| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
I did end up blowing one spoiler, though: I seem to recall there's one set of insane undead who attack anyone carrying a holy symbol on sight, without regards to anything else. So at the end of the night Templari had Athelya present her holy symbol of Pharasma and I said, "Oh, this is delightful! They leave the temple grounds to attack you! Let me read you the description!"
And it was the wrong place.
These darned ghosts actually RESPECTED the holy symbol of Pharasma.
Ooops. Darned huge sandboxes. Sometimes you're just thinking of the wrong insane ghosts...
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Hah! Classic GMing moments!
I'm surprised at the bird, as I thought it would be more terrifying - I'm glad Malek survived, though!
Oh, those ghosts... XD
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Hah! Classic GMing moments!
I'm surprised at the bird, as I thought it would be more terrifying - I'm glad Malek survived, though!
Oh, those ghosts... XD
The little bugger had a short sword, was raging, and power attacking, and was an angry little insect. Even with maxed HP the camulatz wasn't going to win THAT fight. So I dropped him.
Unfortunately, Kwai Chang specifically said, "Just off to the side and not right under the bird," or I would have gotten to hit him with a falling Malek...| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Always funny to read..
Thankies for the chuckles, sniggers, laughs and smiles.
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
The Muse Awakened
Well, it was a very eventful "uneventful" evening, but not a whole ton of hilarity:
The other wonderful part was that Irwin decided to circumnavigate the area to find out where the creature had gone. His Stealth roll of 30 was more than enough for the froghemoth's pathetic roll of a 3 (plus bonuses that I won't mention here), so for two weeks in a row Irwin has survived by a few pips on a die. How long can he go?!?
"When you stop looking."
Interestingly enough, the kids managed to piece that one together. Templari made a Knowledge: Religion roll to know that Desna was a goddess of travel and the stars. Thus, looking for a definite destination was in fundamental violation of her tenets of wandering for the journey's sake. It wouldn't be until Voren was enjoying the open road, under the stars with no particular goal or destination in mind, that he would hear the chimes sing. Voren's response was priceless: "I'm never going to hear those things sing!"
I'm afraid that's a pretty darned easy question for a divine caster!!!!
I made her player roll anyway, but he got a 29, so I said, "Well, there is this spell called, 'Heal', that is ON YOUR SPELL LIST, that would CURE HER!!!!"
Surprisingly, this engendered a bit of debate: Should they cure her? What might happen? If they tried to cast a spell on her, would she take it as an attack and kill them? Were they capable of overcoming her Spell Resistance?
They slept peacefully for the night in the Pathfinder camp.
- The large amphibian was a froghemoth, a giant eating machine, and very, very dangerous.
- From the description, Akarundo had to be a raksasha. They would need good-aligned bows to defeat him. Although she considered the party completely acquitted of all obligations to her, she would still make Hooken a bow if he brought her some of the crystal, and she would ensure it could penetrate the raksasha's skin.
- Unfortunately, she could not make other weapons, nor could any members of her tribe.
- When they mentioned aboleths, her eyes narrowed and rage washed over her. "They were the reason for Earthfall. They are why I have been trapped here for twelve thousand years. They are why I slaughtered my own people. Lure him here. You will not have to deal with him again."
In a moment of pity, the kids all looked like maybe, just maybe, the aboleth didn't quite deserve that... yet.
- In a lighter moment, Kwai Chang got the feathers to the Muse without Osond noticing.
- She warned them of the quest for the crystal: It was skymetal, and had fallen thousands of years ago. All those with ambition, lust for power, or sheer evil would have been drawn to it for the last few millenia, from hundreds (if not thousands) of miles away. Whoever guarded the crystal now would be the most powerful of all who had come. She did not know whether the party would be powerful enough to face whatever it was that guarded the crystal.
As a final note, they asked me for the Muse's name. Anyone remember where that's referenced? I know it's not in the AP book, but I thought I saw another source that named her...
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Group hug is sooooo adorable! Makes you wonder what kids value in real life.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Chronicles of the Righteous might have something on the Radiant Muse.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Nah, but thanks. I Googled and found nothing, and usually Pathfinder references show up there. I see people in campaigns naming her, but not an "official" name.
It's back to, "Make something up, NobodysHome!"
Time to brush off my Celestial...
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
What about The forward in Dungeons of Golarion, or the Hezrou dude's entry in Demons Unleashed.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
When in doubt, I refer to the following for angelic names.
Angel Names
Even if you don't like the list, you can riff off a root name.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
When in doubt, I refer to the following for angelic names.
Angel NamesEven if you don't like the list, you can riff off a root name.
Or several.
"Her name is Adrielmunkarzephon McMarutcassielgrigorijophiel...ington!"
And when I was going to set up an avatar I noticed that Talky made "Iomidae" a gender.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
And when I was going to set up an avatar I noticed that Talky made "Iomidae" a gender.
"Faith knows no gender, Voren."
I'd also like to quote myself from last game:"Templari's words are not mine, because Templari isn't a 15-year-old boy with ADD and hormones rampaging through his body."
And the Muse's name should be "Pectus Aurea." After using the powers of Google Translate, 'Golden Breast(Comes from the Muse's liberal lack of use of clothing)' into Latin got 'pectus aurea,' and then translated back into English, 'heart of gold.'
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
my first reaction when i saw the question asking what her name was my first though was to reply "JOHN CENA!!!!" however i wanted to keep my friends. speaking of which on that list of angel names one of them is maalik.
Never leave friends for dank memes.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
a 15-year-old boy with ADD and hormones rampaging through his body.
It's worth noting that it's just as much the constant internal biological variant of personal brain-surgery by your own brain* that's often the issue as much as hormones. :D
* No, this is not the proper medical terminology. At all. Do not quote me on this, ever, or you will be wrong.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, today I've decided that I'm going to retire the Serpent's Skull game and just switch over to 100% Ponyfinder.
It just seems like the right thing to do.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Whatever happens, Pinky Pie must die!
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Why don't you just convert everyone's characters to ponies?
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, today I've decided that I'm going to retire the Serpent's Skull game and just switch over to 100% Ponyfinder.
It just seems like the right thing to do.
We're currently enjoying a Skulls and Shackles games with ponies.
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, today I've decided that I'm going to retire the Serpent's Skull game and just switch over to 100% Ponyfinder.
It just seems like the right thing to do.
I got excited for a moment. >:(
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I wonder if they'll make an Equestria supplement for that. :-)
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
Well, last night's game is going to take me at least a couple of hours to write up, because it was Epic Awesomeness.
The teaser:
Q: "How do you avoid a TPK when you've walked into the lair of a fully-buffed, fully-aware lich?"
A: Malek.
Ouch, ouch, and... OUCH.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
And for all of my players, according to all the sources I'm looking at right now, "lich" rhymes with "ditch" or "witch", so yes, I was mispronouncing it. So say we all.
EDIT: I think the single-most-irritating thing about it is that for the first 10 years I was aware of liches, I pronounced it correctly. Then all these people started correcting me and saying, "No; it rhymes with 'leech'."
So as usual, overcorrection leads to incorrectness. Whee?
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
So your PCs thought they were in a leech's liar, and not a lich's?
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
So your PCs thought they were in a leech's liar, and not a lich's?
Exactly.
Except without my paying any attention, Malek has accumulated Step Up, Disruptive, Witch Hunter, and a magic bludgeoning weapon. Plus Darkvision.
This is not a grippli to be trifled with...
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I always assumed it was like lick.
Lesson learned I suppose. :-)
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
I suppose it's too late for you to claim it was an undead super slug so you could still be correct.
| 9 people marked this as a favorite. |
Just wanted to thank you for brightening my sleepless nights. This campaign journal is pure gold. I'll immortalize a certain Grippli-barbarian in my home-game. *resumes lurking*
| 11 people marked this as a favorite. |
Ow! I needed that bone!
Some days, you just set up an encounter to be "visceral" and "real" to you, and you realize that you're likely to curb stomp your party if they just walk in the front door, but you figure they'll be more sensible than that, so you set it up anyway, and... yeah... kids' group. I know, I know.
After Hooken detonated the crucified zombie, the party had a bit of argument, then finally decided that they'd head diagonally up the hill; not straight towards the top, nor contouring towards the next crucified zombie, but aiming diagonally a hundred feet over the next zombie over. (Yeah, describing your real estate as, "Just go to the next crucified zombie over, hang a right, and my place'll be the second on the left" is NOT a good way to win friends and influence people.)
The single-most important note of the session was that Impus Minor requested that it be his "birthday game". We've inherited a tradition: On or about your birthday, you can declare a game your "birthday game", and you get three rerolls that day. You can take them for yourself. You can give them to your allies. Or, if you are particularly evil, you can force your enemies to reroll. But the rules are simple: Three total rerolls in the entire session, you may only reroll once for an event, and you must take the result of the reroll. So, with that in mind, we proceed...
For a few minutes, the group explored around the exploded zombie. Hooken and Malek both tried to make Survival rolls to look for tracks. Hooken rolled a 3, so he had Heron roll. Heron's 5 wasn't much better. Malek's natural 1 proved conclusively that this was the exact path Hannibal had used to cross the Alps. Or maybe, just maybe, there wasn't anything either of them were going to find with rolling like that.
I asked the group whether they were proceeding cautiously with stealth, or whether they were walking in the open, hoping to be seen. This engendered another argument (it was that kind of night). Finally, Templari, Malek, and Athelya went forward in the open, while Kwai Chang, Hooken, Voren, and Irwin stayed stealthfully behind them. In no time at all (a natural 20 on his Perception roll giving him a 42 total), Hooken spotted a dark-haired woman in a filthy white dress shielding her eyes from the sun and obviously searching for them.
In a moment that will live in infamy, it was either Talky McTalkTalk or He Who Has Yet to Be Named who said, "Is it a slutty dress? Because if it is we just shoot her. Because that's what we've learned."
I'm not sure whether or not I should list that on my "proud GM moments" resume. Just seems a teensy bit... hmm...
Anyway, they decided they would let her approach. By 100' away they could tell that the dress was torn and she was limping, but she noticed them and called out a cheerful beckoning, "Woo hoo!" She said something additional in a language they didn't understand, so, in a bit of classic hilarity, Templari turned towards the stealthed Voren and called out, "Throw me your potion of Tongues!" Voren was nonplussed. This time she called out in Common, "Oh, you needn't bother. I speak that language, too!"
Once she was within 50', those familiar with ghouls (Malek and Hooken, of course. Where, oh where are you, Xethos?) recognized her as such. As they mentioned this, she said, "Yes, yes, I'm a ghoul. But I'm not here to hurt you. I promise I won't bite or scratch or claw you or anything like that. I'm here to welcome you on behalf of my master!"
They took her at her word (do I love my kids or what?) and let her approach. She explained that her master, Lord Garaub, ruled this mountain while researching the starstone that had fallen. He had many zombies and skeletons working for him, but was always looking for more... versatile helpers, and had asked her (Melange) to escort the party up to him. After a bit of heated debate, they all agreed to come out of stealth and follow her up the mountain.
On the bright side, it eliminated any need for me to add in all the middle encounters of this little side trip...
As they approached the mouth of a great cave, Athelya put Circle of Protection from Evil on Malek. They can learn! They really CAN learn! Melange turned to them seriously. "Yes, yes. That is very good. I am about to call out to my master to let him know we are almost here. He will start casting protective spells on himself, because you can never trust strangers entirely. You should do the same."
So yes, they let her call out, and yes, Lord Garaub, Lich King of Fallen Star Mountain, had all the time in the world to buff. Unfortunately, he was a straight-out-of-the-bestiary lich, so this consisted of all of Shield, Spectral Hand, and drinking his Potion of Invisibility. What? No Mirror Image? No Displacement? Sheesh. Modern liches and their reliance on DR to stay alive...
Anyway, the party conveniently bunched together as they walked into the cave, so Lord Garaub cheerfully dropped a Circle of Death on them, hoping for some immediate minions. Unfortunately, since Hooken had finally gotten rid of his negative level, Heron was the only one within range with less than 9 hit dice. Heron rolled his save... and dropped dead on the spot! Birthday reroll! A natural 15 on the die +7 for Fortitude was the 22 he needed! Heron popped back to life, confused. When nobody died, Lord Garaub cried out, "Kill them all!"
Unfortunately, he and his wights (four of them) managed to be at the dead bottom of the initiative table. Athelya started casting Silence, Kwai Chang dropped a smokestick right next to Lord Garaub to try to distract him, Irwin ran forward to scout and discovered two wights hidden around a corner, Templari, in an interesting move, Smote Evil on Melange and took her out (apparently Templari does not care for betrayal), Voren hasted the party, Hooken shot Lord Garaub and learned that his arrows couldn't significantly penetrate Lord Garaub's DR, and Malek just moseyed forward, apparently oblivious to everything that was going on.
So Lord Garaub dropped a Maximized Fireball on the party, who quickly learned that their 20-point fire resistance didn't mean much against such a beast. Malek's 54-point Draconic Reservoir (courtesy of Voren) was blown down instantly. Everyone else took significant damage. Except Kwai Chang, who danced nimbly among the flames unharmed. (Stupid monks and their huge reflex saves and Evasion!) Then he hit Athelya with a Quickened Magic Missile to end any threat from the Silence spell (just in case the fireball hadn't done it). Two more wights came in from the other side of the chamber and got between the party and Lord Garaub.
The next round saw the party moving for tactical positions, with Voren and Athelya fleeing due to hit point depletion, Templari moving to help Irwin, Malek just walking up to the wights in front of Lord Garaub and laying in, Irwin simply leaving his wights behind to run into the smoke and take a hopeless stab at Lord Garaub, and Hooken summoning his lions to give Irwin a flank. Another fireball from Lord Garaub was making the party Unhappy. They got Unhappier when he stepped into the conveniently-provided smokescreen, hiding himself from any retaliation. The wights flanked Malek, but a pair of horrific rolls left Malek unscathed.
Then came the next round. Malek just walked up to Garaub. "The wights will get attacks of opportunity." "I don't care. They're not going to hit me." Improved Uncanny Dodge proved him right, as both missed again, and he walked up and cracked Lord Garaub with... a +1 earthbreaker. Magic? Check! Bludgeoning? Check! Full damage! Ow! Lord Garaub had found a new best enemy!
Lord Garaub, not being silly, saw himself surrounded by lions, Irwins, and frogs (oh my!) and took a 5' step back. At which point Impus Major read aloud, "As an immediate action, I take a 5' step to keep up with my enemy." "You took Step up?!?!?!" "Yep."
Lord Garaub was forced to cast defensively (yeah, are you going to trust your Concentration check or a full-BAB barbarian with Bull's Strength, Battle Cry, and Haste on him?), rolled a natural 3, and lost the spell. And was rewarded with, "I rage, Power Attack, and perform a full-round attack. And oh yeah, I'm a Witch Hunter."
It was an... unpleasant round...
Speaking of unpleasantness, Athelya started another Silence spell as Kwai Chang got out a shuriken onto which Athelya would cast it. Hooken couldn't hurt the lich, but laid utter waste to the wights (assisted by Voren), letting Templari get in at Lord Garaub as well. Life was... not good. Irwin? Yeah, I'm not sure what he was doing. He was trying to get in there, but it was a narrow passage.
Then came Lord Garaub's fateful turn. Knowing he was toast, he tried to cast Dimension Door defensively. His roll of 11 was enough, even with Malek's Disruptive feat. I pulled him off the map, all the kids looked crestfallen, and then Impus Minor called out, "Birthday reroll!"
"You're going to make Lord Garaub reroll his Concentration check?"
"Yeah. Why not?"
A natural 4 on the table and the group exploded in cheers (his Concentration was +17, but with Malek's Disruptive feat his target number was 27).
And at that point Kwai Chang dropped the Silenced shuriken in Lord Garaub's square, guaranteeing his fate.
It was 9:00 pm and we had to end the session, but the group was elated! They'd killed a lich and all his henchmen without a single death!
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
AWESOME~! WOO~! GO BIRTHDAY RE-ROLL~! :D
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't get English pronounciation <_< I mean, how do you make lich sound like leech?
Seriously, how do you guys deal with that your language isn't written phonetically? xD It sounds so confusing to hear you guys explain how words are pronounced in written form
Anyhoo, reminds me of that time in our Prince of Apocalypse campaign(we derailed it quite a lot) we had side quest with dwarf lich in it. We weren't supposed to fight the lich, we were supposed to sneak around him, find his phylactory and destroy it without lich noticing. Well, what instead happened is that we fought him and... Well, only thing lich did was power word kill on cleric and then hasted figther hit him five times(with two crits) and killed the lich since he dealt over 100 damage in one round. He had really good rolls, which was impressive since the fighter's player wasn't even around xP(gm was botting the fighter)
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Seriously, how do you guys deal with that your language isn't written phonetically? xD
We grow up with it.
That said, what's amazing is that it was pronounced phonetically at one time. Then we started adding in other languages! But that's okay, 'cause that puppy soldiered right on... until French got involved. DAGGUMIT FRANCE~!
... of course this wasn't technically their fault, directly, as, you know, it was a bunch of snooty nobles that thought French sounded better/looked more refined, so English should follow some of the same rules/elements...
But hey, at least we're not Polish~!
*rimshot, while looking straight at our Polish friends on this forum and probably reading this right nooooowwwwwwwwww~!*
(No, but seriously, Eastern Europe is awesome.)
Anyhoo, fun story, Corvus!
And honestly, NH, I really thought when you were talking about weird pronunciations that you were first going to talk about a "l-eye-tsh" (aka a "liche") or a "leash" (also a "liche")... then maybe start into "hora-crews" or maybe "hora-cruxes" instead of "phylacteries" and such... :D
And honestly, NH, I really thought when you were talking about weird pronunciations that you were first going to talk about a "l-eye-tsh" (aka a "liche") or a "leash" (also a "liche")... then maybe start into "hora-crews" or maybe "hora-cruxes"
... or "hora-cruhk'ses", or "hora-crusch-es" or...
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Viva Le France!
DAGGUMIT FRANCE~!
(For the record, as I feel this is really important to clarify, I have no actual problems with France as a country, or the French as a people, language, or culture. It is an occasional easy target for a joke - much like America can be, despite the fact that I'm a fairly solidly patriotic guy. While I don't always agree with the "general French culture" as-presented through various media and news outlets, but I can, at least, understand that different people have different preferences, and that's totally fine.) :D
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I never assumed you had.
Until now.... :-D
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
We had French (and one Spanish) exchange students stay with us every summer.
Hey! Us, too!
(Never watched so much soccer, before or since!)
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
(For the record, as I feel this is really important to clarify, I have no actual problems with France as a country, or the French as a people, language, or culture. It is an occasional easy target for a joke - much like America can be, despite the fact that I'm a fairly solidly patriotic guy. While I don't always agree with the "general French culture" as-presented through various media and news outlets, but I can, at least, understand that different people have different preferences, and that's totally fine.) :D
True story: Just before Monday's game, I was saying something disparaging about the French, and one of the kids (in a "Berkeley kids" way) said, "You can't say that! That's racist!"
I replied, "Oh, they're nothing but a bunch of feelthy, steenking, surrender-monkeys!" just as Kwai Chang's player walked in the front door (Mr. Stereotype's dad).
"Oh, talking about the French, are we?" was all he needed to ask! :-P
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
They have the right idea. "Take whatever you want, just leave the wine, art, and don't hit us in the face, that's the money maker"
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Hah!
I have to say... while parkour is really cool (and it really, really is), it doesn't help the unfortunate French stereotype that, while most peoples develop martial arts useful to fight back against unwanted violence, the French develop one to run away...
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Have you tried running with a bottle of wine.