Jason recaps the events from Agents of Edgewatch S1|24: You’ve Got A Friend On Me.

My internal chronometer was thrown off a little by this week’s episode. I generally thought we jumped in more quickly, and SPECIFICALLY, I thought we had a special guest performer for Sharky from the moment we ventured into the basement. So some of the column I was writing in my head will have to wait for next time. Oh well.

I don’t want to beat a dead horse, but the big thing this week is Steve allowing us to take a long rest and level up. Strictly speaking, it’s not rules-compliant, but it is what it is. The usual ebb and flow of Pathfinder generally assumes an adventuring party that can proceed at its own pace; it’s a system that just doesn’t always handle being on a clock gracefully. And it’s not just the “cops” setting or even a Pathfinder issue; it was even an issue to a lesser extent back in Dead Suns as well, where we had infiltrated the enemy flagship and then holed up in a storage closet for 8 hours.

But what are the other options, really? The realism of the campaign breaks down entirely if you just shut down a hot pursuit for 24 hours (imagine being on the tail of Ted Bundy and just deciding to take a day off…), and if you “call for backup” and let other officers help you, your party members are relegated to supporting actors in their own story which doesn’t make you feel very heroic.

So Steve came up with the best compromise he could, which means we’re level 4 and fully rested. Really the big change for Basil was bowing to reality and taking Battle Medicine – that gives us a few chances to make those heal scrolls and potions last a little longer. I also took a wizard archetype feat that will EVENTUALLY give me first, second, and third-level spell slots… but for now, just a single first-level spell. So… add one blast of Color Spray to my arsenal.

Incidentally, this character is REALLY forcing me to rethink how I analyze spell choices. To summarize, the wizard archetype gets two spells (though they can still learn spells from other sources), and can only have one slotted at each level. Somewhere in the teens, there’s a feat you can take to get an additional spell slot, but for now, one spell per level is all I get. Under those constraints, I’m pretty much choosing for utility. I’m not going to say ZERO offensive spells, but I’m looking at stuff that hits multiple targets or has a duration or SOMETHING that makes it stand out over a single-target ping. In the grand scheme, a spell that deals 20 or 30 points of damage is a drop in the bucket, but if I can give Dougie and Lo Mang flat-footed for multiple rounds, that has legs. At later levels, I may even move toward non-combat options like Invisibility, Comprehend Languages, and other tools that will help the investigative side of the house.

But for today, Color Spray it is. USE IT IN HEALTH.

Next up is the recruitment of Sharky, which is another bit of rule-bending that I’m just going to chalk up to “good radio”. On one hand, Sharky DID critical fail against Seth’s intimidation, so that DOES mean he’ll be pretty compliant. (Strictly speaking, Gomez “controls” him for a week now.) On the other hand, I still think asking it to risk life and limb to go fight creatures would represent a greater danger than anything Seth’s intimidation implies, so maybe Sharky should get a new save or something.

The long and short of it is that one can come up with a rules reason why it’s a dumb idea, and I wouldn’t even argue it too strenuously. But from a standpoint of making things FUN, it’s an absolute winner. It introduces a new dynamic to combat, it makes the party a bit more survivable, and as you’re going to hear next week, it lets us bring some old friends back into the fold for a visit.

So for the immediate future, bring it on. The Avengers have a Hulk; we have a mimic. Though Basil’s going to be keeping one eye on him the whole time.

Which brings us to a little bit of a dilemma. You’ll remember a few weeks back I wrote about feeling a little frustrated about the teasing at Basil’s expense. (The jokes about the fingers resembling worms.) Yet this week, I was pretty much doing it to myself: jokes about Basil “tasting like chicken”, jokes about Basil being distracted by shiny objects. So what’s the difference that makes this time OK?

I think it comes down to two things, though maybe they’re two aspects of the same basic thing. First, I think most of the teasing was about my character’s actions, not the character itself. Setting aside Basil, another thing I’ve noticed about when we tease each other is that it’s usually based on things we DO: Chris always demanding healing, John playing a tanky character, and then complaining about having to actually trade blows and take damage. In this case, I CHOSE to play Basil as wary of Sharky’s intentions; that was a roleplaying choice on my part, so I can’t really fault other people for then reacting to that roleplay choice as they see fit. If their response is to pile on and make jokes about Basil looking like a good snack or whatever… I kinda invited that reaction. Also, I think there’s something about self-deprecating humor… it’s easier to laugh along with something when you’re making the jokes yourself.

So we head down into the basement – for real this time – and we face off against the pickled punks, which has the feel of a classic “stretch your legs at a new level” fight. Paizo tends to put these fights in their adventures; they know roughly when people are going to level, so they usually give you a fairly easy fight out of the gate to figure out how the new tools work before throwing anything too difficult at you. The punks don’t hit that hard with their initial attacks, and don’t even have THAT many hit points (a little more than a one-shot, but most of them didn’t last more than two hits); the only real danger there is the persistent damage if you leave them attached for too many rounds (or get too many of them on you at once). But we manage the fight fairly effectively, and it’s pretty much a walk in the park.

So… the rest of Murder Hotel’s Inner Torture Sanctum is going to be that easy too, right? Please?

Guess we’ll find out next week. As always, feel free to drop by our Discord channel or other social media and let us know what you think of the show. Thanks for listening and we’ll see you next week… with a very special plus-one!

Jason recaps the events from Agents of Edgewatch S1|23: Kill It With Fire!

How’s that for cutting it close?

This week we have to deal with the continuing dilemma of how far to push ourselves. We begin the episode with Ralso trapped in the attic as far as we know. I guess she could be a rogue and be an expert climber, but at first glance, it didn’t seem there were any windows up in that attic. In fact, I thought there was some discussion of piling furniture in front of the door and just leaving her there. Maybe I’m remembering it wrong, or maybe Steve cut that bit for time, but I could’ve sworn it came up as an idea.

But basically, we’re ALMOST out of healing. Even going into the battle, Seth had no spells left and was down to one or two scrolls. I’ll admit I don’t remember who had or hadn’t used their badge at that point – I think I used mine, and I kinda remember Lo Mang using his. There are still a few uses of Battle Medicine left, but that can be unreliable especially if you’re trying to patch up someone who’s already unconscious. You do more damage to someone who’s already out, you apply another level of Dying.

But we decided to go for it anyway. I think there are a few things at play. Part of it is that we already let Ralso out of our grasp once before; we don’t want to lose track of her again. But also, this room literally represents the LAST above-ground room – if we clear this, then the basement is all that’s left. And as I discussed last week that situation feels less volatile: if there’s an exit through the basement, “they” (presumably Pratchett, maybe some henchmen?) have now had a couple of hours to escape. If there’s no basement exit, we now seem to control the only access. One way or the other, we reach a point where the situation can be compartmentalized and we can plan our next move. Also, nobody articulates it, but I think we’re thinking that we blew through her dolls pretty quick; no one SAYS it, but we’re all kinda hoping Skeleton Girl can be dispatched similarly quickly.

Though before we do, we decide to recon the room for treasure. And we find Ralso’s diary which sheds some light on her role in the crimes, and also provides an unexpectedly bleak and kinda sad “origin” story. Curse you Paizo, for making me feel sympathy toward a sub-boss!

Turns out that while Ralso was never a fully upstanding member of society, there was a point at which she was trying to walk a fairly straight path until she was taken advantage of by worse people. From there, her sister died (the animated skeleton in the attic), and her life fell apart from there. It’s unclear how many murders she personally committed, but she surely can’t feign innocence, and the peepholes were primarily for her benefit. So… definitely enough of an active accessory to give her whatever Absalom’s harshest penalty is, whether that’s death or life in the Underwater Swamp Prison.

As an aside: I wonder what the proportions are between “Ralso wanted to pretend her sister was still alive at all costs” vs. “Pratchett did this to use her own guilt and sorrow to control her even further”. Later on during the fight, we hear the skeleton telling Ralso “it’s your fault I died”, so it doesn’t seem like a particularly benevolent relationship. I mean, Ralso still deserves to fry given the sheer number of people they’re likely to have offed, but are there some mitigating circumstances here?

We also find a note about a bank robbery planned for next week that Ralso was offered a chance to participate in, but declined because the other people involved were too crazy even for her. That seems like a WONDERFUL breadcrumb for our next case… but we have to survive this one first, don’t we? For the moment, tuck it in the pocket and keep moving.

Finally, after almost an hour of subpar healing rolls, we’re ready to resume the attack. Huzzah!

The battle ends up being a bit of a mixed bag. Actually, the skeleton sister isn’t THAT tough once you get past her aura, partly because Gomez still has a few “harm undead” tricks left in his bag. But what is concerning is that we’re having a heck of a time actually hitting Ralso herself. I don’t know if the cramped quarters of the attic are causing issues, or it was always difficult to hit her and we just didn’t notice it while we were still downstairs. But we’re struggling to put damage on her, and she… well… isn’t having the same problem. In fact, she’s critting quite a bit. Dougie and I both take turns on the ground as the fight progresses, and Lo Mang is pretty low as well. Heck, at one point, I get revived just in time to get knocked out a second time. Now, I still have my Hero Point if the worst should happen, but we’re still one… MAYBE two turns away from disaster when we finally get Ralso down and win the fight.

And that’s where we end the week. “This house is clean”! Well… the above-ground portion anyway. We still have to tackle the basement, and are faced with the same problem we had taking on Ralso, only now we’re completely out of healing SCROLLS too, and (meta-gamey) I assume Pratchett, the boss, is likely to be nastier than his lieutenant. And there’s that ochre jelly too.

Now, this is a conversation that’s going to continue into next week’s episode, so I don’t want to get too far into it here, but the gist of it is this. The roleplaying of a “hot pursuit” doesn’t play nice with the “long rest” model of Pathfinder. The writers of this AP did the best they could trying to make it fit, but at some point, you’re pretty much FORCED to take a long rest, which you don’t usually get to do when you’re hot on the trail of a mass-murderer. (As a lesser aspect of this, the “right” answer for the last 3-4 episodes has been “call for backup; have every Edgewatch agent in the city swarm the place”, but that doesn’t square with us being the heroes of the story.) And I think we’re pretty much at that point now, so how do we proceed in a way that feels like the game mechanics aren’t eating the story for lunch?

So that’s where we’ll pick it up next week. As always, feel free to drop by our Discord channel or other social media and let us know what you think of the show. Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next week.

Jason recaps the events from Agents of Edgewatch S1|21: You No Take Candle!

It’s the Murder Hotel, Week… oh jeez, I don’t know. 23? 24? Seems like we’ve been here forever.

We start the episode with a bit of a bait-and-switch, as all signs pointed toward us tackling the basement this week, only for most of us (cough-not-me-cough) to bail out at the last minute. There’s a LITTLE bit of added context that either got left on the cutting room floor or that maybe we discussed offline later. I think the thinking within the group was that the basement would be a single room. The Mad Scientist’s Torture Den or something like that. Once we went down there and realized there was going to be a whole additional floor, we decided – and maybe this is a little meta-gamey – that a floor that ends in “a few more rooms” is better than a floor that very likely ends in the Big Bad of the entire first book.

The other part related to escape routes, or lack thereof. If there’s an escape route in the basement, then Pratchett and Ralso can basically leave when they want. They may even be already gone. If there’s no escape route in the basement, they’d pretty much have to come back up this staircase… through us… to get out again. Meanwhile, if we go investigate the basement, anyone still on the 2^nd floor has free rein to escape or attack us from behind. So one way or the other, the threat on the second floor began to feel like the more urgent threat, while the basement is either contained, or they’ve already escaped.

So… back to exploring the second floor it is.

First, I’ll note – as a continuation of last week’s discussion – we start the episode getting Devise A Stratagem wrong and using it (incorrectly) with spell attacks, but have a better feel for it by the end of the episode. I HOPE we finally have this down for good.

Our first room of the new (east) wing is the viper fight. Honestly, that fight was so quick and Basil’s role was so limited, that I pretty much forgot it happened at all. Not much to say about it. Hi, snake. Bye, snake.

Next, we FINALLY… and this feels like a big deal to me… get to rescue some live victims. I’ve been a little frustrated up to this point because while we’ve amassed TONS of evidence, we haven’t caught any bad guys and we haven’t rescued anyone. No thwarting of crimes, just documenting what happened. Yes, we evacuated a few customers, but it FEELS like those customers weren’t in danger anyway, for whatever reason. It feels like only certain guests were targeted and the old halfling lady and the dwarf family were never in real danger. But the list of 20ish people who are officially missing… it’s been a little demoralizing that we haven’t had a chance to prevent anything yet.

But now we have live prisoners… after we beat them up, non-lethally. The gnome is one from our “general” list: Lyrma Swampwalker. She’s a gnome from Vidrian who came to see the fair. The other is a blast from the past – Kemenels. He’s the mage who went missing back in Episode 2 – we never formally met him, but his ward (whose name I didn’t capture) was the kid who was trashing the alchemist’s booth at the fair. So we were aware of his existence and our story crossed his before, even if we never met him directly. Naturally, they’re a little freaked out and don’t trust us, so we have to subdue them, but that’s two live victims saved! I didn’t think I’d have this sort of reaction, but it honestly feels good to rescue someone from this hell.

We continue our search and are starting to narrow things down, and there’s only a few rooms left, but the next encounter proves to be one of the most challenging (as well as one of the most gruesome). The redcap. Not gonna lie: this encounter worries me.

I’ve mentally categorized things into four levels of encounter difficulty. “Should be easy unless luck REALLY abandons us”, “fair fight”, “challenging fight”, and “OK, this is a legit chance of party wipe”. I’m feeling like the redcap represents a legit Level 4 fight. The boot attack is about average for an encounter at this level, but the fact that he can attack while moving gives him efficiency with his three actions. The scythe, on the other hand, is nasty: over the course of the fight, it reveals itself to be a d10+10 base damage, and it also has another d10 of deadly damage on a crit. So even hitting with that is nasty, and if he crits, it starts getting into one-shot territory… certainly for me and Gomez, maybe for Dougie and Lo Mang as well. And oh, he’s also got an undetermined amount of fast healing as long as he’s wearing his little hat.

Fortunately, an Expeditious Inspection reveals the trick with the hat… if we can get the hat off his head, it at least cancels the fast healing, so that becomes the immediate focus. After a few tries, Lo Mang finally has the stats to get it done, and this fight becomes a little more tolerable.

And then we end the episode with an interesting bit of do-over, which ties into Steve’s pre-game point about trusting your GM. The redcap initially appears to roll enough damage to put Dougie down. So I use my turn to get him back on his feet – I figure we need to pour damage on while Lo Mang has his hat, and we need Dougie and his maul for that. But then Steve remembers that the redcap’s hat has a secondary property – without the hat, he also suffers a -4 on damage rolls. Take away those points, and Dougie should’ve lived, and I shouldn’t have had to spend my turn healing him. So Steve rewinds the tape and goes from there.

I think whether intended or not, this kinda reflects our group’s philosophy on GM mistakes. If a mistake occurs during a fairly easy fight, we might just blow past it and figure it out later. “Oh, remember two fights ago… turns out the bad guy WASN’T immune to fire, and that spell should’ve done more damage. Have a hero point!”. But when death, or even a dramatic shift in the balance of a battle, is on the line, we definitely make sure to get it right, and Steve’s not even opposed to rewinding the game to get those moments right. This time, since we’re talking about the party’s main damage dealer dropping, this is one of those ones Steve needs to get right, and he did so. And that’s pretty much what we players have reached a peace with as well…

Now that’s not to say we never argue with Steve. Actually, to tie it back to Steve’s pre-game point, I think we’re more likely to argue the matter of “opinion” cases when we have a pet idea we want to sneak through. We tend to operate in the gray areas of “well, the rules don’t really say anything about using the spell in this way… what do you think?”. In his pre-game, Steve says that as a GM, your opinion is never wrong, and on some pass-fail level that’s true – at some point, the GM is the final arbiter of the rules. But that also carries with it the assumption that you at least let your players make a case to convince you otherwise, and maybe you sometimes change your mind if they’re compelling enough. And as always, the Rule of Cool applies: sometimes you should say yes if it creates a memorable story moment, rules be damned.

But in this case, we’re just rewinding a couple of turns of combat. And as we leave this week’s action… we’re hanging in there. Gomez is furiously trying to keep the heavy hitters on their feet, we at least took the redcap’s healing away, and hopefully things are taking a turn for the better. From my personal perspective, now that the redcap’s damage is a little less, I’m pretty close to full health, so I may have to go against my build and try to draw some fire so Chris and John don’t have to take the full beating. Or at least get in there and help set up flanking. When the redcap could easily one-shot me, I was a little leery. Now that it’s a fair(er) fight, an extra blade just might be the difference between victory and defeat.

But… we’ll find that out next week. As always, feel free to drop by our Discord channel or other social media and let us know what you think of the show. Thanks for listening and we’ll see you next week.