Pathfinder: Take Me Down to the Ossuary, Where the Mold is Green and the Bones are Gritty

Wednesday, January 25th, 2012

ROLL INITIATIVE

Ok, there’s one week left until the first Chesapeake Pathfinder game. I’ve been going over the rules, getting nickel and dimed on miniatures, and starting to formulate flavor text. Everything’s going pretty good but I have some house rule clarifications. Nothing major though, I actually think these will make things easier.

Please make your sheet on DNDsheets so I can look it over and make challenges for you.

Players:

- Bob: Valeria, Aasimar Cleric

- Jack: Gunnar Halftroll, Half-Orc Hunter

- Steven: Elorin Hawklight, Human Rogue

- Eric: Grifflebore Stuzen, Human Paladin

- Enoch: Shania Casa , Changeling Witch

House Rules:

- Identifying scrolls and potions – I’m going to use what I call ‘Nethack rules’ on these. You’ll find a potion with a different color/taste/smell or a scroll with an inscription of <RANDOM NONSENSE WORD OR PHRASE>, and once you identify it (using the normal methods) as a scroll of, say, cure light wounds, then any further scrolls of cure light wounds (even ones with +X enchantments) will be automatically identified.

It won’t tell you whether something’s cursed though, so watch out. This isn’t much of an issue in this dungeon though.

- Divine vs. Arcane scrolls - There’s a rule in the book that in order to read a scroll without a check, you need to fulfill these criteria:

1. You have to be the correct type of caster (Arcane or Divine) corresponding to the scroll.

2. You have to have the spell on your class list.

3. You have to have the minimum ability score.

4. You have to be at the minimum caster level for the spell (or else you make some easy check like DC = caster level needed + 1)/

I’m going to discard rule 1. There’s really one room in this dungeon where they specify one scroll as being divine and one as arcane, but  none of the other scrolls in the entire dungeon are identified as such. Rather than label some scrolls as arcane, some as divine, and some as both, all scrolls are going to be arcane/divine.

- Announcing Checks/Looting a Room – Pretty much I’ll give you most of the checks except for Perception in most cases. If you want to search the room for treasure, you’ll have to say you want to search it and I’ll probably have you roll a Perception check.

 

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Pathfinder: Rolling Bones for Pharasma

Friday, January 6th, 2012

Alright dorklords, here comes the first ever Chesapeake Team Butts Pathfinder game! It’s planned for 1/28/12 at 5:30ish. We’re pretty much well-versed in how Pathfinder goes down already (say we’ll start at 1 PM, start at 5 PM, turn into a scene from 12 Angry Men when it comes time to decide where to eat, etc.), but this game’s going to be a bit different. In an effort to be less work for the DM for the players, we’re going to have slightly different rules. First off though:

The Module:

Here is the module I’ll be running. It’s a well-regarded 1st-level module. Here’s the description:

“The priests of Pharasma in the strange city of Kaer Maga have long sold plots in their ossuary to those rich enough to afford them – a place of honor and stature for one’s bones to lie after death. Yet now, this mausoleum has become full, and it is time to break into a new and unexplored wing of the dungeons under Kaer Maga to create more room. To a band of fledgling heroes, eager to make names for themselves, this represents a singular opportunity – a chance to explore a heretofore sealed section of the Godsmouth Ossuary and perhaps make a fair amount of gold on the side. The only catch is that they’ll need to survive what strange and ancient mysteries lie within! An urban and dungeon adventure for 1st-level characters.”

So polish up on your boner puns dammit.

The Players:
These are the people I have signed up as definite so far:
Bob – Asaarnian cleric
Enoch – Changeling summoner
Steven – Leaning towards magus
Eric – Some sort of tank
Jack – Half-orc ranger
Rules: (more may be forthcoming)
1. Regarding Class/Race/Archetype - You can be any race/class/archetype from any of the Paizo-published books. No third party stuff. Now you can be that Tengu Druid you always wanted to be but if you pick Kitsune I swear to all the Gods in the Heavens that I will bring all my anime Ore wa baka neko yamate yo onii-chan Japanese down upon your head and play the Revolutionary Girl Utena soundtrack whenever you move. Nobody wants that.

2. Regarding Alignment - Your alignment has to be above chaotic neutral. This is a conscious effort to promote less waffling on the DM’s part if you decide your character’s just going to start icing quest-givers and orphans better synergy and roleplaying amongst the group.
3. Regarding stats -  You get 75 points divvied up through the 6 stats. Minimum stat must be 8, no more than 2 stats at 18. This is before racials. This puts us at the ‘Standard Fantasy’ level. When we’ve played at 85 points pre-racial we’ve noticed that our Kroxes cause monsters to burst like they’ve been hit with a cannon, our spellcasters are basically Arks of the Covenant in robes, and watching our gunslingers fight is like watching the Zapruder film: Lord of the Rings edition. Our bards remained comically inept.
4. Regarding the first level -  You get 1 extra skill rank or 1 max HP at first level.
5. Regarding backstories -  A backstory would be appreciated, no matter how short. At the very minimum, you have to have a reason why you’re in Kaer Maga and agreeing to do a job like this in the first place.
6. Regarding traits -  To compensate for the lower stats, I’ll be allowing two traits at start. Try to work them into your backstory (it’s generally pretty easy).
7. Regarding cards/skill spreadsheets -  Not required but they are very useful and they help speed things along. At least bookmark or keep track of your skills in your books or smartphones.
8. Regarding buying stuff - Kaer Maga’s a pretty anarchic city and close to Korvosa, so you can buy what you want for starting gear with your starting wealth.
9. Regarding carrying capacity - Adding up weight and shit and calculating encumbrance detriments is a lot of work. I get that. So to make things smoother I’ll say this: For our purposes our rule is going to be (within reason) use the speed given by your armor stats, but as long as all your junk doesn’t take you over the max med. load, assume no encumbrance detriments. That sounds like a weird rule, but again, since we’re playing with lower stats than normal I’ll allow it.
10. Regarding character sheets – Make one on DNDsheets and send the link to me beforehand if you would. I might tinker with and add bonus checks/spot checks/rooms etc. if there are some checks that people have that the module doesn’t use. (I probably won’t subtract checks.)

Also, if you have a snack/drink/liquor/beer preference, send a shout out and I can get some.

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Gettin’ Hasty with Hastur: Tatters of the King part 1

Friday, December 30th, 2011

The Players:

Enoch P. as David Davis, Crown Prosecutor
Eric S. as Doctor Nikodemus Prosper, German Paleontologist
David K. as Doctor Rowan Legume, Renowned Psychologist
Justin H. as Genevieve “Gigi” Genovese, American Socialite by day and Con-Artist all the time

Notable People:

Talbot Estus – writer of “Carcosa”, an adaptation of “The King in Yellow” for English audiences; loaned investigators The King in Yellow and Der Wanderer durch den See.
Jean Hewart – an attractive young dilettante, acted in “Carcosa.” Daughter of Lord Hewart, the Lord Chief Justice of England. Befriended by Gigi.
Walter Paige – a handsome but sickly young man who acted in “Carcosa”, he’s an art student at University College London.
Dr. Charles Highsmith – superintendent at St. Agnes’ Asylum for the Deranged in Weobley, Herefordshire. Contacted Dr. Legume with a request for assistance determining whether a rather unusual patient of his, one Mr. Alexander Roby, should be recommended for release.
Alexander Roby – he and his brother, Grahame Roby, are the only surviving members of the Roby family following the brutal murder of their father and sister. Claims to be their murderer, though he was found in another room soon after the murders, which were committed in such a way that Alexander was eliminated as a suspect.
Mark Evans – orderly at the asylum who snuck Roby writing implements in exchange for future favors from the powerful Roby family. Was chastised and ceased.
Price – orderly at the asylum who escorts the investigators around the grounds, to both Roby and Harriwell’s cells.
Lucius Harriwell – fat mental patient in the cell next to Alexander Roby’s. Blamed for the horrible murder of an orderly, Cuthbert Yates.
Cuthbert Yates – orderly murdered about a year earlier. Seemed to be an unprovoked, senseless attack. Enough blood covered the room for two men, and there were two blood types found at the scene, though none of the other staff at St. Agnes’ were wounded in any way following the attack.
Grahame Roby – brother of Alexander, and a prominent merchant banker. In a meeting with Mr. Davis, showed himself to be a blunt and uncompromising man, wholly convinced of his brother’s insanity and willing to make the necessary calls to ensure that Roby remains at St. Agnes’. Suggested David speak with Inspector Stephens if he wished to know more of Alexander.

The Story Thus Far…

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The Story so far… (Nirmathas Campaign)

Friday, December 2nd, 2011

Summary:  Our heroes meet up for the first time in a small town called Kassen in the country of Nirmathas.  Everybody except one are outsiders to the town.  In the past, the founder of the town, Ekat Kassen, protected the town from being destroyed by a group of mercenaries lead by a man named Asar Vergas.  In the final battle, Ekat managed to kill Asar but was mortally wounded in the process.  In honor of his sacrifice, the townsfolk buried him in an ancient crypt as well as the invader himself, Asar.  They placed an eternal flame above Kassen’s final resting place, so that all who visited might find warmth in the wilderness.  From then on, every year, the town celebrated the founding of their town by making a pilgrimage to the crypt.  There, they would light their lantern from the flame and bring it back to town.

Every few years, they would task outside adventurers to make the pilgrimage instead.  The quest was relatively simple at first but soon grew elaborate as the townsfolk start setting up simple traps and puzzles for the adventurers to overcome.  This year would have been no different from the other years.  As the adventurers ventured forth to the crypt, they slowly began to realize that something has gone terribly wrong.  As they reached the crypt, they found slaughtered horses outside and dead human bodies instead.  They were, then, forced into battle with the undead.  After the battle, they explored the crypt, avoiding traps (i.e. nearly getting killed by walking foolishly into them) and solving puzzles (no light or detect magic spells from the casters come onnnnnn).  They eventually stumbled into Roldare, one of the surviving members of the group that went ahead to prepare the crypt with booby traps.  He explains that the group was attacked two days ago by skeletons and his sister was taken by a skeleton in ancient mail armor.  He pleads with them to rescue her and the group agrees.

After navigating the two-story crypt, they finally arrived to the resting place of the awakened Asar.  They win the battle and secured Rolgare’s sister.  They lit the lantern given to them by the mayor and as they do that, the spirit of Kassen rises from his slumber and thanks the party members for a job well done.  There, the party finds out what really happened in the crypt and Kassen’s relationship with Asar.  Asar and Kassen used to be comrades in arms.  One day, they managed to acquire a great deal of treasure from an ancient vault.  They sealed the ancient vault up and the only way to open it is to combine three amulets together.  The amulets were split between Asar, Kassen, and an elven sorceress named Iramine and they all parted ways.  Asar, who felt cheated out of his share of the treasure, attacked the town that Kassen founded.  There, they killed themselves and the townsfolk buried them in the crypt.  Three months ago, a group of thieves broke into the sarcophaguses containing Asar and Ekat’s bodies.  They only stole the amulets from their bodies and, as a result, stirred the spirit of Asar.  After Kassen told his story, he granted each hero a boon and parts ways.

The heroes returned back to Kassen to deliver the sad news.  The celebration turns into a memorial of all the fallen townsfolk.  During the celebration, Cygar approaches the party and introduces himself as a Pathfinder.  He tells them that he has an idea of which group was responsible and offers them a job to get to the bottom of this.  The party accepts and they begin preparations to depart for Tamran, the capital city of Nirmathas.  Cygar pays a barge to take them down the river into the town.  There, they meet up with his associate, Renigar Lacklan.  He gives them some information about the cult of Razmiran and confirms that a group of them traveled north some time ago.  Reginar, concerned about the cult’s influence on the town, informs them to start gathering information on the cult.  They will return at a later time in order to plan their next action.  The group decided that the best way to gain information was to join the cult itself.

After spending a bit of time observing the faithful and their “good works”, the party attended a recruitment meeting at the Ranger’s Lament, a tavern that’s across the street from the tavern.  The entire group gets drugged and everybody wakes up in a cell.  From there, they performed a variety of ceremonies before becoming full fledge members of the cult.  The party was forced to take on missions that ranged from being tedious and mundane to downright criminal.  As they complete their tasks, they began to understand the inner workings of the cult and later on, one of the party members escapes in order to attend the scheduled meeting with Reginar.  Reginar comes to the conclusion that they must destroy the threat the cult represents before it gets out of hand.  He orders them to sneak inside the personal chambers of the high priest and steal any incriminating documents or ledgers so that the town officials can drive the cult away from Tamran.  He wants to get the information by any means possible as the time for subtlety is over.

Important Characters:
Ekat Kassen – Famous crusader and fortune seeker.  The founder of the town of Kassen.  Used to be allied with Asar and Iramine until they split off after acquiring a great deal of treasure from an ancient treasure vault.  He used to have an amulet that matched with three other amulet pieces that would open the vault.  Died after Asar mortally wounded him in battle.

Asar Vergas – An old companion of Ekat who went his separate ways after splitting the treasure acquired from the ancient treasure vault.  Was killed by Ekat after Asar tried to raid the town of Kassen but not before mortally wounding Ekat.  Used to have the 2nd amulet piece that opened the way to the treasure vault.

Iramine  - The mysterious elven maiden who held the 3rd piece of the amulet.

Cygar Anravis – Mysterious member of the Pathfinder society who tries to find adventurers worthy enough to join his cause.  He sends the party off to Tamran.

Captain Welren – Captain of the barge.  Loves fishes.

Reginar Lacklan – The pathfinder associate who resides in Tamran.  Gives the group vital information regarding the cult of Razmir and gives them a quest to find any incriminating evidence against the cult.

The Cult of Razmir – The faithful who worships the living god, Razmir.  They aim to corrupt the people and the government of Tamran and to increase the power of Razmir.

Egarthis – The current leader of the temple and the first high ranking leader the party members meet.  Responsible for overseeing the ceremonies.

Krant – A brutish priest who is second in command.  He is responsible for overseeing the group and making sure they complete their tasks effectively.  He also enjoys a little bloodsport as he forces the group to fight amongst each other.

Evlar – A homeless acolyte who joins the cult at the same time the party does.  His father beats him.

Krox – Doesn’t feel that Nirmathas is big enough to contain him.

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Pathfinder – How about you find your way out of this game (7/23)

Tuesday, August 9th, 2011

About two weeks ago we had a Pathfinder game! And people supposedly thought it was pretty fun? It’s entirely possible, nay probable, that they are a group of lying scum but since there’s no way for me to prove it yet I’ll just have to take their word at face value. I know a few people felt burned that they were asked to leave the group, but the truth is I felt this game went about ten thousand times more smoothly than the last one I ran, where we had seven players. I believe we started very close to on time, which is 2 PM, and we actually finished up what I had prepared (which was two parts of the six-part module) by around 6 or 7 iirc. Everyone wanted to keep going, and with Jack and Justin driving up from Chesapeake to play I suspected they might. So we broke for a few hours to eat and I read through the next section and then played that until 2 or 3 AM!

Starting off, the party had just finished off their initial purpose – defeating the rat-bastard Gaedren Lann at the behest of Zelarra, a local fortune teller whose son had died. At the conclusion of that task they learned that Zelarra was actually dead and manifesting herself through her deck of Harrow cards. Armed with a powerful new ghost ally the group exited the fishery Lann had been hiding in to discover a city gone mad. Riots, fires, screaming and violence were rampant, with Hellknights invited inside the city to restore order and mounted griffin riders of the Korvosan Sable Company dropping from the sky like drunken flies shot by arrows or fireballs or whatever. The ailing King has finally died, and the foreign (and ill-thought of) Queen has ascended to the throne. A lot of people weren’t happy about this, apparently.

After a little stop at Johnny Ikea’s House of Furniture ‘N Thangs to sell off the goodies found in Lann’s horde, a nearby blacksmith and neighboring scroll and potion shops owned by elderly twin brothers, the group discovered that one of the items taken by Lann was a brooch belonging to the Queen, who is now sitting pretty on the throne (she’s pretty and she’s also sitting pretty so you see I sdkfj;lkjeriou). After Mr. Ikea informed them about the reward the players went forth, but the riot made journeying through the beleaguered city difficult at best. After being accosted by a group of miniature devils (and saved by a nearby pack of pseudodragons), being manhandled by a grimy crazy man and diffusing an escalating confrontation between a noble and a gang of disillusioned laborers, the PCs made it to the castle and sought an audience with the Queen.

Queen Ileosa expressed her gratitude and rewarded the party with a hefty coffer of gold, then asked if they would be willing to help out the Korvosan Guard in the city’s time of need. They accepted, and after talking to the officer in charge at the Citadel, were put up in a local inn and told to come back tomorrow. That evening, the players encountered a drunken guard, whom they dragged back to the Citadel after listening to him count his woes over several pints. After returning, they met the sell-sword Krox, a lovable guy who offered his services as a mighty warrior should the party require it (at a very reasonable rate). The PCs, who were without a strong front-line fighter, gladly accepted, and so they decided to meet over breakfast the following morning.

The next day the same Citadel officer told the party about a silver-tongued deserter, who had taken advantage of the chaos to lure a few fellow guards into his plans. Holed up in a previously deserted butcher shop, the group was giving out meat to the poor for free. What a great bunch of fellows! But as the group discovered not all was as it seemed, and in a series of intense encounters the group snuck through the back of the shop during normal business hours and were greeted with a great deal of hostility and boars. In the course of hacking their way through jerks and traitors and thoroughly demoralizing animals, the group found the leader, one dude whose name I don’t remember. It was a tough fight, but after a hard battle he surrendered and permitted himself to be carted back to the Citadel for interrogation. The party was given a pat on the head and told to wait for further instructions. Then they went back to the meat shop and discovered the dismembered remains of humanoids in the sewers underneath. What is going on?!? I DON’T KNOW AND NEITHER DO THEY! I guess we’ll have to wait and see!

Highlights of the Adventure:
Darzzo telling animals exactly what he thought of them
Alora using her claws and eliciting an audible groan from the entire table
Kali forgetting a favorable rule for firearms and still managing to blow a head or two clean off
Sumak helping Darzzo up over a five-foot fence and face-first into a pile of manure
Xia stabbing a lotta dudes, like three dudes
Krox being the best character ever created

I hope everyone had a decent time and is prepared for the next Pathfinder game, which will take place on September 17th. Excelsior!

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Call of Cthulhu – Dead Men Don’t Cry, They Only Go Insane (6/25)

Sunday, July 3rd, 2011

Last weekend was the first time in a very, very, very long time we’ve all gotten together for a good and proper p&p rpg, and what’s more it was Call of Cthulhu! We had a lot of fun, drank a lot of sugar, and even had a few special guest stars. Who were they? Well I’m glad you asked! Here was our rogue’s gallery:

Returning cast:

Bruce McPherson, Professor of Physics and Canes at Miskatonic U., played by Enoch
Johnny Ikea, Pilot with a Degree in Gastronomy (also Medicine), played by David
Harry Gallagher, Unstable Sergent in the U.S. Army, played by Kevin

New to the party were:

Micky “the Sticky” O’Houlihan, Former Boxing Champ and Currently Sort-Of Braindead, played by Justin
Salazzo Grizzlebee, Grizzled Forester with an Axe to Grind, played by Eric*
John Thompson, Merchant Banker and Dead-Eyed Wunderkind, played by Tony
Colin O’Shea, “Smooth” Talking Con-Man with a Heart of Bronze, played by Pedro*

* new failures

With this ragged group of players, we immediately set to work investi – oh, that’s right. Actually, since we couldn’t find anyone’s characters sheet we went to work recreating the existing characters to the best of our knowledge. Then we rolled the new dudes and everything worked out more or less for the best. I say “more or less” because in the grand scheme of things some damage was probably done but most of our investigators managed to get by with only severe cases of indefinite insanity, the breadth of which has yet to be determined. That’s what seeing a horde of the undead rise from their graves can do to a mind not carefully weaned on pop fiction since birth!

What we had was essentially an investigation centering around what appeared to be the sudden reanimation of a a man shot dead by a mob hitman. There were police officers, speakeasies, mobsters, more jazz musicians than an episode of The Cosby Show and even THE LIVING DEAD. How very exciting! Now let’s take a look at the catastrophe tally:

Pedro trying to brute-force negotiate with cop: 1
Pedro trying to brute-force negotiate with musician: 1
Two people (don’t remember who!) calling a Mr. Louis Armstrong’s manager and failing to talk their way past him: 2
Tony shooting an unarmed man: 1
Eric shooting an unarmed man: 1
Tony killing an unarmed man: 1
Kevin taking a ride on the insanity train and checking out early: 1
Unarmed (dead) man summoning an army of zombies: 100

Comedy of Errors Score: 107 – HILARIOUS

And then almost everyone got an indefinite insanity. Overall a good, if crowded, showing. That being the case, we are now finished with the tiny adventures in the core rulebook and will begin Tatters of the King after the next Pathfinder game. For which we will have to clear up some space because everyone seems agreed that seven players is far too many to run smoothly and efficiently. It’s gonna be tough.

As a bonus treat, we captured rare video footage of some nerd actually roleplaying Louie Armstrong (under great duress) on the phone with the investigators. He’s not worried about money; he just loves to help people!

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Pathfinder – (2/19) Curse of the Crimson Throne

Tuesday, February 15th, 2011

Game time is less than a week away! Holy Moses! One last update for you before we meet up, just to make sure everyone’s on the same page.

1) BACKSTORIES ARE IMPORTANT FOR THIS CAMPAIGN! You don’t need much, I keep saying this but I don’t think too many people have actually taken care of it yet. You can wait until the very last day if you want, but don’t expect me to work it into the story (because I won’t have the time). There is a Player’s Guide to the campaign we’re running which I will make available RIGHT HERE RIGHT HERE RIGHT HERE – download it, look it over, and at least go to the section on Character Traits so you know what we’re looking for. They give you sample stories to explain your connection to the Big Bad Guy this time around, with traits to go along with them. If you choose these stories/traits they will take up your one trait available, so if you want to have one of these stories and not choose the trait that’s fine. There are a lot of ways to tie yourself to this guy aside from what’s in the book so there’s no excuse!

2) We are nuking the last “adventure” (I invest that word with a great deal of scorn) we had, since it bore little to no relevance to this campaign. We could fit it in, but with people dropping in, out, and starting new characters, it just makes more sense to do it this way. We’ll go over gold totals before the game, but it’s of relatively little importance so don’t worry about it.

3) If everyone could bring around $4 for the first part of the campaign + the city guide that would be great. The guide was ~$12, the adventure was somewhere in the realm of $15-20. Anything over the cost of those two will be put towards future campaign books. If you decide you don’t want to keep playing you get your dollar back it’s that easy!

I hope to see everyone there on Saturday, and I hope we all have a good time. Going to aim for around a 2 PM start time. Please show up and be fed by 2 PM! PARTY ON

Downloads:

Curse of the Crimson Throne Player’s Guide

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Pathfinder: Heroes of Nirmathas

Friday, February 4th, 2011

This is it, guys!  This is the beginning of our campaign with our new characters and my first game as a DM.  Hopefully, this won’t be the last.  The stage is set for this Saturday afternoon (February 5th) and it probably won’t end until later in the evening.  This post will serve as a last minute FAQ for anybody who wants to participate.  I actually meant to post this up on Tuesday but I got really busy.  Oh well.

What the hell is Pathfinder?
Pathfinder is a pen and paper RPG that split off from Dungeons and Dragon after the 4th edition came out.  It’s essentially Dungeons and Dragons 3.75 or what 3.5 should have been.

Wait, isn’t DnD like really nerdy?  Why should I care?
Well, I can’t really change your mind if you think the game is too “nerdy” for you.  If you don’t want to play then that’s cool.  I will ask that you refrain from passing any judgement until you’ve actually played a game or two yourself.  Personally, I’ve always wanted to play a pen and paper RPG like this for a while.  Until recently, there wasn’t really enough interest to justify learning the rules and going through the long process of making a character.  But now, thanks to Arkham Horror and Call of Cthuhlu, we can finally play a proper pen and paper RPG.  Exciting, isn’t it?

Okay, you’ve convinced me! I’ll meet up at your hou…
Whoa whoa whoa!  You’re going way too fast.  First, before you can play, you need to make some preparations of your own.  These preparations are for the benefit for the whole group.  There’s nothing more tedious than stopping a game in the middle of combat because somebody didn’t understand how attacks of opportunity work.  That said, you don’t have to read EVERYTHING since it is a lot to go through in one day.  Everything you need to know are available at this website: http://www.d20pfsrd.com/

That’s a lot of shit.  Where do I start first?
You don’t have to go through everything but you need to at least read the combat rules.  I can’t stress this enough.  You must read the entire combat section.  Some of it might sound confusing and that’s okay.  We can clarify everything once the game starts but you must at least know the basic concepts.  Then after that, if you have time, read the additional rules.  If you’re going to be a caster, read the magic section as well.  When you think you got the basics down, then it’s time to make your class.  Read this page and follow it step by step.  Contact me if you need help.  You can even bring over a partially created character and we can finish him/her off real quick.  Just make sure you know what you want before you come.   If you want, you can even create a back story for your character.

Hey, none of these questions applies to me!  I already know what I’m doing!  Tell me what do I need to know for this game?
Since this is my first game DMing, we will be running a module.  Let me warn you, though, that this module isn’t very sandbox friendly.  So, please bare with me.  For this particular game, I will allow one trait if you provide a back story that explains why you have the trait.  The first game will take place in a small town called Kassen.  It’s in Nirmathas.  A long time ago, a raider (Asar) kept attacking the town for two months until the town’s founder (Ekat Kassen) stepped in and killed the raider.  Unfortunately, Kassen was mortally wounded and died two days later.  To honor his death, the townfolks built a crypt for Kassen and with an eternal flame hanging over his sarcophagus.  It has become a tradition to journey to the crypt every year, now.  Adventurers must light a lantern using the everflame and bring it back to town, where a huge festival awaits.

Is that it?
There’s a lot of information that I’m sure that I’m missing.  In any case, if you have any questions, feel free to IM me and I’ll help you out if I can.  Again, this game is taking place this Saturday.  Please show up on time.  Thanks.

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Pathfinder (2/19) – banishing Moon Apes since 2011

Thursday, February 3rd, 2011

Here’s some new information which will hopefully meet your Pathfinder needs! Also I need to make an announcement:
If you don’t show up for the 2/19 game, you’re out of the group. No hard feelings, we just need everyone there to get started on the campaign proper. There’s always next time (or other people’s games).

1) In addition to utilizing the Ultimate Combat playtest, we’ll also be including the Ultimate Magic playtest! That means more butterscotch for everyone, in addition to a new character class (The Magus) and a new style of play for casters (Words of Power mages). They’ll be linked below, or you can download them for free from Paizo’s website so why not!

2) I’ve got a nice, big map of Golarion here for you, along with a link to the Gazetteer, a nice pocket-sized version of the Campaign Setting. If you’d like to check out the Campaign Setting book, which is a slightly heftier download, by all means; there is a lot more information on races and nations. Get in touch with me and I’ll send it to you!

3) Stats are being re-balanced. In the future I’m planning to utilize a point-buy system to hit a sweet spot between players having control over their characters without making them way overpowered and difficult to balance. If people want to re-do their stats this way, that’s fine (I’ll take a vote sometime in the next week or two); if not, the rule is to take your stats BEFORE your racial modifier and add them up. The total needs to be between 80 and 85. If you currently surpass this, you’ll need to lower them suitably, and across the board. No lowering your least-used stat to 3 and keeping everything else topped off. I’ll take a look at everyone’s dudes way before playtime and make sure we’re all on the same page. I’m not too worried about it.

Links:
Map of Golarion
Pathfinder Chronicles – Gazetteer
Pathfinder Chronicles – Gods and Magic
Ultimate Magic – Words of Power
Ultimate Magic – Magus

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Pathfinder: Seek Your Path Down the Trail Which Led You Here to Find the Truth (February 19th is GAME TIME)

Thursday, January 27th, 2011


Okay here are some changes to the game for next time:

1) Traits are IN. Go HERE to look up what you have available. One per person so don’t get too crazy. Anything is open to you, more or less, with the caveat that you must work it into your backstory. Which reminds me,

2) Backstories, while not mandatory, help both the DM (that’s me) and you (that’s you) understand and work with your character. It’s a lot easier to remember your character’s alignment and particulars of their personality when you have a source to draw such things from, instead of the nebulous ‘well I’m Lawful Good but not really in a high-handed douchebag way.”

You’re free to not write a backstory if you really don’t want to, but then you won’t get a trait (and everyone else is going to make one so just make one alright). It doesn’t have to be long or really detailed; a paragraph or two will be more than sufficient. Check out the geography of the Pathfinder world HERE to start checking out countries and what have you for your chosen race. You may want to wait until I figure out where this campaign is going to be set so you can figure out how you got there, or you can jump right in and start building it now. It’s seriously not hard.

3) Most of you already know this, but I will be allowing use of the Ultimate Combat Guide (I think that’s what it’s called) beta, which includes three new classes (Gunslinger, Ninja and Samurai) to choose from. Go HERE to check it out and see what’s what! I would think if you want to choose either Samurai or Ninja you’d have to be from Tian (basically another continent which is Asia) but I’m always open to changing or breaking rules if you can provide a good backstory and logical reasoning so there you go!

4) Remember that, after last time, you can change essentially any part of your character you’re not happy about. Talk to me about it first so I can make sure it gels with everyone else and that it’s OK but aside from that it’s pretty much Open Season. If you’ve taken some more time to peruse the kits, or you don’t like your feats, or whatever, just tell me what you want to do and we’ll try to get it done.

Either get in touch via the usual methods OR just comment below! My Goodness that’s so handy and easy and convenient now there’s absolutely no reason not to wait until the last minute for things!

Handy links you may need to refer to again:

Character Traits
The World of Golarian
Ultimate Combat Playtest <– this is passworded ask me for the password if you don’t already know it! or anyone else on puppyrush because they all know it!

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