Finished! Items always take me forever because I'm not quite satisfied.. left some gold on the table this time as well, but practice makes perfect.

I'm normally a big proponent of out of combat healing efficiency (wand of cure and all that) but I suspect we don't need to focus on it for this campaign. If anyone has Poison Use, please let me know, I can supply a fairly large amount of dex/stagger/sicken poison between myself and my plant familiar Haru;

Poison variety and strength will continue to escalate for as long as Uluchi is alive.

Sandydale looks sideways and mumbles something under his breath.

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Spoiler text: (Highlight or hover over the text to view)
Current heal ability if needed.  Group heal 8d6+4.  Direct heal 7d8+28.  Strange direct heal 3d6+12
But that takes all my spells.

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LOL

If you can heal that much...I may not even bother to be honest? I could just rework my sheet into being more of a front-line pally altogether! xD

No I need you stay as you are.
The reason is level 5 and 6 my healing will not increase at all.
So I will need your help at that level.

Also uses all my spells and I need 1-2 for other things really.
This message was last edited by the player at 14:10, Thu 28 Apr 2022.

Veana I think your build will be like that anyways or at least if it is like the Oradins I have made.

It just doesn't seem like we would need THAT much healing to be honest...plus with just a simple Paladin I can still use Lay On Hands for extra heal support as necessary, without the need for multi-classing...so I may just go that route. Plus, I think folks have made some good points here about the out-of-combat healing, so I'm just rethinking my build a bit so its more useful overall :)

Your Heal Skill trick is very neat! More importantly, super-duper FREE of spending resources.
Not to mention that Gorum said it'll be battles.

Not necessarily something like in modern MMOs where bosses are conveniently easy to beat as long as you don't fall asleep on your game. ;)

We can have gauntlet-run with something like Tucker's Kobolds, for example. Low-pay, high-risk mission where loot is awful, enemies organized and prepared.

Then in missions where battle-attrition is a serious concern? Excessive amounts of available healing would be a blessing. Especially if we can't rest and recover during such a protracted battle scenario.

Imagine facing Dire Giant Ant nest. Where Queen is possessed by someone SMART and capable of tactics!

In general, the fights I have planned are going to be less "protracted battles of attrition" than "frantic battles for survival."  Though the idea of a longer gauntlet or siege-style battle is interesting, too.

And speaking of kobolds: The first encounter has begun!

A few things I didn't mention in the rules section before, but probably should have: For the most part, the enemy's defensive stats like AC, saves, etc, are going to be publicly listed, so that you won't have to wait for confirmation from me if a hit lands or an enemy drops, etc.  When you target an enemy with a spell, you'll roll the saving throw for them to see if it works.  Similarly, I'll roll for you when you get targeted by a spell.  There will still be things that happen out of turn order, like immediate actions, AoOs, etc.  I'll try to mention these as they come up, but there will probably wind up being a little "retconning" from time to time.

Also, if someone doesn't post their action within 72 hours of the last DM turn, I may run that character on "autopilot" for the turn.  Generally, this will involve the character taking a simple, conservative action, like attacking the nearest enemy or healing the nearest ally.  If there's a reason you can't post earlier (Either IRL reasons, or you're waiting for some in-game information,) let me know and I'll wait a bit longer.
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:10, Fri 29 Apr 2022.

In reply to Gorum (msg # 56):

Will do, Gorum! You don't mind if I sometimes call you Dungeon Master or DM? It's for ease of reference.

Will post character actions in the evening, gotta go to work.

Thanks for all the input guys. I decided to drop the multiclassing and just stick with Paladin. My archetype gets rid of spellcasting--but we already have a lot of casters in the group anyway--and replaces it with some interesting support abilities that adds more versatility to my Lay On Hands. I think overall that will be a more interesting thing for Veana and like I said, I can still help some with healing via my Lay On Hands ability. I did take the Greater Mercy feat, so as long as I'm healing someone that isn't Fatigued via Lay On Hands, I can heal them for an additional +1d6. At later levels, my archetype ability will allow me to grant some Morale bonuses to AC, attack rolls, damage and on saves vs fear effects, so that will be neat. Later on there's an effect that works similar to Lesser Restoration too, so I'll still have some healing ability, just a different flavor of it ;-)

That sounds perfect, Veana.

I would desire to petition Gorum to indicate that 'talking isn't free action!' unless it's a short one word sentence.

Apologies to everyone but it bugs me horribly. I always hit my Players with penalties if their characters chatted AND did other things simultaneously.

Sorry for ranting.

And good choices, Veana. I also get headaches from excessive multiclassing. When unneeded for desired Prestige Class, that is.

That's a fair point Puck! Although, we aren't in the thick of things just yet! But I get what you are saying. A round of combat is 6 seconds, which is not a lot of time to say much unless you are just focusing on pontificating rather than stabbing things with your sword/casting fireball/etc...

We are within hearing range. And if we can hear them? Tiny people with smaller voices? They ought to be rolling those Perception/Listen checks on us right now.

 And why I did suggest smoking the, potentially kobolds, from the cave with a campfire (and lots of smoke created by wet wood)?

I am not very keen on charging into a cave full of, my paranoia claims, prepared kobolds with crossbows ready to pincushion us. Or, to be more honest, into any cave with kobolds.

Why? Kobold caves tend to be small person sized. And while my Character is short-ish, he is still a medium sized person.

Plus kobolds equals with traps. I dislike falling into traps. Or running into people ready to shot me. Or stab me, with the kobold spearmen.

If Gorum set it on standard CR encounter with only Kobolds? I dun wanna be shot by ~16 little assholes with poisoned crossbow bolts?

My opinion is more or less the opposite; we are -only- going to be combat in this campaign. If we hobble our talking we wont be talking at all.

I do take your point to not be exchanging paragraphs or monologues, but i'd rather rule of cool and have some quips and thoughts rather than silent grunting.

As far as perception checks go; yep! Talking has risks inherent; but so does our movement. We only have so long before they'll be alerted and combat begins in earnest.

Speculation and decision paralysis is a rabbit hole I'd rather not get into without some information about the lay-out. Hopefully the interior of the cave is not setup like a castle designed to repel sieging armies, but we shall see :P

My views on the matter are very close to Uluchi's. Especially in play-by-post formats, I think it is best to err on the side of allowing more talking rather than less. As long as people don't go overboard, I am definitely willing to overlook a bit of "conversation length that is impractical for the amount of time allotted." Maybe speed-talking is a common trait among adventurers.

-I mostly went with Gorum because naming myself "Gamemaster" feels a bit impersonal, and Gorum seemed like a fitting patron for a game like this.  Feel free to call me whatever you want, though.

-Talking IS a free action.  It's not necessarily good for stealth checks, but in a situation like this we can assume people are whispering to each other.

Game Master is from not-D&D little kiddies of RPGs. :P

I use Dungeon Master term, although some of my Players liked to annoy me with the "Gummibears" Toady voice acting. Sadly I promised to not sic werewolves at them for being annoying, since Characters were innocent in this, guh it was so annoying.

Thus I kind of know the point from wich you come out of.

Lastly I checked and must apologize to every other Player. It's my first time with Hunter and I forgot to put on an Feral Aspect. Whelp. There goes +2 Dexterity buff.

Live and learn, no? If nothing happens next round I'll activate the Cat Aspect.^^

Thanks for the buff Snadydale. Puck would probably cat-hiss at you, but he is stealthy now. ;)

@Puck: We're not playing Dungeons and Dragons right now, old man.  But feel free to call me whatever you want.  It will have no effect on the number of werewolves I sic on you.

@Sandydale: Sorry, but your turn is illegal as written.  Buck already moved before you posted, so you couldn't reach him to cast guidance. I'll let you edit your last turn, either to cast guidance on yourself, or to follow Buck and cast it on him.

Also, and I should have clarified this earlier: the greenery in the outdoors part of the map are large, coniferous trees, which block movement and line of sight.  If you guys want to keep back from the cave, I can extend the area above the current map so you have more space: However, it won't be pretty because that's as far as the map goes, and it's all going to be pretty dense forest anyways.
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:08, Sun 01 May 2022.

@ Gorum: No problem.  Not my fault the party is running around like headless chickens and may take a  few combat encounters to fall into a attack plan.

@Puck: First have you Puck'ed on this sight before (ie played a character called puck with that picture?)  Second what was your first one?  For Me!  it was a little red box with a red dragon on his treasure on it, two red books and d20 dice you filled the numbers in with a crayon.  Yup I am as GM put it, an old man.

@ Party: I sorry but I think Sandydale is developing into a borderline sadomasochist.  Which is a new one for me.  He CG and this is not a M or A game so it will be light-hearted background rp I promise.
This message was last edited by the player at 10:43, Sun 01 May 2022.

I started with "homebrewed" system, called Crystals of Time, that was first system introduced in my country of origin back in nineties alongside first, and last, RPG magazine called "Magic and Sword". It died around 2000+ if memory serves.
My introduction to D&D was AD&D2ed, then Birthright:Gorgon's Crown videogame. I returned to D&D with the introduction of 3ed.

And i don't mind being called old man as well. :)

The name of my elf savage/redneck? From Shakespear AND that old "Legend" movie with young Tom Cruise and fairy boi called Puck inside.

Fret not, my Puck will probably not understand. Even after Sesa explains to him in small words.
He'll label it under "Not-Tribe-almost-people be crazy, yo" mental folder.

Hi everyone. I've got an announcement to make:  Sandydale's player will no longer be with us.  For a variety of reasons, I just felt he wasn't a good fit for the game.  Fortunately, we had another player interested in the game, and he'll be taking over Sandy's character for this first fight.

Hey all!

I'm the guy taking over Sandydale for the time being. Nice to meet you!

Welcome new Sandydale!

Welcome!!