8-12 Tyranny of Winds III: Caught in the Eclipse GM Thread


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Hey folks. Thought I would toss this up here as it's brand spanking new, and I have at least one question thus far.

First Encounter:
From the way I am reading the description of the initial encounter with the wyrds, it sounds like the wyrds are supposedly interrogating the PCs. Are we supposed to ask the PCs something like "Why are you going to Port Eclipse?" or something of that nature? Also it states that sometimes they use the lightning lash while they have someone under their illuminating flames. Is this basically the plot device or sorts to initiate the combat encounter? Sounds like they want to give the PCs a chance to avoid combat, but doing damage like that is probably going to initiate combat with virtually every party.

Thanks! Will post more questions as needed.

Paizo Employee 5/5 Contributor—Canadian Maplecakes

Dracovaard wrote:

Hey folks. Thought I would toss this up here as it's brand spanking new, and I have at least one question thus far.

** spoiler omitted **

Thanks! Will post more questions as needed.

Good question! Notes in spoilers below:

First Encounter Notes:
The idea is that the comozant wyrds are agents of the Duchess travelling around the area of Port Exclipse, but more importantly, they're just kinda bullying jerks. This encounter is meant to antagonize the PCs. The lightning lash damage is really meant to be a last attempt to antagonize the PCs, but if the PCs stick to their guns, they should be able to avoid combat. So it's a bit of a reward if the PCs endure some humiliation. Otherwise, it's fighting time!

4/5 5/5

Only read through this quickly since I'm not running it for another couple of weeks, but I already noticed a small editing quibble: would have been nice if the interpreter options were in the order they're meant to be presented. As it stands, the NPC that is supposed to be mentioned first... is listed last. :I

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

Just like in the last part Chalissier is missing his arcanist spells per day.

3/5 5/55/55/55/5 *** Contributor

I didn't see a bonus for having played all three parts. Am I just missing it or does this trilogy not have one?

Paizo Employee 5/5 Contributor—Canadian Maplecakes

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Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
Just like in the last part Chalissier is missing his arcanist spells per day.

My mistake on that. I was using some of Chalissier's stats from the previous adventure as a base, and clearly I grabbed that incorrect formatting along with the statblock.

Correct spells per day, should be:

Subtier 3–4
2nd (3/day)
1st (5/day)

Subtier 6–7
3rd (4/day)
2nd (5/day)
1st (5/day)

Paizo Employee 5/5 Contributor—Canadian Maplecakes

Kate Baker wrote:
I didn't see a bonus for having played all three parts. Am I just missing it or does this trilogy not have one?

Correct, there's no specific benefit for having played all three parts, or having played them in order.

That being said...:
The 'Air Affinity' boons received as part of this scenario certainly have ramifications down the line. So consider the collection of all three affinity boons, as being an as of yet unannounced reward.

Grand Lodge 4/5

Thanks for the help Thursty. Slot zero tonight should go well.

Grand Lodge 4/5

I noticed that searching in the final encounter is a standard action. Active perception checks are normally move actions. Any reason for the change?

Paizo Employee 5/5 Contributor—Canadian Maplecakes

Steven Schopmeyer wrote:
I noticed that searching in the final encounter is a standard action. Active perception checks are normally move actions. Any reason for the change?

Given the unique nature of the area, the three dimension of investigation, a standard action seemed more appropriate in this case. It also makes the hunt for the horn (a likely encounter decider) more taxing on the PCs' resources.


Thanks Thurston.

I got the gist of what they were supposed to be doing, just not how far they were supposed to take it. All square now. :)

One other question...

Spoiler:
In the wyrd encounter section, there is a note regarding the Awareness tracking. I know in the post-combat section of the encounter it mentions to dock the party some if at least one wyrd gets away. Is this the only place outside of Port Eclipse where that particular rule is in effect? I think Nix is really the only person they deal with prior to their arrival there, but...

Grand Lodge 4/5

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Alright, Team Numbskulls made it through this one no problem too. This arc caters to both end of the spectrum just fine.

Paizo Employee 5/5 Contributor—Canadian Maplecakes

Dracovaard wrote:

Thanks Thurston.

I got the gist of what they were supposed to be doing, just not how far they were supposed to take it. All square now. :)

One other question...

** spoiler omitted **

Well then!

Answer:
You're correct in your interpretation. The wyrds are the only creatures, outside of Port Eclipse, that the PCs should be accruing Awareness from. The Awareness sidebar does give GM's so leeway in this, and it'd be appropriate to increase the Awareness level if the PCs are telling everyone in Armun Kelisk about their plans of travelling to Port Eclipse. After all, the Duchess has spies all over the Plane of Air's capital.

Lantern Lodge 4/5

I GMed a table of this last weekend, and I had some problems with the final encounter of this scenario...

Final Encounter:

So this last combat takes place in the plane of air (well, they all do, but this one is the most difficult to adjudicate). I ran this last weekend with a high tier group, although they were underpowered for their tier. They handled the rest of the scenario OK, but the final combat I ran into problems that I knew were going to be an issue, and I had worked out some ways to rule on things. However, the way it all played out, I wiped the group – the only reason it wasn’t a TPK was we had to call the game early. After some thought, see the last encounter at high level wiping out all but the most optimized groups (at least, with the way I ran the questionable issues). So, onto the issues...

1. This is the elemental plane of air. Subjective gravity. So how do players start in the ‘middle’ of the map if they were very successful with earlier parts? How do they start floating in air? If I had to rule on it, I would just put them on the nearest ship that I could from the middle...but it seemed to suggest the author was thinking differently than me. With my group, they ended up on the ‘middle of the road’ of successes, so they started on one end of the map – I just had the ground start there, so they were standing on a surface already.

2. When the encounter started I told them, “You can hear thunder in the distance, and with flashes of lighting, you feel like something is coming,” and started initiative. After the available rounds of prep, we started the first ‘combat round’. By that point, two of the players had fallen onto objects (and taken the applicable damage) and two or three characters had just swallowed potions of fly (at least they had the resources and idea to do that at the start). So players had only just begun to search for the horn, and they were spread out, prone, and damaged.

3. When the fight started up, the only PCs who could initially do anything were the casters and the archer. Archer gets disarmed. Now what? Well, with subjective gravity only affecting living creatures, I had weapons that were disarmed to float 1d6 squares away in a random direction (and keep going at that speed). Sometimes, that resulting in a weapon being close enough by to grab...and sometimes the weapon was just plain gone.

4. With the Flyby feat of the caster, he could blast things, and fly away without being affected by most things – even outflying some of the flying PCs (paladin with heavy armor…fly of 40’ vs fly of 100’).

5. The PCs were doing SOME damage, but mostly it was an aggravating battle of the caster doing horrible damage to the group, and the group not being able to do much because of range, not having weapons, or mobility issues.

6. Even if they DO find the horn, it’s not an auto solution. I had to call it (due to time constraints) when they finally found the horn, but by that point, 3 of the 5 PCs were down, and none of the bad guys were down (two were half way, one was still fresh).

7. If I had tried bull rushing PCs off of objects, I probably would have been lynched by my players (but I did not try that – I just stuck with disarm…although one elemental did sunder a weapon cord).

I like having fights in interesting environments and everything, but I feel like the difficulty of the environment did not get incorporated into the fight CR. Even without the caster’s prep, it seems like it’s overkill. We are running the entire 3-part adventure series at a con coming up in a month, and the other players and I (who are also GMs for the con) want to run this without just killing off groups of characters. So, I would appreciate any suggestions or solutions to this. Ideas we floated around (pun not intended)...

• Making the weapons just float away at 1d4 squares per round…or maybe just 1 (but still require a move action to grab, which still might provoke).

• Grabbing a weapon doesn’t provoke AoOs (since you’re not picking it up off of the ground).

• Giving players some kind of bonus for being in the elemental plane of air for a longer period of time on the Wisdom checks to pick a subjective gravity direction (+1 per day? Or +2 for having played the previous part?).

• If you fall on a cargo net, perhaps you take less falling damage.

• More clearly stating how much time you have before the fight starts? (“You’re guessing you have a couple of rounds before whatever those things are comes into view...”)

I would appreciate any suggestions y’all have.

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

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I still have to read this carefully, but after playing it... can we please quit using high crit multiplier weapons on enemies with power attack please ?

This is somewhat less severe in higher subtiers, but in low-tier it would entirely possible to kill a new player who doesn't have the PP for revival with a single crit, from full hp to death in one strike...

It's already annoying enough when players end a complicated encounter before it begins with a single lance charge crit... but especially in low tier... that can be a very nasty first impression.

Shadow Lodge 4/5 5/55/55/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area North & East

Question on the chronicle. The Grand Lodge boon says "You may check the box that precedes this boon when purchasing ___ to reduce the item's cost by to 16,000gp" Is that supposed to be "by 16,000" or "to 16,000"? I assume the latter.

Grand Lodge 5/5

I have noticed some possible stat/CMB/CMD discrepancies in the Advanced Comozant Wyrd stat block.

Stats: not updated with +4 (ignoring STR) for rebuild. My suggestion here would be considering formal stat blocks in scenarios, it would be great if they always used the full rebuild rules for the designated template to help limit confusion vs. quick rebuild (GMing on the fly).

CMB: looks like it should be +9, not +7 (+5 BAB, +5 DEX, -1 size -- an incorporeal creature has no STR, so it uses DEX instead, of course)

CMD: looks like it should be 25, not 21 (10 +5 BAB +5 DEX +6 deflection -1 size -- where, typically, an incorporeal creature has a deflection bonus = CHA mod.)

Good job on the skills. It looks like they are correct with +4 INT and +10 ranks @ 5HD (non-obvious).

Am I forgetting something on CMB/CMD? Thx. They seem important given the aerial combat, subjective gravity, readied PC fly-by attacks or grabs, etc.

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

Well, since they are incorporeal and lack a physical melee attack it is rather unlikely to become relevant. ^^ But yeah tricky stats

Grand Lodge 5/5

Problem: Inaccurate Map Grid - Junkyard Map, p.16

The Junkyard Map digital asset has horizontal and vertical gridline spacing errors, resulting in inconsistent grid square sizes that are particularly noticeable when used in a VTT environment (VTTs have perfect grid spacing and gridline overlays - causes h/v double gridline artifacts).

Paizo Art Dept. - I have seen this problem occur in a number of scenarios (especially Season 7 -- and filed other reports), and it should be very easy to fix by checking maps and grid overlay assets prior to publication/PDF generation against an accurate grid source, such as that provided by Photoshop (or similar tools). Every map should start and end with a perfectly square grid.

Thx! I would really love to see you eliminate this problem, since it detracts from the overall quality of Paizo cartography in the digital gaming domain.

Thx.

Grand Lodge 5/5

Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
Well, since they are incorporeal and lack a physical melee attack it is rather unlikely to become relevant. ^^ But yeah tricky stats

The CMD might be more relevant if they were to end up with items belonging to the PCs where PC CMB steal mattered (as in Through Maelstrom Rift). I agree that it looks like mostly lash melee or diplomacy in this case. But, also, it would be nice if GMs could always count on full rebuild rules in templated stat blocks for printed scenarios.

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

HoloGnome PFS wrote:
Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
Well, since they are incorporeal and lack a physical melee attack it is rather unlikely to become relevant. ^^ But yeah tricky stats
The CMD might be more relevant if they were to end up with items belonging to the PCs where PC CMB steal mattered (as in Through Maelstrom Rift). I agree that it looks like mostly lash melee or diplomacy in this case. But, also, it would be nice if GMs could always count on full rebuild rules in templated stat blocks for printed scenarios.

The wyrds from 7-99 were variant creatures who were not incorporeal,and thus could actually steal something. As written the normal ones could likely only steal ghost touch equipment and force effects (there is at least one IIRC).

Since those are incorporeal they lack this ability, and I am very uncertain how it works, since as written, they could not do what their ecology entry in Skull and Shackles Tempest Rising (the original source) claims that they do, they really like storms.

Plasma Form (Ex) wrote:

Although incorporeal, a comozant wyrd can't hide inside solid objects. It must start its turn attached to the outside of something that's solid and of Small size or larger, or else it takes 5 points of damage. Anyone attacking the wyrd must either take a –4 penalty on the attack roll or resolve the attack against whatever the wyrd is attached to as well.

Unless I am reading the ability totally wrong, they would be terribly disabled on the plane of air, since they would die within several rounds (the plane of air does not have all that much to cling to). Since they seem to appear in a cloud on the horizon they would receive 5 damage every round, until they board the ship.

Carrying a large rock is particularly impossible when you are incorporeal and have no strength score.

The original write-up mentions the fact that they "manifest" on the material plane, and since it is based in ST. Elmo's fire it makes a certain degree of sense to tether them to parts of the ship, I suspect that this effect should not apply in a storm or at the very least on the plane of air.

Of course, they are also pretty "special" in various regards, and I could not name you another ranged ability (other than magic missile) that just deals damage without an attack roll or a save.

The monster has a 20ft. speed and a fly 30 ft fly speed, and I am not entirely sure in which fringe case that base speed could become relevant.

The variant version from 7-99 sidesteps a lot of those problems and in retrospect, I would have preferred to have that one featured, just for the sake of clarity.

HoloGnome PFS wrote:

Problem: Inaccurate Map Grid - Junkyard Map, p.16

The Junkyard Map digital asset has horizontal and vertical gridline spacing errors, resulting in inconsistent grid square sizes that are particularly noticeable when used in a VTT environment (VTTs have perfect grid spacing and gridline overlays - causes h/v double gridline artifacts).

Paizo Art Dept. - I have seen this problem occur in a number of scenarios (especially Season 7 -- and filed other reports), and it should be very easy to fix by checking maps and grid overlay assets prior to publication/PDF generation against an accurate grid source, such as that provided by Photoshop (or similar tools). Every map should start and end with a perfectly square grid.

Thx! I would really love to see you eliminate this problem, since it detracts from the overall quality of Paizo cartography in the digital gaming domain.

Thx.

That explains the fun I had scaling and printing it ^^ good catch.

Grand Lodge 5/5

Good point on the wyrd ilk in #7-99. They are different. I just remembered that they were in that special (maybe guilty by visual association, since the picture is the same ^_^)...but yes...not incorporeal in #7-99. However, both settings are Plane of Air.

I guess Illuminating Flames (Su) doesn't provoke when the wyrd enters a PC square, even though the movement normally would. The ability doesn't say that it does and it's a supernatural ability (vs. say...Engulf (Ex), which offers AoO or reflex). Any thoughts?

But, CMB may matter when it comes to dealing with ghost touch items, since they count as incorporeal (& corporeal) items. Anyway, the stat block should be correct in case it's needed.

(On a lighter note, I would not recommend the weaponized ghost touch underpants that would, no doubt, result in incorporeal wedgies on successful incorporeal CMB attacks during haunted house adventures. ^_^)

re: Plasma Form (Ex)
I was reading this ability to mean that if a comozant, in fact, enters an object per the incorporeal rules and doesn't exit before the start of its next turn, it takes the specified damage, not that it takes damage as a matter of course unless attached to something. The tactic trade-off would be to hide for lesser damage vs. confronting a more deadly opponent (ghost touch heavy-hitter, etc.). Maybe this ability needs additional clarification.

re: Lightning Lash (Su)
I was assuming that it was a ranged touch attack roll (but respecting mage armor, etc. -- and ran it that way) based on the attack modifier in the stat block. However, I agree that the attack modifier is at odds with the ability description, which implies direct damage as a standard action, given 30' LoE.

Comozants would certainly be deadly opponents if the damage were automatic -- a small group could quickly mob/kill a PC lacking electricity resistance. Conversely, an incorporeal touch attack is still a relatively easy hit at +8 or +10 (but not guaranteed). The lack of a save DC also seems to imply that an attack is required. I think the ability description in Bestiary 4 may need clarification (or remove the ranged attack from the stat block if direct damage).

re: Base Moves
I assume the base move of 20 applies to situations where they are attached to an object (since they are no longer flying) and are plasma-sliming their way across the surface.

re: Junkyard Map
Yeah...I spent a bunch of extra time manually fixing the grid lines before using the map. -_-

Thanks for the replies, Sebastian. I am running 7-99 again in a couple of weeks and I guess I will revisit the variant comozants.

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

HoloGnome PFS wrote:

Good point on the wyrd ilk in #7-99. They are different. I just remembered that they were in that special (maybe guilty by visual association, since the picture is the same ^_^)...but yes...not incorporeal in #7-99. However, both settings are Plane of Air.

I guess Illuminating Flames (Su) doesn't provoke when the wyrd enters a PC square, even though the movement normally would. The ability doesn't say that it does and it's a supernatural ability (vs. say...Engulf (Ex), which offers AoO or reflex). Any thoughts?

But, CMB may matter when it comes to dealing with ghost touch items, since they count as incorporeal (& corporeal) items. Anyway, the stat block should be correct in case it's needed.

(On a lighter note, I would not recommend the weaponized ghost touch underpants that would, no doubt, result in incorporeal wedgies on successful incorporeal CMB attacks during haunted house adventures. ^_^)

re: Plasma Form (Ex)
I was reading this ability to mean that if a comozant, in fact, enters an object per the incorporeal rules and doesn't exit before the start of its next turn, it takes the specified damage, not that it takes damage as a matter of course unless attached to something. The tactic trade-off would be to hide for lesser damage vs. confronting a more deadly opponent (ghost touch heavy-hitter, etc.). Maybe this ability needs additional clarification.

re: Lightning Lash (Su)
I was assuming that it was a ranged touch attack roll (but respecting mage armor, etc. -- and ran it that way) based on the attack modifier in the stat block. However, I agree that the attack modifier is at odds with the ability description, which implies direct damage as a standard action, given 30' LoE.

Comozants would certainly be deadly opponents if the damage were automatic -- a small group could quickly mob/kill a PC lacking electricity resistance. Conversely, an incorporeal touch attack is still a relatively easy hit at +8 or +10 (but not guaranteed). The lack of a save DC also seems to imply...

re Lash, since the custom version lists it as a proper touch attack, you are likely correct, that it requires an attack roll (which seems to have been the intention considering the 4 player adjustment).

As a ranged tough, Mage Armor would not have been relevant here (force effectly only seem to matter for the physical attacks of incorporeal creatures, unless I am mistaken, the incorporal wizard with holding a shocking grasp would not be hindered by force effects.

---

re. Illuminating Flames... the wyrd never actually has to enter the target's square for that ability since it has 30 ft. range.

---

It's a very weird enemy and that encounter can turn sour of the group lacks sufficient ranged options, and frankly on tier 3-4 dealing with a ranged enemy incorporeal enemy could be relatively troublesome for some groups (of course in theory, they could just create some sort of fog effect to prevent line of sight and force them into melee).

Grand Lodge *

Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

can someone explain the elevations and general layout of the last encounter?

Details:
Is it assumed the pcs are flying? are they supposed to jump from net to ship to column, or directional gravity themselves place to place and take falling damage? are the columns higher than the ships? lower?

Please help me, I am very confused!

Grand Lodge 5/5

Illuminating Flames:
Right - I was overlooking that illuminating flames has a 30' range. I kept reading "shroud" as "engulf". Still shuddering from Labyrinth of Hungry Ghosts, maybe. ;-)

Lightning Lash:
I guess that's the question - does lightning lash count as an incorporeal attack or is it more like a spell attack? I was treating it as an incorporeal attack that just happens to deal electricity damage -- hence the ranged touch attack and allowing players to benefit from magical armor, but maybe it's the latter. Hmmm...clarification anyone?

Like you, I think the encounter can be a tough one for lower levels. But also, this encounter begs for RP resolution (but not possible for every party -- and creepy!). When I ran it, the comozants did some serious damage to the PCs, but the PCs triumphed in the end and slew the last one on the run. The #7-99 encounter also begs for RP...otherwise...it's a long combat.


A question on boons and the final element of the scenario...

Spoiler:
At the end of the scenario it says that if a Grand Lodge player is present, they "should" decide the fate of the horn. Does this mean they and they alone get the final say, or it is the preferred outcome? Thanks.

4/5 ***** Venture-Lieutenant, Maryland—Hagerstown

Dracovaard wrote:

A question on boons and the final element of the scenario...

** spoiler omitted **

That is how I did it when I ran.

Grand Lodge 4/5 **** Developer

HoloGnome PFS wrote:

I have noticed some possible stat/CMB/CMD discrepancies in the Advanced Comozant Wyrd stat block.

Stats: not updated with +4 (ignoring STR) for rebuild. My suggestion here would be considering formal stat blocks in scenarios, it would be great if they always used the full rebuild rules for the designated template to help limit confusion vs. quick rebuild (GMing on the fly).

CMB: looks like it should be +9, not +7 (+5 BAB, +5 DEX, -1 size -- an incorporeal creature has no STR, so it uses DEX instead, of course)

CMD: looks like it should be 25, not 21 (10 +5 BAB +5 DEX +6 deflection -1 size -- where, typically, an incorporeal creature has a deflection bonus = CHA mod.)

Good job on the skills. It looks like they are correct with +4 INT and +10 ranks @ 5HD (non-obvious).

Am I forgetting something on CMB/CMD? Thx. They seem important given the aerial combat, subjective gravity, readied PC fly-by attacks or grabs, etc.

The lines other than the statistics and CMB/CMD line are correct, and the errors in the statistics and CMB/CMD lines are as you noted. Fortunately, the CMB/CMD of the wyrds is very unlikely to be relevant.

As for the comozant wyrd's lightning lash, it's a ranged touch attack, like a spell. It is not an incorporeal touch attack.

Silver Crusade 5/5 5/55/5 **** Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria

Linda Zayas-Palmer wrote:
HoloGnome PFS wrote:

I have noticed some possible stat/CMB/CMD discrepancies in the Advanced Comozant Wyrd stat block.

Stats: not updated with +4 (ignoring STR) for rebuild. My suggestion here would be considering formal stat blocks in scenarios, it would be great if they always used the full rebuild rules for the designated template to help limit confusion vs. quick rebuild (GMing on the fly).

CMB: looks like it should be +9, not +7 (+5 BAB, +5 DEX, -1 size -- an incorporeal creature has no STR, so it uses DEX instead, of course)

CMD: looks like it should be 25, not 21 (10 +5 BAB +5 DEX +6 deflection -1 size -- where, typically, an incorporeal creature has a deflection bonus = CHA mod.)

Good job on the skills. It looks like they are correct with +4 INT and +10 ranks @ 5HD (non-obvious).

Am I forgetting something on CMB/CMD? Thx. They seem important given the aerial combat, subjective gravity, readied PC fly-by attacks or grabs, etc.

The lines other than the statistics and CMB/CMD line are correct, and the errors in the statistics and CMB/CMD lines are as you noted. Fortunately, the CMB/CMD of the wyrds is very unlikely to be relevant.

As for the comozant wyrd's lightning lash, it's a ranged touch attack, like a spell. It is not an incorporeal touch attack.

Thanks for the clarification Linda, could you maybe explain how the plasma form ability works, in the context of this encounter? As written in seems like a wyrd would die pretty quickly on the plane of air without something to cling to.

Grand Lodge 5/5

LZP wrote:


The lines other than the statistics and CMB/CMD line are correct, and the errors in the statistics and CMB/CMD lines are as you noted. Fortunately, the CMB/CMD of the wyrds is very unlikely to be relevant.

The base stats are also incorrect (missing the +4 for advanced template rebuild). I guess for CMB/CMD to come into play, ghost touch (or maybe Tetori) would have to be involved.

LZP wrote:
As for the comozant wyrd's lightning lash, it's a ranged touch attack, like a spell. It is not an incorporeal touch attack.

Thanks for these clarifications, Linda!

Dark Archive 4/5 5/5 **

Asking about the boon as well. It should either be

'reduce the cost by 16,000gp'

or

'reduce the cost to 16,000gp'

Paizo Employee 5/5 Contributor—Canadian Maplecakes

Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
Thanks for the clarification Linda, could you maybe explain how the plasma form ability works, in the context of this encounter? As written in seems like a wyrd would die pretty quickly on the plane of air without something to cling to.

I'll take this one: It's entirely an oversight on my part.

I misinterpreted how the wyrds operated with their plasma form, having focused on tuning up the social aspects of the encounter. I would simply adjust the encounter so the wyrds are acclimatized to the Plane of Air and don't take damage while travelling towards the airship. In combat, the ship provides enough of a solid surface for the wyrds not to take damage.

Paizo Employee 5/5 Contributor—Canadian Maplecakes

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Keith Apperson wrote:

Asking about the boon as well. It should either be

'reduce the cost by 16,000gp'

or

'reduce the cost to 16,000gp'

This boon should reduce the cost _TO_ 16,000 gp. This should equate to a 20% discount on purchasing the horn.

(Again, sorry for the slows on getting responses back here. Also, big thanks to Linda for stepping in and answering the previous questions!)

Grand Lodge 5/5

Thurston Hillman wrote:
I misinterpreted how the wyrds operated with their plasma form, having focused on tuning up the social aspects of the encounter. I would simply adjust the encounter so the wyrds are acclimatized to the Plane of Air and don't take damage while travelling towards the airship. In combat, the ship provides enough of a solid surface for the wyrds not to take damage.

It's not clear to me that comozants would take damage as a matter of course while flying toward the ship. The damage related to plasma form seems (to me) to be referring to it's ability to hide inside objects (albeit poorly-worded). Hypothetically, it can be attached, but if it tries to hide across the start of its turn, it takes damage. The significance would be that it has the ability to pass through objects assuming they are not excessively thick (<5' thick - per incorporeal rules - like a wall), where it could start attached on one side and end on the other side.

incorporeal wrote:
An incorporeal creature can enter or pass through solid objects, but must remain adjacent to the object’s exterior, and so cannot pass entirely through an object whose space is larger than its own.

At least that's how I see it, and it would benefit from further clarification. Also, these creatures have a fly speed, so if they were required to always be attached to something solid to prevent damage, that requirement wouldn't really make any sense - flying toaster hybrid wyrd mode - activate! Otherwise, they would be unconscious in 6 rounds any time they tried to fly anywhere (@27hp).

Finally, comozants are outsiders with the air subtype, so there's no reason to assume they have any incapacity of any kind in their native plane.

So, if someone could address the wording of Plasma Form (Ex) for comozants at the bestiary level, that would be great!

Silver Crusade 3/5 *** Venture-Captain, Missouri—Springfield

I believe this question hasn't really been answered yet, sorry if asking a third time:

The Final Encounter:
Is this all using the Plane of Air rules (seeing as there is no way of navigating any other way)?


Eric Barrier wrote:

I believe this question hasn't really been answered yet, sorry if asking a third time:

** spoiler omitted **

Spoiler:
I just used the subjective gravity rules included at the start.

Hey all. We are in the GM forum. I'd like to plead with authors to stop putting text into spoiler tags here. No players should be in this forum reviewing this text, so there is no reason to hide the sensitive details of your post. It's just making it more difficult for a GM to scan through the posts and find important pieces of information.

Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
Unless I am reading the ability totally wrong, they would be terribly disabled on the plane of air, since they would die within several rounds (the plane of air does not have all that much to cling to). Since they seem to appear in a cloud on the horizon they would receive 5 damage every round, until they board the ship.

Agreed. However, the monster listing also has this text:

Quote:
Comozant wyrds are most often encountered in the hearts of the greatest storms.

So while the monster listing insists that they must be tethered to an object or quickly die, the same stat block also states that they can hang out in the middle of storms. Therefore, it may be RAW to simply allow them to live/move within storms and if anyone asks, say, "The author of this creature did a bad job with the stat block, but we're not going to punish the creature for that. The author simultaneously mandates that these creatures die within seconds yet also survive perfectly fine in storms, so we're going with the text that implies they survive within storms."

The module author's suggestion in this thread also works.


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Here is some text from my review, which might be relevant/helpful to GMs. Three notes about the final encounter:


  • Chalissier is just a modified air elemental. However, if you run him just like an air elemental, this fight is going to suck. He is also an arcanist. You need to grab the Advanced Class Guide and learn about how the arcane reservoir works. His spells are not even normal due to how he can modify them with the reservoir. For example, in subtier 3-4, his Magic Missle spell should shoot 3 missiles, not 2. If you don't know how to boost spells like that, re-read the arcane reservoir rules.
  • Something many GMs don't realize or forget: Flyby Attack provokes AOO if you move through threatened squares. It is not like Spring Attack, which says no AOO is allowed. Flyby Attack doesn't protect the attacker. So it's a good option on round #1 while everyone is flat-footed and cannot get AOO anyway, but after that it's stupid. It just gives everyone free attacks on your elementals. Try their other abilities.
  • The fight has a glaring flaw: it states that the lightning elementals use their huge disarm bonus to remove the weapons from the PCs, but it says nothing about what happens to a "dropped" item floating in the plane of air. Is it subject to the gravity of the original wielder? So if the owner of the item drops it, it flies off? Does it have no gravity and hover? Does it fly in a random direction? The easy way around this is the disarm rule which states: "If you successfully disarm your opponent without using a weapon, you may automatically pick up the item dropped." So the elementals snatch the PCs' weapons. AND, due to elemental forms being amorphous or "at the elemental's discretion," holding these items shouldn't tie up the elemental's body in any way. The items can simply be "held" within the cloud-like body of the creature. Or multiple wisps could tether each item. Also: the elementals don't have Improved Disarm so this is yet another way the elementals provoke AOO. It might be too good to pass up, though -- they have a +18 to CMB rolls in tier 3-4 (6 normal CMB, +2 charge, +10 Spark Leap).

Also, this module has 2 big failure points, or bottlenecks where it's possible that the PCs just fail with no solution. You may need to help them with some foreshadowing. First, without anyone having any way to speak Auran, it's possible that they simply never get far enough to even hire a translator. They need at least a meager Comprehend Languages scroll, or a Share Language scroll, just to get started. Second point of failure: the final fight will be brutal if the PCs are low wisdom and never bought potions of Fly. That final fight desperately needs mobile PCs. Without that, they can be bombed/strafed from afar by highly mobile air creatures, as evilaustintom showed so powerfully in his earlier post in this thread. Basically, fighter types stuck on a plank in the sky will feel utterly useless. Light hints might be appreciated by your players.

Silver Crusade 4/5 5/55/55/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps Subscriber

Thanks for the warnings. A few notes on your notes:

aboyd wrote:
[lots of stuff about lightning elementals disarming PCs

Disarming a PC results in their weapon (or whatever) becoming an unattended object. The plane of air has subjective directional gravity. Thus:

The rules for subjective directional gravity wrote:
The strength of gravity on a plane with this trait is the same as on the Material Plane, but each individual chooses the direction of gravity’s pull. Such a plane has no gravity for unattended objects and nonsentient creatures. This sort of environment can be very disorienting to the newcomer, but it is common on “weightless” planes.
aboyd wrote:
[Stuff about how flyby attack is not spring attack, which is a very good point to make because lots of people forget that]

Why might Chalissier use flyby attack as a last resort? My guess is that it makes sense at high tier and the tactics were retained at low tier, where they sort of make sense and sort of don't. At high tier, he has dodge and mobility, so his AC should be 4 higher for movement provoked by his flyby attack. If he's going to get hit, he might as well make sure they're targeting his Mobility-enhanced AC.

Other times you'd want to flyby attack: Chalissier shouldn't ever stop somewhere where he can get full-attacked or even threatened by melee characters if he can help it. So don't be afraid to line up lightning bolts and sonic screams, and then fly away. If he's willing to take some AoOs, you can also take advantage of that "bug" to cast shocking grasp. You can't use your free touch attack from casting it in the middle of movement, even during a flyby attack, but Chalissier's pretty bright. Have him use his flyby attack movement to provoke an AoO from his target (in high subtier, this AoO will target his increased AC from mobility!) and then once they've taken that, have him use his standard to cast and deliver shocking grasp--and then fly away, back out of reach. If some lucky foe has combat reflexes, well... it'll be a learning experience for him.


Terminalmancer wrote:

Disarming a PC results in their weapon (or whatever) becoming an unattended object. The plane of air has subjective directional gravity. Thus:

The rules for subjective directional gravity wrote:
The strength of gravity on a plane with this trait is the same as on the Material Plane, but each individual chooses the direction of gravity’s pull. Such a plane has no gravity for unattended objects and nonsentient creatures.

Dude, thank you tons for that rule quote. I couldn't find it, and there are multiple posts in this thread about whether items should fly off or whatever. That definitely solves the mystery.

Also, just to be nice to GMs running this: here is a link to the elevation indicators that Paizo is selling. If anyone out there is having real difficulty running miniature combat in 3-dimensional space, they might help you.

Silver Crusade 4/5 5/5 *

hmmm basic questions

- Awareness Level starts at 0? Seems most logical even if the end numbers start at 1+

- Guessing Jamila is not in a good state if she has been trapped in a block of ice and then the environmental endurance kicks in.. might be worth letting PCs that are knowledgeable or heal specialists get hints that its not just defrosting she needs.


A couple of questions about the gathering of clues:

  • Are the PCs able to communicate using Common with citizens other than Briel? Sylphs normally have Common as a racial language and nothing is mentioned to contradict that, but that would defeat the purpose of having a translator in the first place
  • Is it impossible for the PCs to proceed without a translator? I could foresee the party being stingy with gold and not wanting to pay, which would force them to blunder around until they get 5 Awareness points
  • Is it impossible to use the general skills (Bluff, Intimidate, Diplomacy, Perform) for Maren and Cookie? It's not clear to me whether the individual rules presented are an alternative to those general skills or a replacement

Silver Crusade 4/5 5/5 *

My take on it
- Are the PCs able to communicate using Common with citizens other than Briel? Sylphs normally have Common as a racial language and nothing is mentioned to contradict that, but that would defeat the purpose of having a translator in the first place

I would go with the localised to the plane of air so not used it and not really familiar (sylphs have the gone native to human so this is the equivalent for PoA), I think went with the fence having some broken common for selling things and the others translator and/or those with Auren naturally.

- Is it impossible for the PCs to proceed without a translator? I could foresee the party being stingy with gold and not wanting to pay, which would force them to blunder around until they get 5 Awareness points

Without a way to fix the language, they are very visibly touristing so either give them an idea of the strange looks and wary views from the shadows they are getting or else they will end up with a summons to Troll central. Personally i would go with out of their depth hints as they travel..

- Is it impossible to use the general skills (Bluff, Intimidate, Diplomacy, Perform) for Maren and Cookie? It's not clear to me whether the individual rules presented are an alternative to those general skills or a replacement.

No benefit and no penalty for the lack of a language barrier. M & C are just lesser translators and guides.


Maren and Cookie aren't translators, they're citizens you can gather clues from. They have specific rules (gambling and potions) laid out for them.

Another issue I noticed was that it mentions the possibility of Thunder being made helpful, but doesn't give a Charisma modifier for him for the purpose of diplomacy. As it stands, the DC seems like it would be 10 or lower (if he starts friendly), making it trivial.

Silver Crusade 4/5 5/5 *

Doh.. teach me to not look at the scenario while at work. Apologies jmclaus got confused with Falren and Simmer.

Cookie: "Cookie refuses to give-up any information unless the PCs play one of his table games." I would say he goes for the standard time is money and i'm not paid to blow hot air with you guys... Would maybe make it possible to do so if the pcs lose all the betting but not until they have spent money at the table.

Maren: Definitely seems like an alternative to the diplomacy route, I would say that you could add a diplomacy check if a Pc was looking for one, it is normal interacting rules but i would guess you would need to determine your own Cha modifier.

Thunder: If he starts off indifferent it is more of a challenge but he is a dwarf so racially less charismatic, I would question if you would count him as a citizen of the Port though, thereby making even a simple fail a risk.

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/55/55/5 ***** Venture-Captain, Minnesota

I am planning on writing an elevation cheat sheet on the side of my map, with little cards with the PCs names that I can move around between elevation markers. That way, I can keep track from round to round where the PCs are.

It's low-tech, but worked great in Tyranny I. I'll expect it to work similarly in Tyranny III.

Hmm

Grand Lodge 4/5 5/55/55/55/5 ***** Venture-Captain, Minnesota

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So... Here's how the map with elevation markers turned out. I intend to have the little name slips on the side with the airship detail, where it won't block combat on the airship junkyard map.

This looks like it will be a fun map to play in!

Hmm


So, what are we doing about this line from the read-aloud text on page 8:

Quote:
The cavern housing the settlement is nearly a quarter of a mile in diameter.

...I mean, I don't know if that's supposed to sound huge or something, but slightly less than a quarter of a mile is just 2 city blocks, and the buildings here in particular cannot be tall because they'd reach into the center of the sphere and hit each other. Granted, because the sphere has more surface area than a city block, you'd likely cram the equivalent of 4 or 5 (?) city blocks total (each quadrant of the sphere should house roughly the same surface area as 1 city block).

So essentially, this awe-inspiring secret smuggler port city is maybe 50 homes and 10 to 20 larger business buildings. Also:

Quote:
Airships just out at all angles

...maybe rowboats do. Just 2 or 3 large cargo ships would fill the entire cavern.

Was this really the author's intention?

Silver Crusade 4/5 5/55/55/5

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Maps, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps Subscriber

I decided to interpret it as "the free open space where the tops of buildings stop is nearly a quarter-mile in diameter" because the number actually given is so obviously incorrect and can have such a huge impact on the settlement size and scenario in a way that was very clearly not intentional.

And then I decided buildings were very very tall, accidentally replaced "diameter" with "radius" the morning I ran the scenario, and fudged numbers a lot.

In my opinion it's just like a typo we should ignore only instead of being a typo it's that someone couldn't or didn't math it right, that's all.


Terminalmancer wrote:
accidentally replaced "diameter" with "radius" the morning I ran the scenario

Hmm. That might work. That might even have been the typo.

So I used Google's surface area calculator to figure this out. Due to the curve providing more surface than I originally guessed, it looks like you could squeeze about 12 city blocks into a sphere with a diameter slightly less than 1/4 mile. If you instead use radius for the stated size of the sphere, you can fit in 50 city blocks. That goes from "small neighborhood" to "actual town."

At that size, you could have a couple of residential districts, a merchant district, a port with warehouses, etc.

With a 12 block hamlet (pop. 400), everyone knows everyone. With a 50 block town (pop. 2000), you could actually keep cover and not be noticed there, especially if some of the population is transient (pirates, sailors, travelling merchants). It seems like the latter is what is intended.

OR, if the typo was that instead of the diameter being a "quarter mile" it should have been "a mile" then the surface area allows 200 blocks and a population of 10,000 adults. That a real medieval-sized city.

Wish I knew what the author of the module (or the author of Planes of Power) was intending.

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