Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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Sebastian--the rules are technically with you on this one, but it has a strong smell of metagaming to me.
Jozan: "OK Lidda, now attack me to disrupt my concentration on this Gate before that damn thing can come back through!"
*Jozan covers eyes so he won't involuntarily wince and get out of the way when Lidda stabs him, ensuring damage is high enough to make him fail his concentration check.
*Lidda takes out short sword and stabs Jozan in the kidney.
*Jozan fails Concentration check, then casts cure critical wounds to heal his damaged kidney on his next action.
It all depends on how you spin it.
Jozan: "Okay Lidda, once we see Dragotha, I'm going to cast one of the most powerful mysteries that Pelor grants to me. Once he is through, I will try and dismiss the spell, but there's a good chance that I won't be able to summon the necessary willpower to do so. If you think Dragotha will make it back through, I want you to smack me hard enough to disrupt my spellcasting. Can you do it?"
But I like your solution too.
As an imperfect DM myself, I appreciate the meat of the above discussion. Within it have been some things I didn't consider and I feel I'll be more prepared for the encounter when my PCs get there (they're starting Into the Wormcrawl Fissure this week). Thanks for the story though & kudos to the DM for playing it through! We all learn from the experiences of others.
Whatever happens to Dragotha, the Sending spell will give him options not found in the stat block (ie. "Hey, whatcha up to? See, I'm stuck on this nasty plane..." or "Emergency Plan D. March in 10 Swords of Kyuss and heal my ass with that negative energy burst thingy."). Of course, if he's whalloping the players it'll be a different Sending message, "HAHAHA...seriously, you guys have to come watch me wipe the floor with this adventuring party.".
TPK!
J-
This has been a rather strange thread. Obviously the PCs and DM concerned did not read up on the spells they were casting after all that careful planning. A serious breach of the rules of good gaming (make sure that the steps you're are taking are legal). I am not taking a swipe at "roleplayers" or "storytellers" by saying this because the rules of the game have nothing to do with either. it's just about being prepared.
I lay the blame at the foot of the DM. Hopefully this will be a bit of a learning curve, but considering all the rule breaches in that one encounter, how many other mistakes has the DM made? Ultimately, its up to whether the PCs are enjoying the game. If they are then the DM is running a masterful game whether he knows the rules or not.
The fight scene would have looked spectacular if the DM had described it properly, however brief it was. Would I have let Dragotha suffer that fate? No, I am a much nastier and harsher DM, and my PCs love me for it.
I'll have to wholeheartedly agree w/ Phil L on this one. D&D is all about overcoming challenges and to do this the DM has to present the PCs with legitimate threats.
If the PC's truly come up w/ a supremely creative strategy within the rules, then they should be rewarded for their novelty. In this case, however, it seems that rules were bent and broken.
On a final note, power playing and role-playing are absolutely not mutually exclusive. Simply b/c someone plays fast and loose with the rules, it is absurd to assume they are good role-players.
I'm going to stick with 'Dragotha didn't come back because he
went somewhere else'.
If you polymorph someone doesn't that give you just the
physical characteristics at first?
As a Titan, they would have the strength and the immunities.
They should have gone through the gate with Dragotha.
Why didn't they?
Was the grease spell on it's feet or on a 5X5 area?
There are a lot of unresolved questions.
Now that I hear about this I like our method of looking up every spell.
I have to agree with you! Careful planning means that you know every spell your about to use. A mistake on one spell is excusable, but on every spell wtf? The orginal posters group was happy with results.. so no harm no foul. But I'd make them reread grease, polymorph, and gate.
For those facing Dragotha, I noticed that in the last paragraph under tactics it mentions Dragotha will use Plane Shift to escape once reduced to less than 100 HPs. The stat block missing this spell is probably just an oversight.
Forcecage, Destruction, and Greater Teleport are the 7th level spells listed in the stat block so replace one if you see the need.
I've learned that lesson as well about reading spells beforehand...came about after a few errors where I assumed the spells functioned the same as their 2nd Ed. counterpart. Anyone else frustrated by Greater Invisibility confounding some tough monsters? ;-)
J-
For those facing Dragotha, I noticed that in the last paragraph under tactics it mentions Dragotha will use Plane Shift to escape once reduced to less than 100 HPs. The stat block missing this spell is probably just an oversight.
Forcecage, Destruction, and Greater Teleport are the 7th level spells listed in the stat block so replace one if you see the need.
I have vague recollections of asking James Jacobs about this in an earlier thread. The stat block was redone, IIRC, after the text was written, and they missed the discrepancy in editing. You might want to pull up the original thread to get James Jacobs' original intent here.
I have vague recollections of asking James Jacobs about this in an earlier thread. The stat block was redone, IIRC, after the text was written, and they missed the discrepancy in editing. You might want to pull up the original thread to get James Jacobs' original intent here.
What's "IIRC"?
If
I
Recall
Correctly
Thank you for making my point regarding taking the time to check the rules, it never hurts.Peace out Sebastian and thanks for such a lively debate. I don't agree with you but it was fun.
The thing is that checking the rules does hurt. It slows down the game. Now I'm not sure that I would not have checked out the spell myself in this circumstance - and in fact I would have really expected that the player know their friggen spell. That said I feel that more often then not a DM should usually just go with their best understanding of a spell or rule and keep on with the game as opposed bringing everything to a grinding halt.
The thing is that checking the rules does hurt. It slows down the game. Now I'm not sure that I would not have checked out the spell myself in this circumstance - and in fact I would have really expected that the player know their friggen spell. That said I feel that more often then not a DM should usually just go with their best understanding of a spell or rule and keep on with the game as opposed bringing everything to a grinding halt.
Thank you for making my point regarding taking the time to check the rules, it never hurts.Peace out Sebastian and thanks for such a lively debate. I don't agree with you but it was fun.
It's true that checking the rules would slow the game down if you did that for every encounter. But for such an epic fight wouldn't you want things done right? That way if you post your battle on the Paizo boards people wouldn't question your RPG skills hehe? As myself and others have pointed out almost every spell used by the party bent or broke the rules.
I would think in this case taking a few minutes to look at the rule book really couldn't hurt much.
Peace out
It's true that checking the rules would slow the game down if you did that for every encounter. But for such an epic fight wouldn't you want things done right?
Done right sure sounds nice and one would think that it really ought to be a priority in an epic fight...but its damn hard to have a good epic fight if the game is at a standstill.
In fact I would probably be more likely to go with my best understanding of the rules during a climatic battle then otherwise. It is one of the encounters that you can least afford to stall.
That said if this had been me at the helm I would have expected the players to know their spells and would have been encouraging them to look them up before it was their turn. In most encounters the DM is too busy to be checking all the rules (hence the pre-game prep time, all spells the monsters might use should have been reviewed before the game) but there are usually players who are not actually involved in the action at any given point. Get them to look up needed information.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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Done right sure sounds nice and one would think that it really ought to be a priority in an epic fight...but its damn hard to have a good epic fight if the game is at a standstill.In fact I would probably be more likely to go with my best understanding of the rules during a climatic battle then otherwise. It is one of the encounters that you can least afford to stall.
That said if this had been me at the helm I would have expected the players to know their spells and would have been encouraging them to look them up before it was their turn. In most encounters the DM is too busy to be checking all the rules (hence the pre-game prep time, all spells the monsters might use should have been reviewed before the game) but there are usually players who are not actually involved in the action at any given point. Get them to look up needed information.
I agree. It's particularly tough when the spells reference other spells, as in the case of the polymorph chain (though thankfully, those are located close to each other in the rule book - unlike the various fog-related spells).
I remember a game back in 2e where a player destroyed a flying city using control weather. It wasn't until after the game that read the spell closely and realized that thehurricane he created required that (i) the sky already be stormy and (ii) several hours worth of casting/concentration.
I agree. It's particularly tough when the spells reference other spells, as in the case of the polymorph chain (though thankfully, those are located close to each other in the rule book - unlike the various fog-related spells).
Give me a break Sebastian, that's pretty lame. Are you just plain lazy? That's right I forget you have an important full time job that dosen't give the time to look at the rules.
Now, now, boys (Sebastian & Lord Vile)... let's play nice. You two are worse than my preschoolers. Can't we all just get along? If you are determined to make cutting remarks and insults of a personal nature, you would both do well to remember this: it is a mark of immaturity and lack of intelligence when a person cannot maintain a civil debate or defend his point of view against opposition and instead digresses to character attacks and sarcasm.