My party nearly whupped her too.
In my case it was not dice luck, but a paladin with all the mounted combat feats, a lance, and horseshoes of a zephyr.
It was an interesting encounter for my group.
The group was heading back up to Fort Jasper (they renamed Fort Ranick after their halfling with an ego), and saw the flood occur while between the two. They saw the items and debris (including a "log" that was actually black maga). They realized this could spell disaster for the village so the druid shapeshifted into a bird and flew back to the village as quickly as possible...
but instead of following along behind as quick as they could to help rescue and evacuate (and fight black maga, though they didn't know that part), they stopped and made camp.
So... the druid ended up fighting black maga alone. I had used the forshadowing, but the players had forgotten all of it so it didn't really work out too well. I used the hints at a limited fight time as well. The druid for her part, kept her distance from this thing and just kept summoning up creatures to distract and annoy her... a tactic that ended up working very well. It kept her from doing more damage to the village and she finally shook and raged in anger at the druid but couldn't do much in return (she has a relatively short range) and then fled the scene (at just about the time the druid was running out of spells).
This had a VERY positive effect on the game as up to this point the player just didn't believe me that druids were that great of characters and she felt they were under powered (I know, right?). Now she likes her character a lot more.
Anyway... it ended up being a great addition to the campaign for us, but it did threaten to derail things for a while when they went monster hunting. Mostly they were out in boats chumming the water. Instead of risking a TPK by letting them find her all jaws style, I had her ignore them (being very intelligent and all). Not sure if it would have worked well to have a jaws style side trek or not... I really did fear the TPK and things did work out.
My guess is that this will be one of those loose ends they want to tie up when the game ends.
Sean Mahoney
Your group must have dice luck that would make a Las Vegas pit boss really suspicious.I had the same concerns as others about how to disengage the Black Magga fight without it looking completely staged.
It didn't happen the way I expected. Given the incredible run of luck on crits and damage, etc. (all rolls were witnessed so there was no fudging by anyone) and the very poor rolls I had for saving throws and to hit and damage for Black Magga's attacks, my group had Black Magga on the ropes. I tried to 'beat feet' Black Magga out of there but some terrific parting shots by the party bought her down. The dice gods were looking out for the party that battle.
Yep, Black Magga was added to the trophy case. The party enjoyed the accolades and reputation (not the mention the XP) for defeating her and that accomplishment was a main salient point of the campaign until the final showdown in Xin Shalast.
Very memorable.
Sometimes that happens though.
In my ROTR campaign the party, at 2nd level, followed 1 too many Red Herrings and ended up at the Sandpoint Devil's lair on CHooper's Isle. I thought they were gonners, but then my dice abandned me and the party had several turns of good rolls (the Paladin crited twice while Smiting Evil) lots of minimum damage and 2 critical SPD fumbles...and the party managed to survive. Just barely (several characters were in negative HP)
Sometimes the dice just go their way...
A fort save would be appropriate for a poison, perhaps, but not a maddening gas.
But it was a poison effect, a mind affecting poison effect. So like you said, you can argue it into any of the three saves.
Any how, it really didn't make much difference in the end, so case closed.
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Haha, yes, sometimes the dice do some crazy things. Enlarged enraged earthbreaker-wielding barbarian/sorcerer/dragon disciple getting a lucky crit meant Jagraath Kreeg went down in round one.
Running Black Magga next session (probably; my group might spend the entire time working out the logistics of running the fort, in which case it will be the following session), so wish me luck! (But not too much luck, don't want a TPK after all).
Haha, yes, sometimes the dice do some crazy things. Enlarged enraged earthbreaker-wielding barbarian/sorcerer/dragon disciple getting a lucky crit meant Jagraath Kreeg went down in round one.
Running Black Magga next session (probably; my group might spend the entire time working out the logistics of running the fort, in which case it will be the following session), so wish me luck! (But not too much luck, don't want a TPK after all).
I just had an example of crazy luck. My players just finished skinsaw and during the fight with the scarecrow I was critting their recruited help a bunch for massive damage (that guy is scary) and by the end of it two players of 6th and 7th level respectively felled Xanesha by themselves when by the book there is no way that should have happened :P
As for Black Magga, I'm going to have her be talked about by Shelulu during the trip ala loch ness, and am adding a few encounters to help a few behind players along on xp and one of which is a small tribe of wild halflings that worship her...
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You could definitely cut her. But she's loads of fun if you build her up real dramatic like. In the proto-playtesting I did for Hook, I made sure the PCs knew the Lockness-like tales of Black Magga long before they even got to the Hook Mountain region. When the floods started, I let them know the cause right away, and one of the players was like "What if something else came over the dam with the flood water..." They were freaked as hell about Magga and enjoyed battling her. Though, you are right, she could easily destroy-a-f~@# a party.
I applied this idea in my game.
Within Ma'graul's room they found a book called "Legends and Lore from the storval sea". Of course most of it was des troyed except a few pages about Black Magga. Now they got an insight of the beast that can swallow boats at once.I'll let you know how the fight turns out in a few weeks.
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You could definitely cut her. But she's loads of fun if you build her up real dramatic like. In the proto-playtesting I did for Hook, I made sure the PCs knew the Lockness-like tales of Black Magga long before they even got to the Hook Mountain region.
I wrote up a 'tall tale' as told by a local townsman from TF, an old man with a penchant for storytelling. It's kinda long, but assuming no one minds a longer than average post, here it is:
'What's Black Magga?' you say. You mean you've never heard of Black Magga? Well, have a seat and you can have the gods' honest truth right from one of the few people still alive who's ever seen Black Magga ... me!
Way up in the arms of Hook Mountain, where the Storval Deep lies, when old man Triggins was young, he used to fish those deep waters from dawn to dusk most everyday. He kept a long sturdy log raft hidden in the woods, which had just enough room for his handmade chair, a sail for a bit of shade, and his bait & tackle. The folks in Turtleback Ferry warned him to keep away from that place, or at least to fish from the lakeshore, but he just scoffed at their tales, taking his little boat far, where the cold black waters were their deepest. He knew that's where the best catch swam.
Even nowadays, the elders of Turtleback can tell you all sorts of strange sites and happenings concerning the dark Storval waters, but back in the day, Triggins was brash. He just laughed and didn't heed warnings from folks he regarded as toothless old fools. For weeks at a time every summer, he'd come trundling back to Turtleback each day, with armloads of the fattest fish, still glistening from those cold lake waters.
This went on for a number of years, until one day, Triggins came back with no fish at all. It was getting on near dark, a much later hour than usual for him. In fact, several in the town had taken to the road with their lanterns, thinking perhaps Triggins had been waylaid by some Graul hunter or worse. When he finally stumbled back into town, folks were shocked. Well, I say, 'most' folks but not all. Those toothless old fools, the elders, they weren't surprised in the least, cause they knew just by taking a quick glance at Triggins what had happened to him.
But, Triggins didn't say a word. His clothes were torn and wet, there were weeds in his hair, he was missing a boot, and he had a pale, haggard look about him, like someone that had nearly fallen off a cliff or had been really sick for weeks. The folks in town implored him to say what was wrong, but he just shook his sopping head and shuffled on back to his cottage. And, he continued not saying anything the rest of the night, and then the next day, and the whole durned week, Triggins didn't so much as grunt.
Well, this got a lot of folks riled up real bad, as you can imagine, and they wanted to go see what Triggins saw up on that lake. Several of the old folks just shook their heads, smacking open palms on their legs. "Hain't no need for you to go trampin' into the mountains up yonder to Storval. I can tell you right now what Triggins ran into. And you'll wish you hadn't run into his trouble, too, if you go up there!"
But, no one wanted to listen. A bunch of young folk (yep, I was young once, if you can picture it) packed themselves some food and other travelin' supplies and decided to make a day of it. Even though Triggins would hide his raft on the shore up there, they had a pretty good notion where it lay. So, they spent all morning hiking up the foothills of Hook (this was back before the Grauls were so numerous and travelling that way wasn't so dangerous as it is now, you see), and by lunch they got to the Storval Deep. It took awhile, but they then finally found Triggin's hiding place.
There was no raft on that lakeshore. Instead, what they found barely even looked like it could have once been a raft. That raft was made out of logs big 'round as a horse is tall, and those logs were bit clean through. Not like a beaver, which slowly gnaws the wood down. No sir, these were big clean bite marks. You could see where some kind of beak or teeth just chomped those logs into pieces. And that wasn't all they found either.
All over those log pieces were little sharp bones, like bones from fish. In some places, the ground was white with 'em. This group of young folks spent some time sifting through all this wreckage, looking for footprints or some other sign of whatever could have eaten so many fish and could have eaten that raft up like it did. 'Bout that time, old Jurny Bregg (oh, so you've heard about him, have you?) gets the bright idea to wade out into the water, to see if he can "find" anything. As if you can find footprints in the water on a lakeshore! Sometimes I think my milk cow has more sense than Jurny.
Just as soon as that durned Jurny gets about waist deep, that lake water just exploded. I mean it erupted like a volcano (if you ever heard of one of those things you'll know what I'm talking about). Brother, the sky was filled with the awfulest mess of I-don't-know what. It looked like we had stirred up a real nest of snakes, if you can picture snakes that are oily black and thick as the thickest tree trunk you ever saw. They were just churning in the air, whipping every which way under the sun. And, then the worst part ... a noise like the devil's trumpets. I've heard lions, and panthers, and a Kreeg's yell, and once even a ghostly scream, but this noise had them all beat. It was like that thing's roar just grabbed hold and shook the sense out of me.
I grabbed Jurney by his collar and buddy, we hauled it out of that lake in a hurry. I've never run so fast in my life. We all did, and nobody dared to take a split second to get a better look at that thing. We ran like rabbits, I'm not ashamed to say, cause we knew if we didn't, it was the end. Jurney swears to this day a beaked mouth, bigger than any kind of sea bird you may have heard tell of, tore half his hair out and it would've had his head, if I hadn't pulled him out of the water.
Well, we were in for a royal round of told-you-so's back in town for the next month. We liked to never heard the end of it. "You should know that Black Magga haunts that Storval Deep ... " the old men offered, chuckling underneath their wagging beards. "Few see her and live to tell of it."
And, a funny thing happened cause of that trip. It wasn't long before folks here in Turtleback Ferry started looking up to us right much. You know, we were at that age when most of your elders think you're still a child, and while hunting down Black Magga was surely foolish, it also showed our folks we were brave, too, and that we had sense enough to know when to back off. After that, things changed, and the kids i grew up with gradually started taking over all the work and making all the decisions. And, now I keep telling this story to my son's children, wondering if they're going to venture out for a peep of that Storval Deep someday.
I'm almost up to this point with my adventure group. But the problem I forsee is convincing them to go down to the village instead of up to the damn.
I'm almost certain that me players will go directly to the source of the rising water problem... Skull's Crossing.
My group did that, and the DM didn't adjust the module at all because he's taking an intensive class at the moment and had less prep time than usual. We beat the ogres and trolls and Wet Papa Grazuul, got the sluice gates open to relieve the pressure behind the dam (cost me a negative level, but our cleric has Restoration, so that didn't last long), then headed back down to Turtleback Ferry.
We found that Black Magga had slaughtered the entire population, and there was an enormous glowing sihedron rune centered on the cathedral. Then Black Magga attacked, at full hitpoints because she'd regenerated overnight. We had no magic cold iron or +3 weapons so we were barely able to damage her,* we couldn't keep our distance because of her ability to teleport, and it would have been a totally unavoidable TPK (well, except for my wizard, who was flying well above Black Magga's reach and might have survived if he'd been the type to abandon his party) had the DM not then pulled a literal deus ex machina and had the avatar of Lamashtu show up to take her daughter somewhere else.
Didn't it occur to anyone, when this adventure was being written and edited, that given no information except the fact that the river is rising, a smart party will head upstream to investigate the source of the problem? We had no idea that Black Magga existed -- apparently, what the DM got from reading the module was that nobody knew she existed, since a DC 26 success on Knowledge: Local while we were investigating the ruins of Turtleback Ferry gave us no information on what could have done the kind of damage we were seeing. The way it's written, the module rewards the party for acting without thinking the situation through, and punishes them brutally (with the slaughter of an entire village they were trying to protect, and an all-but-unsurvivable encounter with a full-strength Mother of Oblivion) for analyzing it and taking intelligent action instead of going off half-cocked. It's the first time in RotRL where my immediate reaction after the session was, "Wow, that sucked!"
* I did some damage because we play with a house rule that all element-related energy types, not just acid, bypass spell resistance. The rationale is that if it's blocked by cold, fire, or electricity resistance, then it's a physical effect, not magical force -- SR shouldn't stop a Fireball from burning you, a Cone of Cold from freezing you, or a Lightning Bolt from shocking you any more than it stops an Acid Arrow from melting your skin.
With that rule, a wizard or sorcerer with Fly, a wand of Fireball, Lightning Bolt, or Enlarged Scorching Ray (allowing him to strike from beyond the range of her Breath of Madness), and some defense against her mind-affecting spells could actually solo a Mother of Oblivion. However, under standard rules, between her acid immunity and SR 26, it's next to impossible to do any hitpoint damage with magic, and of course she's also immune to most types of "save or die" spell.
Kavern, your DM clearly did not read the author's comments in this very thread regarding build up for Black Magga. For that I am sorry. If it had been me, I would have given a reasonable chance for someone to know the tale. OR have a local performer tell the tale of Black Magga where the PCs can hear. Too late now though, obviously. Difficult to say in hindsight whether your party would have gone to the dam first upon hearing about Black Magga.
You could definitely cut her. But she's loads of fun if you build her up real dramatic like. In the proto-playtesting I did for Hook, I made sure the PCs knew the Lockness-like tales of Black Magga long before they even got to the Hook Mountain region. When the floods started, I let them know the cause right away, and one of the players was like "What if something else came over the dam with the flood water..." They were freaked as hell about Magga and enjoyed battling her. Though, you are right, she could easily destroy-a-f++$ a party. In my original it's possible to collapse the cathedral on her and she get's swept away in the debris, rather than have to duke it out with her. Kind of like a fun boss fight in God of War. You could go that route if you like.
Our enlarged fighter dropped a church on her and killed her (well, the church tower’s foundations had been undermined by the flooding river, Hudak the fighter gave it a good push to help it along while Black Magga was trying to grab people inside the church).
Heh. I've been looking through your PBP thread lately -- you guys are awesome, by the way -- but I hadn't gotten that far. Would it be out of line for someone not playing in that game to comment in the discussion thread for it? I'd really like to compare notes with your DM on a few aspects of the AP, and the interesting parallels between your group and ours.
Kavern, your DM clearly did not read the author's comments in this very thread regarding build up for Black Magga. For that I am sorry. If it had been me, I would have given a reasonable chance for someone to know the tale. OR have a local performer tell the tale of Black Magga where the PCs can hear. Too late now though, obviously. Difficult to say in hindsight whether your party would have gone to the dam first upon hearing about Black Magga.
If we knew she existed and thought she might be headed for Turtleback Ferry, we'd have gone that way, no question; we like being the Big Damn Heroes.
Another problem was that the PFRPG conversion of the Mother of Oblivion that our DM found apparently made her even nastier than what was written in the module (as if she needed it!): it added a Dimension Door-like at-will short-range teleport ability that made outrunning her impossible; changed her Warp Dimensions power so that instead of the spell just failing, any teleportation spell used near her drops the caster directly into her freakin' tentacles; and added a paralyzing fear effect upon first seeing her, something like Frightful Presence.
I nearly got sick when Karry told me (after the session) about the Warp Dimensions power. At the start of the encounter, our rogue had gone over the rooftops out to the cathedral to reconnoitre, so she was the first to see Black Magga; she failed her Will save against the fear effect and couldn't do anything that round except point and scream. The rest of us, on shore, couldn't see what she was reacting to, but if she hadn't made a second save to snap out of it the next round, I intended to use Dimension Door to jump out to the cathedral roof and Fly to carry her to safety. That would have been the end of Kavren.
I hope that first part was a foible of Paizo's messageboards posting and not that you think I am part of the awesomeness that is Aubrey's ROTRL PBP.
I read and enjoy their posts and laugh at the player's antics, but that is pretty much it.
I do have a game group, but we are doing a broader range campaign. I am not only running the adventures for this AP but have added in everything valid for Varisia that I could find. I have 9 players to please who much prefer more sandboxy type campaigns. We are just at the Misgivings currently.
I hope that first part was a foible of Paizo's messageboards posting and not that you think I am part of the awesomeness that is Aubrey's ROTRL PBP.
I read and enjoy their posts and laugh at the player's antics, but that is pretty much it.
Oops, that should have said "Mothman wrote" -- I copy-pasted the quote tags, then neglected to change the name.
I do have a game group, but we are doing a broader range campaign. I am not only running the adventures for this AP but have added in everything valid for Varisia that I could find. I have 9 players to please who much prefer more sandboxy type campaigns. We are just at the Misgivings currently.
Aldern gave us a bit of a scare -- it was a very good thing our fighter had the Stand Still feat, as he stopped the Skinsaw Man from leaping past him to eviscerate one of the less well-armored PCs.
The other interesting thing about the Misgivings was our solution to dealing with the haunts: send the squishy wizard in first. He has a good Will save, and if he does succumb to a haunt, he's the easiest character for the others to grapple to prevent him from running screaming from the house or harming himself or others. Unfortunately, my D20 wasn't helping me much with those Will saves. Fortunately, when the "misogynistic rage" haunt took hold, the DM agreed that no, my character probably wouldn't remember that he could cast "Scorching Ray" while under its influence, and just try to attack the rogue with his bare hands. The "suicidal compulsion" haunt probably worked more effectively for me than it would have for any of the other PCs, too, because he and Ameiko are lovers, whereas none of the other characters had a specific "person you most love."
I'll toss in our own group's encounter with Black Magga for those interested. As I understand it, our GM was forced to adapt the locale for our first run-in with the Mother of Oblivion due to our group having rushed to Skull's Crossing ahead of its initial collapse. Before heading out of Turtleback Ferry an NPC foreshadowed the encounter by telling us that if there was something big going on near the dam, that Black Magga was sure to take an interest in it. The NPC went on to briefly describe a mammoth sea-serpent-type creature of legendary prowess.
Later at the dam, a giant black tentacle rose out of the churning waters to take a half-hearted swipe at my air elemental familiar as it was scouting out the dam's superstructure. Having spotted the tentacle my character succeeded in identifying the MoO via a 35+ Knowledge (planar) skill check. The DM desscribed a formidable and uber-cunning monster with madness-inducing breath, multiple attacks (including level drain) and a ridiculous list of immunities. Right... Wide-eyed we resolved to steer clear of her if at all possible. We went on to deal with the dam's troll, ogre and ettin inhabitants.
Then, during a break between sessions, I was pondering her role in the adventure and how a lowly group of 7th level characters could ever hope to survive an encounter with her. Then, recalling Black Magga's many immunities, I struck upon an idea. Next session, when the Mother of Oblivion reared her ugly head, pulled herself out atop the dam and began moving towards us I executed the plan I'd devised... and ended up solo-killing her in two rounds by unleashing a quintet of hasted summoned shadows on her in a surprise attack. Turns out one of the few things Black Magga wasn't immune to was negative energy. Those interested can read the details of the encounter here in our group's game log.
Turns out one of the few things Black Magga wasn't immune to was negative energy.
Huh! Who'd have thought an Abyssal outsider with an energy drain attack would go down to a bunch of shadows? But you're right, I don't see that immunity anywhere in her stats. Wights, wraiths, spectres, etc. probably couldn't have done much, since that +19 Fort save would prevent her from being energy drained unless she rolled a natural 1, but the shadow's strength damage doesn't allow a saving throw.
Better yet, their incorporeal touch ignores natural armor -- with the +1 attack bonus from Haste, they'd only miss her touch AC on a natural 1. Even a strength of 37 won't save you when you're taking an average of 35 points of strength damage per round. Does the Mother of Oblivion even have any powers that can hurt a shadow? Her bite and tentacles aren't ghost-touch, and the description doesn't even say anything about them being treated as magic weapons, so she may not even be able to do half damage to an incorporeal creature.
Not that that would have helped our group; our spell-casters are a cleric of Iomedae and an Evoker (me) who took Necromancy as a prohibited school, so summoning shadows to attack her wasn't in the cards. What spell lets a 7th-level caster summon five of them? I might buy a scroll of it just in case we run into Black Magga again.
Though on the other hand, our DM might take offense to such a trick and decide apply the shadow-spawn template to her instead of killing her outright. And you thought a live Mother of Oblivion was bad news....
Better yet, their incorporeal touch ignores natural armor -- with the +1 attack bonus from Haste, they'd only miss her touch AC on a natural 1.
That was my strategy. After hearing a summary of her abilities I figured she likely had natural armor up the wazoo and a mountain of hit points propping her up; going at her with conventional attacks would devolve into a battle of attrition most 7th level PCs couldn't hope to win. But I gambled on her touch AC being relatively low (in actuality, it's abysmal. ;P) and her Strength score being easier to whittle down than her hit points.
Does the Mother of Oblivion even have any powers that can hurt a shadow?
Looking up her stats, she has Damage Reduction cold iron and magic. IIRC that means that her own natural attacks count as both cold iron and magic as well; so the shadows would have suffered damage from her attacks, though only 50% since she's corporeal and they would have been immune to her level draining ability. I figured that if she did have time to retaliate, she wouldn't be able to do enough damage (keeping in mind that her strength score would be plummeting) quickly enough to the shadows to stop them.
What spell lets a 7th-level caster summon five of them?
Just a conventional Summon Monster III cast five times in quick succession. My sorcerer has the Shadow Bloodline from Wayfinder #1; which adds the shadow to his SM3 list of creatures. My character merely hid inside his stocking cap (which functions as a handy haversack) to cast all five summon monster spells (plus haste from a wand) as my familiar moved the cap into position near enough to the MoO so that the shadows could charge her upon exiting; Black Magga was busy monologuing about eating people while this was happening. The first summons were close to ending when I launched our surprise attack but the shadows wouldn't need to stick around terribly long if my plan worked. Good thing it did, cause I had no backup plan beyond running away really fast. ;)
Though on the other hand, our DM might take offense to such a trick and decide apply the shadow-spawn template to her instead of killing her outright. And you thought a live Mother of Oblivion was bad news....
The shadow spawn ability only works on humanoids. Believe me, I checked beforehand. ;)
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Our enlarged fighter dropped a church on her and killed her (well, the church tower’s foundations had been undermined by the flooding river, Hudak the fighter gave it a good push to help it along while Black Magga was trying to grab people inside the church).Heh. I've been looking through your PBP thread lately -- you guys are awesome, by the way -- but I hadn't gotten that far. Would it be out of line for someone not playing in that game to comment in the discussion thread for it? I'd really like to compare notes with your DM on a few aspects of the AP, and the interesting parallels between your group and ours.
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No problem at all. We like it when people tell us we're awesome ;-)
In all seriousness it is a great group, great GM and we are having a lot of fun.
Yeah, and plus I'm a total ham that makes Brian Blessed look absolutely modest if you couldn't tell.
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I'm getting near this encounter as well. My group has just infiltrated Ft Rannick.
I ran "Into the Haunted Forest" as an intro for my campaign, and came up with a number of quests for the "unlocks" of the various items in the Panoply of Narven. Some are sidetreks, and some fall in line with the AP. One item has to be "bathed in the blood of the Beast of Storval Deep". So my party heard about Black Magga sometime during Burnt Offerings.
Still a little nervous that I'll be taking a few of them down, though.
Looking up her stats, she has Damage Reduction cold iron and magic. IIRC that means that her own natural attacks count as both cold iron and magic as well;
Ah, right -- I forgot about that wrinkle in the DR rules.
so the shadows would have suffered damage from her attacks, though only 50% since she's corporeal and they would have been immune to her level draining ability.
Hell, level drain might heal them, or give them a temporary Con bonus or some such effect. That's why I'd have expected her to be immune to negative energy -- she uses it in her bite attack.
I figured that if she did have time to retaliate, she wouldn't be able to do enough damage (keeping in mind that her strength score would be plummeting) quickly enough to the shadows to stop them.
Not a chance unless she won initiative over all of them -- then she might have been able to kill one or two. Her damage dice aren't that great, it's the strength bonus that makes her so deadly.
Just a conventional Summon Monster III cast five times in quick succession. My sorcerer has the Shadow Bloodline from Wayfinder #1; which adds the shadow to his SM3 list of creatures.
Ah, I see. I'd never seen that bloodline before looking at your character, and that detail isn't in the description of it at the Pathfinder OGC site.
The shadow spawn ability only works on humanoids. Believe me, I checked beforehand. ;)
Until the DM decides otherwise....
No problem at all. We like it when people tell us we're awesome ;-)
In all seriousness it is a great group, great GM and we are having a lot of fun.
I can see that. I never would have seriously considered doing PBP myself, but having seen now how cool it can be when run well, I'm thinking about trying my hand at it a little later this year. Maybe using D20Pro, Battlegrounds, or Maptool to some of the big fights in realtime, if I can pull together a group who are able to all be on-line simultaneously for a few hours once in a while, and PBP for the non-combat role-playing and minor encounters.
I've been itching to run the classic Dragonlance campaign under PFRPG rules (further updating the 3.5 version of said campaign put out by Sovereign Press a few years ago), and I'm not sure how realistic it is to hope to get together enough players here in Phoenix who can meet on a regular basis to do it right -- I want players who enjoy a fairly railroady campaign (the original DL series, of course, was the great granddaddy of all event-based, strong story-line adventure paths), and don't mind playing the pre-gen characters whose backstories are already intimately linked with some of the major NPCs they'll encounter along the way.
Yeah, and plus I'm a total ham that makes Brian Blessed look absolutely modest if you couldn't tell.
I'd noticed that; it was a lot of fun reading your friendly competition with the bard for Ameiko's affections, and rather satisfying when constancy won out over charisma (since IIRC Illes was perfectly happy to look for someone easier when he couldn't sweet-talk Ameiko into his bedroom right away). Part of the reason I was looking at the PBP forums in the first place was I was curious whether most groups recognized Ameiko as the Designated Love Interest, or just me. (Depending on how she's run by the DM, she can have aspects of one or more of: the Action Girlfriend, the Distressed Damsel, the Broken Bird, the Kuudere, the Rebellious Princess, and/or the Yamato Nadeshiko.) It seems as though at least one player in just about every RotRL group has his character flirt with her at a bear minimum.
Ah, I see. I'd never seen that bloodline before looking at your character, and that detail isn't in the description of it at the Pathfinder OGC site.
There are three different Shadow bloodlines actually; the one from Wayfinder #1 (the one I use) was the first published, followed by another in Kobold Quarterly #13 and finally one from Paizo in the Advanced Players Guide. Of the three, I prefer the original since it has more of a gnomish/First World feel to it which suits my character.
Until the DM decides otherwise...
Changing how a summoned creature's abilities function on a whim after the fact would be a pretty lousy move for a GM to pull; it smacks of petty vindictiveness.
Changing how a summoned creature's abilities function on a whim after the fact would be a pretty lousy move for a GM to pull; it smacks of petty vindictiveness.
If he knew how the rule worked to begin with, yes. What can happen, though, is that a GM who doesn't realize that a rule he's accustomed to using is not R.A.W., when confronted with R.A.W. contradicting it, will cite Rule #1 and house-rule his existing interpretation over the book. (Incidentally, I'd give my favorite D20 to see the look on your GM's face when you told him what you were summoning, and when you told him the result of the first 10d10 Str damage. Did the shadows get a surprise round? That would have been the icing on the cake -- the toughest foe in the adventure path thus far curb-stomped by the tiny gnomish sorcerer.
By the way, I LOVED that you used that phrase, "Greetings and defiance!" It occurred to me, unfortunately after the last session, that the full quote from the Young Wizards novels would have been an appropriate way for my character to greet the pit fiend inside Skull's Crossing: "Fairest and fallen, greetings and defiance!" At least, it would be if you follow the interpretation from the 3.5 Fiendish Codex II's legend of the Pact Primeval: that Asmodeus and the devils began as angels sent by the gods of light to war against the demons of the Abyss, and the gods learned too late that in battling monsters one may become a monster, and that when you gaze long into the Abyss, the Abyss gazes also into you. (Nietzsche may have been insane, at least in his later years, but he occasionally hit on a real gem of wisdom.) A pit fiend would likely be a fallen Solar in that case, so "fairest and fallen" would fit. I'm not sure if Golarion's Contract of Creation was quite the same thing as the Pact Primeval, but Asmodeus and the devils did fight in the war against Rovagug.
Incidentally, I'd give my favorite D20 to see the look on your GM's face when you told him what you were summoning, and when you told him the result of the first 10d10 Str damage.
It was a big reveal since she hadn't asked which spells I was casting while hiding in my extradimensional hat. I merely described coming out of the hat, uttered my challenge and then explained that I'd cast summon monster spells to summon five shadows, used a wand of haste on them and had them exit down into the dam before then emerging myself. To her credit she played it close to the chest. She simply pulled out the bestiary to review the MoO and shadow to see if there were any issues with the shadows' attacks circumventing Black Magga's many defences.
Did the shadows get a surprise round?
That was a bigger question. The GM wondered out loud whether the MoO's trans-diemensional tentacles might somehow allow Black Magga to perceive the shadows moving incorporeally through the solid matter of the dam. In the end she couldn't find anything indicating this to be the case so she did indeed grant the shadows a surprise round.
So as to involve the other players in this otherwise solo-combat I had each one roll a shadow's attack and damage rolls. When we got 4/5 hits and did 4d6 Str damage I knew that the fight had been effectively decided. Spurred on by a strong first strike the other players, who's PCs had been taking cover some 300-ft away, started rolling initiative and calculating range penalties for their ranged attacks while the GM dutifully went about recalculating the MoO's attack and damage bonuses vis-a-vis her new strength score. I let them go about those tasks cause I didn't want to seem presumptuous in telling them that none of those things would likely influence the remainder of the fight.
Next the GM started describing how the MoO was retaliating with her breath weapon. I had to interrupt her to remind her that the first round having been a surprise, that we first had to roll initiative before the MoO could retaliate. So we did and my PC and shadows won initiative. That was it; 4/5 shadows were hasted so we had a total of 9 attacks; 8 of which hit for a whole lot more strength damage. The GM went about describing how the MoO imploded and disappeared.
In hindsight, throwing 5 shadows at the MoO was likely overkill; the same could probably have been accomplished with 3-4 shadows. But at the time I wasn't sure if it'd work at all, so I figured it was best to give the old girl both barrels. ;)
By the way, I LOVED that you used that phrase, "Greetings and defiance!"
Kudos to you. No one at the table seemed to recognize it. It seemed appropriate considering Black Magga's seeming epicness.
Next the GM started describing how the MoO was retaliating with her breath weapon. I had to interrupt her to remind her that the first round having been a surprise, that we first had to roll initiative before the MoO could retaliate. So we did and my PC and shadows won initiative. That was it; 4/5 shadows were hasted so we had a total of 9 attacks; 8 of which hit for a whole lot more strength damage. The GM went about describing how the MoO imploded and disappeared.
I don't think Magga's breath weapon would even have done anything to the shadows -- it's a mind-affecting poison, and undead are immune to both. It could have messed Aubrey up a bit, but that wouldn't have helped her at that point.
In hindsight, throwing 5 shadows at the MoO was likely overkill; the same could probably have been accomplished with 3-4 shadows. But at the time I wasn't sure if it'd work at all, so I figured it was best to give the old girl both barrels. ;)
I don't think there's any such thing as overkill for a party of 7th-level characters facing a CR 15 outsider; unless you can find and exploit a significant weakness the way Aubrey did, you're deep in TPK territory with a monster like that.
Kudos to you. No one at the table seemed to recognize it. It seemed appropriate considering Black Magga's seeming epicness.
Totally. Pity no one else in your group had read Diane Duane. Of course, there's a couple in the series I still haven't gotten around to, after the extreme weirdness and rather sad ending of The Wizard's Dilemma. I did like Nita's conversation with the Lone one the first time he showed up, though: "I know who you are." "I thought you'd work it out eventually. ...So, that's it? You're not going to go all hostile on me?" Great scene.
I don't think Magga's breath weapon would even have done anything to the shadows -- it's a mind-affecting poison, and undead are immune to both. It could have messed Aubrey up a bit, but that wouldn't have helped her at that point.
Aubrey had an active protection from evil on himself at the time for what that was worth. I think a better question is whether Black Magga's breath weapon would have done anything to her. Keep in mind that the five shadows were attacking the MoO from inside her own space. It'd have been pretty hard for her to target all five of them with a cone effect without also including herself in its AoE.
Pity no one else in your group had read Diane Duane. Of course, there's a couple in the series I still haven't gotten around to, after the extreme weirdness and rather sad ending of The Wizard's Dilemma.
I've read the whole series, even one of her odd cat-wizard novels. In many ways I consider them superior to the similar-themed Harry Potter novels; not the least of which is that magic's existence and functioning seem logical.
I did like Nita's conversation with the Lone one the first time he showed up, though: "I know who you are." "I thought you'd work it out eventually. ...So, that's it? You're not going to go all hostile on me?" Great scene.
My favorite scene is the one in Deep Wizardy when Dairine faces off against the Lone Power. "You think you can match power with me?" It said softly, turning away from Nita and Kit. Dairine laughed. "Think so? I can wring you out and hang you up to dry. Come on you poor fool. Take your best shot." She's not just posturing either; she eventually delivers on that threat in a truly spectacular fashion. =)
I was sort of hoping to hit a similar David vs Mecha-Godzilla vibe in confronting the Mother of Oblivion. The only downside is that I doubt I'll ever be able to top solo-killing a huge-sized monster with a CR eight points above my character level in any campaign I play. =/
Aubrey had an active protection from evil on himself at the time for what that was worth. I think a better question is whether Black Magga's breath weapon would have done anything to her.
I don't think I've ever seen a creature in any game supplement that had a breath weapon to which it wasn't immune. A breath weapon has to be generated inside the monster's body, after all; that wouldn't work so well if it damaged its own respiratory system.
Most 7th-level characters would still have to roll a natural 20 even with Protection from Evil to make a DC 27 Reflex save, but I see on your stat page that being tiny and an agile, natural flyer gives Aubrey a much better save than a human with his Dex and character class would have. (I also see that your GM is a heck of a lot more generous with the treasure than my GM or the module writers were -- my own character, at the same point in RotRL and with treasure divided among five, not seven characters, is about 20,000 gp short of standard expected wealth for level 9. Some of the other characters are doing better in that regard, having picked up expensive weapons or armor for which Kavren has little use, but I think the party as a whole is well behind the curve, too.)
I've read the whole series, even one of her odd cat-wizard novels. In many ways I consider them superior to the similar-themed Harry Potter novels; not the least of which is that magic's existence and functioning seem logical.
This +1. Not that I don't like the HP books -- they're very entertaining, but you have to suspend your disbelieve with bridge cables to get past the silliness and implausibility of Rowling's "Wizarding World." Whereas Duane has the mind of a sci-fi writer, and approaches magic as a technology. Joel Rosenberg has a similar approach in his adult fantasy series, "The Guardians of the Flame" and "Keepers of the Hidden Ways" -- his fantasy owes far more to Heinlein than to Tolkien. (Heinlein himself showed the way with the very rational, practical magic featured in his Waldo and Magic, Inc.)
My favorite scene is the one in Deep Wizardy when Dairine faces off against the Lone Power. "You think you can match power with me?" It said softly, turning away from Nita and Kit. Dairine laughed. "Think so? I can wring you out and hang you up to dry. Come on you poor fool. Take your best shot." She's not just posturing either; she eventually delivers on that threat in a truly spectacular fashion. =)
I believe that was actually High Wizardry, but otherwise I entirely agree -- Dairine at the zenith of her power was awesome. I think the way the amount of raw power wizards can channel actually declines as they get older makes for a very interesting balance -- the seniors know the most but can do the least, and much of the heavy lifting of fighting the Lone One is done by brand new wizards during their Tests.
The scene in The Wizard's Dilemma where Kit actually uses the line that started this conversation is pretty cool, too; he and Ponch are coming in as the Big Damn Heroes to save Nita from her near-fatal mistake, and he's fairly certain that he actually has the advantage over the Lone One in this particular encounter, so he goes with the formal salutation before proceeding to royally screw up Its nasty little gambit.
I was sort of hoping to hit a similar David vs Mecha-Godzilla vibe in confronting the Mother of Oblivion. The only downside is that I doubt I'll ever be able to top solo-killing a huge-sized monster with a CR eight points above my character level in any campaign I play. =/
Ah well, that's the downside of a Crowning Moment of Awesome -- once you've had it, it's over, and it probably won't recur. Not many players of these modules (and there seem to be a LOT of people playing or who have played RotRL) can claim to have curb-stomped Black Magga without their party suffering a single hit.
Most 7th-level characters would still have to roll a natural 20 even with Protection from Evil to make a DC 27 Reflex save
I wasn't counting on the protection from evil to boost my character's Reflex saves. Since the GM described Black Magga's breath weapon as causing madness I figured that the spell might render me immune to what was likely to be a mind-affecting effect.
(I also see that your GM is a heck of a lot more generous with the treasure than my GM or the module writers were.
Yeah. We were far short throughout the first module and our GM seemed to overcompensate somewhat in the second module. I'm not sure what was by the book and what was improvised on her part. The church of Iomedae in Magnimar gave us a heck of a deal on commissioned items after ridding their city of a cult of Norgorber. I believe the situation is slowly rectifying itself as we advance in levels through the third module.
my own character, at the same point in RotRL and with treasure divided among five, not seven characters, is about 20,000 gp short of standard expected wealth for level 9.
That's brutal. I wonder what's up with that.
I believe that was actually High Wizardry
Ah. You're quite right. My mistake.
Not that I don't like the HP books -- they're very entertaining
I agree; they're quite good. But I have to admit that I'm utterly baffled as to how/why HP became a mainstream super-phenomena. A young adult fantasy story about a boy-wizard has mainstream appeal?!? Why HP and not the earlier Young Wizards series? No idea...
Not many players of these modules (and there seem to be a LOT of people playing or who have played RotRL) can claim to have curb-stomped Black Magga without their party suffering a single hit.
I'd be curious to hear of any such stories...
I wasn't counting on the protection from evil to boost my character's Reflex saves. Since the GM described Black Magga's breath weapon as causing madness I figured that the spell might render me immune to what was likely to be a mind-affecting effect.
Ah, I see. Worth a try, and I think it would depend on the DM's interpretation. I'd rule that madness isn't the same thing as possession or mental control, so all Protection from Evil gives you is a save bonus, but another DM might interpret it differently.
Yeah. We were far short throughout the first module and our GM seemed to overcompensate somewhat in the second module. I'm not sure what was by the book and what was improvised on her part. The church of Iomedae in Magnimar gave us a heck of a deal on commissioned items after ridding their city of a cult of Norgorber. I believe the situation is slowly rectifying itself as we advance in levels through the third module..
The modules are pretty parsimonious throughout. Our DM had us tally up our treasure after The Skinsaw Murders and calibrated the rewards we earned in Magnimar to bring us up to our EWBL, but at least some of us have fallen behind again in The Hook Mountain Massacre.
That's brutal. I wonder what's up with that.
Partly it's that we have a bunch of stuff we can't use and haven't yet had the opportunity to sell, and we haven't found a lot that a wizard can use. I also gave a level 9 Wand of Acid Arrow with most of its charges to the rogue, as I'd picked up a level 11 Wand of Scorching Ray, and you can only shoot off one wand in a round anyway.
I have all the crafting feats now except Potions (which our cleric has), Rods, and Staves (and I have a bonded staff, so I won't need to take that one to get a magic staff at level 12), so I mostly make my own items, once I have money and some down time. Kavren will want to return to Sandpoint as soon as we finish off the Kreegs, not hang around Fort Rannick (he misses Ameiko), so down time is imminent.
I agree; they're quite good. But I have to admit that I'm utterly baffled as to how/why HP became a mainstream super-phenomena. A young adult fantasy story about a boy-wizard has mainstream appeal?!? Why HP and not the earlier Young Wizards series? No idea...
Duane's more sophisticated style of magic may be less approachable for a lot of readers, and her less archetypical story-telling might also narrow the books' appeal -- Harry's story follows the structure of the "Hero's Journey" more precisely than Nita's. Sadly, so might the fact that the viewpoint protagonist is a girl -- that may have something to do with the relative obscurity of Garth Nix's excellent "Old Kingdom Trilogy" (Sabriel, Lirael, and Abhorsen), as well. Also, I doubt HP would have been the phenomenon it became without the influence of Amazon's customer rating and reviewing system; my impression is that that was what drove the first and second books into the best-seller lists, and then the whole thing took on a life of its own.
I'd be curious to hear of any such stories...Well, earlier in this thread Evil Lincoln wrote:
My party nearly whupped her too.
In my case it was not dice luck, but a paladin with all the mounted combat feats, a lance, and horseshoes of a zephyr.
From the context, it was clear that that "nearly" meant "before she fled," not "before she ate the whole party."
As for Harry Potter, the very lack of logic makes it very interesting for fanfiction writers. You can develop the world into so many directions, give it so many flavors, that everyone can find something to be happy with.
If fanfic is your cup of tea, I'd hazard to say that the young wizard series (which has sentient cat, whale, computer and alien wizards along with countless alternate dimensions as a part of its cannon) offers up all the toys pretty much any aspiring fanfic writer could possibly need.
Towards the end the series suffered from Rowling trying to redeem the major villains (Dumbledore and Snape who through their inaction caused more problems than Voldemort), but thankfully fan fiction offers many far better conclusions.
Kudos for including (quite rightfully) the inexplicably negligent adults of the series in its roster of major villains. =D
If fanfic is your cup of tea, I'd hazard to say that the young wizard series (which has sentient cat, whale, computer and alien wizards along with countless alternate dimensions as a part of its cannon) offers up all the toys pretty much any aspiring fanfic writer could possibly need.
I think Rowling's writing style is probably easier to imitate than Duane's, though, and these days resources like the HP-Lexicon site make it a lot easier for fan-fic writers to look up details of the Potterverse they want to use in their stories.
Kudos for including (quite rightfully) the inexplicably negligent adults of the series in its roster of major villains. =D
Heh. I've often said that book 5, in particular, really put the "dumb" in "Dumbledore." Everything that went wrong at the end of that one could have been averted if the old fool had just given Harry the information he needed to make sound decisions. Instead Dumbledore tried to pretend that Harry didn't need to make any decisions, and so let him blunder around in the dark, leading his friends into a trap that could have killed them all and did result in Sirius getting killed.
My group managed to kill her while saving orphans.
Of course, they all insisted on hunting down cold iron weapons after the fighter with the quasit in book 1. And they actually used group tactics (rare enough that I normally don't plan for it). Never thought about how much more dangerous she would have been if the quasit hadn't upset them so much.
My group's party did pretty well. Four cardinal characters (fighter, rogue/ranger, wizard, life oracle) and two of them had cold iron weapons (thanks, also, to that nasty fight with Erylium way back when).
Since they were 9th level, when they heard that the waters were rising, they used a teleport spell to arrive up to their waists in water. Two of them headed for the church, two went after the boa on the boat.
The boa ended up baleful poly'd into a bunny and given to the school kid. :)
The party fought Black Magga from the top of the church, and of course everyone failed the save against her breath. No one managed to kill anyone else with their attacks, and Black Magga didn't manage to kill the half-orc fighter with her bite.
She took some damage, but not enough of itself to make her flee. She did grab everyone before the waters ran down... then she dropped them and fled. :)
They found it to be a surprising, nasty but entertaining encounter, and the fighter (who is played by my 8 year old son, I will add) asked, as they were recovering, "can a spell banish her back where she came from?" Which, I'll admit, is not a bad line of thought. I wonder what Lamashtu's reaction would be?
Black Magga has one single thing that makes her not fit the role she's given: grappling. It's not going to happen that someone grappled gets free. In every other aspect, she's an awesome encounter. Scary, primal, monstrous.
When I played it, the group got a bit of help against the grappling part, and managed to drive her off. If I hadn't, she'd have taken two of them.
I'm going to try for the "limited time" combat myself. I'll play it pretty much as-written, except with the PCs already in town instead of rushing in afterward.
I still have the problem of "why does Magga break off the fight?" after a few rounds? I am thinking perhaps she has an aversion to sunlight, and so when the rain stops and the clouds break, she retreats to the depths. There's a paladin leading the party so the "heavenly chorus" thing isn't totally out of place.
Why does the rain stop during the Black Magga fight anyway? Have the Annis Hags given up at that point for some reason?
This is such a cool scene in principle, but it is really hard to fit everything together.
Just ran this on Saturday. We'd had a bit of down time between the sessions and the initial rumor, so a bit more foreshadowing on my part might have improved the impact of the scene.
I ran it as the timed fight written in the book, but kept two of her tentacles working on the church. A full round attack (bite and all tentacles) is likely to kill nearly any character outright.
As far as leaving, instead of heading out, I had a boulder upstream shift sending a massive tree spinning down ahead of a large surge of water. The tree narrowly missed the nearest PC, and slammed Magga away from the church out into the deeper flow, conveniently having her fling away another grappled/grasped PC in the process.
I should have cut this; it was totally lame and flat when we ran it. If it hadn't been a scripted encounter, they all would have died; they didn't even scratch her, so her leaving the scene felt stupid.
Personally, I like occasional encounters where the PC's simply have to run away, especially if they've been particularly dominant of late - pride goeth before the fall and all that. Too, I like the dynamic of PC's having to 'hold the line' against a superior foe rather than simply laying the smack down all the time.
Having said that, after the encounter in our run, the PC's presumed that such a major threat floating down main street clearly played an important role in the campaign and spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out how to draw her out and engage her again, or worse yet, how to follow her into her underwater lair... I was tempted to try and tie it in to the sunken wreckage of the 'party barge' but at the end of the day it was too much work for the time I had available. In retrospect, knowing how my players reacted to it, I would have just written it out.
Besides, the giant snake encounter back-to-back with Black Magga seemed a bit redundant in theme and flavor anyway...
There are several problems with the 'they should run' expectation with this encounter:
1) The module clearly sets up a 'save the townsfolk in the church from the monster' thing, which naturally draws the PCs into it.
2) They're unlikely to ID her and will have little idea how tough she is and what her strengths and weaknesses might be.
3) They're unable to engage in any kind of preparation.
and most of all:
4) The confusion, grapple and 20 foot reach makes it extremely difficult to get away once you realize you're in over your head.
In my running of the encounter, she had 3 of 4 characters grappled within 2 rounds; even taking the -20 to keep using other limbs, her CMB is high enough to threaten 7th level characters pretty easily. I thought there was a chance I might have one of those groups that could actually threaten her - there was a paladin, after all - but the grapple pretty much completely took the wind out of their sails.
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It worked quite well in mine (We take it in turns to run each book in the AP). It happened to be my chapter and she surprised the HECK outta the party, although they got some good hits in.
Having said that I LOVED embelishing the Graul Homestead. Mammy Graul was just too delicous not to play up with. I wanted her to be able to escape to live another day but sadly she died :(
EPIC!!!!
My 9 year old plays "Zero", a 9th level Elven Ranger archer (including 1 level of Wizard). He has Celestial armor, +6 dex belt, and a +1 flaming bow w/cold iron arrows. (They found a small dragon hoard on a random encounter). Cold iron because Demons are a favored enemy.
Anyway, he's part of a party of 6, but the other party members were completely ineffective.
Zero was in a safe spot, so he took a few seconds to cast Mage Armor and Cat's grace, then flew up and started shooting. He has manyshot and deadly aim as well. So, first round, he won initiative, and promptly critted with his first two arrows, missed with the last.
Magga breathed on him, confusing him. I rolled the %ile, and he was to attack the nearest creature, which of course, was Black Magga! Unbelievably, he critted AGAIN with the first two arrows, and hit with the 3rd.
With 5 arrows sticking out of her, Magga fell before getting to her 2nd turn.
Now the Druid is planning on turning into a water elemental, and talking with some local wildlife in Storval Deep to try and find Magga's lair (and treasure).
I'm considering bringing in Black Magga as a recurring enemy, when possible.
I'm planning on giving her buffed stats, with stats like HP and hardness, AC, etc. for each body part, and having any damage done count as a called shot against that body part.
That way, the party can stand a bit more of a chance, and they can get the epic feeling of slicing bits off a giant monster.
I LOVE the idea of collapsing the cathedral on her, it sets a very vivid image.
If I cannot get the party to do that, I'll try to find a way for her to escape into the ocean, nursing a hefty grudge.
I also like the idea of the party knowing she got away, and knowing how much she wants revenge. So maybe they'll be a bit paranoid if they decide to go near any coastlines, let alone on a ship into the open sea.
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Most of our party took one look at the picture of Black Magga and said nope and ran away. Except for the fighter, whose background was from Turtleback Ferry. He chose to try to hold it back while the village evacuated. It worked, in the sense that he stopped Black Magga from getting any villagers, but cost him his own life.