Random DM nagging 2: Endless nagging

[Anastasia]

Okay, quick thing about Jetina, her serenity and turn undead/channel energy. I'll toss it to all of you, see what you think.

First of all, serenity is a feat that turns many paladin abilities to being Wisdom based instead of Charisma based. This includes turn undead. Jetina's taken the inquisitor paladin variant, which trades away turn undead/channel energy. She gets channel energy from healer, so this isn't a meaningful loss for her. However, despite requiring divine grace as a prerequisite, serenity does not specify paladin turning (or the other abilities, in case you get them in a different class).

RAW, it's correct that Jetina would apply her Wisdom modifier in place of her Charisma modifier to total uses of channel energy. This would bump her up an additional 4 channel energies per day, as well as increase the save DC by 4. RAI, it seems fairly clear that it's meant to be a paladin ability and to boost paladin class skills. Applying it to the abilities of other classes is probably not what was intended by the designer of the feat.

What do you all think? Should I follow RAW or the assumed RAI here?

(Serenity's from Dragon Compendium, by the way.)

[Nephrite]

Since Serenity doesn't specify where the ability needs to come from, I don't see an issue with letting it apply.

[Nephrite]

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/spiked-pit May I (or Lucy, actually) cast this via Shadow Conjuration?

[Anastasia]

So as all of you know, Eb's decided to drop out of the Lost Realm. In short, he feels he accomplished what he wanted to with Pepo. His new character isn't working out and he doesn't want to make a new PC. When you combine that with Iddy's time problems and my own lack of enthusiasm for how this game has worked out, I'm going to end this game here. I'll go into the reasons why below.

First of all, Eb dropping out leaves us a player short. I run this games to have fun with all of you, and when a player drops, that hurts my interest a lot. A situation that has players dropping is usually going to damage the game, and in this case I feel it's enough to put this game down.

Secondly, Iddy's been missing sessions lately and his Mondays generally aren't open anymore. This isn't really his fault, as I understand real life has to take priority here, but it's an additional stressor. It's not close to what finished this game off, but it did add some extra pressure and direction towards this choice.

Thirdly, I don't feel this ever quite recovered from my problems back in December. It threw a giant roadblock up that impacted the game for over a month, one that really did a lot of damage behind the scenes. This one isn't any of your faults, it's simply a case where something unfortunate occurred. Sometimes shit happens and it happened here. This would have hurt any game, but it particularly hurt this game since it had pre-existing problems and problems waiting down the line.

Finally, I feel this game had some flaws in the idea and execution. This was touched on in the last feedback topic, but basically my position is the following. The ideas were good on paper but didn't work out in reality. The amnesia one is the most salient, though there are others. I won't rehash this greatly here, since my postmortems will touch on these in due time.

I blame myself for some of this, but I think a good deal of it was bad luck. This game needed me to be involved and circumstances fought against that. I don't think any of you are really to blame (besides arguably about party composition and chemistry, but that's a whole other discussion). Sometimes things don't work out and I feel that's the case here.

No session today at least. I'll be posting more and touching on any possible wrapup later. If there is wrapup, it won't be until next week.

[Iron Dragoon]

Understandable. It was fun while it lasted, and I enjoyed it. I'm sorry work got in the way, whether it was a little or a lot, but hey, I need insurance and paycheck =)

I do like the concept of Veren and may reengage him in a different game after working on the build some.

Over-all I enjoyed the game, there were just some disconnects and issues that got in the way.

[Anastasia]

So why didn't you do any flavor posts for this game, anyway? You did a bunch for Vastwoods when it ran, and you did some for Balmuria while this game ran! What gives?

I want to address this one first, since I've been banging my head against flavor posts for awhile now.

I think this one was a case of outsmarting myself. One of the premises of this game is information control. Y'see, you all came in amnesiac and had to learn all about the world on your own. It's a neat idea on paper, but in reality it means I need to control the information you get. So I have to pay attention to what I tell y'all and make sure to keep a handle on what you know and what you don't know.

This translated to a big old case of writer's block. Whenever I tried to write flavor for the Lost Realm, I head-banged right into these self imposed limitations. I'd spend some time considering if what I wanted to write was acceptable and wouldn't spoiler anything. This tended to act as a great big stopper to my creative energies. In other words, the premise of the game sabotaged my own work.

That's not the only factor. December dealt a serious blow to my work. What work I did tended to be for Balmuria, since that was easier and quite honestly? I know Balmuria well enough that it was comforting to work on during that time. I posted one of my bigger projects and one I'm happy with (Queen Morwel) during that time, as I desperately needed the escapism during that horrible month. All of that shifted my creative energies towards something that was familiar instead of blocked up.

Yeah, I'd do some Balmuria work no matter what, but these circumstances made it even more appealing. I tend to do the most Balmuria work when I'm ahead on my current games, blocked on them or otherwise need something I really enjoy. It's not something any of you did, it's just that miserable month taking an even bigger toll than I first expected.

Also, it's safe to say the general discontent and lack of spark for the Lost Realm contributed to a lack of flavor posts. I don't think it was a decisive factor, but it didn't help at all.

[Anastasia]

Understandable. It was fun while it lasted, and I enjoyed it. I'm sorry work got in the way, whether it was a little or a lot, but hey, I need insurance and paycheck =)

I do like the concept of Veren and may reengage him in a different game after working on the build some.

Over-all I enjoyed the game, there were just some disconnects and issues that got in the way.

Yeah, it happens. Glad you enjoyed it!

In a perfect world none of us would need to work, and we'd be able to game any time we wanted. Unfortunately it isn't a perfect world.

[Anastasia]

So what was _____ about?! Or what was...

If you have a question about the game world, I'll be doing some posts about that in due time. I will address one point now and perhaps the ultimate question of the Lost Realm. Namely, what lies beyond it?

It depended.

Y'see, the demiplane and all of its features were fully worked out. What it attached to and why it was made was left flexible. It could hook into most anything I needed.

If I wanted it to be purgatory? It was a purgatory God made to give souls between Heaven and Hell a chance to decide where they'd go. The purpose of the realm wasn't to escape, but to find and live a life worthy of one or another.

If it was a VR simulation? It was a game made by a twisted jerk that had some glitches. Escaping would cause you to wake up in the real world ala that one anime with Kirito that I can't remember the name of. Oh yeah, Sword Art Online. Same idea.

If it was hooked to a typical D&D world? A mad wizard got inspired by Ravenloft and made his own sealed demiplane to play with. Escaping would end with confronting him and getting some revenge, then going to planes as you please.

If it was hooked into the Vastwoods world? An ancient fey, so powerful as to even resist the changes made to the mantle system, created it. He had the mantle of illusions and became so powerful as to make his illusions reality. A cruel but fair king, he awaits players skilled enough to resist all his efforts and escape his illusions.  For what better members of his court than those who proved themselves against his grandest effort?

If it was hooked into Balmuria? It was a test demiplane with two purposes. The first is for deities to express odd aspects of unusual interpretations of themselves in trial runs. (Qupan might well have been a twisted aspect of the Triune Goddess, for example). The second was to find mortals strong enough to triumph over the restrictions and help stand against Shar.

Whatever cause I ended up plugging in, the internals of the Lost Realm were already set. I left the ultimate question flexible, so I could tailor it better to the group if you made it that far. I could even alter any of the premises above, as I had various contingencies in mind should I want that particular one but not that resolution.

Incidentally, the voice Pepo heard at the end was the ruling intelligence of the demiplane. That touches on a whole host of different issues, but it wasn't whatever was beyond it. Also, how his ending would have fit in each possibility.

Purgatory: Pepo proved himself to be a brave cat who made it to his own paradise. This doesn't really fit how Christian philosophy works, but whatever. I wasn't aiming for theological consistency here.

VR simulation: He ended up in a buffering program, a chance to rest and recover before awakening. The sunbeam was to soothe his mind as it takes time to safely leave VR after being in for that long.

Typical D&D: Pepo found his way home.

Vastwoods: The old mage was the fey in disguise, amused and pleased someone finally succeeded. He gave Pepo time to rest and would deal with him in due time.

Balmuria: Pepo found his way home, but with a lot of eyes now on him.

[Anastasia]

So what about a new game?

I've had this one asked more than once already, so let me answer it. Yes, but not right away. I want to do the postmortem for this game and unwind a little bit before focusing on a new game. Information on that will be provided later.

[Anastasia]

As I work on posts, let me talk to all of you about one point. As you might know, this is the first time I've seriously used the healer revision I made. How do you think it performed for Jetina? Did it work well? Was it strong enough? Just curious as to what all of you thought about it.

[Ebiris]

She performed admirably in the role of healbot. I didn't pay too close attention though.

[Anastasia]

She performed admirably in the role of healbot. I didn't pay too close attention though.

Since the class is healer, that's high praise.

[Nephrite]

I liked her interaction with Moore's Healing Hymn, since it let him buff her ability to do her job.

[Corwin]

So why did the Door of Death treat Lucy differently, then? Whimsy? Something more?

[Anastasia]

I liked her interaction with Moore's Healing Hymn, since it let him buff her ability to do her job.

That worked out well, though it was a bit excessive for normal healing.

So why did the Door of Death treat Lucy differently, then? Whimsy? Something more?

Something more. I'll go into this one in another post.