Piratecat
Sesquipedalian
Riastlin, klofft, thanks!
We played last night. It was a weird game, where I was mostly DMing from a higher level: "there's no way they can retaliate if you're attacking from the tower with ranged weapons. You have to chase the last few down, but you're able to do so. Everyone lose a healing surge," instead of playing out the fight, and "she tells you that things haven't been great," instead of roleplaying it out. That's unusual for me. I'm not sure if I was tired and un-caffeinated, or just not firing on all cylinders. I always try to make every game the Best Game Ever. This one? Not so much.
That said, things have gone to hell in Capria. The now-dead Commander Reymus's plans seem to be carried to fruition. The PCs have a plethora of choices in front of them, each of which I have an adventure roughed out for, and what they don't do right away probably matters as much as what they DO do. Luckily, they have allies as well. And as I type those words, I think I may let the players create alternative PCs, and I'll run one or two side adventures where Grey Guard members try to tackle some of these other tasks. Hmm. Interesting idea.
One interesting fight last night: Cobalt, Sagiro's rogue, got in a single combat with a clath when he gazed into a mirror reflecting a mirror inside the witchwater tower. He did 170 pts of damage in 3 rounds entirely by himself. It was a blast to see.
The other mechanical item of interest is what optimized diplomacy can do. I had set-up a no-win situation where the PCs were going to have to kill "innocent" townsfolk who were infected by clath. Instead, they managed to knock them out and actually figure out how to cure (most of) them, AND convinced a widow that they needed to do an autopsy on her husband, AND managed to leave without leaving any ill will behind. Repeated DC 40 diplomacy checks will do that. Their plan for defeating the clath is a fascinating one: since clath apparently rely on mirrors to propagate, they're discussing spreading a rumor across the empire that all mirrors must be covered until a new emperor is chosen. Dunno if it'll work, but it's an unusual tactic. They're hacking my world with social engineering.
In the Merchant Prince game, the PCs are doing a ludicrously good job of beating up anything I send against them. This is aided by a new PC, the brand new elemental sorcerer. Very high damage (23-35 points with a basic attack) and far fewer choices each round. I like the simplicity and effectiveness. We'll see how the player feels in a few weeks.
We played last night. It was a weird game, where I was mostly DMing from a higher level: "there's no way they can retaliate if you're attacking from the tower with ranged weapons. You have to chase the last few down, but you're able to do so. Everyone lose a healing surge," instead of playing out the fight, and "she tells you that things haven't been great," instead of roleplaying it out. That's unusual for me. I'm not sure if I was tired and un-caffeinated, or just not firing on all cylinders. I always try to make every game the Best Game Ever. This one? Not so much.
That said, things have gone to hell in Capria. The now-dead Commander Reymus's plans seem to be carried to fruition. The PCs have a plethora of choices in front of them, each of which I have an adventure roughed out for, and what they don't do right away probably matters as much as what they DO do. Luckily, they have allies as well. And as I type those words, I think I may let the players create alternative PCs, and I'll run one or two side adventures where Grey Guard members try to tackle some of these other tasks. Hmm. Interesting idea.
One interesting fight last night: Cobalt, Sagiro's rogue, got in a single combat with a clath when he gazed into a mirror reflecting a mirror inside the witchwater tower. He did 170 pts of damage in 3 rounds entirely by himself. It was a blast to see.
The other mechanical item of interest is what optimized diplomacy can do. I had set-up a no-win situation where the PCs were going to have to kill "innocent" townsfolk who were infected by clath. Instead, they managed to knock them out and actually figure out how to cure (most of) them, AND convinced a widow that they needed to do an autopsy on her husband, AND managed to leave without leaving any ill will behind. Repeated DC 40 diplomacy checks will do that. Their plan for defeating the clath is a fascinating one: since clath apparently rely on mirrors to propagate, they're discussing spreading a rumor across the empire that all mirrors must be covered until a new emperor is chosen. Dunno if it'll work, but it's an unusual tactic. They're hacking my world with social engineering.
In the Merchant Prince game, the PCs are doing a ludicrously good job of beating up anything I send against them. This is aided by a new PC, the brand new elemental sorcerer. Very high damage (23-35 points with a basic attack) and far fewer choices each round. I like the simplicity and effectiveness. We'll see how the player feels in a few weeks.
