The Campaign Builder's Guild

Now that sure brings back some fond memories.

Looking at that, I can't avoid the impression that some architect-conjurers made a career of summoning giant creatures solely to carve up their bodies for the construction of buildings.

Quote from: Steerpike
Earlier that session we had spooked a herd of brontosauruses to stampede and kill a horde of zombies,

Looking at that example out of context and probably missing critical information, that reads like a rather stupid plan that ought to go disastrously wrong. Which is to say that it's something I wouldn't even propose to try unless there are some really convincing, known factors that make it make sense IC. These enabling factors would be information drawn from the rules, the setting and prior in-game revelations. For example, if there's an animal handling skill or such that is broad enough in scope to allow controlling the brontosauruses in this manner, and sufficiently easy to pull off that failure is unlikely. Even so I'd want some reliable means of a failsafe, such as a magical item with which to instantly teleport away. Ignorant of any such enabling factors, I'd assume that trying it would only put me in the path of stampeding dinosaurs.

So what I'm saying is that merely having the brontosauruses in an area near the zombies isn't enough to suggest a viable plan, further information is necessary. And that information could well be supplied by the rules.

So in a hypothetical RPG about baseball players, a team of mechanically suboptimal PCs resorting to beating up the rival team's star pitcher before an upcoming match would count as off-the-sheet thinking because the game system doesn't have any rules for personal combat?

I am of the opinion that if you want PCs to primarily engage in non-combative solutions, then you ought to use a rules system that provides mechanical support for such solutions. If combat is intended to be so dangerous as to be avoided when possible, then you probably shouldn't to bother with a very in depth combat subsystem -  a simple lightweight way to handle it should be enough as long as the probabilities are biased against PCs. You'd instead go for more rules that deal with avoiding the monsters, disengaging and fleeing and hiding. Also rules for things like diversionary tactics, gadgetry and demolitions. Because a RPG system should focus on things the game is about, not on things it isn't about.

Quote from: LoA
I don't know what system I'm using for this. I'm tempted to use Pathfinder, but my group I play with are obsessed with 5e.

Maybe you could houserule the Call of Cthulhu RPG? Just ignore the Mythos stuff and stat your own monsters?

[ic=Yarek, son of Darek]

Human Ranger (skirmisher) level 3

[spoiler=Picture][/spoiler]

Yarek is the youngest of five brothers, sons of the woodsman Darek. Like his father and elder siblings, he is a skilled tracker and hunter of game, and has been accepted into the Tracker's Guild. His family lives in a cabin in the wilderness 5-6 days' ride from Ravenkeep, but all of the brothers range far from home on their treks, visiting the various villages and towns of Kangdemar to sell pelts and hear the news.

Yarek's hair is an extreme light blonde, almost snow-white, and his eyes are cold icy blue. Like his siblings he is built tall and robust, but is lauded as the most fair looking of them all. He always carries a strong bow and one or more quivers at hand, and is quite proud of his skill at archery. Yarek dons the guild's surcoat when doing official business with them. Normally he wears practical clothes made from mastodon wool and leather, although he includes an archery bracer adorned in red and black stripes to signify his membership.


STR 15
DEX 17 +2 (Human) = 19
CON 15 +1 (2nd level) = 16
INT 11
WIS 13
CHA 13


HP: 20 (lvl 1) + 10 (lvl 2) + 5 (lvl 3) + 6 (CON bonus) + 3 (Toughness) = 44


SKILLS:

Climb (Str) 1 + 3 (class skill) + 2 = 6
Diplomacy (cha) 3 +1 = 4
Handle Animal (Cha) 2 + 3 (class skill) = 5
Heal (Wis) 2 + 3 (class skill) + 4 = 9
Knowledge (geography) (Int) 1 + 3 (class skill) + 0 = 4
Knowledge (nature) (Int) 1  + 3 (class skill) + 0 = 4
Profession (hunter) (Wis) 1 + 3 (class skill) + 1 = 5
Ride (Dex) 2 + 3 (class skill) + 4 = 9
Sense Motive (wis) 3 + 1 = 4
Stealth (Dex) 2 + 3 (class skill) + 4 = 9
Survival (Wis) 3 + 3 (class skill) + 1 = 7
Swim (Str) 1 + 3 (class skill) + 2 = 6


FEATS:
* Power Attack (automatic; BAB 1+)
* Deadly Aim (automatic; BAB 1+)
* Combat Vigor (Human bonus feat)
* Heart of the Wilderness (additional background trait for Human)
* Toughness (1st level feat)
* Mounted Combat (1st Fighter bonus feat)
* Mounted Archery (2nd Fighter bonus feat)
* Precise Shot (1st Ranger combat style feat)
- Merged with Point-Blank Shot; The new Precise Shot feat grants a +1 bonus to attack and damage with ranged weapons within 30 feet, and also removes the -4 attack penalty for shooting into melee. Feats which formerly required Point-Blank shot and/or Precise Shot now only require Precise Shot.
* Rapid Shot (3rd level feat)
* Endurance (Ranger level 3)


CLASS ABILITIES:
* Proficiency in all simple and martial weapons and with light armor, medium armor, and shields (except tower shields)
* Favored Enemy (Animal)
* Track
* Wild Empathy
* Favored Terrain (forest)


SAVING THROWS:
Fort 3 (base) + 3 (con) = +6
Ref 3 (base) + 4 (dex) = +7
Will 1 (base) + 1 (wis) = +2


INITIATIVE: +4


BAB: 3
Attack Bonus (melee) 3 + 2 = +5
Attack Bonus (ranged) 3 + 4 = +7

Attack (mw comp longbow) +8, damage 1d8+2, critical 20/x3
Attack (mw greatsword) +6, damage 2d6+2, critical 19-20/x2


AC: 10 + 4 (armor) + 4 (dex) = 18


EQUIPMENT:
3000gp to spend on:

Chain Shirt - 100 gp
Masterwork Composite Longbow +2 - 300gp
Masterwork Greatsword - 350 gp
Handaxe - 6 gp
Dagger - 2 gp
Mastodon - ??? gp

100 Arrows - 5 gp
20 Whistling Arrows - 2 gp

Bedroll, blanket, small tent, 50 ft of hemp rope, signal horn, torch, trail rations for 10 days, cold weather outfit, backpack, mastodon brush, howdah

[/ic]

Do we get standard gold for 3rd level characters or something else?

So I'm going to be playing as a archery-focused Ranger. Should I consider membership in the Kang Tracker's Guild?

I'd be just fine with couple of shorter sessions.

Added my times. I may be able to push a bit longer on either session depending on how well caffeinated I am at the time. :P

I'm interested, but unsure if I can make it if the game ends up too late in the night or early in the morning this side of the pond.

You could replace it with the cleric's ability to turn/rebuke, but instead of undead it affects animal and plant based monsters?

Some things are better left for imagination.

Quote from: Places of Interest
[spoiler=On Akhet-hor]

Dragon's Nest
An aviary near the citadel, where dragons and other flying mounts are stabled and aspiring riders are trained in their handling. A wide flat platform extends off the base of the aviary, to make taking off and landing easier. There is also a small watchtower used for signaling with flags and mirrors.

Court of the Obelisks
This is a large open court in front of the citadel's main entrance, flanked on two sides by rows of obelisks. It is used for public gatherings, ceremonies, festivities, oaths and duels. The courtyard is paved with colorful flagstones that form a mosaic depicting the disc of sunfire being lifted by the phoenix bird.

Heaven's Gate
A ziggurat on one of the smaller isles next to Akhet-hor's main island. The hawk-faced protector deity of the skyward realm is enshrined on the top. The ziggurat is faceted with blocks of silvery-blue stone.

Lunar Garden
When paragons and civil servants wish to relax on their free time, they often head to this enclosed garden. While the garden's enchanted perimeter is fairly small from the outside, the world inside it is miraculously vast and spacious. There are many kinds of delightful flowering plants on display, but most prominent of them all are the moonflowers that only bloom at night. Ornate fountains provide refreshment on hot days, and festooned oil lamps shed pleasant lighting after dark. Pathways through the garden twist and cross and double back on themselves, separated by rows of trees and hedges, which creates many private refuges suitable for amorous encounters.

Tower of Wisdom
This slender white tower stands impossibly tall for the capabilities human masonry. Like the citadel, it was erected by the empyrians and later repurposed. Now it houses scribes, physicians and astrologers in service to the citadel lord. The uppermost floors are used as observatories and studies, while the ground floor contains the citadel's library. The middle floors contain many incubation chambers, for paragons and others to make use of when they seek visions or attempt to embark on dream quests.
[/spoiler]

[spoiler=In the Country]

Valley of Three-Legged Men
The inhabitants of this secluded valley are very odd people. They dwell in circular huts that are buried into the ground, such that only their conical roofs are visible. They refuse to touch metal with bare hands, believing it to be holy. Their males are born with three legs instead of two, and run as fast as the flightless ranga-birds they hunt. The valley is blessed with rich pastures of abundant game, but it is also plagued with frequent flights of massive gadfly swarms.

Twin Cities
These two city-states, Ava-karana and Avi-karana, sit on opposite banks of the Dreaming River, facing off each other like duelists. They are rivals in all matters, and have been locked in an everlasting ritual war since the first days of their founding. At every new moon each city musters a company of braves and sends them to clash in a ceremonial battle, observed by the populace from each side. The victor of that skirmish receives a tribute from the other city, and violence ceases for a month, only for the the cycle to repeat again. The Twin Cities are famed for their lavish royal courts and luxuries.

Waterfall City
This city resides on a ledge-like plateau between two landrises, sprawling to either direction from the Opal River which flows across it. The wide and fast-flowing river cascades down the cliffs in roaring waterfalls. It can only be crossed via a bridge of transparent green stone, made of a single piece that arcs across the entire span without any supports. Waterfall City is ruled by an eunuch king who is never seen in public, but is rumoured to be able to create illusions and send them to deceive his enemies. The town is positioned so safely that it has no need for walls, and it's warriors ride Andoos and other winged beasts. Visitors in lieu of flying mounts are winch-lifted up to the city on a gondola if they are dignitaries, while paupers have to ascend a dangerously narrow and winding path up the cliffs.
[spoiler][/spoiler]
The Hollow Mesa
A lone mesa stands eerily in the badlands where the Pale Mountains give way to the dunes of the High Desert. You could never tell it by looking from around it, but this mass of rock is hollow inside. It houses a colony of chittering desert monsters, childlike in size and shape, with shark teeth, rubbery hairless bodies and very large bulging eyes that gleam in the dark. They only come out at night, emerging from secret tunnels dug beneath the dunes, to scavenge and steal from unwary travelers. Sometimes they can be heard "singing" in wild screeching noises.

The Ringing Stele
A monumental stele carved from an immense slab of granite, it stands on a hilltop overlooking the ford on Pearl River. The stele was erected to commemorate the great battle fought a century ago on this crossing, where Nattakir the Heartless, savage warlord of the Striding Horde, had fallen. An ominous droning noise, like the ringing of a large bronze bell, sounds constantly from the stele. Some say that it is because thousands of lost souls were trapped on the battlefield and were bound to the stele by fell magics, and are now humming in prayer.

The Hidden Temple
An extensive temple complex is carved into the rock of a cliff face somewhere in the maze of the Pale Mountains. It's location is a mystery, as the travelers who have happened upon it by accident have given wildly contradictory accounts of it's whereabouts, and none of those explorers that have gone searching for the temple have found it. Some sages speculate that the temple may be moving so as to appear in different places, or even that the very shape of the unmapped landscape is in flux, transforming when no one is watching. The temple complex is attended by an ascetic order of mute priests, and is said to house thousands of intricately sculpted idols.

Jade Island
A notorious island on the Elder Sea, along the sailing route to the west. Although mariners shun the place, they sometimes land there briefly to fetch fresh water from the nearest stream or spring, being always quick to leave and never venture deep into the island. If the grotesque statues of monstrous warriors carved from great blocks of jade standing vigilantly along the island's perimeter won't deter them, the gigantic clawprints on the beaches and the ferocious roars bellowing from the densely forested interior are a more than sufficient scare. Some sailors who have been forced to linger on the island to wait out a storm speak of hearing the sound of fervent drumming and of spotting eerie lights upon the hilltops.

The Lost City
Deep in the tangled expanse of the Hungry Forest, dilapidated ruins of a once monumental city lay about, half-submerged in a rank swampland. Although dappled with moss and strangled by vines, a multitude of ornate stone columns and statuary testify to the wealth and sublime craftmanship of this bygone civilization. Nothing is known of the people who built this place, or even if they were of mankind to begin with. It is a major ordeal just to locate the Lost City, as there are no paths or landmarks leading there through the jungle, and the foliage camouflages the ruins from the eyes of those flying above. Bands of treasure hunters have ventured into the forest with intention of scouring the site for valuable relics, but none are known to have returned.
[spoiler][/spoiler]
The Silent Grotto
This cave, located on the shore of the Elder Sea, is a place held sacred by the Horned Viper Tribe. So holy it is that sound cannot be heard within it. The illusory limits between the phenomenal world and Pandemonium wane in the grotto so that even ordinary people may see glimpses to the other side. Many tribesmen make pilgrimages to the site, but they are wary of entering the cave.

The Spiral Pit
A great pit yawns wide open on the ground, like the maw of some colossal beast, between the central plain and the Bonelands. This enormous chasm spans over a league across and plummets down to unknown depths that go on deeper than sunlight can reveal. Some think that it may even reach down to the primeval sea that is Abyss. The sides of the cavity form a broad spiral ledge that coils downward in a clockwise spin. This ledge is quite rough and uneven, varying in it's breadth and steepness. Grass, vines, shrubs and even small gnarled trees grow out of it's rocky surface. This vegetation gradually gives way to a verdancy of lichen and fungi, and eventually to bizzarre unknown flora as one descends. The cliff walls are punctured all over by entrance holes to myriad subterranean tunnels that wind and twist and coil around the pit, sometimes connecting to spacious caverns. Strange beasts lurk in these hollow spaces, and aberrant flying creatures build nests on outcroppings.

There is an eldritch distortion that subverts the very laws of distance and direction, warping the space within the pit. Where each revolution of the spiral should funnel the walls closer, shortening the gap across to the opposite side, no such thing apparently happens. No matter how deep one descends, the span of the spiral and the length of a round trip along it remain the same.

Temple of the Blue Lotus
Flowers of the blue lotus plant are the source of an important drug used in many religious rituals and some feats of sorcery. They are also symbols of wisdom and vitality. These magnificent plants that grow in pools of fresh water are said to be descended from a fabled ur-flower, the very first blue lotus which blossomed at the dawn of the universe. That original specimen, pretenaturally large and beautiful, is nursed in an enchanted garden in a serene valley through which the Dreaming River flows. A large temple with marble walls and golden roof encloses the garden, itself surrounded by a sacred grove.

By ancient taboos common to all the civilized tribes of the country, this sanctuary is exempt from all manner of violent disturbance. It's eternal peace is guaranteed by a brotherhood of tattooed warrior-priests. The temple is independent from the nearby earthbound kingdoms and wields significant amount of political power. It maintains its prosperity by imposing a religious tax upon villages within it's sphere of influence. Pilgrims arrive from far and wide to revere the original blue lotus, bearing offerings that likewise help support the temple. A great volume of lore has accumulated in the Temple of the Blue Lotus over the ages, gathered from the multitude of visiting mystics and scholars.

The Seven Pyramids
These pyramids stand in a hexagonal formation on the central plain, with the tallest pyramid in the centre and the other six on evenly distanced points around it. They are oriented according to geomantic and astrological lore, creating a liminal space where the celestial bodies of heaven are in harmony with the mundane axes of earth. The outer pyramids contain enclosed tombs of six legendary paragon masters, buried in golden sarcophagi with troves of powerful artifacts. Their burial chambers are sealed behind massive stone doors and protected by powerful curses.

The seventh pyramid, however, does not house a cadaver. It's vaulted chamber contains an unknown menace, the identity of which was struck from records and forgotten after the passing of the six masters. The central pyramid is bolstered with defenses and curses even more potent than the rest, but these were not intended to prevent tomb robbers from entering -- they were designed to keep something from escaping.

The Black Oasis
A large oasis in the High Desert and the principal watering hole along the caravan routes that cross it. The water of this oasis looks disturbingly dark and murky, and has a slightly bitter taste to it. It apparently is safe to drink though -- and also doubles as liquid food. It fends off starvation, but leaves the feeling of hunger. Drinking your fill of the black water is enough to stand for three hearty meals, but no matter how much of it you intake you find that you're still hungry.

A small cluster of huts and a shrine to the tentacled god that dwells in the spring account for the permanent inhabitation. Desert nomads arrive to setup camp by the oasis from time to time, temporarily erecting a sizeable village of tents there. There is no rule of law in the Black Oasis, but ancestral customs of hospitality are ironbound.
[spoiler][/spoiler]
[/spoiler]

It looks as though it could be a fun game.