DoppleGanger Damacy Bootleg Redux! Quest (D&D 3.5/pathfinder)

[Vindictus]

Like dat Dex.

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And six arms.

 

[MrGazzer]

And six arms.

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...
Just realized.
At somepoint we can say
"We are a giant spider."

 

[Thomasfoolery]

[z] you can barely see anything, but you will hunt
[X] Dark Vision 60 Ft (EX) (Your eyes will grow larger.)

To get a link to a specific post just click on the

ReoppleGanger Damacy Bootleg Redux! Quest (D&D 3.5/pathfinder)

Link above it and you'll get something like

http://questionablequesting.com/index.php?topic=291.msg31828#msg31828

 

[mkire]

[z] you can barely see anything, but you will hunt
[X] Dark Vision 60 Ft (EX) (Your eyes will grow larger.)

To get a link to a specific post just click on the

ReoppleGanger Damacy Bootleg Redux! Quest (D&D 3.5/pathfinder)

Link above it and you'll get something like

http://questionablequesting.com/index.php?topic=291.msg31828#msg31828

Click to shrink...

thank you!

 

[nick012000]

[X] Plan Gazzer

 

[mkire]

[z] hunt
[z] darkvision
you writhe in agony, blind and unseeing as your eyes shift in your skull. it feels like ages pass before suddenly the pain ends, and you can see again. your new sight is strange, you see no color, but it does not seem to need any light. You are still hungry. you hunt for more spiders.

One as big as you springs out of the darkness, venom dripping from its fangs. What do you do?
[z] Eat
[z] Run
[z] give in to the hunger. Frenzy.
[z] hey sod, it looks like you're going to get put in the dead book, pay me the music and i'll help you geek them
[z] Write-in
---

So, umm, wow, the doppleganger is really fragile at the start, this update is brought to you by me not listening to the three sets of dice-rolls that say you get eaten by this encounter, and the one that says you win, but take 7 strength damage from poison, meaning you can barely move and die to the next thing to show up.

So i'm going to give you guys a choice of game mechanics or bonuses to add to the doppleganger, hopefully this will prevent 'encounter totally murders you, game over':
[z] Action Points (1d6 is added to any roll these are spent on, you can spend multiple action points on a single roll)
[z] Player participation gives bonuses to the 'ganger (Point buy stats pretty much, Every player gets two points they can put towards strength, dexterity, constitution, wisdom, intelligence, or charisma, continued participation gets more points)
[z] Lucky (the doppleganger gets two rerolls every time i write an update, I'll use them to prevent critical failures. Said failures are why the doppleganger in the SB thread has had a broken leg, and currently has a broken arm, damaged shoulder, and broken ankle.)
[z] Cunning (despite the doppleganger's mediocre intelligence, detailed write-ins will grant large bonuses to success.)
[z] Suggestion (PM me something you want that's in line with the previous offers and i'll consider it)

 

[MrGazzer]

[X]Eat
[X] Lucky (the doppleganger gets two rerolls every time i write an update, I'll use them to prevent critical failures. Said failures are why the doppleganger in the SB thread has had a broken leg, and currently has a broken arm, damaged shoulder, and broken ankle.)

 

[nick012000]

[X] Write-in: Grab its fang-limbs when it raises them to attack, then eat its face.
[X] Cunning.

 

[mkire]

I'll wait until tonight (~12 hours from now), before calling the vote. Ties are decided by DM whimsy

 

[TheOtherSandman]

[X] Write-in: Grab its fang-limbs when it raises them to attack, then eat its face.
[X] Player participation gives bonuses.

 

[iamnuff]

[X]Eat
[X] Lucky (the doppleganger gets two rerolls every time i write an update, I'll use them to prevent critical failures. Said failures are why the doppleganger in the SB thread has had a broken leg, and currently has a broken arm, damaged shoulder, and broken ankle.)

 

[mkire]

so another tie on what to do, with lucky winning for 'holy shit, this is going to murder you, here's something that hopefully will prevent getting murdered'

 

[mkire]

Votes? I don't want to flip a coin or use GM Whimsy, but i will if this tie persists. Come on, I know there's at least ten people interested in this thread, that many different people posted in it.

 

[MrGazzer]

Its a clear thing for Lucky, and I'll switch to the write in.

 

[MrGazzer]

Boop.
Tie is broken, waiting on you.

 

[mkire]

[x] Grab its fang-limbs when it raises them to attack, then kill it. (Grapple!)
[x] Lucky

You grab for its fangs when it moves towards you, only to misjudge their location. It bites you in the shoulder and you can feel a burning sensation in your muscles. there's a sudden weakness in you that prevents you from landing an effective blow against the hard chitin of the spider's legs. it bites you again and you lose consciousness, followed by your life.
---

So the forest is high-risk, high-reward, and this time it murdered you. If you count the number of times i said 'i don't want this game to end in the second update' and reran the encounter, the forest murdered you thirteen times. Nick's plan of 'Cunning' and 'clever write-in' would have worked, but no one besides him voted for the cunning part.

 

[MrGazzer]

Can we take it from the top?

 

[mkire]

restarting is an option

 

[nick012000]

[X] Restart, go after some squirrels or small birds to get our Dex up, and pick up Weapon Finesse, along with alternate movement speeds and Scent.

 

[MrGazzer]

[X] Restart, go after some squirrels or small birds to get our Dex up, and pick up Weapon Finesse, along with alternate movement speeds and Scent.

 

[mkire]

so you guys want to restart in the forest? or would you prefer an even higher-risk, higher-reward environment like a jungle?

 

[iamnuff]

[x] Grab its fang-limbs when it raises them to attack, then kill it. (Grapple!)
[x] Lucky

You grab for its fangs when it moves towards you, only to misjudge their location. It bites you in the shoulder and you can feel a burning sensation in your muscles. there's a sudden weakness in you that prevents you from landing an effective blow against the hard chitin of the spider's legs. it bites you again and you lose consciousness, followed by your life.
---

So the forest is high-risk, high-reward, and this time it murdered you. If you count the number of times i said 'i don't want this game to end in the second update' and reran the encounter, the forest murdered you thirteen times. Nick's plan of 'Cunning' and 'clever write-in' would have worked, but no one besides him voted for the cunning part.

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if the quest managed to kill us 13 times by the second post, then you probably need to rethink your quest set up.

unless you were going for "stupidly hard" mode.

 

[MrGazzer]

Forest is Hard Mode.
Jungle is SUPER FUCKING HARD MODE.

Forest again.

 

[iamnuff]

Forest is Hard Mode.
Jungle is SUPER FUCKING HARD MODE.

Forest again.

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is it a matter of hard-mode? or is it just a poorly built quest method?

I mean, if i was playing a table-top game like D&D or something, and my first random encounter instantly killed me, with 13 rerolls, then I would need to seriously rethink my character, or take a much deeper look at how the game is built, because something is obviously broken.


was the monster we stumbled into just too high level for us?
That would explain the repeated failures, no matter how many rerolls you give, a lvl 1 fighter isn't going to be able to take a dragon, but then again, forcing a level 1 commoner to fight a dragon on his first trip out of the village is probably the sign of a poorly built game, or a poor DM.

or did we just roll 13 fumbles against a kobold?

its hard to say where the problem was exactly, without more information, like how strong the spider actually was, but the fact that we managed to die 13 times, is probably a sign that rolling another character without changing anything is will just end the same way.

unless the GM is already quietly reworking the quest mechanics in the background, then just ignore me.

 

[mkire]

is it a matter of hard-mode? or is it just a poorly built quest method?

I mean, if i was playing a table-top game like D&D or something, and my first random encounter instantly killed me, with 13 rerolls, then I would need to seriously rethink my character, or take a much deeper look at how the game is built, because something is obviously broken.


was the monster we stumbled into just too high level for us?
That would explain the repeated failures, no matter how many rerolls you give, a lvl 1 fighter isn't going to be able to take a dragon, but then again, forcing a level 1 commoner to fight a dragon on his first trip out of the village is probably the sign of a poorly built game, or a poor DM.

or did we just roll 13 fumbles against a kobold?

its hard to say where the problem was exactly, without more information, like how strong the spider actually was, but the fact that we managed to die 13 times, is probably a sign that rolling another character without changing anything is will just end the same way.

unless the GM is already quietly reworking the quest mechanics in the background, then just ignore me.

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Part of it is that the doppleganger starts off really weak. another is that the forest's encounter table includes bears, wolves, boars, Lots of things that're likely to kill a lone character, and again, the Doppleganger is pretty weak to begin with, so something that'd have a fair chance of killing a lone fighter will likely murder the doppleganger.

the SB version has had trouble because they're not acting like a predator with human level intelligence, they haven't once asked 'hey, can we loot the body for stuff?' or 'can we find a place to wash off all this blood and gore that's an obvious marker to anything that sees us that we've killed somebody?'

You are right that the doppleganger might be too weak at start, especially out of the default starting area of a city's slums, which is why i offered the choice of bonus mechanics. In this case: Lucky wasn't as good as i thought it would be, it was actually the weakest of the choices offered.

Had the Point-buy option been chosen, the four people who voted could have made the dopple's strength go from 8 to 14 and still have two points left over, If everyone who's ever voted in this thread had come back to say 'put my points in a physical attribute' the doppleganger could have had 14 str, 14 dex, 14 con, and two points left over, or gotten an 18 in str and had 4 points left over.

Action points/cunning: Both of these have similar effects, but differences in how they work mechanically.
[x] Action points: The players would have to elect to spend these, but when they did it would be possible to use enough to ensure victory in that instance, though it might mean they'd burned through all their action points to do so.
[x] Cunning: With a clever plan and cunning by your side, i'd step back from the dice and weigh how likely it is to work and then write it out.


In summary: I made some mistakes, i still want to run this game, suggestions on how to make it better?

 

[nick012000]

Let us go after squirrels, birds, and similar little woodland critters before you pit us up against giant spiders and wolves?

 

[mkire]

Let us go after squirrels, birds, and similar little woodland critters before you pit us up against giant spiders and wolves?

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there was a option that would've seen you through that encounter, though i noticed no one took it even after i said 'wow, this murders you, have something so hopefully this doesn't happen in the future'. Running from it would have seen you safely away.

 

[MrGazzer]

So running is a perfectly okay option.
Noted.

 

[iamnuff]

So running is a perfectly okay option.
Noted.

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we never actually considered that, did we?


also, exactly how human do we look?


i assume that as a "doppleganger" we could pass for human, but I seem to remember a post mentioning claws?

i'd check, but its 3am and i'm naptime now.

 

[mkire]

we never actually considered that, did we?
also, exactly how human do we look?
i assume that as a "doppleganger" we could pass for human, but I seem to remember a post mentioning claws?
i'd check, but its 3am and i'm naptime now.

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you look like the picture i posted in the character sheet, and as a mutant doppleganger, you've lost your shapeshifting powers for the ability to eat stuff and take on a trait that the thing you ate had in life.