Order of the Mithril Dolphin #10
Well I’ve more or less read the PHB2 and it certainly has some interesting ideas.
Really I just did a skimming to get the basic ideas of the classes and races with an eye towards what will work in my next campaign.
First off, the price was too high. If any book that isn’t a true core book, anything over $30 is ridiculous. Cut out artwork or superfluous fluff to get the price down.
I know I’ve read the complaints when there isn’t enough art in a book, but whatever. If I have to pay $5 for crap that does little to nothing to improve my game I’m allowed to tell the whiny bitches in the fluff and artwork crowd to kiss my hairy armpit.
Now as for the content of the PHB2…
Avenger – He sounds like a paladin, but isn’t.
Barbarian – Expect to see a lot of these guys added to your game.
Bard – Since we’ve seen one in action, we knew the free temps would be nerfed, but they gave him better combat abilities. If you didn’t like the 3E bard, give this one a chance.
Invoker – a wizard for the divine crowd.
Sorcerer – I like the core set up of the sorcerer, especially the wild magic version.
Warden, Druid, Shaman – meh, didn’t read them much but found nothing all that compelling.
Deva – meh, but not totally worthless.
Gnome – I would’ve rather seen more of a tinker gnome type than a fey gnome.
Goliath – Good riddance
Half-orc – Glad to have them back
Shifter – While I do not like their beginnings from Eberron (I think), they may have a place in the Valley.
Racial paragons – Nice, though I think with all the paragon options I’m seeing people are going to be wanting to try more than they’ll be able to play.
Feats – As expected, play-tested to virtual blandness, though some work really well for various “builds”.
If you’ll remember, or read the previous entry, Dale nearly slaughtered us with 5 ghouls and a pale reaver. Since we complained at him, he posted a “Did I goof?” question on the WotC boards. Their response was a resounding “Yes!”, and that we shouldn’t have survived at all. So Dale gave us an extra 200xp.
As for the session all of us made it (levels 3-4 I think).
Ergot (Justin), dwarf druid, controller (kind of)
Kal (Brian), human swordmage, defender
Sephira (Scott), dragonborn cleric, leader/striker
Shamash (Aaron), dragonborn fighter/cleric, defender
Renald (Mike), human bard, leader
Wildeyes (Me), halfling ranger/rogue, striker
Jezzail (NPC), halfling sorcerer, striker
I’ll be out the next couple of weeks and they’ll probably play w/o me, which is rare.
Tuck the fairy dragon is now with us effectively as a “magic item” that Renald can use once per day to cast a level 3 wizard spell. Even if he can only do it once per day, that is pretty strong, especially if the level of the spell Tuck memorizes increase with Renald’s level.
We were soon back on our boat with Tuck giving us directions (I think, I’m not sure anymore) down the river taking us in the general direction of Growlgretch, the black dragon who has the magic gem that Jezzail is looking for.
At some point not far from our destination, in a somewhat shallow part of the river, we were ambushed by some lizardfolk and their pets (several lizardmen skirmishers, 3 crocs, and a vine horror).
The battleground was slightly dynamic as the boat moved forward 1 square after every round. That actually was more of an irritation to our opponents than a problem for us, though the crocs did a decent job of pulling us off the boat with their grabbing bite attacks.
Overall the fight was a easy to moderate fight, with the number of opponents and the terrain being the biggest issue. It would have been worse, but Dale was rolling like Dale.
After that fight it wasn’t much farther down the river when Kal noticed a large disturbance in the water in front of us, and that when Growlgretch burst out of the water.
We were up against one young black dragon, two lizardmen lurkers (hiding), and one lizardman marsh mystic (hiding).
By the end of the first round we were upset at Dale again, because he did it again. Just like the ghouls last week, we were in a fight where the monsters had free reign over us while several of our turns consisted of taking ongoing damage, being stunned, being dazed, and/or being slowed all while in 4’ deep water (which cut your speed in half).
On his 3rd round, Ergot dropped due to ongoing damage, then made his saves that removed all of his afflictions, and then rolled a nat20 on his death save. And that was the first thing that went right for him this combat.
None of us did much of anything the first couple of rounds. If we could move, we went after the lizardfolk or the dragon, given who was nearest. Eventually the lizardfolk were run off due to damage or waiting for their powers to recharge.
I even had Jezzail make herself an easy target so the dragon would go after her rather than anyone who may not survive the combat.
This combat Dale was rolling much better than usual, rarely missing with any of his attacks.
Aaron continued his streak of hitting with his daily attacks once every ten tries.
Of all the things going bad, Wildeyes and Jezzail (whose combat decisions and rolls were made by me) were pounded the least.
When we finally started beating on the dragon (some time around round 7) it went better than the last dragon fight we had.
One thing I did was hold off using my big attacks until the dragon was bloodied, in an attempt to keep him from running away too soon. Then when Growlgretch was bloodied I “went nova” as Dale put it, throwing everything I had on both characters at the dragon.
The results were less than spectacular considering the dragon had 224 hit points over all. But everyone was able to consistently pound on him and hit reasonably well.
After we did some treasure splitting, we called it a night.
Jezzail will probably be out of the group when I return unless I reverse my personal disdain of role-playing anything remotely that looks like romance or “gettin’ some”.
See ya in a few weeks.
Really I just did a skimming to get the basic ideas of the classes and races with an eye towards what will work in my next campaign.
First off, the price was too high. If any book that isn’t a true core book, anything over $30 is ridiculous. Cut out artwork or superfluous fluff to get the price down.
I know I’ve read the complaints when there isn’t enough art in a book, but whatever. If I have to pay $5 for crap that does little to nothing to improve my game I’m allowed to tell the whiny bitches in the fluff and artwork crowd to kiss my hairy armpit.
Now as for the content of the PHB2…
Avenger – He sounds like a paladin, but isn’t.
Barbarian – Expect to see a lot of these guys added to your game.
Bard – Since we’ve seen one in action, we knew the free temps would be nerfed, but they gave him better combat abilities. If you didn’t like the 3E bard, give this one a chance.
Invoker – a wizard for the divine crowd.
Sorcerer – I like the core set up of the sorcerer, especially the wild magic version.
Warden, Druid, Shaman – meh, didn’t read them much but found nothing all that compelling.
Deva – meh, but not totally worthless.
Gnome – I would’ve rather seen more of a tinker gnome type than a fey gnome.
Goliath – Good riddance
Half-orc – Glad to have them back
Shifter – While I do not like their beginnings from Eberron (I think), they may have a place in the Valley.
Racial paragons – Nice, though I think with all the paragon options I’m seeing people are going to be wanting to try more than they’ll be able to play.
Feats – As expected, play-tested to virtual blandness, though some work really well for various “builds”.
If you’ll remember, or read the previous entry, Dale nearly slaughtered us with 5 ghouls and a pale reaver. Since we complained at him, he posted a “Did I goof?” question on the WotC boards. Their response was a resounding “Yes!”, and that we shouldn’t have survived at all. So Dale gave us an extra 200xp.
As for the session all of us made it (levels 3-4 I think).
Ergot (Justin), dwarf druid, controller (kind of)
Kal (Brian), human swordmage, defender
Sephira (Scott), dragonborn cleric, leader/striker
Shamash (Aaron), dragonborn fighter/cleric, defender
Renald (Mike), human bard, leader
Wildeyes (Me), halfling ranger/rogue, striker
Jezzail (NPC), halfling sorcerer, striker
I’ll be out the next couple of weeks and they’ll probably play w/o me, which is rare.
Tuck the fairy dragon is now with us effectively as a “magic item” that Renald can use once per day to cast a level 3 wizard spell. Even if he can only do it once per day, that is pretty strong, especially if the level of the spell Tuck memorizes increase with Renald’s level.
We were soon back on our boat with Tuck giving us directions (I think, I’m not sure anymore) down the river taking us in the general direction of Growlgretch, the black dragon who has the magic gem that Jezzail is looking for.
At some point not far from our destination, in a somewhat shallow part of the river, we were ambushed by some lizardfolk and their pets (several lizardmen skirmishers, 3 crocs, and a vine horror).
The battleground was slightly dynamic as the boat moved forward 1 square after every round. That actually was more of an irritation to our opponents than a problem for us, though the crocs did a decent job of pulling us off the boat with their grabbing bite attacks.
Overall the fight was a easy to moderate fight, with the number of opponents and the terrain being the biggest issue. It would have been worse, but Dale was rolling like Dale.
After that fight it wasn’t much farther down the river when Kal noticed a large disturbance in the water in front of us, and that when Growlgretch burst out of the water.
We were up against one young black dragon, two lizardmen lurkers (hiding), and one lizardman marsh mystic (hiding).
By the end of the first round we were upset at Dale again, because he did it again. Just like the ghouls last week, we were in a fight where the monsters had free reign over us while several of our turns consisted of taking ongoing damage, being stunned, being dazed, and/or being slowed all while in 4’ deep water (which cut your speed in half).
On his 3rd round, Ergot dropped due to ongoing damage, then made his saves that removed all of his afflictions, and then rolled a nat20 on his death save. And that was the first thing that went right for him this combat.
None of us did much of anything the first couple of rounds. If we could move, we went after the lizardfolk or the dragon, given who was nearest. Eventually the lizardfolk were run off due to damage or waiting for their powers to recharge.
I even had Jezzail make herself an easy target so the dragon would go after her rather than anyone who may not survive the combat.
This combat Dale was rolling much better than usual, rarely missing with any of his attacks.
Aaron continued his streak of hitting with his daily attacks once every ten tries.
Of all the things going bad, Wildeyes and Jezzail (whose combat decisions and rolls were made by me) were pounded the least.
When we finally started beating on the dragon (some time around round 7) it went better than the last dragon fight we had.
One thing I did was hold off using my big attacks until the dragon was bloodied, in an attempt to keep him from running away too soon. Then when Growlgretch was bloodied I “went nova” as Dale put it, throwing everything I had on both characters at the dragon.
The results were less than spectacular considering the dragon had 224 hit points over all. But everyone was able to consistently pound on him and hit reasonably well.
After we did some treasure splitting, we called it a night.
Jezzail will probably be out of the group when I return unless I reverse my personal disdain of role-playing anything remotely that looks like romance or “gettin’ some”.
See ya in a few weeks.
posted by BlueBlackRed at 10:06 PM
1 Comments:
At the beginning of the last session, Wildeyes took off with Jezzail on a halfling barge. We all assume he's getting some.
I brought an Avenger in to take on striker duty until Wildeyes (i.e. Sean) gets back. He doesn't do massive damage in one hit, but the two attack rolls help to ensure that he'll hit more often. He can also do some control in that some powers cause the target to do damage to nearby enemies (auras and such), or cause a target to take more damage if the avenger gets hit by someone else. It's an interesting class to play, to be sure.
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