Tabletop Fun

[dalesys]

... the client wanted an important trophy stolen before it could be awarded as part of a game tournament...

Some Klahd skeeving off from the Jahks?

[Jay 2K Winger]

D&D Adventurers League--

Back at one of DM David's tables for a Tier 1 game, an adventure I've participated in before, with a different character. I was a bit constrained with which to bring, because I have a smaller amount of Tier 1 characters now and didn't want to roll up with a level 1 new character. So I brought along Jito, a level 4 Kensei Monk. (Kensei Monks are essentially weapon specialists.)

There were three level 1 characters at the table-- one of them admitted she hadn't played D&D since the pandemic, and was using a pre-gen druid-- but all of the players were leaning into the roleplay side of things where they could, and one of them actually angling to make his character backstory work for him when making some History checks and similar.

The adventure was a casino heist-- the client wanted an important trophy stolen before it could be awarded as part of a game tournament, as well as 5000gp that the casino's owner had stolen from her-- and while things got a bit scuffed, we were generally able to pull it off with minimal chaotic problems.

David was surprised when I revealed part of my character build in combat. Jito has the Fey-touched feat, which allows me access to the Misty Step spell (basically a short-range teleport) and one other 1st-level spell of my choice. I chose Hunter's Mark, which lets me mark a target, letting me track them and deal extra damage. On the initial turn with that spell, I still only get my single attack option (casting Hunter's Mark uses a bonus action), but on subsequent turns, if I'm melee attacking, I'm going in with bare-fisted unarmed strikes (I have a +1 dragonhide belt that gives me a bonus to hit with my unarmed strikes), while holding a dagger in my off-hand to allow me to parry (adding +2 to my AC), and on my bonus action use Flurry of Blows to make two more unarmed strikes. Effectively three attacks as a level 4 character (most martial classes don't get an extra attack until level 5), and all of those attacks have an extra 1d6 worth of damage because of Hunter's Mark.

Combine this with my Kensei Monk feature Kensei Shot, and Hunter's Mark makes my attacks with my longbow that much more damaging, since that's an additional 1d4 worth of damage with Kensei Shot.

After successfully bugging out with our client's loot, we were given a bunch new loot ourselves. Among which were a +1 weapon (I chose a longbow so my ranged attacks have equal bonus to hit as my unarmed strikes) and our choice of several magic items. I chose Slippers of Spider Climbing, so Jito gets a climbing speed equal to his walking speed-- and he's already pretty damn fast as a monk. Now Jito can literally wall-run to make it that much harder to get away from him.

[Nunavut Pants]

Something has clicked for me in Terraforming Mars. I've had two "NOT LAST" games in a row now. I was ahead in the last game, but peaked one generation (turn) too soon. Another player managed to pull off a *30* point final gen!!! I started that gen 10 up on him, and made 10 more points, so obviously he won.

He had *three* cards with "1 VP per Jovian tag" and EIGHT Jovian tags!! That's a whole lotta points...

I've started concentrating more on my Terraforming Rating early on, rather than on income and on fulfilling Milestones. Each TR is one victory point, and also one monetary income per turn. So it makes sense to maximize it--but generally what gives you TR are things that advance the game state toward the end of the game, so there is a bit of a trade-off. Also, if everyone does the same thing at the same time it does get messy. So I had been trying to do other stuff, but obviously that didn't work that well. Now I'm doing better by trying to get more TR early on.

[Ceir]

After playing it a couple times at my weekly meetups, I picked up a copy of Apiary and its expansion.

It's a midweight worker-placement base builder, which I'm usually kind of iffy on 'cause so many of them just become multiplayer solitaire. Apiary has a couple mechanics to encourage player interaction, and I think the themeing is neat enough to balance it the rest of the way out - in the far future, humanity is a non factor (elsewhere, gone, whatever), and instead bees have evolved into sapience and gotten busy exploring the galaxy. The faction names are derived from the species names of actual honeybees, and astoundingly there are no bee puns in the rules. (We make plenty at the table anyway.)

[Jay 2K Winger]

D&D AL--

So Brian H. recently became one of the rotating DMs for our chapter of Adventurers' League. He's the guy who likes to come up with backstories for his AL characters, even when said backstories are by and large irrelevant. He's the guy who was playing the idiotic elven ranger Boron in the Frostmaiden campaign. While Brian's DM'd a couple of games for the chapter, it was on weeks when I either in a higher-tier game (I'd been itching to play in a Tier 3+ game, all of which had been on Frostmaiden weeks) or was unable to sign up in time before all seats filled up. But this week I was able to sign up in time.

Brian's already made himself stand out from other DMs by being generous with Heroic Inspiration (basically a free re-roll of a d20), giving everyone one to start with and handing them out when someone makes a good joke or otherwise helped out other players with their play. This was good this week, since we had a new AL player at the table. In fact, at one point, as the player sat next to me was consulting the Player's Handbook, he and I found out a nice factor about Heroic Inspiration: if you're awarded it and already have it, you can pass it to another player who doesn't have it. When we brought this up at the table, Brian immediately tossed me one of the coins he uses to represent Inspiration, and I then immediately went, "Anyone need some Inspiration? Cuz I still have mine."

Brian also liked to frame his narration as if he were describing the action in a cinematic style, even leaning on that by describing the VFX and/or captions identifying the town of Saltmarsh, etc.

I was playing a somewhat disused tier-1 character of mine, Lucent the Cleric. So when our party is invited in to speak to the town councilman who hired us, Brian starts out by saying (IC), "I'd like to hire you to find my thing. My thing is gone, and I really need it back." Half-loaded with innuendo. (Maybe that should be "half-cocked?" Haaa.) We were all quick to pick up on it, with me interjecting, "I don't know what you've heard, but I'm not that sort of cleric, I don't have that kind of healing magic..." But we were rolling with the vibes at the table, everyone was doing optimal stuff, by and large, and if they weren't, they were still acting 100% as their character would.

The gist of the job was the councilman had invested a great deal of money, and this was being transported back to him on a ship that had vanished at sea before re-emerging, looking quite the worse for wear. We were to sail out to meet the now-derelict vessel and get the box with his money back. Brian did describe the box was going to be tricky to maneuver-- just big enough to be difficult for one person to carry, just small enough that it would be awkward for two to carry, and just heavy enough to impede movement.

The derelict, as one might expect, was full of monsters. Mostly spiders or spider-adjacent creatures like ettercaps (humanoids with spider-like bodies) and a druid that served Lolth the Spider Queen. During the fight against the ettercaps, the first one was killed when the party's wizard hit it with Toll the Dead, and Brian described the monster clutching its head and writhing as it fell over dead. And then, with every subsequent kill, Brian described "cinematically" as the monster died in the exact same manner, regardless of the method of death. Explicitly comparing it to a recycled animation due to a low budget. Almost everything got the same death animation.

The finale of the adventure ended up getting trivialized due to a couple of factors. We were in the bottom deck of the ship, a half-flooded cargo hold which had some ghouls in it. While most of the martial characters fought them, our rogue-- who had backed out of melee range for better aim with his bow-- was encouraged to find the macguffin, since we needed to get off the ship pronto-- there had been a loud Godzilla-like roar, and the ship had already been rocked by something big hitting it. Not only did the rogue find the box, but he rolled a Nat-20 on his Athletics check to pick it up.

Secondly, the ghouls were incapacitated thanks to my cleric using his Turn Undead feature, rendering them frightened and incapacitated, and easy pickings for our party, keeping them from tying us down with multiple rounds of combat.

Thirdly, the party's wizard had-- against all expectation-- prepared a great utility spell called Tenser's Floating Disk. This disk can hold up to 500 pounds, lasts for an hour without requiring concentration (meaning the spell just lasts until it expires or is dismissed), and would follow the wizard wherever he went. The DM was aghast at this, because it negated the awkward maneuvering of the box by the party, allowing us to rapidly escape the ship before it sank under the kraken's attack.

(No, we didn't try to fight the kraken. We were all levels 1-4, in no way equipped or prepared to engage a gargantuan sea creature like that.)

After the session, Brian asked me how well he did, and I told him he did a great job. He admitted he hadn't actually read the module before that night, and I assured him I couldn't tell. Which was encouraging for him to hear.

[Nunavut Pants]

More Terraforming Mars--

Had a game where I built a pretty good VP-generating engine. Got into the lead in the mid-game, was leading going into the last generation. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough, and as often happens this one player pulled off a stupefying last generation and got a ton of points, putting me back into second place.

Still, it wasn't last!

The next game, I was able to buy a number of cards that let me draw cards. I also got a bunch of science tags by mid-game, which allowed me to play the "spend 6 energy for 2 VP" card. Plus I had pretty good energy production. I also bought a card that once per turn gave me 1 money for every science tag I had; and I had quite a few! I had also played the "tardigrades" card, which you can play early but takes a lot of activations to make points. (1 "microbe" per activation, 1 VP per 4 "microbes".) I had played a couple of cards that let me just add microbes to any card, plus had one that added one per science tag I had--which again, was a lot by the end of the game. So I had a bunch of card draws, a bunch of income, and some discounts. I was able to use that to fund two Awards (I missed all of the Milestones) and placed first in those and second in one funded by an opponent.

It all turned out to be just enough to win by a single VP!

The following game, I came in 2nd. Then I was back in last again. We'll see how this current game goes...

[Jay 2K Winger]

Artists are running the Library?

Aesthetics generally would mean artistic principles.

Ascetics are people who generally are isolated from society and try not to do anything enjoyable.

That... makes more sense, I did mess that up. In my defense, I've only seen the word "ascetics" like three times previously, it hasn't properly secured itself in my brain for regular usage yet.

[Kit-Ginevra]

Orangutans are running the Library!

Fixed that for ya....

[dalesys]

...

Oops, looks like I forgot to turn off the "smartass" setting this morning! Sorry!

Well paddle my bum!

[Nunavut Pants]

The aesthetics who run the Library...

Artists are running the Library?

Aesthetics generally would mean artistic principles.

Ascetics are people who generally are isolated from society and try not to do anything enjoyable.

Acetics are vinegars.

Aestheticians are make-up artists or hair-dressers.


...

Oops, looks like I forgot to turn off the "smartass" setting this morning! Sorry!

[Jay 2K Winger]

Dragonlance--

DM Bob does put in his prep work, and we all have appreciated it when he does. But after last session's "Scroll-Con" and the formation of the Whitestone Forces for Krynn (WSF), he turned up this week with like twenty pages listing out the Whitestone Forces' order of combat. Bob is (ex?-)military, and has a lot of experience with logistical stuff, so this was just him applying some of his work experience. It also gave our party titles as part of the main war council.

Lord Commander: Lord Evrouin Brightblade
Master of Wands: Justinius of the Red Robes
Master of the Crozier: Gavin of Erol
Master of Arms: Runa Firebrand
Master of Scouts: Catt Trapspringer

Some of the named NPCs from Scroll-Con were listed as commanders of various parts of the WSF, too, and most of the session was centered around some of the logistics of mobilizing our forces and getting them to the High Clerist Tower, a strategic choke-point where we hoped to stop the Blue Dragon Army's march. We started by heading to Palanthas.

As irony would have it, Jesse (Justinius' player) was absent this week, which was hilarious to the table, because Justinius has been keen to return to Palanthas to try to get into the Great Library there, as he's a keen student of history. To explain his absence, Bob decreed that Justinius was spending his time stuck in "Wizard Zoom." (Justinius was elevated to the Wizards' Conclave within the Orders of High Sorcery, which includes a modification to his robes that allow him to essentially remotely project himself to the conclave meetings.) Bob joked that he was having to sit through "orientation videos" and other HR-mandated stuff.

While other members of the party helped arrange for establishing our garrison near Palanthas, and scouting missions to send out to scout the Blue Dragon Army, the High Clerist Tower, and so on, Gavin went to the Library to see if they had anything that would help us out when we got to the High Clerist Tower. The aesthetics who run the Library were a little surprised at first at Gavin's backstory, but this was-- as I expected-- the "in" we needed, as he was invited to speak with the master of their order, Astinius. He is, like Gavin, an ageless mortal, tasked with the duty of recording everything that happens on Krynn. He has tools to help him in this regard, but as he admitted to Gavin, even these can't see certain events, such as the Battle of the Pit, from the Third Dragon War-- where Gavin's friend Huma Dragonbane died to banish Takhisis to the Abyss. So, in exchange for providing his account of the battle, Gavin would get access to any information he needed about the High Clerist Tower. We all noted that Justinius would probably be quietly fuming about it.

While in Palanthas, Lord Amothus (lord-mayor of the city) said that as the city didn't have any martial forces they could add to the WSF, they would instead foot the bill for whatever needed paying. We did end up having to attend a fancy dinner with a number of the city's nobility-- all wealthy merchants and their spouses-- and having to field some questions, like how did Evrouin become head of the WSF, where is Runa (the barbarian) from, what do you mean Gavin is married to a dragon, etc. All of these nouveau riche types really failed to realize the gravity of the situation-- the Chromatic Dragon Armies have basically conquered or besieged nearly every major settlement on the continent, and Palanthas is next on the list-- and we walked away from the dinner thinking of them all as "useless people."

The High Clerist Tower had been sealed back during the Cataclysm (actually immediately before it), but Evrouin was able to unseal them-- as he was deemed a "worthy" Knight of the Sword. From there, the WSF began building up our defenses in the surrounding fortress and repairing the dragon traps in the Tower itself. But we then found a door in the basement, locked with a rune on the door which Gavin recognized as wizard writing meaning DO NOT OPEN. We all agreed it was a good idea, and basically had Justinius agree not to open it. (Mike/Evrouin: "Justinius, if you agree to leaving it closed, say nothing. ...Excellent.") But, because we still felt we should know what was inside, Runa used her augury ability to remotely view what lay beyond the door:

A Dragon Orb. And she heard a voice whisper (despite her augury ability rendering her deaf while using it) "Free me..." before she was shunted out of her augury vision.

We know from what Gavin learned that during the First Dragon War, the Tower was used as a dragon trap, with the wizards who built the Tower somehow driving the dragons into a blind rage, trapping them when their heads came through the portcullis, clamping their mouths shut, and then slaying them while they were trapped. The Orb was likely how they did it, and they were likely able to do it by dint of being the O.G. wizards who founded the Orders of High Sorcery.

But we also know that meddling with a Dragon Orb is a dangerous prospect. The elven city of Silvanest was lost in a neverending nightmare when their king tried to use one. Justinius got extremely lucky when he used that same Orb to temporarily drive off the ancient green wyrm dragon Cyan Bloodbane, and there's no guarantee he'll be able to do it again.

Next time: The Whitestone Forces play Dragonlance TD against the Blue Dragon Army.

[Nunavut Pants]

I recently came in second out of four in the last Terraforming Mars game, so that's good. I was able to get a lot of titanium and steel production, giving me discounts on building and space cards. I also got the "Von Neumann Machines" card, which you can pair with a card to get a discount--and every turn, you can double that discount! I of course used it on Terraforming Ganymede, which is a fairly powerful card (which can be made more powerful by having cards with Jovian tags on them). I had forgotten that the linked card was public knowledge, so everyone could see I was going for TG. I got teased about it being a "bold declaration" to openly show it early...

Anyway, it wasn't good enough to put me into first, so I came in second. Still, NOT LAST!

[Jay 2K Winger]

D&D AL: Rime of the Frostmaiden--

Belatedly realized I never included a little write-up of the conclusion of our little campaign through Adventurers' League.

We made our way through the tower in the ruined Netherese city in search of the staff in it, a macguffin which might be able to resolve the whole "perpetual winter" problem that the Icewind Dale was trapped in. There were a few fights along the way as we climbed the tower, until we reached the top, where the staff was.

Only, there was a Demilich that arrived just as we were grabbing the staff. A Demilich is a lesser version of a classic Lich-- it's literally just a floating skull, but still with powerful magical capabilities-- and this one wasn't happy that we were stealing its staff. We managed to take down a few of its minions, while it kept blinding us and putting the "frightened" condition on us, but once again I ended up scoring a Natural-20 on what ended up being the final blow on the final boss of a campaign. DM David acknowledged that the damage I rolled would be enough to kill the Demilich, but asked everyone at the table to contribute to the narrative to describe how we collectively beat it, with my sorcerer Rhoric getting the final blow. Everyone's describing hitting the Demilich with arrows, punching its jaw off, etc., while Rhoric (who'd been blinded) just tracked the noise, and flung his final spell into the Demilich and blew its skull to smithereens.

The staff, once attuned to, allows the person attuned to it to control the weather in the Icewind Dale. It was naturally given to the idiotic Elf Ranger, Boron, who was able to make it so the weather and seasons passed as they normally would, rather than being locked in a perpetual winter under the Frostmaiden's control. As long as Boron stays on the mortal plane, his attunement and the effects would remain.

Boron, of course, mistook this for "I must never leave the Icewind Dale" (instead of "I must not leave this plane") and maintained this even after the truth was explained to him, which was also after his twin brother turned up and painstakingly explained that no, you're not actually exiled from your homeland what are you doing you idiot mother is worried sick I'm sorry about him he's always been like this.

Rhoric decided to leave the Icewind Dale and take his chances returning to the Sword Coast, since he knows Boron won't follow him there.

Everyone at the table had fun, but we were ready to finally move on to different adventures. I've missed a couple of weeks because I keep forgetting when sign-ups open up, and all the openings get filled before I remember.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Dragonlance--

Following the recovery of the dragonmetal, our ragtag team of Misfits now found ourselves needing to assemble fantasy NATO the Swordsheath Scroll council-- major kingdoms and nations etc that had signed a mutual defense treaty ages ago-- so we could finally deal with the Chromatic Dragon Armies running amok and conquering or burning down the world.

Fortunately, we had access to the Sending spell, which allows the user to send a 25-word message to anyone they've met, as long as they're on the same plane of existence. Three people in the party have the spell-- Justinius, Evrouin, and Gavin-- and we were able to contact all signatories as well as some other groups who we felt would be amenable to joining the alliance.

Evrouin also had to weigh in on his cousin Sturm Brightblade's petition for knighthood. Sturm had been turned down for knighthood previously, because his lineage was in question, specifically blocked by a knight called Lord Derek Crownguard. Lord Derek is one of the knights who believes ardently that all knights should follow the Measure (a volumes-long list of rules for knights to follow) at all times, while Evro and other knights (including the leader of the knighthood, Lord Gunther uth Wistan) believe that the Measure is outdated and too rigid, and let their Oath ("My Honor Is My Life") guide their actions. Now that Evro held a lordship, he was on the knights' council, and he could sponsor Sturm's petition to avoid the political mess that would transpire if Gunther did it instead.

Of course, Lord Derek tried to block it again, but this time using the fact that Sturm had been falsely claiming to be a knight. While Sturm had been called "Sir Sturm" by his companions, it was down to their mistaking him for being a knight (given he was wearing a knight's armor) and his neglecting to correct them. Derek argued that not only should Sturm not be knighted, he should be executed for his deception. Evro pointed out that he had already passed judgment in the field on Sturm, but this caused Derek to turn around and argue that Evro's judgment is clouded and he should be stripped of his knighthood as well. When Evro returned that Derek himself had voted twice in favor of him-- once to knight him, and once to elevate him to the Order of the Rose-- and that this in turn suggested Derek's judgment was in question, he was challenged to a duel.

As this was an honor duel, the rules stated that neither man should go for lethal damage. Evro kept to this, and while Justinius the wizard was plotting to tacitly intervene by casting Haste on Evro, he never did so-- it was pointed out that using magic in that way would dishonor Evro, and even if the rest of the knights might not realize what was happening, Evro would, and would be honor-bound to admit to it-- and he endured a bit of a thrashing from Derek, who was getting his bell rung right back. But Derek was furious that Evro wasn't going down, and then went for lethal damage, causing Evro to start bleeding, and outraging the knights. Evro won the duel, and Lord Gunther verbally and physically rebuked Derek, kicking him out of the knights' council. Sturm was knighted at last.

Then, as the Swordsheath Scroll council convened (which the table ended up dubbing "Scroll-Con" because we ended up tongue-twistering 'Swordsheath' too much), we had representatives of all these forces we'd allied with coming to the meeting: the Knights of Solamnia, the Ergothian Empire, Palanthas, the kender of Hylo, the gnomes of Mt Nevermind, the dwarves of Thorbardin, the elves of Qualinest and Silvanest, the Monks of the Rose, the Orders of High Sorcery, and the Metallic Dragons. But things almost immediately fell to bickering as various nations argued that their plight against the Dragon Armies was more important than everyone else's.

At which point, this doddering old wizard who had been with the Companions (the main characters from the Dragonlance novels) wanders over to the obelisk in the Whitestone Glade where Scroll-Con was happening, then turns to Solostaran (leader of the Qualinesti elves) and calls him out for having a Dragon Orb on him, magicks it into his hand, scoffs at it, and smashes it against the obelisk. This wizard then reveals himself to be Paladine, basically the chief of the Gods of Good, and dresses down everyone for their disunity while they were facing a threat that wanted to wipe them all out, and more or less told them to get their shit together, citing our group of Misfits as having been capable of doing many great things despite the disparity between us all. For all that we had powerful allies (Evenstar the dragon took his full draconic form for emphasis here), it would be our unity that would help us win the day.

Then Paladine returned to doddering wizard form and walked off into the forest.

Well, that galvanized Scroll-Con into allying together, and Evrouin was chosen to become "Lord Commander" of the allied forces. We showed our allies to the dragonmetal which could be forged into dragonlances, and we set to working out some logistics and strategizing about our first move-- namely, bulwark Palanthas, claim the High Clerist Tower south of it to secure a choke-point and land route for our forces, and then prepare to push south to reclaim Vingaard and aid Qualinest.

[Nunavut Pants]

Finally hosted another board game afternoon!

Several of the people who had RSVP'd dropped out, so we only had five.

So we wound up playing a game of TransAmerica, the lightweight train game. I did well at first, then the final round I wound up waaaaaaaaay out of my green city. I think I had Seattle, while the person who went out did so by connecting to LA. And she was the only one who had gotten their green (west coast) city.

Once it was clear that nobody else was showing up, we moved on to Just One. Played quite a few rounds of that, and enjoyed it greatly. We had a lot of laughs, sometimes at the more "esoteric" clues that people chose, and sometimes just the way that some clues collided. There were several rounds in a row where I and the only other guy at the table had clues that collided, which I found to be more and more funny each time. There were some really good clues--one that I remember was a round where I was guessing, and most of the clues were things like "pyramid", "Egyptian", and so on. One clue was "condom"--and yes, it was from the other guy at the table. That was enough for me to pick out the specific answer, Ramses! There were lots of Pharaohs, but only one shared its name with a condom. Sometimes it's the really odd clues that let you zero into the answer, because they come at it from a completely different direction.

... Still playing Terraforming Mars on line. Still losing. Had one game where I was pretty well out front right up until the end, when both of the other players passed me. Just barely, mind you, but both did.