I just have no idea how you are going to survive. But I'm rooting for you ever so slightly, so there's a difference.

So this morning, I woke up thinking about the battle last night, and a few things seemed important, so I wanted to put them here so I wouldn't forget, and maybe it will help.

We Evil "V" guy said at one point that we were the ones that started the whole war, and took out "his man" in Emerald, and I believe that he also said that we were working for the Night Cloak to try to get Orchid to fight us.

So first, I think that we should talk to Octessa and see how much she can tell us about Evil "V" guy.

I think that we should also track down Orchid, and see how much she can tell us too, and see how the two stories jive.

So what I'm thinking is that we should team up with Orchid and take down the Night Cloak, as the enemy of my enemy is my friend right?

I mean, what are the chances that Orchid and Night Cloak are actually great worms mascarading as humans, have a legion of dragons working for them, and that we'll wander into their lair and have to fight like 10 great worms at the same time? I come up with about 8%...

More specifically, he said we "framed" his agent in Emerald. The only thing I can think of is the assassin guy who didn't stay imprisoned very long. I'm not sure why he said framed, but.... Well, I can't recall actually framing anyone.

I think it's possible the Nightcloak is actually a good guy... Or at least a bad guy with a significantly less evil agenda. He was also trying to keep the boxes from getting to Rimjob.

I definitely think we need to find him and see what we can get out of him...

On another note, we should have at least 3 more evil souls...

You will quickly find out that Vix-Thur is the Voriphan high general, and that the Voriphan forces have been pushed off of Arcata- the remaining infantry mostly having escaped, and the ranking psions and wizards generally turning tail and fled after the destruction of the Red Arrow II (the command ship) at the hands of Roger Thetsan's magical strike team (likely the most powerful wizard of Zem tower, but holding no official position), consisting of Sahyesh Baker (master of abjuration at Zem Tower), Octessa Mellon (headmistress of recruitment and assistant loremistress), and Edward Tharuvulen (master of evocation and chief liason to Imperial Force Command). There were many injuries among even that crew, some unhealable- Edward lost and eye and has suffered some kind of strange unhealable burn to the left side of his face, and Octessa is now permanently clumsier than previously. The strike force did not operate alone, but I only know about one of the knights that accompanied them yet, so I'll address that later if it comes up. While Vix-Thur did indeed escape, much of his command has been lost, and the Voriphan military is likely at a historical nadir, with barely enough boats left to patrol their own isles.

While Narso may or may not have been working for Vix-Thur (or an as-yet-undiscovered Evil Bad Thing), he was definitely not framed, nor was he the cause (in any direction) of the war.

His "agent" was referring to Mitharan Sennishall, the pilot of the Vailx (since executed) that was stuffed with a well hidden alchemical bomb, enough to level a third of Emerald, and only discovered by the bronze dogs while you guys hauled it back to the city.



At this point, you might want to do any of:

-Research Vix-Thur more
-Learn about Voriphan politics, possibly from inside Voriph.
-Figure out what, if any, Umbrans are involved.
-Chase down any lead about Narso's purpose and history- you will be getting a lead on this, having timed out on all things to gather information about at the beginning of the month.
-Go treasure hunting for that Dream Emerald thing. I don't know why you would do this, but if you want to explore Queris, let me know before we get to the table again.
-Hey, what was up with orcs? Something something something orcs?
-Go chase down more Arcatan politics, as proposed in this thread already
-What's up with those evil dragons? Don't they look like they are working together a bit?
-Try to find out what, if anything, is going on with those strange ghost plants. You will also be getting a lead on this courtesy of Srelindel's next letter.

While Orchid clearly had no intention of hurting you guys (and was initially pleased to see that you had changed sides), she's definitely thrown in with Vix-Thur, whose plan of a united land under Voriphan values and rules she apparently favors mightily over the status quo, so conflict with her is rather likely, especially if you bust in on her and some friends she actually likes- but if you can track her down, hey, nothing is written in stone.


If any of you had failed the DC 18 will save that Vix-Thur was tossing around as part of the magic he could project against you from cross continent, you would have lost permanently 2 points to a random stat. HUGS!





In terms of battle difficulty- I think I got it mostly right. The plasma elemental was sort of two rolled up fire elementals in terms of damage output. Mostly I didn't want to poop fire elementals across the board because it would make the battle take even longer, even though there's no way he would be limited to a single one- unless it was a powerful experiment or something, so I went with that. On the bright side, some poor low level party of orcs in the Teryeal Expanse will have something rather far outside of their encounter range perhaps. It's silly to assume things could be balanced. The party had time to prebuff, but didn't start at any of the super close nodes, and Rim-Thul's strategy of sitting in the house and throwing frost out the window prevented him from getting totally faced, but also delayed some if his important spells until later (and even then, there was never a chance to catch two of you in a prismatic spray). His spider bitch didn't really do anything scary at all, which is unfortunate- she made people make a bunch of low 20s DCs, all of which were made. Maybe we'd fell differently if the holds had landed- in general, the saving throw dice were mostly on your side. Maybe I was playing her wrong, but it seems like you guys versus 6 of her would simply destroy them utterly and without even having to think much.

So it was a pretty organic fight, with some terrain and a decent number of spell effects, but it sure did take awhile! I thought that was actually one of the best fights I've seen in awhile, with the party having to think about targets and tactics and respond to a changing battlefield. I know you guys liked the mind flayer fight, but that was a lot of pre-fight strategy and tactics being rewarding during the fight- meaning, to me, that fight was mostly you guys cleaving the living shit down out of everyone, and, while that's certainly good, it wasn't the best actual fight scene- I don't think you guys even got any hostile effects on you besides grapple during that fight.

Even though it took a while, I totally agree. We definitley were fighting well as a unit, and I think that there were about 2 points where if we hadn't have made the decisions that we did as a team, that we would not have come through.

The big one of course coming at the end with Rimjob...

And at least for me, all of the buff's that we did going in where key in keeping me from dying and missing saves and stuff, which apparently would have really sucked.

Very fun indeed.

Is it possible Lady Sara Ann or her Grand Duke boss is the Nightcloak?

funny you should say that. I was thinking the exact same thing.

I'll say this, if Sara-Ann isn't I'd bet money she knows who the night cloak is and is in contact with him\her.

She was making that same trip across the continent way back that we were when we first encountered this Nightcloak. Hm.


On another note, there was really no way a previously enslaved pixie was going to let good dragons stay enslaved while wizards studied the box for a few days. A single round could make a difference somewhere in the world. Also, that die moved. Maybe it rolled from 15 to something else and back to 15, but I know it moved because it moved while I was trying to read it and Par was looking for the right sheet, but no one read it until after it moved. No one was Cab* in this situation.


*Cab = Cheater with dice.

"Cab" in this case equals very excitable and flippy-out about stuff like this. I don't think Cab cheated with dice much, if ever- he's too mathy for that. I wasn't accusing you of cheating, I was accusing you of being like WHAT I SAW IS RIGHT AND YOU ARE WRONG, whether that is incorrect or not.

The whole situation was my fault. Player versus player situations need the DM focussing on every die roll, to call "reroll" the very moment a die does something retarded (before it stops moving), and to focus the table on something. I don't think either of you (or Cab, for that matter) are cheaters, but in that situation you both have opposed interests, and I just DMed it wrong. Both of you played your characters correctly.


You only have had one encounter that could have counted as 'with The Night Cloak"- and that was shortly after selling the paintings, when Alenka forgot all about seeing him (or her) soon after.

I wasnt there for the painting episode, fwiw...

I had fun last night for sure. As a party I felt we did as much as we could, and we did it well. If Alenka had not taken her potion of greater invis, she would have been down after the first round and the flying black goo would have crushed someone else. The biggest key in my opinion, was getting Morgim back into the thick of things. I also thought Mike did a great job with his new favorite toy, the hybrid elemental.

Last, I am enjoying everyone playing in character!

That said, I don't care what we decide to do going forward. I am sure it will be a good time. Alenka would definitely prefer to avoid politic stuff.

There were the men working for the Nightcloak when we acquired the first box. I forget the details, but it seemed the Nightcloak must have been in the vicinity recently.

The other thing was where.... shit. I forget the details again. The Nightcloak was clearly trying to undermine Rimjob's efforts to get that other box made.

I might be thinking of the wrong person, but I though Cab was the one who would "play" with his d20 by rolling it again and again until a high number came up. Then you'd tell him to make an attack roll, and he'd say he already did, pointing to the 19 or 20.

Oh, um....Narso? That was....?

Voriph seems inevitable. The ghost trees sound interesting. I don't remember anything about orcs, but that sounds fun.

I have no interest in Queris. That's metagaming because the pixie may want to go home, but fuck it.

Ghost trees and killing orcs sounds fun to me too.

If it's worth anything:

At the start of the night, I made myself some Gloves Of Arrow Snaring, which I was wearing at the time of Pixie Betrayal (TM). The wording is nebulous - it says that twice per day, I can grab an arrow out of the air as if I had the Snatch Arrows feat. This could mean that I can grab any two arrows that I want. Or, it could mean that I act as if I have the Snatch Arrows feat twice per day, meaning I can grab one arrow per round, twice a day. If it's the former, I'm still up and being assaulted by the pixie, with my turn coming up. If it's the latter, I should've grabbed one, then made a save for the second, since they were both fired in the same round. Problem is, I rolled both of my dice at the same time, so I have one agreed-upon successful save, and one disputed failed save, in no particular order.

I chalk this forgetfulness up to the fact that it was after 1am and I was really freakin tired and forgot about my new magic item. John, do you want to do anything to change how things played out, or just leave them as-is?

In either case, John has a PM coming.

That's pretty odd wording. I mean, we took a fair vote, and Dwarf instead made a move to keep good dragons enslaved. Dwarf then indicated he would fight anyone in the party to get his way to keep good dragons enslaved for longer. No, no, that couldn't be right... Pixie will need to ask Dwarf to verify this is seriously what Dwarf means... willing to fight the party to prevent the destruction of an item that enslaves good dragons so it can be studied? Yes, Dwarf verified that's exactly what he meant. So I didn't realize Dwarf was planning on betraying the party for quite so long when he made gloves of arrow snatching, and it seems odd phrasing on your part.

Still, if you forget about having something... sorry, but so what? Nothing gets replayed because you forgot to use an item. That's ridiculous.

The more ridiculous part is Dwarf considered attacking me after I'd broken the box and woken Dwarf up. Dwarf may need to get over it and move on. The alternative is to maintain hostility which will destroy the party.

C'mon. SRSLY.


Again....c'mon. I've never considered attacking a party member, in any campaign I've ever played.


I'm not sure what this means. I clearly announced what I was making for myself. It was even marked on the sheet that I passed around for everyone to review and see if they wanted anything else on the list. In fact, it still is. What's the "odd phrasing"?


Whatever. Just thought I'd bring it up to John, since it was 1am and everyone was packing up around us as I was trying to process what was occurring. I don't care either way.


Wait....I got attacked by a fellow party member, and it's ridiculous that I considered retaliation? Man, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.


Yeah, cuz getting attacked by a party member is just something to shrug one's shoulders about and keep adventuring like nothing happened.

Things that actually happened in the previous encounter, by: Zem

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

HOLD ON I FORGOT TO ROLL TO PRESERVE MY SPELLS

pixie rolls for 6 rounds ago
pixie rolls for 5 rounds ago
pixie rolls for 4 rounds ago
pixie rolls for 3 rounds ago
pixie rolls for 2 rounds ago
pixie rolls for last round

This. I hate to say it, but I think going forward that we need to end around midnight. I know the vampires out there may protest, but getting home at 2:00 am just plain wrecks me. And honestly, it stops being as much fun for me after that point. If this means that we need to start around noon, that is fine with me...

Hugs!

I assumed we would end around midnight. I don't think most battles will be that long.

WTF? YOU ATTACKED ME!

Me: It's 3 to 2 to destroy it.
Par: I won't let that happen.
Me: What do you mean, you won't let that happen?
Par: I'm not letting you destroy it.
Me: As in, you're going to fight me if I destroy it?
Par: Yes.
Me: Seriously?
John: Roll inits.
Me: Are you serious, we're fighting for this?
Par: Yes.
Me: Alright, fine.
Par: 16 init
Me: 24 init... Are you seriously doing this?
Par: Yes.
Me: Alright, I'll shoot two sleep arrows...

Perhaps not verbatim, but it's pretty damn close there.

So.... I attacked you first because I rolled a higher init? It was a perfectly reasonable group decision, which you refused to accept. THAT is the "betrayal" you were talking about. What did you think would happen? You initiated the impasse, you initiated the idea of combat, you indicated you were willing to go to combat, you rolled inits first, and you verified that we were really doing this. My only part is a higher init and an unwillingness to back down from your challenge.

With the paintings... yes, I ripped off the rest of the party (predictable), but the party took a vote and I at least appeared to follow it. I had to because the only repercussion the party has is to beat the hell out of me.

Maybe this knowledge of dragon boxes is important to the dwarf, but no less important than freeing the enslaved is to the pixie.

CN: Er, you attacked me. My only response was to grudgingly accept the fight and use the least damaging effect I could. I told Rachel you started a fight with me and that I wasn't really sure why.

Well, we did go into combat order because the dwarf stated he was opposing you doing a physical action (destroying the box). That necessitates a call to the rules instead of just roleplaying.

However- you winning init did mean that you had a choice, and you chose to attack him. Granted, it was with sleep arrows, which would probably be for sale at a drug store if they actually existed, and would be safer than everything actually really IN the drugstore (there's apparently no way to hurt yourself with a pixie sleep arrow- you could frigging sound yourself with it and not deal a hit point of damage, by rules). You could have delayed until him, or readied an action, or actually just attempted to destroy the box with your superior init. If you had used circlet of blasting on the box (which you weren't sure would work) on your turn instead of actually attacking a PC, I don't think this would create as much drama as it did. Other good options include move action (grab box) standard action (dim door).


I know to you, the arrows were the safer bet, but time WAS on your side here, and you could have avoided affecting a PC with an action (and actually expending your resources, though sleep arrows are cheap).

Bullshit. It was anything but that.


I'm glad you don't write Cliff Notes for a living. That isn't what happened at all. If you must know, as we were rolling inits, I was devising what I was going to do that would involve not attacking ANYBODY. Instead, I got attacked first. My decided-upon action was one of the things John suggested you do - grabbing the box and teleporting. Yes, I know you're CN. In my 18 years of roleplaying, I've never been attacked by a party member, even an evil one with whom I've been traveling. I suppose there's a first time for everything.

I'm not talking about flying out the window. I'm talking about my final actions. I flew out the window and paused to consider my actions. I played through the possibilities in my brain and couldn't see a way for selling to the rich guy to play out without a battle in the party, so I went to the museum. Sure, I ripped off the party, but we've both done that. That's being a dishonest asshole, not openly defying a party decision. Going to the rich guy's house would assuredly involve rolling inits, and it wasn't worth it to me. That's where we differed.


"I'm not allowing that" = Fighting words. I asked you three times if that's what you really meant, and you said yes each time. Each time, I was surprised you were willing to fight over this. You have the luxury of getting away in a round. I had nothing that I knew would destroy the box with a single action, so I didn't have that luxury. Yes, the blasting circlet worked, but I didn't know that ahead of time (I actually doubted it would). What other choice did I have?


If it upsets you so much, then you shouldn't pick a fight with other party members. Being CN has nothing to do with it. If I were playing a paladin I'd have done the same thing here except he wouldn't have sleep arrows. In this instance, you took the evil act that was also against the will of the party. Maybe the other people with whom you play just say "Well, ok, that's fine..." but you had to know I wouldn't meekly let that go any more than the two people who teleported to the rich guy's house to stop a pixie with paintings did.

You backed me into a corner and confirmed you were going to fight. I don't see how you get to play the victim here. The only thing I did was enforce the will of the party on someone who stated we would resort to violence with the party to get his way. The only odd part is I didn't have 3 other people backing me up.

It's like if you stole a car and complained to the cops that in 34 years you've never been arrested. You're trying to make me out to be a jerk when all I did was take the only action you left me with.

I understand (now) that from your perspective you weren't planning on attacking me directly.

Try to understand that from my perspective, you gave every indication you were planning on it.

You've might've misinterpreted my intentions to actually physically attack, but as John said, you could've readied an action since you won the init and disabled me should I have attacked. Plus, you have a SR of "ungodly", and I'm a wizard without the means to do much about that.

Once again, I'll say that I really wish we could've played out that situation at a reasonable hour, instead of while everyone else was packing up, and my brain was trying to figure out what was going on. I'm, like, 93% sure I personally never said the words "fight" or "attack", and only responded to you without listening to what exact words you were using. In my mind, I never had even an ounce of intention to harm anyone in the party.

I'm not sure what else you could have meant by "I'm not going to let that happen." I asked if you meant you were going to fight over it, and you said yes. To me that was pretty clear. I wasn't too keen on a fight, but I figured I'd go along with it if that's what you wanted. That's why from my perspective, you betrayed the group and attacked me.

Still, even if I had delayed until you grabbed it and tried to teleport, I'd have no choice but to hit you with as much damage as possible in an attempt to disrupt your spell. I suppose I might have taken the chance on a touch attack with dim anchor, but that comes down to a single roll on my part and I'd been rolling pretty shittily all night. Damage was the best bet for disrupting a spell. It's not something I'd want to do, but necessary.

Yes, I have a high SR (30). The problem was that it was higher than my hit points (23) at the time, and there are several spells that do not involve SR. I wasn't volunteering the information about my low hp, but I figured there was a pretty good chance you would kill me. Not drop me, but kill me. I assumed we were at a time where our round/level spells were over (my glitterdust) but the minute/level were still active (your see invis). One Orb of (Whatever) from you would have killed me. Though it wasn't your intention, I believed your intention was to attack.

On that "30" note, I am going to not count your bonus levels towards that anymore. So, for the rest of the game, calculate your SR as if you were two levels lower- the SR was built assuming lev-4 and we are using the idea that monster hit dice eventually count for less and letting your sorc level be lev-2. Those two things stacking is creating a dash of a balance issue.


PAR- you were remarkably silent, and I was also wondering if you were going to hurt the pixie. I have seen plenty of player versus player in my games, and I don't consider what went down to be all that rare or remarkable- though if you guys started bringing out big money abilities, I would have (such battles often end with a new character, and bad feelings).

I don't know whether Par wants to talk about it here or in email, but I'll put up this option.

In my view, the dragon box was a group quest item and group property. We took a vote, and the dwarf said "I won't allow that." That is the only betrayal that happened. Par and I have both partaken in shady dealings with our respective parties from time to time, but I have NEVER encountered a player who openly defied a real group vote regarding major quest items. I can't think of a gaming group where that would fly.

The fact that he didn't actually want to attack me seems as relevant as an armed robber who broke into a house and was shot by the homeowner. "I wasn't going to hurt anyone" isn't a viable excuse for him, and he isn't a victim of irrational violence. Had the homeowner not been there, then he still would have lost his TV.

At first I didn't believe he was going to try to override the vote, which is why I asked several times if he were serious. When he said he was serious about it, I went along with it. I used as little damage as I could to stop him from making off with the box, but the truth is that if I played a character with nothing but a sword, I'd have used it. It's not something I'd want to do, but in response to a wizard who suddenly breaks from the normal group interaction to get away with a quest item, I don't see any other choice. For all I know this wizard made a secret deal with the Nightcloak to bring him the box. That seems far fetched, but it's the best explanation I could imagine for "I won't let that happen." I'm also a little surprised no one else was there with me rolling inits.

For comparison, the entire party was nearly up in arms over the possibility I might go against a party vote over to whom we sold paintings. Not evil magic paintings, just paintings. I just couldn't see any way of it playing out without a battle in the party, so I went to the right place. In the very least it would have caused seriously animosity if not outright character death. Sure, I ripped you off, but that wasn't openly defying anyone. These weren't quest items or anything of the sort, and the dragon box clearly was. I don't see how we allow individual characters to override any group votes, particularly those regarding quest items.


Now, here's why this is relevant. It seems Par and I are at an impasse, which sucks. His position is that I attacked him without provocation, and his character should enact some retribution. He can explain this more clearly if he wants. My position is pretty well laid out above. I think if there were any repercussions, they would be for the dwarf, but really I just want to move past it and forget it.

So I want the opinion of the others. I don't want some pussy responses like "I think you were both idiots" or anything where you get to avoid taking a side. Either it was right or wrong. This is important. If I'm wrong I want to know it. Was I the dick for attacking the dwarf without provocation, or was the dwarf the dick for breaking the group vote? If the dwarf puts soap in a sock for a midnight Code Red, are you going to hold me down or ward him off?

So it stays at 30 for 2 more levels or it drops to 28?

Your mother said she thinks it should stay at 30. To be fair, this was shortly after she screamed all sorts of things. I think I could have gotten her to say anything.

Simple solution. We start up next time with Rigby and Ash facing off, and just throw out what happened at the end of last session.

Both get a do-over, and we can all think things through...