Zelknolf DMing

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gonz.0
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by gonz.0 »

Zelknolf wrote:*dusts thread off*

Timeslot is not revived, as I expect to ad hoc for the time being, but information about what I do when I have a DM stick is still valid.

Welcome back, I look forward to it.
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Zelknolf
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

Still can't promise the same time every week, but if I promise something ahead of time, I'll note it here.

Of course, if I have to cut people to manage the session, I'll accept people who aren't getting DMing somewhere else first. Call me a dirty commie.

Next ones are
Sunday, March 24, 10p U.S. Central or Monday 0300 GMT (Drake, Rerin, hopefully Zyrus, and whoever else happens to be there-- group won't be level or alignment restricted, and I'll write excuses for folk to not kill each other if that would add one of our un-DMed [esp. if "un-DMed because hard to DM"] characters)
Saturday, March 30 U.S. 10a...ish... U.S. Central or 1500 GMT (Pies and Pennies, plus anyone they recruit to their cause)
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Adanu
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Adanu »

Highly, highly doubt I'll be awake at midnight (I'm on EST), BUt I will try to make it. Consider me a no show by default for the moment though.
First Character: Zyrus Meynolt, the serene Water Genasi berserker. "I am the embodiment of the oceans; serene until you summon the storm." Zyrus: http://tinyurl.com/9emdbnd

Second Character: Damien Collins, the atypical druid. "What? Being a stick in the mud is boring. No pun intended grins"

Western Heartlands HDM: On break. PM for emergencies
Zelknolf
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

11p Eastern -- but I take your meaning, and I have crass things to say about that availability. Crass things! I'm not sure I can open up more sessions, and the evening time seems to be about as early as AK can log on (given the posting, it sounds like he's usually working nights and doesn't want to destroy his sleep schedule every weekend?) so I guess that puts the options to being available weekend mornings/early afternoons and getting an in-character 'in' with the Pies, or flinging PMs to Cloud, Jern, or Ith.
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Adanu
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Adanu »

Well, it's due to insomnia that I'll probably not make it. By the time I've stayed up to your time slot, I'm going to be half asleep. Depends on what you're looking to do if I can manage to stay up for it. To be fair, I am normally awake during those hours. It's just partial insomnia is random for me.
First Character: Zyrus Meynolt, the serene Water Genasi berserker. "I am the embodiment of the oceans; serene until you summon the storm." Zyrus: http://tinyurl.com/9emdbnd

Second Character: Damien Collins, the atypical druid. "What? Being a stick in the mud is boring. No pun intended grins"

Western Heartlands HDM: On break. PM for emergencies
Zelknolf
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

Ah, so might be a possibility longer-term. I will leave a random-ish encounter type area on the server that would work for folk in the level range tonight, then. Give ya opportunity to rally a couple pals and murder some things that turn red on mouse over, at least.
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Galadorn »

Hello Zelknolf, is this randomish encounter "off limits" to the general populace? My PC does not go looking for such, but if he runs into "it", may he flee/freeze/buff/parlay/shred/cry/talk-to/destroy it? or whatever seems appropriate at that moment?

((again, 0.000000001% chance i'll see it, but point is, some DMs "forbid" PCs to "interfere" with DM spawns, which I agree with! ..but just wondering in your case. :) Better safe than sorry. ))
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

Posting in the rumor thread about it.
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

An addition to my bits of stuff:
-- Anything that leaves behind or is a placeable with an inventory (cabinets, chests) or things with an in-engine avenue to provide found loot (dead monsters) are assumed to contain everything that your character could find and that said character found useful. Any addition that your character would notice will be spawned in said container, and the remainder should be treated as unusuable / not worthwhile in character (that is, yes, some bad guys wear plate armor-- and then you killed the guy and said armor became useless and dejected. You'd have to be a monster to do anything but euthanize it. Even Bane would answer anything else with "Holy crap, man. Have a heart.").
---- However, the body is still a thing that you can/should interact with, if doing so is in character. Bury 'em, hide behind them, stack them up like sand bags to hold back a flood, tie strings to their limbs and make them dance for your amusement. All totally valid to ask me about; that stuff needs a DM to run.
---- Also, things that don't normally have some kind of loot container interface (e.g. ripping up the floors of a room to see what's under the boards) still go through asking me, and area searches (e.g. ransacking a room for some particular thing, instead of just searching a chest) still go through asking me.
-- Spot and Listen are passive skills. Don't roll them or expect to roll them because you're looking around. If your actions change the potential areas of perception such that they start to include something you could notice with a spot or listen check, I will call for said check at that time, but you can't just throw spot for giggles. At best, you can stop what you're doing and hope that opportunity for a spot check comes while you know that you won't be distracted. Search, however, is an active skill, which you only get when you stop to search things (with the caveats above).
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

-- Also, related to search checks: it's a full-round action to search about 25 square feet of space, and a one-tile room is about 725 square feet. Taking 20 requires the time it would take to perform an action 20 times, and players should be aware of how much of their days they're actually investing in searching stuff. Buffs can/should/will run out while you ransack that 4x4 room, and you might need to stop to eat and sleep when you're done.
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

Sunday sessions have had no attendees for a month now; I'm dropping the timeslot.

I will be around on Saturday mornings, priority to hins and people who hang out with hins if hins are around. Filling the server with horrible fire-breathing superdeath if no one is.



Probably won't be able to replace the second timeslot; tech's under a lot of pressure to produce lately, and we're just plain not keeping up.
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Analogkid »

Sad to hear that Zelk, still the last few Sunday sessions evolved more into discussion time or aimless wandering with nothing happening which kind of took the incentive to continue away I think.
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

Please see the first post for an explanation of why.
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by Zelknolf »

A few comments about naval warfare as I will be running it:
  • I advise investing in a few skills (or seeking items that provide bonuses), if you're planning on primarily making someone who fights on ships:
    • Balance -- it's actually quite difficult to run across a sloped or angled floor in armor, which is pretty much always on a ship. If you charge in wearing naught but a look of determination, a +9 is enough to never faceplant while charging someone on a boat. If you wear armor, more is going to be useful. Or planning on getting around only by walking is going to be useful.
    • Climb -- even if you're only going to be climbing on the chance that you fall into the water, a damp rope ladder is still a climb check (DC 5). Fellows in light or no armor can expect to get up that ladder without falling back in (you need to fail by 5 or more to fall). Dudes in more armor need to invest in skills to have that security. Also an interesting bit of trivia, if someone injures you while you're climbing, you have to roll climb to hold on. So if you're up on the rigging, "will I also fall onto the deck if I'm hit by an arrow?" is a real question.
    • Swim -- as with climb, you need to fail by a margin to start drowning, but water outside of a harbor is pretty much always "rough water," so you need* to be able to roll a 10 reliably to not spend time under water if you end up in the drink. 15 if the weather is bad. And you can't breathe if you're under water**.
    • Profession -- two professions worthy of note. Sailor is needed to make sail-operated ships go where you want them to. Seige Engineer is needed to operate pretty much any device capable of sinking someone else's ship.*** These are trained-only checks. So, if everyone on your ship who has ranks in sailing dies, you're in a pretty bad way. If everyone with ranks in siege engineer dies, you're confined to devices light enough to be reasonably comparable to regular weapons.
  • Consider a diversity of weapons-- particularly
    • A light weapon that can be used in confined spaces. (one might consider a shortsword, a handaxe, a light mace, or a dagger; I am likely to do a little work to handle that scimitars aren't "light weapons" but are our D&D standin for the cutlass, which is a very good weapon for confined spaces on boats)
    • A ranged weapon that can be used one-handed. (for the most part, this means throwing weapons-- so that you can keep fighting while hanging from something or anchoring yourself to a point).
    • A piercing weapon that can be used without penalty in or under water (spears, shortswords, rapiers, daggers-- amusingly, the rules as they read say a spiked chain takes no penalty. I lol at this, and am glad we don't have those)
  • Be careful with armor and with shields. Everything that matters on a ship is affected by your Armor Check Penalty.
  • Be careful with fire. Things that are good at keeping water out of a ship are also good at spreading fire on it.
* Unless you're a water genasi. They have a swim speed, and thus only have to roll checks to do backflips through hoops and beg for fish from their trainers.
** This may or may not be problematic for your character. Some spells temporarily cause you to not need to breathe (living undeath, stone body, iron body) or allow you to breathe water (water breathing), and some races don't need to breathe (air genasi) or can breathe water (water genasi).
*** Probably of note that only ships explicitly built for war actually have weapons heavy enough to straight-up sink a ship on them, and I'd thus put this on the "take this if your character has a strong and established background in naval combat" list. Most ships have ballistae, which require no profession check to use, and medium-sized creatures can operate them at -4 to hit. Though they can't really sink a ship, they can damage one, or its sails, or be fired right in a kraken's stupid face.


I might update this list if I find more stuff about how boats work in D&D. Seems to all be reasonably well handled by the SRD, though-- probably because of D&D's history as a wargame.
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Re: Zelknolf DMing

Post by oldgrayrogue »

Two questions Zelk:

If I understand correctly no search rolls should ever be rolled unless asked for -- such as searching the body of a dead monster or NPC for clues, etc.

How about rolls like diplomacy, bluff or intimidate? Same rule? I only ask because sometimes these can be PC initiated, as in you may not know my PC is about to lie or flatter etc.

Thanks and looks like it will be great fun!

Oh, and I think Rumple should be our "Face." With a name like "Rumple" I could think of another appellation, but Face works :mrgreen:
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