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

[ian_scho]

Ohhh, another question. If they're not attacking Haynuus... Do they get a free swing if he charges away to help Westian?

[Lord_BoNes]

Now THAT'S some speedy work!

[beowuuf]

Sorry, I posted the bit before the map - didn't realise two of you guys were around! I felt swarmed.... swarmed I tells you! It really is unpleasant. Wow, I suck

And yeah, Falkor's fireballs currently have a radius of 2" at UM, so he can touch multiple opponents if they are clustered like they are now. The 1" radius LO version might need some skill to plant in the middle of creatures. Sadly for now, his fireball only has a range of 10 foot before it starts degrading in effect....it's still a short-range killer. But a very good one

[beowuuf]

Ohhh, another question. If they're not attacking Haynuus... Do they get a free swing if he charges away to help Westian?

Try it and see! Does their focus on Westian/Aurek stop then from launching AoO on other people... who knows...

Oh wait, that would be me. Yeah, try it and see, but you can probably guess the answer.

[beowuuf]

Now THAT'S some speedy work!

The map was mostly updated (I update per move), it was just that I'd realised Farel's initiative had dropped due to his delay, and I hadn't changed the lighting!

[Lord_BoNes]

Could Falkor close the gap and then nuke them, in the same round?

[beowuuf]

Spellcasting is only a standard action, so he can certainly try catching the tail end by moving four squares, though it would probably be a single hit kill as the two clustered critters are only in range of the reduced in size end of the UM spell..

Depends if you think I've pitched this encounter as a 'kill 'em quick and it's all good' encounter, or if you think I've pitched it as an 'unrelenting hordes until you figure out the exit strategy'

[ian_scho]

If Haynuus were to sheath/drop his weapon and pull out a club and a torch (or just two torches) in each hand:
* could he do that as a minor action? Then attack?
* What are the penalties of swinging against two critters at a time. -4 to hit on the second arm?
* Does he still get his cleave ability where he could end up having 3 or even 4 swings against these vermin?

[ian_scho]

Ahh I got it.
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/combat/specia ... onFighting

Code: Select all

Circumstances					Primary Hand	Off Hand
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Normal penalties				-6				   -10
Off-hand weapon is light	 -4					-8

[beowuuf]

Also you need to make a full round attack (ie you can only move five feet) to do it. But yes, now you have great cleave,as long as they are within reach, you can keep a swing going. Can I suggest you make an attack roll for anything in range from now on, just incase you get a nice swing going

[beowuuf]

OB & LB - because you might get critters coming right into your square, can you give me an Attack of Opportunity roll aswell as your normal actions please?

[oh_brother]

Hey, thanks for the help Ian!

Beo, the roll you asked "just for the hell of it" was 10.

As for Falkor, maybe he is right to focus on how to get out rather than attacking, as beo said it could be that they keep on coming until we escape! Of course an easy way to escape for everyone would be to kill the cleric and the paladin...

Nice encounter, I liked the timing with Haynuus's armour, the red-herring where we all thought the greaves were the problem and the swarming combat! (I like it at least, Westian does not ).

[Ameena]

Is this gonna freak Aurek out? I mean, send him into the whole "Zomg! I is righteous Paladin, must killinate all you EVIL UNDEAD SCUM!!!" kind of thing because the undead widgets are "Evil"? I mean, I figured that the reason they're attacking Aurek and Westy is 'cause they're doing "Sense Good", basically, mechanics-wise. So surely Aurek would automatically get some sense that they are Evil without having to actually use the skill? I mean, at least some kind of sense of unease or something? I'm not entirely sure whether Pallies get an automatic kind of passive effect to detect stuff like that. So I thought maybe if the undead can immediately tell that there are two holy clericy-types in the room, maybe Aurek gets some kind of automatic "bad feeling" too? Unless the undead thingys were just so bored in the walls that they just spend all their time going "I use Sense Good. I use Sense Good again. I wish something would happen. meh. Sense Good again." .

[beowuuf]

The timing was purely Ian doing what Ian does I've discovered - have the oddest timing to do and say the fuinniest things Derk the paladric fighter, sneaking daggers to Helm, and now checking out greaves, have all caught me completely off guard!

Anyway, I have the day off, and everyone has moved, so let's see if I can be giving you a sneaky update soon

[beowuuf]

Yeah, Ameena called it pretty well when I wasn't even thinking like that - essentially, the undead are doing a 'sense good' down to the restrictions on what they attack, and how long they took to home in you lot. Nice to see my brain was intuiting the D&D mechanics even then!

And no, Aurek doens't get any automatic 'sense evil', and more importantly, what makes these guys evil? They aren't really consciously thinking anymore, they are trapped because of Lord Chaos's actions. Not to give anything away, but technically speaking they would use a 'sense evil' like thing in the same way and attack anyone too far into an evil High Lord's path.

They just hate the High Lords, and perhaps in what is left of their brains assume eventually they'll end their own suffering if they kill the right source of priest-like power! Good or evil doesn't come into it!

And it's just how they perceive the world - it's innate, it just follows the same mechanics as sense good/evil I guess! Well, except anyone who is plain good or evil but unaligned to a High Lord might well escape detection.

[beowuuf]

Oh, hey, Westian has a Fortitude save of +5... who knew!

Ok, update done... you guys are doing quite well. This was just too easy. Soon be over. No problems whatsoever. None. Don;'t worry about the golems, they're just here to help.

LB, can you roll me two extra d20 next turn if you stay in the same square?

You didn't, so you can ignore me

[beowuuf]

Woohoo, full house - updating as we speak so you guys can see what's what for the weekend

[oh_brother]

Oh, as for your comment about torches, I did not think Westian was carrying any. I just kinda assumed someone else had one, did not think much about it to be honest.

As for Falkor, maybe he is right to focus on how to get out rather than attacking

Well, if that really is what he is doing, he seems to be more of an interested bystander at the moment!

[beowuuf]

By the way Ian was talking, it sounds as if Haynuus is carrying - though he'll need to confirm that. I've also retconned Farel into carrying a torch too ...for now

And I love Falkor's action just now... though I do want to kill you all, so takethat how you want!

[oh_brother]

Will save is 16 + 6 = 22, I assume that makes it. Although I don't think it matters, there is not really anywhere I can move to!

[beowuuf]

Doubt not the awesome power of Haynuus's chopped! Dare to believe!

[Lord_BoNes]

And the one elemental language that I DON'T have is earth

[beowuuf]

I know Probably for the best, constructs don't tend to make good conversationalists!

[beowuuf]

lol, you know you are in trouble when the low intelligence half-orc...ok, ok, his more intelligent player - has to point out your main weapon against being swarmed. That was the level check btw. My fault, I probably did too good a job of downplaying the turning as a cleric ability, but it's still the equivalent of a war cry with benefits as far as I'm concerned. Especailly in this type of situation, and by now Westian has built up a decent +4 just for his cleric levels alone let alone the other bonuses that might be sneaked in.

Oh, and irritatingly with a +8 melee, even the 3 hit from Haynuus's blow

There might be some duration changes to turning which we can negotiate if it feels to little, and it's going to act more like intimidation. In some situations, that will screw you over numbers wise, and in other situations it might be better. At these low levels, anyway.

[oh_brother]

Eh, I thought we agreed turn undead was not in the DM world? I got a bonus on items with fear effects against undead in its place?

[ian_scho]

I checked for the Turn undead ability on your character sheet before I wrote it!

I understand where you're coming from though.

[oh_brother]

Yeah, but my sheet says "Turn undead: +5 bonus to fear effects versus undead." At least that is what I thought! Anyway, if I get Turn Undead ability I won't argue! Good call.

[beowuuf]

Yeah, I thought I hadn't explained it well. Fear effects include intimidate, which these sort of 'turning' effects are likely to be based on. So essentially you get to have a much better version of 'war cry' against undead than Haynuus would. At the moment your bonus is +5. You aren't going to make them run as far as possible for 10 rounds, but you may well get some of them them to move a few steps back.

Part of this is that I wasn't going to complicate the discussion until we got closer to some undead, and then I got distracted by work stuff and so forgot I hadn't had the discussion to clarify.

Apologies!


Hmm, I just realised no-one ever said if undead monsters were more likely to be affected by a war cry from a priest in DM....

[oh_brother]

Ah okay, I thought it meant that I got a bonus on say "Brandish" with the staff of claws or something!

[beowuuf]

Both, you get the bonus for using any fear effect be they your own unarmed attempts or be they using items like a brandish or calm. I think the mention of using your intimidate skill is buried somewhere. I think aurek has it mentioned on his sheet, hadn't spotted you didn't have it explicitly on yours.

If you look at the definition of the intimidate skill, you'll see what I mean intimidate. The victim gets to use bonuses against fear effects because it's on that same scale. So as far as I'm concenred, you're making an intimidate check, but I'll throw in perhaps a little big more 'oomph' in terms of how shaken they get or how many get affected depending on your check result and clerical level opposing their HD.

Anyway, sorry again, I'd made it vague to start with because I knew turning as it stood wasn't D&D like, but wasn't sure how powerful I wanted to make it as opposed to a normal 'war cry' like affect. With the mummy fight, you guys just hacked the crap out of him and it didn't come up, and while I knew you'd be fighting an undead of one type or another depending on your choices, I didn't want to spoil it by discussing it too early.

Anyway, you guys seem to be dealing with the critters with weapons just as well, so hopefully no harm done!