Random DM nagging.

[Anastasia]

I'd say it's more a matter of getting the right numbers and then a coherent strategy to win. If you can deal enough non-lethal damage to down him, finishing him off with 21's simple. The trick is getting that far.

[Anastasia]

Today's note: Feline diplomacy is surprisingly effective when you're in good with Sharess.

[Anastasia]

Also, tablet of destiny was unstuck and the coda sheets were stuck on request.

[Anastasia]

More chat meanderings. Posting here for posterity and easy reference.

1. Antimagic, artifacts and deities

<Merc> Hey Ko, moot point question, but would Ithea have had +5 to social skills within the anti-magic bubble when we were negotiating for that coin? Or does the bubble not affect artifacts?
> It was an artifact, it would function even in antimagic.
> Antimagic doesn't work on artifacts or deities.
* Merc nods
<Merc> Good reference to know for future then.
> Deities are too connected to magic and vital things to be stopped by mere antimagic, and artifacts are generally created or tied to deities and/or primal forces.
> Mystra can cut them off from the Weave, but she has a standing edict from Ao (and possibly the other two of the Three Incarnations) that doing that will get her in deep crap. Bad, bad things happen if a deity's cut off from magic, since they represent primal things. It's like some parts of those concepts go missing from Creation.
> Like cutting of Ithea from magic? Not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. She's powerful, but she doesn't have the sheer meaning and spiritual weight of a deity. It's not like valor, cats or glaives suddenly produce reality errors if she's cut off.
> But cut Sharess off, for example? Suddenly, everything in her portfolio has problems. Big problems. Like deleting parts of a file and forcing it to run anyway, then watching the errors cascade.
<Merc> Yeah, I'm not gonna go out and piss off the goddess of magic.
<Merc> god/goddess of dragons, sure.
<Merc> but magic's a different story.
> Mystra's high up on the list of entities not to personally piss off.

2. Bahamut, Tiamat, Io and Aurora's relations with the Triad

* Merc can't recall if Ithea has bad rep with other deities besides Bahamut/Tiamat.
> Not really. Aurora had some problems with the Triad in general, by Tyr made efforts to smooth those over.
<Merc> Most of those were over Annalise, weren't they?
> Helm's main problem is settled now that Annalise is a memory. Ilmater had no real problem with them, and really only hates those that make others suffer unneedingly.
<Merc> Or was that someone else?
> Bahamut's kinda-sorta tied to the Triad and has his problems, but they're due to what he has to deal with based on Io's edicts about his and Tiamat's duties as the parents of dragon kind.
> His position was really shitty in B3 on account of that. Wasn't really his fault.
> (Io's the original greater deity of dragons. Is either dead or in deep seclusion, not much is known about him besides that, even to dragons.)
> (He left certain instructions for Bahamut and Tiamat, ones they have to obey. No prismatic dragons is one of them.)
<Merc> All vowel-o's are killjoys, aren't they? What's Eo, Oo and Uo's killjoy factor?
> Y'all wouldn't be on good terms with Tiamat in any case, since she's in tight with Baator. She was even Lord of the First ages and ages ago, but it didn't work out long term. Massive conflicts of interest. Was a fairly amicable parting, as far as those things go.
> In her defense, the position of the Lord of the First was more of an add on title. She's already a powerful deity. It just gave her a few bonuses and charge to lead the Blood War. Which she did pretty well, really.

3. Slaad suns and Lathander

> The worlds have totally different physics and rules. Like if you go up to the sun in Balmuria, it isn't a super hot ball, but instead a ball of lifegiving fire tied to Lathander.
<Merc> What about the sun in a crazy epic slaad's dungeon?
> Just an emulation of a Lathander sun. It's still -hot- and looks more or less like a sun to our untrained eyes.
> I mean, the Lathander sun will still fry you without proper protection.
> But questioning why a slaad's fantasies work in any particular way is essentially pointless.

[Anastasia]

This is a preview of a piece I'm working on for the rules and setting board. It's relevant to y'all, as it's the tier you're in.

This is subject to changes and edits, but the core of it's accurate.

21-26 Low Epic Tier

At this point, you have great power. A mortal of this level is a hero of legend, the sort born once a century at best. An immortal of this level has at last gained a measure of true power, further able to advance its aims. The epic rules are now in play, opening up new feat choices, epic prestige classes and epic skill usages. Even the most mundane warrior is superhuman and can manage feats that defy the normal rules of physics.

Mortals who reach this level of power have the absolute attention of the outer planes. They are great champions that are nurtured, likely to be soon brought directly into the fold. Those that oppose them make take great risks to subvert or destroy them before that can happen, so that the opposition does not gain another powerful ally. At this point, the greater realities of the planes become evident. As the purpose of mortal life is to prepare for the eternal afterlife, creatures of this tier are often ready to skip ahead to that. Many become outsiders or similar spirits without having to die, given transmigration by their patrons or allies.

Indeed, many find themselves limited by a mortal body at this level of power. A spirit of sufficient purity and power to reach this level of ability chafes under the constraints of flesh. Outsiders and other spirits find the same problem in a different way. The mortal world reacts and recoils from them, unable to fully bear the intensity of the spirit outside of the cage of a mortal body.

Creatures in this tier face down the epitomes of mortal knowledge routinely, as well as horrors forgotten to time. They can defeat the mightiest dragons and wander the planes freely. Those who wish even more power may be able to research the path to divinity, though such is a long, difficult and dangerous process. Most creatures can be defeated or resisted, though greater entities, direct servants of deities and deities are generally too strong to oppose.

[Yulia]

Remember to reply to downtime/away too!

[Anastasia]

Yuth, were you going to catch the logs up?

[Yuthirin]

Tomorrow!

[Anastasia]

Awesome, thanks.

[Anastasia]

As you may know, I make and post a lot of NPC stats. However, these stats aren't always optimized, but instead with notes on additional treasure they may use or similar things. This is meant to give me flexibility should I use the stats; for example, someone like Vel Custos is going to be differently equipped going to war than on day to day business.

But it begs the question: How much is a prepared NPC boosted? So let's take a gander at one and see how it goes, namely Vel Custos. If you're not familiar with him, he's in the same general category as a Duke of Hell. He has considerable resources as an Authority of Celestia, so it's not hard to get serious with boosting him.

This won't include changing his spell list. He's perfectly capable of preparing a selection of spells that can further augment his effectiveness, but it's not what I'm looking at here. Likewise, this will use standard SRD items and nothing custom. This includes epic items, as he's an epic level character.

First of all, he'd like some more HP. So he requisitions an amulet of health+10. A rare item to be sure, but hit points are important at war. This boosts his hit points by 70, his Fortitudes saves by +2 and his Concentration skill by 2. Takes up his neck slot. Not a bad start. Next he'd like to augment his armor class. A ring of protection+7 fills an obvious niche for him, so +7 deflection to armor class. He'll also nab a dusty rose prism ioun stone for a +1 insight bonus to armor class. While he's there, he'll grab a pale green prism for a +1 competence bonus to attack rolls, saves, skill checks and ability checks.

Then let's toss on a cloak of resistance+7, since his saves are a bit low. We'll top it off with boots of haste for free-action hasting when needed. He could also grab some metamagic rods if he's really going to war, not to mention a selection of scrolls and expendables.

+70 max hp
+8 armor class (+7 deflection, +1 insight)
+1 attack rolls
+10 fort saves, +8 ref saves, +8 will saves
+3 concentration checks, +1 other skill checks (overlaps with boosted skills)

So that's a reasonably decent boost. I could expand on this with items beyond the SRD or custom items. For example, boosting the insight bonus from the dusty rose ioun stone was a thing in B3. But the point is that there's variance to how you can prepare and set up NPCs/bad guys, depending on the situation.

[Anastasia]

!!!!

Muirfinn awoke with a start. Hovering over his face was 27, smiling ear to ear. It whispered to him, "Logs."

Muirfinn did not stop screaming for a long time.

[Yuthirin]

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RTrAVpK9blw

[Anastasia]

Scary.

So consider this 27 nagging you about logs.

[Yuthirin]

Arright

[Anastasia]

Excellent. Now would you like a mushroom?