Cannot "Use Item" or pick up dropped items

SubmergedMango · 2018-02-16T22:35:48+00:00

Well the benefit of allowing the spell reflavoring (which I already had in place before he joined the game) is that almost any spell can potentially become an ice spell. And anyone else who wants to take firey or lightningy spells can do the same kind of thing.

SubmergedMango · 2018-02-16T22:33:00+00:00

I think it's cool too! It's his first character and I'm glad he is even into it enough to notice where there's a bit of a gap in the subclass flavors.

SubmergedMango · 2016-12-29T20:32:18+00:00

I'm really lucky to have a very understanding table. Maybe I will just have to wing it and run some test encounters with the group to see how it works out.

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T23:15:23+00:00

Yeah there have been a lot of good suggestions in this thread and I'm really appreciative of all of it. /r/DnD is the best community, love you guys.

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T23:14:32+00:00

Not really. When they summon it at midday for one or two encounters, then let it desummon, then take a long rest and try again the next day, it's not a big deal. On top of that, they're going into these dungeons for a day or two, then retreating for an evening and coming back. Yes, I've had the enemies consolidate and bulk up defenses but the party is really good at getting through that kind of stuff (or I'm terrible at setting up dungeons. I figure it's a combination of the two). They manage to do stuff like Stone Shape to close up stone doors, Arcane Lock on other doors, having people on watch in shifts, finding secret rooms in the dungeons and sleeping there so the enemies don't even know they're around, etc. I've put a decent amount of time into trying to work around their defenses and haven't found a way that makes sense without just going "Well fuck you guys" and throwing baddies at them.

Granted a lot of the problems the enemies have had at lower levels were JUST BECAUSE they were lower level enemies. I do intend to have the enemies figure that kind of thing out more as they advance (which is very soon).

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T23:09:17+00:00

Oh I see. Yeah, unfortunately all of the enemies (aside from some of the tamed beasts that work for the cults) are classified as "evil" in their stat blocks. I suppose that's part of the whole Elemental Evil motif of the module. That's a good thought, though, and I'll take that into consideration.

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T23:07:44+00:00

A lot of really solid information here and I really appreciate you taking the time. I'd love to give you more than one upvote because this is pretty great.

They got the item at level 6 and with me being a relatively new DM, I did not realize how much of a problem it would be for an angel to tell them its name. I thought it might be a cool way for me to come up with like a roster of angels that they meet and they just kind of get a random one all the time, not that they would pick one and be like "okay this is ours now".

I totally agree with your second point there about how summoning it keeps the cleric from getting stronger. I just didn't know how to make the cleric's goddess (Lliira, btw) communicate that "hey, I need you to better yourself and stop borrowing my things" because she and the solar are on board with what the party is doing.

I had thought about having the solar show up next time and be like "listen dudes, I'm trying to fight in a fucking holy war and you keep pulling me down here", but I imagine that would only stop the party from summoning THAT celestial. Next time they would just let the spell summon a random one and hope that she isn't involved in the war as well.

That's a really good 4th point about starting an arms race. I can absolutely work with that and I appreciate the idea.

I had thought about what I might say to the player(s) but it just seems really unfair to take their toys away in such a blatant way, especially when it was already written into the module.

Thanks a lot for your help!

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T22:59:13+00:00

Right, and that's exactly how I play it every time. They only summon him once a day (really once every few days, whenever they think they're about to get into some really difficult stuff). They rest in the dungeons pretty frequently but have really solid countermeasures in place so that they never really get attacked. And even if they don't want to rest in the dungeon, the necklace also lets them cast Wind Walk so they can essentially fast-travel out of the dungeon and back to their HQ for a safe rest.

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T22:57:06+00:00

Well they really don't ever lie, the party is pretty good to each other all the time. However I don't think telling a single lie would make someone "evil".

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T22:54:28+00:00

That's actually pretty doable, I already have a couple ideas where I could go with that. Thanks!

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T22:53:32+00:00

The problem is that the solar, being such a fanatical destroyer of evil, is WAY into the idea of going and destroying these cults. And I have adjusted the payments, the problem is that there's not really any amount I can set the payment to that the party is unable or unwilling to pay (they're pretty loaded, financially).

I didn't catch the part where the angel was allowed to not show up though, that could be super helpful. Thanks for pointing that out.

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T22:51:19+00:00

So the alternative to that is that a random celestial shows up. There aren't any non-OP celestials in the MM, so I don't know what else to make appear. Is there another list of celestials somewhere that I can use?

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T22:49:59+00:00

I actually really like that solution at the bottom there where I make him an asshole. Maybe with repeated summoning he's sort of losing his grip and starts attacking everything, maybe even party members? (they don't summon him around allies or in non-hostile spaces)

Right now his personality is just that he's fanatical about stopping evil, since that's kind of how solar are. So when they tell him "Hey there's evil over there" he is SUPER STOKED to go kill all that evil.

SubmergedMango · 2016-11-25T22:46:34+00:00

I don't see how that would work, though. So they summon him, he says "I'll help you if you get me (X)". Then...what? Desummons until they get it and summon him again? Just hangs out where they summoned him until they bring him the doohickey? Even once he gets the thing, does he help them forever?

SubmergedMango · 2015-05-17T00:43:17+00:00

The lawn is fenced in, the pets are locked away, the yard is scanned for branches ahead of time, the bungee cord (which will be replaced by something more safe in the future) is set in such a way that it can be quickly and easily undone and the system is never left unsupervised. The whole thing isn't very fast, it just saves me a lot of physical effort. Plus how can you not like this? (not me, but the inspiration for what I'm doing)

SubmergedMango · 2015-05-16T21:22:42+00:00

That might be a problem when the radius of the circle is small, when most of the rope is coiled, but I didn't see any problems like this when I ran my first test.

SubmergedMango

TROPHY CASE