@Iszi, @Kedearian Morning again.

how goes?

Not bad, can i use a spell shard instead of a ritual book for my ritual casting? just as a flavor thing

Absolutely.

I'm /incredibly/ liberal on flavour

like if you want your spells to be arcane words running through your body... go for it?

@BrianBallsunStanton Have we heard news of the other characters?

Nope. I should probably timeout right now

er, add a timeout

but wow, today is such a horrible day

hrm

Oh?

it wont let me add dimensonal scramble as an at will power even after i added it manually

@Kedearian I thought you had the Psionic Power update/

i do

but that one is not showing up for some reason

What powers do you see?

gonna reload it and see if it didnt refresh right

hrm it only has the phb3 powers

Sounds like you didn't get the update.

august 2010 update

unless they didnt add it untill sept or october 2010

October.

...and barely, at that.

hrm

well i'll send you my .dnd4e and you can add that for me then?

yes, there's a recent update

actually, the cool bit is that if you add the power name as a custom power, it'll auto-fill

so it "just works" when we export it as um... stuff

I wish my brain worked.

pdf?

as PDF and iplay. I can take care of that when I get home if you throw it on wave.

@Kedearian If you want, I'll give you some temporary creds to get a fresh install and update.

Or, I could do the build for you.

sure im it to me?

It'll take a minute to set up.

so.. anyone watch top gear?

Not really.

c'mon that stuff's great

I don't disagree. Just don't watch it.

I don't really watch TV, sorry

Loved the bit they did on the Veyron at top speed though.

it's good background noise

i perfer the "challenges" they do

like.. make a minivan do a lap faster than a Mitsubishi Lancer Evo VIII

arrghbghb

so, Ked, what feat did you choose?

Suggestion: Orbiting Object

what?

Why not?

I'm not sure what that's an answer to

Feat

huh. I've... never heard of that

i dont think i have far hand

Allows you to maintain Far Hand for free, if target is adjacent or in same space.

Cute....

Sustain far hand for free if target is adjacent or in your space

I'd be recommending superior implement proficiency

I forget if Far Hand is a class feature, or utility power... one sec.

cause um, /me loves accuracy

class feature for telekinetic psions

oh

Right.

right then

wow, I read "Psion Hashalaq Initiation" as psion hashtag initiation

Hi guys, I'm a #kalashtar

dnd4 still feels a bit off for me

what's up, mate?

I use Orbiting Object + Sunrod as a cheap Floating Lantern.

i got an ever burning torch :)

Fun

Yeah, but the torch still takes up a hand.

wait, you could afford one of those suckers?

50 gold yeah

i dont need food, or water, or a bed...

So, you didn't take an Adventurer's Kit?

nah

hrmm

i got rope and a dagger, a backpack.. flint and steel

oh, and cloth armor

yeah

hrmm, neat.

i might get a few pitons and a hammer

climber's kit

cause you know.. iron spikes and hammers are useful

cause yeah, is useful

@BrianBallsunStanton +1

not for climbing tho

Ouch.

disarming traps bwahhaha...

::ponders::

I was thinking more of Far Hand + Piton = improvised projectile attack.

a flock of sheep is also a great way to clear a hallway of traps, if you have one on hand

I wonder if I should give everyone a free RP attack

free RP feat

C'mon... I like that "legal" flag!

Is point, is good point

gnaaah

@Kedearian Take Orb Expertise

i dont wannna!

Oooh, you wouldn't want to give him a superior implement would you?

Petrified Orbs are good fro TKs.

Superior is also shiny.

for* and TK=Telekinetic.

i thought you ment team killing

which is also fun, in the right game

@Kedearian That's why I clarified.

::scratches head::

oookay.

what?

you've never played a Whitewolf game? that's all about killing your own party, in a sneaky way.. and usurping power

No, that's one of the reasons why I dislike WoD

I mean Blue on Blue is fine sometimes...

that's why you dont always play whitewolf games... and mage isnt to bad about killing your friends

Hrmm.

now Munchkin, that's all about stabbing your buddies, says so on the cover

force punch looks like just an insane combo with petrified orb

huh, so is kinetic trawl

Anything using the Force keyword, which is of course most TK-themed powers.

yup

what book is that orb in?

PH3

but yeah, the obscene +1 from orb and +1 from feat....

@Kedearian You need the appropriate Superior Implement feat to use one though.

i'm not in love with my current feat tho

what's your current one?

it let me use my discipline power twice i think

if this would ever finish updating i could tell you

You have two discipline powers.

Far Hand and Forceful Push

Hrmmm....

oh wow, the orb and feat integrate with your class features too. That /is/ neat

Of course, if you grant him a superior implement, the rest of us should have magic weapons...

i think i might do that, i can afford the implement.. isnt that enough?

Iszi, "grant"?

It's a feat.

You can't afford a superior implement at L1

yes you can.

it's 25 gp

Feat's useless without the implement.

25 gold

Um, no?

we start at 100

A Petrified Orb is a L1 magic item.

no it isn't :)

(at least)

i'm looking at the table

it's an implement. costs 27 gp

p 195 phb3

25

It acts /exactly/ like superior weapons do.

greenstone is 27

oh.

Oh you're right...

Dunno why I never saw it there.

Petrified orb 25 2 Energized (force), forcefu

which fits your theme quite well :)

though it doesn't buff dimensional scramble (cause that power so doesn't need any buffing)

you know.. i could update these files manually, in hex... with a butterfly, and it would have been done by now

I... doubt it? :)

xkcd.com/378 -- if you didnt get the joke

@BrianBallsunStanton Where do you find Superior Weapons?

:9301 Um, AV

thought they were in PH1, but apparenty things like greatbow are in AV1

@BrianBallsunStanton I mean, in CB.

oh, they're part of the huuge weapons list

just sort on one of the columns for superior

and the way they handle implements and superior implements is silly

Oh, I see... Basic/Military/Superior...

yah

So, did I catch right that we are getting an additional RP feat?

you complained against it

but I'm willing to be persuaded either way

I know sohum wants becomer

I dunno

Was more sarcasm than anything... I thought your direction toward Ked to take Orb Expertise was indication that we were doing it.

@Kedearian Don't know if you've been following it, but The Event is on now.

no idea what that is

Good show. NBC. Catch up on it though before you watch any of it.

@Kedearian How's the update going?

still going

You did do a fresh install, right?

yeah

Then what'd you do to piss off your ISP? ;-)

uninstalled, deleted the folder, downloaded it and waiting on update

it's at 100% of the download

but still just waiting

oh

you don't need to uninstall

odd... have you updated .net?

yeah

it's still going

i guess

that's ... very odd

still?

yeah

i'm gonna goto bed and leave it running, hope for the best

Hrmm. Cancel and try again? :(

right. cheers mate.

@Kedearian You want to send me info to do the build while you're updating?

I dunno why my ISP's pissed at me

/me um. -> To the game table!

also, Thief not being in CB is annoying

can't use iplay4e, or the combat tracker...

@BrianBallsunStanton Looks like the Shardmind's mostly done, with just one or two loose ends.

The discipline focus was oddly broken-ish, said the character's first name for some reason.

And, it seems no backgrounds were selected.

wait, he ended up with discipline focus?

@Sohum, yes, though we can approximate with rogue...

Aso, welcome back.

I got work done! I have actual results! I now have a ginormous report to write!

yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay

@BrianBallsunStanton Discipline Focus is a part of the Psionic class selection.

It's where you pick Telekinetic, Telepathic, or Shaper

:9360 Results? I'm not sure that's allowed

:9363 right. What feat did he go with. I don't have CB at uni

@BrianBallsunStanton I'm totally going to sneak it in

@BrianBallsunStanton He went with the superior implement feat.

Also, missing his "choice of one other" ritual.

:9368 Strongly strongly recommend traveller's camo

:9366 I don't understand

There's 30-some GP unspent, and no reagents purchased.

well, no reagents necessary for floating disk

and I'm perfectly happy doing the "gold is the ultimate reagent" thing

A mage chews on gold and shits residuumn. ::shrug:: I don't see the "Oh snap, we didn't bring enough [substance X] as all that much fun, especially with the cost of rituals.

k... He's only got a +3 to Nature.

That, on the other hand is a problem.

hrmmm

And no Backgrounds that offer that bonus.

(Speaking of which, he hasn't chosen one.)

I recommend that you kick him into fixing these problem :)

I'll shoot him an e-mail, but don't expect anything until tomorrow afternoon (Eastern).

Um, +24H?

And I'm not fussed, I've basically scrapped today anyways

You gonna set a deadline of +24H on everything?

oh wow, Wild Sage is actually... a really handy feat

oh, boo. the cb still reads the rapier as superior melee?

That would be the sensible thing to do.

Yeah, sure, why not?

Sorry guys, I'm having a /really/ off day today

@BrianBallsunStanton Unless he adds another Background to the character that will do the job, he can't train Nature.

It's not a class skill.

::nod::

Is OK, he should go with a more flavourful ritual anyways

He's in good enough company anyway - Zankul has a -1 to Stealth.

@CRoss @Iszi @Kedearian @EricWeilnau @Sohum @RMorrisey Two questions and a comment: 1) Timeout for roughly finalizing characters in 24H from time of this message, if you don't have CB is OK, just post in public or private wave with what you want your character to be like, and those of us will work it out. Or message me on gtalk for temporary DDI credentials. 2) Do you folks want to append the social contract to do more stealthy bits as a party. It only works when /everyone/ wants to do stealth.

3) Do you folks want to have a free "RP" feat? It means your characters wouldn't be rules-legal, but I'm not hugely fussed.

I need consensus on both questions to implement them.

@BrianBallsunStanton re: 2), I'm fine with either, but I'm obviously not the person that matters as I'd have Stealth anyway. 3) Yes, please.

@BrianBallsunStanton I'll take a look into how much reworking of Zankul would be necessary for Stealth training and get back to you.

@BrianBallsunStanton As for the RP feat, no real complaints here either way I suppose.

also, @BrianBallsunStanton , is there a calculate-everything excel/similar sheet that supports HoFL?

No

when did HoFL come out? I'd have expected the community to have done something by now...

:9413 Spoiled by CB. Last month

Essentials easy to calculate

/me grumbles

the problem is I can't seem to save text in pdfs

so I'm trying to find some sort of editable sheet that I can keep around

Er

dunno. Back... in a while. Need moar coffee.

@BrianBallsunStanton Sent @Kedearian an e-mail with the partly-patched character file, and list of remaining action items.

@BrianBallsunStanton I could drop 2 points Athletics and 5 points Intimidate for an increase of 6 points Stealth (total 5 Stealth). This would also give me one more point in Bluff.\

Hrmmm. Stealth is one of those "good enough" skills where, esepcially in the case of a stealthy party, everyone should try to have it at the same level

Skills are also very much a social contract between the players and a different contract between the player and the GM

It's a "I want to solve problems this way" and a "I want these sorts of problems"

Now, myself, I /love/ stealth and recon. But that's as a player. I'm happy to support whatever style you folks want as a GM, up to and including "We kick down the door" as a functional protocol.

::twitch::

I think as a character, Zankul is built more for brute strength and intimidation - kind of in the nature of a Dragonborn.

Still, even with the point losses above, Athletics ends at 9 and Intimidate at 5.

Correct. It's mainly a question of "does the 5th regiment, as an army, favour stealth and indirection"

(Been reading the Black Company recently... it strongly correlates with my thinking)

the obvious answer is no

armies in general don't tend to favour stealth

misdirection, maybe.

this is because it is really hard to hide an army :P

Or a giant bipedal lizard.

::blink::

Um, US military is one of the best counterexamples I can think of

Stealth, when it comes to army terms, means punching out their eyes in useful ways.

What? The Army has anthropomorphic dragons?

Modern day warfare also has a lot of different variations of the skills "Stealth" and "Perception"

Maybe the Thief isn't best paired with a Warlord that will likely give away his position.

Yes.

And thief as stealthy isn't nominally used on battlefield

It's... very odd

Actually, now that I think about it, if you guys did want to explore party-based skill challenges, there's a great RP feat for ... functionally any skill

the tribal and guild feats suggest that kind of group training, and are perfect fits for regiments.

Oooh, Silent Shadows.

/me argle bargle.

@BrianBallsunStanton can you point me to that word doc sheet again?

The one I found doesn't upload to gdocs

gbugh?

Brain fail. will try again later. Time lunch for me.

.....whoa

If we want to go stealth, I think that's the way to go.

Yeah, it is.

that and traveller's camo will get you quite ninja in stealth checks. And I'll use the all-in-the cards hazards for them too, so they'll be /interesting /skill challenges

how is that functionally different from roll two stealth checks +[Allies in range, max 5], keep better?

i.e., what's the "you dislike" bit for?

@Sohum huh? Where'd that come from?

And... for starters, it's a +2 to any stealth check before the reroll.

@Iszi ...where'd what come from? You posted Silent Shadows, and I asked for a clarification?

@Sohum Where'd "you dislike" come from?

Oh.

yea.

I suppose any roll you don't think is good enough to do the job.

but stealth is a target

so you always want the highest number anyway

So, what feat are you referring to, in the "functionally different" question?

The reroll is an effective +5

okay, yeah, really should lunch

@Iszi I'm not, I'm rewording it to remove the "you dislike" part

Good point. Didn't write the rule, just copied it.

oh, I see

it's subtler than that

However, there is a difference between the two rolls.

yea

First roll only gets a +2. Second roll (if able) gets up to a +5.

+7

you still get the feat bonus

No, you don't.

Even if you did, "maximum of +5" limits the bonus.

"You gain a +2 feat bonus to Stealth checks." "you can reroll the Stealth check with a +1 bonus"

there's a difference between a feat bonus, and a bonus :P

Dunno... +7 on a reroll sounds a little too strong.

hell, +5 on a reroll is still too strong

...which means you're not helping.

...or you are, too much.

:9481 But it's the "if able" thing you wrote there is what I'm concerned about

let me try to reword it again

"If able" is "if there's an ally with this feat within 5 squares of you"

ah

right.

Else, no reroll.

aaah. so you don't get the reroll without an ally nearby

Right... and I think I'm going to post a question on the +5/+7 issue.

"You gain a +2 feat bonus to Stealth checks. Whenever you are within 5 squares of an ally that also has this feat, you can roll twice for your Stealth check: once as normal, and once with a +1 bonus for each such ally, to a maximum of +5. You can then use the best result."

Is that text functionally different?

Depends on how you translate the original. I see it going one of three ways.

1.) Reroll starts at zero bonus, +1 for each qualifying ally up to +5 maximum.

2.) Reroll starts at +2 bonus, +1 for each qualifying ally up to +5 maximum total.

3.) Reroll starts at +2 bonus, +1 for each qualifying ally for up to a maximum of 5 allies.

So, the minimum/maximum bonuses possible depending on ruling would be: 0/5, 2/5, 2/7

I believe by a strict RAW it would be 2/7

because the first line is completely unrelated to the second

I lean more towards one of the x/5 options, for essentially the same reason.

i.e.: Rerolls are classified separately from first rolls.

yes, but +2 applies to all stealth checks

there's no reason it would apply differently

but that wasn't what I was asking

wizards tends to be very precise with their wording

at least in M:tG, and they seem to have carried that onto DnD4

so I'm wondering why "you dislike" is in there

So you're not forced to reroll every stealth check.

Not that it would be a bad thing, far as I can tell.

yes, exactly. it wouldn't be a bad thing, and you only get the bonus on the second roll

It also leaves room for player error. Say you rolled a check that you thought was high enough and decided to keep it. But, it turns out the monster has a higher perception than that. It then became your choice to not reroll that may have been your downfall.

so even if you get a natural 20 on the first you'd want to reroll

but why would a player choose not to reroll

I don't think there's meant to be a "why".

It's just a matter that they can.

yea, but a choice should be meaningful if it exists

Should be, but doesn't need to be.

with Wizards, usually is

Posted query.

blerg

@BrianBallsunStanton Howdy

Catching up?

answered

+2 feat + 5 untyped.

Didn't know bonuses had "types".

::blink::

that's a /major/ rule. Recommend posting question :)

Vulnerabilities, yes. Resistances, yes. Damage, yes.

Bonuses?

yup

Ah... reference pages 27 & 28 of the Rules Compendium and I'll accept that answer.

Don't know why I didn't get that earlier - I see @Sohum was trying to bring it up.

um, okay :)

Unless you want to leave Sohum to add the references in a comment - then I can upvote his comment, and accept the answer.

@Sohum You 'round?

updated :)

with link to DDI as well, even :)

muahahaha

Any comment as to why we have the comment of "roll you dislike" and "use best"?

author silliness

Normally roll you dislike is use second

which means it's the typical WotC editing job (of worthlessness)

I'm certain that the original text was use second and it was edited to best.

Aren't edits usually noted in the Compendium?

nono, pre-press edit

not errata edit

Ah. Brilliant.

another reason why I don't bother with the gorram books is the horrible editing job WotC does

Rules Compendium is awesome - bad editing or not.