The Rod of Seven Parts: Kauai Team OOC
CanadienneBacon
Explorer
The table really didn't stand a chance when pit against the large spider.
It's supper time here. I'll check back in here and will be glad to address concerns in two hours' time, but unfortunately until then I've got to go take care of my children, feed them supper then draw baths and tuck them in for the night. If something is really bothering anyone about the last rounds of combat, now would be a good time to speak up.
It's supper time here. I'll check back in here and will be glad to address concerns in two hours' time, but unfortunately until then I've got to go take care of my children, feed them supper then draw baths and tuck them in for the night. If something is really bothering anyone about the last rounds of combat, now would be a good time to speak up.
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CanadienneBacon
Explorer
It looks like I forgot to address the question regarding where the cockatrice coop is. It's in the courtyard. A bit of the courtyard got cut off during my map making endeavor. Since no one had been interacting with the cockatrices (pl. cockatrice ?), I left off pinpointing the coop.
The cockatrice coop: "A low, stout enclosure made from whitewashed timbers and wrought iron bars stands in the courtyard, surrounded by a neatly trimmed edge of lawn. There are four large fowl inside. They look to be hens, and the cage reeks with the odor of live poultry. The hens' long tails and wicked eyes, however, suggest something sinister. An astonishingly lifelike statue of a drunken man poking his finger through the bars indicates that these particular fowl might be best left alone."
The cockatrice coop: "A low, stout enclosure made from whitewashed timbers and wrought iron bars stands in the courtyard, surrounded by a neatly trimmed edge of lawn. There are four large fowl inside. They look to be hens, and the cage reeks with the odor of live poultry. The hens' long tails and wicked eyes, however, suggest something sinister. An astonishingly lifelike statue of a drunken man poking his finger through the bars indicates that these particular fowl might be best left alone."
Strahd_Von_Zarovich
First Post
Voadam said:
And I'm using Hebrew as Celestial.
Ambrus
Explorer
So Maelicent got pinned beneath the collapsing table rather than the wolf-spider?CanadienneBacon said:
I'm still unclear how the creature managed to strike, knock prone, disarm and pin Maelicent in a single round while also moving and taking a swipe at pilgrim.CanadienneBacon said:
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Strahd_Von_Zarovich
First Post
Full attack with Eight limbsAmbrus said:I'm still unclear how the creature managed to strike, knock prone, disarm and pin Maelicent in a single round while also moving and taking a swipe at pilgrim.
CanadienneBacon
Explorer
I think maybe you're trying to dissect it a little bit too severely.
The spider tried to jump. When it did, it incurred an AoO for its movement. Pilgrim hit it, causing the spider to miss its jump. Since Pilgrim also had a readied action, he took his stated action at that time. The spider "fell." It fell on top of Maelicent (and the table from which he was sniping).
In thinking about how things ought to go, it made good sense to me that if a very large and very heavy spider fell on top of you, you would probably suffer a wee bit of damage from it and you would probably also drop whatever item you were holding. The bow is not broken. Maelicent is dirty and suffered 1 hp of damage but is otherwise out of the mess. Will this description satisfy every rule contained within the PHB? I'm certain it will not. Does it provide a possibly interesting character enrichment environment? I'm certain it does. Maelicent is a well-written character and I personally cooked up my computer this morning just to read his reaction to the whole mess.
The spider tried to jump. When it did, it incurred an AoO for its movement. Pilgrim hit it, causing the spider to miss its jump. Since Pilgrim also had a readied action, he took his stated action at that time. The spider "fell." It fell on top of Maelicent (and the table from which he was sniping).
In thinking about how things ought to go, it made good sense to me that if a very large and very heavy spider fell on top of you, you would probably suffer a wee bit of damage from it and you would probably also drop whatever item you were holding. The bow is not broken. Maelicent is dirty and suffered 1 hp of damage but is otherwise out of the mess. Will this description satisfy every rule contained within the PHB? I'm certain it will not. Does it provide a possibly interesting character enrichment environment? I'm certain it does. Maelicent is a well-written character and I personally cooked up my computer this morning just to read his reaction to the whole mess.
Ambrus
Explorer
I appreciate your fondness for the character and I can appreciate your desire to describe combat in a dynamic and creative manner, but I'd like to point out a few things. This wolf-spider accomplished more by accident in a move-equivalent action than it or its brethren did in any deliberate actions during the previous rounds. One of the wolf-spiders managed to web Pilgrim once and I believe each one bit a character once. This one managed to injure, trip, disarm and pin an opponent simultaneously during a move action. Its mishap proved to be a better tactic than most of its deliberate attacks. The wolf-spider itself, in turn, didn't seem to be terribly inconvenienced by unexpectedly falling onto a collapsing table; it managed to follow up with an attack against poor Pilgrim.
Considering Maelicent's decent AC and the wolf-spider's failure to hit an unarmored kobold, I suspect that if it had had to roll an attack roll to attempt to accomplish something similar against the goblin that it would likely have missed. Likewise, if Maelicent had been allowed a Reflex save to leap clear of the falling wolf-spider I think he'd have had a good chance of succeeding. Just as you can imagine Maelicent getting hurt and dropping his weapon when the wolf-spider fell upon him, I can imagine the goblin rolling to safety first. The rules are written as they are so neither of us gets carried away with our imaginings to the detriment of the other players' fun.
Please don't get me wrong; loosing a round of actions and a hit point isn't that big a deal (though it could have been if the wolf-spider had attacked Maelicent instead of Pilgrim or had remained alive itself). It's just that I worry when opponents accomplish more (far in excess of what would be possible if using the RAW) by mistake then with their deliberate actions. Please just think about it.
Considering Maelicent's decent AC and the wolf-spider's failure to hit an unarmored kobold, I suspect that if it had had to roll an attack roll to attempt to accomplish something similar against the goblin that it would likely have missed. Likewise, if Maelicent had been allowed a Reflex save to leap clear of the falling wolf-spider I think he'd have had a good chance of succeeding. Just as you can imagine Maelicent getting hurt and dropping his weapon when the wolf-spider fell upon him, I can imagine the goblin rolling to safety first. The rules are written as they are so neither of us gets carried away with our imaginings to the detriment of the other players' fun.
Please don't get me wrong; loosing a round of actions and a hit point isn't that big a deal (though it could have been if the wolf-spider had attacked Maelicent instead of Pilgrim or had remained alive itself). It's just that I worry when opponents accomplish more (far in excess of what would be possible if using the RAW) by mistake then with their deliberate actions. Please just think about it.
CanadienneBacon
Explorer
I welcome your feedback, as it will help me improve future combat rounds. I'm appreciative of the fact that without you being here to game in person at my elbow, you don't benefit from knowing what all I might be rolling behind the scenes. Maelicent got but failed his save to move out of the way. As for the vagaries of the dice, I am rolling by hand at home and am using what I roll to adjudicate combat. A foe can pump up his AC to a decent level but if I roll high for a player's attack, the foe's painstaking efforts to jack up his AC won't matter worth two beans. The same applies in reverse for foes' attacks on players; your character does have a good AC, but sometimes the foe just gets lucky. While it's not my style to use or link to invisible castle rolls, I can work on tweaking my descriptive language to make it more evident to players when and what I am rolling. It tooks me about 90 minutes to work up each round of combat. I work from home and have four children milling about my house who require attention...I basically look for any way I can to shave off time from how long it takes me to provide combat posts. I see others using invisible castle, but the extra time it takes to use that service then link to it is a killer for me. Real, physical dice are faster and more convenient, so that's what I use. Having players who trust their DM is critical to the success of this game, and I certainly am willing to work for yours. I will sometimes fudge die rolls in increase the likelihood that things turn out a certain way. Did I do that here? No. Would I ever do it even though I know it's going to utterly screw over a character? No. Your characters are the life of the game. If you die, there's no game. If players leave due to discontent, there's no game.
Recounting the actions in the IC, I was overgenerous with movment and attacks on behalf of the party vice the monsters, and by a large margin. I had actually been hoping that no one would realize the encounter came out tipped in your favor, because oftentimes such realizations spoil one's willing suspension of disbelief. That you think it's the opposite (that in one instance the spider managed to disarm and damage your character) tells me that you're viewing the combat through a lens of how it affects your character. I don't mean that rudely, but in hindsight I do see that you're definitely disappointed with my desicions and description. The long and short of it is that the spider's attempt to jump was the cause of its rather abbreviated death. In my opinion, the spider kinda came out on the short end of the stick on that one.
edit: I'll be around if you want to continue hashing this out, but off and on throughout the day. Please don't feel that I'm ignoring the situation if I don't immediately reply. I did also want to chip in that I think the real issue here is that the players and I are establishing trust. Counting up who got what attack, when, and where is kind of fruitless as it addresses a symptom of a problem and not the root cause of the issue at hand, which is trust. I'll need yours if we want this game to function, and I'm willing to earn it by trying to think in the future how things look from the player perspective and seeing if I can somehow clean up description to supply you with the information you need. I'll need for you to go with the flow a little bit so that you can see me establish a pattern of not screwing your character over.
Recounting the actions in the IC, I was overgenerous with movment and attacks on behalf of the party vice the monsters, and by a large margin. I had actually been hoping that no one would realize the encounter came out tipped in your favor, because oftentimes such realizations spoil one's willing suspension of disbelief. That you think it's the opposite (that in one instance the spider managed to disarm and damage your character) tells me that you're viewing the combat through a lens of how it affects your character. I don't mean that rudely, but in hindsight I do see that you're definitely disappointed with my desicions and description. The long and short of it is that the spider's attempt to jump was the cause of its rather abbreviated death. In my opinion, the spider kinda came out on the short end of the stick on that one.
edit: I'll be around if you want to continue hashing this out, but off and on throughout the day. Please don't feel that I'm ignoring the situation if I don't immediately reply. I did also want to chip in that I think the real issue here is that the players and I are establishing trust. Counting up who got what attack, when, and where is kind of fruitless as it addresses a symptom of a problem and not the root cause of the issue at hand, which is trust. I'll need yours if we want this game to function, and I'm willing to earn it by trying to think in the future how things look from the player perspective and seeing if I can somehow clean up description to supply you with the information you need. I'll need for you to go with the flow a little bit so that you can see me establish a pattern of not screwing your character over.
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