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I have begun running a second group through CotCT. We are using the Beta Rules, with the 3.5 Ruleset as back up obviously, to cover that which the beta does not. We are also using the Spell compendium and a feat here or there to flesh out as needed. The group are composed of some very long term players, none of whom have played for less than 10-15 years is my bet. The group is made up of people who have played together at one point or another but never together as a group, this is the first time these 4 players have sat together at a game but not the first time some of them have sat down with someone else at the table. We have a party of 4 and I have had a chance to make the changes to the game that I would have if I had known.
I use a Fate Point system, a house rule that allows me to reward roleplaying when exp’s just won’t do. The FP’s also allow me to put the decision of character death in the hands of the player, as they can help prevent pc death as well as smooth out the vagaries of randomness. 1 FP can be used to stabilize a character or to cause a complete reroll, very helpful against that crit build ogre who just confirmed 3 crits.
I will be linking this forum to the group, so please if anyone who is not one of my players are going to chime in all I ask is that you use spoiler tags for any AP/Story reveals. That being said, I don’t think we should have to use spoiler tags for anything the party has run across. It will probably be rare that I use spoiler tages so please, if you are going to play this AP don’t read beyond the point you are already at.
Let me introduce to you my party. For space sake I will use the Spoiler tag on each character
Rogue.
We have a 1/2-elf Rogue, Skill focus: Perception (1/2 elf bonus feat), Improved Init. His character is very Dex oriented and used some of his starting Fatepoints to increase his dex, but also Int based and has quite a few skill’s floating around.
Ranger.
He is going the Crossbow route as well as being a member of the Sable Company with hopes to one day have a Hippogriff. Human, has Point Blank Shot and Rapid Reload, Crossbow. He also used Fate Points to buy a feat at the start of the game, he took Precise Shot. He is eyeing the Crossbow Mastery feat from the CotCT Player’s guide. He is using a Heavy Crossbow.
Rogue.
Human Rogue who will be taking Fighter Levels. He is going the 2-weapon build using the Saw-tooth sabers from the player’s guide. He also purchased a feat at level 1, his feats are 2-weapon fighting, exotic weapon Saw-tooth saber and Weapon Finesse.
Cleric of Gorum.
He is a Human (Shoanti) and has chosen the Bastard sword as his weapon of choice. He is as much Str build as he is Wis build. He chose a level of Warrior for his starting allotment of fatepoints. His Feats are Exotic Weapon Bastard Sword and Quicken Channeling (We are trying this as a Move Action instead of a Free or Swift as Quicken Turning was. We are concerned that Channeling is so much more effective and powerful than it was. I have reserved the right to move this back to a free or swift action, but also we have talked about making a second feat that would make it a free/swift action) This Character is being played by the player of the Sorcerer from my 1st CotCT campaign. He will not reveal what is to come.
The party started by each PC receiving a mysterious card. On the back was a note to meet at a certain house at a certain time. Each member arrived, with the expected outcome of the super alert, hyperactive rogue hanging outside watching and “perceiving” as much as he could. The Ranger and the fighter rogue having a conversation at the door and then heading inside, followed by the Shoanti and finally the sneaky rogue joined them. They met with one Zellara a fortuneteller of some ability, but little means. She told the party of her plight, a certain Ghaedran Lamm had wronged her and she knew that he had wronged each of the party as well. She told them where they could find Mr. Lamm and asked them to deal with him, as the guard and the law would not.
The party headed down to The Old Fishery, where they skulked around and examined the place for quite a while. Finally they decided to split, the Ranger and the fighter Rogue went one way and the Shoanti Cleric and the Sneaky rogue went another. After a few moments, the Ranger and the fighter Rogue tried the door they had chosen, only to realize that it was boarded up and no longer really a door.
The Other two, by this time, had opened the door they had chosen and entered the premises to find a half-orc fighter harassing some children. He turned just in time for the Shoanti Cleric to charge him. The Sneaky Rogue waiting for his chance to get into it with the 1/2orc. A round or so later the Ranger and fighter Rogue came back around to join in. Sadly, by this point the 1/2-orc had done a number on the Priest and the Sneaky Rogue, in an attempt to find away behind the 1/2orc had opened a door and found a nasty little surprise in a gnome pretending to be a child.
The place was loaded with children who were nothing more than press ganged into a work force and a pickpocketing scheme. The Sneaky Rogue shut the door on the Gnome and balanced (Using the Acrobatics Skill) his way across the edge of a large vat to a catwalk behind the ½ orc and bounced a shot from his heavy crossbow off the 1/2orc. By this point the Ranger and the other rogue were coming in to back up the first two. The Shoanti had healed himself back into fighting form and the Sneaky Rogue was able to get a flank for a sneak attack. One attack and heavy damage later the 1/2Orc is injured quite a bit and turns and pastes the Sneaky Rogue sending him into light negatives. The party finishes the 1/2-Orc and the Cleric uses his second C.L.W. on the Rogue putting him back in the fight. The Gnome has entered the room by this point and the party turns on him and spend a couple of rounds all missing each other, until finally someone puts him down.
The party quickly regroups and begins to fan out looking for Ghaedran again. They open another door to a small office and find a blonde man with a stick readied to attack the first person through the door with an Acid Flask. Sadly for him he rolls a 2 on the die and fails to connect. The Ranger then tries to shoot him with his heavy crossbow, not to much affect the first round. The rest of the party takes a round or two to back up the Ranger so the man aims his wand at the Ranger and gets nothing. His Use Magic Device Check requires a 7 or better to succeed, a Theme for the day is that the bad guy with the most interesting concept will not roll above a 5. He has 2 chances to use the wand and fails both times. There is no 3rd chance as the Party puts him down, then stabilizes him.
They find a dog in the next room and the Ranger quickly puts his moves on the dog. Poor thing had no idea what hit him, one second he is a faithful defender of the fishery, the next he is a faithful friend to this complete stranger who walked up and charmed the pants off of him…if he wore pants at any rate.
No Ghaedren. They ask some of the children, several poor diplomacy checks later the kids are about to bolt in fear, they now fear the party as much as Lamms men. Finally they pull together some good Diplomacy and it is revealed to them that below the building is a lair that Lamm hides in.
Down the ropes through the floor they go. Sadly the Dextrous Fighter Rogue slips and falls into the water. You guessed it…Shark!!!!!
Several rounds later after the Shoanti has also fallen into the water and the fighter Rogue finally just had had it and attacked the Shark, actually killing it, the party finds itself on a dock, in front of a door ready to confront the old man. They all take a deep breath and pop open the door.
With all the noise fighting the shark and falling into the water, Ghaedren Lamm had no difficulties hearing them coming and has readied an attack….that misses. And thus poor Ghaedren’s luck will not improve much.
The Party moves in. There is much yelling and name calling here, in case there are children or sensitive ears I won’t mention any of the vile words used by either side. Suffice it to say penance will probably have to be made…
Ghaedren shoots his faithful friend Gobblegut an Alligator of medium size that proceeds to attack the fighter Rogue and take him to 0 hp’s. The Cleric, knowing the rogue was hit but not knowing how bad moved to beside the rogue preparing to attack Ghaedren. The sneaky rogue and the Ranger moved around to the far side of the room where they could target the old man with their Heavy Crossbows.
The Fighter Rogue Attacks the Alligator, missing then fall’s to -1. The cleric then attacks the Alligator and heals the rogue (quickened channeling) Bringing the rogue to conscious. The rogue makes another attack from beneath the Alligator, scoring a hit and some hefty damage even without sneak attack. The Cleric then “Smites” the Alligator finishing the Alligator, meanwhile the other two have cornered Ghaedran and he is failing his Bluff checks trying to get sneak attack off on them and trying to talk various peple in the room into switching sides, non of them are biting. 2 rounds later the killing blow is done and Ghaedren Lamm is dead.
There is nothing much left to do but loot the place and head out. In their searches they come upon a hatbox with flies buzzing about it. Opening the box they find the head of a woman and a deck of Harrow cards. Upon further examination they recognize it as the head of the woman who sent them here to find Ghaedren. She seems to have been dead for weeks…
She materializes before them and tells them of how Ghaedren had slain her and how she had reached out through the power of her harrow deck as well as the force of her will to find the party, bring them together and to exact her revenge upon Ghaedren through them. She begged them to come together for the good of Korvosa, a City in need of heroes like them and she warned that the city would be needing them soon.
The party also decided to examine a ship tied up to the docks out back, thinking that if they could take it, it would fetch a handsome price. After boarding the Ship and finding it infested with what the fighter Rogue called Pirates (merely drain spiders a tiny spider with a nasty bite) they discovered that the ship was pretty worthless and at this point it was more of a permanent addition to the docks than anything that anyone would want to take.
At this point they were given their Experience and we broke up for the day. The party has leveled up.
Sneaky Rogue, took another level of Rogue. He was quite excited to try out a Rogue Talent. Didn’t record which one he took, but I’m sure it will make him happy.
Ranger took a level of Sorcerer to complement the heavy Roleplaying he was performing with Zellara and the Harrow deck. He accumulated enough Fate Points to purchase the Harrower Feat from the Player’s Guide. This is a very nicely themed Feat to go with a Well Themed Character.
Fighter Rogue, Took a level of Fighter so now he truly fits the description. There was much debate about the feat for this character and while something was decided on, I have a feeling we’ll be revisiting that before we start back up.
Cleric. Took another level of Cleric, a theme to be seen repeated a lot I am thinking. Though one day here soon the temptation to take Barbarian will probably just be to much.
Brute, I am interested in your Fate Point system. It may be too large to post here, and if so, could you send me a copy of it? anissah05 at gmail :)
Oh, and
Cleric. Took another level of Cleric, a theme to be seen repeated a lot I am thinking. Though one day here soon the temptation to take Barbarian will probably just be to much.
Nah, our mutual explanation/agreement behind the level of Warrior was more than sufficient to keep me from wanting a level of Barbarian. He is from a barbaric tribe, but even they have spiritual leaders from which to seek answers when the problem is not simply hack & slash, blood & guts. We had discussed this previously when the "class dipping" thread was running rampant.
Been awhile (13 years) since I've played a Cleric, hopefully I can successfully meet the party's divine(healing) needs.
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Shoanti Jim (Jengo Jimiyu Zesiro)
(Real name means: Strong one born in summer eldest of twins)
Brief Synopsis: Jim, as Tshamek (city folk) would call him, voluntarily left his village only days prior to becoming one of the important members of the tribal council and apprentice to the tribe's shaman. His slightly younger twin brother had gotten himself deeply involved with the wrong kind of people on his errands to Korvosa, which resulted in a drug addiction. Jim knew what had to be done, he had to stop treating his sibling like a child, with this Jim publically resigned his future position with the tribe and declared his brother the replacement. Surely his brother would now have to man up and take life seriously or be killed trying as the Sklar-Quah(Sun Clan) tribe would not tolerate his addiction as his family had done for far too long.
On his travels Jim learned of other Quahs. He met a man named Thousand Bones of the Lyrune-Quah (The Moon Clan). This man was not quick to share conversation, nor was he very hospitable as Jim was from the directly opposing Quah, but still a Shoanti all the same. It wasn't until Jim was praying that Gorum's blessings be with his younger brother(and why) that Thousand Bones had suddenly found enough interest to speak to him. Thousand Bones shared a similar story, except in his case, the child had yet to return and was rumored to be working for a criminal known as Gaedren Lamm in Korvosa. Jim recognized this name, he was the one his brother had been getting drugs from in the past. Jim told Thousand Bones that he and his younger brother had been to Korvosa numerous times, that he had more than enough reason to crush Gaedren Lamm on own, but would help find the child he seeks.
Class: Cleric
Alignment: CG
Deity: Gorum(CN)
Stats: {*20 pt. build}
STR: 16 (+2 Human)
DEX: 12
CON: 12
INT: 7
WIS: 16
CHA: 14
Feats: Exoctic Weap. Bastard Sword, Quicken Channeling
Weapons: Bastard Sword, Dagger, 2 Spiked Gauntlets
Armor: Chain Shirt, Heavy Wooden Shield
Domains: Strength & Destruction
On his travels Jim learned of other Quahs. He met a man named . This man was not quick to share conversation, nor was he very hospitable as Jim was from the , but still a Shoanti all the same.
ERROR: Thousand Bones is a member of the Skoan-Quah (The Skull Clan) and it is not an opposing clan. I apologize to any small children I may have flooded with improper information and Pathfinder scholars I have made cringe in horror as I unknowingly butchered a fact.
CORRECTION: ...the premise is the same: two wildly different guys are thrown together, their relationship tested by tradition until they discover an unlikely affinity, forging a bond of friendship...
Yea, yeaaaaa so it's the definition of a "Buddy Movie"... get over it. :)
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Due to a scheduling problem with the party we were unable to pick this game back up until this past Sunday. So here is the report from game 2’s second Session. It’s spoiler time and thus time for my usual speech. If you are going to DM or have played this AP then by all means open the spoiler tag. If not, find yourself a DM or some players and play this AP, the story is fantastic and the detail’s that are provided make this one of the best modules that I have read. So go find a game and get to it…
The party picked up where they left off. Having finished off Ghaedren they began to prepare to leave, taking Ghaedren, the Blond man with the wand (They never asked his name and haven’t had a chance to talk to him yet), and Zellara’s head. As they exit the building they were provided with several bit’s of information resulting from the Perception rolls from the previous day of gaming. It seems the city is in full Anarchy. They have heard, smelled, or spotted numerous instances of Fire, Mob Rioting, Dissarray and general trouble.
They quickly head north to try and find a guard post to dispose of Ghaedren and his friend. The way is blocked! They then run into a mob who is about to pummel a nobleman down. They save the nobleman, but not until after the mob almost slaughters him. The Cleric is able to include him in his Channeling of energy and the noble is saved. The Rogue and the Sable Company man haul Ghaedran’s body off to a burning building and shove it in, having come to the conclusion that the city is in no shape to deal with the crimes of a petty thief and crime lord.
They turn and head south where they run into another mob, but they come up behind them so are not noticed. But then almost out of nowhere comes a squad of Hellknights who then lower lances and charge the mob. The party all seemed taken aback for a moment. The Gorum Cleric rushed out and got as centrally located as he could and discharged another Channeling, saving dozens of people, then had to duck behind a building as the HellKnights had turned and come back for another charge.
They finally found a Korvosan guard post, though, it was empty and abandoned. They left the unconscious Ghaedren assistant in the jail cell and a note with who he was and what he had done. They also left the Noble man after telling him what the man was accused of. Off they went. The Ranger, being of the Sable company, was in a yank to get back and report in, but they were very far from any post, so he led the party to Citadel Volshynek, the home of the Korvosan Guard. There he was greeted by several other Sable Company refugees trying to organize up. There were several rider’s without mounts as well as numerous other ground folk. The Fighter/Rogue as well as the Sable Co. Ranger began trying to organize the Sable Company folks, while the Cleric and the Rogue went and had a drink in the inn.
A long story short involving much RP and quite a bit of fun, the Ranger convinced his superiors that they should send some men by boat around the river and up to the Sable Company Headquarters. He led up said detachment. He and his party members along with a dozen Sable Co. Soldiers who knew how to sail procured a small ship and sailed it. They used the cruise to see the devastation that was occurring to Korvosa from her own citizens. The party made its way safely to the Sable Co. HQ. There they rested, gathered a little info on what was going on out in the city.
After the worst of it all died down they grabbed some sleep and then began to divvy up the treasure from Ghaedren’s place.
Unfortunately this is where the roughest part of the day occurred. It seems that the party is not sure how to divvy loot. They have 2 different systems. The Fighter/Rogue player wishes to do the value everything and buy the loot you want back from the pile then sell the rest. The others are more of the opinion of give the stuff that people want/need to those people and sell the rest. The later is how I personally like to do the treasure from a player side, the former is a system that I understand the equity of but I worry about the details of.
Anyone out there with opinions on loot splitting? As the DM I don’t really care what the PC’s do, as long as the group agrees to it and they don’t take up to much time divvying it up. Here the fight lasted over an hour and seriously began to crimp into the rest of the game time. I have DM’d for almost 30 years (yea I’m old get over it) I have never seen a party have such a difficulty with a loot division as this one has. I have seen a few disagreements, I have even seen a party or two with questionable morals who wound up drawing on each other and I don’t mean with pens or tatoo’s. This time it was beyond my experience and left me speechless. My philosophy is that the treasure is up to the PC’s I am just the bearer of said treasure. What they decide to do with it is up to them. But in this situation I am thinking I may have to step in and do something because of the amount of time that the argument is wasting.
Back to the game, which was a lot easier to say here than during the actual game…
So the Ranger is trying to explain what he did to some mid ranking folks when Endrin, the Commandant of the Sable company comes flying through (figuratively). He stops in trying to talk to these officers but stops and has our PC explain to him what was going on. The Commandant then turns and puts the smack down on these other officers and drags the PC with him. He gives him orders that need to be taken to the Castle as well as to the Guard’s Citadel. The rest of the party has been buying and selling (See above note about the headaches involved with that) They come back and mention to the Ranger that the Queen’s Brooch that they found in the pile of loot is virtually unsellable in the city. No one will buy it as it is stolen. So they decide to hit the castle and turn it in for the reward. The Ranger says, “Good, I am heading that way anyway come on let’s go” they go to the castle, the Ranger drops off his papers and they mention to the guard that they have the queen’s brooch.
The party is taken inside the castle, deeper and deeper around and up, over and down until they are taken to a room with Sabina Merrin, the Queen’s Handmaiden and Personal body guard. She speaks to them for a few minutes, getting their names and eyeing the brooch. The Rogue is about to hand it over to her when she turns and starts to leave. She pauses to look back at them and ask’s if they are coming or not. She leads them into the throne room where a woman veiled in black sits. The party didn’t even need to roll a knowledge check. They as a group dropped to their knees. The queen thanked them for their courage and generosity in returning her brooch. She asked them if they would serve Korvosa and her queen, which they agreed to do. She had Sabina present a beautiful chest (containing gold bars) and begged the party to travel to the Citadel and work for Cressida Kroft the Field marshal of the Guard. They all agreed and quickly found themselves heading off to join the guard, not as guardsmen but as agent’s of the Field Marshal. Cressida was very friendly and quickly had them agree to do her bidding out in the city. She did mention to the Ranger that he had been transferred to her command, thus removing the pesky need to deal with running back and forth all the time.
Cressida had a bit of trouble that the party was the best solution for. She sent them after some renegade guards. A sergeant and several of his guards had taken over a Butcher shop in Northpoint. The party quickly gathered some guard gear to pass themselves off as renegade guards also. They then proceeded to Northpoint, taking care to avoid the continuing unrest that was still popping up sporadically. They stopped in to the Temple of Shelyn and offered up a holy Symbol of exquisite crafting they had found in Ghaedren’s den. They were rewarded by the temple with a couple of Potions. Then they moved on to deal with the Renegades.
All the World’s Meat was quite a set up. The party entered, and began trying to bluff a couple of the guardsmen they found. They explained that they were quitting the guard and that they had heard these guy’s had a good gig and were hoping they could join them. Several fairly good bluff and diplomacy checks later, they were told they would have to go upstairs and talk to Verik Vancaskerkin. This was the guy they were really looking for. He was the Sergeant and they figured the leader here. They went upstairs and tried to talk to him. He wouldn’t open his door. So the Rogue opened it for him, and took an arrow from a readied attack for his trouble.
The party quickly moved in and the rogues flanked and subdued him mercilessly. It was a round and a half fight. But then the 4 guys downstairs realized something was wrong and charged up the stairs. The Ranger had moved a table in front of the doorway as the rest of the party was dealing with Verik in expectation of a fight from below. He held his own for a round or two, which was plenty of time for the rest of the party to deal with Verik and then come out to help him with the other 4. These guys lasted quite a while. It was easily the toughest fight the party had had to this point. The Cleric was forced to use several bursts of his channeling, and he got to use his Smite ability which made him happy. The Fighter/Rogue broke his Saw-tooth saber after a poor roll and a critical fumble draw. There were several uses of the Critical Fumble deck by the bad guys and 2 uses of the Critical Hit deck by the party. Ultimately the party prevailed, the Fighter/Rogue went down well into the fight, but the Cleric’s Channeling had pulled him from the brink of danger.
After the Fight, the Rogue and Fighter/Rogue searched the room Verik was in, finding a note from someone named Vimanda, as well as an exquisite silver dagger. The Ranger checked out the 1st floor and discovered that not everything was as it seemed down there. He found human remains in the discard pile. This caused him to search a bit more closely. Turns out there are human parts in the meat locker. The party as a whole is not pleased with these guys…
That was pretty much where we left off. Next time they will have to finish their exploration of the Shop and then…well we shall see won’t we.
Unfortunately this is where the roughest part of the day occurred. It seems that the party is not sure how to divvy loot. They have 2 different systems. The Fighter/Rogue player wishes to do the value everything and buy the loot you want back from the pile then sell the rest. The others are more of the opinion of give the stuff that people want/need to those people and sell the rest. The later is how I personally like to do the treasure from a player side, the former is a system that I understand the equity of but I worry about the details of.
Anyone out there with opinions on loot splitting? As the DM I don’t really care what the PC’s do, as long as the group agrees to it and they don’t take up to much time divvying it up. Here the fight lasted over an hour and seriously began to crimp into the rest of the game time. I have DM’d for almost 30 years (yea I’m old get over it) I have never seen a party have such a difficulty with a loot division as this one has. I have seen a few disagreements, I have even seen a party or two with questionable morals who wound up drawing on each other and I don’t mean with pens or tatoo’s. This time it was beyond my experience and left me speechless. My philosophy is that the treasure is up to the PC’s I am just the bearer of said treasure. What they decide to do with it is up to them. But in this situation I am thinking I may have to step in and do something because of the amount of time that the argument is wasting.
Wow ... I luckily haven't had to deal with this situation in a very long time (yeah, I've been gaming and DMing just since 78 as well, Brute <G>), but I have seen it. We've had parties divvy things evenly by cost down to the last copper piece, and we've had give folks things that will help them help the party (and specific wants) and sell the rest off -- that's what we currently do, while trying to make sure that gear does get spread around the group.
I did have to step in once in a similar situation, where one player wanted to divvy a different method than the rest ... and the worst part was, he was the one best suited to handle the treasure and selling, so he was going to refuse to do it unless the rest of the party caved to him ;p I spoke to him on the side, reminded him this was a group game, and he was the only one that wanted his particular divvying method, so for me, majority rule was the way to go. If he didn't like it that much, he could drop out, but I didn't want to see him holding back on the party because he wasn't getting his way. He backed down, and eventually did drop out of the group since we didn't "play right" ::roll eyes::
I'd say talk to the Fighter/Rogue, since it seems a clear 3 to 1 majority on how to divvy the treasure up, and ask him to go with the majority in the interest of spending more time playing than worrying about the coppers :)
Good luck!
I did have to step in once in a similar situation, where one player wanted to divvy a different method than the rest ...
<snip> I spoke to him on the side, reminded him this was a group game, and he was the only one that wanted his particular divvying method, so for me, majority rule was the way to go. If he didn't like it that much, he could drop out, but I didn't want to see him holding back on the party because he wasn't getting his way. He backed down, and eventually did drop out of the group since we didn't "play right" ::roll eyes::
I honestly hope it does not come down to our Fighter/Rogue having "hurt feelings" over the method in which we divvy the treasure, it's a relatively minor aspect of the game. I was the only one that understood what he was even talking about from the get go, however I could not explain it well enough to the other players to prevent the hour+ debate. I'm sure there was a tidbit of "unwillingness" to understand involved as well.
I personally made out better THIS way, THIS time because I wanted an armor upgrade, which I wouldn't have gotten the 'normal' way. (152gp normal method, 517gp Living Greyhawk-ish method) Though this method will eventually hurt the party as I will NOT feel the need to soak my share of the loot for Wands of Cure "X" Wounds when they appear. I play a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants Cleric as it is, but tack on Gorum, Shoanti and Exo.Weap.Prof. Bastard Sword... yea, angry.
At one point, our Sable Company Ranger/Sorcerer appeared exetremely fed-up and disinterested in treasure entirely and I turned to Brute and jokingly said... "I'll take my 450gp/ 450exp, screw this." which is how Living Greyhawk would've actually handled the situation.
I needed nothing from the treasure list, but I ended up upgrading my armor from a Chainshirt to Bandedmail(+2AC) and my Bastard sword to a M.W.Bastard sword(+1ATK). Movement dropped to 20', next stop Fullplate and/or Belt of STR... possibly Boots of Striding & Springing depending on how the party handles treasure in the future and how frustrated I get with 20' movement.
Spoiler:...searched the room Verik was in, finding a note from someone named Vimanda, as well as an exquisite silver dagger. The Ranger checked out the 1st floor and discovered that not everything was as it seemed down there. He found human remains in the discard pile.
This tidbit of information made a bit more sense my second time around, with a brief explanation from Brute a few distant future events tied in nicely.
Brute, I am interested in your Fate Point system.
Have you tried using the Fate Point System yet? Just curious. I like it quite a bit and it's more versitile than the system my DM used back in the military playing 2E. ("Hero Points"; if you've ever played Marvel Superheroes... it was similar to how KARMA works, but not in the triple digits. Points could be used exclusively to alter die rolls(ATK & Skills) for players and intelligent enemies alike.)
Brute, I am interested in your Fate Point system.Have you tried using the Fate Point System yet? Just curious. I like it quite a bit and it's more versitile than the system my DM used back in the military playing 2E. ("Hero Points"; if you've ever played Marvel Superheroes... it was similar to how KARMA works, but not in the triple digits. Points could be used exclusively to alter die rolls(ATK & Skills) for players and intelligent enemies alike.)
Not yet :) Currently we are wrapping up the first chapter of Second Darkness, then it'll be my turn back in the GMs chair. I didn't want to throw the new rules at my current GM as this is her first time GMing in an age, and while she is doing a fantastic job, too many new rules could confuse her a bit.
I am going to propose it to my group at the end of our next play session, to see if they like it and want to give it a try for Seven Days to the Grave <eg>
Not yet :) Currently we are wrapping up the first chapter of Second Darkness, then it'll be my turn back in the GMs chair. I didn't want to throw the new rules at my current GM as this is her first time GMing in an age, and while she is doing a fantastic job, too many new rules could confuse her a bit.I am going to propose it to my group at the end of our next play session, to see if they like it and want to give it a try for Seven Days to the Grave <eg>
Nah, I meant in the CotCT campaign you were running. I didn't know how often your group played. While the Fate Points are useful throughout a campaign, I think the most fun comes from using them at creation. That is when/where you can seriously alter your character theme, mainly via Race or NPC level, but I've gone with Masterwork items a few times also. And as Brute has said a few times in our 2 threads, they help him fix the oops' that occur from time to time as well, by empowering the players to be able to alter critical moments. (Orc+Earthbreaker+Confuse+Sorcerer= SPLAT! Fate Point) If you get to implement them I hope you enjoy them as much as we do! :)
We don't get to play nearly as often as any of us would like ::pout:: Two and a half hour travel time for half the players and wonky work schedules for the husbands means we can only manage one weekend a month ... but we tend to play around 10-12 hours out of that weekend on the average. Then the fact that we're rotating all three of the first APs and the GM chair, we keep busy! :)
Hi! This is sneaky rogue. I took the Talent that gave me Weapon Finesse at 2nd level.
Hi! This is sneaky rogue. I took the Talent that gave me Weapon Finesse at 2nd level.Oh...well there goes the whole adventure path *sigh* ;)
65% of it at least. (The joke that got us through the treasure dilemma, probaly had to be there to understand without flooding the thread with silly player antics.)
I'm gonna throw this out there before Brutesquad07 gets around to posting this past Sunday's events.
I have to say it's a shame when the Shoanti in an adventuring party is the "NICE" guy, but of course I exaggerate slightly. Sapping, hobbled guys that are tied to a wagon, so they won't "RUN" is pretty damn mean... in a funny sort of way!(see below)
For those interested and reading this, the general gist of the characters so far as "I" see them are as follows...
Jim the Shoanti Cleric(me); Think Michael Clarke Duncan (Ref: "The Whole Nine Yards" & "The Green Mile"). Not the sharpest tool in the shed, but a relatively intimidating presence through size & appearance. Being Shoanti has its benefits even if it does hurt my diplomacy/gather info checks some right now. 'Gentle Giant/Shoanti Ambassador' is the intent, plus I'm doing my best to not change events too drastically for the other guys as this is my 2nd time through the mod, so I let them decide when it's a combat or a diplomacy situation.
Elam the Varisian Ranger/Sorcerer; I haven't quite pegged a character-type for him yet, he's militant, but not angry "Full Metal Jacket" militant. He has a sense of purpose(duty) and is being voiced with a French-Gypsy-like accent, I think. (no insult intended) By far the most "serious" character in the party. He has for the most part, taken up the mantle as party leader. We are still waiting for his paycheck to come in from 'profession: soldier' so we can claim OUR 65% of that too! lol!
Atrius the (Cheliax?) Rogue; He's a very angry "vigilante". The reference to Rorschach from "The Watchmen" was made previously during the 1st session. He has a "fondness" for sapping & shanking people, and no it's not just cuz he's a rogue either... it's FUN for him. He attempts to deny it. :P Definitely 'Shoot first, ask questions later' kinda guy.
Muli (Insert rest of name HERE) the Quadiran Fighter/Rogue; When I see this character being played I come to a not-so-subtle blending of Sinbad the Sailor(Ray Harryhausen) and Martin Lawrence, LOL! As much as he tries to be serious, he continues to come off kinda silly in that Martin Lawrence 'trying-to-hard' sorta way.
We may be adding a 5th player before the next session, that should be entertaining as well knowing the 4 'characters' we have already.
That should flesh out events a bit more, enjoy! :)
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As our shoanti cleric has pointed out, we did in fact play this past Sunday and here is the report.
Instead of spoillering everything I am going to just go ahead and give you fair warning that everything from this point on is a spoiler for the AP.
We picked up where we had left off the previous session, inside All the World’s Meat, the butcher shop that had been taken over by the deserter guards. The grim discovery of human remains within the packing house was rehashed and the party was none to pleased with the guards. Elam, our ranger/sorcerer found a pen with a pair of Boars within. Using his ranger ability he was able to calm one of the boar’s, but the other crashed out of the pen and attempted to assault him. The party put the smack down on the boar quite quickly. With a few more attempts at handle animal the Ranger had the other boar calmed down. Within the Pen they found a vast plethora of treasure. This will lead me into a resolution from our previous game.
The Loot splitting dilemma was solved with a single quick painless word. No. Muli’s player began to go into the loot splitting thing again and Elam’s player said no. This along with a united front from everyone else and the issue was over. There were a few minor points brought up here and there but suffice it to say the issue is dead and buried. Back to the tried and true method of need before greed and greed gets split evenly.
The party quickly attached the 4 guards, Verik and the three thugs who were not slain outright in the fight, to a wagon as the locomotion. Atrius, our trusty rogue who likes his sap a lot (I will be sending out the wedding announcements for the Sap and Atrius soon) rode upon the wagon and made a point of having his sap next to him and his hand xbow loaded and ready.
The Loot, the boar’s carcass, and the captured were loaded or attatched to the wagon and the party set off for the Citadel, a long slow walk to be sure. Halfway there the ground erupted as one of the sewer Otyugh’s tore its way to the surface.
Elam, poor fellow, failed his will check and was overcome by Fear (no Otyugh’s do not have a fear aura, Elam has a character trait of Otyugh fear). As he was relieving himself in his pants, Shoanti Jim rushed forward but was to far away to get more than half the distance to the beast. Muli charged the beast, scoring a nasty sneak attack upon the thing. His impressive dancing (ie dodge) kept him from being abused by the Otyugh long enough for Jim to join in the fight and for Elam to overcome his fear and begin plugging it with Crossbow bolts. Meanwhile Atrius was sapping the guards attatched to the wagon. There was a logic to it, he didn’t want them running away. But after the first one, at which point the group and I thought he would be joining in on the Otyugh, he moved to the next and gleefully smacked that one down also. It would have continued, but for the Otyugh running out of Hit Points and thus the fight was over. The party turned around and found the rogue beating the bejesus out of the poor guards.
The party decided to stop off at the house, formerly Zellara’s house. Just before they got there they stopped at a tavern, Shoanti Jim grabbed the carcass of the Boar and went inside to make a deal. Before his eyes got accustomed to the dark of the place he knew that something was wrong. There were a lot of angry people inside. He found a guard sergeant being assailed by a small mob of folks. Atrius and Muli, hearing the commotion, jumped in to back up their Shoanti friend. The guard, it turned out, seemed to have been drinking for a very long time, days at the least. And the crowd seemed to no longer like the fact that he was a guardsman. Jim pushed through the crowd and slapped the boar on the bar saying, “If I give this to you may my friends and these fine folks here eat for free and then you can have the rest?” meanwhile Atrius and Muli escorted the sergeant out the door and onto the wagon. The Tavern Keeper was so happy to not have his place demolished with a brawl that he didn’t think twice and accepted Jim’s offer.
The party quickly ran over to the house where they dropped off some loot and they fed the Dog (Bloo from Ghadren’s Hideout)
Then it was off to the Citadel. The guards were turned over to Cressida Kroft. She thanked the party with the promised one thousand gold and suggested they get some rest as she didn’t have anything for them to do at that time. The party returned to the tavern, ate dinner on Jim and the free boar. The next day the Sergeant, Grau Saldodo, they had saved in the tavern showed up to thank them. They then spent a day or so selling loot and buying up a few more things. We have our first magic armor in the party and it is on Atrius. He snagged a +1 Studded Leather with his portion. Muli picked up his Master Work Saw-tooth sabers that he had put an order in our previous session. While they were over in that section of town Elam checked in at the Sable Company headquarters. He found out that Marcus Endrin, the Sable Company Commandant was looking for him.
The Commandant had a request for Elam. He wanted him to keep his ear’s open for any information about the Seneschal. The man had gone missing the day the King died. Several day’s later and there were no leads and Endrin was worried.
The party then spent some time gathering information here and there. They went to the Castle to try and find out what they could. A note about Gather Information: I write up numerous rumors, some truthful, some fanciful, some just absurd. Rank the rumor by 5’s and then when a PC gather’s info I give you one of each level that you have earned. So if you roll up a 22 Diplomacy check you get a 5, a 10, a 15 and a 20 but not a 25. obviously there are ways to gain bonuses and penalties. For instance, Jim suffers a -2 for being a shoanti while inside Korvosa. When the party started tossing some gold around I bumped everyone up 1 category. So a 20-24 got a 25. The party emptied my Gather Info supply. I was worried that for the first time ever I was going to have to tell someone that they had just run out of rumors. I see a lot of work to replenish those in my future.
There were actually a few rumors about the Seneschal, some of which had the party torn about what to do for a while. They eventually decided to see what Cressida Kroft knew. She told them point blank that she knew he was missing and was keeping her ear’s and those of her people open for information. She also had a guest in the room. Vencarlo Orsini, master of the Rapier and owner of the Orsini Academy a fencing academy. Cressida explained how he was a good friend and very trustworthy to her. She also mentioned that Orsini had it on good authority that the Chelaxian Ambassador was going to be causing a lot of trouble for Korvosa. Kroft had a plan though. She asked the party to go to Eel’s End and meet with Devargo Barvasi a vice lord in Old Korvosa. She knew that the Ambassador regularly visited his place and if anyone knew something that would stop the Ambassador it would be Barvasi. The group agreed and was given another thousand gold to help facilitate the deal. The party, along with Orsini who agreed to accompany them up to Eel’s End, headed out. Muli spoke with Orsini quite a bit. Orsini offered to teach Muli a thing or two and gave the fighter/rogue the address of the academy and suggested he stop by whenever he had some time. Muli was quite pleased by this.
Orsini bid them fair well at the dock’s out to 5 moored ships. Here was Eel’s End. Any manner of Vice could be had here. The party entered cautiously, and began to gather information once more, learning more about the city and it’s goings on. After a while they finally just turned to a guard and asked to see Barvasi. After a bit of wrangling with the thug they were pointed to a cabin in the back of the main ship. They knocked on the door and were greeted by another guard. He was even less helpful, until finally Atrius called out that they had a deal for the boss but if he didn’t want to let them in then he could explain to the boss why money was leaving. That got some attention.
Barvasi had a handful of guests already, some street thugs. He seemed to be quite arrogant and self important. There was also a cage with a pseudodragon inside. Atrius negotiated for a while, but things were coming to an impass. Ie the Diplomacy checks were good, but not quite good enough to get the evidence of the Ambassador’s improprieties. Barvasi suggested a game of Knivesies. A game of chance and skill where two opponents are tied together and a knife is stuck in the table between them along with some coin and the object was supposed to be to grab the most coin or to knock your opponent off the table. Of course the other option is to just grab the knife and stab them repeatedly until they stop taking coins (ie die). The rules on this game didn’t translate well to myself or the players sadly. The idea was awesome. But Muli, the self elected player of the game for the party, grabbed the knife in the first round then just looked it all over and bullrushed his opponent off the table in the second. It wasn’t hard. We even played a second time and he did it exactly the same the second time. The wagering system needed work also. Though I thought about it later and I did goof that up a bit. I’ll be rectifying that next time we play.
In all of the knivesies commotion Atrius examined the cage the Pseudodragon was in and found it to be locked and heard a plea for help from the creature. When Barvasi left to get the evidence for the party he sleight of handed an Open locks check. Meanwhile Elam used Open/Close to pop a porthole open. The party left it at that.
Barvassi agreed to take 300 gold from the party and gave them 2 letters, of which the party has opened but I have not thoroughly described yet. The party took their leave and left Eel’s End. Not far from there Majenko, a psuedodragon flew in to thank them profusely. That was where we left off for the evening.
There will be a slight delay before we play the next session, it looks like it may be 4th of July before we can get back together.
Whoops, I should've been healing for 2d6 with Channel Energy. Something always gets missed in the pre-leveled characters sheets as hard as I might try. :p
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Update for the Campaign. So we played this past Friday (after a couple of weeks of down time for the DM and my family) It was a tad rushed as it was an unusual day for us to play so we started early and ended even earlier as I had to get to work. Enough about that though On to the important stuff…the game!
I am going to use spoilers to keep the length of the post a bit shorter.
We have added a new player; he has placed Tormod a Gnome with a high rate of speech, and a sorcererous background upon the table. I see the Point Blank Shot and Precise Shot feats in the near future after several rounds of missing with his elemental shot do to Melee and Cover Issues.
Recap
Claiming the Reward and gaining a new mission.
Heading in to Arrest someone.
The Chase was on!
The interrogation
On the way to deliver the goods.
Turning over the Prisoner and finding out more about a lost boy.
The Dungeon Crawl.
A note: Science has proven that Light spoiled stealth is the number 3 killer of parties by the way. The number one killer of Parties is a lack of Hit Points.
Back to the dungeon. The little guy turns and shoots the rogue before he can get quite close enough to attack. That ticks Atrius off. The rest of the party moves to support him, a couple of Stirges attack, one attatches to Tormod the other misses. Before the round is over the two stirges are dead and the blue guy is starting to be surrounded. He retreats to another room where an Otyugh rests. Elam charges into the room to get a good shooting lane on the blue guy, then spots the Otyugh and I was amazed, he made his save vs fear and shot the Otyugh! That didn’t go quite as well as he planned. The Otyugh is now after him. The blue guy has opened a door, but not gone in yet since he ran out of movement. Muli charges through, and Grapples the poor little guy. Only to realize there is another blue guy inside the door the first one opened. “Really?” he asked. I said yep. He shrugged and said “Oh well I’ll just have to kill both of them then.” The little guy Escape Artists his way loose and the fight boils down for a few rounds. Eventually the Otyugh falls and quickly the first blue guy does to. Not a long fight after that. A few rounds of searching later they have found something disturbing. There are Hips and legs with Shoanti tattoos on them that are rather fresh. They decide that this must be part of Ghaeken. The party throw the legs in a bag, grab some loot they find here and there and proceed on into the place.
They find a long narrow room or hall lined with Skulls from floor to ceiling. They eye the room a bit, a coulple switching to Blunt weapons after the Skeleton thing. They enter the room, sadly Atrius had failed to spot the Acid Splash trap and everyone but Elam is attacked twice by acid Splash. Then three of the skulls separate from the wall and the party is faced with 3 Necrophidius constructs. One of the things opens with a Dazzling attack, catching Elam and Jim for several rounds of Daze. One hits Jim, Paralyzing him after he fails the save. Atrius rushes over to defend Jim, Muli begins whittling on one and Tormod begins the dance of “Not in the face” as he tries to damage his, keep it off of Elam and not get close to it when he casts all at the same time. If they could have spoken it would have yelled, “Dance little guy! Dance!” This fight was a long drawn out nickel and diming affair. Atrius and Muli were unable to get Sneak attacks off very often because of the tactics involved. Tormod could do some damage, but couldn’t pound enough fast enough. Eventually Muli finished his about the time the other to PC’s recovered from the Daze and the group piled on. This was when I realized I was going to be late for work…Mad dash for the exit on my part.
So that’s where we left off and where we’ll pick up next time in a couple of weeks.
Another funny point of note was when Muli couldn't understand why there would be a Church for Asthema. (aka Pharasma) Jim would explain it to him, but lacks the INT to effectively do so, he blames it on his Shoanti upbrining and the extensive knowledge of Totem Spirits instead of organized religion.
"I'm not saying you're gonna get stabbed if you don't give me your wand, but you might get stabbed if you don't." Stated in a Zone of Truth... Absolutely PRICELESS.
I'm pretty sure we have WAY more than THREE Stooges at this point.
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"Until and unless one of these 'civilized' barbarians does something which offends my Qadiran sensibilities, I try always to remember that I am the foreigner here. In the end, you can't take life too seriously as you are not going to come out of it alive anyway."
Muli Ahmed Akmud al Risuli the Magnificient
Lord of Qadira and sherif to the Qadiran Dervish
In fairness, I'd rather go with an as needed treasure split myself but 30+ years of playing this game shows me that someone always ends up feeling cheated and Ithat feeling!]
I personally don't care how we divide treasure as long as it doesn't take a grand jury to do so.
I've never seen The Wind and the Lion, but I could see a Sean Connery/Jack Sparrow combination. He was something along those lines in the original Highlander movie... Expert swordsman drunkard extrordinaire.
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[ooc]Geez Andy, you've painted me in such a bad light I don't even want to play with me anymore! ;)
Now now now, that was not the intent. I apologize if any feelings were hurt. To be honest, other than the possibility that the party may come unglued over the whole thing, I found it rather amusing. 65% of the argument was ammusing ;)
I brought the subject up here, because it was such an unexpected thing to me and I was curious if any of my friends here on the boards might have some insight, which as you saw, they did.
Now...don't you have a shop to run or something slacker? ;)
Get back to work *cracks whip*
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Yesterday, well the day before yesterday now that I look at the time, we picked up the game again after a very long hiatus. We must have taken 6 or 7 vacations over the month and a half between games.
We quickly converted the characters to the new Core Rules. It wasn’t that difficult, though it did take a little time. I let folks adjust to the new rules, making whatever changes we needed to so that the characters would stay true to character. For instance during beta I allowed all rogues to “spot” traps 10’ away with a perception check. The core rules made that a rogue talent so Atrius, our rogue, switched his talent to trapspotter and then swapped out his Point Blank Shot feat for Weapon finesse (He had taken finesse rogue which gave him weap finesse as a bonus feat before). Things like that.
Once the characters were up to speed we picked up in the dead warrens at the mid point. The party was a little dinged up and depleted but continued on. They opened the next door and immediately we were in a fight as they had found another of the short blue guys they had fought before. Muli, the Fighter charged, jumping upon a table and sliding down the length of it to attack the guy. I knew the day was going to be interesting as he opened the fight with a crit. The next attack was a critical fumble. We use the Critical decks. It got all kinds of crazy with deck drawings left and right for the whole day. Oddly the baddies never wound up drawing a card. I could never confirm a fumble and I never threatened the whole day.
After the opening, the fight was pretty much over. The guy had 6 hp’s and stood up. That should have been the end of him. But Muli only hit him for 4 with his AOO. I then proceeded to miss on my attack. That was it for that fight. He lasted one more action. The party found the room half smashed up and they were pretty sure they didn’t do it.
A tunnel and a door were the only two ways to go. True to good old fashion D&D they started to do both. Atrius headed for the tunnel to scout, while the rest of the party headed to the door to prepare to open it. After some discussion they then started to three stooges it up a bit as Muli headed for the tunnel to scout and Atrius started to check the door. Finally they got on the same page and decided on the door. Something was rummaging around inside and the door was barred from the side they were on. They opened it, because that’s what you do you know when there is a door barred from your side and something is obviously crashing around on the other side.
Turns out there was some abhorrant creation within. A sort of stitched pieces of people and creatures wandering around under it’s own power thing. It charged. The party had prepared a nice ambush and it fell into it quite quickly. Elam the Ranger opened with a shot from his crossbow which drew it to charge straight at him, putting it directly between Atrius the Rogue and Muli the Fighter/Rogue. Tormod the sorcerer and Jim the Cleric also surrounding it. It had a stench though. Poor Tormod and Atrius lost their lunch. And breakfast. And a few snacks. Oh and the water they drank. And umm…well you get the idea. Jim ran around and filled in for Atrius to provide a flank for Muli. After that the fight was pretty well in hand.
Turned out that the creature was holding a piece of the Shoanti brave that they were looking for.
So from there they moved down the tunnel and doubled back a bit to find a room with 3 pits off of it. Atrius had snuck ahead of the party and found a large man, perhaps a bit to large, with his back to him. Atrius shrugged and snuck up and hit him really hard in the back of the head with his Sap. “He didn’t go down? Are you sure? I mean I sapped him pretty good!” Nope. Now Atrius had acted on the surprise round and the guy didn’t get to act again until after Atrius in regular initiative. “I sap him again!” Down went the Ogrekin Cabbagehead. They rescued some prisoners here. These folks told them some sob stories about how they were captured (if they remembered how they were captured) except for one surly dwarf who swore that he could have tunneled his way out if the party hadn’t saved them.
After some debate they placed the manacles on Cabbagehead and put him in the closet that the stitched creature had come from and Muli and Majenko the pseudo dragon led the prisoners out of the dungeon before the party continued on. They found another of the stitched creations that was unfinished in the next room. It wasn’t animated yet though, so they removed the head (which it turns out belonged to Ghaeken the Shoanti they were looking for) Continuing on, hoping to find Rolth and capture him, they found a bed room and then another, and there was a blue fellow playing with another piece of the Shoanti. They started combat, but turns out he was a bit tougher than the others. He had some Wizard going on and quite a bit of it.
He started with extended Shield and got tougher from there. The fight lasted a long time. He couldn’t manage to cast on the defensive and they couldn’t manage to hit him. He got a couple of lucky strikes in on AOO’s. They managed to get the Hvy Crossbow Ranger up on top of him in a place where he could shoot. He was the only one providing real damage for the first half of the fight. Early on he used his wand of Ghoul Touch and dropped Jim the Shoanti Cleric of Gorum. The Stench was overpowering. Later he would use the same wand on Elam the Ranger trying to take out the crossbow. That didn’t work as well. He did manage to put Muli down for several rounds with the wand however.
It was a long fight because mostly no one could do anything. He failed to cast any spell that would do real damage (mostly poor rolling but somewhat also the new concentration checks which he was not optimized for) He got 2 Ghoul touches off and he did manage to get a blindness on the Ranger finally. However, the Ranger has a level of sorcerer and he just would cast true strike, shoot once, true strike and shoot. The damage went from every round to every other at least.
They asked him if he was Rolth and he said, “NO! I am VREEEEEG! Welcome to Vreeg’s house of Pain!”
“Where’s Rolth”
“He is out, you will have to deal with me, Vreeg!!!”
“In the house of pain?”
“Yes now suffer!!!”
“Aww, failed your spell again? Sorry about that”
“You will be!”
Finally they beat him down after he started to threaten to do real damage to the party. Some looting later they have found a library with some scrolls as well as a collection of books about necromancy, constructs and diseases. With all the parts of the body they came for they left the dungeon.
Then came the EXP. Level 4 has been achieved. Yay. A few minutes here and there and we were off again.
Stopping at Citadel Volshyenek they found the place in a tizzy. Cressida was looking for them and was not in a mood to be toyed with. Seems the queen had ordered the execution of Trinia Sabor, the woman accused of killing the King. The party jumped all over this news as they were pretty sure she was innocent. Cressida wanted them to go to the execution. She had some tailors fancy them up, except for the Gnome…I’m not saying they wouldn’t dress him up nicely, I’m just saying that he showed up in some unfortunate robes. ;)
The party mingled, checking out the lay of the land. Numerous gaurds were stationed about. They saw the Queen’s new gaurds for the first time. They were surrounding the queen and Sabina. Mulli saw his opportunity and took it. He began to “Entertain” Sabina trying to catch her attention and hopefully her favor. Atrius examined the executioners stand. The axe and block were up there unattended, but there were some guards standing nearby watching. He was about to make a move up when the gnome said he’d take care of it. A lot of befuddling bumbling and just plain chaos later, the axe was knocked down, the Gnome was trying to diplomacize the guard and Atrius had managed a sleight of hands on the axe to try and sabotage it. Jim, meanwhile had moved in to assist but it was over before the guard he had chosen as his target for a readied trip ever moved. Through all this Elam was chatting with some other guards and Muli was telling the tale of his first caravan trip to Sabina.
Then it came time for the execution. Trinia was led in as the Queen stood and monologued for a bit. The party tried to start rumors of Trinia’s innocence. They also tensed in preparation to rush up and save her after the axe (cross your fingers folks) failed. Then…the Executioner grunted as something hit him. He was struck with a dagger from behind. A man all in black, with face mask and hooded cloak stood upon the edge of the courtyard. He called out to the queen challenging her authority and honor and all but proclaimed the girl was innocent then rushed to help her. Atrius yelled, “She’s getting away stop her” and “Tackled” her off the platform, getting Trinia away from the executioner and several guards in his attempt to “prevent” her escape.
Jim readied to trip again. Again his guard didn’t move. Tormod began using his Gnomeish ghost sounds to cause more confusion. Elam moved into a better position to help then blew his signal whistle to call in the patrolling sable company, hoping, no doubt, to provide more chaos. The man in black yanked the girl to her feet and ran to the edge of the courtyard. Atrius ran over and “Assisted” the guards by providing the man in black a +2 to his AC. Tormod began churning up the confusion. Jim charged over, bullrushing one of the guards who was close to the action. His check succeeded a little to good and he knocked the man over the side of the courtyard, and he fell the 60 feet to the street below.
“I swear I didn’t realize we were that high.”
It was very very impressive and yes he is correct. I, in my haste to set the scene, forgot to mention that they were up that high. To give the big guy credit he did lean over and yell sorry…
Around this time the man in black drank a potion and feather fell with Trinia down and away, escaping with her from the executioners block. The party seemed somewhat overjoyed by this…hmm.
And then the queen turn and fled, followed by her guard and Sabina. Muli never stopped telling his tale, even after the doors had shut.
The group then left the party, cheerfully actually. The guards didn’t seem to know what happened and had no idea that the PC’s had had much if anything to do with it. The only fatality was considered an accident. “Sad that Bob fell off the cliff trying to stop that girl from escaping.”
The party has spent a few days now going through their loot and selling and purchasing some new toys and handy dandy trinkets. Turns out that Muli and Atrius both picked up some craft Alchemy and are now working on some poisons. Muli even managed to poison himself in the process.
Jim has acquired some new armor, with cool spiky things all over it. Tormod snagged the robe of bones off of Vreeg and along with the wand of Ghoul Touch figures to only need some blue paint and he can take over for Vreeg…;)
There we left off. Next time we pick up with the beginning of installment 2: 7 days to the Grave
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I was going to start a Council of Thieves campaign, but your campaign journal has convinced me to run Curse of the Crimson Throne first.
Excellent. I am glad to hear that you will be joining the CotCT family. If there is anything you need help with let us know. Personally I really enjoy this AP. I am looking forward to Concil of Thieves also, but I will be running Rise of the Runelords for my groups next as I have purchased all but the first module (can't find it and will probably be getting the PDF and the map folio to run it) and wish to use them. Also I have learned that I like to have as many of the books in hand as possible to start.
I love to foreshadow and have as many rumors and NPC contacts and meets before hand. It really allows the story to pop and the world to feel alive. When you meet someone and then two modules (4 or 5 months of real time and 3-6 levels) later they turn up to be someone important, either a villain or an important Contact the story just solidifies.
Jim charged over, bullrushing one of the guards who was close to the action. His check succeeded a little to good and he knocked the man over the side of the courtyard, and he fell the 60 feet to the street below.
“I swear I didn’t realize we were that high.”
It was very very impressive and yes he is correct. I, in my haste to set the scene, forgot to mention that they were up that high. To give the big guy credit he did lean over and yell sorry…
Yea, I would really appreciate elevation numbers in the future, at least for commonly known things like THAT. I was expecting he would smack up against the wall and maybe be disoriented. Instead he fell 60 feet to his death... poor bastard missed the glass of water he was suppose to dive into.
------------------------------------I also had to mercy kill "Cabbagehead" as the party was going to leave him(currently unconscious) to starve to death in the locked(barred) room that the one golem had previously been in. I deemed starvation an honorless death and properly beheaded the foe, such is life and death on the battlefield!
Jim has acquired some new armor, with cool spiky things all over it.
Gorum wills it so! M.W. Spiked Fullplate, rawr!
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I was going to start a Council of Thieves campaign, but your campaign journal has convinced me to run Curse of the Crimson Throne first.Excellent. I am glad to hear that you will be joining the CotCT family. If there is anything you need help with let us know. Personally I really enjoy this AP. I am looking forward to Concil of Thieves also, but I will be running Rise of the Runelords for my groups next as I have purchased all but the first module (can't find it and will probably be getting the PDF and the map folio to run it) and wish to use them. Also I have learned that I like to have as many of the books in hand as possible to start.
I love to foreshadow and have as many rumors and NPC contacts and meets before hand. It really allows the story to pop and the world to feel alive. When you meet someone and then two modules (4 or 5 months of real time and 3-6 levels) later they turn up to be someone important, either a villain or an important Contact the story just solidifies.
I have to say, as the militant Ranger/Sorcerer I am having an absolute blast in the AP. Oh... and I have the first book and the map Folio for Rise of the Runelords... they'll be with me at the next session.
-Larke/Elam Dhatri
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We played once more this past weekend, here is the report.
We had a full house, picked up a few days after the Queen’s party for the Execution of Trinia. The party had leveled at the end of the previous session.
The party had a few more things they wanted to accomplish, book keeping, purchasing, researching, etc. We did some of that, reacquainted with the characters and such. While that was going on the party gathered information, If I haven’t mentioned before, I preset a large number of slips for every 5 DC’s and each party member makes a Diplomacy check and receives a unique rumor for each step. For instance if Jim rolls a 18 he receives a 5, 10, and 15 rumor. Some rumors and information set we got to work.
A girl the party had rescued had an unfortunate incident at the house, as the only PC present was Tormod when she arrived with a thank you gift, a wand of Cure Moderate Wounds. I must say that a certain Cleric of Calistria in my other game would be proud of the behavior of the Gnome. The girl used the words “I feel dirty” as she fled the scene.
Grau, the guard the party helped out of a drunken stupor early in the campaign came begging for some help. His niece was sick. The party quickly gathered up and headed over to Trail’s End, a shanty town across the river. Meeting the girl they quickly realized she was very very sick with something no one recognized. They began distributing a little food to the area and investigating the illness. They realized that she had been infected with something and it didn’t seem quite right. A little investigating left them with the conclusion that it was no ordinary malady. Some sleuthing took place and they found out that the girl, Brienna, had found some silver coins down by the river. The party found the box that she had found the coins in but it was not magical and was rather unhelpful.
The party found an Abadaran Cleric, Ishanti, who the girl’s mother had hired to do some herbalism. They quickly hit on the idea to pay him to cure the girl, so they managed to get Brienna healed but they then worried this would not be the only sick child.
Some more sleuthing took them back into the City where they poked around some of the shops Brienna had spent the coin, hoping to find some of the coin to verify if it was the cause or not, as well as to check where she had purchased various items. The party discovered numerous children running around with shiny new silver coins in their hands. Fearing the worst the party examined some of the coin (by purchasing it from the children and a shop keeper) The silver turned out to be magical, though it was all fading away and they were only able to determine that it was Necromancy.
Muli walked into a candy shop and bought up all the inventory then began to sell it to the children, using his Quadiran haggling skills to suck up as much of the silver as he could.
Tormod rushed back to the house to begin researching, using Rolth’s captured library from the last session, the disease and hoping to find a cure. He discovered that it was similar to, but not the same as a magical disease called Vorel’s Phage
After a day spent collecting information and a couple of notes sent to some of their contacts to warn of an impending plague, they returned to the house to rest. Sadly, the party thought about, but failed to follow through with, the purchase of a wand of remove disease. Now, it looks like they will be far to expensive as all of Korvosa is falling under the influence of the disease.
The Party was called to the Abadaran Temple where they met with Ishanti who asked they get him to the Citadel safely. The party agreed. Arriving at the citadel with the cleric they discovered that Cressida was introducing a new group of Queen’s Physicians to the Guard. These men in masks, along with the Grey Maiden’s were to be given the authority of an officer of the guard. After the assembly, the party was granted a private audience with Cressida and they brought her up to speed. She had worries and concerns, but none she could act on. She also mentioned to the party that Vencarlo Orsini was looking for them and hoped they could meet up with him at his school.
The party headed to the Acadamae, where they were greeted by a doorman of dubious abilities whom they quickly came to dislike. Some arrogance and lack of interest in them left the party fuming. They hoped to peruse some of the library there but were unable to get in, though it was suggested they come back at a later date to see if the “Circle” would grant them access to the library.
The party then headed to the HQ of the Sable company. Elam checked in and found out that Endrin, the Company Commandant was out. No messages for him so the party headed on to the Orsini Academy to speak with Vencarlo Orsini. He had a revelation, he had Trinia Sabor, the woman accused by the Queen of killing the King and the one whom Blackjack had saved from the executioner (with a quite a bit of help from the party). He explained that Blackjack dropped her on him and while he adored her company, she was in danger and had to get out of the City. He was hoping the party could escort her, safely and quietly, out of town. After agreeing, there came a long discussion on how to disguise her. They finally hit upon shaving her head and painting her up as a shoanti. The disguise set, the party boldly walked her to the dock, avoiding but one guard patrol, purchased the use of a boat and took her right across the Jeggare and landed her north of town. They then escorted her around the city, through Trail’s End and on her way.
Just before they were to send her on her way, however, Atrius noted an alley with several bodies piled up and an unmanned dead cart. The party, finding that odd, went to investigate and stumbled upon an alley that contained a dozen or so dead people haphazardly piled up. Investigating further, a hole in the wall of the alley was found which led into the back of a dingy and cluttered toy store. The toys were misshapen and hideous, but the toymaker was found dead in the back of his shop. He had been dead for a while. Some investigating showed that he had numerous pin pricks in his neck a couple inches apart in pairs. Everyones hackles raised up at that discovery. A couple of Knowledge checks later (a couple of nat 20’s were rolled) and I just handed over the Monster Manual and let them reread everything about vampires in there.
The gnome snuck into the crawl space beneath the shop and found some coffins, popped one open and the fight with 4 vampire spawn was on.
The Ranger dropped down in the crawl space to provide the gnome some assistance, but when the gnome fled (as the ranger suggested he do) Elam found himself prone (to use his Heavy Xbow effectively in the squeezing situation) and flanked by 2 vampire spawn. Several rounds would go by with him in this precarious position.
After taking a negative level in the first round, Tormod the gnome sorcerer fled the basement, and the spawn then moved up and prevented anyone else in the party from being able to help Elam. Eventually Elam, with the help of a couple of Fate Points, was able to tumble his way out of the way of the Vampires and get to his friends. He had been hit several times, and managed to make the save all but one time. The fight was intense for a while, but once the rogues got flanking going and the cleric was able to leverage his silver dagger along with some channeling the vampire spawn began to fall. In the end all four vampire spawn were destroyed and their coprses hauled out into the sunlight where they could burn to dust and the party had only suffered 2 negative levels. One on Tormod and one on Elam.
That is where we left off, we’ll pick it up again in a couple of weeks.
Hey now, don't forget Jim's small act of atonement for poor Bob the guard, took us like 2 days to track that guys family down and give them that 25gp. I felt guilty being CG and all, but he still died in combat and doing his job... Gorum wills it! (AND I still owe the party approx. 300gp from my new armor investment.)
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A girl the party had rescued had an unfortunate incident at the house, as the only PC present was Tormod when she arrived with a thank you gift, a wand of Cure Moderate Wounds. I must say that a certain Cleric of Calistria in my other game would be proud of the behavior of the Gnome. The girl used the words “I feel dirty” as she fled the scene.
I have to elaborate on this scene as it was funny as hell and had everyone red-faced for a good 5 minutes. -Not verbatim-
Tormod - "Gee, that's a nice stick, thanks! I'll go put that upstairs in our stick-room, where we play with our sticks!"
Girl - "It's a magic stick, for saving us from the Dead Warrens."
Tormod - "Oh... a MAGIC stick... WELL THEN, I will put it in the MAGIC-stick room instead, where we play with our magic sticks."
At which point I think he invited her to come upstairs play with the sticks or something, and she said "I feel dirty." and ran off.
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Muli walked into a candy shop and bought up all the inventory then began to sell it to the children, using his Quadiran haggling skills to suck up as much of the silver as he could.
This was a fun and different approach from our other group, as well as some entertaining insight at Muli and Atrius in an urban setting. "Stealing candy from a baby" came to mind a few times, but I believe they both behaved themselves.
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Tormod rushed back to the house to begin researching, using Rolth’s captured library from the last session, the disease and hoping to find a cure. He discovered that it was similar to, but not the same as a magical disease called Vorel’s Phage.
Another funny... when we returned home and Tormod's player jokingly said "You see me packing up and if you ask me why I say, 'It's a plague, not just any plague, but a pack-your-sh##-up-and-get-out-town-plague.'" Funny because I know I've seen a few other threads say something similar to that in regards to a few characters at this juncture.
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Trinia > After agreeing, there came a long discussion on how to disguise her. They finally hit upon shaving her head and painting her up as a shoanti.
Lol, she wasn't really keen on having her head shaved, but after we botched the first disguise attempt with something like a "5" total, she folded. I attempted to teach her a few, simple phrases of Shoanti... with suggestions of having her say "I would like to have sex with your monkey and a coconut.", which damn sure made Jim smile wide, but he's not the comedian of the group.
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Toy Store > The gnome snuck into the crawl space beneath the shop and found some coffins, popped one open and the fight with 4 vampire spawn was on.Elam > Several rounds would go by with him in this precarious position
This fight was NEARLY identical to the way our other group did it, was kinda crazy how scripted it almost seemed.(FROM A PLAYER ACTION STANDPOINT, NOT THE AP) I was worried about Elam, he was in a BAD way down there, there was no way to get to him directly AND I was required upstairs if for nothing else a flank-buddy. If there was ever a time for Fate Points so far, that was it, they were well used.
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This past Sunday we returned to Korvosa.
The party had just defeated some Vampire spawn when we quit last time. Funny, everyone, including me, forgot about the Abadar vault key they had found in that mess. The group decided to head over to Orsini’s Academy and see what he knew about the missing Seneschal, as well as any info he might have on the plague. Orsini greeted them warmly and had them to tea. After verifying that Trinia had been escorted safely from the city the party mentioned they had been tasked to find the seneschal and also that they were chasing down the cause of the plague. They mentioned the ship and the boxes that were coming from it. He had no answers for them but told them he would look into all of it and get back to them quickly with what he found. Atrius asked him about Sabina, I think perhaps the rogue is suspicious, though of what I am not at this time sure.
Orsini offered them a place to stay the night and then he went out to speak with some of his contacts. The party, bored after a few minutes of nosing about Orsini’s place, decided there was still afternoon and evening left so they ran over to the Acadamae to see if Tormod, the gnome sorcerer, could get into the library. They had made a request with the Acadamae the previous session and been told to come back later. After some rough back and forth RP and several threats of bodily harm to and from the gnome he was let into the acadamae to do some research. The rest of the party headed over to the Aerie, which wasn’t far. While Elam the Sable Co Corporal checked in, the other folks headed to the bar. Several minutes of gathering information later, and the return of Tormod left them ready to head back to Orsini’s place and see what he had found.
Vencarlo greeted them once more. He explained that he had found nothing out about the Seneschal as of yet, but about the boat he had some knews. He then introduced them to Eries Yelloweyes, a wererat contact of his. She explained that she did indeed know where the ship had sunk and even knew of a place where she could get potions of waterbreathing for them cheap, but asked they do her a favor first. Go down to the sewers and Put a stop to a rabble rouser. Girrigz the wererat was rousing the others into a foolish attack upon the city that would surely result in the wererats being exterminated and nothing else. The party agreed to take out Girrigz in return for the location of the ship and the cheap potions. After a little discussion about the ethics of this mission as well as what the party knew about wererats they decided to reequip in the morning with some silvered items and then go hunt some wererats.
So the next day found them sloshing through the sewers. They found the lair, as Eries had promised and began to infiltrate. They were stealthing in slowly when a Shrieker Mushroom went off and gave away their position pretty much right off the bat. A quick Silence from the Cleric was enough to shut up the mushroom but the damage was done. The wererats in the lair were alerted. A running battle through several rooms began. With first 3 wererats and a couple of Dire rats, then a couple more were rats, then a couple more were rats then an Otyugh and then a couple of rat swarms. By the time it was over there were a lot of dead rats and several unconscious and bound wererats (The party had promised not to kill the rest of the wererats and they did a pretty good job of it).
After interrigatng a couple of wererats, the first having been far to lippy for the party and was knocked out, they discovered the Girrigz was still in the next room. So they grouped up and headed in. Girrigz was waiting for them. He launched himself at the Cleric, and missed. Uber AC clerics are just not cool…They quickly learned that Shoanti Jim the Cleric of Goram was the only one Girrigz was going to have a hard time hitting. They also learned that they as a group had quite a hard time hitting him. Muli’s player once commented that he needed a 17 or better with a flank to hit. Jim was in the same or worse boat. Eventually Jim began to Aid Muli’s attacks and that was enough to finally bust through the AC, not to mention the blur effect he had on. Down went the Wererat leader.
That was all we had time for this week, but next week I hope to push a little further into the module. Till then, happy gamming.
Uber AC clerics are just not cool.
Oh, That's a matter of perspective, lol.
Once the wererat boss moved up on me and got his full round of attacks he was whooping me pretty good at 10dmg a round.(38 HP total and I was out of channel energy) But the party did get to see where their -398gp of party treasure got spent since the boss and the swarms were the only thing that hit me.
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Oh man, you skipped the whole part where we left the Aerie/Acadamae and went to the Excrible's Theatre, due to a rumor, looking for the missing Seneschal. It was a ton of RP, but worth mentioning.
After gawking at the paintings we decided to split up and gather information ... kinda...
Atrius and Elam were trying to figure out a plan to get upstairs... Tormond(gnome) walks right between the guards and up the stairs seemingly unnoticed or with a complete lack of concern from said guards. Stopping to long enough only to turn and give Elam and Atrius some sort of gang/peace sign declaring dominance.
Tormond while upstairs proceeds to declare himself "the entertainment" while searching for his good buddy Bob, then Rob & finally Gary. A few irritated guards and very good bluff rolls later the gnome found himself in a room with several people two of which were Magistrate Garrick Tann and Archbanker Darb Tuttle. At which point he begins the interrogation followed by him being removed from the room and hastily heading downstairs where he gets lost(hides) in the crowd.
Jim saw the many Shiver addicts and decided he need to educate them on the concept of "Drugs are BAD MmmmmKay." (His brother had fallen victim to a Shiver addiction thanks to Gaedren Lamm.) What Shiver he had managed to collect(1000gp worth) he then emptied into the river. When the addicts would get uppity and refuse to listen he would simply smash their vial of Shiver on the table and brush it away. "Now see... this is what you have left, NOTHING." *angry druggie* "...and you feel empty inside, you're letting this control your life... etc., etc." The DM said a few of them seemed really pissed, but at the samed time relatively intimidated by the 6 ft. tall Shoanti in spiked full plate. :D
Muli declared the entire establishment an unclean den of sin... or something along those lines and left almost immediately after we entered. He waited for us outside across the street. (Player went to get dinner, but regardless it was in-character for Muli to have done so.)
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This past Sunday we returned to Korvosa for another installment.
We picked up in Orsini’s house where the party was recuperating from their jaunt into the sewers to take on the wererats. Vencarlo offered them a place to stay for the night and in the morning he provided a large and delicious breakfast as the party went over the happenings. Orsini mentioned that he still had no leads to the whereabouts of the Seneschal, but he had some folks to still make contact with and that if the party dealt with the plague, he would see what he could do about finding the Seneschal. Eries Yelloweyes showed up and they filled her in on the happenings the previous day. She was saddened by the death of Girrigz, but had seen that as inevitable so was resigned to it. The fact that no other wererats were killed was a great joy to her. She told the party where the ship had sunk and offered to procure them potions of waterbreathing at half cost. Actually I made an error and they are getting an even better discount. I told the party 325 instead of 375. I am devastated that they will be saving 250 gp and don’t know how I will deal with the power creep this will provide ;)
The party spent the rest of the day procuring equipment. Elam jaunted over to the Aerie to pick out his brand new mount with that new mount smell. Kicked some tires, ruffled some feathers that sort of thing. Magic was applied to several weapons and a couple of toys were purchased. The gnome spent some time in the stick room instead of making purchases so the entire party was happy. Please don’t ask what goes on in the stick room.
The party prepared to go into the river to find that ship. As they were pulling themselves together, Grau knocked on the door. He had with him a woman friend that Atrius had seen Grau with a couple of times before. After Tormod was sent to find pants, the running joke is that he answers the door pantless, the party offered Grau and his friend breakfast. As the feast was being consumed Grau explained that the woman, Deyanira Mirukova, a special friend of his, is a musician. Her brother is also a musician and he was invited to play at a party at the Carowyns, some minor nobles. That was 2 days ago and he hasn’t returned. She went by the house but it was locked up tight, the curtains were closed and it didn’t look like anyone was home. Her knocks were unanswered and she finally asked Grau for advice. Grau, of course, immediately thought of the PC’s.
The party agreed to help her, after all she was a damsel in distress, and it’s their job to help. The party geared up quickly and went to investigate the house.
Arriving at the Carowyn Manor they found it just as Deyanira had told them. Locked up, curtains pulled and they could hear an odd shuffling sound from within. They have Majenko check the house out. He can hear only one woman inside. “She is odd, I don’t understand her at all” reported Majenko. The party glanced around and…Atrius picked the lock. He is now wanted for breaking and entering…ok that’s not true but he was a bit nervous about that. Inside they found the house to be littered with dead bodies, some of which were dancing. The party stepped up and began to put down the former nobles turned zombies. A couple of zombies in, a cackling erupt in the house. Another round and the woman, whom no one has seen and no one knows the location of, begin mocking them. Finally she launches a screaming bolt, catching most of the party in the effect and sneak attacking Tormod for 20 points of damage. The Gnome Sorcerer starts screaming about homicidal B$#%’s who attack him with sticks from a crossbow. I almost fell out of my chair laughing he was so angry and funny at the same time. The party splits up at this point. Jim and Elam work on the Zombies while Muli and Atrius try to ply their sneak attacks on the woman. Tormod spent the time trying to manage a potion of healing and not get shot at the same time. The woman jumped off the balcony of the second floor into the room with the zombies (executing a tumble of amazing skill to not take damage). The two rogue types chased after. Jim used his Bastard sword to devastating effect on zombies, but the further into the house the party went the more zombies there were. After a while the party was able to lock some of the zombies in a room and hold them down with Jim while the rest of the party put the smack down on the crazy woman dressed as a harlequin.
After disposing of the rest of the Zombies in the house they searched the place and realized that none of the dead folk in the building were Varisians so were not the musician they were looking for. They decided to check the cellar and see if he was down there. The only thing they found down there was a very sturdy door they were unable to unlock. After a few moments Jim activated a bunch of his cool cleric powers, got larger and extra strong and smashed in the door (or Hulk Smash’d it as he calls it). Inside they found the owner of the house one Ausio Carowyn. He was hiding inside a studio of some sort. After speaking with him for a few moments, and realizing that even Tormod’s unimposing size was terrifying him, the party suggested he sell the house to them. He did. 300 gp was the deal (see I got my 250 back and then some). Elam took him, via Hippogriff ride, to the gates of the city, but then the man was like, but I needed to go to the bank of Abadar. So he graciously took him there instead.
After the fight they had stabilized the woman to ask her some questions. During the fight she had referred to her boyfriend Rolth a couple of times. The party was greatly interested in that. Unfortunately Shoanti Jim had no Zone of Truths and the woman was Batcrap crazy so she didn’t reveal any information that was useful. She did start asking Tormod to beat her up some more. I think I got a little revenge on him and made him feel dirty with that one. Yay DM.
After giving up on the interrogation the group moved on to trying to figure out what to do with her. There was talk of locking her up and asking her questions later, but then it got mentioned that they may forget about her and then she would starve to death down there, at which Jim reminded them that he executes prisoners instead of letting them starve to death, so it was decided that Elam would take her to Citadel Volshynek and have her locked up there.
While he was there he checked in with Cressida who was quite interested in his little prisoner and her possible ties to Rolth (she has mentioned on several occasions how much she despises Rolth). She also mentioned that the Pharasma clerics that Elam asked to come clean the bodies out of the house would be a long time coming as they had all kinds of problems including a ghoul infestation in the gray district. Elam agreed to take care of the ghouls, Cressida ponied up a grand of gold for the party.
The Ghoul fight was rather unimpressive. The party came up with great tactics and used some heavy lumber (2 monster summoning III spells for a fire and an earth elemental), the ranger hovered on his hippogriff and rained bolts down upon the undead, and Muli stood on a wall and did the same. The fight was over pretty quickly.
That was where we left it. Next time into the river with them….
I purchased nothing with this loot share(saving), plus I had to pay the party back the 400gp I owed them for the MW Spiked Fullplate I bought 2 sessions ago. I considered it well spent/borrowed and I'm hoping they have as well.
In Carowyn Manor I felt bad for not being able to heal our gnome comedian(sorcerer), but I was knee-deep in zombies by that point and using Channel Energies to try and pump out additional damage so they could be more easily destroyed. Fortunately he was able to drink his potion before she shot him the 2nd time later on, lol. I did manage to throw up a Silence for a few rounds to prevent further bolts/casting... also purposely keeping the gnome out of the 20' radius so he COULD cast.
As for the crazy woman... Jim is doubtful Zone of Truth will/would've improved our chances, especially if she believes the crazy talk she is spewing.
I am doing my best to impress upon the party that Jim is still very much a barbarian by culture/nature, even if he doesn't have levels as one. Also, I am viewing Gorum's beliefs as a sort of 'battlefield honor', to die in battle is glorious, everything else is worthless... dying as a neglected prisoner is shameful on many levels. Had the party promised to tend to her properly, he would've had no problem with taking a prisoner. As soon as I mention starvation = swift decapitation they get a bit jumpy... guess I made that point clear with Cabbagehead-less, lol. Turning her over to the authorities is probably for the best as I don't know how long I can continue to justify the 'out-of-combat' executions. Chaotic Good cleric worshiping a Chaotic Neutral war deity is bound to be a bit of a fine line.
I had prepared spells for a WATER encounter(as much as one can), which is where the Summon Monster III came from, it just came in handy for the graveyard. The other 3rd level I had was Water Breathing, aka Cure Serious, lol. I had no idea the sorcerer was going to do the same thing. :)
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Elam here,
You think it is difficult being the barbarian? Try being the Lawful Neutral representative of "The Man" without knowing what the actual laws are and having a party full of foreigners and chaotic types...
Being a follower of Abadar and an extension of the law of the city, Elam should have run the nomad and the barbarian out of town sessions ago, arrested the rogue for assault and battery and unlawful imprisonment and just killed the sorcerer for the benefit of polite society (He's seen the stick room).
As it stands, Elam is finding it hard not to take justice into his own hands and become more a vigilante than an officer in a mercenary company. Perhaps he's already leaving his mark on the city with his "urban renewal" plans and his constantly acquiring property in the city. (Which reminds me, he needs to recondition that butcher shop and get his own people in there to maintain occupancy.)
When it comes down to it, the authority under which Elam functions no longer exists. The patron of his Company is missing, and presumed dead. The Queen has created her own secret police force and military arm which will prey on the law abiding folks while letting the corruption in the city grow in the chaos.
One might think that a single well placed shot, with a properly poisoned bolt could cut off the head of the snake and allow others to step into power. Perhaps someone who has the welfare of the people foremost in his mind...
I purchased nothing with this loot share(saving), plus I had to pay the party back the 400gp I owed them for the MW Spiked Fullplate I bought 2 sessions ago. I considered it well spent/borrowed and I'm hoping they have as well.
In Carowyn Manor I felt bad for not being able to heal our gnome comedian(sorcerer), but I was knee-deep in zombies by that point and using Channel Energies to try and pump out additional damage so they could be more easily destroyed. Fortunately he was able to drink his potion before she shot him the 2nd time later on, lol. I did manage to throw up a Silence for a few rounds to prevent further bolts/casting... also purposely keeping the gnome out of the 20' radius so he COULD cast.
As for the crazy woman... Jim is doubtful Zone of Truth will/would've improved our chances, especially if she believes the crazy talk she is spewing.
I am doing my best to impress upon the party that Jim is still very much a barbarian by culture/nature, even if he doesn't have levels as one. Also, I am viewing Gorum's beliefs as a sort of 'battlefield honor', to die in battle is glorious, everything else is worthless... dying as a neglected prisoner is shameful on many levels. Had the party promised to tend to her properly, he would've had no problem with taking a prisoner. As soon as I mention starvation = swift decapitation they get a bit jumpy... guess I made that point clear with Cabbagehead-less, lol. Turning her over to the authorities is probably for the best as I don't know how long I can continue to justify the 'out-of-combat' executions. Chaotic Good cleric worshiping a Chaotic Neutral war deity is bound to be a bit of a fine line.
I had prepared spells for a WATER encounter(as much as one can), which is where the Summon Monster III came from, it just came in handy for the graveyard. The other 3rd level I had was Water Breathing, aka Cure Serious, lol. I had no idea the sorcerer was going to do the same thing. :)
they are convinced that at this rate they will receive a medium creature as a pet any day now and not to far in the future they will be adding large and huge creatures to their menagerie.
<sigh> No young one, you cannot keep Cindermaw.
I must say that a certain Cleric of Calistria in my other game would be proud of the behavior of the Gnome. The girl used the words “I feel dirty” as she fled the scene.
Hey! I heard that! I am very diplomatic when the occasion requires it, after all I am Chaotic Saucy, not Gnomish Sticky.
(Tormod & Girl)
See? Damn Sticky Gnomes. Not to be confused with the Sticky Dwarf from Halloween III.
he answers the door pantless
Ah. Hmm.
Although in my defense I didn't have the Endurance Feat so I couldn't sleep in armor, the smile was just that I was happy to see her, and the whip is the favored weapon of Calistria.
You think it is difficult being the barbarian? Try being the Lawful Neutral representative of "The Man" without knowing what the actual laws are and having a party full of foreigners and chaotic types...
Sadly you are nearly at opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of RP from the rest of the party. I argue a party typically needs that grounded, leader-type so they don't get themselves killed. You just happen to get saddled with a WIDE variety of chaos, I wouldn't let that stop you from taking charge when you see fit.
I have done my best to play a 'calm' barbarian (I know, silly talk!), its difficult, but enjoyable. Jim has more personal motivation to work with the party than against it... after all, he's not a bloodthirsty madman who saps people tied up to a wagon.
As it stands, Elam is finding it hard not to take justice into his own hands and become more a vigilante than an officer in a mercenary company. Perhaps he's already leaving his mark on the city with his "urban renewal" plans and his constantly acquiring property in the city. (...butcher shop ...)
Every vigilante needs a lair and a large bank account. You just got the cool ride (Hippogriff), we're getting there. It's not a big stretch for your alignment or character theme to say a soldier becomes a mercenary/vigilante type, I say just go with it. Time to shop for a mask and a cloak!
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We picked up the dice and headed back to Korvosa yesterday.
The party was lounging in the newly acquired Carowyn Manor when we met up with them again. The zombies and dead had all been put in the back yard, awaiting the Pharasma clerics to do a pick up. The Sorcerers had spent a while cleaning the house with Prestidigitation and Shoanti Jim had rearranged the plumbing. The party decided to rest the evening before heading back north to pick up the waterbreathing potions they had arranged to procure from Eries Yelloweyes the wererat they had helped.
The Next day they set out for Old Korvosa to Orsini’s house, to pick up those potions. On the way they made a few purchases, in preparation for a dive into the river and to find that ship. They noticed a long line coming out of a Perfumery. Tormod and Elam investigated, asking folks in line what the deal was. Turns out the place was selling a cure for the plague (a plan that Muli and Tormod were upset that someone beat them to). Elam quickly arranged a place in line near the front with a quick bribe and the party moved in to the shop. The owner was indeed selling “Lavendar’s Luxuriant Linement” a cure all that was particularly effective against the plague as she put it. Numerous haggling and diplomacizings later they had purchased 5 doses of this cure. They determined that it was not magical and running back to the old house, where the Alchemy lab was set up, Muli and Atrius determined that it was merely sugar, cheap perfume, and river water.
Back to the shop the party went, this time with a squad of guards, and they moved to arrest the owner and her thugs. After a few rounds of talk back and forth Elam declared them all under arrest. There were three or four rounds of sapping from both sides. At one point Muli whacked a guy upside the head with 2 saps at once, and Atrius showed why his middle name is Sap. Jim provided some muscle to help Atrius out who wound up one on one with a thug in a back hallway. Elam was charmed by the lady, but eventually she broke that with an ill advised attack on Atrius. The woman and her henchmen were arrested, except for one thug that managed to escape out the back. This time there was just no way to arrange for the party to come into possession of the building.
The party returned to the manor in the southern district and Elam just flew to Orsini’s place on his Hippogriff. On the way he spotted numerous Gray maidens moving to barricade the bridges to Old Korvosa. He managed to hook up with a Hippogriff patrol and discovered that the Queen had ordered the entirety of the Island of Old Korvosa to be quarantined. He rushed to Orsini’s house, were he met Vencarlo and Eries. He offered to get them out of Old Korovosa aboard his trusty steed, but Vencarlo refused, said he had numerous leads to pursue still about the seneschal and that he would be fine. Elam then offered to get Eries out and she took the offer. The deal included the potions being free now. Elam then headed back to Zelara’s House to drop Eries there and let her lie low. As they were leaving the island though, the bridges were all afire. The queen had ordered the island completely cut off. Now only one bridge was left and it was held by the Gray Maidens.
After Elam returned, the party decided to rest and tackle the Ship in the River first thing in the morning. They procured a boat from the guard and moved down the river to about where they thought the ship had sunk. With Waterbreathing potions and light spells aplenty as well as some Sun rods to keep track of time as well as provide light. They entered the river. It was dark, cold and murky. Eventually a couple of hours into their journey they found the ship in the deepest part of the river. After a quick combat with a large Jigsaw shark they moved to enter the ship via one of the port holes near the back of it. Then they were attacked by a sea hag. She was a bit more vicious than the shark, but they were able to handle it pretty well. Mostly because they had piercing weapons aplenty and had prepared for a water encounter. (If you will note the first time I ran this encounter it went far worse for the first group of PC’s)
They were then able to enter the ship, where they found a floating corpse of a Queen’s Physician. Searching him they found a Holy Symbol of Urgathoa on him (the goddess of Gluttony, Plague and undeath) They then found a sealed watertight box and a DeathHead’s Coffer, the magic box that transported the plague. This one was unopened. They took the two boxes and the body back to the surface with them. From there they hauled their take to Citadel Volshynek where they showed it all to Cresida (in a store room, they didn’t want to haul corpse through the halls for some reason) After explaining that the queen’s physicians had had much more to do with the plague’s start than it’s ending Cressida agreed that they needed to investigate the Queen’s Physicians and find out what was truly going on there.
I gave Experience at this point and the party spent a day resting and leveling up.
They then headed to the hospice where the Physicians had set up shop and poked around a bit. After Atrius “accidently” opened one of the doors in the back he explored a store room full of junk then managed to poke his head into the main room where he saw numerous beds full of folks suffering from bloodveil as well as a handful of doctors and gray maidens. The party had pulled out and was deciding on a plan of action when I broke us for the night. In two weeks we will return to the Hospice and see what secrets these doctors are hiding.
Shoanti Jim had rearranged the plumbing.
Well Tormod told me the bathroom sink would pass as a masterwork earthbreaker, though he didn't say it would only last one swing. lol, I did no remodeling, it was ooc player ramblings.
Perfumery “Lavendar’s Luxuriant Linement” ... Alchemy lab was set up, Muli and Atrius determined that it was merely sugar, cheap perfume, and river water.
Never seen poison or alchemy get so much use as it has with Pathfinder, something not so new, but made more accesible to players and getting more use because of it.
Back to the shop ...Elam declared them all under arrest.
You forgot about Muli's attempt at arresting the entire building, kicking in apartment doors, etc. Pretty funny I thought, Elam's player just shook his head and rolled his eyes a lot, lol.
The Shark and Sea Hag
I agree this went much, much smoother with group #2 than group #1.
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My group returned to Korvosa yesterday. We were short a player, Atrius the Rogue was unable to fully participate as he had tickets to the football game. He did make an appearance for a while and we used his character after he left.
The day began with a simple breaking and entering. The party entered the Hospice of the Blessed Maiden to investigate the Queen’s Physicians after numerous suspicions arose about their assisting with the plague and their leader’s involvement with the start of the plague. After breaking into a store room in the back and getting a lay out they decided it was best to split up. Tormod the Gnome Sorcerer and Jim the Shoanti Cleric were tasked with going to the front door and asking for Dr. Davaulus and seeing if they could talk their way into a meeting. Elam the Ranger, Atrius and Muli the Fighter/Rogue were hold up in the back room waiting in case anything went poorly.
Muli was sure it was going to go poorly.
The gnome tried to convince the woman at the door that he had the Plague; she quickly summoned a doctor who was interested in Tormod’s condition and wanted to take him to be examined. He tasked another doctor with taking Jim elsewhere inside the building to be examined. Tormod then explained (in his crazy gnomish fashion) that he really wanted to see Dr. Davaulus. He was told that Dr. Davaulus was far to busy and that he should just submit to the examination. At this point Tormod “crashed the party”. He turned and started wandering around the large hall full of beds calling for Dr. Davaulus. Jim moved to stay fairly close to the Gnome, but eventually they were separated as the Gnome was dashing from here to there shouting for Dr. Davaulus. Finally the Queen’s Physician called for help exclaiming there was an intruder. At this point we entered initiative, the party versus 4 Queen’s Physicians and 4 Gray Maidens.
The fight was something of a running affair. Tormod ran, the Physicians and Maidens gave chase and the rest of the party except Muli chased the Physicians and Maidens. Muli broke through some double doors and found an elevator and naturally figured, what the heck lets see where this goes.
The party, less Muli, was able to handle the Maidens and Physicians eventually. Some of them did their best (except for Jim who has a take no prisoners attitude and Tormod who has something of a Homicidal bent) to use Non-lethal damage. Tormod somehow got one of those perfect lines set up and was able to lightning bolt, taking out a Gray Maiden and a Queen’s Physician outright and wounding another Gray Maiden. 2 Blown saves and 3 made saves plus the Physicians had Evasion. A round later and Elam’s player asked (in general as he obviously knew I wouldn’t reveal anything) why Queen’s Physicians were using Sneak Attack and had Evasion.
The party eventually put down the doctors and maidens. By this time Muli has started a fight, on the third level where the elevator dropped him off, with a pair of Gray Maiden guards. He was holding his own fairly well, though it was rather a miss fest up there mostly because he was trying for Subdual and taking the -4 penalties. Then the party found the stairs and came to his rescue, arriving just in time for him to drop the first gray maiden and they assisted with the other. Before they can even think (i.e. before they have finished the second) Tormod who can’t really reach the Gray maiden just opens the next door and finds three more Queen’s Physicians in a room with a couple dozen more patients who were all strapped down to their beds. Quickly the Party put them down. Elam realizes that all the “patients” in this room are Varisians. Meanwhile Jim has saved one of the Physicians and straps him down to a bed, to make sure he can’t escape…
Muli quickly get’s bored and says hey one more door let’s see what’s inside. He finds what they quickly realize is Dr. Davaulus’ office. Atrius, Elam and Tormod begin searching the Room and Muli shuts the door and stands in front of it. “Just in case there’s someone invisible inside.” He says. It is amazing how these coincidences can happen. It just so happens that Dr. Davaulus was indeed invisible in the room, having heard the fighting out in the next room he quickly realized he should become “Scarce” and he tried to sneak out the door but Muli (who for him made an amazing perception check) realized someone was indeed in the room and trying to sneak out. This prompted a fight with Dr. Davaulus who quickly began to threaten them. He explained in no uncertain terms that the queen would hear about this. They smiled at him and said good. He didn’t last 2 rounds. He got hit with so much Subdual that it will take him a week to wake up.
Elam slapped his MW Manacles (one of his prized possessions) onto the “good” doctor they gagged him (turns out he has some bard in him) and hog tied him just to make sure he didn’t get away. Then they hauled him with them.
This is about where Atrius’ player had to bolt. The group and I played his character from this point on. So very unfortunate for the poor character of Atrius. Who knew he liked to charge into battle so much? ;) (j/k we tried to play him as close to his character as we could)
Earlier Atrius had realized the lift had a secret, it also went down into a basement. They found on the Doctor a button that would make the lift do just that. Putting a few things together they took a ride down under the Hospice where they found a full blown temple of Urgathoa.
The first room had a couple of ingenious traps which Atrius noticed after some examining. After he disarmed the traps the party prepared to enter in some double doors ahead. Just as they were about to open them another door opened and out charged four more of the Queen’s Physicians. Battle ensued. If the dice had not failed me that would have been an awesome combat as I had one throw open the door and shoot and three charge. The party was flat footed to the sneak attacks. Sadly if you added all my attack rolls up I probably wouldn’t have hit. I got one hit out of the 4 and that was for 3 points of damage. This fight pretty much ended right there.
The party decided to make sure the other door from the other direction didn’t have anything before they tried the double doors. They found it to be some sort of locker room but empty. Then they went through the double doors and found some odd “art” of Undead crawling and swaying behind glass. It was disturbing but they quickly realized it was not to dangerous. They opened another door to the left and found 4 Queen’s Physicians as well as 4 Priests of Urgathoa (it took them a couple of rounds to identify them as Urgathoans though it came as almost no surprise) along with 4 Skeletons acting as waiters with drink and food trays. That drew a disgusted laugh or two then the fighting began. That fight went pretty well for the party. No real problems. Jim used a channeling to smash three of the Skeletons and Atrius who had taken a +1 Human Bane Rapier from Dr. Davaulus discovered that he could do Lightning bolt quality damage with that against the priests and Dr’s. Muli and Elam also got into the act here and there.
Elam’s job, as seen from behind the DM’s screen, really does seem to be keep the party moving forward and following the correct Path. He doesn’t do the most damage though he is no slouch, but without him I don’t see this party functioning at all. Muli is easily distracted, Jim is only mildly interested in Korvosa, Tormod is sick (the kind that can’t be cured with remove disease) and Atrius is really one sapping away from finding himself in a jail cell. They would probably still be heroes, but Elam makes them Heroes.
That being said, for all the reasons I just mentioned this is a very fun party to DM for.
After cleaning up their mess they went across the hall and found another room, this one had a couple of priests a couple of doctors and an Elven woman as well as a Human Male. Oh…and 5 zombies Including a Zombie version of Cabbage Head, the Jailor a few adventures back they freed the prisoners from in the Dead Warrens.
Initiative started with the man cursing at the party for being vagrants for breaking into his home and for spoiling all his plans. The party puts some things together and realizes they are finally facing Rolth face to face. And then, they realize after she sneak attacks Muli, that they are facing the elven woman from the Carowyn manor again.
Tormod asked Elam, “Isn’t that the chick we put in jail?”
Elam replied, “Yep.”
“Told you we should have killed her I hate that B*&@!”
This was an epic fight. Rolth held Atrius in the first round. Jolistina (the elf woman) locked down Muli, using Sneak attack and a couple of Zombies to prevent him from going for Rolth. The Zombies held Jim and Elam in place for a round or two. Then Rolth let loose a lightning bolt that Muli and Atrius (who had just made his save to shake off the Hold person) Evaded, but Tormod took to the face and went down. Jim saved him with a channel and Elam rushed over to hit him with the wand of Cure mod, thus putting Tormod back into the fight. This is the closest the party has come to loosing someone so far all campaign. There were enough bad guys that this fight lasted quite a while, but eventually the party pushed in, destroying a couple of the zombies, both of the doctors and finally the clerics of Urgathoa.
They have managed to sling a couple of spells and xbow bolts at Rolth, but really haven’t done a lot to him. He has nearly killed Tormod with that lightning bolt and he hit Jim with two rays from a Scorching ray for a significant amount of damage then he dropped an Ice Storm into the room, of course he was left out of it, hampering everyone’s ability to get to him and doing some damage to them all. Jolistina has taken a few good hits (including the ice storm) but she has given Muli just about all he could handle. Finally he was forced to Five back from her, pull and drink a Cure Mod Potion.
The party is now starting to see the end of this fight. Rolth is running low on spells and almost out of Minions. Atrius and Muli have almost taken out Jolistina and Jim is about to finish the other side of the room. Tormod and Elam are preparing to let loose on Rolth. Jolistina fails her tumble and Atrius and Muli hit her for some good damage as she moves back by Rolth. Then it is Rolth’s turn and he…cast’s Dimension Door and takes Jolistina with him, escaping from the Party’s grasp…
CURSE YOU ROLTH!!!!!
The Cleric is out of channels, but the party has a horde of Cure Mod Potions now. Tormod starts divvying out the potions. Now something I didn’t mention earlier was that when they looted one of the empty rooms early in the temple they found some doctor masks and potions. Tormod checked the potions out and discovered three of them were potions of Cure Mod, but the fourth he couldn’t identify (very poor roll) he just lumped it into the Cure Mod potions. Turns out he gave that unidentified potion to Jim as one of the Cure Mod’s. It was, in fact, not a cure mod but a Potion of Poison. Let the Laughter ensue. I don’t know if Tormod will ever live that one down. He almost killed the priest by poisoning him…
There was just enough time to enter one more room. Here they found some vats, being tended to by 6 priests on Catwalks. The party pressed in and, even though this fight got ugly at a couple of rounds, even with pulling 4 zombies in from another room the clerics never really got going. They managed to get a bless off and I considered having them Channel Negative energy, but having seen it a couple of rooms back, even if all 6 channeled and even if they had been able to not hit each other which they couldn’t do enough, 6d6 with a save for ½ (that is 1d6 from each one) while it looks impressive. Really isn’t that impressive. Then once you realize that they would all take 4 or 5 d6 of that damage also? Heh no brainer they went for melee with spells to back them up.
Early in the fight Jim used a scroll of Hold Person on one of the priests engaged with Atrius. The priest rolled a nat 1 of course and then Atrius Coupe De Grace’d him. After that the fight ended pretty quickly. Atrius got a peek into the next room after one of the priests tried to go that way. Atrius killed him at the door and then shut it.
I gave the exp for the day and the boys will all be leveling.
That is where we left it for yesterday and we’ll pick it up in two weeks to see the rest of the temple.
Hospice Entrance: I was pretty sure we were sent to the front entrance as a distraction, so I just went with it. Jim is realtively quiet to begin with, but under no circumstance would he even attempt to be more outspoken than Tormod, so he just rolled with it and waited for initiative, lol. It was only a matter of time and it took a grand total of approximately 30-whole-seconds for Tormod to upset the ENTIRE warehouse, patients included. Approximately 30 more seconds later he shot a lightning bolt just above a dozen or so beds to add further excitement and frying a few bad guys in the process. (see combat explanation above) Seriously, how can I compete with that? WHY would I even try? LOL!
Subdual Damage: Jim doesn't know what that means. Is there even a word for that in Shoanti? Isn't that the thing that Gorum makes you lose all your powers and atone for? Also, no one told Jim it was a covert-ops mission where we should subdual people, his instructions were... "Go with Tormod, we'll wait here." Which as I explained above, JIM HEARD "When they start chasing Tormod, open a can of Whoopa$$. We'll wait here."
Poison, Drink Me: Um, yeaaaa... as a player this was pretty darn funny, even to me. Although after hearing the numbers of CON damage that would've ensued, it was likely a 'SAVE or DIE' situation. With 12 CON and posion that does 1d3x6 CON dmg, glad I saved. A screech from Tormod "OMG! Not THAT one!" (the potion he handed me 10 mins. prior) and a loud belch from Jim later, I drank a REAL Cure M. Wounds potion cuz the first "didn't work". The party honestly doesn't even know what the potion is/was so no harm done... stupid gnome, lol.
CMB/CMD: I am enjoying this mechanic quite a bit. Even without Imp. Bullrush and Imp. Overrun Jim has managed to do it successfully a good 90% of the time, typically on minions. They usually can't break his AC on their AoOs to prevent the manuver. I did have to raise an eyebrow when a Necromancer bested my overrun total of 21(MY 13th Sorcerer has 24 CMD with a 20+ DEX and tons of magical defense), but Brutesquad later explained the numbers to me, which made me feel better about both of my characters. I don't expect the BBEGs to be slouches, but wizards/sorcerers aren't suppose to be able to bodyblock STR-based Shoanti Clerics, it's just not right, lol.
Interest in Korvosa: Hard to say really. I'd have to say from Jim's perspective, the party has helped him accomplish his initial goal of finding Ghaeken(sp?) and returning his remains to Thousand Bones, even if slightly reluctant. That's significant enough for him to help them for awhile. Also, they allowed him to borrow funds to further his religious beliefs and continuously provide situations which inevitably lead to battle, though he could probably just follow Tormod for that. I think I can safely say, by the time Jim finds himself truly losing interest, the party will be interested in having him around.
Tormod here ...
1) I am NOT homicidal! I just figure that as a gnome if someone is gonna start a fight, I am gonna end and make sure they stay down! Also from now on, NO ONE gets taken to jail. A spear to the throat ends all chances that I may see them again, atleast in non-zombie form.
2) I have always wanted my own Shoanti! Jim you are welcome to follow me around all the time and I promise we will always have fun situations to bash and lightning bolt our way out of.
3) Also new note, never send your earth elemental threw a wall and tell it to attack anyone it finds ... Those patients were probably going to die anyway.
Tormod
CMB/CMD: I am enjoying this mechanic quite a bit.
IIR, this is about the time Ace's Improved Disarm stopped being useful. It really helped in the beginning, (The half-orc in Gadrin Lamm's fish factory & that Vreeg guy in the crypts both had looks of startled disappointment) but I really haven't had any real fun with it since then. I only get d20+18 so I think it's the Cleric's moderate BAB hampering it.
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IIR, this is about the time Ace's Improved Disarm stopped being useful. It really helped in the beginning, (The half-orc in Gadrin Lamm's fish factory & that Vreeg guy in the crypts both had looks of startled disappointment) but I really haven't had any real fun with it since then. I only get d20+18 so I think it's the Cleric's moderate BAB hampering it.
I also might add, that I don't believe Ace is built with a high strength which is all but required to pull off maneuvers especially the higher you go. With moderate BAB, Moderate at best strength and no feat to add some other bonus' you are just plain running against the characters build.
IIR, this is about the time Ace's Improved Disarm stopped being useful... snip ... I only get d20+18 so I think it's the Cleric's moderate BAB hampering it.I also might add, that I don't believe Ace is built with a high strength which is all but required to pull off maneuvers especially the higher you go. With moderate BAB, Moderate at best strength and no feat to add some other bonus' you are just plain running against the characters build.
Yup, and dare I say Ace probably wouldn't approve of my style of Cleric'ing. Jim is built for combat with "I can heal" on the side; to the point where I pretty much see him as a CG Paladin. Channel Energy helps a combat cleric a ton, especially with Quickened Channel.
Strength & Destruction domains pretty much says it all. Is he as cool doing manuvers as a Fighter, Monk or Orc would be? Nope, but he does manage without feats. I'm fond of Overrun, it lets me footstomp(boot to the chest) minions and get to the source of the problem. Bullrush is nice, but the last time I did it I killed someone... who knew there was a 60' cliff behind Bob? I didn't. Ace, two words... Blood Pig. :D
There! I have an avatar now! Not the one I went on the net and found, but thats ok, I probably would have offended someone with it anyway.
I am glad someone likes him, he usually just sits in the stick room all alone, maybe a visit from Jim ... oh so lonely.
he usually just sits in the stick room all alone
Stop that or you'll go blind. Trust me, I'm a Calistrian. If you're not careful you'll poke your eye out.