I've decided to run something of a trial campaign in an attempt to see how a Tabletop RPG would work in a forum setting, as I've personally never seen it. It will be fairly short, but if it goes well, I'll run a longer, much more in-depth campaign on here. I'll be using the rules of Pathfinder, so if you aren't familiar with the rules of it, ask me and I'll do my best to explain everything i can about it to you. For all information you need about pathfinder, refer to this. Please note that there is third party content listed, so if you'd like to use a class or feat, or anything listed that says third party, ask me beforehand. FAQ Spoiler: What is Pathfinder? Pathfinder is a spiritual successor to Dungeons and Dragons (3rd edition), published by Paizo. As such, it'll play very similar to D&D if you've ever played it before. Be warned, Pathfinder play does involve a significant amount of reading, upwards of 50-100 pages of content (or its equivalent, should you choose to utilize the wiki). I will do my utmost to explain and condense it as much as possible. For those of you who have played Pathfinder before: Please be aware that this is a play-by-post setting, and a trial one at that, so bear with me if there are some technical issues to begin with. If you have experience with play-by-post and are willing to assist me, please let me know. Spoiler: Can i use any third party content? Yes. I'm not banning it, only asking you run it by me first. If it's not third party, you can use it. Spoiler: What is an alignment? An alignment is a system to determine the morality of a character. It consists of two spectrums, ranging from Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic. As well as Good, Neutral, and Evil. One of each is taken to determine your alignment. For example, an upholder of all that is just and righteous would be Lawful Good. One who revels in carnage and destruction would be Chaotic Evil. If both spectrums are neutral, then your alignment becomes True Neutral. Spoiler: What does it mean when it says something is a "class skill"? Class skills are skills that you are inherently better at because you are that class. If a skill is your class skill, you gain a +3 bonus to it. Spoiler: How do i determine the bonus an ability score gives me? 10 is the average a normal person has in that respective attribute, and thus is a +0 and is used as the starting point for determining bonuses. For every two about ten, you gain an additional bonus. 12 is a +1, 14 is a +2, 16 is a +3, etc. If your scores is lower than ten however, you gain a minus. At each odd number beneath ten, it is reduced. 9 is a -1, 7 is a -2, 5 is a -3, and so on. Spoiler: How do criticals work? When you are making an attack roll, if the natural result of the dice, before modifiers, is within your critical threat range, you have guaranteed that the attack will hit. In addition, you make the same attack roll once more. If they roll passes the AC, then you have confirmed your critical hit and will deal additional damage, possibly with additional effects depending on feats you may have. Inversely, if you roll a natural 1, you have guaranteed that you will miss. You must make the attack roll again, and if it does not pass, you have critically failed and will have negative consequences. Spoiler: What is an Attack of Opportunity? Certain actions, such as running past an enemy or casting spells while near them, will let your guard down and as such, the enemy will be able to make an attack against you as a result. Although the reverse is also true. If the enemy performs such a reckless action, then you will be able to take advantage of their moment of vulnerability. Under normal circumstances, any given combatant can only make one attack of opportunity per round, but this can be increased by various means. Spoiler: What is a “D20”? It’s an abbreviation for a type of die. When D is followed by a number, such as d20, or d6, it is referring to the type of die. A d6 is a six-sided die, whereas a d20 is a twenty-sided die. Building a Character: Building a character is something of an extensive process, so I'll go through step by step and explain everything you need to know. Spoiler: Name This is the name of your character. I know, right? And just wait, we haven't even gotten to the really crazy stuff yet: Spoiler: Age Your age. Note that the average age may differ from race to race. Spoiler: Gender Male or Female Spoiler: Race Refer to the wiki to select your race. Note that this does have an effect on your gameplay Spoiler: Appearance What do you look like? Description or images are acceptable, but images are preferable so i can make tokens out of them for combat Spoiler: Alignment Your Morality. For the moment, must be Neutral or Good. Lawful, Neutral, and Chaotic are all accepted. Spoiler: Deity Only certain classes will this have an impact for. You, in most cases, do not actually need to fill this in, though it may help with flavor. refer to the wiki for a list of deities. Spoiler: Class Each time you level up, you can put the level into a class. More often than not they will all be in the same class, but you are capable of putting them into multiple if you so desire. Though, since we'll be starting at level 1 for the moment, that's kind of irrelevant for now. Refer to the wiki for a list of classes Spoiler: HP Your health. To determine your HP, look at the "Hit Die" for your class. Roll it, and add your constitution modifier to the result. The result is the HP you gain for that level. For the first level, always treat the die as the highest possible result. Spoiler: Ability scores These are the six attributes of your character. They are divided into three physical (Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution), and three Mental (Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma). In order to obtain your ability scores, take four d6, or six-sided die, and roll them. Out of those four, discard the lowest result and add up the remaining three. The total is the number you use for one ability score. Repeat this for the remaining five, but note that they do not have to be assigned in order. Strength does not have to be the first result, and Charisma does not have to be the last. Roll all six before you begin to assign them. Ability scores can be modified in several ways beyond this. Racial bonuses may increase or decrease certain ability scores, Magic Items or spells may add to certain ability scores, and every four levels you can increase one of them by one naturally. Spoiler: Saving throws These are your ability to resist effects on you. They are sorted into Fortitude, Reflex, and Will. Each class has a base bonus to each of these at each level, which can be found on the page for it. In addition to this, your Constitution modifier is added to Fortitude, your Dexterity modifier is added to Reflex, and your Wisdom modifier is added to Will. Spoiler: Armor Class Often shortened to AC. This is a means of determining how difficult you are to hit. Be it because of protections from your armor or because your dexterity allows you to evade attacks. Your base AC is 10, and your armor bonus and maximum dexterity bonus from your armor is added. Spoiler: Gold The amount of money you have. Your starting wealth will be 500 GP to spend on gear and such Spoiler: Weapons Your means of killing things that you don't want to be alive anymore. Refer to the wiki for a list of weapons. Spoiler: Armor Your armor will add to your armor class, but it may come with restrictions based on how heavy the armor is, and your class chosen. Refer to the wiki for a list of armors Spoiler: Magic Items and other equipment Anything that is not weapons and armor you have on your person goes here Spoiler: Skills Skills may not be what you initially suspect they are. Skills are your capabilities outside of combat. Examples are crafting, Perception, Knowledge on various subjects, among many other things. A list of skills can be found on the wiki. Each level, you gain a number of skill points based on your class plus your intelligence modifier. Each point put into a skill increases the bonus you gain when attempting to use it by 1. You cannot put more points into any one skill beyond your character level, or your total level among of your classes. Spoiler: Feats Feats are a representation of your character's abilities and traits, often tricks that your character has accumulated over training, or traits that your character has inherited from ancestry. Whatever the case, feats make up the backbone of any character, defining their identity and empowering them. Any character gains a feat at every odd level, and some classes grant bonus feats. Refer to the wiki for a list of feats Spoiler: Spells Certain classes rely on magic to turn the tide of battle in their favor. Spells are limited by the number of slots a class is limited to. As a wizard, think of spells as cards that you choose from a deck. Once used, they are expended for that day. This is called prepared casting. Sorcerer's have a hand of cards that they can play from, but the spell is not expended upon use. This is called spontaneous casting. Arcanists have a full deck of cards, and choose several of them to be their hand for that day, and then act as a sorcerer. Arcanists are the only class that use this method of casting. Each spellcasting class has its own list of spells which it can learn from. Spoiler: Character Sheet Name: Age: Gender: Race: Appearance: Alignment: Deity: Class: HP: Strength: Dexterity: Constitution: Intelligence: Wisdom: Charisma: Fortitude: Reflex: Will: Armor Class: Gold: 500 Weapons: Armor: Magic Items and other equipment: Skills: Feats: Spells:
As long as i still get my job... I literally almost threw the fight for that
Boy, the world's one river, and I'm its king. Ain't no place I ain't been before, ain't no place I can't go again.
you know it ;)
I will crawl my way through the RPA one monthly post at a time
As they reached their destination, Beuce saw the white cloaked figure they'd met in symphony of sorcery who had given them the final note. If he was taking the cornerstone, then his suspicions had been correct after all. Beuce's eyes narrowed into a glare as the dreamer said some rather odd things. Follow the beacon when they were lost in darkness...what..? The words rang through Beuce's mind again and again but he couldn't make sense of them. This seemed like way too late into the game for a bluff. They'd basically already won. So why would he say something like that now of all times? While Beuce's thoughts raced, the man disappeared along with the thing they'd come to retrieve, leaving the world to its fate. Accompanying it was a masked man who looked like he was a solid mass of concentrated muscle appeared. Aux. Aux simply furthered his confusion when he claimed that the man had no affiliation with them. His threats to Hikaru and Kaida were more than Beuce was willing to stand for, but he wasn't stupid. He knew when he was outmatched. He hadn't fought Aux himself, but he'd fought Nequa. If he was anything even close to her, then all of them together likely wouldn't be able to so much dirty his armor at their full strength. In their weakened state, they didn't stand a ghost of a chance. Glen and Raisor had both tried to fight him, but to no avail. It was like flies trying to bring down a behemoth. Implying that the former was really weak and couldn't really do much offensively and the latter in addition to being really strong just as a base was a total unknown and they had zero idea what to expect out of it. Beuce took in a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Son of a *****. He was going to have to do it. He turned his head to Stratos momentarily. "Hey. Do me a favor and shut your eyes for a second? I'm about to look stupid." With that, his legs carried him forward into what was certain to be quite the ass whooping. He managed to duck under the sweeping arm blow which came to hit him in the temple, but that far from won him the fight. He drove his fist at Aux's chest, but the man made no move to avoid it. Not because he couldn't, but because he didn't need to. He may as well have been hitting a brick wall. Beuce wasn't normally weak by any stretch, but this was unnatural. He knew that it wasn't purely due to Aux's defenses, though that likely played a part in it. They'd lost more than their keyblades. They'd lost everything. The next blow he wasn't quite so nimble with. A fist that looked approximately the size of a mountain crash into his face. Funnily enough, it felt like one too. Blood instantly flew from the sundered skin on Beuce's face. He stumbled backwards, only just barely managing to retain his footing. Saying he hit like a truck was insulting to the amount of force behind that one blow. Aux didn't stop there. Blow after blow crashed into Beuce as he was pushed further back and finally onto the ground, where a massive foot knocked the wind out of his lungs. Aux backed off at this point, allowing Beuce to struggle to his feet and come at him again. It wouldn't be quite accurate to say that the futility of the matter had just set in. He'd perfectly understood how hopeless a fight it was from the very beginning. He looked up at the sky. The ever growing vortex of darkness that would bring the world to its doom loomed over their heads. He hadn't seen this sight quite exactly before, but it wasn't entirely dissimilar to Atreia's death. It hadn't been darkness that killed it, but it had died all the same. As if in a final act of desperation, Beuce summoned his will inside him. Though, nothing happened. Of course nothing happened. The Empyrean Lords were dead. The world which they'd held domain over with them. His power was nulled. He had no wings to take him to freedom. As he stared into the black sky, a thought struck him. He couldn't help but chuckle at the absurdity of it. It was a gamble, to say the least. He had to put the entirety of his trust, along with the lives of him and all his friends in the hands of a complete stranger who was still of questionable allegiance with extremely ambiguous instructions. "I've had worse plans...They worked too." He muttered to himself, before looking back to Aux. "Congratulations, you've beaten us here. Proven yourself to your master, but just one thing. When you go back to No Heart, give him a message." Beuce weakly raised his finger toward the sky. "Tell him that we're not finished. We're going to go into that black void and rip it apart from the inside out. If our hearts were reset, all that means is we need to earn our power again. And when we come clawing out of there, we're coming for him. Not you, Nequa, or anyone else will be able to stand in our way. " With that, the darkness drew him into the sky.
Beuce honestly couldn't say he was overly worried about this "Maleficent." After all, They'd seen the power no heart could give his henchmen, and the blew Mortimer right out of the water. She might've been powerful, but she obviously paled in comparison to the threat they already knew about. Still, another opposing force was the last thing they needed right now. They were honestly at the ends of their ropes. With the order gone, Eraqus missing, Yen Sid petrified, they were running out of allies quickly. When Horace's guise was revealed, Beuce silently cursed to himself. "Witches...Why did it have to be witches?" When suddenly the reason why he had a profound hatred for witches came into effect. Just like the last witch they encountered, she sealed away their keyblades. However...This was different. He felt...Empty. Everything he had was gone. He couldn't remember how to perform any kind of attack, cast any spell, Use any job. anything he'd trained for and gained throughout their journey had vanished at the mere flick of a wrist. "This is bad..." As the events unfolded further, people were turned into gems one by one, and heartless began to overrun the town. So even this place fell it seemed...Typical. They brought nothing but ruin wherever they went. In any case, their only chance was to get to the Cornerstone. If they could somehow fix that, they might be able to fix everything here. So, Beuce turned and began to break for the castle. He doubted they'd get another windfall if they messed this one up.
Don't worry, just act natural.
Given that the boss fight was now over, i'm going to assume that space contorted itself so the two groups were together. Beuce chimed in after Karina. "How exactly do we do that again? I barely understand how we got here. Hell, I don't think HE understands how we got here." He said, gesturing to Mortimer. Beuce made a gesture that seemed like it would've been crossing his arms, but he just kind of folded on arm over his chest and held out his stump. Dammit. He couldn't remember anything that happened before the bloticle fight. As though it were a year ago. Maybe the answer lied somewhere in there..."Anyone got any ideas?"
Beuce used a mega-potion
Beuce felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see the blonde woman looking up at him, dead in the eye. He smiled as she thanked him for healing her. "No problem! Any ti- AAAAAAAHHHHHh" Beuce cried out as he was turned into a living projectile to combat a dragon. God. This is like the time that Karina almost killed luna by throwing her at Arma. Like, actually, what the fuck? Who sees a giant creature of monstrous strength and thinks "Oh i'll just throw my teammate at it and hope they survive probably it'll work out fine." Yeah, brilliant ideas all around. Well turns out it was a fine idea because as he rammed into the dragon, he got off a considerably good punch at its neck. Wait...Its neck...As Beuce was falling, an epiphany hit him. If he could summon that cat...Then it could deal with the dragon in no time. He raised up his arm and called forth power to do what needed to be done. That is to say, he created a ball of electricity and began to ride on the rail which formed from it, as summoning the cheshire cat was just as likely to kill all of them as it was to aid them in any way and was a terrible idea.
Their assault had nearly finished the rat off, but he had a surprise of his own in store. Out of seemingly nowhere, an enormous dragon rose up and began to assault them with fire. Though the rain from Kaida's reality marble had indeed quelled the heat of the flames, if they didn't finish this quickly then it would spell trouble for them. That being said, Stratos was looking worse for the wear, Kaida had been knocked unconscious, and glen wasn't doing to well either. The only reason he'd be relatively unscathed is because Stratos had taken the blows for him. In order to get the party back up, Beuce took matters into his own hand. He stepped up toward the dragon, then turned around to face the party. In order to heal them, he began to dance. He went through the motions perfectly, and must have known the dance through and through. However, since one of his limbs happened to be absent from the performance, he simply waved around a small stump whenever the dance would've called for the use of his right arm. Needless to say, this added a certain touch to it. It was hand down the best dance that wasteland had ever seen. Beuce used Break Time
Avatar: 7 Signature: 6
Why not
Don't tell me what to do i'll miss it if i want!
LORDY LORDY I SAY THAT THIS MAN RIGHT HERE WITH THE POWAH OF HIS FAITH I SAID HIS FAIIITH SLAPPED HIS HAND ONTO THE GROUND AND MY GOD FROM HEAVEN ABOVE BEAMS OF LIGHT CAME SHOOTIN DOWN LIKE STARS AND THE PLOWED RIGHT INTO THAT SINNER OF A MOUSE AND BEAT THE DEVIL RIGHT OUTTA HIM
Throwing the flute to the ground after having perfectly recited the glory of techno on it. He decided he no longer needed these petty tools. His voice was the only instrument he'd ever need. Placing his singular hand onto his chest, Beuce opened his lips and let out a sound that not many could fully comprehend the beauty of. A perfect translation did not exist. Well at least not in your language, but if you must know, well picture this. Fifty billion rainbows and the sun is setting and the moon is setting also and you're there in a gazebo and then God descends from heaven and he gives you a million dollars. Take that feeling and put it into a song. I could translate, but that'd take too long. I've got stuff to do. I don't have time for this. you gotta trust me, this freaking song is brilliant. Musical Mastery: 28/30 pieces
Beuce grabbed a flute and pressed it to his lips with one hand. He began to play a song. A song which many had heard before. In fact, if you'd ever heard any song, this was probably its title. Especially if you asked what it was in some kind of comment section or something. It started off quiet with dodo do dodo do do do do do do Do do do do do do do do and then it picked up with a Do Do Do Do Dodododo....Dodododo...Dodododo dodododo dodododo dododododododo and it built up to a dodododo dodododo dododoDodo dodododododo do dodododo Do dodododo dododododDododododo Dododododadodododo
Beuce, now that he'd finished doing exactly what the others were doing, picked up a triangle. Just a triangle. Now, how does one play a triangle with one arm, you ask? Hell, how does one play the majority of these with one hand? Luckily for Beuce he was a GRANDMASTER GENIUS EXTRAORDINAIRE and hadn't been helping for the first ten posts because he was inventing one handed versions of all the instruments present so he could play them. And so, he began to play his one handed triangle. I could explain the inner workings of such an advanced device but it would likely be lost on you. Musical Mastery: 12/30 pieces
Having successfully failed at playing the classic rocker instrument, the guitar, Stratos Beuce then moved on to getting to fail at some other instrument. The drums. They were also a classic that he could horribly butcher. Walking over to a set of them that were just floating about, he took the drumsticks in hand and started to play a mighty fierce beat. Which obviously meant tapping the sticks together followed by striking the instrument with the sticks like a madman. Given that Stratos Beuce had barely any LOTS AND LOTS OF strength to speak of, it was no surprise that the drums didn't break under this frantic, random and consistent pummeling of the instrument. However, that did not mean that they didn't produce noise, and a noise that would destroy the rat's ears simply from hearing the discordant rhythm and sharp sounds that made zero sense. Musical Mastery: 7/30 pieces
