Against the Dragon: An ECL 20 Mini-Adventure

[mostlyharmful]

We've been seen in town asking around about the dragon. Cat is already out of the bag. However, if you want to back away from the abduction idea, I'm open to other suggestions. Squeeze Theda's hand once for yes, twice for no.

Nutters wandering around asking annoying questions is one thing. Nutters with the ability to teleport are worthy of actual attention. May I council that your energies could be more productively channeled into exerting yourselves towards exterior sources of information beyound the simple waylaying of unsuspecting bystanders. Go find a few high level bards and pump them for information in whatever manner you deem appropriate. Or else contact your gods or your superiors or whatever, just don't go off half cocked and get any chance of the element of surprise flushed away down the sewerage system.

[Toliudar]

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Happy to ret-con away from the abduction concept for the moment, if others want to spend some time pursuing another avenue. Mind if we assume that the place we teleported to is on the coast?

Theda strolls over to the strident wizard.

"Look, buddy. At least we were doing something, and remembered to show up on time. You want to go chat with minstrels, go do that. It'll take weeks, by which time the world could be kablooie. Now, you may already have your own little pocket plane set up somewhere, but I kind of like this place.

"Meanwhile, why don't I see if I can turn up anything on the lair indirectly. If we can't scry the dragon, maybe we can scry its servant."

She turns and picks up a piece of the vines - the extraplanar vines they had un-polymorphed. Theda gestures for Terry to join her as she walks over to a shallow tidal pool. She waves a hand over the pool.

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Casting her Extended Greater Scrying, focusing on the Djinni servant of Eolestrix. I'm hoping that since the vines were, probably, created by the genie, they count as a "possession". Unmodified, the will save is 24.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

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Well, we never went through with the teleporting, since the planning interfered and then objections came up during the planning...

[PhoenixRivers]

The extended Greater Scrying is not successful.

[mostlyharmful]

sorry for pointing out the holes in your position.. if you want to alert the dragon go right ahead. It'll make our lives harder but you're a big boy so you can do what you want.

On the note of not being able to scry the dragon, yes but we can use divinations particularly in contacting Gods. You may wish to use the next day or so to either prep some magic to do so or use the contacts that you have doubtless built up in your hectic life to make similar inquiries. I'm not suggesting we wander across the planet knocking on farmhouse doors to see if they happen to have a spare minstrel in the attic

That being said I intend to spend tomorrow deducing the spell selection and other major abilities of our adversary through divine insight. If you would rather charge into action I will not stop you though I would surmise that it behoves us to avail ourselves of all possible advantages within a set timeframe, say 48 hours to get a good handle on what we're facing and then prepare ourselves accordingly. Correct me if you feel I am mistaken.

Torvin will prep 24 Contact Other Planes for the next day. Spell selection, feat selection, combat preferences and minions/lair defenses are generally good subjects, if anyone wants a particular question or two please submit to the pot. Fist I'm looking at you.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

"Do as you see fit, but I advise against preparing so many spells devoted to divination. We could be attacked tomorrow for all you know."

I shall sleep for 2 hours in his mansion. When I wake up, I shall apply a disguise.

Disguise: (1d20+14)[29] (Disheveled drunkard)

[mostlyharmful]

"Do as you see fit, but I advise against preparing so many spells devoted to divination. We could be attacked tomorrow for all you know."

I shall sleep for 2 hours in his mansion. When I wake up, I shall apply a disguise.

Disguise: [roll0]

My spells are not my only means of defense but given the time constraits and being the sole caster who can cast what seems the most effacacious spell at our disposal I shall have to make with some risk for a quicker payoff.

[PhoenixRivers]

Prepare any questions you have, and I'll answer them. List the number of questions you get for each, and seperate them out. As there are quite a few questions, and some may require followups, I encourage you to provide multiple lines of questioning at once, to expedite the process.

[Toliudar]

Theda, now completely resigned to be thought of as a man by her companions, shrugs.

"Scrying didn't work on the djinni either. It would be easier if you could learn its name. I'll try finding the path, which might get us in the approximately right direction, anyway."

She begins casting yet another divination.

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I just noticed this sentence from Hide the Path: "Hide the Path has no effect on divinations cast from outside the area." *Slaps self in forehead.* So as I read it, Find the Path would stop working once we hit an area covered by Hide the Path, but will otherwise work normally. Am I misunderstanding? Theda's going to try it, regardless.

[PhoenixRivers]

@Toliudar:

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You are not misunderstanding, but you must be able to identify the location in a way that the spell can understand. For example, referencing Eolestrix could put the spell at odds with Mind Blank, which essentially renders a subject nonexistent for the purposes of divination magic.

The text you refer to shall be interpreted to reference the target, however, not the caster's location. If the spell referenced the caster's location, essentially the spell would do nothing. So divination spells targeting the spell's area will not function without the appropriate checks.

[mostlyharmful]

I'll be doubling up casting questions to ensure a higher level of reliability...

There's three main lines of inquiry it seems to me

1. spell selection and feats
2. tactics and allies
3. lair and defenses

I'll be asking questions based on each, say eight doubled castings for each, given the bead of karma cant hold up to all of those I'll only be asking 11 questions per time. doubled over that makes 131 questions I can ask at a pretty much certain level of reliability.

part one - spells and feats.

I'll be asking for each level of casting from ninth down to fifth - Name a spell of X level that dragon Y knows, then name a spell of level X that Y dragon knows that I don't know that he knows. given I know he's a caster almost as powerful at Seto and I've got Seto on hand to ask how many spells a sorceror gets it's probably ok to know how many of each level a 19th level Sorc gets. Which is two ninth (already know Miracle is among them so I can skip one), 3 at 8th (already know PAO is in there), 3 7th, 3 6th and 4 5th. After that it's about feats which is a little trickier and depends on your rulings on how much in character understanding of feats is realistic. Some give you flat out new capabilities, creation feats, metabreath feats, metamagics, wingover, hover, etc... which I useually say are known about in game but that's up to you.

part two - tactics and allies

I'll be asking about minions and the usual response of this dragon to invaders and high level PCs, lots of this will depend on part one answers so I'll need to know about this things spell selection in particular. given initial responses it seems that this thing is focussed quite a bit on information denial to anything hunting it so it's probably not got much in the way of living minions and it's good alignment might well cut down on raised or bound undead/outsiders so this one's a little less important, esspecially given the metagame position that we want to get this show on the road.

What is the most powerful minion this dragon has access to within its lair on a permenant basis?
What is the response time for minions called in by the dragon in the event of it being confrounted not including those called or summoned by the dragon?


part three - lair and defenses

location and any note worthy features, I want to know about any other intelligent protectors usually in it, where it is, escape routes and any valuable mechanical traps and magical traps. Alarms and wards and anything else an Int 34 pc could dream up after a life of adventuring.

While I can go through some questions with backup lines of inquiry it seems like a better idea would be for you to divulge what you think would be a reasonable amount of information given 24 CoPs from a high level caster to simulate some level of preparedness on the part of the party and then we just get to it, otherwise we could be here for months as we go over each question. I just don't want to run in blind because I don't think it's all that representative of a high level party and at the same time I know we're losing momentum while I do this. Your call. (glad I'm not the DM)

[Pharaoh's Fist]

"If Torvin is going to cast divinations, the rest of us should prepare to cover the eventuality of combat."

[PhoenixRivers]

I'll be doubling up casting questions to ensure a higher level of reliability...

There's three main lines of inquiry it seems to me

1. spell selection and feats
2. tactics and allies
3. lair and defenses

I'll be asking questions based on each, say eight doubled castings for each, given the bead of karma cant hold up to all of those I'll only be asking 11 questions per time. doubled over that makes 131 questions I can ask at a pretty much certain level of reliability.

part one - spells and feats.

I'll be asking for each level of casting from ninth down to fifth - Name a spell of X level that dragon Y knows, then name a spell of level X that Y dragon knows that I don't know that he knows. given I know he's a caster almost as powerful at Seto and I've got Seto on hand to ask how many spells a sorceror gets it's probably ok to know how many of each level a 19th level Sorc gets. Which is two ninth (already know Miracle is among them so I can skip one), 3 at 8th (already know PAO is in there), 3 7th, 3 6th and 4 5th. After that it's about feats which is a little trickier and depends on your rulings on how much in character understanding of feats is realistic. Some give you flat out new capabilities, creation feats, metabreath feats, metamagics, wingover, hover, etc... which I useually say are known about in game but that's up to you.

part two - tactics and allies

I'll be asking about minions and the usual response of this dragon to invaders and high level PCs, lots of this will depend on part one answers so I'll need to know about this things spell selection in particular. given initial responses it seems that this thing is focussed quite a bit on information denial to anything hunting it so it's probably not got much in the way of living minions and it's good alignment might well cut down on raised or bound undead/outsiders so this one's a little less important, esspecially given the metagame position that we want to get this show on the road.

What is the most powerful minion this dragon has access to within its lair on a permenant basis?
What is the response time for minions called in by the dragon in the event of it being confrounted not including those called or summoned by the dragon?


part three - lair and defenses

location and any note worthy features, I want to know about any other intelligent protectors usually in it, where it is, escape routes and any valuable mechanical traps and magical traps. Alarms and wards and anything else an Int 34 pc could dream up after a life of adventuring.

While I can go through some questions with backup lines of inquiry it seems like a better idea would be for you to divulge what you think would be a reasonable amount of information given 24 CoPs from a high level caster to simulate some level of preparedness on the part of the party and then we just get to it, otherwise we could be here for months as we go over each question. I just don't want to run in blind because I don't think it's all that representative of a high level party and at the same time I know we're losing momentum while I do this. Your call. (glad I'm not the DM)

@skipping the casting process:

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If you leave the amount of information to me, you'll get absolutely nothing. I'm not doing intelligence checks, and "what my character would know". That's based on knowledge checks. If you don't have knowledge (Dungeoneering), then you're pretty much limited to any traps with a knowledge DC of 10 or less, whether your intelligence is 2 or 2000.

In other words, high intelligence is not going to marginalize or circumvent the proper use of skills, spells, or other information gathering techniques. If you want to cast 24 CoP's, then formulate the questions for 24 CoP's. No free passes there. You get what information you earn. No more, no less.

As for killing momentum? I'm not the one devoting all of a 20th level caster's mid to high level slots on a time consuming divination spell. Though if I were the greater deity you were contacting, somewhere around question 45-50, I'd probably send a group to your location as a courtesy warning against wasting a god's time. Maybe sooner, depending on the deity.

[Toliudar]

PhoenixRivers:

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Here's my thinking. The djinni can't be a regular summons as per the regular Brass Dragon power, if it is in fact the source of the permanent Major Creation. Major Creation takes ten minutes to cast, and SLA's take the same length of time to cast as the associated spell. So I'm assuming that it's been called as a permanent resident.

The previous Contact Other Plane question asked "who" the most powerful servant was, not "what" the most powerful servant was. If Djinni was a sufficient name for that question, it should be enough for this. If I identify it as the home of the nearest djinni, I'm not referencing the dragon at all. Sufficient?

[mostlyharmful]

@skipping the casting process:

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If you leave the amount of information to me, you'll get absolutely nothing. I'm not doing intelligence checks, and "what my character would know". That's based on knowledge checks. If you don't have knowledge (Dungeoneering), then you're pretty much limited to any traps with a knowledge DC of 10 or less, whether your intelligence is 2 or 2000.

In other words, high intelligence is not going to marginalize or circumvent the proper use of skills, spells, or other information gathering techniques. If you want to cast 24 CoP's, then formulate the questions for 24 CoP's. No free passes there. You get what information you earn. No more, no less.

torvin's got 10 ranks in dungeoneering and the first third of the questions still apply. If you want 131 questions set out then we had better do this one casting at a time because each casting will change what questions are asked from the information received from the previous subject to discussion with the entire team. I'm sure you're aware of the irony of this, you were the one that argued for a DM seperate from whoever was running the dragon. If you're serious then my personal schedule gets involved and I can't give this game that much time until the 18th, until then I'll be posting once, maybe twice a day. if that.

This would take months. literally months. I'm asking you to make a best gestimate, I know that but it's the only real way of doing this short of giving up on prepwork. If you won't do that then Torvin gets a brain hemaroge and we all just prep for combat with the unknown because the other way will utterly deteriorate into farce. if it hasn't done so already.

Either way the first third on just the simple mechanics of your dragon build have been set out in reasonable detail in the above post. Fourty eight double checked questions on spell selection and feat choice is better than nothing.

Edit: And any God that choose to object is welcome to do so, I would imagine a high level mage would spread the questions around every pantheon he knows (and with lots of ranks in knowledge religion that's a lot) but meh.. the advisory board's deity won't be contacted again but it will be made known that they objected to someone trying to maintain the world and all people in it... over a few seconds of their time. I would imagine that would somewhat tarnish the reputation of the shining bastions of light that depend on the worship of these piddling beings we're trying to save.

Knowledge checks and Int checks are for IN character processes, what I'm asking for is a DM adjudication on information retrival in order to keep this thing moving. that's all.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

This is why I told you not to diviniate so much...

[mostlyharmful]

and it was a good suggestion I just couldn't stomach the idea of a level 20 team going in blind when they could avoid it. And if you don't have DIRE DM fiat reasons for forcing the timetable then they would do a whole stinking hell of a lot more than this. 4 CR appropriate level encounters is just a damn stupid mechanic and it get utterly ludicrous once you get to control the rate of adventure. With teleport, MMM, scrying/divs and all the rest it takes a DM to keep it on track like the book wants.

[PhoenixRivers]

@Toliudar:

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The Dragon ability doesn't reference a specific Djinni. Nor does many spells it could cast that WOULD last long enough.

@mostlyharmful only:

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At the time you entered this challenge, I opened the character sheets provided, in case they needed to be referenced for a roll (such as this one). This provided me essentially with a snapshot of the sheet as of the time you entered. On that sheet, I have the following Knowledge skills: (Architecture and Engineering), (History), (Nature), (Nobility and Royalty), (Local - Sigil), and (Geography).

Please note: I intentionally do not refresh or update the sheets. This is so that I have essentially a xerox of a character sheet at entry.

Neither Religion nor Dungeoneering is on that list.

@divinations:

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By what means are you double checking?

Please note, Mostly. To an extent, you can control the encounter rate. And, if you try to pester a greater deity with 131 questions, I assure you that you WILL add at least one (possibly more) to the list, and it will be equivalent in CR to the dragon. There is no non-epic ability or power that will stop such a deity from placing what it wants, where it wants, to deal with such issues.

There's a difference between going in blind (as you suggest), and needing to know the dragon's favorite toothpaste before going forward.

Strike a happy medium. This adventure was explicitly not stated to be hardcore pure RAW. It was stated to be ran as a reasonable DM would. Thus, I'm handling such a situation as I would were I DM'ing. I will have creatures or entities contacted react in an appropriate manner. Contact other Plane explicitly states that the creature contacted resents such contact. Deities will react accordingly.

[mostlyharmful]

@mostlyharmful only:

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At the time you entered this challenge, I opened the character sheets provided, in case they needed to be referenced for a roll (such as this one). This provided me essentially with a snapshot of the sheet as of the time you entered. On that sheet, I have the following Knowledge skills: (Architecture and Engineering), (History), (Nature), (Nobility and Royalty), (Local - Sigil), and (Geography).

Please note: I intentionally do not refresh or update the sheets. This is so that I have essentially a xerox of a character sheet at entry.

Neither Religion nor Dungeoneering is on that list.

PhoenixRivers only

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I've been dinking around with that sheet for months, I gave it as an idea for a character in the initial thread with no real intention of joing this campaign, I'd much rather be a lurker to be frank. When I gave it as an idea of a character it was just that, not a fully fledged character. I literally don't have a sheet from the date when I entered this sheet as an idea (or do you mean when this thread opened, or do you mean when you listed me as part of the team in the original thread?).

If you've got a set sheet could you please PM me with a copy since until we actually get to combat I've not seen the need to pin down some of this stuff. I'm sorry if that seems a little slap dash but until tuesday (I think it was) I wasn't expecting to be in this with Torvin and he was far from a fully fleshed out guy.. I still don't think he's finished but if you want it to be about the guy when he was first posted ok.

Given this predicament I'm fairly sure that I'm going to be something of a detriment to the style of campaign you've got in mind, I'm fine with either playing Torvin as he was or being turned into a NPC/contact that in some way replicates the power and influence a bunch of level 20 characters would have built up by this time. Either way's fine, your call.

Divinations

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Double checking can be done by casting the spell again and asking a new deity the same questions. There's a number of greater deities listed in core, with each splat it expanded, I think there's somewhere in the low two hundreds all told.... no one deity needs to receive more than one question. And I was under the impression that one days diving was a happy middle ground. If that's not the way you see it then as I said Torvin can change his mind and just ask about spell selection and go with that. If they think the dragons a recluse with no friends there's even a reasonable argument for that.

[PhoenixRivers]

@mostlyharmful only:

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The sheet is the link you provided in the signup thread, also shown on the front page. The time the snapshot was taken was when I added him to the OP of this thread, shortly after your first post in this thread. I will likely duplicate each sheet precisely in the next couple days, so that when I move, I won't lose the snapshot.

@Divinations:

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This will work. However for the purposes of this challenge, the following is true:

1) These realms have 9 different greater deities, one under each alignment. Each one follows the general ethos of that alignment. In the event that a cleric in the group has a specific deity, that deity is one of the 9.

2) Casting of CoP multiple times in a day targeting the same deity will qualify as a "rare occasion" where the divination will be blocked by certain deities. Namely, the one you attempt to double tap for information.

[mostlyharmful]

Ok, with that metaphysic we'll cut down the CoPs considerablly. With three major good powers and three major neurtal powers we can cast six CoPs without having fallout being a possibility. We've used one so five left. We'll need to leave out fact checking for time constraints and go with initial responses. so, 55 questions. We know he's got miracle and PAO so the questions will be about spell selection and then we'll just have to muddle through as is.

So, the questions on succesive levels of the dragons spell selection seem appropriate, see above posts for details.

We've got one unknown 9th, two unknown 8ths, three unkown 7ths and three unkown 6ths. With questions of what is the spells known we should get an 88% chance good listing of what this dragon has to throw at us.

Pheonix only

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the link I listed in the original thread IS the sheet I've been dinkering around with, I literally haven't got a clue what I'm playing with now.... sorry..... All I know is its a level 20 wizard build and that's about it. Although I'm frankly surprised I was so dumb as to build a knowledge guy without dungeoneering.

[PhoenixRivers]

Please list the exact phrasing for the questions that you will use, else I will default to:

Of the spells that Eolestrix knows how to cast, what is the name of the most powerful one that I am not currently aware of?

[mostlyharmful]

Please list the exact phrasing for the questions that you will use, else I will default to:

Of the spells that Eolestrix knows how to cast, what is the name of the most powerful one that I am not currently aware of?

I have no real problem with that wording.

[PhoenixRivers]

You intend to ask 9 questions on the subject, and double check them for accuracy?

[Tehnar]

Once morning comes, and Ghrem gets his full 8 hours of sleep, he will memorize some new spells.

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lvl 1: hunters mercy, arrow mind, guided shot, Scent
lvl 2: exacting shot, barkskin, bears endurance, listening lorecall
lvl 3: find the gap, forestfold, neutralize poison, bottle of smoke
lvl 4: deeper darkvision, commune with nature, foebane, summon nature ally 4

After we get into town, Ghrem will tell everyone that he needs to go into the desert for a short time to cast a spell, and if they will accompany him. It does not have to be right away.

Once there he casts Commune with Nature and wish to know:
1) the location of any outsiders
2) the location of any caves
3) the location of any buildings

[Superglucose]

I'll gladly go with you. All my divinations have been for naught, and I frighten to think what Lorkhan will do if I bother him with something as trivial as the destruction of the world, so I'll prepare myself for combat and escort you into the wilderness. We're on a rather important quest and it wouldn't do to go alone!

TBH most likely nothing will happen, but having me along means access to Greater Teleport and the option of running away... more effectively

Ghrem and I will go now, I guess, since there's not much else for me to do and there's not much reason to bring the whole party.

[PhoenixRivers]

Once morning comes, and Ghrem gets his full 8 hours of sleep, he will memorize some new spells.

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lvl 1: hunters mercy, arrow mind, guided shot, Scent
lvl 2: exacting shot, barkskin, bears endurance, listening lorecall
lvl 3: find the gap, forestfold, neutralize poison, bottle of smoke
lvl 4: deeper darkvision, commune with nature, foebane, summon nature ally 4

After we get into town, Ghrem will tell everyone that he needs to go into the desert for a short time to cast a spell, and if they will accompany him. It does not have to be right away.

Once there he casts Commune with Nature and wish to know:
1) the location of any outsiders
2) the location of any caves
3) the location of any buildings

I'll need the following:

Will Save (Kagrenac) DC 16 (divination effect, so any proper precautions will stop it) In addition, you get a +5 circumstance bonus to the save.
If that Fails, Intelligence check from Kagrenac (DC 20).

From Ghrem, I need a Caster Level Check when he casts Commune with Nature.

EDIT: And nice, Super, on the Deific guilt trip, lol. I'd consider it less about the saving of the world, and more about pestering him with a step of that that you should be able to handle on your own. ;)

[Superglucose]

DC 16 will save at a +36 bonus.

(1d20+36)[45]

Sigh crit fails can be the dumbest rules ever sometimes

Oh look not a 1!

EDIT: Like I said, I shudder to think what he'd do if I bothered him with this

Something along the lines of: I gave you spells, what more do you want?

[PhoenixRivers]

DC 16 will save at a +36 bonus.

[roll0]

Sigh crit fails can be the dumbest rules ever sometimes

Oh look not a 1!

Ok, the scry attempt fails. Though all you know is that you were affected by something that you resisted in the wilderness.

[Superglucose]

Wait a second. I have my shield. I activate its reflecting ability.

Bloody grammar.