[ooc] - Dogville - a bloody 3.5 game [5/5]

[doghead]

ooc - dogville

WB. Not sure how to handle Kaddok's wolf. Appart from a couple of minutes a day, the cleric doesn't have any control over it. Or am I missing something?

The bolas seem fine. Interesting actually.

doghead
aka thotd

 

[Walking Dad]

ooc - dogville

WB. Not sure how to handle Kaddok's wolf. Appart from a couple of minutes a day, the cleric doesn't have any control over it. Or am I missing something?

The bolas seem fine. Interesting actually.

doghead
aka thotd

From the pathfinder rules (also on Kaddoks sheet):

1st Summon Companion (Su): As a standard action, you can
summon one animal to aid you as per summon nature's ally I.
The creature remains until you dismiss it and you can never
have more than one such creature in your service at one time.
Once the creature dies or is dismissed, you must wait 1 hour
before summoning another. At 6th level, and every four levels
thereafter, you may summon a more powerful companion,
increasing the summon nature's ally spell by 1 (II at 6th level, III
at 10th, IV at 14th, and V at 18th).

I don't really know. The bolded text could mean, that there is no maximum duration. Don't forget the other 1st level domain abilities are at will without "cool down". It is also fairly weak on higher levels.

The other boded texts suggest this, too. "never more than one" "wait 1 hour" on an effect measured in rounds?

 

[doghead]

ooc - dogville

WD, I get the undefined duration. It lasts until dismissed or killed. The couple of minutes came from the duration of the Speak with animals ability. I don't have a problem with the duration of the animal companion ability. Just not sure how the companion is supposed to work in game outside combat.

The question I had came from the Summon Nature's Ally aspect -

This spell summons a natural creature. It appears where you designate and acts immediately, on your turn. It attacks your opponents to the best of its ability. If you can communicate with the creature, you can direct it not to attack, to attack particular enemies, or to perform other actions.

So basically, it attacks your opponents. And when there are no opponents? What does it do? Apart from once per day, and for a couple of minutes, Kaddok has no control over the animal as far as I can see.

Which seems to limit its usefulness as a long term companion in the manner of a druid's animal companion or a trained animal. I was just wondering if this had been addressed somewhere like in the source material (Complete Champion?)

I like animal companions. A number of my characters have had war dogs. So I would like to find a workable solution. One way would be to allow the animal to be treated as trained, like a war dog. Giving commands to a trained animal is a std action requiring DC10 Handle Animal rolls. Making it an automatic success seems to be moving towards making more of the ability than was intended or is perhaps fair. One way to balance this may be to limit the learning of tricks to one per day/week etc.

Anyone got any thoughts?

doghead
aka thotd

doghead
aka thotd

 

[Walking Dad]

My intent was to use it as a combat summoning. Perhaps a little spying, when I can use the speak ability twice a day (first giving orders, second time get the report).
Your handle animal idea seems fine, but I already used my human bonus skill for survival (and not for acrobatics or perception, what would have been my gamist choice ) and the 2+ Int leaves not much room to learn an additional cross-class skill.

Edit: My signaling the enemy was mostly fluff (It attacks your opponents to the best of its ability.). I will dismiss the wolf after the fight.

We shouldn't focus to much at the rules. Or I ask on what object Voda used the darkness ability (Target: Object touched)

 

[Voda Vosa]

You would laugh, as I did, if you knew what bolas means in Spanish.

 

[doghead]

ooc - dogville

WD - using it as a combat summoning creature largely sorts the problem. I had the feeling that you wanted it as a persistent companion, and so wanted to find a way to make that work. On Speak with Animals, I read once per day per two levels as meaning Kaddok could use it once as he is level 2.

Voda - Darkness, ... that reminds me of something. I need the crunchy bits for abilities, spells etc - damage, range, duration, area of effect. I am not familiar with many of the character abilities being used. Voda, also give me AC in posts. Very useful is AC.

Everyone - the wagons are still moving. I wasn't really clear on that I realise, looking back over my posts. Not fast, just 20 - 30 ft. per round, double move for bullocks.

doghead
aka thotd

 

[Walking Dad]

ooc - dogville

WD - using it as a combat summoning creature largely sorts the problem. I had the feeling that you wanted it as a persistent companion, and so wanted to find a way to make that work. On Speak with Animals, I read once per day per two levels as meaning Kaddok could use it once as he is level 2.

...
doghead
aka thotd

Yes, once at level 2.

Perhaps a little spying, when I can use the speak ability twice a day (first giving orders, second time get the report).

I meant "when" = "later". Sorry.

BTW: A persistent companion would be nice, but is very difficult with a cleric (not the right skills, or enough). Perhaps I retrain later as a druid

Edit:@doghead: Are some goblins already down? Or are they only wounded?

I have changed my chain shirt to Hide shirt. It is light armor!
[sblock]James Jacobs (Editor-in-Chief, Pathfinder), Sat, Sep 1, 2007, 12:06 AM
Go L 68 Fiendish Tyrannosauru avatar

rward30 wrote:

Hit a question with this item from the RotRLPG: Hide Shirt. In the description it says that it is light armor, but on the chart, it's listed as medium. I'd assume that the description is correct with it as a light. Then again, it is an additional +1 to the standard hide armor AC and other stats the same (excepting movement), so it could work be medium (with an error on the move rate.) Any ideas on this one?


Hide shirts are light armor.

They are, pretty much in every way, better than hide armor. This is intentional, and sort of an experiment I wanted to try. The image of a barbarian wearing hide armor is iconic, yet the way hide armor works in the PHB means that few barbarians will ever wear it since it's medium armor and slows them down. Since we're no longer doing stuff that's official D&D... that actually opens up a lot of room to try to "fix" things that we think need fixing now and then. Hide armor is one of them.

Of course... then we had to go and mislabel it. Which made me say all sorts of words that these messageboards would censor if I wrote them.

http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboard...lords/burntOfferingsClarificationsGMReference[/sblock]

 

[doghead]

ooc - dogville

WD - I think we can come up with something a little less drastic than having to class dip just for an animal companion. The summoned animal is a divine blessing of a sort. Perhaps a feat? If you have any suggestions, feel free to throw them in. I haven't read all of the deity/domain stuff closely.

Not fussed about the hide shirt thing.

The goblins all appear to be functioning. IC - the characters are experienced enough to know that it takes more than a few blows to kill even goblins. OOC - I have done something similar for the NPC's as to for the PC's. Little creatures are not so tough, but look out for the big ones

Constitution: Maximum hit points for 1st level plus your
Constitution score and any other bonuses.

I'm actually thinking this system is a bit generous. If I was to do it again, I would probably change it to Constitution score for first level, then class hp + relevant bonuses from 2nd level. In meta-game terms, this still moves most characters up out of the danger zone less than 8 hp (one good hit and it all over red rover). In game terms, at first level characters have barely begun their lives as fighter, clerics, wizards, etc. So their survivability is determined more by their inherent toughness (Con score) than their class. I would also probably drop the favoured class +1. I'm not a big fan of favoured classes. I usually pay no attention to it, or the multi-classing penalty stuff. Its just another little widget to keep track of.

Most of the other first level hp systems (Double, Racial and Flat) still leave frail classes/races in this range.

doghead
aka thotd

 

[Walking Dad]

I'm with you.

If you really like to change HP, I have no problem with it. We are on page one yet.

But, IMHO, I don't think it a good idea to use the new HP rules on NPC classes (even "classic" 3.5 didn't give humanoid warriors max HP on first level). It just gives the damage - HP ratio a bad feeling. Feats like cleave become nearly pointless and a rogue will be unable to sneak kill even a frail commoner.

Also, in PbP combat already takes a very long time. To much HPs don't help this.

 

[doghead]

ooc - dogville

WD - I don't really want to go back and start fiddling around with characters again. 3.5 didn't give max HP at first to NPC classes, but I always did. One less dice to roll. But yes, you're right. Using the full Con + (HD + bonus)*level did give the gobbos a few too many hp's, potentially slowing combat down a fair bit. So I wound it back a bit. On the other hand, most of my NPC's tend to run before they are killed, if they have the chance. Few will fight to the death unless they have good reasons, or are backed into a corner.

Voda - its up to you. If you want to reuse unused rolls, just re-post them. Of course, if you chose that path, you should be using bad unused rolls as well as good ones.

Thanks for the info on darkness and eldrich blast. But I'd still include those details when you use the powers. And post ooc posts here rather than in the ic thread. Thanks.

doghead
aka thotd