Heroica RPG - Quest Masters' Lounge

[Endgame]

So, Quest 135.

Your quests are always have the best sets, and the best photography, and it is always a pleasure to look at them. Your monster designs here outclassed those in 93, and I thought those were awesome - Farfarello is up there with my favorite designed enemy/NPC in the game, Syrma and Zaniah looked great. The torched forest scene was incredible as well, and the shot of the belltower and the titan is also pretty remarkable.

And the battles were well designed, I think. Where I disagree with you is that they breezed through them. They all had fairly high risks of failure. The Void Eater could remove heroes from battle for good. Rastban had a move that would kill most of the heroes if they couldn't take him down in 5 rounds, the Titan was a tougher form of an already tough threshold monster (this time as Battle 3 and an entire entourage) and Farfarello was decently challening. The battles were among your best, and they were well paced and balanced for a story quest like this, but I hardly think the party breezed through them. There was so, so much that could go wrong - Ironically, what did go wrong was unrelated to the battles themselves.

One of the quest's best points - the Baba Interludes - was also one of its biggest flaws. The readers loved seeing it, but it was not told in anyway to the heroes. And there was so much more story in a couple of interludes than there were on the actual hero's side of things. Ultimately, the majority of the story was not something the heroes were told or could even interact it. Zaniah and Syrma were good, but they and Rastaban were pretty mcuh the only NPCs and story they got in three months of questing. I think that your computer issues had a big hand in hurting the pacing, but I don't think it affected the sparseness of the story.

If I had to offer a suggestion on how to blend them, I'd take a page from Zepher and use Flowers of Sibyl, litle memory capsules that sprout up from memories and ether (hell, maybe even the ether from the brainsquid on Pretzel's head is what makes them pop up?) With a little bit of changing in how the story was framed, it could've combined the two threads in a pretty organic way, and it could've been really cool throughout. Do I think that you planned for them to merge in the end? Definitely. But I think the party could've benefitted from it being drip fed to them, instead of to the audience, and then eventually just dumped on their heads at the end.

Was the treachery thing cool from a future RP standpoint? Yes, Zepher is spot on with that. And some of Pretzel's sidequest tasks (secretly ring the belll, shift the labryinth) were great concepts. But I disagree with how it was all implemented. From the way it was designed, the players had every right to be vexed and frustrated. Pretzel had a tough game to play. But the other heroes were playing a game they didn't even know existed. The hints and little nods are likely a lot clearer to you, since you were the one who crafted through the quest. But as someone who read through it as it progressed, and real through all of it again when all was said and done, there was no reason to think there was a traitor, or anything like that. The biggest clue, the fact that Pretzel was on watch with Johon, could've easily been brushed over because of the herd of rockling cultists who showed up almost as soon as the bell was rung.

Continuing off the party's viewpoint, the amount of invisible pressure on them was insane. Pretzel threw them into a lot of hard battles (as he should've - I do not disagree with how Palathadric played this in the slightest, he was given a role and he performed it). As soon as he got that Agni Bomb, things could go catastrophic in a second. Namyrra goes down? He can insta-wipe everyone but Thormanil. Thormanil goes down? Nuke and sleep the rest of the party. After a certain point, the entire party's well being hinged on two of the party members getting knocked out without them even realizing it. Even before then, one bad round and Pretzel could've dished out some effect bombs, crippling the party and letting them get smacked around into oblivion. It was downright punishing, and the rest of the heroes had no way to fight it and no informed decisions to make about it. They were left completely in the dark until it blew up (quite literally) in their faces and caused them to fail the quest. It wasn't a fair or well blanaced mechanic. And that has to hurt, especially because they lost a lot (Gems and the healing staff) and gained very little.

This couldve been fixed in a lot of ways. Just telling the party there was a traitor, or preventing Pretzel from acting as an enemy in front of the party (or hell, stopping him from using items) would've changed it for the better. The former would've been a great choice, because itd add a whole layer of paranoia and cool party interactions.

Edited September 18, 2015 by Endgame

[Flipz]

I'm going to echo what Swils said earlier: if Pretzel was going to directly make his move, he should have had to make it as his stated in-thread action. The other secret sabotage was fine, but other Heroes have to enact mid-battle betrayals through in-topic bolded actions, so Pretzel should have had to do so as well.

Also, now I'm going to say again: the "high reward" was nonexistent in this Quest. Over the course of three months, the entire party got one decent Artifact, one decent shield, and a disappointingly low amount of Gold for their Levels. These are the worst drop rates of any Sandy Quest, by far; one needs only to look at 130, which has been going on nearly twice as long but has given infinitely better rewards. Perhaps you had a lot of loot planned as end-of-Quest rewards, but in that case this Quest is a perfect example of why end-loading your loot is a bad idea (...says the QM who's pretty much end-loaded his loot in 141, so take that as you will ). At the very least, like the automatons/ninjas in 120 (which you fixed for us mid-Quest after realizing the mistake), the Rocklings should have had guaranteed drops.

You've already heard my piece on collaboration/trusting the party to maintain player-character separation, so I won't repeat that again. I will say that, having recently re-read 38, the Flowers of Sybil idea would have been perfect for this, but I know you don't read through a lot of Quests given how busy you are, and since no one (*cough* *cough* ) ever even wrote anything up about them or 38 on the Wiki, I can't blame you for not knowing about them.

That *cough* *cough* isn't directed at you, by the way, Sandy, but at literally everyone else (including me) who has failed to write things up for the wiki.

[Palathadric]

To be fair, Sandy did initially state that I would have to post in thread unless I was manipulated by the clown. That's why I held up doing so for so long. I always was looking for a better time.

[Quarryman]

This ended up being rather harsh, but please bear with me, it's all meant to be for the greater good.

Overall I liked the traitor concept, and even more so after having seen the PM chain for Pretzel's side-quest. But yes, the execution regarding the rest of the party was poor. Either he should have had to make his move publicly, or at the beginning of a battle, or perhaps in a way that accounted for the massive mismatch between how much damage heroes can deal vs how much they can take, but certainly not in the "Boom! You die! Quest failed!" way that it ended up being now. I'm all for trying out new things, but in the future please try to run the numbers first to see if there's a way the party can actually make it out. And also, discuss the mechanic with someone not on the quest to see if they spot any problems, having a second pair of eyes on things generally helps a lot.

Secondly there really wasn't any way the party could know about there being a traitor. As I said earlier, I read through the entire quest the day after things blew up to see if we had missed something, but no, not even knowing there was a traitor I was able to see any kind of hint about it. Yes, Pretzel acted weird, but he always does, all his antics could easily be written off as good RP on Pala's part, which it was, by the way, great job Pala! Maybe/probably things could have worked out better if the players knew about the traitor, but not the characters. I'm pretty sure all of us could have separated that knowledge.

Third, I think I've never said this before, and I probably never will again, but the quest was too battle-heavy, hardly any plot development at all. A lot of background about Baba being told, which was great to see, but no plot development in the quest itself, which gave me the feeling of just being used to tell Baba's backstory. I'm going to refer to ancient EB history here, but in a way this quest reminded me of Imperial Soldiers Mafia in a very bad way, that also gave me the feeling of being used for storytelling purposes without being allowed to influence things. Now, I know this wasn't your intention, but that's how it made me feel at the time, and that's a very negative feeling to be left with. So in conclusion, I'm pretty disappointed with the quest as a whole. Yes, this was probably influenced a lot by the way things ended, and I likely would have been left with a better feeling if things had gone differently.

However, there were of course many good things about the quest too, the sets were beautiful as always, the NPCs great, both visually and character wise, and the battles were good. Yes, they had some nasty enemies with nasty specials, but we were a very hard-hitting party, so tough enemies were to be expected.

And I liked our party, I don't think Namyrra has quested with Thormanil before, which as a very positive experience, and both Nerwen and Pretzel are always enjoyable to quest with, even though Namyrra tends to want to give Pretzel a good whacking. But Bricksandparts, seriously, what the flying megabluck were you even doing on this quest? If you're not going to participate and pay attention just don't sign up in the first place.

One final thing, what would have happened if I hadn't been so stupid as to let Pretzel go before Namyrra and had gotten in that amplified spell that would have taken out Farfarello?

[swils]

Quest #135:

Others have said it already, and I can only echo it: the sets and builds were really well done. The backstory we got on Baba was great, too. In many regards, this was a perfectly Sandy-level quest.

However, I am leaving #135 with a sour taste in my mouth. As a player, I really feel cheated. I was excited for this quest, for the chance to develop some more interaction between Thormy & Baba. Of course, I never expected to face her directly in combat, and if we somehow did, I had no expectations of winning. However, Thormy never really got any of that. He got to crawl through a few bosses and barely pick up scraps of information about Baba. The interludes were great, but as was already mentioned, they didn't do much for the characters who were actually on the quest. To me, it felt like we were still really early in the quest. We had barely had the chance to make headway towards our destination. That definitely leaves me with the feeling of us being tools to advancing a greater story without actually having any influence over it. I don't even care about loot that much, I really was here for the story. That's not to say that I didn't enjoy leaving with a new piece of gear, because that's always nice (Although, could we perhaps consider making that shield upgradable via bright polish, just not via smithy? Heh).

I think the battles were all pretty fair. As a party of heroes (ignoring the traitor factor for the moment), we obviously had a high power level. But that was balanced by the danger of some of the specials we had to face off against, deadly in their own right. Given that I felt as though we were early in the quest, I thought it was a fine power curve and expected the difficulty to ramp up, as it began to with Farfarello, a bit.

Now, the traitor thing. I have no problems with the mechanic in its own right, and think that it has the potential to be a fun (rare) twist for all parties. I do have quite a few critiques of it here, though. Firstly, the actual betrayal happened, as far as I understand it, before the quest itself. No one but Pala had even inkling that something was amiss, or could be. The party didn't get jumped upon entering the portal and wake up a few hours later with some bumps and bruises, opening the window to that brainslug being put in place. The only time that would have been reasonable for us to think anything could have happened would have been during that first shift at the ruins (or, for a real stretch, when he got eaten during the void battle). That is just far too much withholding of information, in my eyes. Looking back over the quest, I can, of course, see a few instances where we were perhaps expected to catch on such as during the conversation with Rastaban and then during the night at the ruins.

As far as Rastaban was concerned, well, I'll take some blame there: I'm not the strongest roleplayer, and I felt helpless there. I knew I wasn't asking the right questions in the right way, but didn't know quite what I was supposed to be asking, or how. I knew I had missed something, but knowing that you missed something is a lot different from knowing the circumstances and knowing that you missed something. It was like being told to go somewhere and find something that piqued your interest, versus knowing that you're a detective, and being told to go to that same place (a crime scene) to find something incriminating. Without the context, it was really just a shot in the dark. We knew that Baba had a myriad of tricks up her sleeve, and Rastaban clearly knew something (and, okay, he was under some sort of influence himself, so that could have been a clue), but as I said before, without any window for Pretzel to have been separated from us and turned, why should I have any cause to think that he (or any of the PCs) had already been turned? There's the chance that somewhere down the line, someone would be abducted and returned to us, and that definitely occurred to me as a possibility, but not that we were down a party member from the get-go. And I did hope that Namyrra would get the chance to pry information from Rastaban once he had been reanimated, but that never came to fruition, so maybe that's on us.

The second instance was during the night at the ruins. I have no idea what happened in the PMs between you, Pala, and B&P, but I'd hope that there was some indication in there that it was Pretzel who rang the bell, and that B&P simply failed to pass that along to us. I want to think that you at least gave us that information, or the chance to glean it.

So right now, I could three opportunities to find out what was wrong: My talk with Rastaban, Namyrra's talk with reanimated Rastaban (which didn't happen), and Johon's shift with Pretzel at night. That's actually a reasonable amount of opportunities, but I still feel that it was a complete shot in the dark as far as conversation was concerned. My attempts certainly proved rather fruitless, and maybe that discouraged Quarry from trying to talk with him as well. When Quarry probed about a way out, he was rather dismissive, so I can't argue with not pursuing that much further.

I'm going to quote myself here, because it is pertinent:

I feel like I can comment on this without the quest being wrapped up:

I strongly disagree with the notion that we had bad rolls in that fight. Granted, we still had to take down a near-full-health Farfarello, but we weren't in a bad spot. Quite the contrary: we were setting up for the possibility that Nerwyn could knock it out with a single roll. Palathadric's bolded action was to repeat his attack, not drop two giant, tide-turning items on us. We were completely blindsided by that, and, without commenting too much on the rest of the quest yet, I feel that we had absolutely zero way to prepare for that/anticpate it. That's not unfortunate rolls. That is, admittedly, a clever move by Palathadric, requesting that he get to act before Namyrra, but I don't think that it was fair to hide his actions from us. He declared that he was repeating his attack (which, without any target specified, should have been against Farfarello or, if you want to say that because he switched sides at that point, it should be against the first person listed in our battle order (because he didn't specify another target), so Thormy should have eaten those attacks.

Again without getting into the quest as a whole, I think it was really unfair to us for that round to play out as it did. Without any indication that it could/would, it went against the standard battle mechanics of "declare your actions, in bold, in the thread". Now, I think it would have been perfectly reasonable if he had flipped sides at the start of the round, putting us in a bind, perhaps (It's hard to say whether or not that would have actually hurt us, we are admittedly a very strong party). But when the rug is pulled out from under our feet in a single round where we thought all actions had been submitted, that's just not fair to me.

TL;DR I respectfully disagree that we lost this battle because of any bad rolls/running out of luck.

In addition, Pala mentioned that he was required to post his actions in the thread unless he was controlled by Farfarello. That's fine, it says that Farf will dictate actions of the strung-up PC. However, at the time that his actions got declared that really screwed us (the bombs), he wasn't Dance Macabre'd, Thormy was (and we'd already decided that the Soul Link didn't transfer the effect as such). I really can't see any reason why his actions shouldn't have been made clear in thread, that he planned to throw those bombs.

I hold no grudge against Pala, he played his role well. I don't hold a grudge against you, either, Sandy, to be clear. You were testing the waters with a new concept, and unfortunately it just didn't work out as well as you may have hoped (at least, not if you ask most of us who were on the quest, haha). I don't think I've quested with Pala before, but anyone who has quested with me will likely know that Thormy isn't generally one to turn down a fight. Rastaban's reluctance to being talked down wasn't really an obstacle for him; he had no qualms about dropping another dragon who was intent on roasting him otherwise. Having another player in the party who was intent on getting into a fight wasn't a red flag for me (who doesn't love more exp & loot?). I honestly considered joking around about just ringing the bell during the daytime--loot and exp, baby.

Actually:

The pleasure at dealing such a powerful hit does not last long as I feel a sharp pain in my head.

"Darn!" I mumble, repeating my attack hesitantly.

I could have sworn, at the time, that there was some visible-context for that, maybe in the battle's flavor text, but I'm missing it now if it was there. If there wasn't any, then that was some wonderful characterization by Pala. However, we still didn't know that there's anything amiss, so no one really knew to ask about it.

---

I'm sure I'm missing something, but I really want to stress that for what we did get to play, I mostly enjoyed the quest. I'm perfectly at home in a boss crawl, and blending that with a chance to get back at Baba (as Thormy saw it)? Perfect! Unfortunately, as I said, there really wasn't much development for Thormy on that front, just another "Oh, Baba tricked you and got the better of you and beat you. Again." And of course there's the betrayal which I think I've harped on enough.

All of that said, I do still want to thank you for the quest. Going on your quests is always a treat.

Edited September 20, 2015 by swils

[Chromeknight]

It's just a game, it's just a game.

I'm saying that first mostly to remind myself.

Lots of good things about this quest, all said eloquently above. I agree with them all.

Clear critique too. For me it boils down to two things.

First, Actions should never ever be hidden from their targets. Especially in PvP. Palathadric posted one set of actions in thread and delivered another. I don't know why you thought that'd be ok. Yes, I get that he was playing a side game with you in PM already and that to declare his actions would've made his task much harder, but it was flat wrong to blindside us like that.

Second, The game works on trust amongst players and between players and QMs. I think we all felt betrayed, by Pretzel yes, but by you also. We got stiffed in a game we didn't even know we were playing. From where I sit, it looks like the quest was never completeable. From the moment you singled out Pretzel and gave him the "play this way or skip the quest" ultimatum, we were stuffed. Nothing we did as characters had any meaning or consequence. You could have had cardboard cutouts in there and it would've turned out the same. That's your prerogative as QM and as GM, but it makes for a not fun quest. If a quest is going to fail out, it should be because the players have decided to fail it or they've badly mismanaged a battle. Here, neither of those apply. We did nothing wrong questwise and still fail. That's wrong too, though I appreciate its much more a judgement call than the above.

Sure, it'll lead to some interesting RP if Pretzel ever shows his face in the hall again and it neatly sets up phase 3 of your storyline with Ulric getting the psycrown. I'm looking forward to seeing it play out. I really did enjoy the quest right up to that round it's just a shame that treachery is so bitter a taste.

Edited September 20, 2015 by Chromeknight

[Zepher]

@Quest 135. I will happily host a quest for that party where you all betray Pretzel, and he has to try to figure it out in time.

[swils]

@Quest 135. I will happily host a quest for that party where you all betray Pretzel, and he has to try to figure it out in time.

But then he'll surely see it coming... so the real joke would be to have us not betray him, but not tell him that, so that he just comes out of it seeming very paranoid! Heh

Honestly, I really don't begrudge Palathadric for playing that role. Nor does Thormy hate Pretzel for it--this is just another of Baba's tricks, to him.

[Palathadric]

Okay, I need to add my centimes on 135.

I just wanted to say, that when I saw that I was chosen for this quest to kill Baba, my heart kind of soared. It just felt like such a worthy quest for him with such an obvious “bad person” after the mess that was 127 (no offense Zepher! )

When I found out I was destined to be the traitor (not sure if my Wolfgang rep was the determining factor or if it was assigned to me randomly) I was a little disappointed. However, after thinking about it, it kind of made sense to me. Obviously, Baba is a really powerful mindflayer and this quest was never going to be easy and straightforward. I thought it would probably be bad sportsmanship to decline the role, because I was unwilling for Pretzel to be mindflayed, so I accepted the role. How bad could it be, right?

Well, not that great in the end. I don’t think I am one who complains a lot about faults and things in quests, and especially not while the quest is on as I tend to assume that the QMs know what they’re doing and don’t want to be nagged consistently about little issues or worries of ours. But on this quest, I probably should have mentioned things to Sandy more. Obviously, Sandy can’t look at what he does from everyone’s perspective, so maybe it would have been good for me to do. Then again, I always feel it’s a bit like cheating for a player to “advise” the QM.

Anyway, it did not take long for me to realize why I have always found reasons for Pretzel to go along with the party in other quests even when his actions seemed against what his character would do (Heck, he’s fought the Order Imperial twice now, and they are probably the organization he should like the most), I did not find myself enjoying the quest very much at all. Again, I must apologize to Sandy for not mentioning anything. I guess I just figured that the reason I didn’t enjoy the quest so much was because I had so much looked forward to putting down Baba beforehand. More importantly, though, it just felt weird interacting with any of the party members. I mean, Pretzel was being controlled by a freak so it just seemed impossible to have a meaningful conversation with anyone. Maybe I could have played it differently, but also not having my own agenda for Pretzel, stopped making the choice for my roleplaying being “what would Pretzel say at this point,” but “what would benefit Baba’s motives.”

I think the NPCs could have been cool if Pretzel had gotten to interact with them in his right mind, especially Rastaban, considering that Pretzel has quite a respect for dragons and all that. However, as others pointed out, there were very few NPCs that we could interact with on any level throughout the quest. To top it off, our party seemed relatively quiet, but I suppose that can be expected without Pretzel spearheading the conversations and debates and with everyone focused on the seriousness of the mission. I guess I have to echo what Quarryman said in that the quest was far too battle heavy. I wonder if I, as the traitor, would have been able to enjoy it more if it had not been.

I didn’t take the breaking of the Healing Staff very well either. I didn’t moan about it too loudly, but I think at that point I was already pretty frustrated. The rule of no “PVP” (I’m not sure when that changed or if I missed something as I got the impression it wouldn’t be allowed at all) made it difficult for Pretzel to have any influence on how things went. I mean, there are only so many things a player can do to make “stupid” choices without being obvious (and having Flipz pointing out how I could be making better use of my equipment ). I did what I could in trying to use less effective weapons on the creatures, not loan out my equipment, etc., and getting the heroes into battles, but there’s only so much one can do without resorting to PVP or being obvious.

Regarding the Healing Staff, I was obviously using it so that Zaniah would die, I am just surprised nobody hollered about this before Sandy posted the results. The fact that Zaniah didn’t die and I lost the Healing Staff on top of it, bothered me a lot. Seriously, I had been hunting for a Healing Staff since after my first quest and would have bought it immediately had I had the money at the time (before it was even discovered how broken they were), and then mine gets destroyed without getting a chance to use it, but I suppose I am to blame there too, though again I was just trying to use what I could to influence the quest without being obvious. I couldn’t say “I pour potions into Zaniah’s throat and then accidently pour a venom inside as well.”

The fact that I didn’t know that we were supposed to reject Syrma’s offer for being our guide, made me try to take action to prevent that, and the loss of the Healing Staff made me feel like I was being punished for trying to play my role, which already wasn’t that easy for me to play since, as both a player and as Pretzel, I really wanted to see the quest successful.

I’m not sure what you had planned for the night if Pretzel hadn’t been on the first watch, as it would probably have been strange to only open a thread when he was, but I think it was done alright. I kind of liked having to “dispose” of Johon and get him distracted, but honestly as far as the story was concerned, I don’t see why Baba couldn’t have had one of her other emissaries ring the bell. I think somewhere around this point I began to believe that the party had been warned that there was a traitor and I worried that all my posts were…well…telling.

I also do want to apologize for complaining about Nerwen and Namyrra’s strength. Honestly, though, with the strength of our party, even the Farfarello battle seemed to be complete walkover (maybe I am finally beginning to realize how enemies feel when they throw their best at heroes and are still rebuffed with ease ) and Namyrra was getting stronger after every battle. I knew that to have any chance against the party, I would have to knock her out, but that too was no easy feat considering her immunities.

By the time we fell into the labyrinth, I just wanted to get things over with. I kind of wanted to see what lay in the other treasure chests, but I think I mainly just wanted to get the party to the demon so we could call it quits. Anyway, the labyrinth thing was interesting and at least provided me with something different to do.

Again, I’d like to apologize for not having Pretzel attack sooner. At this point, I was frustrated with myself for not doing more to make Baba’s quest successful and I worried that if I would just come out as the traitor and throw the bombs that I would just be letting my player feelings override what I should have been doing as a PC under Baba’s control. Your trip made things difficult as well, because there was no way that I was going to post in thread that I’d throw a bomb and then have to wait a week for the opposing party to strategize as to how they could neutralize my damage.

Looking back, you probably should have kept the initial ruling that Pretzel had to make his actions in thread, but if Pretzel were pulling out a bomb, it’s not like the party would suddenly think, “he’s going to blow us up.” I don’t know if I should have expected them to separate “player knowledge from character knowledge” either of if it would even apply in these circumstances.

At the end of the day, I think that the battles were probably too easy. Others have said otherwise, and there were certain dangerous specials, but it’s not like the party was ever in serious danger until Pretzel intervened. What can I say though, our party was awesome! Of course, a harder battle may have just meant more a clean sweep for Pretzel.

I probably have more to say, but not that comes to mind right now. I think a lot of the problems with this quest could have been prevented with better communication between the QM and the players, and I apologize for not doing my part, being the only player “in the know.” I wish I had done things a lot differently so we all could have had a more enjoyable experience.

Sandy, I do appreciate your trying new things and keeping us on our toes. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Trying new things is hit and miss most times.

To the party, I felt really crumby betraying you all as a player and as a PC. I think if we had gone through this quest together then it would have been a really bonding experience for our PCs, even if we had failed. Now, I don't know, but probably not so much. I didn't really know that the mind controlling thing would reveal itself to the party when I betrayed them, so I felt pretty certain that I would have to retire Pretzel after this, because I just couldn’t see anyway that he could walk into the hall again after doing that. I think I might do otherwise now, though he would still hesitant. I really would love to quest with all of you again, especially Swils who I had never quested with before (that I remember ), since we didn’t get much of a chance to interact properly in this one. Of course, Nerwen is always great to quest with and Namyrra has to be one of the most terrifying heroes out there.

PS: If I made some mistakes or portrayed things incorrectly, I apologize. No offense intended to anyone.

If this quest did one thing, it certainly shattered Pretzel's belief in himself and his strength. Not even sure how to begin roleplaying for him right now.

Edited September 20, 2015 by Palathadric

[Sandy]

I just want everyone to know that I myself am not pleased in how the quest worked out, even though I have to point out the various distractions in my life for throwing me off the focus.

You see, not only did I have computer issues and a travel abroad, I also separated from my fiance after a 10 year relationship, and had to organize a new job and a move to another city. That's why I have had so little time and energy for Heroica, which pains me greatly.

I know I should have done many things differently with the traitor mechanic and the whole quest. I doubt I will ever try it again, and if I do I will inform the questees beforehand. My apologies for any grievances the quest caused.

PS. Breaking the Healing Staff was somewhat of an overkill, but thatweapon just doesn't work with the game mechanics so I kinda want them all gone...

[The Chosen Minifigure]

PS. Breaking the Healing Staff was somewhat of an overkill, but thatweapon just doesn't work with the game mechanics so I kinda want them all gone...

Noooooo!

[Dragonfire]

You see, not only did I have computer issues and a travel abroad, I also separated from my fiance after a 10 year relationship, and had to organize a new job and a move to another city. That's why I have had so little time and energy for Heroica, which pains me greatly.

I'm sorry to hear that. Don't worry, RL always comes first. We don't mind.

[Palathadric]

I just want everyone to know that I myself am not pleased in how the quest worked out, even though I have to point out the various distractions in my life for throwing me off the focus.

You see, not only did I have computer issues and a travel abroad, I also separated from my fiance after a 10 year relationship, and had to organize a new job and a move to another city. That's why I have had so little time and energy for Heroica, which pains me greatly.

Sorry about that Sandy! I know things were difficult for you, so I hardly blame you for how things turned out. I hope your move is working out alright.

[Flipz]

Have people considered something like: "resistant to negative effects"? For example, all chances for negative effects would be halved.

I can see both sides of the issue. On the one hand, there are the players, especially assassins and classes with effect giving shields or other rolls, that are basically devaluated by the Immune to effects, immune to instant kill thing. But as a QM, you have a challenging battle to produce, and considering an assassin with a multi attack weapon has either a 1/6 or a 1/3 chance to kill anything, that's annoying, bypassing all the numbers, or a party trivializing what in the story should be a hard battle with a pumpkin bomb or something. I think "resistant" might solve those problems, making effects (and instant kill) harder to pull off on your elite enemies, while still allowing the party to deal them out. How it would work is half the chance for any effects, so 1/6 would be 1/12 and so on. A 100% chance (from a bomb for example) would become 50%. What do people think?

I like the idea of effect resistance on enemies, a lot actually. That said, it's still not a "one size fits all" solution. I mean, take a look at Endgame's enemies; since our discussion all the way back during Quest 70, I don't think I've seen more than 6 immunities on a single opponent he's made, and yet his battles have remained just as challenging as they should be, even with players using Pumpkin Bombs and the like on them. Honestly, putting thought into battles is the best solution; here's a rough idea of how my mental thought process goes down:

1.) Am I re-using/modifying a Fields enemy or an enemy from another Quest for the sake of world consistency? If so, try to match what's already been seen, but fine-tune appropriately for my party.

2.) Do I want the party to have to struggle with this particular enemy?

2a.) Why do I want the party to have to struggle with this particular enemy? (Is it a main villain? A recurring enemy? A "boss"? Does the enemy do some mechanical thing [i.e. summoning reinforcements] that I'd prefer they have the chance to do?)

2b.) Do I already have other enemies in this battle that I want them to struggle with? If so, which of the enemies would I most prefer to be the focus of their struggle?

3.) Do I want the whole party to struggle with this enemy, or only some of them?

3a.) Do I want this enemy to be a challenge for all party members except one, or is there just one specific party member I want to make this enemy difficult for?

3b.) If I'm making this enemy tough for one specific party member, is there at least one other target said party member CAN take on?

3c.) Do I really want to make this enemy a pain, or do I just want to force my party to try alternate methods from their norm? [side note: this is the question where I usually answer with the latter, which actually changes the way I think about the problem--after all, how can I expect my party to think outside the box if I myself don't think outside the box in my balancing?]

4.) Is anyone in my party going to feel gypped by what I've laid out for this battle?

That's just my process, though, others' results may vary.

[Endgame]

This question has been sparked following the SP; 0 Hippogriff in 136 (and my confusion of why that field exists in its stats if it has no SP. )

QMs, have your thoughts changed on SP/what are your thoughts on it in general? I used to have it on every enemy, but looking back, it just looks like clutter. I feel as if I would only include it for enemies who their whole "thing" is being armored (So a minimum of SP: 20ish) or to give value to SP-piercing weapons. Otherwise, despite being one of the few who used it a lot, I've more or less permanently retired it.

Edited September 27, 2015 by Endgame

[Asphalt]

The one enemy I had with sp I forgot to deduct them.

[Zepher]

The one enemy I had with sp I forgot to deduct them.

That's generally why I leave it off. I actually think it's a good mechanic (highly incentivizes attacking from the front) but I sometimes forget to do it. I think it's good though!

[Flipz]

That's generally why I leave it off. I actually think it's a good mechanic (highly incentivizes attacking from the front) but I sometimes forget to do it. I think it's good though!

Yeah, It's really great at making an enemy's health pool last longer without having to give them thousands of HP. It's also great for people who have poison/curse weapons, helps them feel useful to the party even if their WP is low.

The big warning, though, is to do SP OR back row. You do NOT want to end up with this:

Golem Skirmisher Mob *Immune to Weakened and Fragile* *Back Row* *Ranged (ignores Row)* *Assistance: Assisting Golem Ranger Mob* *Mob 2* *Phalanx (5 Rounds)* *Lucky*

Type: Humanoid

Level: 88 (44*2)

Health: 888/1100 (550*2)

Defense: 40 (20*2)

Special: Phalanx - The Skirmisher crouches behind his shield in close formation with the rest of his party, halving his and their damage taken during the next three Rounds. If Special Damage is rolled against him again while his Phalanx is in effect, his Phalanx is extended by another three Rounds.

Drops (varies by roll, rolled twice from list):

1-2: Spear (WP:6), Pugilist's Gloves

3-4: 2x Mead, 2x Smelling Salts

5-6: 30 gold

Note: The Golem Skirmisher mob attacks with throwing weapons; after two rolls of Damage or two Free Hits, the Golem Skirmisher Mob will no longer ignore row.

[Endgame]

Sometimes I want bigHP pools, for the purpose of making the numbers look scarier.

The entire point of the Open Wound thing in the Eternal Reaper fight was to justify the ER having a really scary amount of HP.

[JimBee]

I enjoyed #141 quite a bit. It was pretty straightforward and other than the unavoidable delays I think you improved on everything since #118, Flipz. The first battle was needlessly hard for level 1's, but you clearly remedied that for the rest of the quest. The elemental battle was a bit random but the XP wasn't unwelcome, though the enemies were also a bit tough in that one as well. I think that would've been a good place to use passive specials that determine the enemies' levels based on the heroes'.

It was great to see Mac again, as well as the Tritech charcters. Using other QM's NPCs is always a highlight for me. It was weird that Sakurai just disappeared without an explanation. Kiri was an interesting and unique character.

I also liked the group that we had. I hope you had fun on your first quests, MysticModulus and Alfadas. I think I could've made a better attempt to have Jinnipher interact with your characters but at the same time they were never really "out there" and there weren't many opportunities to talk. I'd be interested to see them develop more as they participate in more quests.

Boris is cool. Level-headed and somewhat religious, though the chip on his shoulder shows from time to time. I like that Boris was able to choose to heal during battles in this quest - I feel that's not something that happens often with higher level quests because you can just pop a potion instead. We got lucky with the healing rolls this time, but I'm still a strong advocate for boosting Clerics' healing abilities (i.e. no "No Heal" rolls).

I also like Kheyli a lot and I think her and Jinnipher could get along pretty well together. Though her (K-Nut's) activity fell off towards the end.

Overall a really enjoyable quest. Thanks for hosting Flipz, and thanks Pala for running a few rounds.

Oh, and how could I forget Terry? I quite like his character too, and interacting with his was fun. He and Jinnipher are interesting foils. She thinks he's too inexperienced, and he criticizes her skepticism. He's got something to show for it too, even if she refuses to recognize it.

[Endgame]

Thanks for the quest, Flipz!

The sets were really nice, with the Undead Tyrannosaur being one of my favorite builds. Seeing Mac again was a pleasant surprise, and Kiri used what screentime she had well, but I'm not sure what happened to Sakurai. I liked him while he was there, but he kind of just fell off the face of the earth?

As for battles, the difficulty curve was out of whack. I enjoyed all the battles, but they went in the wrong order. The undead tyrannosaur, for example, was a breeze.

Loot was really cool, albeit a bit excessive at times, but it all tied in very well thematically with the people we were fighting. I feel as if the elemntals and the Mirage Knights, as much as I loved their characters and designs were a bit redundant. They both had the same motivation of protecting sacred grounds. I can't really fault you for this, because I highly suspect they'll be coming back later, but they felt out of place a bit.

The puzzle was pretty phenomenal - I really enjoyed solving (or rather, screwing up) solving it.

I really liked this party. I hope Terry's interactions with Jinnipher/Boris didn't overshadow the rest of you - i made attempts to reach out to the other folks, but I imagine not all f you post as much as myself/JimBee/WBD. I like Torlad's brutishness, and Ezeran's weird juxtaposition of being a pretty calm, unfazed everyman with a demon maw in his gut, and I liked what I saw of Kheyli, too.

[K-Nut]

I also like Kheyli a lot and I think her and Jinnipher could get along pretty well together. Though her (K-Nut's) activity fell off towards the end.

Agreed on both counts. September/October is my busiest time of the year, and it got extra busy this year so I got pretty shotty on updates. Completely my fault.

However, at the same time, I loved this quest for Kheyli. It's nice and simple as a first quest should be, but it still was deeper and darker than you'd think to fit with the current themes of the game. The loot was really great too. I don't think I need to say much more than that, because it was really great. I'll definitely be keeping a close eye on your quests in the future.

[Palathadric]

Fantastic to see Mac again.

Now if only Jeaux would return as well...

[Flipz]

Heh. A week ago I pretty much had all of my thoughts on 141 figured out in my head. Then, everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked I got sick and my head went loopy. Apologies if my words occasionally fail to make sense.

I like how this one turned out, overall. Still not up to the standard of 104, but definitely went a lot smoother than 118. I put a lot of planning into this one mechanically, though story-wise I think it probably could have used a little more polish.

Basically, the idea behind this Quest was to explain why Bones and Ancient Bones have monetary value, but only to magic merchants; imagine, if you will, that the sort of bone-trading we saw here happens on a regular basis throughout the Heroica world, wherever Bones/Ancient Bones are bought. I also wanted to loop in the Fields, give a little bit of background lore to the place and flesh out some non-Hero opinions of them. Kiri and Sakurai both embody attitudes some Heroes/players have towards the Fields of Glory, and they were both motivated in part by the loot drop of the current Roaming Monster (and yes, that's why most of the stats of the Mirage Knight were hidden, I can't go and spoil everything, now can I? ). From those concepts, I just had to connect the dots to make a coherent cycle.

Originally, I had planned for the cycle to go through twice--Sakurai (or rather, the original concept character I was using instead of him) was going to be the necromancer who hired the party, and he was going to conduct a necromantic ritual to revive the Tyrannosaur so you could fight it and get the bones, which you would have then taken to Kiri who would have raised them as the bone beast. I shied away from that concept for fear of beating you over the head with the concept, as well as allowing the slaying of the Tyrannosaur in Timehenge to contribute to the "abuse of nature" theme Pie's developed during his Fields runs.

The loot on this Quest was a little excessive, but was all dropped for a specific purpose: the poisoned non-elemental weapons were there to help you with the two Tyrannosaur variants (especially the Undead one the Barbarians wouldn't have been able to touch otherwise), while the SP-defying elemental ones were, naturally, also designed for said fight. They ended up being a bit excessive, but only because I ended up making them guaranteed drops instead of 1/3 chance drops from the elemental spirits; if the martial Heroes had been forced to use non-SP-defying weapons, I think the final fight might have been more in line with what I'd originally intended (i.e. wear down the SP so that the Heroes with elemental attacks can actually deal damage). I'll probably revisit the mechanic at some point in the future, just tweaking things a bit more to encourage more attacking.

Speaking of the final boss, the Ancient Amber/Ancient Sapphamber Staff was also intended to be preparation for the final boss, which was supposed to be Ancient/Undead; I switched it to Undead/Beast, however, when I realized that the original typing would have left the elemental blades useless (and I wasn't sure if the martial Heroes would think to use their non-elemental weapons against the boss). Like I said, I'll be tweaking this mechanic before I use it in the future.

Speaking of the fights...gods, Terry and Jinnipher make things difficult. The first and third fights were sort of balanced to give them a little bit of a challenge, but nearly ended with party wipes instead; on the other hand, both Tyrannosaurs ended up as jokes in the face of Jinnipher's SP because I didn't want to make them unfair to the rest of the party. I think handing out the SP-granting hats at the start of the Quest might have helped a lot with that, but in actuality I'd only planned out the Cultist Caps at that point (having a variety of hats instead of just them was a late addition to the Quest, formed after the first near-wipe). Ultimately, though, I'd rather see Jinnipher breeze through my bosses rather than watch the rest of the party wipe, so I'm fine with how the last battle turned out.

I think if I had to pick one thing I'm most dissatisfied with, it'd probably be a toss-up between Kiri and the ending. I'll be honest, while I like Kiri's concept (especially mechanically), character-wise I had difficulty writing her. I originally intended her to be sort of over-the-top Gothy (I wanted all of this Quest's NPCs aside from Mac to have the sort of "quirky-but-still-serious-when-needed" vibe Flare mastered in 57), but there were times where she kept drifting towards just being Diana 2.0, which I implicitly didn't want. She was too agreeable here, a little too generous and not quite petty enough. I do have plans to bring her back eventually, but she'll need some work in between now and then. As for the ending, I really think I can chalk that up to a lack of preparation crossed with external complications; in my head, an abrupt ending made sense, but in practice the writing was just a bit awkward. Going forward into my Diana Quest and my Charis Quest, I think I'll put a bit more of my pre-planning efforts into the ending, hopefully ending up with something more akin to Dual Dragoons than to this Quest.

Characters/Players:

Terry/Endgame

I was really psyched when I saw that Terry was back in the Hall and signed on for this Quest, even though I knew from experience that as a mage he'd be an absolute pain to balance for. I'd hoped that thrusting him into a position of leadership would lead to a lot of awkward moments, and I was definitely not disappointed. My advice for you in future party leadership, however, would be to watch the mood and activity of the other players and try to give them moments to play off of you. As party leader, every single character on the Quest is already going to be paying attention to you and your posts, so if you can give them a moment to show off some of their character's traits, it's naturally going to be easier for them to spot those opportunities you give them. We saw you do just that in your interactions with Jinnipher, but I would have liked to see some of that with the other characters, particularly Ezeran (some mage-on-mage mentorship could have been cool, especially with the character age difference) and Kheyli. Also be careful of loot-hogging--I'm guilty of it too (it was especially egregious in 120 ), but it's something to be aware of.

Jinnipher/JimBee

As with Terry, I was really excited when I realized you were available for 141; for one thing, it meant I could buff the battle difficulty a little, since I knew she'd be able to take on some of the harder foes for the little guy. That said, she's a nightmare to balance for at her current Level, though that should hopefully even out a little more now that she's in the Level 10 range instead of being grouped with Level 1s. Jinnipher's belligerent shone through a lot here, to the point where you almost inspired an unplanned battle (your and Boris' skepticism of Sakurai nearly led you to have to battle through the Burning Forest to get to Timehenge, where you would have arrived just in time to see Sakurai get eaten). That said, there seemed to be a bit of tunnel-vision on Terry at some points, and like with him I would have liked to have seen more interaction between you and the two party Barbarians.

Boris/Waterbrick Down

I've always liked Boris; there's an inherent contradiction to his character that makes him absolutely fascinating to watch, and I always get a kick out of him quoting Ennocian scriptures (which is a really cool way of breadcrumbing world lore outside of hosting a Quest ). I'd originally slated him to be Party Leader before Jinn and Terry signed up, and I still think it could have turned out well; that said, I was very pleasantly surprised in his interactions with the NPCs, where he reciprocated Kiri's attraction while being skeptical of Sakurai (as I said earlier, almost to the point of throwing me off the rails to an unplanned encounter). You also did a great job of quietly shepherding the lower-level characters to speak up a bit and roleplay, which I as a QM really appreciated. I wish I could have had Mac interact with you and Ezeran a bit more, but unfortunately life had other plans for me. The decision to make the scientists interaction a puzzle instead of just "choose between keeping the bones for yourself or getting Ji Pei rep" came from realizing you'd be on the Quest, and me wanting to give you a taste of the experience you've so often provided for the rest of us. We as QMs often make the sort of Quests we'd like to participate in, so it's always nice to have a chance to give back a little in that respect. My advice to you: while I know the stats aren't your biggest interest, I'd really suggest doing a little optimization on Boris. Despite having a massive level advantage over the rest of the party, he felt a little under-powered even compared to the Level 1s, and while I agree with JimBee that it's refreshing to see a Cleric actually be able to heal allies in battle instead of just fighting, it's a shame to see him so unable to contribute when he does fight. Even something as simple as Karie's Spring Staff would be of tremendous help to him in battle--give him enough WP that his Crits and Heal Mores actually mean something.

Ezeran/MysticModulus

You have a great character with a cool concept...and quite possibly the worst offensive element in the game. Usually, Mages are the most overpowered base class (as Terry handily showed), put poor Ezeran's very first battle put him up against a bunch of foes who were immune to his only element. On the one hand, I'm glad it let me use Weather as a balance tool (seriously, weather is a powerful but underutilized option in the QM toolkit for adjusting battle balance), but on the other I really wish I'd been able to give Ezeran a few more chances to shine. Still, you did an excellent job of staying active and engaged, and interacting with your fellow party members and the NPCs. I look forward to seeing you grow and develop him and his symbiont more in the future, and I'd happily bring him along in future level-appropriate outings.

Torald/Alfadas

You were the other newbie on the Quest, and while you had some great moments, there were also some silences where I could have stood to see more of you. You and Sakurai seemed to get along well, as well as you and Boris, so hopefully in the future we can see more relationships like those. I'd especially like to see a little more roleplaying during combat, as it's a great opportunity for Barbarians to express why and how they fight, and how that makes them who they are.

Kheyli/K-Nut

Like Torald, you got a bit overshadowed on this one, and I would have liked to have seen more of Kheyli as well, particularly her opinions on and interactions with the events unfolding around her. I can tell you have a definite personality established for her, I just couldn't seem to see enough of her to actually grasp it. I'm glad to hear you enjoyed yourself, though, and I look forward to seeing what you bring to Kheyli in the future.

Guest QM/Palathadric

Wow. When I saw the narration you gave for the elemental battle, I wished I had brought you on to narrate all of my battles. You nailed the Flare-ian Quest 57 vibe I had wanted to bring to the entire Quest, far better than I ever could have. I really think you'll make an excellent QM when you finally jump in to hosting, as you've definitely demonstrated you have the skills it takes. Thank you again so much for helping me, and if I'm in a jam in the future, you'll definitely be one of the first people who comes to mind.

I enjoyed #141 quite a bit. It was pretty straightforward and other than the unavoidable delays I think you improved on everything since #118, Flipz. The first battle was needlessly hard for level 1's, but you clearly remedied that for the rest of the quest. The elemental battle was a bit random but the XP wasn't unwelcome, though the enemies were also a bit tough in that one as well. I think that would've been a good place to use passive specials that determine the enemies' levels based on the heroes'.

It was great to see Mac again, as well as the Tritech charcters. Using other QM's NPCs is always a highlight for me. It was weird that Sakurai just disappeared without an explanation. Kiri was an interesting and unique character.

The sets were really nice, with the Undead Tyrannosaur being one of my favorite builds. Seeing Mac again was a pleasant surprise, and Kiri used what screentime she had well, but I'm not sure what happened to Sakurai. I liked him while he was there, but he kind of just fell off the face of the earth?

As for battles, the difficulty curve was out of whack. I enjoyed all the battles, but they went in the wrong order. The undead tyrannosaur, for example, was a breeze.

Loot was really cool, albeit a bit excessive at times, but it all tied in very well thematically with the people we were fighting. I feel as if the elemntals and the Mirage Knights, as much as I loved their characters and designs were a bit redundant. They both had the same motivation of protecting sacred grounds. I can't really fault you for this, because I highly suspect they'll be coming back later, but they felt out of place a bit.

It's funny, the "Level based on the Hero's" mechanic is one of my favorites for mixed-level parties, but it honestly never sprang to mind. *blush* Looking back, it would have been perfect for the elementals fight, maybe along with some level-based SP as well.

The spirits were probably the least-explained portion of the Quest, mostly because I didn't want to bog down the Mirage Knight in a ton of lore that the other Fields Masters would have to keep track of once a Fields party gets to fight him. In case it wasn't clear, the Mirage Knight is the "Auster" who spoke to the four elemental spirits, sending them after the party; they're allies. And as you might guess, the Mirage Knight at least will make at least one more appearance; it's up to the Fields parties whether or not his next appearance will be his last.

Sakurai was originally supposed to Flee mid-Tyrannosaur fight, leaving behind his staff just like he did, but I decided after your initial interactions to tone down his cowardice a bit and let him learn to be a bit more of a risk-taker to distinguish him from Kiri's "play with pawns" style. Since he definitely didn't want you to drag him back to Kiri to complain about his leading her (and you) on about already having the bones, he ran a different direction from you when you fled the Mirage Knight, leaving him free to begin plotting his next scheme. No doubt he'll break into the Fields yet again at some point, and undoubtedly Heroes will end up involved in cleaning up his mess...

Edited October 22, 2015 by Flipz

[Endgame]

I'm not sure if Mage mentorship would've been appropriate - Terry has no desire to lead, teach, or mentor anybody. He got a small confidence boost this time around, but if anything, 141 convince dhim leadership isn't his thing.