GenCon and the DCC tourney

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Jengenritz
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Post by Jengenritz »

Hey there! I played in the group Bastard Sons of Lee Van Cleef;
There were a lot of clever team names this year, but yours was hands-down my favorite.
I HATE that big die!!
I think it's fair to say that everyone hated that big die...but at least they were cripplingly sucky for everyone.
Next year we'll have the same rules, but different dice.
Should I make it to GC next year, I'll be more than happy to team up with you again, and this time take home those first place trophies!
I hope so! You guys were a strong team, which keeps us Judges on our toes!
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Post by toad »

The problem with the big die was, at least for our die, that all the low numbers were on one half, all the highs on the other. In stead of the 19 being next to the 1 and the 2 next to the 20 they all shifted. I have seen other dice like that so that is why I looked at it closer after it took 16 rounds to kill one goblin.
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Post by fathead »

We had one judge that provided several big dice. That way, we weren't stuck rolling one die, but everything was still rolled out in the open. They also weren't one of those fist-sized "I could crush a man's skull if I tossed this across the room" dice....they were still big dice though.

Every other round we played though, we had one mammoth die to roll.

BUT...if we rolled sucky, so did the GM. :)
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Post by hexnut »

N'Haaz-aua wrote:Congrats to all the teams, especially to those I game mastered for (Simple Weapons, Clan Yeoman, Team Gygax, and Smoked). I don't like to disclose tactics and stories, because its not fair to the teams who have hard won experience, but hopefully some of them will share a tidbit or two. Fun was had by *most*, and I won't steal their thunder by disclosing the kill rate, but one of my teams had 3 deaths (-10) and *still* were an alternate to advance to level 2.
I was on team Smoked. I played the Guard and was the only surviving member. After clearing the first room we ran into some trouble with the ooze along with trying to decide which door, of the three, to head towards. We finally ended up at the bronze door where most of the team fell. I made a mad dash for the portal on the left knowing everyone else was going to die. My plan was to score as many points as possible at that point regardless if I died.

I figured out the maze room right from the start and ran through it collecting the key. I spent a LONG time figuring out the spheres since I didn't want to die figuring out a puzzle. I finally placed the spheres and retrieved the key... plenty of time left. I found the book in the library and didn't waste any time stacking the cards and retrieving the key.

I made it to the last room and decided to step in to make the encounter. The DM tried to kill me but a teammate questioned the ability to sit up, jump, run and attack. After some book browsing the attack was negated and I retreated, cowering in the hallway but still alive.

We were the 2nd alternate but would have been short a player had the opportunity arose to play through.

It was a lot of fun, my second year playing the tournament. I hope to advance into round 2 next year!
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Jengenritz
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Post by Jengenritz »

Hey, welcome to the board, hexnut!

Cool tournament story!
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Post by clockworkjoe »

I'm glad to hear the armory in round 1 gave the PCs some headaches. Did anyone try the round three armory?
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Post by N'Haaz-aua »

hexnut wrote:
I made it to the last room and decided to step in to make the encounter. The DM tried to kill me but a teammate questioned the ability to sit up, jump, run and attack. After some book browsing the attack was negated and I retreated, cowering in the hallway but still alive.

!
I had an illegal partial charge, received a 5 yard penalty, and had to repeat the first down. :oops:
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Post by fathead »

clockworkjoe wrote:I'm glad to hear the armory in round 1 gave the PCs some headaches. Did anyone try the round three armory?
We came in the entrance hallway in round 1. In round 3, was the armory the room with the spinning top of death?
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N'Haaz-aua
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Post by N'Haaz-aua »

fathead wrote:
We came in the entrance hallway in round 1. In round 3, was the armory the room with the spinning top of death?
yea
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Post by fathead »

N'Haaz-aua wrote:
fathead wrote:
We came in the entrance hallway in round 1. In round 3, was the armory the room with the spinning top of death?
yea
We stayed outside of the room and used range weapons, aiming at the chord. After it dropped, we entered. We searched the Spinning Top of Death TM, and found the tarot card. I think the door said "the key is at hand" or something similar. We didn't know of any key that we had run across, and couldn't come up with any other interpretation other than "maybe it doesn't have a key and we have to force the door open"...which worked fine.

Out of curiousity...(correction) how were we SUPPOSED to handle it?

We searched all over that room. What did we miss?
Last edited by fathead on Fri Aug 24, 2007 4:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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N'Haaz-aua
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Post by N'Haaz-aua »

I suppose thats one solution... (thats a no)
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Post by fathead »

N'Haaz-aua wrote:I suppose thats one solution... (thats a no)
Ha. :) Yes, we're brilliant.
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Post by jfrenia »

We were definitely bummed to sit down and see the characters had advanced 8 levels between rounds; would have made character selection a lot different, LOL.

I was on eleran's team Gleneagles. I'd say our biggest downfall was definitely poor rolling, esp in round 2, we probably went for a 20 min. span without rolls about a 5 against the mist dragon.

The blind cleric was esp sucky; having her grope the floor for my dying body was a bit.. painful... :?

All in all, the tournament was fun and very challenging. Round 1, definitely made you put some thought into what to do. We were lucky to happen to go by the booth on Saturday and slide into a round 2. :-) It was equally as challenging and a lot of fun and both our DMs were great. I've also considered DMing next year if DMs are needed, but if I do play, our DMs will have to excuse us if we're not too chatty. I think we had a few too many side conversations being friendly with the DMs which cost us time, LOL.

As the fighter I was bummed to get the flaming greatsword and never actually getting to swing it due to running out of time.
- Joseph Frenia
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Post by hexnut »

Jengenritz wrote:Hey, welcome to the board, hexnut!

Cool tournament story!
Thanks! I'll have to try harder to keep up with the forum.
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Post by hexnut »

N'Haaz-aua wrote:
hexnut wrote:
I made it to the last room and decided to step in to make the encounter. The DM tried to kill me but a teammate questioned the ability to sit up, jump, run and attack. After some book browsing the attack was negated and I retreated, cowering in the hallway but still alive.

!
I had an illegal partial charge, received a 5 yard penalty, and had to repeat the first down. :oops:
Ha! Thanks for not killing me. It gave me boasting rights until I played "Battle the Colossal Red Wyrm" and my PC slept through 95% of the dragon battle! :(... bad saving throw.
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From the Blood Kings

Post by Celtar »

[quote="Mouse"]Just a few random thoughts

"Blood of Kings" had the ranger, monk, cleric, and rogue. Oddly the "Glen Eagles" (my round 2 table) also had the same mix.

Odd mix, but it worked for us! :) Although we definitely missed the mage in the later rounds.

The ranger had sick fire power if he was shooting at "evil" targets. That holy bow was holy terror. He killed half of everything in the third round.

The bow was excellent!

For all the fiendish purple worms awsomeness, it was kinda funny when it got "Dismissed" in round 3. It wasn't likely but sometimes the "Hail Mary Shot" pays off. (I think it rolled a 4 for its save). Talk about some excited players. At that point the cleric had unquestionably earned the MVP for round 3 for all the time a resources saved.

- I did run some numbers on the Worm... Here is what I found:

So to recap the odds...

The DC for the Dismissal is = 10 + level of spell (4) + Charisma bonus (4) - HD of creature (16) + caster level (10) = 12

So, since the worm had a +4 will save... the odds of this getting through is 35%

The creatures SR is 5 + HD of creature (16) = 21.

My roll against SR would be d20 + 10 + Spell Penetration (2) = 12

Therefore I would have 60% chance (only a roll of 1-8 would fail) to get through the SR.

This would result in a 35% X 60 % or 21 % chance of dismissing the creature. I would say that this was worth a "hail Mary".... If everyone in the group had the spell, I would have wanted everyone to do it... ;)


I think everyone had to test the implosion trap at least once. Blood of Kings actually tested it twice. If they hadn't deavtivated the third one alrerady, I'm sure they would have walked into that one too.

- Bad move... but I was outvoted....

I played Tanlew from the Blood Kings...

We had an awesome time & are still talking about it!!!

:)
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N'Haaz-aua
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Post by N'Haaz-aua »

I'm pretty sure every team fired the implosion trap at least twice... We need a higher DC :twisted:
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Post by Damien the Bloodfeaster »

Now that I think on it, I have a question about something I've been wondering since the tournament, with regard to scoring.

I understand that you get points if you disarm a trap, and lose points if you trigger a trap. But what if you trigger a trap in such a way as to avoid the consequences or negative effects? For example, in the first round room with the wax, if you used a rock or a wagon to hit the pressure plate and set it off from a distance? Or in round 2, if you summoned a monster and sent it through the magical trap on the stairs to determine the effect, and if triggering it would remove it, or if it was automatic reset? Would that cause a point deduction (since you set it off), or a point bonus (since by doing so safely, you effectively disarmed it)?
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Jengenritz
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Post by Jengenritz »

It's like this:

1. In the specific example of the wax trap, we clever writers wrote bonuses in for setting the trap off safely. Speaking generally, we frequently look for ways (especially for 0-level heroes) to trigger effects without causing them harm, and give out points rewards accordingly.

2. The magic traps auto-reset on the stairs in round 2, as some teams discovered to their woe. Nothing would happen for triggering it with, say, a summoned earth elemental...the party did not "disarm" it, but neither did they really set it off. If the party then assumed the trap was discharged and subsequently blundered into it, they would lose points for setting it off, in addition to any other in-game penalties (like being turned into a daschund).

Hope that helps.
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Post by Hamakto »

I am another member of the Blood Kings...

We took Thoramir (Expert), Lyewyn (Aristocrat), Aminflost (Guard), and Tanlew (Adept).

I personally was Aminflost and became a HOLY terror in later rounds.

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Round 1
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When I did round one, I will have to say that I was not originally in love with the module. Partly because I was mentally beat up after that round. Where every action needs to be carefully measured to prevent a needless death.

But after sitting back and thinking about it (and eating some food), I have to say that it was a very enjoyable experience because it is something that you do not do very often and you have to call on a new skill set to survive. There is no... just do it and see what happens. You die.

We did OK except for two of the puzzles/traps where we just over thought or passed on the solution earlier. We did reach the final room in every round... but never got to finish the bad guy.

--------------
Round 2:
--------------
Our choice of characters (after they leveled up) caused us no end of changes to our tactics. We ended up with a Monk, Ranger (bow weapons), Cleric and Rogue. With no front ling fighter, the Monk had to step up and do his best not to get killed! With no Wizard... the Ranger became the king of ranged death.

But in the end this choice of characters proved key in several encounters in Round 2 and Round 3. In Round two the stunning attacks by the Monk prevented some of the bad guys from getting any actions off before we killed them.

In round 2... the plants were a killer encounter (literally). But the rest of the melee fights went very well for us and we took little to no damage in them. Something to be said for a non-standard party.

We did get to the last room in round 2... and had started to engage the bad guy... but time was called before anything decisive could be done.

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Round 3
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The shadow encounter was a suprise, but once again the Monk shined. His high touch AC and mobility allowed him to draw them out with AOO and the party eliminated them with minor threat. The Tree was held off by the Monk and the Ranger did death from range.

The Wurm was banished in the first round of combat by the Cleric (see posting above). Without the fighter and mage, the wurm would of seriously injured the party.

As noted above, we detected the traps on the portals and even disabled one of them. But the party still had to test them (*shakes his head*).

When we got the the final level through the trap door, we made a careful plan. Lets drag them to us and not get spread out.

So we rolled initiative... the monk won... and he charged ahead into combat!!! Doh! That is what happens after playing DnD for 12 hours that day... you forget the plans.

It all worked out for the better... we beat the bad guys. Did not disable the flying mechanism (we talked about it). And we started the fight against the big demon...

-----------

All in all a very good adventure arc. We will be back next year
Andy
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N'Haaz-aua
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Post by N'Haaz-aua »

Not getting to engage the last boss on each level is a contributing factor to why you advanced/won. You scored maximum room exploration points by engaging the boss, but ran out of time before they cleaned your clock and caused death penalties. Well done.
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Post by fathead »

The Blood Kings! About time you guys showed up! You steal all the glory, then don't stick around for the accolades! ;)

Seriously though...great job guys.
Celtar wrote: This would result in a 35% X 60 % or 21 % chance of dismissing the creature. I would say that this was worth a "hail Mary".... If everyone in the group had the spell, I would have wanted everyone to do it...
Smart thinking. Wish we'd thought of that. ;)
Hamakto wrote: I personally was Aminflost and became a HOLY terror in later rounds.
There were quite a few encounters where Aminflost would have been very useful.
Hamakto wrote:
Our choice of characters (after they leveled up) caused us no end of changes to our tactics.
This was one of the things that made this year's tourney very challenging. It required us to adapt and change tactics from one round to the next.
Hamakto wrote:
The Wurm was banished in the first round of combat by the Cleric (see posting above).
You missed out on the best "oh ****" moment of the 3rd round. That creature terrified us like nothing else in the tournament.
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Post by Rick Maffei »

fathead wrote:You missed out on the best "oh ****" moment of the 3rd round. That creature terrified us like nothing else in the tournament.
To quote a tiny part of an e-mail wherein I first mentioned the worm idea to Harley:
"...an encounter that is memorable, the sort where the players look at each other and say, “Oh !!%$#@!!” but they are smiling when they say it..."

Well done, Blood Kings and Clan Yeoman! :P
I'm glad between the shadows and the worm I could strike terror into a few hearts at least!
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Round 1

Post by Celtar »

N'Haaz-aua wrote:Not getting to engage the last boss on each level is a contributing factor to why you advanced/won. You scored maximum room exploration points by engaging the boss, but ran out of time before they cleaned your clock and caused death penalties. Well done.
I will say that in the first round we didn't actually run out of time, we made a choice to stop. The other 2 we pretty much ran out of time. I think that we would have killed the end guy in Round 3 without losses (although we wouldn't have killed him permanently). I have no idea about the 2nd round guy. We didn't get to see that much.
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Post by Celtar »

[quote="fathead"]The Blood Kings! About time you guys showed up! You steal all the glory, then don't stick around for the accolades! ;)

Seriously though...great job guys.

******************************************************

Thanks a bunch Dan! Obviously you guys did fantastic as well, finishing in 2nd this year & 1st last year... The repeats are not easy in the everchanging Goodman environment. Definitely an awesome tournament. I had a career D&D high in the 3rd round.... Keep in mind that I have been playing since I was about 12 & am 37 now....

Soon after Tanlew dismissed the purple worm and we went to fight the spinning top of death, Tanlew tried a flame strike on the chain holding it (rolled horrible for damage), and then tried a searing light (rolled well) which dropped the top! Woooohooooo!!!!

Those are the feelings you get while playing D&D that can't be recreated in any other games. Totally got psyched up at that point! .... Although it was put on hold for a bit... because right after to top drop, the spectre came out to play and hit me for 2 levels loss... That was panic time, because we all know that you can't have your medic sucking his thumb...

Todd
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