"Epic Pathfinder adventure unfolding on Roll20" Topic

OK, well. PC party are all 4th level at this point. A gnome wizard, dwarf rogue and human cleric (Pharsma.) We had another player who was a human Inquisitor, but he dropped out of the game. We are actively evaluating other Roll20 players to see if any will be a good fit for the DM's style or roleplay and the players.

Korvosa, Varisia. The PC's had previously become locally famous after some exploration in The Grey and discovering and thwarting demonic corruption at the highest levels of the Pharasman faith there. So the King throws us a party, with his own agenda in mind…

We are tasked by him in front of the noble houses to blaze a trade route to about 160 miles. We spend about two weeks in and out of game time organizing, buying and leveraging supplies, negotiating alliances and support (and hiring.) Because this is, after all, Korvosa; the most powerful and connected institutions and nobility are more-or-less Lawful Evil, so we have no real choice but to have diabolist aid. Church of Asmodeus, Hellknights, etc. are all about "civilizing the wilds" by force if need be.

We have 12 Signifiers and 12 Hellknights (Order of the Nail), a 50-strong experience and well-equipped mercenary company, a party of adventuring NPC's, two Darklight Sisters, 12 dwarven ranger/mountaineers from Janderhoff, a 250-strong party of skilled and unskilled laborers and engineers of various types, plus about 50 "caravan guard" types we hired that underwent training with the merc company for two weeks before we headed out. We had two 5-hr sessions or straight-up roleplay with no combat the last two weeks.

My dwarf was with the Darklight Sisters, the NPC party and the ranger/mountaineers as a scouting vanguard 4days ahead of the main train.

The first valley we get to has evidence of a goblinoid and giant spider presence, but we do not actually encounter any (we are too big a party), and has geothremic processes (an inactive volcano.)

Six days in, we come across a tribe of Shoanti, 2,000 strong. It is always hit and miss with Shoanti, some tribes are peaceful, some warlike, most are in the middle somewhere. I hoped these were in the middle, and my alignment would not let me just allow them to be slaughtered without a chance to choose to leave first. So my dwarf approached them alone while the scouts went back a days travel.

Well, turns out these are the most cartoonishly stereotypical barbarians in RPG history. Wearing bones and skulls of animals, all of them big and beefy, they kill or enslave the weak, hints at cannibalism, only respect the strong, etc. . I was concerned, because our GM is normally more cerebral than going the route I would have thought was, "lazy." BUT – through deft verbal roleplay coaxing intelligence from the Shoanti, I found this was not lazy at all --- this was still a thinking-players game…

The tribe have some duergar enslaved making them their nice weapons and armor, claim to have an alliance with a nearby giant clan, boast of being "dragon-slayers" of a wyrm in "the place of filth," and they do not have one leader speaking for all. Strength and power, and respecting that strength and power are all that matter.

Additionally, the Shoanti of this area were originally scattered and killed by the ancestors of Cheliax (the people that founded Korvosa – where we came from), so they have a generational hatred of… well, of what would be our entire road-making party. And there are 2,000 of them. Well armed and armored with duergar-forged weapons, not like stone and wood or bone.

So, my mind is ticking away… With the element of surprise, we are actually powerful enough in our party to defeat them, even if there are 2,000 of them, but it would be prohibitively costly way too early in the expedition. We have to approach this more deviously…

1. Place of Filth. May be the valley we just passed, since weakness & weaklings are below contempt, it may be "filth" to them. Need to capture a few goblinoids and make them talk, "any dragons used to be here?" If there are any dragon(s) remaining, possible alliance to slay the tribe that killed their parent/young. Quite possibly we can press the goblinoids into our service to use them in a diversion. Even better if the goblinoids have already domesticated the giant spiders (packs or cavalry.)

2. Giants. We need to make sure these are going to be two separate fights. We have to find a way to negate any reinforcement of one force to another. Does not matter how. Need to recon and find out WHERE they are, our solution may present itself by their location or composition, etc..

3. Poison. We should locate their "food supply" and the source of their water. Find out if it is feasible to poison/spoil their supplies. We may physically weaken the Shoanti and affect morale by spoiling or poisoning their food/water supply. Unless the train has someone with experience and equipment for the task, we'd need to do this magically. We would have to assume this is a one-shot thing… as curative magic is probably not unknown to them.

3. They have no one unifying leader or purpose. We have to ensure we do not give them a reason to rally with one another to bolster their will and willingness to fight.

4. Pride. Their fierce pride in their physical strength will be their ultimate undoing. We need to develop a plan to publically humiliate one or more clans in front of the others and/or cause one or more of the leaders to be shamed in front of his people. It will sow strife and conflict, stoke rivalries to action, and encourage clan-on-clan violence and confusion that we can capitalize on. Nothing that has a chance of backfiring like the "single champion combat" BS, we need to figure something that still keeps our own presence hidden.

5. We must develop contingency plans for the worst-case scenario of failure in any of those.

no link to a blog with further details? Disappointing.

TMP *is* my blog for this type of stuff!

TMP link