The rogue told the kraken to fuck off and shot him, legendary action to grab her with a tentacle, his turn, he tossed her in his mouth like a piece of popcorn
The party ended up running away, 2 out of 5 survived
Random NPC sailor that jumped into the water with a harpoon made it
Did you get to do your big speech?
Nah, it was non stop combat for 4 brutal rounds
Rogue actually survived, she used cape of the mountebank to get back to the party's ship from his stomach, pretty hurt, standing on crows nest to fire from above. Kraken ate the fighter on round 2 and took a lot of damage, kraken's wizard companion was wreaking havoc as well, and followed the almost dead rogue to the player ship.
Kraken dragged the giant king and 3 party members under the waves on his third turn (while vomiting fighter up from taking damage, using his action to just petrify fighter and continuing his descent), and the sorcerer's intelligent familiar (a small genie) managed to retrieve the party's bag of holding (I am a merciful god...) that the kraken somehow let slip after eating the sorcerer and wizard, the giant had to be beaten unconscious
The archmage would have crossed off the rogue - but I knew she had a magical tattoo from long ago that gives death ward, I just pretended I forgot as I described the low health mage cackling while finger of deathing her, only for her to excitedly point out that she had the tattoo and then took him out on her turn
So a complete catastrophe and near TPK and at least the two (barely) surviving players felt like it was a big victory because I misplayed (I didn't, if he had cast Circle of Death instead, then run into the hold for cover.... everyone on the ship including both players would have been fucked), the Kraken got what he wanted and had every reason to believe his wizard would succeed (because the rogue was nearly dead, the ship's crew all but not a threat, wizard 2 unconscious, and the fighter turning to stone).
Only 2 were eaten by the kraken, one of the three floated unconscious to the surface and the petrified one was retrieved from the sea floor after coming back later and having to bribe some mermaids. Wizard's Magen and the sorcerer's genie familiar just kind of no idea what to do with themselves with their creators dead, but still want to help.
I stole a plot element from Daughter of the Drow. An asspull? Yes, certainly, but fucking hell man if I can't have any consequences in the second to last chapter of this campaign I'm never going to have any. The Kraken has sewn a tapestry containing troublesome mortal souls, which Wizard and Sorcerer are now part of. Attempts at at resurrections that were ultimately tried, did fail (I PM'd the dead players with this and we had their new characters, temporary? set up by the time it was time to introduce them)
They remembered to scry the giant ASAP after the kraken fled, the Kraken is immune to scrying, the giant king WAS while on that prison ship, but in the open water? Nope. So using the power of plot, when they ended up scrying was the perfect moment to see a sunken airship near an underwater trench, where the Kraken's lair is. Few airships exist in the world, and fewer go down over the ocean, so "it's just a matter of research" to determine where it went down.
One of the players said what every NPC ally suggested to do before going to fight the Kraken: teleport to the Maelstrom to let the Storm Giant Regent know what they know, which will unravel the BBEG's plans, and they have proof in the form of her resurrected mother (which was killed by the kraken and blamed on humans), and get help to deal with the Kraken's forces by being made SWOL via potions of giant size
ended the session on a note of positivity with the other players' temporary characters (they're playing as a drow ally and the mother of the sorcerer who is one of the instructors at the arcane academy, neither of which needed much setup) ready
oh yeah and the party being coalition minded gathered up Countess Sansuri and Thane Kaylithica, two ostensibly evil giant villains that they made an accord with and found commonality to go with them to vouch for their character despite being small folk (my players are committed to keeping the Ordening dead and gone, and have been convincing several giant lords who seek to both bring it back and be on top of it, that a divine caste system is ultimately a form of slavery and that it's best to let it stay dead)
You guys doing the blue dragon in the desert or was that already? My DM at the time was kind of sick of DMing at that point so we did the dragon and he called it done at that point, didn't go anything with the Kraken
They haven't done the dragon yet, they know she's the regent's aid, but haven't bothered to tell the regent that yet
I'm going to give them giant sized potions so they can fight the kraken in his lair, bing them up to 14, and for the final dragon fight they're going to have their airship and some allies with them
This is Exandria so instead of a traditional desert, I've moved the dragon's lair to the ruins of Aeor because I can put lots of cool shit there
My (admittedly more by the book ) SKT party is in Maelstrom right now having successfully talked their way past the "court" of hating small folk giants and attracting the attention of the friendlier to small folk storm giant princess. We'll see how that goes next session. The bard rolling a 29 on his persuasion check to name drop the Giant Oracle and presenting their (taken from a fire giant corpse) Conch like it was baby Simba caused a ruckus in the antechamber that brought the princess to see what the fuss was about.
THEN they'll be on the path to figuring out that the Queen was murdered, and the King was kidnapped by the Kraken. All at the behest of the Ancient Blue Dragon who is also manipulating the giants and then they will eventually go after her too.
I'm actually getting pretty tired of this module as well and wondering where I can cut things out and save a few sessions here and there. I imagine I can try and snip out the casino bit in Yartar and get them the evidence the party needs to point them at the Kraken some other way....
My players did things a bit out of order, such as killing the casino captain noble at level 4, the rogue didnt like him so she murdered him
specifically she seduced him and then stabbed him to death in his bedroom and took his stuff, and of course I put some kraken themed stuff in his house
anyway she stole a pile of paperwork and I just made up what it all was but one thing was an order for renovation of a ship called the Morkoth to increase the size of its hold and reinforce its frame. She dumped all the paperwork in the bank (yes this is the player that keeps evading death, rogues man)
cut to ... 3 sessions ago? after talking to the oracle who was like "You already have everything you need, the Morkoth is the key" and they beelined back home and looked through that stuff which was put into the bank and only then did I describe the ship's design (because previously she didnt look over the documents, just skimmed them and then moved on and forgot about them) and be like "ah shit this thing's big enough to hold a giant"
Edit: Earlier they brought the storm giant queen back to life and are hiding her in the bath house in the party's town, the central public bath is a pretty big room and they put her in there (still woozy with resurrection sickness) because "storm giants like water" and closed it to the public (she chuckled at the storm giants like water thing at how, idiotic it was, and how it was the kind of thing one of her daughters might have said if they found some humans alive when they were younger and brought them home to keep as pets). She's humoring them because she doesn't want to endanger an entire town by letting the dragon know she's alive, but at this point she's been crammed in one room sitting in shin deep in water for like a week and is starting to get upset despite being literally the most patient storm giant in all of creation, and has asked 3 different players to get her something to wear and each one just forgot. They have a golem bringing her food and wine basically non stop.
I DID remind them after the kraken fight and they did go tell her that they fought the kraken that was responsible for her death and it didnt go well and she practically screamed WELL GO TELL MY DAUGHTER IM ALIVE OR I WILL IM TIRED OF THIS SHIT. before apologizing and recomposing herself. A thunderstorm started outside, thankfully, they are finally going to the maelstrom
Sansuri was floating over the town and realized the source of the storm, investigated, and threw a fit that they hadn't gotten the queen anything to wear and she was covering up with a large treated animal skin tarp that goes over the central bath if it isnt being used. Allfather damnit Sansuri hates Neri, but this is unacceptable, so the two of them and the (new) cleric spent some time on Sansuri's castle doing some fashion stuff
Team Anti Ordening is the party, countess sansuri, thane kaylithica, queen moog (the new leader of the hill giants, literally a hill giant you meet in a random encounter with a serious head injury that they did not kill despite her being violent to them because my party can be sweeties, they healed her up), and the increasingly frustrated queen neri
edit: most of my players are women who tend to play characters who are supreme assholes to almost every individual but who are dedicated to ending a global system of oppression and have very high persuasion scores, second game where this has been the case after tomb of annihilation and ending slavery
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
Spoilers for Rime of the Frost Maiden, about 1/2 way through the adventure....
We raided the Ancient white dragon's hoard aboard the ice locked pirate ship and found the wand of Orcus. One of the PCs (an unconventional wizard) is played by our usual long time DM (He's played D&D for over 20 years) and between history rolls and Meta knowledge we know what we have. Instead of dropping it into the depths we've wrapped it up and taken it for right now. At some point it's going to end poorly, It has to. I can't wait to see how it shakes out.
Spoilers for Rime of the Frost Maiden, about 1/2 way through the adventure....
We raided the Ancient white dragon's hoard aboard the ice locked pirate ship and found the wand of Orcus. One of the PCs (an unconventional wizard) is played by our usual long time DM (He's played D&D for over 20 years) and between history rolls and Meta knowledge we know what we have. Instead of dropping it into the depths we've wrapped it up and taken it for right now. At some point it's going to end poorly, It has to. I can't wait to see how it shakes out.
The wand in the adventure as written is a fake, right? I just looked it up because I was curious, and it looks like a number of DMs have decided to just make it the real deal instead of a fake.
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
Spoilers for Rime of the Frost Maiden, about 1/2 way through the adventure....
We raided the Ancient white dragon's hoard aboard the ice locked pirate ship and found the wand of Orcus. One of the PCs (an unconventional wizard) is played by our usual long time DM (He's played D&D for over 20 years) and between history rolls and Meta knowledge we know what we have. Instead of dropping it into the depths we've wrapped it up and taken it for right now. At some point it's going to end poorly, It has to. I can't wait to see how it shakes out.
The wand in the adventure as written is a fake, right? I just looked it up because I was curious, and it looks like a number of DMs have decided to just make it the real deal instead of a fake.
I'm not the DM so I have no idea! As players we're playing it straight because that's the info we have. Honestly I'm more worried about the pissed off ancient dragon figuring out who stole their shit.
Spoilers for Rime of the Frost Maiden, about 1/2 way through the adventure....
We raided the Ancient white dragon's hoard aboard the ice locked pirate ship and found the wand of Orcus. One of the PCs (an unconventional wizard) is played by our usual long time DM (He's played D&D for over 20 years) and between history rolls and Meta knowledge we know what we have. Instead of dropping it into the depths we've wrapped it up and taken it for right now. At some point it's going to end poorly, It has to. I can't wait to see how it shakes out.
The wand in the adventure as written is a fake, right? I just looked it up because I was curious, and it looks like a number of DMs have decided to just make it the real deal instead of a fake.
I'm not the DM so I have no idea! As players we're playing it straight because that's the info we have. Honestly I'm more worried about the pissed off ancient dragon figuring out who stole their shit.
Oh shit, sorry. I assumed you were the DM for some reason.
Spoilers for Rime of the Frost Maiden, about 1/2 way through the adventure....
We raided the Ancient white dragon's hoard aboard the ice locked pirate ship and found the wand of Orcus. One of the PCs (an unconventional wizard) is played by our usual long time DM (He's played D&D for over 20 years) and between history rolls and Meta knowledge we know what we have. Instead of dropping it into the depths we've wrapped it up and taken it for right now. At some point it's going to end poorly, It has to. I can't wait to see how it shakes out.
The wand in the adventure as written is a fake, right? I just looked it up because I was curious, and it looks like a number of DMs have decided to just make it the real deal instead of a fake.
I'm not the DM so I have no idea! As players we're playing it straight because that's the info we have. Honestly I'm more worried about the pissed off ancient dragon figuring out who stole their shit.
As a suggestion, do not use Minor Illusion or similar to make the White Dragon's dead wizard buddy your ventriloquist puppet.
It doesn't go well.
Or, at least it didn't for our party.
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
Spoilers for Rime of the Frost Maiden, about 1/2 way through the adventure....
We raided the Ancient white dragon's hoard aboard the ice locked pirate ship and found the wand of Orcus. One of the PCs (an unconventional wizard) is played by our usual long time DM (He's played D&D for over 20 years) and between history rolls and Meta knowledge we know what we have. Instead of dropping it into the depths we've wrapped it up and taken it for right now. At some point it's going to end poorly, It has to. I can't wait to see how it shakes out.
The wand in the adventure as written is a fake, right? I just looked it up because I was curious, and it looks like a number of DMs have decided to just make it the real deal instead of a fake.
I'm not the DM so I have no idea! As players we're playing it straight because that's the info we have. Honestly I'm more worried about the pissed off ancient dragon figuring out who stole their shit.
As a suggestion, do not use Minor Illusion or similar to make the White Dragon's dead wizard buddy your ventriloquist puppet.
It doesn't go well.
Or, at least it didn't for our party.
I really need to stop forgetting the Paladin in my CoS campaign has Sentinel =(
Im in the same boat with my fighter. Gotta put a post it note on my character sheet.
My paladin has a displacer cloak that I keep forgetting about.
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
edited February 2022
We just hit level 7 and the rune knight abilities continue to be top notch. So many fun things to do per short rest as a fighter. I have 3 runes to play with, action surge and second wind, then runic shield and giants might multiple times per long rest.
I really need to stop forgetting the Paladin in my CoS campaign has Sentinel =(
Im in the same boat with my fighter. Gotta put a post it note on my character sheet.
Oh, I'm the DM haha. I keep forgetting she has sentinel, so every time anything gets close she just wrecks it. Definitely stealing the idea from earlier in the thread of Strahd polymorphing her into a whale when that fight finally happens.
I really need to stop forgetting the Paladin in my CoS campaign has Sentinel =(
Im in the same boat with my fighter. Gotta put a post it note on my character sheet.
Oh, I'm the DM haha. I keep forgetting she has sentinel, so every time anything gets close she just wrecks it. Definitely stealing the idea from earlier in the thread of Strahd polymorphing her into a whale when that fight finally happens.
Here is another one i did that game. Strahd has an ability that lets him pass through walls/floors of his lair (the castle). So i ruled that as long as he maintains any contact with a castle surface, he can effectively zip along it in any direction in humanoid form, i.e. "flying" up a tower shaft by touching the tip of a finger to a wall.
My party was 5 optimized murder hobbos + arcane guardian + NPC Izzy with Gladiator stats and magical armor and 2h sword, so i had to crank up the difficulty otherwise the party just steamrolled everything.
In the Amber Temple encounter there is coin filled room where party fights a golem. I made the room magnetized with a cyclotron (effectively, but narratively it was magic) so when combat broke out the coins would spin wildly through the air and dex saves for half damage were needed at initiative count 20 each round).
So I doublechecked Strahd's stat block and I forgot his legendary move action protects him opportunity attacks, so the Paladin's sentinel feat is almost useless against him! Still gonna polymorph her into a whale though.
I like the visual of the rest of the party just punching the Whaleadin over and over again to try and get them down to 0HP so they revert to regular form
Hoping that the Paladin realises, because they can't speak and are just going "BWOOOOAAAAAOOOOOOAAAAAA"
WotC's starting their promotion of the adventure book Critical Role Presents: Call of the Netherdeep, and there's a character who looks a lot like a certain couple from Campaign 2:
This character really looks like they could be Fjord and Jester's kid. The only two things that make me think she might not be are 1) unless there are weird time shenanigans afoot this adventure would have to be set well after Campaign 3 and 2) it's usually stated that the child of a tiefling is always a tiefling, but I guess they're free to ignore that if they want.
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
Spoilers for Rime of the Frost Maiden, about 1/2 way through the adventure....
We raided the Ancient white dragon's hoard aboard the ice locked pirate ship and found the wand of Orcus. One of the PCs (an unconventional wizard) is played by our usual long time DM (He's played D&D for over 20 years) and between history rolls and Meta knowledge we know what we have. Instead of dropping it into the depths we've wrapped it up and taken it for right now. At some point it's going to end poorly, It has to. I can't wait to see how it shakes out.
The wand in the adventure as written is a fake, right? I just looked it up because I was curious, and it looks like a number of DMs have decided to just make it the real deal instead of a fake.
I'm not the DM so I have no idea! As players we're playing it straight because that's the info we have. Honestly I'm more worried about the pissed off ancient dragon figuring out who stole their shit.
Oh shit, sorry. I assumed you were the DM for some reason.
A resolution!
So after goading our friend all week over discord, and in the beginning of the session last night he finally goes "alright I have to know what this wand actually does and in character "Ok I touch the wand!" all dramatically. Our DM as Villayne goes "You know you have to attune to it right?". We all have a laugh, and he attunes to it and then is all like "What happens?!" The DM just looks at him and deadpans "nothing". There is a pause and then he tells the player that the wand is a fake. OH MAN. The look on the players face and the rest of us just start busting up. He'd been working himself up all week to do this crazy thing, and then nothing happened. It was great.
So I've got one player who is good at creating a very optimized character for combat (currently running a Phantom Rogue) and another who is much more interested in roleplay and not particularly savvy in creating a character that can function well in combat (running a Bard 7/Cleric 6). I don't want to tell this latter player how to build their character and figured that I'd try to "patch" them by giving them stronger magic items, but their inability to cast higher level spells and that class features like "Destroy Undead" are limited to affecting CR 1/2 undead really hinders how much they can contribute in battle (I'm also learning through this experience that Cleric is one of those classes you really don't want to multiclass out of).
I'm particularly bothered by this situation because the former player of the Rogue is dealing out huge amounts of damage from a distance while the latter player of the Bard/Cleric is mostly using spells that require saving throws that targets often pass. Other than making it harder for the Rogue to attack from a distance and throwing in mobs of CR 1/2 undead and other weak enemies likely to fail saving throws, is there anything else I can do to make the player of the Bard/Cleric feel more like an important member of the party? Healing isn't much of an issue because the group has had plenty of access to healing potions, which in retrospect I've realized makes the Bard/Cleric's role as a healer largely obsolete (maybe I could find more ways to inflict conditions that Lesser Restoration could help with).
Presumably the rogue is doing to hit stuff, so throw high AC enemies at them. Also iirc rogues get no AOE while clerics do so many mobs could work. And if the cleric player is more of a roleplayer the cleric, there are certainly spells that assist with that like ones where a divinity is contacted. The rogue may kill a bad guy but the cleric's god tells them where to find the bad guy to begin with. And is it just the two if them??
Give opportunities for the bard to get advantages from roleplay, perhaps even a henchman or hireling - perhaps a bodyguard who will give them a few extra options in combat without overshadowing the rogue (and likely setting up some sneak attacks for the rogue to play around). Could be a student wishing to learn from the cleric, or a stocky farmhand who witnessed their first miracle. Perhaps even a miraculous mount sent by their god as a reward for a quest (with a magic item for the rogue as a way of the deity saying "Thanks, even though you're not my main guy").
Or perhaps a rotating series of characters if they travel about more, a guard captain who is with them to certify the deed they were hired to do has been done. A noble who has been assigned to smooth things over with the neighbouring duchy as two renowned and heavily armed mercenaries move through, or a scout who the bard has hired to get them through a mountain pass, or lead them to the dragon horde, or perhaps a dwarf prospector looking to recover his old family hold.
Having a few minions certainly helps, especially if they have a base and lets the role player do more of the stuff they want to do, living in the world, whilst letting the rogue be a little more focused on themselves. Downtime sidequests for the rogue might be to track down the inventor of some nifty gadget or some specialist poison ingredients whilst the bard/cleric is going to be more focused on building their organisation and making new connections with those in power. Occasionally the two quests might end up entwined...
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
edited February 2022
Also bards and clerics have great party buff abilities. Sometimes its not doing the damage but enabling others to do even more damage, or pass skill checks/saves.
Also what are there wis/cha scores? One of them is decent, right?
Quick question. Has the bard/cleric actually expressed a concern that they're not as "effective" as the super-optimized rogue in combat?
I played in a game where I was a bard/cleric multiclass and played him mostly to succeed out of combat, with focus on skills and spells that would help in a lot of non-combat situations. We had a couple players heavily optimized for combat (and not much else), and I was more than happy to let them carry extra weight during combat. Often times if I added up my "buff damage", it was way more than what I would have ever managed if I tried to do damage directly.
And I was fine with it.
So is there a big problem here, or do you only think there's a problem here?
The player might not have a problem with it, but I just always feel bad when they try to cast a spell and it seems like the majority of the time the target makes their save. I have been trying to give them more roleplaying opportunities, though.
One thing I might could try doing is inflicting more status conditions that they could heal, provided they have Lesser Restoration prepared.
The player might not have a problem with it, but I just always feel bad when they try to cast a spell and it seems like the majority of the time the target makes their save.
Yeah, that's how my own bard often felt in combat- either I landed my spell and turned the entire fight around with some galaxy brain stunt or I did nothing. And so many of their best spells require concentration, so even if you land one, welp, now you're an inspiration battery I guess, best not take a hit and drop that spell.
It was made up by all the social shenanigans they got up to out of combat tenfold!
But I agree with iron, just ask the player directly if they feel this is a problem- there are plenty of players who don't mind that sort of thing (and I wish I were one of them!).
We just hit level 7 and the rune knight abilities continue to be top notch. So many fun things to do per short rest as a fighter. I have 3 runes to play with, action surge and second wind, then runic shield and giants might multiple times per long rest.
Which runes have you been using?
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
We just hit level 7 and the rune knight abilities continue to be top notch. So many fun things to do per short rest as a fighter. I have 3 runes to play with, action surge and second wind, then runic shield and giants might multiple times per long rest.
Which runes have you been using?
Fire, cloud and storm.
Spoiler about a BIG combat Around level 6 in Rime.
We were fighting the Chardalyn Dragon and it failed its check for the fire shackles. It got us a solid 2 rounds of being able to beat on it. Completely changed the tone of the fight. It was awesome.
Does anyone here use the Beyond20 browser extension to link DndBeyond and Roll20?
Does it work well? Is it good?
It works great as a player. The being able to roll straight from the character sheet is really nice.
That's what I wanted to know. Someone in my group is suggesting we buy all the content again and rebuild our character sheets in Roll20 and I really do NOT want to do that.
I don' know if I posted this before, but I cam across the question searching for something else, and I have had a pretty great experience using Avrae/Dicecloud over discord. It definitely benefits if you already own things on DnD Beyond, but you can brute force most rolls if you don't have access to the non-SRD content already. It's not quite as easy as dragging icons around a map, but it does have a function for uploading maps, moving icons around it, initiative tracking, HP tracking. I haven't been on the DM side yet, but I know you can have it bring in monsters, and then the players just say "attack a monster" basically, and it rolls the dice, checks the AC/save, and if it hits, will roll damage for them.
"I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."
We just hit level 7 and the rune knight abilities continue to be top notch. So many fun things to do per short rest as a fighter. I have 3 runes to play with, action surge and second wind, then runic shield and giants might multiple times per long rest.
Which runes have you been using?
Fire, cloud and storm.
Spoiler about a BIG combat Around level 6 in Rime.
We were fighting the Chardalyn Dragon and it failed its check for the fire shackles. It got us a solid 2 rounds of being able to beat on it. Completely changed the tone of the fight. It was awesome.
Rune Knight is one subclass I absolutely want to try some day, followed closely by Way of Mercy for Monk
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webguy20I spend too much time on the InternetRegistered Userregular
We just hit level 7 and the rune knight abilities continue to be top notch. So many fun things to do per short rest as a fighter. I have 3 runes to play with, action surge and second wind, then runic shield and giants might multiple times per long rest.
Which runes have you been using?
Fire, cloud and storm.
Spoiler about a BIG combat Around level 6 in Rime.
We were fighting the Chardalyn Dragon and it failed its check for the fire shackles. It got us a solid 2 rounds of being able to beat on it. Completely changed the tone of the fight. It was awesome.
Rune Knight is one subclass I absolutely want to try some day, followed closely by Way of Mercy for Monk
It really feels like I have spells, and depending on the short rests/encounters per day I can deploy these abilities a fair amount.
In the Frostmaiden campaign I'm in (D&D as a player not DM?? Who knew!?), My wife is playing a Way of Mercy monk and she's having a ton of fun with it. I was considering Runeknight but I'm a basic asshole so I went Echo Knight and that mess is broken. Fun though!
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You guys doing the blue dragon in the desert or was that already? My DM at the time was kind of sick of DMing at that point so we did the dragon and he called it done at that point, didn't go anything with the Kraken
I'm going to give them giant sized potions so they can fight the kraken in his lair, bing them up to 14, and for the final dragon fight they're going to have their airship and some allies with them
This is Exandria so instead of a traditional desert, I've moved the dragon's lair to the ruins of Aeor because I can put lots of cool shit there
THEN they'll be on the path to figuring out that the Queen was murdered, and the King was kidnapped by the Kraken. All at the behest of the Ancient Blue Dragon who is also manipulating the giants and then they will eventually go after her too.
I'm actually getting pretty tired of this module as well and wondering where I can cut things out and save a few sessions here and there. I imagine I can try and snip out the casino bit in Yartar and get them the evidence the party needs to point them at the Kraken some other way....
specifically she seduced him and then stabbed him to death in his bedroom and took his stuff, and of course I put some kraken themed stuff in his house
anyway she stole a pile of paperwork and I just made up what it all was but one thing was an order for renovation of a ship called the Morkoth to increase the size of its hold and reinforce its frame. She dumped all the paperwork in the bank (yes this is the player that keeps evading death, rogues man)
cut to ... 3 sessions ago? after talking to the oracle who was like "You already have everything you need, the Morkoth is the key" and they beelined back home and looked through that stuff which was put into the bank and only then did I describe the ship's design (because previously she didnt look over the documents, just skimmed them and then moved on and forgot about them) and be like "ah shit this thing's big enough to hold a giant"
Edit: Earlier they brought the storm giant queen back to life and are hiding her in the bath house in the party's town, the central public bath is a pretty big room and they put her in there (still woozy with resurrection sickness) because "storm giants like water" and closed it to the public (she chuckled at the storm giants like water thing at how, idiotic it was, and how it was the kind of thing one of her daughters might have said if they found some humans alive when they were younger and brought them home to keep as pets). She's humoring them because she doesn't want to endanger an entire town by letting the dragon know she's alive, but at this point she's been crammed in one room sitting in shin deep in water for like a week and is starting to get upset despite being literally the most patient storm giant in all of creation, and has asked 3 different players to get her something to wear and each one just forgot. They have a golem bringing her food and wine basically non stop.
I DID remind them after the kraken fight and they did go tell her that they fought the kraken that was responsible for her death and it didnt go well and she practically screamed WELL GO TELL MY DAUGHTER IM ALIVE OR I WILL IM TIRED OF THIS SHIT. before apologizing and recomposing herself. A thunderstorm started outside, thankfully, they are finally going to the maelstrom
Sansuri was floating over the town and realized the source of the storm, investigated, and threw a fit that they hadn't gotten the queen anything to wear and she was covering up with a large treated animal skin tarp that goes over the central bath if it isnt being used. Allfather damnit Sansuri hates Neri, but this is unacceptable, so the two of them and the (new) cleric spent some time on Sansuri's castle doing some fashion stuff
Team Anti Ordening is the party, countess sansuri, thane kaylithica, queen moog (the new leader of the hill giants, literally a hill giant you meet in a random encounter with a serious head injury that they did not kill despite her being violent to them because my party can be sweeties, they healed her up), and the increasingly frustrated queen neri
edit: most of my players are women who tend to play characters who are supreme assholes to almost every individual but who are dedicated to ending a global system of oppression and have very high persuasion scores, second game where this has been the case after tomb of annihilation and ending slavery
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Oh shit, sorry. I assumed you were the DM for some reason.
It doesn't go well.
Or, at least it didn't for our party.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Im in the same boat with my fighter. Gotta put a post it note on my character sheet.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
My paladin has a displacer cloak that I keep forgetting about.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Oh, I'm the DM haha. I keep forgetting she has sentinel, so every time anything gets close she just wrecks it. Definitely stealing the idea from earlier in the thread of Strahd polymorphing her into a whale when that fight finally happens.
Here is another one i did that game. Strahd has an ability that lets him pass through walls/floors of his lair (the castle). So i ruled that as long as he maintains any contact with a castle surface, he can effectively zip along it in any direction in humanoid form, i.e. "flying" up a tower shaft by touching the tip of a finger to a wall.
My party was 5 optimized murder hobbos + arcane guardian + NPC Izzy with Gladiator stats and magical armor and 2h sword, so i had to crank up the difficulty otherwise the party just steamrolled everything.
In the Amber Temple encounter there is coin filled room where party fights a golem. I made the room magnetized with a cyclotron (effectively, but narratively it was magic) so when combat broke out the coins would spin wildly through the air and dex saves for half damage were needed at initiative count 20 each round).
I suppose, but appraising the value of things feels solidly in the Int department.
Hoping that the Paladin realises, because they can't speak and are just going "BWOOOOAAAAAOOOOOOAAAAAA"
This character really looks like they could be Fjord and Jester's kid. The only two things that make me think she might not be are 1) unless there are weird time shenanigans afoot this adventure would have to be set well after Campaign 3 and 2) it's usually stated that the child of a tiefling is always a tiefling, but I guess they're free to ignore that if they want.
A resolution!
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I'm particularly bothered by this situation because the former player of the Rogue is dealing out huge amounts of damage from a distance while the latter player of the Bard/Cleric is mostly using spells that require saving throws that targets often pass. Other than making it harder for the Rogue to attack from a distance and throwing in mobs of CR 1/2 undead and other weak enemies likely to fail saving throws, is there anything else I can do to make the player of the Bard/Cleric feel more like an important member of the party? Healing isn't much of an issue because the group has had plenty of access to healing potions, which in retrospect I've realized makes the Bard/Cleric's role as a healer largely obsolete (maybe I could find more ways to inflict conditions that Lesser Restoration could help with).
Or perhaps a rotating series of characters if they travel about more, a guard captain who is with them to certify the deed they were hired to do has been done. A noble who has been assigned to smooth things over with the neighbouring duchy as two renowned and heavily armed mercenaries move through, or a scout who the bard has hired to get them through a mountain pass, or lead them to the dragon horde, or perhaps a dwarf prospector looking to recover his old family hold.
Having a few minions certainly helps, especially if they have a base and lets the role player do more of the stuff they want to do, living in the world, whilst letting the rogue be a little more focused on themselves. Downtime sidequests for the rogue might be to track down the inventor of some nifty gadget or some specialist poison ingredients whilst the bard/cleric is going to be more focused on building their organisation and making new connections with those in power. Occasionally the two quests might end up entwined...
Also what are there wis/cha scores? One of them is decent, right?
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
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I played in a game where I was a bard/cleric multiclass and played him mostly to succeed out of combat, with focus on skills and spells that would help in a lot of non-combat situations. We had a couple players heavily optimized for combat (and not much else), and I was more than happy to let them carry extra weight during combat. Often times if I added up my "buff damage", it was way more than what I would have ever managed if I tried to do damage directly.
And I was fine with it.
So is there a big problem here, or do you only think there's a problem here?
One thing I might could try doing is inflicting more status conditions that they could heal, provided they have Lesser Restoration prepared.
I'll have to check on the ability scores.
It was made up by all the social shenanigans they got up to out of combat tenfold!
But I agree with iron, just ask the player directly if they feel this is a problem- there are plenty of players who don't mind that sort of thing (and I wish I were one of them!).
Ask yourself a different set of questions then. What could you do to make yourself feel better about the situation?
If they do feel the same way about it, maybe let them retrain either their bard or cleric levels?
Do the other players care?
Which runes have you been using?
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Fire, cloud and storm.
Spoiler about a BIG combat Around level 6 in Rime.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
I don' know if I posted this before, but I cam across the question searching for something else, and I have had a pretty great experience using Avrae/Dicecloud over discord. It definitely benefits if you already own things on DnD Beyond, but you can brute force most rolls if you don't have access to the non-SRD content already. It's not quite as easy as dragging icons around a map, but it does have a function for uploading maps, moving icons around it, initiative tracking, HP tracking. I haven't been on the DM side yet, but I know you can have it bring in monsters, and then the players just say "attack a monster" basically, and it rolls the dice, checks the AC/save, and if it hits, will roll damage for them.
The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson
Steam: Korvalain
Rune Knight is one subclass I absolutely want to try some day, followed closely by Way of Mercy for Monk
It really feels like I have spells, and depending on the short rests/encounters per day I can deploy these abilities a fair amount.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
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