ho ho ho

@GPierce howdy, building your own battle mats is a pain in the neck....

@waxeagle kinda, sorta?

so... uh

are we going in?

@BrianBallsunStanton sounds like a plan, lets leave animus outside, to keep watch, so we only have 3 chars, and because he couldn't make a stealh roll if his life depends on it....the religion would be nice...but...

@waxeagle yes

shall we do this on the battlemap?

@BrianBallsunStanton that would make sense...

@BrianBallsunStanton thankfully walmart sells pre-grided cardstock and contact paper, unfortunately the grid is very faint and 1/2"...yeah sharpies!

uhhh

@BrianBallsunStanton its late, and I'm probably a bit high on sharpie fumes :)

right

@BrianBallsunStanton and I'm probably freaking out a bit cuz tomorrow is my first time DMing 4e...

yeah, I hear that. No worries, man.

:)

@waxeagle lol i'm doing the same thing right now!

@GPierce what size?

must be nice having inch grid paper, i have not been able to find any

i just printed grid paper out on various colored papers

right now i've done 8 8x10, 6 5x5, 10 4x4, and a lot more, all of varying colors

@waxeagle what about you?

@GPierce 21x27 :) gonna try to do 3, but may only get 2 finished

walmart had poster board with a really light grid on it, its huge, but I need a couple of wilderness scenes...

$2 for 3 sheets...

contact paper is expensive though....

not bad. i got a nice sized roll of contact paper for about 6 bucks

what did your's cost?

@GPierce like 7 for 36' so i guess its not that bad...just seemed expensive...

i have one 21x27 posterboard one i made, but it's bid and slightly unweildy, which is why i went the smaller route and also made some dungeon tile sized for convenience

@waxeagle no, not bad at all. i've seen worse. hobby lobby sells the same sized roll for almost $10

@GPierce dang...

yeah... hobby lobbysucks

@GPierce yeah tile sized is nice, I'm playing with the dungeon ones for a couple of rooms tomorrow...trying to decide which rooms I'm gonna build and which ones I'm just gonna show the map of and say, search here there an everywhere...I don't want to give away where all of the combat is...but I also don't want to build everything

the posterboard sized one is great for large scale stuff, or just drawing out a town

or having a couple of rooms open for the dungeon at a time

@GPierce yeah, Im thinking if we actually get to the non-combat areas I'll rough them out on the poster and go from there.

man, i'm excited for you

i'm hoping to introduce some friends tomorrow night to D&D 4e through the Castle Ravenloft board game. The missus talked to them about it last weekend and they were excited about it

So... i'm hoping they get the bug from it. It's not neccessarily the same thing.. but... close enough

I really want to run them through KotSF badly. I spent a lot of time reworking it

@GPierce its been a lot of fun, I have no clue how it plays at L1...but at L6-8 its been a blast :)

@waxeagle L1 as written can be a challenge... I've read of plenty of L1 groups that get spanked by the goblin ambush at the very beginning

The encounter design leaves soemthing to be desired, and tweaking it is very easy

@GPierce lol, ive read that a few times...I'm still wondering what "ambush" :) I think we wiped the floor with it and didn't even notice it was an ambush...

@waxeagle it's the first combat written-as-is

but yeah, i think it could fit really well as a higher level game

it's got a fun story, for sure

kalarel makes a good baddie

@GPierce just looked it up, and now I remember, yeah it was an ambush, but having been playing for a while at this point we just shrugged, killed the guys and moved on :)

@waxeagle i think our big problem when we played through it was that we had just come from 3.5 and hadn't really grasped the concept of the roles. So that may have been in..

@GPierce that makes sense. Most of us didn't have any RP experience before we started, so it was all fresh

@waxeagle no preconceived notions probably helped, and a thourough reading of the rules probably helped. we all made assumptions about rules thinking that 3.5 stuff was the same if not similar (not... not the case)

How goes your prep? are you playing it as-is or changing anything? it looks really good as-is

@GPierce probably straight up, I may add a monster or two to each encounter as there are 6 PCs

@waxeagle not a bad idea. what does their party make-up look like?

@GPierce Looks like warpriest, mage, sorcerer, barbarian, warden and a rogue of some kind

not happy about 3 strikers (our group is rather unimaginative), but oh well

not terrible... potentially 4ish strikers depending on what type of powers the mage selects

especially if they go evocation

2 strikers, 2 leaders, 1 controller, 1 defender would be ideal

warlords are just too amazing. i'm playing a resourceful one currently in my irl game and i love it. i want to play a bravura one badly. the things they do at such a risk is so, so cool.

@GPierce seriously, I loved my dragonborn bravelord. slightly crazy, gender neutral, and flat out awesome

bravelord + thief is a party I want to play soon.

@waxeagle warlord is easily one of the best classes i've ever played

my lady plays a rogue and jesus... that synergy is amazing

direct the strike, hammer and anvil, etc

@GPierce basic attack optimized rogue?

or even wolf pack tactics to help them set up flank

@waxeagle with weapon finesse

@GPierce good deal

huge focus on short sword and shurikens

it's just too bad you can only use sneak attack 1/round

otherwise we'd be doing ridiculous damage... rogue turn flank CA sneak attack, warlord turn direct the strike flank CA sneak attack.... gah, too bad it doesn't work like that

i tried to talk her into playing a thief... but she wanted her shuriken ninja rogue

@GPierce its per turn

@waxeagle ??

so.... she could use it again if i came after her in init order?

@GPierce she can use it on her turn, on an enemy's turn for OA's, on your turn, any time she has CA

brain explodes

@GPierce most other strikers its only 1/round or just on their turn, Rogues get it every turn.

@waxeagle holy crap

where is this?

need to show dm

@GPierce pulling compendium now

> When you make an attack with a light blade, a hand crossbow, a shortbow, or a sling and hit an enemy granting combat advantage to you, that enemy takes extra damage based on your level (see the Sneak Attack table). You can deal this extra damage only once per turn.

wizards.com/dndinsider/compendium/…

how is "turn" defined...

@GPierce turn is the action sequence of a character. if it meant round it would say round (like Hunter's quarry does)

oh wow

very awesome

for intance you can take one opportunity attack per turn.

but you get one immediate action per round

ok, very awesome

ok. I have to go to bed, I have 2 appointments tomorrow...yeah $$ :)

i'm beyond stoked about this

alright man, i'll talk to you later

@GPierce this is why rogue+brave lord is awesome :)

brash strike, you swing, you take a hit, you give your rogue a swing with CA :)

this seriously is about to change things

(or a hurl as she likes her shurikens)

btw, convince her to chuck daggers, they deal better average damage :)

(at 1[W] at 2[W] shurikens are better)....

she has the rogue weapon talent for shurikens so they do 1d6s

@GPierce doesnt matter. +4 @ 1d4 is actually better than +3 @ 1d6. I can give you the math if you need it :). The key is the extra +1 to hit means applying sneak attack more often

@waxeagle yeah, very true

didn't think about the proficiency

@GPierce that bonus makes a huge difference for 1[W] powers because rogues don't care about thier weapon, they care about shouting "sneak attack bitch"....

or whispering it if they are trying to be quiet...

based on setting though, i don't think we'll have access to that many daggers.... (not a lack thereof, but mainly a lack of a shop to purchase a substantial amount)

@waxeagle especially with the backstabber feat to make them 2d8!

@GPierce are magic items available? Also if you have 5 or so you're fine, you pick up thrown ewapons when the encounter is over automagically....

@GPierce yup

@waxeagle magic items are light, but he's been handing out tailored magic items for the party about 1/session

plus they are solid in melee too... (same logic applies with dagger v short sword)...

low magic, so inherent bonuses (yay!) and custom magic items is not shabby at all

@GPierce cool. ok, really going to bed now, I can talk rogues and average damage until the sun comes up...then I will be falling asleep at a 90 yr old's computer...

haha, alright man, have fun tomorrow

@GPierce will do, I should be around in the afternoon....

@GPierce oh, there are a number of rewrites on the web...

@waxeagle don't!

@GPierce false. It's now 1/turn :)

@waxeagle they're fixing this with the class updates :)

whee

@BrianBallsunStanton sweet, Hunter's quarry is updated. thats awesome. 1/round was rather unfortunate.

@waxeagle I found a great website with maps and tutorials on how to make maps/ tiles... let me find it for you.

@GPierce Really good list of tutorials @GPierce @waxeagle newbiedm.com/tutorials

and some maps that can be printed from the free modules

4ehomeencounters.com

What is bravelord?

@GMNoob bravura warlord

@BrianBallsunStanton this just makes me so happy

bravura?

which book is that from?

@GMNoob one of the martial power books

@GMNoob might be in MP 1 or 2...

i can look up which one is a second

not important which ones, thanks :)

but basically they do ridiculous things and if they pull them off they get awesome benefits, if they don't it hurts

interesting

it's a really fun way to play the class (presumably, i've yet to actually play it, only read about it and its powers)

for instance, the at will I mentioned last night...

I personally hate the idea of classes from specialized books :)

powers, fine.. entire classes, I'm not so happy

@GMNoob i did too, until i did a little more investigation

you take a swing, and hit or miss your enemy gets an optional basic attack. if they take it an ally gets a basic with CA...

my opinion changed now that i have all of the __ power book

@GMNoob they are just builds, not whole classes

@GPierce oh?

@GMNoob yeah the builds in it are really nice. just opening up a lot of options for existing classes

gotcha

with those books you can make the rogue you really want to, for example. my lady made a shuriken weilding ninja rogue and loves it

"cunning sneak"

they aren't so overwhelmingly better than the default class that you must have the book or else?

@GPierce thats a nice one, saves you a utility :)...

@GMNoob some stuff was broken, but they've erratta'd a lot

@waxeagle yeah, it's nice

@waxeagle that was my issue with the __ power books at first, a lot was broken. but the erratta has done a lot to fix it and make it balanced and still retain the fun

@GMNoob those newbiedm links you gave us are amazing

@GPierce Yeah, I wet myself when I found them :P

TMI?

@GMNoob especially the print a battle map from a pdf

@GMNoob lol, nah, just disturbing

@GPierce I could relate to Evan

@GPierce yeah, thats handy...

I really like the token tutorial as well

I may be using that today..wonders if paint.net or gimp will do the same thing

I like tokens

only problem is that here in Israel, they don't make 1" anything :)

@GMNoob lol yeah you need 2.5 cm.....

it's either a hobby store, or a birthday party store, I havn't quite figured it out yet

@GMNoob lol, might be the sasme diff...I was in a party store yesteday and nearly bought a bunch of really awesome ninja figures...

nice

@waxeagle if you can find a lot of cheap little figures, they generally work. i found a tube filled with knights. a little larger than minis, but they still worked fine

also a tube filled with horses, that was perfect

@GPierce nic,e we have a healthy supply of tokens so its not big deal....

Looking at the Sethanine picture again, I reazlied we can get some 5' circular glass cutters and repel into the temple :)

Ok, I'll be honest, that comment was just there as a segway into wave discussion

segway^tm

@GMNoob lol

@waxeagle the token maker tool was cool

@GMNoob that's definitely an option

@GPierce created an opening for you to continue the wave :)

done and done

Are we doing this on a square by square, move by move basis? or general narration in 4 minutes?

d20

2d20

lol

wasn't this supposed to be shift change? I'm confused.

@BrianBallsunStanton from the exterior, yes, there are always guards on the inside. pilgrims come at all times to worship

@BrianBallsunStanton There were two guards outside asking people questions before they were allowed to enter, now those gaurds are not there.

right

@GMNoob exactly

For the record, I'm not using the dice on this chatroom anymore :)

they only roll high when it doesn't matter!

lol

new wave for a skill challenge-esque info gathering mission

i won't be able to be back on until later tonight so go ahead and make a few rolls/justifications and i'll tell you what you learn. (2 max/apiece)

talk to you getns later and @waxeagle i expect to hear about how your game went!!

Does that mean I'm out of checks?

I just did a new wave response in the old wave

Or since I only get two, can I try do it over?

@GMNoob 2 new checks in the new wave. no more info gathering in the current one

all info will be gathered in the new one through the skill challenge-esque thing

Ok

and thanks :)

@GMNoob so fresh slate, basically

all skills are open for the new wave, just need a good jsutification

Looks like Molly knows anything we need to know :)