[DnD 4E] Dark Sun Discussion & Marauders OOC

smeej

I'll update this main post when I get home!

But I think we could use an OOC thread for the game to talk about the world, and hey let's just make it an open Dark Sun discussion thread!

OptimusZed

Currently planning two sessions of Dark Sun. One that will feature the events of Kalak's ascendence from the perspectives of slaves and one that will start in the middle of the desert escorting a caravan in the Ivory Triangle.

I'm going to start a death pool with the players, I think.

Validity

puppy mauled my laptop cord. I'm on impulse power until the replacement cord comes in.

http://4e.orokos.com/sheets/2435

there's gutters character sheet. smeej can contact me when it's my turn, I'll tell him what I wanna do.


uuuuuuuggggghhhhhh.

Tofystedeth

Validity probably won't see this, for a while anyway, but I really liked Gutterslimes speech to the templar. Especially how after all that, there wasn't even an intimidate roll.

Like, "I am a bug and am making a literal observation as to things we could do to a human."

i giggled.

smeej

OptimusZed wrote: »

Currently planning two sessions of Dark Sun. One that will feature the events of Kalak's ascendence from the perspectives of slaves and one that will start in the middle of the desert escorting a caravan in the Ivory Triangle.

I'm going to start a death pool with the players, I think.

Character tree! Character tree!

I want to dump some Dark Sun characters who really have a hate on for sorcerer-kings in Sigil and see how they react to Lady of Pain.

Foolish Chaos

OptimusZed wrote: »

Currently planning two sessions of Dark Sun. One that will feature the events of Kalak's ascendence from the perspectives of slaves and one that will start in the middle of the desert escorting a caravan in the Ivory Triangle.

I'm going to start a death pool with the players, I think.

I started a dark sun game a few weeks ago. So far, the PC's have been in search of a missing caravan, been captured and sold into gladiatorial slavery, escaped during the fall of kalak and killed their former captor/master, killed a few known "heirs" of kalak, and bought a crodlu and 9 days of supplies as they trekked to alturack in search of the merchant house which betrayed them. Once in alturack they sold the crodlu in favor of the Inix they tamed (formally belonged to a group of Black Sand copy-cats), which they forced me to roll a wild talent for. We were all hoping for thought projection.

Oh they also have developed an "in" with the toothcutters and a definite out with the ruin creepers.

And they have stolen from a high ranking member of the Veiled Alliance...

So far it seems that basically everyone hates them, which should make preparing for sessions relatively easy. "Okay, so whose turn is it to send assassins after the PCs?" :P

smeej

Roll a d20 to figure out who is killing you today!

smeej

Anyone know where I can get info about the garb of the different templar? In the 2E books?

Specifically, I'm not sure what a Tyrian templar looks like, though I imagine I can find a description in Verdant Passage now that I think about it. I guess Tyr is basically Rome...?

OptimusZed

Black tunics. Tyrian templars wear black tunics.

smeej

WHY WOULD I NEED TO KNOW WHAT TYRIAN TEMPLARS LOOK LIKE. WHO KNOWS.

This but with black:

Fondor_Yards

Can we return Mind's messages like normal psionic thought sending? Cause Menander has no interest in harming the dude....but has no interest in stopping Gutterslime once we are done with him.

OptimusZed

Mind can only project thoughts, not read minds.

So return communication needs to be verbal. How many of us speak elven?

Fondor_Yards

The only ones who share a language other then common are Glata and Kira with giant. So she could return her and Glata's answer with her own send thoughts, I could always write down something on a piece of paper and teleport it to Mind/Kira if needed.

MidrealmDM

smeej wrote: »

This but with black:

Quick retouch

Edit : Yes the edges around the cloak are rough - I said it was a 'quick' retouch.

smeej

Well, less metal too, but awesome.

MidrealmDM

smeej wrote: »

Well, less metal too, but awesome.

Damnit I'm a art hack, not a miracle worker! :P

dresdenphile

I'm starting a DS game after the CB updates. I have three controllers and a defender. I don't think they'll make it to level 2.

smeej

Well that should be the goal. If you want them to survive I guess you could send them up against more brutes and artillery.

The manifestations of Epic Destinies is difficult for me to reconcile with the kinda scaled back scope of things in Dark Sun. Like, I can imagine a game where your level 30 cap adventure is taking out one sorcerer-king and liberating a city. That's phenomenal and epic in this setting, but kinda like mid paragon stuff in PoL.

"You killed a despot and freed a people! You are the greatest man ever to have lived. Also, your apotheosis is complete and you are a god. So you got that going for you, too."

MidrealmDM

smeej wrote: »

The manifestations of Epic Destinies is difficult for me to reconcile with

There is only one Epic Destiny in Dark Sun
Tyrant King

"You have ascended to near godhood and realize that you now wield the power to contol the fates of an entire city-state. You see that, without your guidance and control, the people will fall to another tyrant within a few years. There is only one way to save them, and that is to bend them to your will and prepare them for the coming conflict."

OptimusZed

I just found out my wife wants to play a templar.

In the game where I was planning on them helping the Veiled Alliance take down Lalali-Puy.

Yeesh.

smeej

Well, she could easily be an ex-templar trying to make up for their crap, or a special ops templar from another city-state trying to disrupt things in Gulg. A templar can team up with VA easy enough, especially if they are concealing their templar nature from them. Gives them an interesting dilemma too, if the VA needs them to do something that disrupts their native land.

Templar 4 lyfe.

Foolish Chaos

Special Ops rogue/assassin templar sounds amazing and I want to play one.

Also I am enjoying the hell out of the bug/giant talk in the IC thread.

smeej

My monk-templar in Encounters is basically a wetworks guy who gets to operate independently. It's great.

DarkPrimus

Working on a Dark Sun game for my home group. Two of the players have pretty solid ideas on the characters they want to play, while the third is still at the concept stage - he knows the personality but nothing mechanical yet. I'm still waiting on them to get things fleshed out a bit more before I figure out which region I'm starting the game in, but I suggested that a good way for them to meet in the beginning is to have come independently to a small village and then joined a caravan that was traveling through at the time, safety in numbers and all that.

UncleChet

I'm running Maruaders in my home game and am preparing to run it in Maptools. I'm really enjoying making maps, I've got the first 7 encounters laid out so far, I'm just waiting for 3 more maptools players . BTW, THanks for the OOC thread. I really enjoy reading the story thread but I don't want to threadshit it by commenting so I can say WTG Gutterslime! in this thread.

smeej

I will take some of those Marauders maps.

>_>

OptimusZed

Quickly

I need a reason for a caravan from Nibenay to be on the Great Ivory Plain beyond the Mekillot Mountains.

Chanus

Their navigator was eaten and they're lost.

UncleChet

smeej wrote: »

I will take some of those Marauders maps.

>_>

Mine? I'll be only too happy to email you the whole campaign file so you can extract the maps.

OptimusZed

Chanus wrote: »

Their navigator was eaten and they're lost.

No

That happens after.

I need them to start there.

Chanus

OptimusZed wrote: »

Chanus wrote: »

Their navigator was eaten and they're lost.

No

That happens after.

I need them to start there.

Their last navigator got eaten and they were lost but now they're heading back home. :P

Really, though... all you have to do is throw in a merchant and that explains why they're near any city anywhere.

UncleChet

Zed,
Perhaps they are on the trail of a former zealot/templar and they must capture/kill him

OptimusZed

I'm thinking they were part of a Nibenay'an supply caravan for an outpost on the coast of the silt sea.

One of the players will be a Shadow Wife, so it would make sense.

The first session will feature an encounter with a confused, hungry mekillot.

Chanus

That works.

Another thing to keep in mind is the caravan doesn't necessarily need to be of one purpose. It's Athas, people travel in groups as long as they're going the same direction... so it doesn't need to be only one reason, or the reason doesn't necessarily need to apply to the whole caravan... just those leading it.

OptimusZed

Cromlin is a trading village for House Shom on the same estuary as Guistenal, and it's on the other side of the black spires from Nibenay. Shom is based in Nibenay, so it's not hard to align their caravan with a templar. Other PCs can be hangers on or hired guns I guess.

Now to decide exactly how to strand them in the middle of nowhere. I'm thinking bandit raid (or is it?).

Chanus

GARYSHARK!

OptimusZed

Chanus wrote: »

GARYSHARK!

Oh, there will be garysharks.

They won't have cookies, though.

Chanus

Imagine coming across a pristine plate of chocolate chip cookies just lying in the middle of the road (such as it is) in the vast desert.

TERROR

Fondor_Yards

They would treat that thing like the ToH.

Since we burned through about half of our dailies, surges, and ap in our very first fight, back to the inn to recover them, then next day get us a boat/supplies and head out?

Tofystedeth

Am I the only one really annoyed by the disparity between the granted powers of the Gladiator theme and the Wasteland Nomad theme? The Nomad one is barely better than a rogue at-will, while the gladiator one is awesome.

Foolish Chaos

Fondor_Yards wrote: »

They would treat that thing like the ToH.

Since we burned through about half of our dailies, surges, and ap in our very first fight, back to the inn to recover them, then next day get us a boat/supplies and head out?

Yeah I don't think there is any real need to hurry, unless I missed something.