonbeam wrote:

I don't think s would be severely disturbed by those descriptions, regardless of gender. Since they play RPG's, they must be used to bloody situations at least at a certain level. Right?

Maybe try it a bit and see their reaction, if they really get freaked out, then skip the description texts and say what they see using more general (less graphic) terms.

well I don't think they will get nightmares or somthing like that,

but they will not enjoy it - I want my players to have a godd time and fun.
so I will leave it out, but the gore is the only thing special in hook mountain the rest is just mediocre at best.

Maybe I am just a bit frustrated at the moment, I will make it work somehow

I (and my players) had a lot of problems with the gore and disgustion in the flavor text of this module, at some point during the ogrekin house exploration I just started eliding material "blah blah grossness blah" when reading the room descriptions.

I loved the descriptions. And yeah, not all my players are into this. But it had the author's desired effect: the players were horrified at the villainy of these beasts.

Once we got past the Grauls, though, the Kreegs, while still gross, evoked a different reaction: the players were astounded that these ogres refused to let anything go unbroken wherever they went. It became a bit of a running joke, up to and including the dam.

Is there ANY chance at all that this thread will get back to the OP's topic? I'd rather read stories about heroic paladins rather than philosophical arguments that are gounded in way too many unspoken presuppositions.

I suppose I might get in trouble for this, but what the hell.

In my campaign, on a practical level, all the goods are differently but equally good (and vice versa).

However, in my cosmology, the OP's alignment scale is essentially correct: lawful good is the most good, and chaotic evil is the most evil.

The reason for this is that a single good God created the universe and imposed an order on all of creation (which the people simply know as "providence"). This means that both goodness and order are hallmarks of the Creator.

CG is thus "less" good because it doesn't pay due respect to a concern for right order in the world (in theory anyway, though not necessarily in practice - more on this in a moment).

LE is thus "less" evil because it is an abuse of persons while respecting the notion that the world is an orderly place. LE is an abuse of that order, while still acknowledging that it exists (in theory anyway).

Even the corner cases are curious: at times, LN might seem a little more "good" than CG because order is important; likewise, CN might seem a little more "evil" than LE because of its lack of concern for right order (in theory anyway).

But I keep noting "in theory," because in practicality, none of the characters in my world sit around really philosophizing about L, N, and C. The fundamental conflict between good and evil is WAY more important in my world. Thus, LG and CG characters don't argue about who is "more" good because there is a lot of evil that needs its ass kicked.

Just curious, but why isn't the paladin the party leader?

A million points of Charisma, the perfect set of leadership skills, and the (typically) pompous superiority that usually goes hand in hand with all the "chosen ones" who rise into important positions within prominent churches.

On the counter point, paladins are not suited to be followers. First, a paladin will lose everything. Power, dignity, respect, etc., if he strays from Lawful Good, so there is almost no way he could follow anyone who isn't Lawful Good. Second, even other Lawful Good allies may have different goals and objectives that the paladin's church doesn't support, so following someone of a different faith is questionable. That leaves following only LG members of the same faith; anything else is reckless (and recklessness is the path to chaos...)

I'm not trying to imply that paladins must lead, but they sure are suited for it, and stupid or not, they're not well suited to taking direction from anyone else who isn't a ranking member of the same faith.

Yeah, everything I just said can go right out the window in any campaign as the paladin and the DM see fit. I'm just curious at how it worked out that your group's paladin...

The paladin follows a nobleman who is presently LN, but who tends to choose good, such that he will likely become LG by the paladin's influence. He is also a paladin of Altua (we're not using Golarion), a goddess of nobility, so it makes sense that he would respect and follow a true noble. And he is not the primary healer because the party has a super-dedicated cleric healer.

We also don't play paladins as necessarily "members" of their churches in any specific sense (it depends on the god: some have larger and/or more organized churches than others). In fact, my whole cosmology doesn't really work with conflicting churches, so this doesn't really come up.

Finally, while the party is Good, several are chaotic. But that doesn't have to fly in the face of LG; we understand CG simply to mean that those good people don't feel beholden to law and/or authority in order to good. But it doesn't mean they HAVE to break the law to be CG!

Anyway. That's how our group does it.

I don't have a particularly cool story, but the paladin in our group is not a problem (nor was the paladin before him).

The present guy is eager to throw himself into battle, but smart enough to know when to flee and re-group, always eager to help the "people" with no thought of reward, always willing to follow a trail that seems like it will lead to facing evil, and yet is quiet enough that everyone is willing to seek his counsel and listen to him, including the party's leader, who often relies on the paladin for a "gut check."

As a professor of morality, in my experience, when people express problems with paladins, or insist on playing them as lawful stupid, it reveals more about the player's or group's sense of what "morality" is than an inherent problem with the class. YMMV.

I decided to run the flood immediately and, after they recovered, they're heading straight to the dam.

They probably won't get to Magnimar to unload loot until after Hook Mountain.

FWIW, my players are quite ambivalent about the fort. Only one enthusiatically wants it.

OK, this is something to think about.

When I hadn't received any responses for a few days, I re-read all the other HMM threads. It seemed that there was such an issue with the scenario's timeline that I could pretty much do whatever and it would probably work.

The players haven't planned for it or complained about it; I just figured that would be the next thing they'd want to do, so I was preparing in advance.

However, perhaps I'll check their present wealth by level status. If they happen to have an appropriate amount of useable gear, maybe I'll just move to the next crisis.

Thanks. If anyone has a counterpoint to share, I'd love to hear.

In your games, how long did you let pass between the re-taking of the Fort and the flood at Turtleback?

The book doesn't give a specific time frame other than "soon after," but the party has just made it out of the Fort with all this loot that they can't really sell in Turtleback Ferry. So they would need time to get back to Sandpoint, or ideally Magnimar, and then return to the Fort, which is a few weeks' time.

Does it seem reasonable that the flood would wait that long?

It seems this conversation is sort of rounding off to the inevitable "whatever works for your game," but I thought I'd sound off because no one else has mentioned what we do at our table.

We are thoroughly committed to rolled stats because we're grognards but, using Paizo adventures, we also got too used to TPKs, using 4d6, highest 3.

Compounding this problem is a role-playing attitude that means that not every room is tossed hard searching for treasure, and a small but not insignificant portion of treasure found is given away as charity, and other treasure is not used as is and is thus only worth half.

Bottom line: we're usually behind the average on presumed gear for our level.

So after the first TPK in RotRL, we started the next party at 5d6, take the highest 3. Yup, stats probably average 14 or so across the board, but survivability has finally reached a comfortable level, even though they are still financially poorer than they are supposed to be. Plus the high stats mean that it makes perfect narrative sense that everyone treats them as superheroes.

Before high levels, the vagaries of a d20 roll means that things are rarely ALWAYS a cakewalk. As DM, I roll ridiculously well, so the threat of death is always only a few rolls away. Sure, my new party has waltzed easily through many encounters in HMM, but there have been others where a few die rolls have sent them running.

This is a useful thread. I do get to play, but I get to read a lot more than I'll ever get to play, so this is very helpful. Thanks!

Can you tell us your Player makeup (Classes) and the general tactics they used?

Sure. Anything to help.

Half-Elf Half-Elf Paragon 3/Human Paragon 3/Fighter 1 (Reach weapon melee fighter)
Elf Wizard 7 (Generalist with special proficiency in fire spells)
Human Cleric 7 (Super-focused on healing)
Human Paladin 7 (Melee fighter)
Human Rogue 7 (Specializing in feint)

The whole fight was only 3 rounds, and the retreat began halfway through round 3.

The room is awfully small for two large creatures and the party realized they needed to get out of the 5' doorway or they'd get bottlenecked. So several of them dashed in to engage in melee. During ALL the melee actions, two of the Black Arrows were killed by Lucrecia, and our 2 melee fighters each hit Xanesha once. Lots of missing otherwise (the lamias ACs were between 24 and 30 at any given time). This basically leaves the spellcasters.

The cleric moved to the doorway, cast Summon Monster IV and summomed a celestial lion (ineffectual) and then Shield of Faith on the last melee fighter before retreating. Summon Monster IV was the only "offensive" spell he had prepared. He mostly prepares buffs.

The wizard cast focused Dispel Magic on Lucrecia, removing her Mage Armor. He then tried Manyjaws on both of them and blew his spell penetration in both cases. Then, as the retreat was sounded, he threw a 10d6 empowered fireball (he has feats that allow him to do this). He made it past SR on both, but Lucrecia easily made her save and Evasion eliminated all damage. Xanesha also saved. A crappy damage roll ended up with only 27 damage after halving. Then they ran.

Even if all their successes had been against Lucrecia alone, she wouldn't even have been at 1/2 hit points, yet her melee ability would have done 1/2 or more HP to any one of the characters every round.

I know there have been a lot of threads about Lucrecia and especially Xanesha. But my group is still having problems.

When they faced Xanesha, she instantly killed their cohort, and they turned and fled. I had heard that happened for a lot of groups and, as defeating her wasn’t essential to moving the plot along, I figured I’d just use her again later.

Last night, they found Lucrecia by going through the tunnels beneath Rannick. They were fully healed, had Shalelu, Jakardros, Kibb, Vale, and Kaven with them, and had only used a few spells to provide electricity protection, which were still in effect.

They never touched her before sounding the retreat after Vale and Kaven’s deaths.

[As a side note, I had Xanesha make an appearance here WITH Lucrecia. I know that sounds crazy, but doing the math, this EL 12 encounter seemed possible for a party of 10 level 6-8 characters. I realize now that that was wrong. In truth, Xanesha only made a couple attacks of opportunity while she sat there and buffed. So, aside from distracting the party’s actions, she didn’t affect the outcome significantly. But I was wrong on this one for sure. She dimension doored out and won’t appear again before Mokmurian. Anyway, back to my problem.]

If Lucrecia is the “easy” one (as several have attested), how is a party of this level (4 8th level characters, I presume – my party is 5 7th level ones) supposed to defeat her? Her melee ability without buffs and with average rolls is easily enough to deal about 20 points per round, with the potential to easily do a lot more. Her AC without buffs is high enough that only combat specialists have a reasonable chance to consistently hit her. And her combination of SR and Evasion and a +18 Reflex save makes most traditional artillery useless against her. [She resisted a Manyjaws and then evaded a 10 die empowered Fireball.]

My players were pretty crestfallen last night. Sure, none of them died (in fact, most even avoided serious wounds, but the fight was only 3 rounds), but they believe that they’ll have to face her again (likely true) and they can’t see how even leveling up to level 8 will make any appreciable difference in their ability to defeat her. What are we missing?

Any insights greatly appreciated.
C

Krauser (from an animated martial art movie series derived from a video game series, I don't remember the name of any more - he loved a good fight, had a thing for organ music and was Gothic - not the modern incarnation of Goth, but the real deal)

That would be Fatal Fury 2 (and plenty of sequels). He was the long-lost relation of Geese Howard of Southtown, the villain of Fatal Fury 1. I actually totally love the overblown stories in fighting games!

Moonbeam wrote:

That went nicely! It bodes well for the rest of the campaign that the group did so well in that deadly encounter. :)

Have you already decided how you're going to get the group to go to Fort Rannick? Will it be Lord-Mayor Grobaras who asks them as in the adventure?

Actually...

** spoiler omitted **

I figure that will be enough to get them moving. That and a little revenge. :)

-Lisa

This is a great letter and I may steal it...but do you think it reveals too much of the big picture at this point in the story?

If you can have the players discover her plot to ** spoiler omitted ** and they can save him from her attempt, then that gives them the "You saved my life and seem like a competant bunch" plot hook back.

It doesn't even necessarily have to be her they stop, could be other minions. Nothing says that the ** spoiler omitted ** was the only Skinsaw Man Cult hideout, so there could be other members elsewhere in Magnimar. You could clue the party into another hideout, let them spot some cultists in a dark alley one night, follow them back to their lair, overhear them talking about ** spoiler omitted **etc.

This may be the way to go; thanks. I'm not sure I want them to fight Xanesha again until much later on - I'm not convinced they can take her.

I suspect that she'll move on, possibly out of Varisia entirely though possibly just up-river a bit. She'll want new minions, if nothing else. Before she leaves though she's going to want to take out Lord Mayor Grobaras. He's been her big project for a while now, and she's got to be pretty close to figuring out how to get to him.

The first thing she'll do, I expect, is abandon the Shadow Clock. She has various lovers around the city who pine for her when she's away, so she won't have any trouble finding a place to stay. Maybe one of these people can even help her lure in the Lord Mayor.

In my game the same thing happened as in yours, and the PCs fled all the way back to Sandpoint. They just let bad stuff happen, so Lord Mayor Grobaras died and Deputy Mayor Arkona took over. Xanesha wasn't in as bad shape as in your game (since more of her minions survived), so she's staying with various rich men and masterminding the deaths of more greedy people (including a lot of Scarnettis).

Good luck!

So how did you get them to Hook Hill?

A while ago, my players were TPK'd by Aldern Foxglove. They made a new party, analyzed problems with their player tactics, and I continued the story with a new party in Magnimar.

Last night, they faced Xanesha. They were pretty healthy HP-wise, still had a few decent spells left on their lists, and are a party of 5 6th level characters with a 4th level cohort.

She trounced them. After the cohort was stabbed to death in a single round, they chose the better part of valor and fled. I saw no particular reason that Xanesha would pursue them, and I thought it would be a pretty RBDM thing to do anyway.

But now I'm stuck. What would Xanesha do at this point?
Foxglove is dead.
All the Skinsaw Cultists in the sawmill are dead.
Justice Ironbriar (father of one of the characters in my game) has been quietly brought to justice.
Xanesha's faceless stalkers are all dead.

Would Xanesha leave Magnimar behind? Start hunting the PCs herself? Sit and wait for adventurers to kill her? :)

I'm eager to finish Skinsaw Murders and move on, but my party needs the reward from the mayor to improve their gear and a viable hook to get them to Fort Rannick.

Any suggestions or ideas for what to do with Xanesha and/or how to move the party forward? Help!

Thanks in advance,
C

tbug wrote:

Joey Virtue wrote:

Well there are murders going on of Greedy Souls and now she has a double prog attack in Magnimar

So they are investigateing the murders and now the murders have picked up as Aldern is now in town also

Good call. Xanesha was using the three faceless stalkers to commit the serial murders, but she gave them other duties a week or so before the scenario finds her in Magnimar. Perhaps now that she has Aldern back in his townhouse she can free them up to resume their murderous activities.

Nice:)

Ah. If the adventure's author likes a line of thought, it seems like one worth considering. :)

So...for those who contributed to this idea above: there are THREE murderous groups working for Xanesha? Aldern, the faceless stalkers, and the Skinsaw Men? If I'm reading this correctly, it would be simple enough to incorporate Aldern and the Skinsaw Men. But any ideas of how they could easily encounter the murderous stalkers? My reason for asking is that my players are not the best investigators AND this investigation is the introduction of a whole new party. I'd like to get them "back on track" as quickly as possible while stay maintaining the survival of Aldern from the previous party's failure.

Thanks again.

Sixth level might be a good idea; a very good idea, in fact. The only thing my players may balk a little at is how much they enjoy developing a character's backstory from as low a level as possible (usually 1st). But I think it's good.

Tbug,

I like some of these ideas more than others. I'm hesitant to have NPCs "save the day," as it were, as I'd rather not shove their inability to defeat Aldern onto the players. I really like the goblin idea, but it suffers from the same issue. I may bring Aldern back to Xanesha. That would give the players (playing new characters, of course) a second chance at him.

Where would you suggest placing him then? At Xenesha's side would make an already rough encounter way too tough.

As for the Magnimar plot, I haven't figured out what I'm going to do yet, but I figured I would just give plenty of expository info to the new characters. The last group were not locals to Sandpoint, and that was a minor problem. So one of the newbies will likely be a resident returning home. I'm thinking another PC could be a Black Arrow or somehow affiliated with them. Another could be a resident of Magnimar.

Any other thoughts or ideas about how best to re-set this campaign-in-progress would be great.

So Aldern TPK'd the party last night. I tried to help, I tried to fudge a little, but the grind of die rolls ultimately depleted their luck. The players were bummed, but they're moving on.

I ideally wanted to continue RotRL with a new party of 5th lvl characters (there are 5 of them, so I figured 5th, rather than 6th). I'd like to start in the next section, coming up with a reason for the new party to be investigating the Skinsaw cult in Magnimar. Suggestions welcome there, but I think I can handle that part.

But what do I do about the fact that the Skinsaw Man is still running around Sandpoint? I REALLY don't want to do Foxglove Manor again (I LOVE that section - my favorite in the whole AP - but it really wore the players down).

Thanks in advance!
C

[Cross-posted on ENWorld and RPGnet.]

Hey all.

I don't know if this is the right place for this, but it seems to be the most appropriate spot.

I'm writing on behalf of a friend. He is a comic book artist who has done the con circuit as an independent artist. Now he is interested in breaking into the game industry.

Can anyone tell me what "standard" rates might be for someone doing freelance art for a successful-but-still-small gaming company? He doesn't want to charge too high, but he also doesn't want to undersell himself either.

Any hard numbers someone might be able to offer would be greatly appreciated (and ASAP as well!)

Thanks in advance.
C

My group has just finished Burnt Offerings and is getting ready to begin Skinsaw. They were reviewing Nualia's notes (and were totally unmoved by her backstory, FWIW) - which the text says includes Nualia's story as presented on p. 9-10. I edited things out that I knew she didn't know (like the truth about what Malfeshnekor is), but older stuff was harder to discern. So I mentioned her encounter with the Skinsaw cult and called it by name. However, as I'm prepping the next adventure, it seems that the Skinsaw cult's existence is much more of a secret. Did I blow it? The party is already eagerly questioning Sandpoint about the Skinsaw Men (obviously, with no success). Thoughts? Ideas? Thanks.

Orik is dead. They accidentally killed him before he had a chance to surrender (critical hit from a goliath with a greatsword).

They are only 2nd level because of a house rule about being in a "safe place" (e.g., town) to level up. They have enough XP for 3rd, but decided to boldly press forward rather than retreat.

These are just clarifications and explanations, though. Thanks for the suggestions so far - I wouldn't mind more!

I am presently running Burnt Offerings from Rise of the Runelords and I have run into a difficulty. In order to prolong the game’s survivability, I gave the party a number of “death saves.” These simply allowed the character to automatically stabilize at -10 HP and survive. In this way, their compatriots could heal them, or at least drag them to safety. The players appreciated them and the system worked fine.

Then they met Nualia and her yeth hound. And another wounded yeth hound that had previously escaped. And Brathazmus, who no longer had any weapons (they had been stolen while he was unconscious), but who did have a huge chip on his shoulder. And the party was only 2nd level.

They actually did pretty well, considering their ridiculously horrendous luck. They managed to kill one hound, seriously wound the other, kill Brathazmus (he was still fairly badly wounded from before), and, though they didn’t know it, got Nualia to under half HP.

But they all went down, four in Nualia’s presence, one fled from the yeth hound howl and ended up in the pit under the glaive-wielding statues. Now what should I do?

The idea behind death saves was that they aren’t dead. It would be lousy of me to say, “Sorry, you all went down and you have no death saves left, so she lets the hound eat all of you. Game over.” But how can I “save” them from a narrative point of view?

I realized that Nualia would have reason to keep prisoners as sacrifices. That’s pretty easy. But what about all their gear? What about healing? For the latter, I’m considering just hand waving it and giving them their HP back. But the former…I want to avoid the silly cliché that she conveniently leaves it 10 feet outside their cells in a pile, but I don’t want them to have to fight too hard or long to get their gear back either, as it would also stink to have them live just to escape prison and die ignominiously without weapons.

If I hand wave healing, the last character could be a savior, as Nualia has no reason to suspect where he is. Even so, though, his great sword was dropped when he was panicked, so he’d still be without a primary weapon.

Please help!
Thanks in advance!
C

Meh, sounds a little too silly for my tastes. I need a new game system to replace that clunky Street Fighter: The Storytelling Game.

I've been writing that replacement for 12 years. It's newest incarnation should be available next year (I have to finish writing the books that pay the bills before writing the ones that won't!).

Can someone clarify the direction of the smuggler tunnels under the glassworks? It says that it winds NE toward the cliffs...but then talks about the tunnel's southern half with branching tunnels. Does the tunnel initially have branches that go both south and northeast? What am I missing?

Thanks in advance,
C

I haven't finished reading the 2nd page of this thread yet, and this is a bit of a threadjack, but...

Yes, I use random HPs, though we simply roll twice and take the better roll.

But to those who dislike them and say that no reasonable person would randomize other aspects of the game...we do...

Every new character is generated from two lists of randomly determined races and randomly determined classes.

I run a VERY big kitchen-sink game, simply because I have so many books. It doesn't mean everything is in the world, but it means POTENTIALLY everything is in the world.

Added to this is the fact that many of my players have few or no books and limited D&D experience. If I allowed open choice of race and class, rarely would anyone leave the PHB. There's nothing at all wrong with that (and presently 80% of party races and 60% of party classes are PHB), but the random roll encourages my players to at least consider things they may never have even thought of as character ideas. And I, in turn, get to actually use my huge collection in game.

[Furthermore, we don't have to deal with the quarrels like, "Warblades are better than fighters, so why play a fighter?", because you may not have such a choice.]

Threadjack over. Thanks.
C

I am running a homebrew “kitchen sink” campaign. Only recently, I have tried to start finalizing my particular perspectives on various races from the long list of traditional archetypes – and it was reading about the world of Golarion that really inspired me to start answering these questions. The discussion about elf ears was especially interesting to me, as I always thought of myself as a “shorter ear” guy, but the longer ears have become more appealing to me (my players will likely disagree, but none of their characters are presently elves, so it doesn’t much matter).

I was wondering if I could pick the creative minds of the Paizo boards on my gnome problem. Ya see, I really like the Golarion gnomes (which remind me vaguely of the Midnight gnomes), but in a kitchen sink setting, I also would like to provide room for the “gnome tinker” archetype to go with the “gnome fae” archetype, yet still consider them the same race. Any ideas about how to combine these disparate stereotypes?

Thanks in advance!
C

Any chance of honoring the prices from the end of '07 Green Ronin sale? A couple books that were cancelled from my order at that time are now available once again.

[Sorry if this is posted in the wrong section.]

I just received RotRL #1 today and I plan to begin running it tomorrow. I was wondering about party composition. My players (a party of 5) are making characters. Thus far, they have only a little divine magic (maybe one favored soul) and only a little arcane magic (a bard and maybe a sorcerer). How badly are they going to get mauled without "standard" magic? I understand they need healing magic - but aside from that, how necessary is magic needed for success? Thoughts? Thanks.

As a Chatholic I see being gay as a sin, but I can still deal with my views as a mature adult as you have. Hell I joke more then anyone but dosent change my core belife system. Don't think your alone and don't jump ship. As a said a few post above I think the guys at Pathfinder just wanted a more realistic fantasy setting, some like it some don't. Most I think...

I have no idea why I'm joining in on this thread...

I am a professor of Catholic sexual ethics and I would certainly be considered "conservative" in that I support the Church fully on these matters. I just wanted to clarify that the Catholic church does NOT teach that being "gay" is a sin.

As a separate point, KnightErrantJR, thanks for everything. On behalf of my gaming group of practicing Catholics, thanks for always being willing to speak up against intolerance here.

Peace.
C

If there's enough demand, we'll reprint it. (As some of you have already heard, we're currently surveying the retail channel to gauge demand.) But reprinting it when there isn't sufficient demand would be silly—that's how companies go out of business.

Forgive the threadomancy, but I've just been converted to the wonders of this setting and I really would like to get a print version of this for less than $50 (for a used copy no less). So consider me part of the demand! Thanks!

Hoping for good news soon,
C

DR for armor can't really be on the table while keeping the rules backwards compatible with 3.5. As for the rest of these issues, I agree that some armors become excessively used. I personally don't see it as a problem, but one way to tweak it without changing any combat bonuses as written in the SRD would be to just change the prices to better reflect what you are getting.