To Prove D&D Exists for Echolon

“Wait a minute, can I see that a moment please?” Toots tests this thing with all 5 senses and makes an Intelligence (Arcana) check on the device: 20

“I think this is a magic doohickey! Hey, Oethe, can you maybe help figure this out? Your god makes stuff, right? Did you sweaty blacksmith types learn how to identify things, or just make them and grunt a lot?”

"Of course I can identify it. Give me a few minutes." Oethe casts identify as a ritual.

Elyona stiffens a bit at Toots' comments about sweaty and grunting blacksmiths.  But she leans in to look at the metal rods and to watch Oethe work.

OOC: Midnight,

Just a heads up. When I was skimming the group’s character sheets to see if anyone could cast Identify, or had a higher Arcana then Toots at the very least. I noticed that Tommary has Arcana marked as one of his Skill Proficiencies, but the Skill appears to have been accidentally overridden because it’s showing a blue “+0,” but it should instead be a normal black +3.

Quote from ArwensDaughter >>

Elyona stiffens a bit at Toots' comments about sweaty and grunting blacksmiths.  But she leans in to look at the metal rods and to watch Oethe work.

OOC: Wysperra,

I have no idea how (or even if) you will want this done with stats. In my group we would ask if Elyona was trying to hide it, trying to be noticed, or neither. If she was trying to hide it we would use her Stealth Roll, if trying to be seen an auto fail, and if neither we would calculate her “passive stealth” and compare whichever appropriate against Toots’ Passive Perception to determine if Toots had noticed that or not. Toots has a Passive Perception of 14.

However you do, I just want to know if Toots noticed or not please.

Oethe runs his finger over the object muttering prayers and the item is revealed to be a

Rod of Lordly Might

Congratulations!

EVERYBODY LEVEL 8!

OOC: Who gets the rod? Oethe gets Divine Strike this level, so he'll be goodish at melee.

Quote from IamSposta >>

OOC: Midnight,

Just a heads up. When I was skimming the group’s character sheets to see if anyone could cast Identify, or had a higher Arcana then Toots at the very least. I noticed that Tommary has Arcana marked as one of his Skill Proficiencies, but the Skill appears to have been accidentally overridden because it’s showing a blue “+0,” but it should instead be a normal black +3.

OOC: Thanks, you're right.  I double checked the editor to confirm that I took Arcana as a Bard proficiency so ... that's weird.  Guess I'm gonna check out the bug report after I level up.

OOC: It probably happened by accident. Happens to someone at least once every couple months if not more often.

Quote from Wysperra >>

Oethe runs his finger over the object muttering prayers and the item is revealed to be a

Rod of Lordly Might

Congratulations!

EVERYBODY LEVEL 8!

THREE CHEERS FOR THE DM!!

Hip Hip, Huzzah! Hip Hip, Huzzah! Hip Hip, Huzzah!

PS- By the way, are we doing everything by the book when we level up, or do you have any house rules in regards to doing something special? Can we use feats now or is that a campaign long prohibition?  Stuff like that. 

OOC: No Feats.

Casters can change any or all of their spells.

Take standard set HP increase.

“Hey everybody, I don’t know about you all, but I’m a little pooped and I’m not sure how much more I have in me for today. I’ll keep going if you all want to, I’m not really that hurt or anything, but I feel drained and won’t be able to contribute much more than some simple spells today no matter what. I do have a few tricks left, so whenever you want to make camp let me know and I’ll see we all feel comfortable tonight.” If anyone looks, they’ll start to see some dark circles starting to form under Toots’ eyes and her color is a little drained. She even has a slight slump in her posture. Almost like a child up way past their bedtime to welcome Morrowyear with a candle and the customary song chorused by all throughout Cliffside at the stroke of Daychange.

OOC: There ya go Midnight, I‘ll see your “Vaults of the Brothers Warner,” and raise you:

• 1️⃣ Major Holiday: (New Years Eave)
  • ✅ Named- Morrowyear
  • ✅ Traditional Celebrations Detailed- A candlelight vigil and customary song chorused by all people throughout Cliffside at the stroke of Daychange.

• 1️⃣ Time of Day: (“Midnight,” or otherwise recognized time when one day officially becomes the next.)
  
  • ✅ Named- Daychange

Quote from Halfastbracegirdle >>

OOC: Who gets the rod? Oethe gets Divine Strike this level, so he'll be goodish at melee.

 OOC: I vote that it goes to either you Oethe or Elyona. The rest if us are all Dex builds and the last place Toots wants to be is in melee. 

So... without further ado, (*psst...mutters* “Drumroll please.”)

LADIES... AND... GENTLEMEN!!!

In this corner, weighing in at an unknown number... A devotee of the Forge God whose name I cannot currently remember,  and having newly acquired the Divine Strike feature allowing him to add an additional 1d8 to one attack every round!!! The Cleric you can count on... 
It’s Oeeeethe!! 

And in this corner.... Weighing in at a number nobody was brave enough to ask for.... Having swornan oath to her favorite Ancients, and rocking the power to divinely smite the Ancients’ enemies off of the face of Urth!! The Paladin to Pall around with....  Elyonaaaa!!!

"Looks like good workmanship," Elyona says, "It looks like it suits you, Oethe." 

OOC: While it looks sweet, and Elyona would enjoy using it, she's happy to let Oethe have it.  Tactically speaking, since Elyona doesn't have darkvision. flame tongue could come in really handy.  But I'm happy to leave the decision up to Oethe/Halfastbracegirdle, and happy to let Oethe have it.  (Come to think of it, if Oethe used the flame tongue option and Elyona stuck close to Oethe in battle, she'd get the advantage of the light, and could offer Oethe some protection; she'd stick close to at least one person anyway, to make use of her protection ability.)

OOC: You sure?  I mean, Tommary could use the rest of the bars to set up an octagonal cage to resolve this....

“WHOO!! I don’t know what it is, but for some reason I feel great all of a sudden! Maybe it’s because it feels like we’re doing so well, or maybe it’s because I’m feeling such a sense of personal growth at the moment... like I’ve reached a new plateau in my life. Whatever the reason, I feel like I have 1 more bout of trouble left in me today before bed, so it’s up to you all. Should I set up camp here for the night, or do you all want to go put that bridge thing together and see what was behind door number 1 that Tommary found but we haven’t yet checked?” For some reason, the weariness you all noticed a moment ago seems lessened, and Toots has more of her usual string in her step.

OOC: Before the level-up all Toots had left in the tank was one 2nd-level slot, a few Bardic Inspirations, and he Favor. That wasn’t nothing, but it wasn’t much. Especially since I’d rather hold the slot for tonight just in case. So she could have kept going a little bit longer, but not much. With the level-up she just got another 4th-level slot, and a little more variety to her Repertoire so she definitely has another good fight left in her today and can still hold one in the tank for tonight if everyone wants to press on.

So, long rest or wait?

• If you want a long rest Toots can see to relative safety and a little creature comfort for us after a hard day of adventure.
• If not, then does anyone need a short rest before we continue?

OOC #2: I wanted to ask everybody for their opinions on a couple of spell choices if you don’t mind.

Blindness/Deafness or Hold Person

• Morality: Tied in Toots’ opinion.
    For a lot of people they view B/D as “evil” while HP isn’t, but for Toots, the mind****ery aspect of HP makes it just as bad (or worse), so they are a tie on morality.
• Effect: B/D : HP
     Blinded or Deafened is nice, but hands down Paralyzed is way more powerful.
• Range: B/D- 30 : HP- 60
• Target Variety: B/D- all creatures : HP- Humanoids
• Duration: B/D- 1 min : HP- C 1 min
• Save Type: B/D- Con : HP- Wis (ostensibly)
• Components: B/D- V : HP- V,S,M

Personally I think I might be leaning towards Blind/Deaf, but I wanted to hear other people’s opinions.

Chaos Bolt or Chromatic Orb

• Effect: Statistically the bolt has more damage potential, but the orb is more reliable.
  Bolt- 2d8+1d6, random damage type, chance to bounce, +1d6/slot level
  Orb- 3d8 chosen damage type +1d8/slot level
• Range: Bolt- 120 : Orb- 90
• Damage Type Variety: Bolt- 6 Basic + 2 Strong : Orb- 6 Basic Energies
• Components: Bolt- V,S : Orb- V,S,M$

I’m obviously leaning towards Chaos Bolt, but I wanted to hear other people’s opinions.

OOC:  I've really wanted to like Chaos Bolt in the past.  All my players have who've used it are super "meh" about it.  Might just be bad luck but in over 100 hours of gaming this past year a sorcerer has yet to see the "chaos" of chaos bolt pop up.  FWIW, I added Enemies Abound to me list.  I was initially leaning to leveling the rogue to get the ASI, but instead took the Bard to 5 for the 3rd level slots, proficiency bonus, and inspiration die boost.  I'm in a similar position as Toots re: resources, so I'll propose the following, shifting to IC:

IC "I got some left in me.  I'm thinking maybe we secure the bridge, and scout over the other side a little bit, once we have a sense as to what's over there, I'll be more comfortable figuring out where and how to bed down.  Did we collect  the rest of this 'water'?"

OOC: Did we collect the truesight fluid?  If not, I'm actually carrying two waterskins, so could dump one.  If no one's done that already, I'll take care of it before we break from here.

Quote from MidnightPlat >>

OOC: Did we collect the truesight fluid?  If not, I'm actually carrying two waterskins, so could dump one.  If no one's done that already, I'll take care of it before we break from here.

 OOC: As far as I know we have not, I don’t even know if there’s any still liquid, but Toots also has a spare canteen if you need it.

Quote from MidnightPlat>>

OOC:  I've really wanted to like Chaos Bolt in the past.  All my players have who've used it are super "meh" about it.  Might just be bad luck but in over 100 hours of gaming this past year a sorcerer has yet to see the "chaos" of chaos bolt pop up.

Thank you for the insight.

Normally I would agree with you and go for the much more reliable Orb. I’ve never seen Chaos Bolt ricochet either and without that providing actual damage, the potential damage is irrelevant. But at least if I roll double 1s it won’t suck as much, and I roll lots of ones. (Of course, with my luck it will only happen when there are no viable targets. 🙄) However, the Bolt does have the 120’ range, and the only other things Toots has with that long of a range are Chill Touch and Hypnotic Pattern (and Message). So the additional range is attractive.

(Not to mention that Chromatic Orb requires a Diamond worth 50+ gp to cast. Toots doesn’t happen to have a Diamond worth at least 50 gp, so unless anyone else does she wouldn’t even be able to cast it until the party finds one.)

OOC:  I wear diamond soled shoes, but no, you may not.  [I don't really though it would be in character]