The Taladas Debate Archive Page
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Hello.
Kev is specialised in Airrider magic, like most of the family. That's a (very limited) school of magic devoted to flying spells, weather control and lightning blasts, that we agreed with Ed when Kev joined in. Unsusrprisingly all the powers supplied so far came from Airrider-school wizards.
The current generation of Airriders are:-
- Merlin - Airrider school
- Kite - Token non-wizard
- Peregrine - Conjuration
- Kestrel - Necromancy
- Hawk - Airrider school
- so the staff could end up being pretty potent by the time it gets handed on to the next generation...
Oh, just to dive back to the armour debate for a second I was going through the Arms & Equipment Guide supplement the other day (looking to see if that could help me decide what lamellar armour (used by the later Roman army) would class as in AD&D terms) and came across another explanation as to why certain armours cost more than others. If just about every armourer can make chain mail (which since it is so popular with the bulk buyers in the armies and watches, they certainly should) then the price wars between them are going to artificially drive down the cost of chain mail in comparison to less common armours such as banded and scale mail, which may be only made by a few armourers. It also points out that certain armours (scale mail is mentioned and there are others) only crop up in more eastern and southern cultures where they are better under hot conditions than plate or chain. (Not perfect, just better...) When bought there they would be cheaper and it would be foreign chain mail that should be more expensive than it's AC would reflect.
Just a thought.
Alex
I suppose Pez could add a few summoning abilities to it. Airial servant comes to mind as being appropriate. I'm not so sure about Kev's character. Is he specialised in any perticular type of magic?
Andy
The Airrider staff at present can
- Fly (at the same speed and agility as a Broom of Flying)
- Come to an Airrider's hand on command (again, as a Broom of Flying)
- Fire small bolts of lightning (as the spell Lightning Bug from a Waterdeep supplement I have lying around)
- Generate thunderclaps when an enemy is struck in hand to hand doing extra damage (as a Staff of Thunder and Lightning)
making it in effect a Staff of Thunder and Lightning combined with a Broom of Flying, with the Lightning Bolt ability replaced with the first level Lightning Bug instead. The first two effects are free, while the latter two burn up charges.
The background is that the staff was made to be a family heirloom with each successive generation adding their own effects to it (and presumably there are some notes somewhere at Skywyrm House explaining how to add new abilities which should cut out some of the research costs for the following generations...). For those who are interested Peregrine II (Grandad to our current pair) was the one who gave it the flying abilities, Falcon (Dad) the Lightning Bugs, and Uncle Raven the thunderclaps. Thus to stay true to our character backgrounds me and Kev are going to have to make his magic item better. Such a pity. Sigh.
As far as armour goes I think I have it much easier in the Dark Age campaign where I can simplify things by keeping out all the armour that is beyond the tech level and cost isn't an issue in a barter economy. Also it helps that in a magic item-poor environment like my campaign a good quality suit of armour (usually Roman) can be used as a substitute for handing out magic items. (The system I use in my campaign is that every magic item (bar scrolls and potions) is a one of a kind. Even the humble Sword +1 is unique...)
Alex
Ah, I wasn't thinking about the 3rd edition so much. Personally, I still think the cost maters. If the pc's have so much old, they don't even think about such things any more, perhaps the DM has been giving out a little too. Ed could probably tell you that I don't always give out huge amounts of cash.
I can see his point though... Not many people with a dex high enough to make use of the +4 max bonus would be in a class where they would want to put up with the armour check penalty. For most others interested in medium armour breastplate armour would be better... if you've got endless gold. I might say that hide armour is there for low levels sort on cash. Adequate protection for a small cost.
Fire enchanments on red dragon hide make perfect sense to me, and I agree it would be easier than platemail with similar powers. I think that was what I was on about before.
Yeah, I can see how manufacturing would reflect price, but still, how come scale mail cost more than chainmail. It's just plain easir to make. Quicker too. Brigandine and ring mail are simpler too.
Armours that provide better protection are usually more difficult to make. Shaping steel is harder than tailoring leather. Joints are always hard to protect too, requiring extra time and skill. All these things add to the cost above and beyond material expenses.
Demand is one of things that effect cost. Warriors will pay more for what they see as better protection (ergo lower AC). The smiths will charge what they think the soldiers will pay. Because of this, I think it makes perfect sense to link cost to AC. Armours that don't give decent protection for cost will become historical foot notes, unless it is the only sort available for some reason.
Incidently, what does the air ryder staff do at the minute anyway?
Andy
Just quoting the author of the article who was only regarding AC bonus, speed adjustment and dex check penalties in 3rd edition. He felt hide was a poor balance of the three. He also talked about magical enhancement and specifically talked about casting fire resistence into red dragon armour and how you could say such a thing would be easier than full plate armour of fire resistence.
I think some of the armour costs are based around ideas of manufacture as well as quality. Of course that means nothing to PC who is only interested in AC benefits.
As far as magic items are concerned the Airrider brothers should both be thinking about adding abilities to the family heirloom, the Staff of the Airriders...
Hmm.
Alex
Funny you should mention hide armour as being poor, because I've always thought of it as being one of the best cheep armour types! I can't think of anything else that gives AC6 for only 15 gp... baring an armour spell, of course.
Technically, Schallat is actually wearing hide armour now, in the form of red dragon skin armour, but that is (almost) magic.
I can see your point about price and wealth. It was messing around with the Battlesystem stuff that set me off thinking about it again. In that context, the cost of different armout types is very important. Looking at it that way hide + medium shield (AC5 for 22 gp) beats chainmail any day (AC5 for 75 gp and the same weight, although you can use a two handed weapon). The only reason I didn't list it more was the fact that I didn't think most civilised military forces would use it!
To be honest, there is a part of me that says being able to buy good armour is one of the advantages of wealth. Still, the idea of brewing up special rules for different armour types does have a certain alure. However, the stronger part of me questions whether it would be worth the extra hassel in game - especially coming up with a enough of them to make ring mail (AC7, 100 gp and 30 lbs!) worth it could strain both my brain and the credability of the resulting system.
Perhaps a little of both might be in order. Secondary advantages aside, I can't see why simple armour types like ring mail should cost more than splint mail. That just doesn't make any sense.
I do like the idea of associating different armour types with various properties. It would make sense for it to be easier to make magic item that 'feel right' in a mystic sense, such as Arctic Hide which protects against cold based attacts, or Fish scale armour which allows the wearer to swim and breath under water while worn.
Seeing as we are now getting to the point in the game where we can think about making our own magic item such things become more relevent. We're still only mid-level characters, so it would make sense that the spell casters would have to find such justifications to ease the processes of enchanment, and leave making Whatnote +2 for higher levels.
Perhaps the biggest advantage of doing things this way would be that it makes the resulting item more interesting than just another long sword +1.
Andy
Hello.
As far as spells go I would probably put in a kind of
- Flame Strike; see Wrath of Chislev
on the sheets. That should solve any major problems.
As far as armour goes that reminds me of an article in Knights of the Dinner Table. It was talking about armour in 3rd edition and how if you crunch the numbers only three suits of armour are optimal depending upon class and dexterity. His answer, and I think it's a good one is to find plus points for the weaker armours, rather than just twiddling with prices. After all, once characters hit a certain amount of finances cost doesn't really affect them much.
One of his examples was hide, which was never that useful in either edition. I think my bear-worshipping paladin has been the only hide-wearing character in our campaign's history and that was only because it was made of holy bear-skins. And look how long he lasted... Anyway, the answer from this article was to say that certain hides could have certain bonuses e.g. salamander hide gives a bonus to saves vs. fire attacks, and so on. They could also be more easy to bless or curse in some way. Maybe certain armours cause less damage when hit with a heat metal spell because the metal is kept away from the skin. Alternately you could say that the better armours are more prone to doing damage through heat spells because they cover more skin.
Obviously some armours already have their down sides (anyone want to be wearing full plate when they fall into the river?) but there should be plenty of other ideas between us to balance some of the armours...
Alex
I don't know if it has occured to anyone else, but when you look at the cost for a lot of the armour types, they don't make any sense.Ring mail and brigandine both cost more chainmail, but basically are not as good. Why worry about chainmail? Splintmail only cost 5 gp more and gives a better AC yet. And why does bronze platemail cost so much more then splint mail when it only provides the same protection at greater weight?
This has been bothering me for some time. How about we change the costs to something that reprosents their usefulness a bit more. Maybe someone will actually BUY ring mail then. I'd surgest:-
- Padded armour, 4gp
- Leather armour, 5 gp
- Ring mail, 20gp
- Studded leather, 30 gp
- Scale mail, 40 gp
- Brigandine, 50gp
- Hide, 60 gp
- Chainmail, 75gp
- Bronze platemail, 150gp
- Splintmail, 200gp
- Banded mail, 300gp
- Platemail, 600gp
- Field Plate, 2000gp
- Full plate, 4,000 - 10,000gp
On a lighter note, another Smithian spell - Smith's Blessed Absence. A bit like the Sancturary spell, except more of a bonus to other people than the caster.
Andy
Thank you, keep the idea's rolling! Both for the armies stuff and Smith. I like the idea of messing around with spell names to manke them more personel, although I would put the 'standard' name in brackets afterwards, incase he want to look something up. Magic Vestment could be Skin of the Crocodile. I'll think about it a little more.
Speaking of Smith, I tride to put together Smith's horn of friend summoning, but the item creation roll failed.
Andy
Oh, I forgot to say... Great Fang Cavalry. Yay!
And I'm slicing off a lot of the old debate that we aren't really referring to much anymore. I'll put it in a safe place so we can still refer to it if we need to.
Alex
How about Smith's Diabolical Duplication which gives the target a Charisma score equal to the caster. A positive boon if Talasek casts it, a mighty curse if Smith is the one doing the prayers...
Or maybe even a higher level version that allows him to swap Charisma scores with another person. Scary.
As for Smith's armour, well the Airrider bank is always open to loan applications, even if you have been refused credit elsewhere (or in Smith's case, everywhere...). Or just maybe Pez could find it in his heart to buy him a suit of plate or something.
Oh, one touch I've been doing with some of the revamped spell sheets I've been doing for the priests (with your new spells like the Claws of Chislev and so on) is to rename some of the spells. Nothing too serious but things like Spiritual Mace (a name I've always disliked) is now St Cuthbert's Mace, Barkskin is now the Aura of St Cuthbert, Flame Strike to the Wrath of Chislev and so on. I think it gives the spells a little more character and ties into the backgrounds without having to concoct a whole raft of new spells.
Alex
Yeah, Sandy mentioned it awhile back.
Some more Smith magic. Smith's lice ridden armour. Allows him to cast summon insects or something similar. Or a spell, Smith's terrible breath, allows him to breath acid over those who displease him.
Andy
I take it the other person was my brother, as I came up with the idea a few weeks back during a conversation with him. Its just with you putting up the Vale-Elf forces it seemed a good point to introduce the concept so I could later use one as a character...
Making magic items would indeed make sense for Smith, what with the imposed lack of human (and demi-human) contact. I'll give the Smithesque spells some thought.
Craig
Ok, seeing as you are the second person to call for Sabre tooth tiger cavalry, I'll see what I can do. I've added the goblins to the loyal forces, so their now officially called Tunnel Wardens, seeing as that's what they do.
As a side point, I was talking to Geoff a bit ago about where he was going to take Smith in the long term. Some people might surgest 'away' as a good start, but we were thinking more in terms of development. He was saying that there was little point in trying to have him build a castle as gain followers, because.. well its a bit obvious really... Cha 3.
Anyway, I surgested in send his time creating new magic items and spells. St. Cuthbert knows, Smith could do with some decent equipment. That chainmail is looking a bit rusty and rather average.
I thought he could make a two handed mace and call it Smith's Blunt Truth. Goeff thought about a spell that instantly causes everyone to leave the area - perhaps Smith's Repulsive Aura. Can anyone else think Smithian magic?
Andy
About a dozen goblins also turned up if I recall. Both lots signed up to the Watch, though they remain loyal primarily to me. The goblins been quite handy in keeping an eye on the sewers, the giants have been... well, they've been giants, what more do you need them to do..?
Oh, and I have suggestion for the Vale Elf Forces - Elves riding Sabre-Tooth Tigers!!!
Its not that far fetched as it first sounds either: You have a bunch of tree-hugging elves living in this Vale + Sabre-Tooth Tigers that have been bred for riding starting to flourish in the area = Some of the more elite of the mounted archers taking to riding Sabre-Tooth Tigers rather then horses.
Simple really.
And a way-cool image.
There would only be a handful of them, because the Sabre-Tooths have only just started breeding in the area, but they'd be suitably scary if you came into combat against them. And if the Vale-Elves have taken an interest in keeping them then it would go someway to explaining how they have become quite prosperous.
In fact I think that’s my next character idea sorted, should Noman fall, or retire for a bit.
(a threat that probably means Ed won’t be killing him off in a hurry…)
I’ll leave it to Andy to sort out the BattleSystem stats for them as he seems to be having fun doing that…
Craig
Three of them, hey? More the mightier. I think firegiants might have rather metalic names, like Fireflux or Forge. Maybe Acetylene too, although that sounds like a girls name.
Any idea how far firgiant can hurl rocks? I guess I need Ed yo look it up in which ever monstrous compendium it in. I'll assume 150 yards for now, which is quite a shotpur.
By the way, did Noman gain any other followers at the same time? AS I telly it, the current count of our pooled followers is 200 bakali fantics and 3 fire giants. I'll do up some BATTLESYSTEM stats for them, which should be pretty impressive.
Andy.
I thought there were three of them, but no they don't have names yet, just 1, 2 or 3 tattooed on their respective heads.
I'll come up with some names and let you know (unless Ed has come up with some himself...)
Craig
Craig, do those two fire giants of yours have names yet? Aside from the fact that there is an empty section for them, it occured to me that I should mention them in the loyal forces section, seeing as they are your biggest fans. Pun intended.
Andy
Well I did say he was drawn in after a clash with Kite and Merlin. It was just a little more brutal than the Airrider history made out...
Oh, and if you think you had problems reading it just think what it was like for me writing it! Plenty of scrolling up and down, muttering things like "OK, Rook could be working with Swan on that. No, wait. Swan died thirteen years back. OK, Rook and Osprey were working on..."
Still at least its done...
Alex
Can anybody remember the name of the dwarf stronghold near to the vale of the mage? It's just that I've been reorganising the armies page. I've split it into three sections for loyal force, allies and mercenaries. I want the dwarves for the allies section, although I might give each group of allies their own page if I decide that it looks to messy.
The loyal forces contain listing for those troops we are likely to be able to directly control. I've got down bakali fantaics, human watchmen, kobolds, and AirRyder house guards. Anything interesting that I've missed?
Andy
PS. Sandy, I've had a look at the Airryder page, and I can't see anything terribly wrong with it. The one thing I did notes was that you said Alabastor was drawn into ravenloft - all good and true, but acording to a statement by Ed on this page he was dead at the time! That might might be worth adding. I confess that I did start to have trouble remembering all the names by about half way through. Like all the aristocracy, they have too many numbers and not enough names!
Grumble
He was not his brother.
He was just an obsessed groupie.
Craig
Except, of course, that he had a brother...
By the way, has anyone looked at the Armies of Southern Hosk page that I added? I just wish I could spell better...
Andy
Alas the Kente family history is not so illustrious. (and of Noman's true family, nothing is known...)
Craig
One for Ed. I've just put the Airrider family history up on the site. Any chance you could have a look at it and scream "Nooooo!" loudly at any bits you don't like (or just tell me if you like...). There's a link from the Pez page or you can use this one (The Airriders).
Alex
By the way, has anybody thought about two handed weapon specilization in the new initiative system we've been using? It's benefits are now defunked, so we need to adjust it. Any surgestions?
Andy
Well feel free to add a section on the vale elves to the armies page. Off hand, I can't even recall who the Korred even are. As for the sabretooth's, surely there can't be enough of them to mount a military force yet? If there are, I hate to think how inbred they must be.
To be honest, I was think of you when I started putting the page together. I know that you have quite a history of war gaming, so I thought it might apeal.
Andy
Don't forget that as Guardians of the Vale Pez, Hawk and sister Kes would have a certain influence over its inhabitants including a small force of Vale Elves, some Korred (though I'm not sure how much influence we have with them) and a growing population of Sabretooth Tigers (see Shiro Takashi for more details).
Alex
Seeing as we are getting to the point in the champaign were we have control over sizable forces (When Noman and Shallat's follows tern up) and because we seem to be taking it on our selves to organise the defense of Southern Hosk, I thought it might be appropriate to set up a page relating to the types of troops we might have.
I thought I would use what I can recall from the BATTLESYSTEM rules to describe them. Of course, its worth bearing in mind that everything that I say there is provisional until Ed gives it the ok, but I thought it might be interesting, especially as we haven't used that system in a long time. The last was when Shallat oversaw the defence of southern hosk against the minotaurs, and in real time that was a LONG time ago - I recall that Greg and Tom were helping me out, to give you an idea.
Andy
A very simple way of doing critical hits would be to just say that they give you an automatic extra attack. This has the advantage of being fairly regular, but still allowing for an occational super spurt of attacks, bacause criticals could critcal. If you like, the extra attacks could have a lower 'critcal number', than the first so a second attack might critical on a 18-20, a third on 16-20. Once in awhile, someone would pull out a massive amount of damage. Furthmore, creatures with low AC wouold more resistant to criticals.
Andy
I like the idea of both - more results, more variety.
Andy
Just a thought on the 'large damage' effect on any critical table. Rather than a set bonus why not go for a 'maximum effect' result where a weapon automatically does maximum damage? Obviously this favours the more nasty weapons as they would do more damage, but I think that works well. After all, a solid whack with a two-handed sword will do more damage than a solid whack with a toothpick. Or why not have both, so one result helps low-damage weapons and one helps high-damage ones.
A thought, anyway.
Alex
I've been thinking a lttle more about what I said before. Rather than basing damage bonuses off size, we could use hd/level instead. The given explanation of how a human sized fighter could have a hundred hp was that thet learnt to role with blow as well just being hard. On a critical they might fail to do this and take a much larger amount of damage.
If you like the nloodthirsty element, we could always sneak in a few results like bleeding wounds, were the victim takes continus damage over several rounds, or until they recieve medical aid. Stuns and knock outs are possible as well. Trouble is, that sort of thing can be hard to apply to certain creatures, but we can certainlty think about it.
Andy
Hmm, all food for thought. I've got to confess that I do have a soft spot for my critical hit table, bloodthirsty and flawed as it is - after all, hand-to-hand combat should be both extremely dangerous and have an unpredictable element to it.
I'll mull this one over some more, but thanks for the comments so far - very helpful.
Ta, Ed
Agreed. We can mix results together, some good for the attacker, others bad for the defender to get a nice long list of general results. I don't feel the need to put anything too firm together just yet, but a pottential list might include things like:
- Opponent loses 1 initiative per point of damaged suffered
- Opponent loses next attack
- Attacker gains an attack
- Opponent loses 4 ac until next round
As a point of interest, are we having these in addition to the extra damage or instead off? If we have them instead, we can slip extra damage results into the table. Currently, we use a multiplier, but it might be more balancing to use either a straight bonus like +5, +10, or bonus dice - +2d6 or whatever. Having occations where Shallat can inflict 40 damage is dramatic, but I'm not sure how realistic it is. It does tend to move into the realm of instant kill... which we were trying to avoid. The other advantage would be that it assures that a high damage critical does a certain minimum level of damage, rather than rolling a 1 and having it doubled to 2. Doing things this way will mean that low damage weapons benefit more, relitavely speaking, than large ones. Still that does kind of make sense when you consider that every blow from Noman virtually tears off a limb anyway. You can't do much more damage with one blow than cleave someone in half, and if you can do that with a standard blow anyway...
In some respects, this could be made to tie in with the way weapons do different amounts of damage against large creatures. Standard damage bonuses could be greater against large creatures. I feel inclined to limit this effect depending on the strength of the attacking creature. This would mean that a kobold to do impressive damage with a dagger, enough to shock a human fighter, but not any more on a dragon. Nomans criticals against mansized opponents wouldn't be much different to his normal blows, but against that unfortunate dragon they could be devastating. Any more thoughts or objects?
Andy
I reckon something like that could work, but it would have to be things that make sense in a combat scenario. So whilst the charactor who scored the crit wouldn't speed up, a blow might slow the opponent down, the defender might lose their next attack or the attacker may see an opening and get an extra attack, and so on.
All these sort of thing would be applicable against most opponents and have the added bonus of actually being quite useful. After all, whilst it was satisfying to take out an oponents eye (or whatever) their life exectency wasn't much more then a couple more rounds anyway, so that system penalised us more then the enemy.
Craig
Over the weakend Ed reminded me that I ment to review the critical hit system, something which I had forgotten about. I'd like to move away from tables with very specific results, because they can encounter problems with people using odd weapons or fight wierd monsters. Crushing a beholders fingers doesn't make much sense I'm sure.
I did have an interesting thought... what if a critcal result, rather than doing something nasty to the enemy, did something nice for the attacker, like giving them an extra attack or an AC bonus for awhile. Given the new initiative system, it might give them a bonus to that, allowing them to act faster in future rounds. Any sugestions?
Andy
Hmm, my memory is very poor on this one. The good news (which also answers Sandy's query way down the page) is that at the end of February I'm going to stay with my Mum for a few days and plan to have a big sort out of all my roleplaying stuff which is stored in the loft. This should include (fingers crossed) all of the character sheets from school. Watch this space.
Also, I've finally fixed the last major glitch in the timeline - it (the timeline that is, not the whole history which is still only half-finished) is now ready for review and constructive criticism ;-)
Cheers, Ed
Technically speaking, it's not incorrect to say that simons necromancer was bald - just like all Bakali. I think that he adopted Krinkleberry because he couldn't find an apprentice amongst the lizard folk. Perhaps Ed could enlighten us as to why he created Krinkleberry, because as I recall he just told Simon he had an apprentice the first time he played.
Andy
---
Yup, I was sure the Necromancer was Bakali as well, as I recall everyone wondering why a lizardman had abducted a human child (Krinkleberry) to teach...
And there was the whole lizard-wizard thing.
Though he definately did have a bald charactor too, as I remember that micky-taking well.
Craig
No, simons necromancer was definiely a bakali. I remember it well, because it was an odd choice of class for a race that has an int penalty. Speaking of which, do you recall how high his sats were? Even with the penalty he managed int 17, wis 16, and I think he had a con of 15 or 16 as well. I recall Ed's face well...
Andy
In reply to Andy...
I thought Simon's necromancer was human. I seem to recall much sniggering and derision when he announced that the guy was bald. Or are we talking about different characters here?
Alex
Cheers for putting the 24 hour certificates up, though I did spot a mistake you'd made.
But don't worry, I corrected it.
Snigger.
Craig
I've just there is a little sentence next o simons Necromancer on the inactive pc's page specu;ating on his name. To be honest, I can't remember what he was called, but Milianos Krelmanthrop doesn't sound much like a bakali name.
Andy.
Hello.
Well, I found the 24-hour certificates and they are now up on the wiki (with a few changes like putting the weirdness of Andrew's campaign down to sleep deprivation and not hallucinogenic drugs...) along with the Vindu and Firkin biogs. I may find myself adding to the Firkin background at some point. Once you've read it I'm sure you'll see which paragraph needs extra bits.
See you all soon.
Alex
Morning.
Glad you liked the top trumps. Just remember to bring them with you at the end of the month. I'd like to see what they've done with the Horror deck. Surely it can't be as gruesome as the 80s version...
A quick question. How many of the old character sheets do you have lying around? I was wondering if you still have the stats for Firkin and Nathan, should I decide to go back to playing either of them. Oh, and it would help with naming a few of the ex-directory characters in the PC section.
Adios for now.
Alex
Greetings folks.
Thanks for your comments Sandy, here's my answers:
1) Ta for that. I'd like to do the final reshuffle once the history et al page is finished (which will probably be this time next year!).
2) Ta for that too!
3) Your fix sounds fine to me.
4) Yes, the timeline is TOTALLY knackered at that point. The reason is that the further down the document you go, the less refined the text is (ie the less time I've spent on it). When I first wrote out the timeline it had about six glitches of similar magnitude - this is the last one that needs fixing (it is, of course, also the most important one as it determines what the present date is! :-) ). I'm hoping to have this fixed asap.
5) Couldn't agree more, it's a superb idea. Am looking forward to adding my own characters from various campaigns in (Grungi Chaos-Bane, Axel Von Middenheim and, er, Jonah Goodstats all coming soon).
Lastly, hopefully you got my text, but thanks again for the top trumps! The nightmares of my childhood brought forth in glorious technicolour!
Cheers, Ed
Hello again.
Couple of points.
1) Ed, as per the little request on the page I've moved your background notes to a new section of their own, so the History of Taladas just has the history. And the geography. And a few character descriptions. And... I think we may have to shuffle a few more bits out of there before we're done.
2) I also added a tiny bit to your history (it's in the scribe's note describing the first minotaur invasions of the barbarian lands and offers some explanation as to why reports of that era are sketchy). I just though it helped since I've established that the first known Airrider was involved in that war.
3) I know your enamoured of the new initiative system Ed but I think we have a minor problem. Pez (and I think Hawk too) both have an ability from Skills and Powers that altered the speed of their casting in spells from their own schools. Effectively using a skill system that only uses dex modifiers screws over that ability. However I think its an easy fix. All we do is roll at the start of a fight as normal and then just pump our score up by 2 if we choose to cast a spell from our school. So we still don't roll every turn but might go before or after some other character depending upon what we cast. Tiny bit more complicated but I think its workable. The alternative is we're losing a class ability (which worked for Pez since it replaced the 'standard' specialist's save modifier which was useless to him with so many of his spells not affecting targets and not requiring saves).
4) I noticed at the end of your history you seem to have increased the jump between the end of the school campaign and the current era that seems a little too dramatic (eleven years?). It also goes against the idea that the Mage of the Vale first noticed Pez in the minotaur war (274) and then gave him the Vale (285). After all he's about 26 in 285 which would make him only 14 when he joined in the big battle at the end of the war. A five to seven year gap seems more plausible, putting the current date around 279-281 AC. Any thoughts on that?
5) I like what people are doing with the character section. It's really helpful to see what their owner's thought made their characters tick. I just end up nostalgic over them now. After writing Nathan's bit I wanted to go back to playing him...
A rather misty-eyed Alex...
Right, I've added all my past characters to the site, bar Vindu and Firkin who lasted a little longer and deserve a little more time to be taken on their pasts. I've also given Krinkleberry and Klob their own pages. I know they were only men of hench but I think they deserve a little chance to shine on the PC page rather than on the NPC listings. It might also give us a chance to add backgrounds to other NPCs who are slightly under our control (familiars, henchmen, sentient weaponry, mystical extra-dimensional lions, etc.).
Alex
Ah, yes. You are correct, Noman has died and come back twice (which might explain his rather relaxed view on killing...)
But the first time wasn't in Deepmountain, he definately saw the end of that as Krath was roled up betwen a monday and a friday, not a rushed job during the 24 hour.
I think it was very shortly after that it happened though. I reckon my brother missed out on what came dirrectly after the 24 hour due to playing something or other with Rob Bradley and that lot. So by the time Sandy returned to the campaign with his Bear-Paladin I was already playing Krath.
Noman was Wished back just before the Pheonix stuff happened, and definately saw that through to the end as he had to shoot the Rakshasa at the end of the Ravenloft bit with his Tigerbane crossbow.
Then he got himself decapitated somewhere remote (I think we were still in Ravenloft doing one of the smaller Ravenloft adventures) so I couldn't replace him with Krath, which resulted in the swift creation of Sylvanmoon...
Then I went off to play Rifts (or whatever) with my brother, returning to Taladas after the school-days to find Noman was alive again.
Oh, and I have no objection to creating new names for unidentified charactors. Indeed, I don't recall Sylvanmoon's first name, so unless anyone can remember what it was I'll follow suit and make up something that sounds right.
Craig
Nice of you to ask.
I believe the spirit naga was part of the Phoenix adventure saga. I started that one with my rakasta, continued it with Vindu, who was killed in the last battle on Taladas which is why when the party popped into Ravenloft they woke up with Firkin next to them. Firkin remained alive (despite Ed's best efforts) until we left Ravenloft. I believe I started running another game (Rifts I think) at that time and when I started playing again it was as Pez.
Oh, Noman's second resurrection happened then. His first death was in Deepmountain I think, and his first resurrection was with the wish we were granted after Five Shall Be One (which was why Craig was playing Krath in that adventure, but Noman during Phoenix saga). Both me and Craig were absent (playing Rifts perhaps) during his second return.
Nightmare Lands, I think we're mostly clear on. The starting party on that one was Pez, Smith (first appearance of both), Zabu (Craig's neanderthal ranger, who he tells me he's scribbling up the background for and might explain how he ended up in the Waltdorf watch...) and Andrew's halfling thief who died part way through to be replaced by his witch hunter, neither of whom I can remember the names of.
Both Smith and Pez were in the watch at the time which is how they knew each other (and presumably it was they who brought Kite and Sandrana together). They got into Ravenloft that time by choice, going through the portal in the Vale. When they returned it was into the middle of Splatterblood's attack on the Vale.
One quick question. Does anyone remember the names of the characters I listed as Ex-directory in the Characters section. I've started the backgrounds for my many, many hordes of characters but I can't remember the names of a few of them. If no-one can remember them does anyone mind if I start giving them names I think are about right and which we can use from now on?
Alex
Ahhh, things are becoming clearer, it's all coming back to me.
Andy - You're quite right about the Spirit Naga (a sort of Usa/Takhisis demon) - chances are it was one of those adventures that you did for the Mage of the Vale? You are also right about the curse of ravenloft, and Noman being decapitated.
The Nightmare lands is all coming back to me. Pez's brother is Kite - he was tricked by the evil necromancer Alabaster into decapitating Smith's sister. That's how Smith came to adventure with the party in the first place, unless I'm mistaken? Alabaster, previously slain by Kite, had popped up in the Nightmare Lands where he was able to influence Kite's dreams. Kite ended up in Ravenloft too, and by the time you found him, he was well on the way to being a dark lord himself. But you saved him, and did for Alabaster.
Craig - I seemed to remember that it was a wish spell that brought Noman back (but I'm at a loss as to how the party got hold of such a spell). I seem to remember that Fairweather wanted to use the wish to get loads of gold (most un-paladinlike) but was outvoted!
Thanks chaps. Sandy, any pearls of wisdom you want to add?
Ed
Pez had nothing to do with the first trip into Ravenloft - he hadn't even been created yet. Believe it or not, our first time in the demiplane of dread was a deliberate, using the gate in the vale of the mage. We were chasing the Spirit Naga - a nasty, shape shifting entity. I believe we were trying to prevent it from completing a ritual of some sort. I recall that when we finally caught up with it, the Spirit Naga assumed the form of a giant collumn of blood. With claws. It was after defeating it that we were afflicted with the curse of ravenloft, which is why we keep getting drawn into the place.
The nightmare lands were part of the quest to recue Pez's brother. I remember, because I was playing my witch hunter at the time, and he hated the chaotic place. I remember mentioning that Shallat would have loved the place... and Shallat is the only character of mine to have been to ravenloft, at least in your main campaign. Do you remember that you once ran a series of mini games in ravenloft with Greg Roger,Simon Ryder (I think), and me? I played a half orc gladiator who fought with a whip and short sword.
I can also remember what killed Noman - it was a crystal golemn with vorpal blades. I recall that it decapitated him on a lucky roll. I don't recall why we were fighting them, or where.
Andy
Of the post-school adventures the first Ravenloft was to rescue Pez's brother, who if I remember correctly was marrying Smith's sister.
I don't remember how we came to be in the Nightmare Lands, all I recall is the Giant Hamburgers chasing Pez...
As for Nomans death, I think it happened in a previous Ravenloft adventure, as I couldn't bring in Krath to replace him, which resulted in me quickly rolling up another charactor (Sylvanmoon).
I think some creature's demise at the end of an adventure resulted in a wish that was used for Noman's return. But I'm not entirely sure because I think it may have occured during some period when I wasn't playing in the campaign, as I'm sure I came back to find that Noman was alive...
In fact, thinking about it I think it happened sometime between the end of school and the Pez/Smith party.
Craig
Right you are - I've obviously tried to block the whole sordid episode from my memory! Right folks, here's some questions I've got on prior trips to everyone's favourite demiplane of dread, Ravenloft.
1) Trip 1 (is this right?) was to fight Alabaster and save the soul of a relative of Pez - but who was that relative? My brain just doesn't want to retrieve this :-(
2) Trip 2 (is this right??) was to the Nightmare Lands - but how did you end up going there in the first place? What was the objective of the mission?
3) Non-ravenloft question - what killed No-Man, and how was he resurrected?
Definitely going senile as I'm gtting older :-(
Cheers, Ed
It was definitly Docksey playing the Druid. I remember that he would punch Ryders character every 5 minutes and say it was for the balance. As I recall it was Shallat who performed the marriage ceromony... That was for the balance. After all the good things he did, saving the world and all that, he had to do something to retain his neutral alignment.
Andy
Wasn't it Docksey who was playing the Druid? As I recall he married one of Greg's female charactors (a half-elf acrobat I think...)
Anyway, I don't think that the Druid class can really be blamed for that, its almost entirely the fact that Doksey played the charactor that should be held responsible...
Oh, and I owe money for the Chinese too (though in my case just the £3.50 for the veggie thing)
And finally, I'm liking the quote bits that Andrew is doing on the charactors, expect some from my guys over the next few days.
Craig
No more druids - not after the last one married Docksey, in what was surely the lowest point of the long-running saga :-)
Ed
Actually, I think I might still owe Kev.
Andy
Howdo,
Fair enough. At least the suggestion made this page live up to its name. And at least if Schallat doesn't have access to the Weather sphere (as I thought he might, being a nature priest) he can't gain access to the Call Lightning spell and the 792 points of damage he could do with it.
Hmm.
Ed, how would you feel about me playing a druid?
Alex.
Hi all,
Just a few random thoughts:
1) Andrew is definitley right about Smith's creation process.
2) I also second Andrew's comments on Schallat - it's part of the chaotic nature of his religion that he can access just about everything. I'm not wild about fiddling around with the spells that characters have already got unless there's a very good reason for it. Priestly magic in Taladas is unpredicatble at the best of times.
3) You probably picked up on the fact that I'm very enamoured with the new initiative system pinched from 3rd ed rules.
4) Watch this space for the map changes.
5) On a completely different topic, did everyone give Kev cash for the takeaway?? :-)
Cheers, Ed
Hello.
Actually the best time for a reality shift would be when we make it out of Ravenloft. After all, we're out of 'normal' reality at this point, so changes could take place while we're off-stage. That's assuming Ed ever lets us out of Ravenloft... [insert Ed's evil laughter here]
Alex
Hello All
I can't speak for Smith - I think his spheres were bought as part of the creation process using the powers and skills book. I believe that's why he only appears to have a limited number - he traded range of spells for other abilities, such as the ability to specilize.
Shallat I can say rather more about. Almost the exact oposite of Smith, he has the use of many spheres, which balances his inability to ear most sorts of armour and rather limited powers against the undead. As I recall he origonally had major acess to every sphere apart from Necromany, to which he only had minor acess, Sun (none) and weather (also none). As to the Barkskin/magic vestment thing it is worth remembering the aspect that Shallat worships Chislev in - the angry god of chaos, champion of the Bakali race. Given this rather war like aspect, the choice of spells isn't that odd. i have to confess that barkskin sounds like an odd selection for Smith, though. I'm surprised he even has access to it.
To be honest, it strikes me as the concept of what Shallat actually belives in has evolved rather a long way since his creation over a decade ago. Now might be a good time to review his abilities. At least there want be any plot inconsistencies - we can just say that Chislev desided to start granting new abilities right out of the blue!
Andy
Cheers.
Its not their starting spells that concern me. Its any extra ones they've picked up over the years. And like I said this all started because of an article that was talking about juggling around the spheres a little to stop the traditional druid spells from ending up in spheres they don't have access to and redeundant spells in the same sphere and so on. We can talk to Andrew (though possibly not Jeff judging from the noises coming from Ashleyville) in a week's time.
Oh, any chance you could stick up on here those map changes you were after?
Alex
Hello! I've done a few updates to the Taladas History page; still tons left to do though :-/ The bottom half of the history ("Taladas Today" onwards) I haven't touched at all today - maybe will have time tomorrow.
As for the spheres, they are definitely different for Taladas, so the Ansalon ones won't be any help. I will try to dig the spheres out - will take a bit of digging around in my cupboards but I'm sure I have the info somewhere. Once thing I am certain of is that I definitely used the correct spheres when Andrew rolled up Schallat all those years ago (and I'm fairly certain I'd have done the same with Smith). Anyway, watch this space.
As for Barkskin/Magical Vestment, you may be right - I have no strong feelings, but would be interested to hear what Andrew and Jeff think.
BFN, Ed
Hi.
Question for Ed here. What are the spheres for Paladine/Cuthbert and Chislev in your campaign? I'm asking because I rooted out an article in an old Dragon magazine which had a reorganisation of the spells in each sphere to solve the problems with priest spells. It was designed to stop priests and druids being quite so similar and I thought it might help the similar nature of Schallat and Smith's repertoire; you know, the way they both use Heat Metal, Dust Devil and so on. Get a bit of contrast. While I was checking their spell lists to see if this would monumentally screw one of them over I also spotted that Smith has Barkskin and Schallat has Magical Vestment. Both are AC improvers, but shouldn't they be the other way round? Anyway, I was looking at their spell lists and comparing them with my (well, Craig's) Ansalon listing of spheres for Paladine and Chislev and noticed a lot of inconsistencies with their current lists. So can I have a list of their available spheres and see if there hasn't been a boo-boo somewhere down the line.
Speak to y'all soon. Alex.
'Lo
I may have to go over to my dad's (he has photoshop on his machine) but I shouldn't have any problems adding bits. Just tell me what extra stuff is needed.
Alex
Hi folks,
Sandy - moving the stuff over to the other pages (eg geography) is fine, but I'm going to be doing some rewrites on the history page, so you'll probably need to shift it over again once I'm done. Hopefully I'll get some more writing done next week in between my revision. Meanwhie I've redone the timeline yet again - I'm still not 100% happy with it by any means, but I'm getting there - we can then start to look at little closer at how old the characters are/should be!
Craig - Glad we're on the same wavelength with Noman's back story - feel free to embellish/amend it all you want. I'd like to change the histroy bit to make it read Noman instead of No Man no-man etc - again will do this during the next rewrite.
All - is anyone good with paint packages on computers? If you google image search for Taladas there are some good maps on there, but they would need quite a bit of work to get them matching the Barker version, and I totally suck at anything that involves drawing (Mr George once described a painting that I had done as "shameful....it demonstrates a total lack of application" - fair comment, but at least I don't look like one of the chuckle brothers).
Bye for now, Ed
'Lo.
Just to let people know I've been copying some of Ed's stuff over to the other pages like I said. I haven't altered Ed's page at all, just made extra copies where we already had pages set up for it.
Alex
Working from the top sounds like a sensible move to me, I'd also sugest putting a dividing line after each new entry so its easy to see where each bit ends.
Noman's age is a litlle trickier then just adding his starting age onto the length of time since he joined the campaign, as he's also spent some time in the great tavern in the sky and then coming back. However the principel is good as I'm sure he should be older then is written on his sheet, its just I'll also have to work out how long his afterlife was...
And for the record, most people call him Noman (one word) but it does derive from No Man (in much the way that Ed surmised in the history) So it isn't technically incorrect, its just very few people write it that way. Mind you Noman himself probably writes his name as a large X...
I'll go into a little more detail when I write up how I see Nomans back story (which, I'm happy to report, is pretty close to how Ed wrote it, so we must have been paying attention to each other when we've come up with bits...)
Craig
OK, a couple of suggestions...
One is that we start doing these debate pages in reverse order, so the most recent ammendments are at the top of the page and the older ones near the bottom. That way the new stuff is there when you open the page. Not a huge change but it'll save lots of scrolling when you log on.
Secondly, I noticed there is a lot of Ed's 'History' page which actually fits on the Geography and Character pages. Can we have his permission to move it out there?
Thirdly, since Ed doesn't want us twiddling his history pages I think we should start debating the important changes it needs on here. Let's start with a baffling one. How old are our characters? The old timeline had some dates of birth but these are slightly inconsistent (by about twenty years) with his new timeline. Even if you just move everyone's birth up by twenty years there are still inconsistencies such as Noman barely being a teenager when he's supposed to be deposing tyrants. I think the easiest way to sort it out is to work out at what point each character joined the campaign, at what age they were at that point and then do the maths to sort out how old they should be in current game time.
The campaign starts (and therefore introduces Noman and Hank) in 270 AC. The Dragons Return (and Hawk's intro) is in 280 AC. Pez and Smith came in at the same time one adventure before the Dragon one so have a couple of months travel on that and their first Ravenloft as well. Either 278 or 279 AC sounds about right. I'm not sure on Schallat but somewhere around 271 AC would be my guess.
Finally one minor query. Ed seems to spell it No-Man. I spell it Noman. Can Craig step in and tell us how it should be spelt?
Alex
I've cleared out all the old debate so we can start again.
Andy
