After our previous Kingmaker TPK our new party has been shoehorned into the campaign and not without difficulties. We've managed to kind of partially in a way resume the campaign from where we were at level 9.
(note: I believe that RPG systems should have some kind of inbuilt safeguard against TPKs because they ruin campaign coherency)
Now. Last session had a series of EPICALLY AWFUL ROLLS. They were so bad is was spectacular. I'm trying to figure out a way to dodge the situation which might turn into another TPK unless the GM goes soft on us.
But before I elaborate on the details of last session's events I want to mention that we earlier ran into a random encounter that nearly killed all of us. I admit the GM did manage to weave that creature into the campaign quite nicely, but it's frustrating that while the creature we fought (or tried to fight) spared us, it took the weapons of our fighters (fighter and battle oracle) with it when it left.
We have managed to replace the lost weapons with weaker substitutes, however. At this point we're still quite weakened. Having lost two magical guisarmes.
However this loss is but a minor setback compared to our current situation...
We had just spent some time exploring a swamp to the west when we decided we had to check out the enormous lake nearby. We got into our boats and set out. Because our group does things too brashly (it's not really the group, it's the "let's get going already!" attitude of the group leader) I almost never get time to actually think about which spells to prepare for a particular situation. This is one such situation.
We set out and the GM rolls random encounter.
Two black dragons (size large).
Uhhhh...
Our GM tends to apply, in situations like these, a "luck roll" which is basically a d20+0 where a low result is unfavourable in some obvious way.
I roll, and I roll a 2. They notice us, and one of them dives into the water causing a large splash and waves of water. We get to roll to maintain balance of our boats. The guy rowing my boat rolls a 6. The boat tips over...
End of session.
Situation:
Archer bard and fighter (with non-magical weapon) are still in their boat.
Battle oracle (with non-magical weapon) and wizard (me) fell into the lake.
We also have an arcane archer, but she was not available for this session.
My prepared spells (as a gnome illusionist):
Lvl 1: Silent Image, Mage Armour, Expeditious Retreat
Lvl 2: Acid Arrow, Invisibility, Glitterdust, Minor Image
Lvl 3: Haste, Dispel Magic, Fly, Major Image
Lvl 4: Shadow Conjuration, Greater Invisibility, Dimension Door
Lvl 5: Hungry Pit, Overland Flight, Shadow Evocation
What's most annoying is that for some reason I decided NOT to pick teleport this day. I ALWAYS pick teleport. I have nine rounds of illusionist invisibility which I can activate as a swift action.
The GM himself is not a fan of TPKs either, so I suspect he might have the two dragons actually avoid combat, but that will still incur a cost of some kind. Most probably paying these two dragons tribute, and we are already down somewhere north of 20k cold pieces in lost weapons to the previous encounter.
One idea is to activate invisibility and then cast overland flight on myself. Then during the next round unless the dragons kill me I cast dimension door to teleport out of range of whatever invisibility they have. From then on I have nine hours of flight.
I'm looking for ideas on how to handle this.
And do not discuss dragon stats or abilities in this thread. I don't want the GM to accuse me of cheating for looking up stats :P
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well everybody knows basic dragon abilities, not really your biggest issue here at the moment.
Well you are in the lake...which means that your option for dimension door are limited. Well not sure how deep you are in the lake and top of it you are a gnome, you are going to need to come to the surface of the water to at least see a shore of some kind, remember that dimension door requires LoS to use and you can't take any other action after you dimension door.
Without needing to discuss the abilities in detail, the black dragons are most likely going to use their breath weapons at your party depending on their position, which might be the biggest issue in the first few rounds.
Carla the Profane: Alas, the shore is a kilometre away. Far out of range for my dimension door.
kestral287: He rules differently on illusions depending on what you're trying to do with them. He tends to rule in favour of distractions, so your idea might actually work.
Question: How would I go about to create an illusion of us all sinking? According to my understanding of the image spells, they cannot make us invisible. So casting a major image to make it look as if we are drowning would not hide the real us. So we'd still be floating there, only with duplicates of ourselves drowning.
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Reading phrases with TPK in it and it seems you've been defeated. You might want to do a little research on this Dragon. I'm not so keen on the rules for blind sense and illusions but will this blind sense sight see that the illusion is not really there?
The reason why I am bringing the blind sense sight is that all this might not be helpful in the long run.
There is a limit to the range of blind sense so illusions might work there in that case if he is out of that range. You can ask the GM if he is open to the idea that dragons might be brought out by illusions farther away according to what I'm reading.
Some GM's scoff at the idea of any kind of illusion and just will defeat it.
If he is, ask your GM if you or someone in your party can make an Arcana check to determine what these kinds of dragons, if you know the type, Like to eat, chase or are entertained by in order to bring out the dragon and its ability in order to defeat illusions.
I believe all the dragons have blind sense, your best bet if he is within his blind sense range is to use spells to increase AC and resist the breath weapon. If our GM is not open to the idea of illusions you can also resist the breath weapon a little easier by increasing the reflex save.
I haven't been through kingmaker so I didn't read the first post Beyond two or three sentences. I'm just going on what I have read in the later posts.
Normally, I believe blind sight, blind sense, tremmor sense, life sight or what not will see through all illusions.
ShadowDax: Nothing in the first post is a spoiler, so you can read safely. It might seem like one thing is a spoiler, but it's a random encounter.
Just an update: We got out of it alive, though now the bard has been geassed... :P
blindsense cannot see through illusions, only thing that ALWAYS sees through illusions is true seeing.