Sean's Campaign - Session #16
The DM had lots of free time for this session. He played around while everyone else did some good old paperwork gaming. (The podcast I believe is under 2 hours long once I cut out the paperwork gaming.)
As for who was around for the session, Brian and Justin both had to cancel at the last minute. Allen played Trebor and Aaron played Zelast.
The party hasn’t had a chance to do any shopping or crafting for several sessions, so they’ve built up quite a store of loot. After splitting up items and selling what was unwanted, they had approximately 18,000gp each for all 7 PC’s.
If you’re thinking that’s a lot of money, you’re right. But if you combine the amount that each PC has, they are probably right around, or below, the suggested amount of gold for PC’s of their level.
Third edition’s easy item creation is an excellent improvement to the game, but it comes with the idea that since item creation is so easy, there should be stores for it. Screw that. Buying potions and scrolls is one thing, but having access to shop at the “DMG store” when you have some spare gold is something else entirely, and totally removes any concept of rarity from magic items. Each city may have an available item or two but not much more. In Endrin they can buy Vests of Resistance +1 and Amulets of Mighty Fists +1. In Maratheelia they can buy only bows with a +1 enchantment. If they talk to the right people they can find someone that will brew a potion or two, sell some scrolls, or buy a wand here or there.
This requires the party to craft their items, but wait, there’s more. Crafting most items requires specific gems as a component (but no special components from creatures’ bodies and the like). This reduces the crafting price accordingly (often making the creation price much cheaper), but prevents open access to the DMG and sometimes forces the party to make some tough decisions on what to use the gems on.
As an example, the party had about 10 rubies worth 1000gp each. After crafting some wands, bracers of armor, and other things they had only a couple left. If they only had one such gem they would have only been able to make a Wand of Magic Missiles.
If an item requires diamonds, you can forget the party making the item. They need them for an emergency Raise Dead in the field. Raising a dead PC in town is easy, and only 5000gp; but doing the same thing in the middle of the wilderness, with cities several weeks’ travel away, is not easy. Ysilia can cast Raise Dead now, but she still needs the diamonds. For reference, the party should expect to see about one 5000gp diamond per 200 gems they find overall.
During their three month stay, most of the party found something to craft or spend their money on. And they all probably owe Ari a debt who has Craft Wondrous Items and Craft Wand.
Sorra and Zelast each had crafted for them a Belt of Giant Strength +6. They had to borrow money for that.
Ari bought some scrolls from the elves, made a Wand of Magic Missiles, and made a desperately needed Amulet of Health +4. The amulet increased her hit points by 50%.
Trebor bought a +1 bow from the elves with a strength bonus, and then had Ari craft a Belt of Strength +4. He loaned 2000gp to Sorra for her belt.
Artemis got himself an Amulet of Health +4 because Dale’s deathly afraid that 70hp is not enough for a warmage. I can’t say I disagree –insert evil laugh here–. I believe he had Ari craft some Boots of Flying for him as well. Nothing says “target” to an opponent quicker than someone up in the air.
Lindo was actually quite thrifty. He is saving up for a Monk’s Belt, so he only got some Dust of Disappearance.
Finally Ysilia had Ari craft some Bracers of Armor +5 and then gave her remaining gold to Zelast for his needs.
Crafting alone cost them a large chunk of XP, around 6000 total.
All of this crafting and such was going on during the party’s three month stay with the elves.
The elves treated them like royalty and the party was considered to be “elf friends”, which Aaron described none-too-poetically as “won’t kill you on sight”.
Sorra, Zelast, Lindo, and Trebor aided the elves with their clearing of forests of any remaining nearby critters that shouldn’t belong.
Ysilia spent her time meditating at the temple and “reconnecting” with her people after being away for over a year. She was probably the only one of the group who actually tithed some of her money.
Artemis spent his time training what few warmages he could find. He did better than most would have, but not enough for his hopes.
He was also trying to get information from the unnamed elf that put them on the mission to clear the glade and save the Tree of Life. For whatever reason, Dale just had to know this guy’s name. The elf made it clear that he had no intention of doing so. So Artemis asked around, again and again, with no information turned up. Eventually he stopped but only after the trees appeared to be menacing him.
But none-the-less Artemis did end up helping Maratheelia out in several ways; training warmages and reestablishing the school, partially getting a trade agreement with an arms company, and that whole saving the Tree of Life thing. I need to get him a personal reward for that.
Ari spent huge chunks of her time crafting items, scribing scrolls into her book, and attuning herself to Maratheelia’s and Endrin’s fountains.
In case you are wondering about that, I’ve changed Teleport (all versions) into more of a Town Portal spell from Might and Magic. In each town of value to wizards there is a fountain, known as a node, that can be teleported to if you have previously been to that fountain and cast Teleport on it. You can bring others with you, and they can do the same. The Apocalypse disjoined this network of nodes, forcing everyone to have to start over with connecting themselves to the network nodes.
This prevents anyone from continent hopping to places they’ve never been before. So Teleport is now a spell for emergency evacuation and as a means to travel to and from cities they’ve been too without having to spend months traveling there. To offset the loss of the spell’s power a bit, I’ve relaxed the rules on how many people can be teleported with a single spell to 1 person per level instead of its current 1 per 3 levels.
Eventually the Protector of Maratheelia Tree of Life summoned the party once again to speak with Maratheelia.
She spoke to them that the Prophecy of the Six Flames more ancient than she, and she has lived for thousands of years. And the oldest and greatest of Trees of Life is not responding to any questions sent to it. (Wouldn’t you like to know how ancient trees talk to one another? Yeah, good luck with that.)
She informed them not to worry about questing to help the tree; it is too far away for that. But she did discover a place under the glaciers to the north. She did not know what the place was, only that it was not natural and too deep to have been made any time soon.
The protector (the unnamed druid) gave them a map with directions on how to get to the lands far to the north. Traveling there would be difficult because a mountain range blocked an easy path, but there was a pass of sorts that traveled through and between some mountains if the idea of going over the mountains did not suit their skills. He then told them that Maratheelia would be resting soon, to recuperate from her recent efforts.
So the party gathered up and began traveling north. Amazingly, they had no real encounters during the three weeks of travel along the road. They eventually found the trail that led to the pass, and within a couple of days they were passing through an area between two mountains.
At a spot in the pass, the party had to travel through a natural cave opening, and the smell of it indicated that it was inhabited.
This fight sucked for the DM. It was my intention to have this place as an encounter where a bunch of low powered creatures worked together to give the party a good challenge. But alas, good spot rolls good search rolls, and a cautious party revealed enough information to make the traps less effective.
Falling rocks above the entrance were to split up the party (the party spotted it). A spiked pit trap was supposed to take front line fighter out of the fight for a while (that worked). And some spears were supposed to funnel the party in a direction to face a gauntlet of monsters (that ended up not mattering). There were a lot of creatures too; half a dozen bladelings, a dozen darkmantles appearing as stalactites, a dozen piercers doing the same thing, a couple of grells meant to paralyze, and some earth mephits hiding in the pit waiting to pound on someone.
Overall it worked well but it wasn’t enough to really worry the group. Had I thrown some slightly stronger creatures into the mix with some stronger traps, I have really challenged the party. That will happen next time –insert another evil laugh here-.
The party searched for treasure and continued through the pass, eventually getting back above ground near the end of the day.
That is where we stopped for our day.
As for who was around for the session, Brian and Justin both had to cancel at the last minute. Allen played Trebor and Aaron played Zelast.
The party hasn’t had a chance to do any shopping or crafting for several sessions, so they’ve built up quite a store of loot. After splitting up items and selling what was unwanted, they had approximately 18,000gp each for all 7 PC’s.
If you’re thinking that’s a lot of money, you’re right. But if you combine the amount that each PC has, they are probably right around, or below, the suggested amount of gold for PC’s of their level.
Third edition’s easy item creation is an excellent improvement to the game, but it comes with the idea that since item creation is so easy, there should be stores for it. Screw that. Buying potions and scrolls is one thing, but having access to shop at the “DMG store” when you have some spare gold is something else entirely, and totally removes any concept of rarity from magic items. Each city may have an available item or two but not much more. In Endrin they can buy Vests of Resistance +1 and Amulets of Mighty Fists +1. In Maratheelia they can buy only bows with a +1 enchantment. If they talk to the right people they can find someone that will brew a potion or two, sell some scrolls, or buy a wand here or there.
This requires the party to craft their items, but wait, there’s more. Crafting most items requires specific gems as a component (but no special components from creatures’ bodies and the like). This reduces the crafting price accordingly (often making the creation price much cheaper), but prevents open access to the DMG and sometimes forces the party to make some tough decisions on what to use the gems on.
As an example, the party had about 10 rubies worth 1000gp each. After crafting some wands, bracers of armor, and other things they had only a couple left. If they only had one such gem they would have only been able to make a Wand of Magic Missiles.
If an item requires diamonds, you can forget the party making the item. They need them for an emergency Raise Dead in the field. Raising a dead PC in town is easy, and only 5000gp; but doing the same thing in the middle of the wilderness, with cities several weeks’ travel away, is not easy. Ysilia can cast Raise Dead now, but she still needs the diamonds. For reference, the party should expect to see about one 5000gp diamond per 200 gems they find overall.
During their three month stay, most of the party found something to craft or spend their money on. And they all probably owe Ari a debt who has Craft Wondrous Items and Craft Wand.
Sorra and Zelast each had crafted for them a Belt of Giant Strength +6. They had to borrow money for that.
Ari bought some scrolls from the elves, made a Wand of Magic Missiles, and made a desperately needed Amulet of Health +4. The amulet increased her hit points by 50%.
Trebor bought a +1 bow from the elves with a strength bonus, and then had Ari craft a Belt of Strength +4. He loaned 2000gp to Sorra for her belt.
Artemis got himself an Amulet of Health +4 because Dale’s deathly afraid that 70hp is not enough for a warmage. I can’t say I disagree –insert evil laugh here–. I believe he had Ari craft some Boots of Flying for him as well. Nothing says “target” to an opponent quicker than someone up in the air.
Lindo was actually quite thrifty. He is saving up for a Monk’s Belt, so he only got some Dust of Disappearance.
Finally Ysilia had Ari craft some Bracers of Armor +5 and then gave her remaining gold to Zelast for his needs.
Crafting alone cost them a large chunk of XP, around 6000 total.
All of this crafting and such was going on during the party’s three month stay with the elves.
The elves treated them like royalty and the party was considered to be “elf friends”, which Aaron described none-too-poetically as “won’t kill you on sight”.
Sorra, Zelast, Lindo, and Trebor aided the elves with their clearing of forests of any remaining nearby critters that shouldn’t belong.
Ysilia spent her time meditating at the temple and “reconnecting” with her people after being away for over a year. She was probably the only one of the group who actually tithed some of her money.
Artemis spent his time training what few warmages he could find. He did better than most would have, but not enough for his hopes.
He was also trying to get information from the unnamed elf that put them on the mission to clear the glade and save the Tree of Life. For whatever reason, Dale just had to know this guy’s name. The elf made it clear that he had no intention of doing so. So Artemis asked around, again and again, with no information turned up. Eventually he stopped but only after the trees appeared to be menacing him.
But none-the-less Artemis did end up helping Maratheelia out in several ways; training warmages and reestablishing the school, partially getting a trade agreement with an arms company, and that whole saving the Tree of Life thing. I need to get him a personal reward for that.
Ari spent huge chunks of her time crafting items, scribing scrolls into her book, and attuning herself to Maratheelia’s and Endrin’s fountains.
In case you are wondering about that, I’ve changed Teleport (all versions) into more of a Town Portal spell from Might and Magic. In each town of value to wizards there is a fountain, known as a node, that can be teleported to if you have previously been to that fountain and cast Teleport on it. You can bring others with you, and they can do the same. The Apocalypse disjoined this network of nodes, forcing everyone to have to start over with connecting themselves to the network nodes.
This prevents anyone from continent hopping to places they’ve never been before. So Teleport is now a spell for emergency evacuation and as a means to travel to and from cities they’ve been too without having to spend months traveling there. To offset the loss of the spell’s power a bit, I’ve relaxed the rules on how many people can be teleported with a single spell to 1 person per level instead of its current 1 per 3 levels.
Eventually the Protector of Maratheelia Tree of Life summoned the party once again to speak with Maratheelia.
She spoke to them that the Prophecy of the Six Flames more ancient than she, and she has lived for thousands of years. And the oldest and greatest of Trees of Life is not responding to any questions sent to it. (Wouldn’t you like to know how ancient trees talk to one another? Yeah, good luck with that.)
She informed them not to worry about questing to help the tree; it is too far away for that. But she did discover a place under the glaciers to the north. She did not know what the place was, only that it was not natural and too deep to have been made any time soon.
The protector (the unnamed druid) gave them a map with directions on how to get to the lands far to the north. Traveling there would be difficult because a mountain range blocked an easy path, but there was a pass of sorts that traveled through and between some mountains if the idea of going over the mountains did not suit their skills. He then told them that Maratheelia would be resting soon, to recuperate from her recent efforts.
So the party gathered up and began traveling north. Amazingly, they had no real encounters during the three weeks of travel along the road. They eventually found the trail that led to the pass, and within a couple of days they were passing through an area between two mountains.
At a spot in the pass, the party had to travel through a natural cave opening, and the smell of it indicated that it was inhabited.
This fight sucked for the DM. It was my intention to have this place as an encounter where a bunch of low powered creatures worked together to give the party a good challenge. But alas, good spot rolls good search rolls, and a cautious party revealed enough information to make the traps less effective.
Falling rocks above the entrance were to split up the party (the party spotted it). A spiked pit trap was supposed to take front line fighter out of the fight for a while (that worked). And some spears were supposed to funnel the party in a direction to face a gauntlet of monsters (that ended up not mattering). There were a lot of creatures too; half a dozen bladelings, a dozen darkmantles appearing as stalactites, a dozen piercers doing the same thing, a couple of grells meant to paralyze, and some earth mephits hiding in the pit waiting to pound on someone.
Overall it worked well but it wasn’t enough to really worry the group. Had I thrown some slightly stronger creatures into the mix with some stronger traps, I have really challenged the party. That will happen next time –insert another evil laugh here-.
The party searched for treasure and continued through the pass, eventually getting back above ground near the end of the day.
That is where we stopped for our day.
posted by BlueBlackRed at 9:08 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home