The Scythe and the Forge - OOC

[Delia2531]

I couldn't go any further without an OOC thread; those rolls! 😞

 

Ozzy has lost so much of his cool stuff 😳

[DragonFriend]

It isn't just Oswald's stuff. The Scythe rolled an 18, it lost its magic as well. I'm honestly not sure what to do here. I guess I could alt form into a raven, but even if I get out I'm going to be at 25HP while in raven form and 38HP when he turns back. I don't have any healing magic or items and his Oslecamo version of alt form as wildshape doesn't heal when used.

Edited March 27 by DragonFriend (see edit history)

[Delia2531]

14 minutes ago, DragonFriend said:

It isn't just Oswald's stuff. The Scythe rolled an 18, it lost its magic as well. I'm honestly not sure what to do here. I guess I could alt form into a raven, but even if I get out I'm going to be at 25HP while in raven form and 38HP when he turns back. I don't have any healing magic or items and his Oslecamo version of alt form as wildshape doesn't heal when used.

Escape may be your best bet at this point.

[Delia2531]

Dice tell stories, and they certainly seem determined to here!

The party have risked alienating the Barkeep to save the RFT and now we can't even do that. 😳

[paladinred]

Naomi has some healing, she is stuck fighting the damned tree, lol.

[rogueblade0729]

6 hours ago, Delia2531 said:

Dice tell stories, and they certainly seem determined to here!

The party have risked alienating the Barkeep to save the RFT and now we can't even do that. 😳

Yep. Damn… we were so close, too.

[Blue Jay]

Oh boy! Well, I planned the disjunction to try to sweep the Forge out from under you before the final check, but I forgot that it would hit all your items too; and that the items get saves.

Okay, let's figure this out. I'd set all of the Barkeeper's other save DCs at 25, without regard for spell level (except that one time I tried to slip a DC 40 past you), so let's continue with that. That means most of your items succeeded.

The reaper's scythe will count as an artifact, so there's only a 40% chance the spell will affect it. Let's see if we luck out:

Scythe Chance (40 or lower)

((Okay, so the Scythe survives: you're still in business! I'll roll a save for the Forge in the IC thread. Actually, no: I'm just going to keep the result for the Forge, to keep up the drama. Now you still need to finish forging, but without the Forge itself to help.))

Edited March 28 by Blue Jay (see edit history)

[DragonFriend]

Alright, that doesn't change the fact Oswald doesn't have the skill modifier to hit a DC40 anymore, his items and his spells were a good chunk of that modifier, or that he is almost dead. At this point my suggestion is have Terry eat the scythe and figure it out later.

[Blue Jay]

Okay, I've obviously made a mistake with disjunction: I didn't fully consider the ramifications of that. But frankly, Terry's saves are high enough that your items weren't really in danger anyway, so I don't feel that bad about it.

But, hitting a 13th-level artificer with disjunction was pretty rough, and I do feel bad about that. I'm going to say that the effects are not permanent: your items can be restored without cost after the mission is complete, but we'll keep playing for now with "destroyed" items being nonfunctional for the remainder of the mission (unless you ask Ukumalei to restore them).

Also, the Barkeeper destroyed an artifact with his disjunction, so that technically means he has to roll a Will save to avoid permanently losing all spellcasting abilities. I didn't make actual stats for him, so I don't know what his Will save bonus is. But, I'm pretty sure he's only going to fail the save on a natural-1, so let's just roll a d20 and see what happens:

Will Save

Okay, well there's no major ramifications of that, then.

On another note: I'm not liking these high-level games much. It feels like all my options as a DM are either completely lackluster or excessively volatile. I can either roll some piddly damage or status effect that seems to have no real consequences; or I can cast a spell that gives a 50-50 chance of ending the game in one go. I find this really uninteresting and kind of stressful.

Edited March 30 by Blue Jay (see edit history)

[DragonFriend]

I'm not blaming you Blue Jay, my fault for just going with the SRD instead of just rolling the rolls you asked for or even just asking for clarification first. It was an awesome cinematic moment, just one I was a unprepared for. I'm not sure being higher level would have helped, other than better saves. It honestly never occurred to me to give Oswald some counter-spell abilities, I was always planning on relying on my items and buffing spells to protect him and I never built him to be the "spell caster" of the party. I was assuming I'd be able to have my items restored, not at the end of the mission but after the Barkeep comes to his senses at the end of the story arc.

I don't think the Barkeep would be subject to losing his spellcasting, it is fluffed as punishment from a god with an interest in the artifact, not sure the Forge would have such protection given its origin, or the Barkeep would be subject to it anyway as some level of divine himself, either his own or borrowing the divinity of the pocket Realm itself.

Also, yeah, 9th level spells are bloody scary. As a side note, I think I am going to have Oswald build some sort of dimensional evac item when I can. Not high enough level to make a Scroll of Gate quite yet though.

[Delia2531]

This game is extremely challenging, and a great story; I'm sorry to hear you aren't enjoying it @Blue Jay.

 

On an unrelated note, I don't think the map worked? It certainly didn't for me so I can't make a full post as I can't see where anyone is.

[Blue Jay]

2 hours ago, Delia2531 said:

This game is extremely challenging, and a great story; I'm sorry to hear you aren't enjoying it @Blue Jay.

 

On an unrelated note, I don't think the map worked? It certainly didn't for me so I can't make a full post as I can't see where anyone is.

I'm tired of my maps not working. I'm probably going to have to think of some other way to handle this, but I don't want to: I'm stuck in my ways.

There's just no rhyme or reason for when it works and when it doesn't.

I've just removed and re-attached the map, and it's working for me now. But, @Delia2531, now your images aren't showing up for me.

Edited March 30 by Blue Jay (see edit history)

[DragonFriend]

I've found that switching between .png and .jpeg and vise versa on the same image when it doesn't load the first time seems to get it to work pretty much every time. Usually. Most of the time.

[Delia2531]

7 hours ago, Blue Jay said:

I'm tired of my maps not working. I'm probably going to have to think of some other way to handle this, but I don't want to: I'm stuck in my ways.

There's just no rhyme or reason for when it works and when it doesn't.

I've just removed and re-attached the map, and it's working for me now. But, @Delia2531, now your images aren't showing up for me.

I'm in France at the moment, I wonder if that has affected it? 🇫🇷⛷️

 

I'll try to update them, but it is only profile pictures.

 

I love your maps, perhaps it is just a file format issue?

[Delia2531]

I nearly went with a teleport and FRA on that spellcaster but thought it was probably overkill on someone with 32HP! 😁

 

Post updated.