Basic Fantasy RPG Forums

BTW, I think we missed something:
Anna and Freya will take a look at the two locked chests, first checking for traps then attempting to open.

Did that happen?

(now reading about what you have planned for me... robot?)

I failed to read that.

They are both well locked, with a type of lock neither person recognises. You do not think they are trapped. In fact you are pretty sure of it. There is no magic visible around the lock.

Neither Freya or Tiana can open them, although Freya thinks she got close on both of them. They are harder than all locks you have encountered so far. And the keys you found in the tower certainly would not fit in these tiny locks.

Do you mind of we leave it at that, and say you headed over the bridge at that point? Now you know what is there I'd like to get to that point and not backtrack too much more.

Yep, I'm fine. I also would have been fine with "Freya, I thought you were opening it" -> "No, Anna... I thought you were opening it" -> "Wait, you didn't open it?"

Who is carrying what: yep, that's what I was thinking as well. Unless I say so explicitly, it's random. It's not truly 1/n though -- Tiana has the most headroom and Kilian the least, so that should get factored in somehow as well. Hopefully the situation will never come up.


Does anyone recognize the language, or even the roots of the language? Freya will back up without saying a word, unwilling to attack something she doesn't know as friend or foe.

No one can recognise the language at all.

I'm interpreting your post to say that in the surprise round, Freya retreats backwards and everyone else just holds. She is now just in front of the dwarves.

The lead robot ("Living Statue") is walking out across the bridge, following Freya, still yelling at you in a demanding tone, waving his sword in one hand, the other raised. Another one appears from one of the alcoves, and is 10' behind him.

"There's more behind, too!" yells Bruce.

We're in rounds from this point. You all beat the robots and you all get to go first.

Locations as marked except Freya is back in front of the dwarves. For convenience sake I'll say that the bridge and corridor are all 10' wide, so the lead robot is about 20 feet away from Freya.

The bridge forms a natural bottleneck, which is good. The dwarves will hold their position on the bridge, with everyone else getting behind them. They won't charge but instead, wait for the robot to come to them. Hopefully the robots will stop their advance. Kilian will yell back at the robots, in dwarvish.

How does the positioning work? Do the robots need to be single file, or can they fight side-by-side? Is it only the dwarves who fight side-by-side, or can I fit three (Talin) at the base of the bridge? Assuming only two, does Talin's 2H sword give him reach over the dwarves or will he need to use his longbow to attack?

Kilian and Bruce will use their 1Hers and shields. Freya and Anna will use their bows. Tiana won't do anything yet. Talin TBD.

IEffectively, bridges and corridors are 10'wide: 2 5'squares. On bridge and in corridors, two robots can fight side by side. Two of anyone else can fight side by side except Talin who has to be on his own if he is using two hander. No he couldn't fight over the dwarves' heads with it. He could use his bow to do that. Back in the wider rooms, you can fit more people fighting side by side.

(In future we better specify what weapons you are all carrying as you move around. Didn't think to do that).

So what happens is:
- Freya runs behind dwarves and Talin. That's her full action. I've rolled randomly and she was already carrying her bow.
- The dwarves hold positions while the robots run towards them.
- The lead robots move towards the dwarves yelling at them.
- Anna panics and fires at them, rolling a nat 20, and doing 6 points of damage. This makes part of the armor buckle and collapse and red steam comes out. It has clearly done some damage.
Kilian and Bruce both attack the leader, realising that it is now definitely going to attack. Kilian hits and Bruce gets another nat 20. The thing is bashed to pieces as soon as it arrives on the scene, and stops talking.
Talin takes a shot at the second robot coming over the bridge, and hits as well doing 6hp.

The second robot could not get close enough to you in this round to attack the dwarves with its sword, but it does fire an energy burst at Bruce, seeing as Bruce has just cut the leader's arm off. It misses. A bolt of red energy flies out of its hand and into the bridge at Bruce's feet.

You can now hear more of the robot creatures in the ''wings' of the entry way beyond the opposite portcullis.

Talin's action is yet to be announced and Tiana did not act. Nor did Abigall.

I need:
Talin's action for round 1. (He starts that round carrying his two handed sword. Changing to longbow means he can move, but not shoot).
Everyone's action for round 2 - including Talin.

PS - epic rolling. That thing was tough and you creamed it.

Talin will switch to his longbow. Tiana will keep watch to see how many more appear (IOW a no-op round).

Round two, all archers fires at the robots, starting with the closest one. If they can move behind the archway for proper cover, they'll do that as well. If the dwarves can attack the closest without moving in, then they will do so. Otherwise, they will shield wall to give themselves additional cover.

End of round 1 - Talin switches weapons.

Tiana can't really see, but guesses 2 or more extras.

The Animated Statue's programming forces it to make the suicidal move of walking over its dead companion and continuing to move towards the dwarves, who are now in melee with it.

The archers move back a little and take some cover behind parts of the portcullis arch. fire. I've decided you'd take a medium safety penalty (-2) to avoid hitting the dwarves (or Talin and Freya in Anna's case) in the back.

Freya - misses.
Talin - misses.
Anna - misses.

Lose all those arrows please, unless you go down into the canyon later.

The dwarves go into a shield wall (full defense) which mean Bruce's AC is 21 and Kilian's is 22. They do not get to attack this round.

The robot attacks Bruce with its sword and misses by a mile, the shot bouncing harmlessly off his well placed shield. Bruce grunts with satisfaction.

Two bolts of energy fly from the the (presumably) two more robots that are hidden back in cover behind the west portcullis. One slams into Bruce's shield, the other into Kilian's shield. Neither do any damage. The archers get a glimpse of the creatures moving round the archway and shooting. They have good cover, probably -2 on your attack rolls.

It's your go. The archers can fire over the dwarves at the robots in the portcullis area with no penalty, but not the one in melee, without either talking a penalty or risking hitting the dwarves in the back. The dwarves can keep defending, or attack the thing in front of them.

Archers will switch to firing at the back row. The dwarves continue to defend.

Talin misses.
Freya misses.
Anna misses. Her arrow lands the closest, but its a tough shot.

The robot on the bridge attacks Kilian and actually hits him! It does 8 hit points to Kilian.

The two in the archway fire again on the dwarves. One of them rolls a nat 20 and hits Bruce for 5 hit points. His whole body glows red for a second.

Meanwhile, more fire breaks out on the dwarves from part of the chasm wall, about 30' north of the west portcullis. It looks like there is a room immediately on the other side of the chasm wall, and the Animated Statues have holes that they can fire out of. It would be almost impossible to hit them through these holes.

Both of the blasts of the magic blast fire miss. One whistles past Kilian and the other slams into the bridge. They do not seem to do much damage to inanimate things.

After an early round of excellence, the tide has turned and the dwarves are now a bit exposed and getting hammered. Bruce looks scared. If he gets hit again, he could die.