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[D&D 5E] Xanathar's Guide to Striking a Nerve

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Posts

  • Emperor_ZEmperor_Z Registered User regular
    edited July 2016
    Brody wrote: »
    Also, as the DM, you could just choose to not use that move/spell?

    I play fair with myself. How can I trust myself if I bend the rules for myself? That guy's a shifty bastard who can't be given that kind of leeway.

    In seriousness, I like to try to keep things internally consistent. The more things conform to rules and/or realism, the more players can form semi-reliable expectations about the world, and therefore form plans that are clever, or have plans fail because they were poorly conceived. It would also remove some tension if players realized that the situation was working out solely because I allowed it to

    Emperor_Z on
  • AegisAegis Fear My Dance Overshot Toronto, Landed in OttawaRegistered User regular
    Don't forget Banishment. Basically a kill spell against demons/devils/whatever from other planes and "only" a complete disable against everything else. If you're fighting two bad ass monsters realize that fighting one by itself and then the other by itself is way way easier than fighting both of them at once.

    Greater Invis is both a defensive spell for personal safety and an offensive spell if you cast it on somebody who makes a bunch of attack rolls.

    Banishment being concentration based seems a bit of a pretty serious drawback, since if you lose concentration at any point prior to the spell expiring on its own after 1 minutes, the creature you banished immediately pops back to where it was. Well, that and you're stuck not casting another concentration spell while you wait for Banishment to naturally expire on its own.

    We'll see how long this blog lasts
    Currently DMing: None :(
    Characters
    [5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
  • DevoutlyApatheticDevoutlyApathetic Registered User regular
    Absolutely on the loss of other buffing opportunities but your previous list was pretty high on the pew pew pew. If managing to sustain concentration is a routine problem it also diminishes in value though that's typically on the rest of your group working together.

    In general though I favor spells that the fighter can't mimic by swinging his sword a few times. If you can pop out the Fire Giant so the party can focus on his minions while not taking giant hits it is usually worth it. Good judgement of targets is important though.

    Nod. Get treat. PSN: Quippish
  • AegisAegis Fear My Dance Overshot Toronto, Landed in OttawaRegistered User regular
    Yea, it's definitely beneficial to have a high priority enemy that can't make the CHA save out of the combat for however long that lasts. Provided his friends aren't intelligent enough to immediately realize what's going on and focus fire the one guy maintaining concentration.

    We'll see how long this blog lasts
    Currently DMing: None :(
    Characters
    [5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
  • Mongrel IdiotMongrel Idiot Registered User regular
    Finally getting a chance to try out the Battlemaster archetype over in Steelhawk's game. I always thought it looked awesome, right from when 5E released.

    It's pretty sweet. I've got kind of a battle-captain thing going right now, and already in one fight I've topped up an ally's temporary HP, granted another ally advantage, and (depending on how Steelhawk's ruling goes) may have managed to move an ally out of range of a monster, all while dealing what feels like solid damage. Lots of fun to play, and a nice variation on a straight-up fighter. I'm pretty happy with it.

  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    Ardent wrote: »
    Angry GM could be insightful, but honestly he picks some really stupid hills to die on.

    I haven't run 5e combat, so I can't speak to its speed (or lack thereof), but in general the speed of combat is normally tied directly to the system being used to run it. If that system is relatively simple (one roll, for example) combat is at a pace dictated by THE GROUP because some players will ponder longer on tactical decisions than others, who may take longer to describe actions than others. None of which is bad.

    I try to encourage my players to think about the battleground in their head as everyone acts so that when its their turn they have some idea of what they want to do.

    But man, blaming everything on the GM with regard to combat speed is just ignorant.

    I've never seen Angry blame the GM alone for combat speed issues. I mean, in one of his pieces, the one about running combat better he specifically says his players turns get skipped if they aren't ready to declare their actions when it's their turn in initiative, and they know that so they're ready to go. Not punishing people who take longer to describe, but if you're not ready to declare what you want to do when it's your turn, then you will be skipped over. I don't personally do that, but I have had to make sure my players know that they need to stay focused off-turn so that they're ready when it is their turn. If you don't, especially if you have a larger group, things bog down really badly.

  • ArdentArdent Down UpsideRegistered User regular
    Joshmvii wrote: »
    Ardent wrote: »
    Angry GM could be insightful, but honestly he picks some really stupid hills to die on.

    I haven't run 5e combat, so I can't speak to its speed (or lack thereof), but in general the speed of combat is normally tied directly to the system being used to run it. If that system is relatively simple (one roll, for example) combat is at a pace dictated by THE GROUP because some players will ponder longer on tactical decisions than others, who may take longer to describe actions than others. None of which is bad.

    I try to encourage my players to think about the battleground in their head as everyone acts so that when its their turn they have some idea of what they want to do.

    But man, blaming everything on the GM with regard to combat speed is just ignorant.

    I've never seen Angry blame the GM alone for combat speed issues. I mean, in one of his pieces, the one about running combat better he specifically says his players turns get skipped if they aren't ready to declare their actions when it's their turn in initiative, and they know that so they're ready to go. Not punishing people who take longer to describe, but if you're not ready to declare what you want to do when it's your turn, then you will be skipped over. I don't personally do that, but I have had to make sure my players know that they need to stay focused off-turn so that they're ready when it is their turn. If you don't, especially if you have a larger group, things bog down really badly.
    On Monday, I wrote a rant about how I’m tired of hearing dips$&%s GMs complain about the speed of combat because the speed of combat is in their hands. The thing is, a good two-thirds of my articles are written as a result of my getting tired of listening to GMs complain about stupid things. Or give bad advice about how to fix stupid things. Seriously? Do you want me to write an article on a specific topic? Go ahead and start complaining about a stupid thing and then send me a link. If I don’t hunt you down and slap you unconscious – just block you on social media channels – I’ll probably write an article about it.

    Ok.

    Steam ID | Origin ID: ArdentX | Uplay ID: theardent | Battle.net: Ardent#11476
  • DenadaDenada Registered User regular
  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    edited July 2016
    Ardent wrote: »
    Joshmvii wrote: »
    Ardent wrote: »
    Angry GM could be insightful, but honestly he picks some really stupid hills to die on.

    I haven't run 5e combat, so I can't speak to its speed (or lack thereof), but in general the speed of combat is normally tied directly to the system being used to run it. If that system is relatively simple (one roll, for example) combat is at a pace dictated by THE GROUP because some players will ponder longer on tactical decisions than others, who may take longer to describe actions than others. None of which is bad.

    I try to encourage my players to think about the battleground in their head as everyone acts so that when its their turn they have some idea of what they want to do.

    But man, blaming everything on the GM with regard to combat speed is just ignorant.

    I've never seen Angry blame the GM alone for combat speed issues. I mean, in one of his pieces, the one about running combat better he specifically says his players turns get skipped if they aren't ready to declare their actions when it's their turn in initiative, and they know that so they're ready to go. Not punishing people who take longer to describe, but if you're not ready to declare what you want to do when it's your turn, then you will be skipped over. I don't personally do that, but I have had to make sure my players know that they need to stay focused off-turn so that they're ready when it is their turn. If you don't, especially if you have a larger group, things bog down really badly.
    On Monday, I wrote a rant about how I’m tired of hearing dips$&%s GMs complain about the speed of combat because the speed of combat is in their hands. The thing is, a good two-thirds of my articles are written as a result of my getting tired of listening to GMs complain about stupid things. Or give bad advice about how to fix stupid things. Seriously? Do you want me to write an article on a specific topic? Go ahead and start complaining about a stupid thing and then send me a link. If I don’t hunt you down and slap you unconscious – just block you on social media channels – I’ll probably write an article about it.

    Ok.

    But he's right and also not only blaming GMs. He's just pointing out that the GM is the one who sets the expectations for the table. The speed of combat is in their hands. A GM who doesn't require their players to be ready to declare actions on their turns and then complains about it is being a fool because they're the one who has to do something about that. A GM who spends too much time narrating actions in combat with flowery language instead of being efficient and then complains about how long it takes is in the same boat.

    I mean, the GM is the one to blame if they're not adjudicating their game the way they want it. It's a collaborative effort at the table, but the GM is the one who sets those expectations.

    Joshmvii on
  • AegeriAegeri Tiny wee bacteriums Plateau of LengRegistered User regular
    Sorry Ardent, I don't agree with you and Angry is right. Combat speed is largely down to the DM and how you choose to enforce decision making. Obviously if you run very tactical combats with frequently high lethality, like I do, then you give players more time to make decisions. Many aspects of combat and how fast/slow it goes is in the GMs hands. You can make players roll their attack and damage dice at once, you can skip turns or fiddle with initiative, you can design encounters to be as threatening/complex/detailed as you want etc.

    There is a tremendous amount of game design and knowledge used to control the pace of a fight in any RPG. These are all things the GM has complete control over compared with players, who only ever need to do one thing in a combat (tell you what their character does).

    The Roleplayer's Guild: My blog for roleplaying games, advice and adventuring.
  • BrodyBrody The Watch The First ShoreRegistered User regular
    Aegeri wrote: »
    Sorry Ardent, I don't agree with you and Angry is right. Combat speed is largely down to the DM and how you choose to enforce decision making. Obviously if you run very tactical combats with frequently high lethality, like I do, then you give players more time to make decisions. Many aspects of combat and how fast/slow it goes is in the GMs hands. You can make players roll their attack and damage dice at once, you can skip turns or fiddle with initiative, you can design encounters to be as threatening/complex/detailed as you want etc.

    There is a tremendous amount of game design and knowledge used to control the pace of a fight in any RPG. These are all things the GM has complete control over compared with players, who only ever need to do one thing in a combat (tell you what their character does).

    Hey, I also need to decide between Cheetos and Doritos. Don't make light of my struggles.

    "I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."

    The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson

    Steam: Korvalain
  • ElvenshaeElvenshae Registered User regular
    The pain is real, @Brody.

  • AegeriAegeri Tiny wee bacteriums Plateau of LengRegistered User regular
    Well okay, I should have also added "Fail horribly at whatever they tried to do and require a complete rewrite of the plan the players discussed for 10 minutes to finally agree upon".

    The Roleplayer's Guild: My blog for roleplaying games, advice and adventuring.
  • ArdentArdent Down UpsideRegistered User regular
    Again, I'm not sure I'm equipped to argue this vis-a-vis 5e because I've never run 5e, so I can only guess at how hard or not it is to wrangle your players through combat based on my one experience playing it.

    Moreover, I know that combat in Exalted, or Vampire, or Dark Heresy/Rogue Trader/Deathwatch is going to take longer than combat in a one roll resolution engine. It's inherent to to the multiple rolls/chart referral of those game engines.

    Can I punish players who take too long by taking their turn away from them? I guess, if being an absolute dick was my goal. Generally, my goal is to collaboratively tell awesome stories, so I'm not going to take Nathan's turn away from him because he wants another minute to consider whether doing a backflip over Mook A and landing next to Brian is going to be a bad idea because Bad Guy Supreme has Cleave. But when Brian's in the bathroom on his turn, I have no problem dropping him to the end of the initiative order.

    He starts out framing his argument incorrectly (i.e. GMs, most especially bad ones, are the problem) and his attempts to apply nuance are pretty bad as well; I suspect nuance is not something he does well.

    Steam ID | Origin ID: ArdentX | Uplay ID: theardent | Battle.net: Ardent#11476
  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    Angry GM frames the beginning of his article joking about how he's constantly bombarded with questions from GMs having problems that are soooo easy to solve(just let him tell you how).

    It's the shtick of the website. Any time Angry is not actually explaining the thing he's writing an article about, he's just being incendiary and verbose because that's what his "parody of a one true wayist" persona does.

    You suspect wrong if you think Angry doesn't have nuance to his articles. If you really think that, I'm sure you've not actually read any of them in full.

  • webguy20webguy20 I spend too much time on the Internet Registered User regular
    Our normal game sessions for D&D are about 2.5 hours on Wednesdays, which is nice and we get through a bit. This Saturday we are going to play for like 8-10 hours straight. I am incredibly excited! It's been forever since I've gotten to binge on pen and paper RPG goodness.

    We just hit level 4 in curse of Strahd so 20 strength, here I come!

    Steam ID: Webguy20
    Origin ID: Discgolfer27
    Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
  • AegisAegis Fear My Dance Overshot Toronto, Landed in OttawaRegistered User regular
    Wizards of the Coast doing something intelligent with an online medium?

    Nope, don't believe it.

    We'll see how long this blog lasts
    Currently DMing: None :(
    Characters
    [5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
  • ArdentArdent Down UpsideRegistered User regular
    Rius wrote: »
    I mean, it's basically the prime venue its played in already...

    Steam ID | Origin ID: ArdentX | Uplay ID: theardent | Battle.net: Ardent#11476
  • ElvenshaeElvenshae Registered User regular
    My first thought was, "Hey, that's cool! :D"

    My second was, "I bet it's 5th Ed only, though ... :("

  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    I always figured as long as there wasn't an exclusive deal with Fantasy Grounds who already had the 5E modules, this would eventually happen. 5E dwarfs every other game played on Roll20 so it's a no brainer for Roll20, and for WotC it's just free money.

    I don't play my games online, but I like to see people who do get this kind of support.

  • webguy20webguy20 I spend too much time on the Internet Registered User regular
    Played about 7 hours of D&D yesterday. It was great, its been years since I've played for over 3 hours. Only had one 20 minute combat too, the rest was exploration and RP. It was still pretty good! I game with a bunch of fun folks so there are a lot of hilarious moments. Halfway through we took a dog park break and tuckered out the pups that were with us. It was exactly what was needed. I can't sit in a chair straight for multiple straight hours anymore, and getting out and having a good walk with the dogs was so nice.

    Steam ID: Webguy20
    Origin ID: Discgolfer27
    Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
  • GreenGreen Stick around. I'm full of bad ideas.Registered User regular
    So my LG aasimar cleric stumbled into two wishes from a travelling caravan and the party is in the midst of deciding what to do with them. Our discussion gets sidetracked by a small horde of zombies besieging the town, which was the DM's friendly reminder that we hadn't dealt with a local necromancer yet. We beat them down with little problem but they manage to zombify some of the villagers (including the mayor) first. So as we're standing there with the survivors, our CG sorceress and CN barbarian start to loot the bodies. Keep in mind these bodies are a) poor villagers, and b) in full view of their surviving friends and family.

    My cleric loses her shit. She tells them, in no uncertain terms, that she will not allow this to happen. (A bit of an empty threat given her nature, but they don't particularly know that.) The barbarian relents, but the sorceress starts doing it anyway. The cleric knows she can't really start an open conflict within the party and is just so frustrated by what's going on that she just starts screaming.

    "I WISH YOU WERE LAWFUL GOOD!"
    It didn't stick though, the sorceress's player has demonstrated a complete inability to play LG so the DM agreed to pretend it hadn't happened.

  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    edited August 2016
    Alignment is stupid, but looting the bodies of innocent recently slain villagers in front of their families(or at all) is not the behavior of a good character, chaotic or not.

    Joshmvii on
  • GreenGreen Stick around. I'm full of bad ideas.Registered User regular
    Joshmvii wrote: »
    Alignment is stupid, but looting the bodies of innocent recently slain villagers in front of their families(or at all) is not the behavior of a good character, chaotic or not.

    I know! I really wish our DM would crack down on him for that but they're longtime friends so that seems unlikely. In his own words, his sorceress's main character trait is "fuck you, pay me." This is not a Good character.

  • BrodyBrody The Watch The First ShoreRegistered User regular
    Green wrote: »
    Joshmvii wrote: »
    Alignment is stupid, but looting the bodies of innocent recently slain villagers in front of their families(or at all) is not the behavior of a good character, chaotic or not.

    I know! I really wish our DM would crack down on him for that but they're longtime friends so that seems unlikely. In his own words, his sorceress's main character trait is "fuck you, pay me." This is not a Good character.

    I disagree, that could be a great character. Han Solo. But you never see Han rifling though an unconscious... Alright, well, he wasn't looting, he was procuring a disguise. Its totally different.

    But I agree, looting bodies is a generically terrible idea.

    "I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."

    The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson

    Steam: Korvalain
  • see317see317 Registered User regular
    Brody wrote: »
    Green wrote: »
    Joshmvii wrote: »
    Alignment is stupid, but looting the bodies of innocent recently slain villagers in front of their families(or at all) is not the behavior of a good character, chaotic or not.

    I know! I really wish our DM would crack down on him for that but they're longtime friends so that seems unlikely. In his own words, his sorceress's main character trait is "fuck you, pay me." This is not a Good character.

    I disagree, that could be a great character. Han Solo. But you never see Han rifling though an unconscious... Alright, well, he wasn't looting, he was procuring a disguise. Its totally different.

    But I agree, looting bodies is a generically terrible idea.
    I'm thinking that since "Good" was capitalized, that the character was not behaving in the way a "Good" aligned character should be behaving by looting the recently killed villagers in front of their kin.
    Sure, a blood thirsty money grubbing bastard could still be a good character, but probably wouldn't be a Good aligned character.

  • GaddezGaddez Registered User regular
    Yeah, there is a bit of tact required for proper looting; the smart call would have been to wait for the villagers to take care their dead and then wait for a reward given that they're on the poor end of things.

    Hell, it might even lead to a bigger reward.

  • GreenGreen Stick around. I'm full of bad ideas.Registered User regular
    Yeah, Good as I used there meant Good-Aligned. To be clear, I have no problems with the character, the player, or the DM. Just, y'know, a little alignment check wouldn't exactly be uncalled for in this situation.

  • AegisAegis Fear My Dance Overshot Toronto, Landed in OttawaRegistered User regular
    Alignment check is going to do nothing to resolve the situation, and is likely to make things worse. You've already mentioned that they're apparently incapable of playing a Lawful Good character and are now demonstrating an inability to play a Chaotic Good character. This seems to suggest they have a problem understanding or handling conceptual constraints to their character-building or roleplay, which to me is the more significant issue at play.

    As someone who was a DM & player on an NWN RP server for years, alignment policing was one of the more annoying things to run into, because there exist people who are incapable of understanding the constraints of the alignment system, for whatever reason. At best, they'll simply ignore (or fail to process) any alignment discussion and the next time a situation arises in which their vision for the character (or an impulsive reaction) goes against the alignment system you'll be right back to square one. At worst, they'll interpret the situation as you personally punishing them for something they don't understand what they did wrong.

    I think I ran across less than a handful of times an alignment transgression was handled maturely, and in almost every instance it was the player that requested the change because either they felt their initial alignment wasn't appropriate to how their character was actually playing out in practice, or a player's character was going through some severe crisis in which their actions necessitated an alignment change and said player was interested in RPing through the entire change. But like, when players themselves start inquiring about alignments it shows they already have an understanding on how it constrains their character.

    We'll see how long this blog lasts
    Currently DMing: None :(
    Characters
    [5e] Dural Melairkyn - AC 18 | HP 40 | Melee +5/1d8+3 | Spell +4/DC 12
  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    In the end, I think alignment is really stupid, but at my table, there's an understanding that we like it when characters disagree on how to handle different things, and major disagreements about stuff like that will be handled in character. And the players each have to be willing to sometimes take a loss in a disagreement, but if it happens enough times and somebody is just constantly doing things with their character that don't fit what the rest of the group is about, their character will end up forcibly retired because they'll be booted from the group. It's never come to that because people are adults, and I doubt it ever will, but yeah. It's ultimately a cooperative game, and even if you're going to disagree on things, you have to be able to work together.

  • ArdentArdent Down UpsideRegistered User regular
    In playing D&D, players are going to loot. I stopped bothering to say what they found in full, either describing it as "nothing of interest" or "you found a particularly well-made sword that you suspect may be valuable," or even "you sense a bit of magic about his sash."

    So if something is intended to have loot, et voila, it does. If it isn't, nothing catches the character's eye. This the key part of this statement. I don't care if they player thinks they want 67 goblin short swords. The character doesn't.

    Steam ID | Origin ID: ArdentX | Uplay ID: theardent | Battle.net: Ardent#11476
  • BrodyBrody The Watch The First ShoreRegistered User regular
    That's a good point. The GM could have easily responded with, "There is literally nothing of value on or around their person. This does not require a thorough search."

    "I will write your name in the ruin of them. I will paint you across history in the color of their blood."

    The Monster Baru Cormorant - Seth Dickinson

    Steam: Korvalain
  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    If you're talking about D&D 5E, the looting really isn't an issue, because the game actually tells you that when looting enemies monster gear isn't worth anything. Players don't get to go "I'm going to loot the 20 goblin shortbows to take them to town and sell them," because they're not worth anything. I would never take the agency away from the player to tell them that their character doesn't want to loot shit, but that doesn't mean janky goblin bows are worth anything. You can make firewood out of them if you want for all I care.

    But in the example of looting villagers, I don't know what the player in question was trying to find. Peasants deal in copper or maybe a couple silver pieces. They're not going to have anything worthwhile on them even if a player does want to be terrible and loot their fresh corpses.

  • see317see317 Registered User regular
    edited August 2016
    Joshmvii wrote: »
    But in the example of looting villagers, I don't know what the player in question was trying to find. Peasants deal in copper or maybe a couple silver pieces. They're not going to have anything worthwhile on them even if a player does want to be terrible and loot their fresh corpses.

    Would the proper response in this situation be: You're suddenly (but not surprisingly) set upon by an unruly mob of armed peasants. Since you're busy molesting their recently dead kin in an attempt to shake a few copper pieces out of them, they all get the drop on you. Do you have armor with bonus resistance to pitchforks? What about improvised clubs?

    see317 on
  • JoshmviiJoshmvii Registered User regular
    I mean I would certainly have the living villagers react in horror to somebody looting the bodies of their recently deceased kin/friends. I don't know that I'd have them attack them, but they'd certainly be in their faces screaming at them about what they're doing.

  • FryFry Registered User regular
    edited August 2016
    One of the groundrules of D&D for me personally is that I want to tell a story about heroes doing heroic things. I'm not really interested in telling a story about the kind of characters who would attempt to loot innocent villagers, or haggle with every innkeeper over the price of room and board.

    Fry on
  • DevoutlyApatheticDevoutlyApathetic Registered User regular
    You forgot the other perennial: favorite the guy who wants to set up shop as a merchant.

    Nod. Get treat. PSN: Quippish
  • AistanAistan Tiny Bat Registered User regular
    Finally we confront the nefarious necromancer who has been raising all these zombies! Time to end this undead plague before it gets any worse than just a few inside a small cave.

    *First turn, supercharged magic missiles, 12 damage, down goes the paladin*

    ... welp. At least the rest of the party took him down, but she's rather pissed off at herself that she fucked up so badly at one of the few things her god is emphatic about stopping. Good hook to have her be grateful to the others though, who finished the job while she was incapacitated. Nice reason to have her want to set up a more permanent partnership since they can be relied upon.

  • GaddezGaddez Registered User regular
    So today was interesting in my curse of Strahd campaign in that the party decided to utterly cock up what should have been an easy enough fetch quest.

    Having retrieved a seed from yester hill, the party decided to go and get the other one, which they were given to understand belonged to a powerful Hag called Baba Lysaga. This should have been easy; I'd decided to have the hag elsewhere when they arrived so sneaking into the ruined village she was layering in and getting past her handful of scarecrow guards should have been the obvious course of action.

    Two of my players decided that they were too smart for that though, and one of them (a warlock who was playing for his second time with a second level character) decides to fire an eldritch blast at one of the scarecrows, which (upon seeing the party) flees towards this immense stump in the middle of the village while screaming, which got the rest of them screaming and heading over there.

    Now, 7 scarecrows would have presented quite a challenge to a party of 7 heroes of varying levels, but what came next exponentially worse: the stump hut pulled itself out of the ground and began moving in the direction of the players.

    Uncertain as to what was going on, the players debated what to do until they saw the stump hurl a rock at the warlock which came up as a crit and then 38 points of bludgeoning damage on the character that could sustain 13. Said player spent the next few minutes in a state of shock at how utterly he'd been looney tuned.

    The rest of the players though, were smart enough to know they needed to GTFO, since the stump was still coming at them with more rocks and fled for the treeline, though not before discovering that the stump had the other magic seed inside of it. Gingerly, they decided to set up camp and rest up in preperation of the next assault, but not before seeing some sort of large object pass overhead and land in the village.

    In the morning, they found what the object was: a giant skull that was resting upside down. Warnings had come down the pipe from others that the skull was able to fly thanks to the hags magic, so it stood to reason that she was about. In theory, this was ok since the players were angling to somehow convince her to give up the seed so that they could get her help to fight strahd or something. The best laid plans this was not.

    (In the mean time though, one of the players had decided to try and pet a scarecrow that then proceeded to murder the crap out of him).

    Much to the chagrin of the players, they discovered that Lysaga wasn't interested in scheming against strahd, since they discovered the hag considered him to be her son and had been merely ammusing herself at their expense.

    Cue the players fleeing while their buddy the stump threw some rocks at them.

    Current death/insanity toll:
    1 elf mage (killed by a vampire he tried to feed beef jerkey)
    1 Dragonborn barbarian (killed by a vampire)
    1 halfling druid (left to fight the afformentioned vampire and proceeded to IC ragequit the party; I'm toying with him showing back up as part of an encounter)
    1 Warlock
    1 sorcerer

    I'm not big on killing players but Lord almighty I've had fun with it this season.

This discussion has been closed.