DM themed play-by-post D&D game : OOC thread

[beowuuf]

@ameena the +2 conceal bonus for hiding daggers is an inherent bonus for daggers buried in the rules. Everyone gets that if they try to conceal a dagger on their person. I'd award anyone a similar bonus for similar items, but remember part of a dagger's appeal is it is small and ergonomic and narrow. A key is more fiddly and slightly bulkier with a recogniseable shape for example. Play it on a case by case basis.

The +1 against disease comes from having a -1 to your fort save because of your low constitution. So against disease, you had an overall +1 fort save at the time.

It's up to you how you want to award your points. You can either be exceptional in some areas and have weaknesses, or you can try to minimise your weaknesses at the expense of your development. Either is viable metagame wise. RP wise, you might like to only boost something you've used. However, your recent poisoning and eventual survival cvould be grounds for boosting your constitution. It's slightly sketchier, but you have kinda tried to assert yourself a few times with Drommal, and the soldiers, if you felt that justified a charisma boost. That is weighted against running away and keep from fights, of course

[ian_scho]

Oh you're jokeing! Sorry Beo, I missed the '8 is lowest out of 10 bit'. I'll happily re-roll it again, and I've recorded the previous values, just let me know!

Scotland - nice to be back home but it's frickin cold now, right? Enjoy the new year celebrations, more important there than in England!

[Ameena]

Ahh okay, with the Fort Save vs. Disease thing, I didn't think of that with the -1 thing affecting the bonus. I'll change the Disease save thing back to +1 then .
If I decide to put my stat point into Con instead of Dex (making the score 8 and the...er..."bonus" therefore -1), would that have affected my hp roll? I'm guessing I would get one extra hp from what I did get. I won't change anything yet but just want to check. I think that's what I'll do though - put the point into Con instead of Dex. And I will edit my skills appropriately after doing so. I just don't like having negative stats, really - it's annoying having minus numbers in there .
As for RP explanations of it, that's easy enough - Cha can be obtained as she increases confidence as her memories come back and also as she talks to people (like Helm) more. And as for Con, well, like you said, it can come from her (physically) toughening up a bit from all the nasty things that keep trying to splat her .

[ian_scho]

I'm off for 5 days now, bye peeps

[beowuuf]

Cold everywhere Ian! Will head back to England for New Years', though I've been 'persuaded' to stay longer here so it will be an odd blur of here, new year, then back to work before I know it

Enjoy your holiday!

*uses delay to work out how to do 2 hp extra damage all the time to Haynuus*


@ameena: constitution is great, it reflects your current health so the bonuses get applied to all hit dice. So you get to add +3 to your old hit points score to reflext the +1 on your last three hit rolls. And you will only take a -1 penalty to your current roll.

While mechanically minus numbers seem bad, and a spread of stats across players makes my job as DM harder, I also think a spread of stats in a player makes them interesting.

Anyway, now that Ian and money have played for a while, I can see if that feels the case in the business end of being a player

[Ameena]

Erm. So...I put one point into Dex and rolled my new hp score and sorted out all my skills. Then I decided I wanted to change my mind and put the point into Con instead. So I will take one point from all the Dex skills (because the bonus will go back to +3 instead of +4) to show that. Since I already rolled my hp, I was gonna just keep that roll but add whatever I need to add to it as though I had put the point into Con originally. So I get just one extra hp, yes? Because my Con bonus is going up by one? The roll I had put my hp up from 9 to 13. I think I rolled a 6, so minus the 2 made it 4 (therefore 9+6-2=13). So instead I should only subtract one point so it's 9+6-1=14hp total.
If that's wrong, let me know...
Numbers + My brain = Bleerrrghgguuhh? :S

[beowuuf]

you had 9 before. The new constitution score retroactively applies to your old rolls, so you get 3 levels worth of +1 back to make 12hp for your last three levels.

so your score for level 4 is 12+6-1=17hp

[Lord_BoNes]

That's quite a jump. You near on doubled your HP

[Ameena]

Woooo, it works retroactively? Cool! I thought stuff didn't work like that. Groovy. Uber-murafu .
At least I'm less likely to pass out from any more accidental Rock Monster encounters .

[beowuuf]

Nothing else does, so enjoy. Of course, if you take constitution damage... oooooooh, bad!

And lol, you might be less likely to pass out, but you also missed out on being a touch faster in combat, a touch less hittable, a touch more skillful in most of your attacks and skill checks.

Still, I guess if you can't stand up due to death, that isn't an issue

[Ameena]

That's assuming I ever end up actually trying to hit anything . Anyway, I figure my Dex is pretty good - I can up it next time, maybe. It depends on what kind of things we encounter - if it turns out there's more talking-myself-out-of-situations, then putting it into Charisma (one more point will increase the bonus to the amazingly high total of zero ) might be a good idea. Then again, of course, Dex would help with my stupidly-high Sneak and stuff anyway, so that would help in not getting into bad situations in the first place. Well, we'll have to see. I've sort of got myself into the situation where I do sort of want to kill stuff, but my character's ended up being one who won't do that kind of thing. Still, it depends on what kind of things we end up facing. I mean, she probably won't have much of a problem with undead - she knows those kinds of things (skeilies, mummies, etc) are just dead bodies that have been reanimated by magic and hold nothing of their former occupant - they're just corpses that walk by magic. Even so, getting away from such things would be first priority - fighting is a last-resort kind of action. Usually.

[beowuuf]

I'm back finally to my proper computer! Weeeeeeeee.

Just realised, 25 pages of the main IC thread! Well done everyone on a quarter century of entertaining, intelligent and interesting reactions, character beats, actions, and DM stimying.

And this thread is on 50 pages too. Congratualation to Ameena and myself for keeping the waffling on a 2:1 ration with the IC thread! Woohoo!


Have we dropped LB over the christmas period? I hope it's for wacky fun reasons not pneumonia death related reasons

[Ameena]

Oh gawd, and I still haven't got any further with my character-knowledge thingy I started - got to page five of the IC thread, plus I have a few PMs I've retained for the purposes of jotting down relevant info from there whenever I get that far. Hopefully I will get on with this thing one day. Eventually. Maybe .

[Lord_BoNes]

I'm still alive!!! I just took time off for christmas related stuff.

[beowuuf]

Very sensible!


I'll post an update including Farel's progress tomorrow, but proper updates and play not until the 4th.

ENJOY YOUR NEW YEAR'S EVE EVERYONE!

[ian_scho]

Back

[beowuuf]

@LB: The soldier was actually mocking the fact that you probably wouldn't slit his throat, because of your god. Your previous intimidation kept him cowed, but basically the group has been sounding off previously and now about being allied to a good religeon, so the last roll of 1 just let him get a bit of courage to put that assumption to the test.

You can try to intimidate him further, but mechanically that is supposed to harder anyway, and RP wise you might find most of the people around you will make it

Given you are standing in black armour and did drop him with a fatal blow (unlike Farel who used non-lethal force), you can probably just rely on passively being a wild card to him, and hope you blocked his perception enough that he didn't spot that WEstian refered to you as a paladin. Or hope his experiences of paladin have been bad enough he won't gamble you wouldn't kill him

[beowuuf]

Oops, and welcome back Ian

[beowuuf]

Ok, just to remind everyone game restarts on Monday! Blow the cobwebs out those of you who have been doing the Christmas/New Year's thing. I think everyone's kept their hand in but most people have dropped out for a time (me included, I think Ameena's the only one constantly here), and more importantly the timing has stretched without game timing having gone past.

So just to remind everyone what's going on and what's unresolved:

- your captured soldier has mentioned a mage and a priest might hold Farel's squire and Westian's lost cleric respectively. Farel may well decide not to find the closest exit anymore, and wish to go find this mage, the one you were going to be taken to.
- many poeple are still injured, though stable. Westian should be able to start healing people, though he has already given away an UM potion, and Aurek should have a LO potion available. Falkor has magic again, and the magicusers should keep regenerating spells at a rate of 5 - 15 minutes depending on their actions.
- you have a couple of items you have grabbed - flasks, armour, and that necklace of the soldier's.
- Farel did mention he had kept something for Aurek, and has givne the pakc to Aurek. Something Westian and Falkor might be interested in
- Westian and Aurek should be able to mutually learn a few spells from each other - the shield spell and the stamina potion.
- Falkor's being a little bit quiet as he's going through a mini nervous breakdown
- the party have pretty much managed to connect the dots to their past lives and connection to each other, if not what then happened to them when they first came to the mountain
- Westian has asked a few questions of each character - if Aurek is Westian's protection, and what Falkor knows of Gholst
- Aurek has asked everyone of their tactical abilities

I think that's it for what's been going on. Plot wise, you decided to rest for a moment then choose where you were going. Not sure if you were geared up to go along with Farel on the King's path or not, but now the gentle push may well be to seek out the mage. Certainly plot wise this would be an interesting way to go. The question is, which way will the party actually decide to go

[Ameena]

Heh, meanwhile Ameena still just wants to get out. And it might still be a good idea for her to have a bit of a chat with Falkor, whenever Money gets back...though how they'd go about doing so I'm not sure. Especially with everyone else around talking about their own stuff and asking questions of each other and trying to get the party to move on or whatever. But maybe they'll get a quiet moment at some point or something. I think this kind of stuff is a bit tricky with not all of us (players) being here to RP. But hopefully that'll change next week when we get back into it .

[beowuuf]

Exactly. Plus, don't wait for quiet moments to talk. Once you actually get the darn things, you players manage to not be around or just manage to distract yourself with any half-dead soldier you come across.

If you aren't having deep heart-to-hearts while running away from Oitus, YOU AREN'T TRYING HARD ENOUGH!

[Ameena]

Hey, my character finds it difficult to talk whilst on the move since she generally has to trot along on all-fours (walking upright she can literally not get much faster than a fast walk, which given her size isn't really very fast compared to the larger strides of everyone else), which means she can't really look up at someone to talk to them. Even with Falkor, who's not too much taller than her when she's standing upright - when she's down on all-fours her head probably comes up to his knees or something. But maybe they'll get a moment to talk whilst standing near the edge of a pit or something, I dunno. Or maybe they'll be left alone somewhere to have a proper talk with no-one else to interrupt them except the great big dragon that everyone else just ran away from or something .
But it does need to be done at some point, I think - as things are, Ameena has now no way of telling whether Falkor is just gonna launch another load of fire at some other random unsuspecting person he doesn't like the look of (which is pretty much how she interpreted his actions last time). At least she knows that he can chuck fire now - I'm quite sure he hadn't even mentioned being a mage up till that point, and even if he had there's nothing that necessarily implies that all mages can lob fire at people.
Still, I suppose we'll just have to see how things go...Ameena's comfortable enough with Helm right now, but if he decides to go off on his own or something, I dunno what she'll do then. It depends how close she's got to anyone else (if she even does) in the meantime. We'll have to see! Oh the fun of RPing with other people - you never know what anyone's gonna do .

[beowuuf]

Well, Ameena really needs to bring up the subject of her frequent sleeping - homefully she can get carried alot more by the hulks of the group, and so get to chat more and see more

Wait...where was Ameena when Falkor tested out the fireball at the door to the chapel back in the mummy hall? He set some rags on fire when he remembered the fireball spell...

Yeah, the fun of RPing NPCs when the players keep doing stuff. Helm: I shall steal Ameena away from these rotters...umm, except when the cleric declares how good he is infront of all these evil guys. Farel: I shall go off alone and scout...except when the party discover some soldier still alive who points to go the other way.

[Ameena]

Stuff like how often she needs to sleep she probably wouldn't think of mentioning. Not unless she starts to get tired while everyone else can still carry on quite happily. She wouldn't want to be a burden to the group anyway, troubling someone with carrying her. I hope you're keeping a track of how much time is passing, since I'm not sure myself - I know it's probably been a comparatively short time since they all woke up in the altar room (maybe about an hour or something, I'm guessing?), but of course various events and exertions would wear her (and everyone else) out quicker than usual. But I think I decided it would be what, about four hours in between sleeps? I think. I think it was something like humans tend to sleep for about eight hours so are up for the remaining sixteen in a day, but murafu I think sleep for more like one hour and are awake for only four. Something like that. I think it was in this thread somewhere. Maybe I should find it again and check...oh gawd...out of fifty pages, lol...
About the fire thing, ohh yes, I had forgotten about his earlier test of the Ful rune. But I think all he did then was set some rags on fire from a distance - he didn't actually cast a proper Fireball, did he? He just kinda looked at the rags and they burst into flames or whatever. See, this is why I need to get that character-knowledge thing done, lol. As for what she thinks of him now, well, whenever they get to talking about it, I suppose we'll find out...

[beowuuf]

Less than an hour, more like half an hour, though time will catch up when there's the general rest to recover mana.

And surely Ameena has travelled with humans enough to know her sleep schedule can clash with their own travel patterns? certainly, you don't want to be chased later and be under fatigue penalties

I do believe you came up with a 4th of the human sleep cycle - two hours awake and 4 hours awake to be comparible with the 8 hours to 16 hour human patterns

[Ameena]

Two hours asleep, don't you mean? And yeah, that was probably it - the numbers just woudln't go through my head properly last night for some reason .
And yes, I expect she will have hit upon the problem of sleep-times clashing (she has already had private thoughts, earlier in the adventure, about how such creatures can stay asleep for such a long time and stuff, I do recall), but in the current circumstances it's probably not something she's gonna think of until it comes up. She will have met and probably travelled with humans (and other such species) now and then, but not necessarily very often or for very long - she's only twelve. She's probably only been travelling for about three years or so, and much of that time was spent away from human (and other race) habitations - the world is a big place, and there's plenty to explore besides those kind of races (who she knows generally respond negatively to her). She probably hasn't ever engaged in any heavy-duty proper actual adventuring (like what's happening here). The only travelling she's likely to have done with such people will be maybe travelling down a road between towns or something, when she comes across such things (roads, that is), and she wouldn't necessarily have stayed with them for very long. Plus don't forget that the kind of people she spent more time with will be the ones she properly became friends with - and she can't fully remember any of them right now. So it's logical that it wouldn't come to mind that she ever had to mention to them that murafu sleep more often than they would have. After all, sleep is something that people do a lot - it's probably something most of them (including murafu) take for granted - you get tired, to find a place to curl up. Remembering that you're travelling with creatures who have different sleep patterns to you may not be the first thing on your mind when you're in some dark and mysterious place with half your memories missing and various nasty creatures, people, and spells all over the place .

[oh_brother]

Hi all, I was away for awhile but I am back posting now. Belated Merry Christmas/Happy New year to all!

Ok, for the will save for memories I rolled an 11 + 5 = 16.

I will level up today or tonight. @Beo, is any of the armour on the other soldier guys still in good condition? And not covered completely in evil soldier guts?

[beowuuf]

Welcome back!


To hopefully alliviate the confusion:

Drommal indeed ran off through the teleporter, and went in the opposite direction from the game's start. He closed a pit behind him.
The other soldier Bruhur went through the teleporter, and back towards the start
Aurek and Farel thought they heard a soldier when they first left their cells. Farel will explain later that there is a t-junciton later , and the mage sounds like he is the other way. Therefore, a soldier must have gone the direction of the mage. Whether he has gone to the mage is annother matter

The other two sets of armour are probably serviceably, though both will look bad. Arbrut's armour will be charred, and Thinpas's will have a sword blow and blood through it

I think Haynuus only took the greaves (and poleyn)?, there is still a black breastplate to grab from the captured solder Passin.

[ian_scho]

He took two sets of Greaves and Poleyn but not the breast/back plates. Come on - lets have a fancy dress party!

[Ameena]

Just to shine a big bright light on another teeny misprint by Wuffy, Drommal opened the pit .
Do you guys really want to be wearing the icky (possibly cursed) black skully armour? Or was it only Drommal, Arbrut, and Thinpas who had skulls on? Even so, there still might be something dodgy about it. I don't know whether Aurek's "Sense Evil" would automatically detect any kind of curse on armour or whether it only works with certain types of "Evil" thing or whatever.