[OOC] Expedition to Castle Ravenloft

[truemane]

dangelo's workload is the main concern, as far as splitting the party goes. The potential danger doesn't bother me since, for this kind of game, everyone dying a horrid (possibly ironic and/or dramatically poignant) death is as much a win as killing Strahd.

I just worry that if three of go to the top and come down and the other three head in the front, then, from a story standpoint, we'll basically be playing two mini games rather than one big game.

Which is less fun, I think.

But Rue has low self-esteem, so she'll do what she's told. Until she (explodes in a blood-soaked hurricane fury of bestial anger anyway).

[dangelo]

On splitting the party: It's not in me to say "no" to players without a practical reason, and really there's nothing keeping you from splitting the party (except certain death); But I agree it somewhat kills the purpose of the whole dungeon crawl vibe.

In homebrew dungeons, I like to do "controlled" party-splitting. That means when the party splits, I already have a vague notion of how the PCs are gonna meet up down the line. But it's more of a complication than a resource for the players to use... In most cases, splitting the party is bad.

Oh, cool! Could Yikkol buy a climber's kit from Eva, or would that be metagaming?

Nope, not metagaming. That's why she's there (:

Ok, I finally have some time to finalize things. Rolling for starting wealth, then will edit post with more information: [roll0] x100

Looking good!

3. Dangelo, I can say that the armor is linked to a bionoid crystal that Rua carries in his Bag of Holding. So in order to don the armor, he puts this crystal to his forehead or chest or something and it comes forth. Whenever I doff the armor, it goes into the Bag of Holding. So if anything destroys the Bag of Holding, then my armor, assuming it's in there, is also destroyed. That would be a bad day indeed lol.

I was going to list all the gear I wanted to purchase but I need to get to sleep. Figured I'd ask first as well

Sure, that sounds very reasonable. Thanks for collaborating on this.

All would be in his Bag of Holding. Does this make sense? Too much? Let me know.

EDIT: Forgot, I rolled 1300gp. Purchased two 300gp diamonds for Revivify, and the two potions of healing from Eva. So that leaves me at 500gp, which I can use to purchase the mundane gear (I think, will need to calculate).

Not at all, it makes perfect sense that your character would carry these things given his background. Plus, that's what Bags of Holding are for

However you don't have to deduct your mundane gear from your rolled treasure. This roll (x100) is just the spare money you brought to Barovia, for things like spell components. Your weapons, armor, adventuring equipment and all are free. I realize now that this system can be abused, but everyone has been playing it fair so it doesn't bother me

[Waistcoatwill]

@truename: I didnt make it clear enouth, but Bori is riding his dinosaur alongside the carriage. I dont k ow of that would make Rue feel any better or not. I am more than happy to have him comedically break into her reverie or keep a distance depending on which tone you'd prefer.

Bori's dragonmark essentially makes him a walking sanctuary/beacon of home comforts, so it should be interesting if she ever gets within 10ft of him.

[truemane]

@truename: I didnt make it clear enouth, but Bori is riding his dinosaur alongside the carriage. I dont k ow of that would make Rue feel any better or not. I am more than happy to have him comedically break into her reverie or keep a distance depending on which tone you'd prefer.

No no, you made it very clear. I'm just leaning into Rue's Poor Me Mode. I'm fine with him breaking in however you like, if you want to go that way. I have no idea what they would talk about, but I'd be excited to find out.

Bori's dragonmark essentially makes him a walking sanctuary/beacon of home comforts, so it should be interesting if she ever gets within 10ft of him.

Something something irresistible force vs. immovable object.

:)

[Waistcoatwill]

Fab, I'll post un a couple of hours depending on how bedtimes go.

[The Commander]

It should be abundantly clear, but Zinro is clearly out of his depth here, and is trying his best to be perceived as 'powerful' by falling back on his noble heritage.

[TaiLiu]

I'm all for mayhem. My only actual reservation is causing unwanted extra work for dangelo. Other than that I'm game for anything.

As a character, Rue could be convinced to split the party. As a player, I would be concerned that it'll be a looooong time before we re-convene (especially as it's PbP pace). Which waters down the narrative a little.

With regards to splitting the party, I've never played in Ravenloft, but given the tone Dangelo is going for, and the comments on difficulty, I don't think we should open up with splitting the party. Plus it could be difficult to do over PBP. That said, it is good to know that we could if we had to.

dangelo's workload is the main concern, as far as splitting the party goes. The potential danger doesn't bother me since, for this kind of game, everyone dying a horrid (possibly ironic and/or dramatically poignant) death is as much a win as killing Strahd.

I just worry that if three of go to the top and come down and the other three head in the front, then, from a story standpoint, we'll basically be playing two mini games rather than one big game.

Which is less fun, I think.

But Rue has low self-esteem, so she'll do what she's told. Until she (explodes in a blood-soaked hurricane fury of bestial anger anyway).

On splitting the party: It's not in me to say "no" to players without a practical reason, and really there's nothing keeping you from splitting the party (except certain death); But I agree it somewhat kills the purpose of the whole dungeon crawl vibe.

In homebrew dungeons, I like to do "controlled" party-splitting. That means when the party splits, I already have a vague notion of how the PCs are gonna meet up down the line. But it's more of a complication than a resource for the players to use... In most cases, splitting the party is bad.

Good points. We'll nix the party-splitting idea and travel together as a family team.

EDIT: Forgot, I rolled 1300gp. Purchased two 300gp diamonds for Revivify, and the two potions of healing from Eva. So that leaves me at 500gp, which I can use to purchase the mundane gear (I think, will need to calculate).

You don't need to buy diamonds for Asha. Spell components are abstracted as gp.

Nope, not metagaming. That's why she's there (:

Great! I'll pick one up just in case, then.

It should be abundantly clear, but Zinro is clearly out of his depth here, and is trying his best to be perceived as 'powerful' by falling back on his noble heritage.

I'm looking forward to Zinro's attempts at negotiation.

[Waistcoatwill]

No no, you made it very clear. I'm just leaning into Rue's Poor Me Mode. I'm fine with him breaking in however you like, if you want to go that way. I have no idea what they would talk about, but I'd be excited to find out.

Something something irresistible force vs. immovable object.

:)

I just went fir being chatty, he's empathetic enough not to make light of her travel preferences without getting to know her first.

[dangelo]

Didn't wanna kill this awesome roleplay vibe so I delayed my post for a bit, but it is here now! Lemme know if you have any questions.

[The Commander]

As an FYI I expect our initial meeting with Strahd to go, ultimately, poorly - but I think it makes narrative sense for all of us to meet him properly first, and then go on our grand quest to defeat him. Plus it'll give us some cool RP moments to kick off the start of the crawl too, and will hopefully solidify the reasons for us all working together.

[dangelo]

@ The Commander
For some reason the book suggests pure Strength rather than Strength (Athletics). I believe the designer's intent here was to make this check a bit of a nuisance for the PCs, since a skill check would likely have +4 proficiency, making DC 15 a very easy target number.

[The Commander]

@ The Commander
For some reason the book suggests pure Strength rather than Strength (Athletics). I believe the designer's intent here was to make this check a bit of a nuisance for the PCs, since a skill check would likely have +4 proficiency, making DC 15 a very easy target number.

Interesting. Why not just inflate the target DC if they were worried 15 would be too easy? But fair enough.

[dangelo]

Mmmm maybe cause characters who don't have proficiency in Athletics wouldn't even have a chance at DC 19. I think that's the deal behind Ability checks without skills attached to them.

Always interesting to analyze the details in the design of such an awesome dungeon!

[truemane]

Rue has Expertise in Athletics. And 18 Strength. So either way, she's the portcullis hoisting master (mistress?).

Arcana: (1d20+5)[22]
Perception: (1d20+6)[14]

[TaiLiu]

Poor Rue. I feel for her.

[truemane]

Poor Rue. I feel for her.

Yeah, I really laid the misery on her. Poor thing. I figure, you don't get a name like "Rue" when you've had a pleasant go of things.

[Waistcoatwill]

Perfect fodder for someone who wants to avoid dealing with their own trauma! I smell a project for Bori.

[dangelo]

Quick question: When we start fighting monsters, how do you wanna deal with the battlemap? I usually just use Owlbear Rodeo, but I'm open if anyone else has other ideas, specially since Owlbear got a recent update and although it has more functions (and is probably bringing some money to the creators now) it lost that user friendly plug-and-play vibe I liked so much. I can also mock something up on Inkarnate + Photoshop and lay out numbers and letters for rows and collums if you don't mind the analogue approach.

[Waistcoatwill]

@dangelo: I'm more used to roll20 but more than happy to try Owlbear rodeo or an inkarnate/PS mock up. Whichever is easiest for you is almost certainly best for us.

@TaiLiu: Standing next to him with bis full mark on feels like a child getting a warm hug from a parent.

[truemane]

Perfect fodder for someone who wants to avoid dealing with their own trauma! I smell a project for Bori.

Oh no. I hadn't even considered what would happen if Rue met someone who wanted to actually help her. Like in the broad sense. She is basically nothing but trauma.

It would be an interesting spin-oiff though.

Quick question: When we start fighting monsters, how do you wanna deal with the battlemap? I usually just use Owlbear Rodeo, but I'm open if anyone else has other ideas, specially since Owlbear got a recent update and although it has more functions (and is probably bringing some money to the creators now) it lost that user friendly plug-and-play vibe I liked so much. I can also mock something up on Inkarnate + Photoshop and lay out numbers and letters for rows and collums if you don't mind the analogue approach.

That's funny, I also use Owlbear Rodeo, and have the same feelings about ver 2.0. It does things now that I always wished it would do, but it's lost of the ease and seat-of-the-pants vibe it had before.

Google Sheets can work, as well, as a very low tech alternative.

I'm happy working with whatever works for you.

EDIT:

Yikkol, ever the pessimist, immediately sidles up to the halfling.

That's very funny. "Sanctuary, eh? Lemme just...."

EDIT 2: Every year at my job I have an insanely busy and stressful and exhausting six week period and it's just about to start. I think it'll be more like three or four weeks this year, but my RL is about to be naynays until the end of Sept or so.

I'll be doing my best to keep up, but please don't pause or wait for me. If I'm away for a few days, assume Rue has lapsed into Brooding Silence.

[Dr.Samurai]

Sure, that sounds very reasonable. Thanks for collaborating on this.

Thank you for considering it and allowing it!

However you don't have to deduct your mundane gear from your rolled treasure. This roll (x100) is just the spare money you brought to Barovia, for things like spell components. Your weapons, armor, adventuring equipment and all are free. I realize now that this system can be abused, but everyone has been playing it fair so it doesn't bother me

Sounds good, I will fill everything in on my character sheet.

It should be abundantly clear, but Zinro is clearly out of his depth here, and is trying his best to be perceived as 'powerful' by falling back on his noble heritage.

Well, Asha hasn't gotten that vibe, and fully expects Zinro to treat with Strahd. As someone who has tried to keep it together while a plane is taking off, only for people around him to notice he's staving off full blown panic, I might say Asha might have noticed Zinro's discomfort with heights .

You don't need to buy diamonds for Asha. Spell components are abstracted as gp.

Awesome, thank you for pointing that out. Also, I rarely play spellcasters so this will be a bit new to me in general. I'm playing a warlock now in another game, and I've played a paladin before in a one-shot (pbp though so definitely went on longer than a one shot normally does lol).

@ The Commander
For some reason the book suggests pure Strength rather than Strength (Athletics). I believe the designer's intent here was to make this check a bit of a nuisance for the PCs, since a skill check would likely have +4 proficiency, making DC 15 a very easy target number.

As someone that predominantly plays Strength characters, this is a little bone I have to pick with 5E. The DC 20 Strength checks means even a Str 20 fighter is struggling to succeed, and often the modules specifically use Strength checks instead of Str(Athletics) checks.

That said, it's easy to get Expertise, and Advantage, and then you're just blowing through these DCs if they're Athletics.

Quick question: When we start fighting monsters, how do you wanna deal with the battlemap? I usually just use Owlbear Rodeo, but I'm open if anyone else has other ideas, specially since Owlbear got a recent update and although it has more functions (and is probably bringing some money to the creators now) it lost that user friendly plug-and-play vibe I liked so much. I can also mock something up on Inkarnate + Photoshop and lay out numbers and letters for rows and collums if you don't mind the analogue approach.

I've used Roll20, Google Sheets, and the DM posting a picture of the map+grid. I can use Owlbear or whatever is easiest for you. I much prefer a map over ToM, especially with PbP.

[The Commander]

Quick question: When we start fighting monsters, how do you wanna deal with the battlemap? I usually just use Owlbear Rodeo, but I'm open if anyone else has other ideas, specially since Owlbear got a recent update and although it has more functions (and is probably bringing some money to the creators now) it lost that user friendly plug-and-play vibe I liked so much. I can also mock something up on Inkarnate + Photoshop and lay out numbers and letters for rows and collums if you don't mind the analogue approach.

I've used a virtual whiteboard for some things in the past called Miro. But happy to go with whatever you feel comfortable with.

[J-H]

I use Excel and screenshot it. There are a few limitations if you need a very large map, though, and it's not pretty.

Google sheets never seems to work right, possibly because I don't use Google browsers and don't maintain an active login, for reasons that I probably can't fully discuss on here.

One DM I'm in a game with is using Roll20 maps and then screenshotting them. I tried that recently, but could never get the grid to line up with my background image.

[dangelo]

I've put up a modest Discord server for us. The link expires in a few days so I guess it's fine to post it publicly?

On battlemaps: I never quite managed to wrap my head around Roll20, or any VTT service for that matter. If you guys are fine with Owlber, I'll be much more comfortable with that option
Also will check out Miro. And I actually enjoy trying different stuff in Excel so I'll give that a shot sometime too

An example of the kind of mockup I mentioned, from one of my previous games here in the forums:

Spoiler

Show

EDIT 2: Every year at my job I have an insanely busy and stressful and exhausting six week period and it's just about to start. I think it'll be more like three or four weeks this year, but my RL is about to be naynays until the end of Sept or so.

Np, thanks for letting us know! Wish you good luck in these tough weeks.

As someone that predominantly plays Strength characters, this is a little bone I have to pick with 5E. The DC 20 Strength checks means even a Str 20 fighter is struggling to succeed, and often the modules specifically use Strength checks instead of Str(Athletics) checks.

That said, it's easy to get Expertise, and Advantage, and then you're just blowing through these DCs if they're Athletics.

I think the main difference between Athletics with a higher DC or Strength with a lower DC is that in the first case, everyone has a fairly similar chance to succeed, while in the second, it will certainly fall on the Barbarian or Paladin's shoulders to do so. In the first case, the complication is time, because the party might need several attempts to hit that target number 15; In the second, the complication is requiring a strong PC to spend their action next to the door; In a combat situation, while the players are trying to run away and someone has to open the porticullis, I can actually see why they went with the first example.

But I definitely agree, pure Ability checks with higher DCs would be more of an annoyance than a challenge. It's never fun to just retry the same check over and over.

Also sorry for textwalling you guys, I get excited when talking about d&d game design.

[Waistcoatwill]

@truemane: Best of luck with work! Bori will be delighted to continue failing to help Rue when things are easier.

@dangelo: That mockup looks brilliant to me. Giving a few things a go sounds fun.

[TaiLiu]

Quick question: When we start fighting monsters, how do you wanna deal with the battlemap? I usually just use Owlbear Rodeo, but I'm open if anyone else has other ideas, specially since Owlbear got a recent update and although it has more functions (and is probably bringing some money to the creators now) it lost that user friendly plug-and-play vibe I liked so much. I can also mock something up on Inkarnate + Photoshop and lay out numbers and letters for rows and collums if you don't mind the analogue approach.

I've used Roll20, Google Sheets, and the DM posting a picture of the map+grid. I can use Owlbear or whatever is easiest for you. I much prefer a map over ToM, especially with PbP.

@dangelo: I'm more used to roll20 but more than happy to try Owlbear rodeo or an inkarnate/PS mock up. Whichever is easiest for you is almost certainly best for us.

That's funny, I also use Owlbear Rodeo, and have the same feelings about ver 2.0. It does things now that I always wished it would do, but it's lost of the ease and seat-of-the-pants vibe it had before.

Google Sheets can work, as well, as a very low tech alternative.

I'm happy working with whatever works for you.

Agreed with everyone here. Whatever works best for dangelo is best for us, if only cuz you're the one who's gonna be making the maps and stuff. *

It looks like we're going Owlbear Rodeo. I haven't played on a battlemap in years, so I'm excited to play with rigorous positioning again.

* My preference is theatre of the mind (perhaps unusual amongst this crowd), but I also like Owlbear Rodeo and other battlemaps that can be accessed from the phone without logging in. PBP games have such a high rate of deaths that I'm inclined towards solutions that minimize work and friction for everyone.

@TaiLiu: Standing next to him with bis full mark on feels like a child getting a warm hug from a parent.

This is why she's nice to you but standoffish to most of the others.

Mommy... I miss you... T^T

That's very funny. "Sanctuary, eh? Lemme just...."

EDIT 2: Every year at my job I have an insanely busy and stressful and exhausting six week period and it's just about to start. I think it'll be more like three or four weeks this year, but my RL is about to be naynays until the end of Sept or so.

I'll be doing my best to keep up, but please don't pause or wait for me. If I'm away for a few days, assume Rue has lapsed into Brooding Silence.

Good luck with work!

Awesome, thank you for pointing that out. Also, I rarely play spellcasters so this will be a bit new to me in general. I'm playing a warlock now in another game, and I've played a paladin before in a one-shot (pbp though so definitely went on longer than a one shot normally does lol).

Oh, nice! Artificers are half-casters, too, so if it helps it's probably very similar to playing a Pally.

[dangelo]

@TaiLiu I'm an enthusiast of the balance between the two
Battlemaps work for encounters where your positioning matters. If the enemies have area-based effects, or can fly, or are applying a specific formation to get advantage of their surroundings, then I use battlemaps to give the players the chance of wargaming their way and get advantage of tactics. But some encounters happen in empty rooms where everyone just hack 'n slash every round. In these situations, ToM will actually make the fight much more fun, and is also a chance to take a break from the math-heavy encounters and enjoy some fast-paced action.

In fact, since many encounters are only there to make the heroes spend a little bit of their resources, and aren't necessarily death threats, I like to convert some of them to group-based Skill Challenges (borrowed from 4e) and deduct hitpoints or spell slots from the PCs based on the results. Hopefully that will help you feel more comfortable in such a grid-heavy campaign

@all Don't worry if this sounds too homebrew-ey for you, it's more of an alternative that I will suggest at some point and you guys can say yes or no.

[TaiLiu]

@TaiLiu I'm an enthusiast of the balance between the two
Battlemaps work for encounters where your positioning matters. If the enemies have area-based effects, or can fly, or are applying a specific formation to get advantage of their surroundings, then I use battlemaps to give the players the chance of wargaming their way and get advantage of tactics. But some encounters happen in empty rooms where everyone just hack 'n slash every round. In these situations, ToM will actually make the fight much more fun, and is also a chance to take a break from the math-heavy encounters and enjoy some fast-paced action.

In fact, since many encounters are only there to make the heroes spend a little bit of their resources, and aren't necessarily death threats, I like to convert some of them to group-based Skill Challenges (borrowed from 4e) and deduct hitpoints or spell slots from the PCs based on the results. Hopefully that will help you feel more comfortable in such a grid-heavy campaign

@all Don't worry if this sounds too homebrew-ey for you, it's more of an alternative that I will suggest at some point and you guys can say yes or no.

I should clarify that I don't mind the grid-heavy aspect of this campaign. It's just that it's been a while since I've played with a battlemap.

The skill challenge idea is clever and probably useful in PBP games, which tend to be slow. Looking forward to seeing how it works.

[TaiLiu]

Lots of places to go! I vote up.

[truemane]

I also vote up.

[...]
Nethis seems to **** her head slightly before feignting a lash with her tail.
[...]

That's an interesting place for the profanity filter to kick in. Did you misspell 'duck'?