motrax's page

I am thankful for this thread... I played Monday night in Joshua North's group and seemed a little puzzled at the "1 upgrade per scenario" rule... it seemed like deck upgrades would be really slow. But then allowing for replays (for deck upgrades only) and also the fact that you get to pick your specific card upgrade, it does seem to counterbalance it a bit.

And in fact, I was playing Zarlova, and had to banish my armor in both scenarios we ran. I did of course replace it with Basic: Chain Mail... no sense taking the Swashbuckling Light Armor. I am curious if once we reach deck 3, then I can use the rebuild from 2 decks lower or not. But I suppose we have PLENTY of time for clarification on that.

Cowabunga DUDES!

My wife shares your love of the turtles... so I have a pretty good feeling when I show her your custom-characters here, they will be soon-thereafter getting a playtest run!

They look very nice and well thought out in respect to their fighting styles and personality!

I think the only potential for problems with them as a group is their relatively low total of allies and blessings... might make multiple explores difficult.

Now GET to work on making Shredder the Villain, and Bebob and Rocksteady henchmen!

Motrax

How about changing it to "when you receive your 3rd skill feat, if you have upgraded 3 different skills, you may take an additional feat"

This would reward diversity, but not so restrictively that you couldn't specialise if you wanted.

Would the fact that you ended up with an 8th skill feat at the end be too powerful? Obviously it could easily be implemented after the 4th instead.

I don't think rewarding an extra feat would be fair, but how about this instead?

-After each scenario, you may lose one skill feat point and gain a different skill feat point. This will allow you flexibility and constant variety with this character.

I think Mike commented on this once... I think essentially it USED to be a giant, but it died and has deteriorated to such a point that it has lost all Giant traits. It's now essentially a rather large, slow, hulking undead bag. It's not strong enough anymore to hurt everyone at your location (typical Giant trait) but it is still massive enough to hurt you more if you let it (the discard from deck ability).

Unless there is an errata issued... let the cards speak for themselves. If it says it's a thing, it's that thing. If it doesn't say it's a thing, it's not that thing.

Good luck on your adventures!
Motrax

Welcome to PACG!

Rise of the Runelords was (and with 1 release to go still is) being released monthly. But with the popularity, they are going to a monthly release cycle. It is mentioned in the last paragraph of this announcement.

Good luck on your adventure!

My friend Hawkmoon I believe meant it is being released BI-monthly, that is every two months. Sins of Saviors was just released, and I think deck 6 is supposed to come out in June. I myself am still waiting on my copy, but have been told by Amazon May 8-10. With the level of popularity I don't realistically expect to see a deck 6 copy until early July.

As long as I get it before KantCon I'll be happy. I intend on bringing the full and complete game and powering through as many of the Adventure Decks as I can with whoever wants to try it out with me!

Motrax

Hey Hawkmoon,

This sounds like a fun, powerful character. Not necessarily OP, but definitely strong since he'll have d10 in STR and DEX which all weapons base combat off of.

However, I do think some of the powers underneath need toning down a bit. One thing I think is cool about the iconic characters is that MOST of their power feats are all along the same levels of power, there isn't always and obvious choice of what feat to take next. Sure there are play style preferences, and the Virtuoso Lem feat of using his own skill on himself is perhaps a no-brainer. But most everything else is nice and even keel.

One that jumps out at me as OP is treating 1's as MAX die. Say on a d10, that's a 9 point combat swing from just 1 power feat. Even on an average skill d6... with the potential for multiple 1's to come up, this particular power feat seems like a game-changer.

Here's my suggestion: []During a combat check, you may reroll any 1's one additional time, and keep that result. Limiting it to combat and rerolling only 1 time lets you benefit with a likely increase to your roll, but not a guarantee and also not such a static huge jump.

Also, on the Arcane Caster side... I do think jumping his Arcane by 4 points in one shot is a bit much. Maybe break it up into two feats []Arcane+2[]+4 ? Perhaps you could remove the recharge[6] to make room. After all, if he's got Arcane+4, he's not likely to need recharge+6.

I am working on a custom character of my own, I still haven't got it all worked out yet but it is essentially a specific world's version of Halfling rogue. I'll try my best to get it worked out and posted soon so I can have your and everyone else's help and input.

But I leave you with the race and perhaps the most terrifying two words one could ever hear him utter.

Kender: "I'm bored!"

Hawkmoon: You are a saint among sinners for the amount of help you provide in these boards.

No offense to all the other sinners in these threads. ;)

I'll amend that slightly, he is a SAVIOR among SINNERS... we gotta get the deck 5 plug in there properly!

Tee-hee!

According to Amazon, my deck will arrive May 8-10. Couple more weeks before I can join the sinners.

And in the immortal words of Billy Joel:
"I'd rather laugh with sinners than cry with the saints... Sinners are much more fun... and ONLY THE GOOD DIE YOUNG!"

In a 4-man game (Seelah, Ezren, Harsk, and Seoni) Seelah ended up Mike-Tyson-ing the villain Nualia in her first turn.

Her first hand draw (4 cards) she got a shield, so didn't have a card to bury to take all damage when Nualia force-attacked for 4 damage. (Handwipe!)

Luckily, Harsk and Seoni each had 1 blessing of the gods, and the timer blessing was Lamashtu! (Bury, 2 dice vs monster)

Was still a tight fight, due to Nualia's anti-blessing buff, but the 2nd check was just high enough to punch her lights out. Of course she ran away, but it was an EPIC first turn location-close.

If defeating a villain's checks with NO HAND isn't an achievement I don't know what is.

Ok onto another location:

Duck pond - I think this will be a cute/peaceful location. Cast your rod and see what junk you can pull in! But perfect hiding spot for the VILLAIN!

Mon: 0
Bar: 1
Weap: 1
Spell: 0
Arm: 1
Item: 4
Ally: 2
Bless: 0

ATL: Difficulty of checks vs Banes are increased by (Max hand size - 1d4)
WC: You may auto-close this location
WPC: You may recharge a card to draw a card.

Lakeside - I see this one as being somewhat peaceful, but not necessarily SAFE. A tweak on Waterfront.

Mon: 3
Bar: 2
Weap: 0
Spell: 1
Arm: 0
Item: 1
Ally: 2
Bless: 0

ATL: Difficulty of checks with the Aquatic trait are increased by 1d4.
WC: Summon and defeat 2 consecutive AQUATIC traited Bandit henchmen. (Both get +1d4 essentially)
WPC: All characters at this location MAY draw a card.

Cool use of Perception or Knowledge check at the Secret Stairs, folks would very likely be rolling D4s for that one.

Quiet Graveyard

Mon: 4
Bar: 0
Wea:
Spe: 3
Arm: 0
Ite: 1
All:
Ble: 2

ATL: You may evade an a monster with the undead trait. OR Monsters with with the undead trait are a minus 2 in combat

WC: Succeed at Divine check 8

WPC: Nothin' special

Battlements
Mon: 5
Bar: 1
Wea: 1
Spe: 0
Arm: 1
Ite: 1
All: 1

ATL: maybe if a henchmen is encounter, fight that henchmen twice. (Like a general leading a battle?) tougher guy
WC: Defeat current scenario non-named Henchmen +3 (miniboss?)
WPC: Roll a D6 and randomly draw armor, weapons, or items. (Looting the battlefield)

Ble: 0

Remember that the total count should be 9... the 10th being the henchmen/villain spot. I think cutting 1 monster from each of these would suffice.

Although I like the undead having a different power at the graveyard... I think they should perhaps be TOUGHER. And then maybe once you close the graveyard, Undead traits have difficulty reduced by equal amount (2?) for remainder of scenario, kinda like the Giant Cave.

Here is a suggestion for Secret Stairs

Mon: 3
Bar: 1
Wea: 1
Spe: 1
Arm: 0
Ite: 1
All: 2
Ble: 0

At this Location: At the end of your turn, attempt at a Perception or Knowledge 10 check. If you fail you are moved to another random location.

When Closing: Succeed at a Dexterity or Stealth 10 check.

When Permanently Closed: During another character's turn, you may recharge a card to move here and then move to any open location where there are no characters.

Awesome feel for this one... how bout this minor tweak.

I realize this is extremely wordy... maybe some way to cut it down while keeping the same intent? I think this power illustrates how hard it is to FIND the secret stairway as well as to REMAIN there.... but exempting you from the check for the same turn that you MOVED to it. This also keeps AMIRI from abusing the location, hehe.

Meanwhile, I note that Amazon has changed their shipping date for AD5 from April 30 to May 13. Ugh.

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

I think Amazon is doing this on PURPOSE to make up for the February oops-release... that's got to be it.

(Off I go to sulk in the homebrew section, ;p )

Cool. Low monsters but good amts of allies and weapons, I like it.

How about Cathedral.

Mon: 2
Bar: 0
Weap: 0
Spell: 2
Arm: 0
Item: 1
Ally: 1
Bless: 3

Location: You may recharge a blessing to explore again. (Autorecharge for praying here)
Closing: Succeed at Wisdom 8? check
Perm Close: Nothing special.

I think this is a great idea and an area that needs more homebrew expansion. Lots of people have been working on new characters, but locations are really the core of every scenario. I'll chime in here with a few suggestions for these locations.

Lets start with Cave on Beach, making it barrier heavy like MundoBot suggests.

Mon: 2
Bar: 4
Weap: 1
Spell: 0
Arm: 0
Item: 2
Ally: 0
Bless: 0

Location power: After your 1st exploration, add 2 to the difficulty of all checks at this location. (To simulate going further into the cave on the same turn)
When Closing: Draw a random barrier from the box and encounter it. Redraw if Ambush (Because, well you know)
When perm closed: Roll 1d4. Draw from box a random (1) spell (2) weapon (3) armor (4) blessing.

I'll come back with more but there's something to get us running!

FYI, Town Gate is probably going to be too similar to City Gate in the base set, but you could change it up a little.

Recharging a card is different than playing a card, correct?

Lem can reveal a weapon, play a blessing, and recharge a card (to give himself d4+3).

Recharging a card for his ability is an activation cost of his power, so in that sense, no it is not "played". Playing is using a card for its own powers, I'm pretty sure.

Now in your example, you would NOT be able to "reveal" a weapon and "discard" a blessing at this particular location for the same check, because "Reveal" is a way of playing a card.

I have not yet got my deck 5... but this location sounds NASTY! I love it!

Andrew K wrote:

I've been replaying as Kyra, and very much enjoyed beating her. Niche? Yea. Satisfying as hell after beating the scenario 6 times and never being allowed to actually defeat her? To the point words can't even describe.

That's cool.

I am the cleric in our group play through, I use the Paladin in solo.

In solo I never came close to taking damage from Iesha...

In group I got to confront Iesha and decimated her...and felt disappointed that the rest of the special effects from defeating her went to waste (we knew SM was not in that location, and didn't find him in the one I chose to look through).

All is good, I just think it is a bit too much corner case.

Remember, just because you can't encounter the SM doesn't mean that defeating her and then choosing a different location has no benefit. Knowledge is power. If you pick a location with 10 cards still in it, discover that he is NOT there... then you know you don't have to go there to close it, you can just temp-close it if need be. And you also know what boons/banes are there and what you need to defeat them! And there is a LOT of power in that effect if you DO discover where he is, even if you can't go fight him.

So essentially, Iesha is an undead Mayor! lol

Hi everyone,

A couple clarifications are needed...

1. If Character A defeats a Henchman, and is then able to try and close the location the Henchman was in, can that player choose to wait for Character B's turn to come to that location and attempt to close it, without having to go through the entire deck?

2. Also, same question, but instead, assume Character A and B are at the same location when Character A defeats the henchman; can Character B then attempt to close on that same turn?

3. Last one; does the discard pile need to remain face-down, or can we cycle through it at our leisure, just to see what we've lost?

Thanks!

1. Nope. Person who defeated henchmen either attempts close, and if you choose not to it stays open until you empty the location and then you may TRY again to close it. Just FYI an empty location is not auto-closed.

2. Nope. Only the active player may attempt location closes. Other players may assist by adding blessing etc, but it is the person whose turn it is that must close.

3. Discard piles are supposed to be discarded faceup. So yes, you may look through it... but you shouldn't rearrange it, due to locations like the apothecary that care about the order it is in.

Barbarian Back Card.
Barbarian Front Card.
Barbarian Juggernaut Card.
Barbarian Berserker Card.

Please leave feedback, as I would like the input of the Community.

WarChyld

You've transposed the TH in Strength on the character front, FYI. Looks nice, otherwise!

Please do not take offense, but I do believe this character would be quite overpowered if played alongside existing characters.

Lini's animal ally ability is one of the most useful, if not explosive, character powers in the game. Giving this same power to someone who can carry 3 weapons AND is proficient with them, AND has +2 Ranged... I don't see a single combat scenario where this character could lose, frankly. Even with a simple dagger and an animal, you would be rolling (1d10 +2d4 +2) which averages to 12.5, before any skill bonuses.

And I'm also not a fan of characters with no obvious weaknesses. No d4s? Yes the total die value comes out the same but the lack of that 1 bad stat makes this version too well rounded, and in my opinion invulnerable.

Sajan is the only character without a d4 in the base characters, and for me this makes sense and is OK because he's a monk. He's all about balance and control.

In an attempt to be constructive I'll make a couple suggestions:

It looks like you're trying to make a Harsk/Lini hybrid, based on your class name. So I'd move your d10 to WIS (like Lini) and your d8 to DEX (like Harsk) Divine should probably be +1 like Lini. I feel STR should be the weakness at d4, but a case could be made for INT (neither rangers nor druids are necessarily BOOK SMART, but I wouldn't consider them DUNCES either) And Gnomes are generally hardy, so I would take CON to d8 or perhaps give Fortitude+2.

And then on the role card... looks almost exactly like one of Lini's. But where is the 2nd ROLE?

I am a bit disappointed by the Velociraptor, can't help on other explore except the one he provide, not usefull if you dont draw a fight... A tiny bit too circumstancial to my taste.

Disintegrate is very nice for Seoni, the wand could be if she manage to get it.

I believe Velociraptor was clarified to help on ALL explores during remainder of the turn. Going off memory but I thought that was the errata or FAQ on it?

EDIT: Helps on all combat checks of its free explore. I think I misinterpreted the FAQ... it's meant to help both times on multi-combat monsters. It does NOT help out on further explores. My mistake!

Hawkmoon269 wrote:

Maybe there is more than 1 and so there is a male and a female. Or maybe the first printing Velociraptor was male, but the second printing is female.

Given that this entire card concept is based on a Doubleclicks song called "Clever Girl", she's rather definitively a she.

Wow! My geek fandom has just again EXPANDED! I just watched like 6 straight songs by these guys, if I weren't supposed to be heading somewhere I might have spent most of the morning listening to them!

Thanks Mike for the introduction, and I'll definitely be thinking of them now whenever I do get a velociraptor!

+1 for Traitor. It's definitely an interesting opponent, especially for a Lini. In fact, it is my wife's nemesis, I think she has hit 3-4 in the current adventure path alone.

An interesting tidbit though. Characters that don't have an ally in hand, of course still have to fight the monster. When a player protested, saying they had no ally to turn on them... I replied:

"OK... you're IMAGINARY FRIEND is now stabbing you in the back!"

Personally, I never pass up a chance to add health to my deck. Even 4 junk cards is 4 more hit points. If you pick up 4 useless items, just discard them during reset and draw new cards. Until you are healed, your deck is not impacted. Never underestimate the power of a junk card. I don't know how many times I kill a henchmen and then the close requirement is banish a card, and I have all nice cards... don't want to banish anything. Perfect place for a darn caltrops or chainmail or basic dagger.

Favorite card so far? It's tough choice since I haven't got to use it that much but I'm going with Emerald Codex.

+3 random divine spells per scenario for cost of an item slot, can't lose them to a handwipe, Scenario reward loot card so every party gets one, unique one of a kind card. Not necessarily the MOST powerful card due to its random nature, but definitely up there.

Dream draw from it: Scrying, Swipe, Any Cure spell.

Not too big of a deal or anything, I guess it's just natural with the amount of traffic paizo has and all. I'm betting because the subforums are so similarly named that is a contributing factor. Just a curiosity.

What I do love, however, is whenever someone mistakenly posts in PACG forums, Hawkmoon proffers that etiquette suggests that they now give PACG a try. I do hope that someone takes that advice and discovers what we all have, that PACG is awesome!

IM-patiently awaiting adventure deck 5!
Motrax

Bah! Was especially effective joke since that is what happened with AP4. I thought Paizo was going to have to sic their lawyers on Amazon. Good, classic, fun joke.

Extra explores do not stack... you will get to explore again if you wish, but only 1 time. Interesting tidbit though, had you failed the pittrap check, if you wanted you could still explore again due to the academy power. Although you probably would be hurting from falling in the pit, may want to stop anyways. :)

I'm going to have to heavily agree with kysmartman's Top 10. I'm not going to re-rank them but I'll bring up a couple more cards that could possibly make my top 10 by knocking a few of the lower ones off. Holy Candle is da bomb. Also, I don't have promo cards, so while cards like Poog and Fire Sneeze do look awesome, I have to exclude them since I'll never get them.

And in regards to POWER... later-on cards and LOOT generally SHOULD be more powerful. That should be the natural progression of the game. Therefore I would give "extra points" for cards that come out earlier (and also because I've had more chances to use them) Obviously Mokmurian's Club looks awesome, and I'm sure it will be. But which of us has actually used it? Unless you're rerunning scenarios, none of us! You got it at end of Adv. 4, and are drooling like a troll to use it! Lightning Bolt and Holy Light are heavily utilized and powerful early spells.

Ok, my first additional nomination: the DEATHBANE LIGHT CROSSBOW +1.

Awesome weapon from the character expansion, magic +1... no base weapon proficiency penalty... so any character can fight with it, good base damage (Dex + 1d8 +1). Then if monster is undead, add 1d8 again. If you are weapon proficient, you can use like any ranged weapon to assist combat for 1d4, or 1d8 if monster is undead. Only one in the whole deck, but once I draw it it's NEVER going back. Too many non-proficient characters that you can pass this onto for their main weapon.

Next: Father Zantus. From base set, healing for 1d4+1 from an ally... so can be used by any character, and buries so you get him back after the scenario. Additionally can be recharged for 1d4 on a divine check. Not used as often, but still nice if you are making a tough Divine check to close a location. Finally, has the special distinction of being able to be banished to close the Sandpoint Cathedral. Only would do this in the most DIRE circumstances... but since you can eventually reacquire him, I wouldn't hesitate if it was the difference between winning or losing the scenario.

Finally: Find traps spell. Base set, usable ON anyone encountering a barrier, has a good chance to recharge... adds 2 dice just like Abadar. So while Abadar may be more utile... the easy recharge vs. discard makes it almost as good. I love using it to help open large chests, lockboxes, etc. A character even with an untrained d4 now has a shot with 3d4.

Gotta run but there's 3 additions that I consider quite good.

Right, but it specifically says what to do on that card. If there are no overriding instructions, then they go back to the box.

I think the hangup is that you are using henchmen-cards in a non-henchmen capacity. If there is a clarification in the rules already that "summoned" henchmen are NOT henchmen, that should be all that is needed.

Ah, okay. Then I've said too much.

(Waves hands) "These aren't the allies you're looking for..." ;)

Role 1: Controller (Hand Size: 6 []7 []8)
*If you play a spell that has a duration that last until end of turn, you may roll 1d6. on the roll of 6([]or 5)([] or 4) ([]or 3) the spells effects last until the end of your next turn.

If the intend is to reroll at the end of each turn, not just your turn, then you should remove the above "your"

This is why I thought my meant that it would last all the way around to YOUR next turn.

I think the extra duration might be really powerful in large group sizes. At first it will be fairly rare without a blessing to get it to last long, but I think it might be overly abused when you get the pips in to active on 4+ or 3+. In a 6 player game, casting a Toxic or Incendiary Cloud with the potential to last for 7 total turns??? (since it lasts all the way through your turn and then ALL of your allies turns?) Remember that it will trigger on EVERY monster fight. This is UBER powerful... might need to tone it down but don't know how without nerfing the spell itself. Maybe have it only work on buff spells and not Cloud spells? Part of the power of the duration/damage spells is the ability to help allies with it. But this seems to be setting up for quick abuse of it.

Just my thoughts... I do like the feel for the character, just need to check on the power level of some of those power feats.

One final update on Planet ComiCon. Truly was an awesome weekend, ended up playing PACG with somewhere between 10-12 different people, we as a group finished up Adventure 1. The final two scenarios were EPIC, in opposing ways.

Adventure 4 was played by 4 characters, and we kept finding the villain defeating him but running away to open locations. I had the FINAL turn with Harsk, moved to the final open location with only 1 explore in a deck of like 7 cards. Found villain on top, and defeated it on final roll check by only 3!

Adventure 5 I started out solo, 4 chars, and in 1 round I had 3 locations closed. Lucky re-explorations found 2 henchmen and were able to close those. However, the MOST epic turn was the paladin (turn 4) which I will describe in detail. I had 3 people join in on the game to finish it, but this first turn was all me!

Paladin starts at a location and uses her scout for Evil ability. Finds a potion, sends it to bottom. Then explores and finds: VILLAIN! She deals 1d4 damage force damage before combat. Paladin has a hand size 4. Rolls.... 4! Handwipe! (She started with Magic Shield so had no option to bury armor for all damage!) How am I going to defeat 2 combat checks with no hand! Paladin has 1 STR pip and 2 melee bonus, so 1d8+3 net.

I look around table of open players, only 2 players have a BoG. Gonna have to split them between the combat checks for any shot. Then I check the blessing deck: BLESSING OF LAMASHTU! UN-HOLY CRAP! 2 bonus dice for fighting a monster if you bury it. So each check gets 1 blessing, buried, for 2d8 bonus.

1st check, don't remember roll but was a blowout success, even with the +2 difficulty for using a blessing.

2nd check, I think was 14+2 difficulty for blessing. Rolls 3d8 = 8,2,3 +3 for strength = 16 exactly! Villain runs away, but is beat by a Paladin with NO HAND who has two friends pray to Lamashtu. How FUNNY is that!!! Probably the most memorable Villain combat in a LONG time!

We have talked about making a list of "Cards we might not want to repeat." Holy Candle sometimes gets brought up in that conversation.

I see... so we might be able to "burn the candle at both ends." So to speak. :)

One thing I can't wait for is to see if there is a similar card to Holy Candle in S&S. To me, Holy Candle is perhaps one of the most powerful unique items in the game.

If there is, I would think that the ability to acquire both of these items (if there is one) in one party would be really powerful. Not necessarily game-breaking, but really powerful.

Of course, the chances of acquiring both items in a item deck that is twice as thick help mitigate that power... if it happens it happens!

I think in this particular situation, there is no point in temp closing. The first villain will "RUN AWAY" to the scenario card no matter what you do. You still have to defeat it... but you skip the "check to see if it escapes".

Now, this does, however create a DOUBLE temp closing when you end up fighting the 2nd villain. This time, this villain CAN escape, and you must close up all other locations or it will. So lets say there are 2 other locations open, and you succeed at closing them, and then beat the villain. Well, NOW THOSE OPEN BACK UP and you have to immediately fight the 1st villain again. Time to temp-close those locations again!

So in short... 1st villain, don't waste your resources on it, won't matter. Before 2nd villain, try and PERMANENTLY close as much as you can... cause otherwise you'll be temp-closing stuff twice!

I remember running this scenario with the wife, and it was NASTY! Basically 3 villain scenario! It took us to the FINAL TURN to win, and it was by the skin of our teeth!

Fond memories!

EDIT: I stand corrected, I did forget that the villain still runs away if you DON'T defeat it... it doesn't happen all that often so I forgot that possible scenario.

Small update on Planet ComiCon in KC. I went to the Wil Wheaton panel this morning and was one of the first few people to get to ask him a question! I had made up some poster-board signs advertising the game throughout the Con floor and in the gameroom, and I had one "special" sing just for him.

I briefly told him about getting this game for Christmas and then finding out that he was a playtester for the game. I then showed him my sign, saying "WIL you play with us?"

He laughed and politely declined the invitation, as his time schedule did not allow for it. However, he then went onto a 4-5 minute narrative description of what the game was like and the "deck-building" component of the game that he personally loves!

I knew I was going to need more than 1 Blessings of the Gods for that Diplomacy check... but damn, if I don't just love his response anyways!

I then proceeded to play several scenarios in the game room with a variety of people including a father-son duo (son being perhaps 8), a couple guys that were there to run a "DEMO" version of the game, and instead joined me with the REAL DEAL!, a couple more guys that I had played with yesterday, and the core of us made it through A1S3 before we had to wrap things up for the evening. I know at LEAST 3 of my players said, flat out... "I'm gonna BUY this!"

All in all, a great day! Thanks PAIZO!

With 2 characters playing 6 locations I'd say we completely empty 1-3 locations per game without repercussion. We almost never temp. close locations either.

6 locations * 10 = 60 total possible explorations, not counting any failed ones that get shuffled back into the deck. If you are almost never TEMP closing locations, and you are completely clearing 3 of these locations, that's 30 explorations right there. Granted many turns will get multiple explores but not without the penalty usually of discarding a card to keep going. I don't see how you are getting this done in just 30 timer blessings, nor killing off your characters.

You are flipping a blessing for each characters turn, yes? You don't all get a turn on one blessing... I've heard a few people think that was the case resulting in really easy games. Just wondering.

Mike Selinker wrote:

Thanks especially to you for starting us off on this discussion.

Glad to help!

Orbis... I perhaps misunderstood your intentions when you first starting discussing this exploit. I think perhaps because I enjoy this game so much that I took it a little personally that someone was trying to "BREAK" my beloved game.

As the discussion evolved, my understanding of your intentions cleared up. You weren't just some kid saying "Hey guys, look what I can do!" and instead were saying "Hey guys, here's a possible scenario where people can abuse the game."

So, just like crash tests for new cars, you've got to really try and break something to make it safe and effective. It doesn't matter that I don't ever intend on being IN a crash... just knowing that that car, or the GAME, will survive one. That's priceless.

So some joking around was done earlier about the blessing of Orbis. How about this instead:

Ally: Crash Test Dummy - Discard this card to prevent all damage to "the Spirit of the Game" If a player is abusing a mechanic in the game, declare "DON'T DO THAT!" and said player may NOT do that again until Mike Selinker or Vic Wertz make an official ruling or errata for that card. You may also discard this card to explore your location for a new non-powergaming friend.

OK... never mind... that'll never fit on a card! LOL

Yeah! Give Sajan a few Weapon card feats, WEAP prof, a Deathbane LCB+1, and maybe Shock Longbow, and lookout. He'll be able to kick butt on his own turns, and help out allies on theirs! And he doesn't have to worry about discarding his weapon because he can still fall back on his fists for a d10, minimally.

I took my Sajan Zen Archer route like this and haven't looked back.

I realize this is probably a bit of short notice for something like this, but for any of you out there going to Kansas City's Planet ComiCon this weekend, I'm going to be there this weekend with my copy of Pathfinder Adventure Card Game.

I'm going to try and get a marathon-session going in the game room to run a group through the currently released Adventure packs. Or as far through as any relatively consistent number of players can in the time-frame. After reading about Mike & Co. at BGGCon, I think it is do-able for just 4 adventure packs.

So if any of you happen to be there this weekend, I welcome you to join me, even for just a scenario. I imagine the marathon-session will have people rotating in and out, but anybody that has the desire to run the whole to-this-point-released campaign is more than welcome!

One final note: Wil Wheaton will be in attendance at this Con, it is a rather large collection of Trekkies this weekend. As one of my fellow message board commenters pointed out to me, Wil Wheaton playtested this game! See his name in the playtest credits! It is my hope to make a sign and inquire/plead/beg/grovel with Mr. Wheaton to join us in playing a scenario! I'm sure his schedule is booked solid with appearances, photo's, autograph's, the StarTrek-tacular event... but Wil is a Gamer at heart... perhaps if a large enough group of us cheer for it... he could spare an hour of his weekend to join us for a game?

Here's to hoping!
Motrax

Here is the promised update from tonight's adventure.

My two characters, Sajan and Kyra, teamed up on Giant Lair, hoping to weaken further Giant encounters. My wife's, Ezren and Lini, both started at Thassalonian Dungeon.

Kyra started with just one blessing but drew the Giant Club+3, so was set for just about any combat she ran into. She smashed her way through a Goblin Warchanter (Wisdom save was easy for her) and took an extra explore with her rechargeable blessing but I think found a bow that was unnecessary.

Wife flipped her very first card: HENCHMEN FORGEFIEND! Well, she didn't intend to fight it melee anyways so didn't have to worry about his extra damage ability. She lit it up with a Lightning Bolt and then easily closed the Dungeon, 1st turn.

So now Lini doesn't need to hang around there, she moves to Treacherous Cave and uses an Augury for monsters. Hill Giant Runeslave is 3rd down, she topdecks it, blasts it with Holy Light (its undead for scenario) and then auto-succeeds the Survival check to close.

Holy crap, wife closed 2 locations with just 2 turns!

Sajan and Kyra beat down on the Giant Cave some more, acquiring a few boons along the way. Eventually find the Headless Lord with Kyra, smack him silly with a discarded Club+3 (I had drawn longsword +2 so still had a spare weapon) plus her undead bonus, he was missing more than his head when I got through with him. Drew a magic shield for the armor he gives. I double-checked the scenario card that states to "reshuffle in" the henchmen if you don't close the location. A momentary thought passes by where I could keep bashing in his phantom skull to keep drawing armors... but then I went ahead and blessed to help guarantee the closure.

A turn earlier, Lini had found the fireproof breastplate so I am going to be getting better armor at the end of scenario anyways.

Sajan starts into the Prison when Ezren gets Brodert Quint. She uses him on that location and spies the villain... leaves him as 2nd to last and now we have vital information. Spread out to other locations, couple rounds and actually perma-close them all except for prison.

Sajan and Ezren are at the prison and Sajan feels pretty good about fighting the big guy. He hasn't drawn either the Giantbane Dagger or Lightbane crossbow yet, and his magic fists only have 1 blessing available, but he's got Belt of Dex, Dex+2, Charmed dragon for 5 fire damage, and a Merc for +1d8. Kyra SWIPED a heavy crossbow for the purpose of assisting since she is proficient... and she has a fiery weapon spell from the emerald codex waiting.

I actually fail the fortitude check but then just roll a 1. His triggered hand reset actually HELPS OUT because I draw an extra blessing.

We decide to double down with the fire, 5 points from the dragon +2d4 for a fiery crossbow bolt. I use 1 blessing on his fists (1d10) and save the bigger Erastil and the Merc for the 2nd check.

After adding in the FIRE and dex bonuses, subtracting 1 from each die... I fall 2 short on the FIRST check! Curses! I toss the Merc and another card for damage, leaving the belt and Erastil for final check. Ezren takes 2 splash damage, but keeps his Wand of Ennervation for the 2nd check. 2nd check goes fine as the Ennervation MAXES and the extra 2 dice for Erastil is plenty. No more damage but still undefeated. At least every location is closed, so he's got nowhere to run and only 1 other card to shuffle.

Kyra comes on over and 50/50 that she'll see him right away... she does. She ALSO flubs her Fortitude check! but rolls a 3. Kinda bad, keeps 1 weapon, but then hand reset actually locks the WIN! I draw a GORUM, SARANRAE, and I think the BAST SWORD+1. Sajan is able to bless EACH check, I'm able to use and discard Weapon for each check... and GORUM gives 2d6 to the bigger check. Mockmurian renews our Library card and gives us his Club, and Robe of Runes.

Overall, not nearly as exciting as the previous run, but still enjoyable. The early closures made a lot of difference, I think we ended with 10-11 turns left, PLUS we had never lit the Holy candle. I did pick up ONE Restoration spell during this scenario. Have to see if I really want to keep it or not, we haven't broken our decks down yet nor chosen our Card feat reward.

motrax wrote:

We'll try and make sure we operate that way in the future... it didn't end up changing the result as she didn't draw an attack spell, but now at least we know that you won't be able to draw spells in between the multiple checked monsters.

Note that in the current rules (which might need fixing; the current situation requires action memory that the designers usually try to avoid), Ezren doesn't get to peek until after all the checks, so you wouldn't have been able to draw the cloud spell in time for the second check.

Oh, I didn't make it clear enough, but she had both Incendiary Clouds already in her hand. I was just making sure we followed the "one spell per step" so 1st check only got one cloud, then when we did 2nd check, allowed for 2nd cloud.

We shall try and sneak into the library again tonight. I shall of course give an update as to whether Mockmur-brarian gives us the boot again!

Motrax

Hey people,

Just love the game and I actually got my girlfriend to love a board game other than Monopoly-type games.

Looks like Hawkmoon269 did an excellent job (as usual!) in explaining your questions, so I'll just take a moment to welcome you and congratulate you on graduating your girlfriend to another level of board gaming/card gaming. Even with the lack of a board... PACG kind of feels like one, just with cards.

Feel free to fire any more questions or weird situations our way... plenty of us here more than willing to help.

Also, let us know how your adventures go, if you are so inclined. Some of us can't play quite as often as we would like and therefore live vicariously through other adventurers! :)

Motrax

I think it also creates the possible situation of having a turn with NO TIMER BLESSING at all. One time, I waited until there were 6 turns passed to get max use out of the candle, and then rolled a 6! Hmm, I guess they all go back!

Never ran into anything like a lycanthrope on it, but woulda been nice to say that, NO.. there is NOT a blessing of gods on top of the blessing deck.

A great read, thanks for posting. Follow this thread to find out if you are playing Ezren's power correctly:

When Ezren plays multiple spells in an encounter

Thanks, yeah I wondered if that might have been the case. I took it as a general "you can peek" each time you cast a spell, but I see the clarification, and it uses Ezren in the example. We'll try and make sure we operate that way in the future... it didn't end up changing the result as she didn't draw an attack spell, but now at least we know that you won't be able to draw spells in between the multiple checked monsters.

Here's a quick question though: If Ezren casts a spell at Thassalonian Dungeon (if you play arcane spell, you may draw a card) would he be able to do both the "peek and maybe draw" and the "may draw" ability? I know somewhere in rules it said if you earn multiple explores for the same action, they don't stack.... but these aren't exactly the SAME action. One is a peek/draw the other is just draw. We've been playing it as you could do both, in either order. So wife casts a spell there, peeks, if its a spell she can draw it, and then MAY draw again, resulting in 2 cards. If it's not a spell she puts back, but then MAY draw it anyway.

Think we're playing it right, but wouldn't mind any opinions or thoughts on the matter. Ezren at Thass Dungeon can be powerful!

The wife and I are playing a 4 character team of Ezren, Lini (wifes), Sajan, and Kyra (last two mine). I thought I would share a little bit about our experience with the final scenario of Adventure 4, which as you can tell by the title... we failed.

The first scenario with some lucky early closings, we managed to finish in just 11 turns. With a 4 blessing Holy Candle, it made it seem only 7 turns had passed. That was a fast game, time and card wise. But we barely gained any loot. Sajan did tame a Dragon though!

2nd scenario was slightly more difficult, but I don't recall any major failures, beat up on the henchmen and I think had closed down to 2 remaining locations when we found the villain. I do believe I got the Giant club +3 in that one for Kyra which was pretty nice.

3rd scenario which supposedly hands out spells like CANDY... (not really) Ezren actually ran into the Monk villain early, failed to beat and handwiped, and had a small discard pile buried as a result. He regrouped with the others and even found a MASS HEAL which the others blessed him up to make sure he could acquire. He then came to visit Kyra and passed off the Knowledge of the Gods. Kyra returned the favor a couple of times with Heals keeping his deck stocked. Saw and amulet of fiery fists get banished from a closed location. Kyra took the emerald codex after the win and handed her Staff of minor healing to Lini. This group is somewhat starved for item slots, only 2 spots apiece for Kyra and Lini, and Ezren is just loaded up with loot items. (Wand of enervation, sihedron medallion, he's got the snakeskin armor too cuz Kyra wears heavy armor and gets no value out of the dex bonus)

4th scenario was a doozy via the timer. Essentially having to beat 3 villains... that chewed up the clock! Never failed on a check vs. the Lamias...but just hunting them down and they were both in lower portions of a deck, the timer ran ALL THE WAY DOWN to the final turn in which we squeaked out with the win! Lini finds headband of Inspired Wisdom... now nearly all her recharges are auto-success.

And now, after a few days of not playing I setup the final scenario to play tonight... got a late start and also Daylight Savings and all.

Lini and Ezren start off in Thass Dungeon and slowly move to Thass Library. Their search for Spells slows them down especially because of the auto-end turn at library if you get a spell. Lini does find the 2nd MASS CURE!

Sajan starts at Prison while Kyra starts at Treacherous Cave. She's plenty Wise enough to move away if need be. As the wife's characters thin out the Dungeon, Sajan jumps down to help them finish off a henchmen card (the final, bottommost card) He's gone ZEN archer route and has both the Deathbane Crossbow +1, and a light Crossbow +1. Since the henchmen are undead he can dispatch them fairly easily.

Kyra eventually draws Codex and uses... gets Cure, Major Heal, and Detect Magic. Not bad... Look at my hand with another Major Heal in it... thinking NO ONE DIES this game. :) We aggressively explore and I use the Major Heals and the Detect Magic, get decent rolls on heals.

Problem is, he doesn't do quite so well closing the locations. 1 Giant is re-healed TWICE due to his inability to make the Charisma throw at the Prison. Plus hitting the darn WIZARD LOCK barrier with anyone other than Ezren is problematic. Wasted turns. The first time he had GLIBNESS cast on him, has a +1 skill boost in Charisma, so just needs to avoid NUMERO UNO to close...which of course rears its ugly head.

Over half way through the timer and only the THass Dungeon is closed. When Lini FAILS an ambush check, which we think is ok, but UH OH! IT'S MOCKMURIAN. Not at all ready, still 2 locations unoccupied. We temp close those that we can. Re-read ambush, and it says -1 on all dice for CHECKS on the encountered monster. Whelp... that INCLUDES the CON check too! So Kyra uses one of her valuable RECHARGEABLE Saranrae's to help guarantee the CON check. OK, done... wife tosses 1 card for the success instead of 1d6 for fail. First combat check... 20, She transforms STR which has +2, uses her animal 1d4+2, uses Impaler of Thorns... I think we blessed one time, so its final is (2d10+2) +(1d4+2) +(1d8+2) -5 for ambush... should be easy, right? Ok it was... I think she blew it away 30-ish. Now 2nd roll, same setup but need 24, transform, we use 1 blessing (last one, we figured we needed 1 on each check) Impaler of Thorns, etc. Final result =23! WAIT! REROLL for Impaler... whew that was close, almost forgot that. OK reroll is.... 23! AGAIN! ARG! After the transforms, bury the card at beginning, and 1 pt. damage... she is left with her CAT in hand. Ah well as least an animal... draw up, end turn. Lose 2 timer turns because of open locations and not beating him.

Finally get Prison closed, after 3rd attempt, but turns are running down. Haven't even touched Giant Cave, barely Deeper Dungeons. Nice Augury sends two monsters to bottom at Deeper Dungeons, and in exploring it we hit a blessing. Deductive reasoning kicks in and we know he's NOT here since this location normally has no blessings. We move on and around. Holy candle finally shows up... alright lets get some TURNS back! And..... 2. ah well at least we got the two turns we lost earlier back.

Kept Consecration from the last quest after we nearly ran out of time, so I'm eyeing the remaining turns and our explores keep fizzing out. Lini runs into Mockmurian, surives the CON check but then uses Holy light for one check, and then the (healed back) IMP of thorns +Poison cloud from Ezren and maybe 1 blessing. Horrible first roll and then re-roll falls short by 1 AGAIN! Sajan was unable to temp-close the Strength 10 Giant Lair with just 1 blessing, so we lost 1 timer turn again and didn't know where he was between the LAIR or the TREACHEROUS CAVE. Kyra has to stay at Deep Dungeons for temp-close but she consecrates for 3 turns. Final turn will now be Sajans.

I see Brodert QUINT in Ezren's hand and suggest wife use it just for information. She spies bottom of CAVE and THERE HE IS, she puts him as the topmost card, leaving 3 above it. Sajan goes there to thin it out, finds a SPYGLASS, and acquires. USES it, and next two cards are both boons. Hmm, ok... Ezren had just acquire MAESTER GRUMP, who lets you pull the next bane to the TOP! Which is going to be the VILLAIN! YES! WE can still WIN!

So Lini takes her turn and sets up at Giant Lair. With her animal ally 1d4+2 and STR+2 bonus she has best shot at making the Melee/Str 10 check. So now Ezren comes up to the CAVE... but sucks at CON so is going to auto-fail that. Well that's ok because the 1d6 bury cards also resets hand so might draw new spells. Already had a lightning bolt, and rolled low enough to be able to keep it, and an incendiary cloud although don't want to use it because of die penalty for fire trait. Well... she resets hand and draws very little offense, only another Incendiary cloud, but at least he only subtracts 1 per die no matter how many fire traits there are.

SO, we move to the temp-close checks. Kyra makes her Fortitude check guaranteed with a SARANRAE. Now Lini just has to roll ok... she transforms to get a d10, and tosses her animal d4... SNAKE EYES! 1+2+1+2= NOT ENOUGH the villain can escape. With only 1 turn left Sajan MIGHT just be able to explore enough to possibly find him if he runs to cave.

Ezren does his lightning bolt first, hoping to draw another attack spell. Turns on one Incendiary cloud. Plenty. Now 2nd check, adds another Incendiary cloud, but now has to fight melee. Everyone who can blesses... but it is for naught. Her slightly impressive mass of dice are just too small overall to add up to 24 very quickly, and after subtracting the fire penalty she results in a handwipe. After recharging the spells she still has enough to survive... BUT, the final turn is now stolen away by the villain as he flees.

Sajan puts his fist into the wall in frustration. "I didn't even get a final CHANCE!"

Mockmurian says "SSHHHHHHHH!!! This is a library!" as he kicks us out! Kyra shakes her head and starts chuckling as we go back to town... "We just can't take you ANYWHERE!!!"

Also, never even ran into Headless Lord or Forgefiend. Other than Ezren's final handwipe, no one really approached death. Time was just wasted in some spots and not used wisely in others. Wife was a little irritated at the length of this game due to having to work in morning, but I couldn't be happier with a failed scenario. No one died, but it proves to me this game is still no cakewalk and you will have some bad luck or bad decisions sometimes.

Hope you all enjoyed my recap... I gotta get to bed, I get one less hour of sleep tonight!

Motrax

GREAT SCOTT!!!

Where we're going we don't NEED roads! ;)

Not completely. What you can by the rules do, is if you don't have enough cards in your pool of ALL players at the end of a scenario, is go back and pick from B, C, or 2 adventures behind.

There are certain ways you can "help" this process along, but you can't just automatically chuck cards to get new cards.

If you are wanting to thin your spells, you could pass them to a character during the adventure without the Divine or Arcane trait and have them cast it so it becomes banished. Just remember that your total spells acquired have to be low, or this might backfire. If your group finds and acquires a bunch of Mendings, Guidance, Levitate... well, you get the point.

seems interesting overall. Only comment that I would make is to not worry about temp closed locations at all, and just focus on perm closed ones. the balancing factor will be that a group of 6 will have 8 locations, and a group of 2 will have 4. I would probably also consider adding an option for groups that want to run with more locations, and you probably shouldn't double penalize character death, as that will skew players away from certain characters (seoni comes to mind immediately).

Yeah I probably wasn't clear but I was only scoring 3 per permanently closed location. Temp close = 0 pts.

Looking back on this I think I either am overvaluing defeating banes or undervaluing remaining turns left on Timer. Timer turns should be fairly valuable. I think [Turns Left * 2] is better.

Ok, on character death penalty: Lets say a character in a 5 man party with 15 card deck dies. 15/5 = 3, only currently a 3 point drop in the boon bonus. However, I didn't think it through completely... what if a 15 card deck dies in a 2 player game? That's 7.5 card boon loss. Hmmmm. Penalty is much harsher on smaller parties. And the smallest parties tend to be the ones with the highest danger of death. This isn't fair by any means.

How about this: Boon bonus is computed based on the surviving party members. If a character dies, his deck will not be used in the computation, but then a [-1 * party size] death penalty is applied. So a two man party that loses 1 character, gets a -2 penalty. But a 6 character party that loses 1... gets -6! And if they lose 2, -12!

Oh, and TPK = 0. You can't go negative but obviously if the whole party dies... you get NUTHIN!