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Messages - SteveMaurer
261
« on: May 19, 2009, 04:42:56 pm »
The current description of [lore]Arcane Archer[/lore] states " Fighters, Rangers, Paladins and Barbarians become Arcane Archers to add a little magic to their combat abilities." The class's Requirements call for a PC to already be able to cast arcane spells. Something doesn't add up.
262
« on: May 18, 2009, 02:36:01 pm »
If you cast Invisibility Sphere, and then use the Illusion Fading Rune, then the caster becomes visible. However, people with 15 feet of the caster are still invisible (until the effect goes away).
I don't know whether this was intended or not. I'm posting here on the assumption that it is not.
263
« on: May 12, 2009, 07:49:20 pm »
[SIZE=18] A Traveler’s Guide to Mistone[/SIZE] [SIZE=16] Introduction[/SIZE] Dear Reader, If you have just been given this guide by a merchant who is distributing it because of my recommendations of their store, please do not discard it immediately. I assure you that the information contained herein is of utmost importance, and may prevent your untimely death. You are interested in living, aren’t you? Good. Then read on. I promise not to waste your time. -Lady Z [SIZE=16] General Ways to Enhance Your Survival While Traveling[/SIZE] Travel is dangerous. Layonara may have always been a desperate place, but it is absurdly so now. Likely due to magics from various Gods of entropic predation, all that you meet attacks with suicidal mania. Nothing ever flees, even if badly wounded, and pursues until either you or it are dead. So prepare for travel as you would for war, expecting assaults from the most unlikely quarters: hawks, skunks, rats, deer, shrubbery. See the pretty little butterfly? It’s trying to lick you to death. To deal with this fact of life, please consider the following suggestions: - Befriend an experienced companion. Guides can point out dangers better than any book, even this one. Locals can point out who is trustworthy in this regard.
- When traveling alone, stick to the roads. Thanks in large part to the Law Of The Roads, roads are safe. But do not veer off them even the slightest bit. And if a road peters out, so usually does the safety.
- Your greatest advantage is your superior eyesight. When traveling to unfamiliar regions alone, walk slowly and scan the horizon constantly. You will likely see hostile creatures before they see you.
- When doing the above, walk with stealth, even if you believe yourself not to be stealthy. Distance aids your abilities. But do not depend on stealth either: believing yourself undetectable and learning otherwise when too close, is a way many curious travelers die.
- Invisibility is even better than hiding, but it too is not perfect. Spells and potions are time limited, and many actions can cause you to be seen. Further, even being Invisible does not make you undetectable. Highly sensitive enemies can become aware of you, and once they do, they will not lose sight of you. To combat this, you can walk stealthily while invisible, which makes you nearly impossible to detect.
- To help your scanning, stay close to impassable areas: rock walls, tree lines, rivers, etc. That way, as you walk, you need not scan those areas. Work from the edges of a region, in to the center.
- If you encounter a lone beast and it charges you, do not charge in return, for it may have friends in the distance who would welcome your sudden appearance.
- Fleeing is always an option, especially if you are very fleet of foot, but often all this does is give you time to prepare. Sometimes, however, the time to drink an emergency healing potion, is all you need. However, also remember that by bringing trouble to civilized regions you may be breaking the Law Of The Roads.
- Although they are expensive, a single Potion of Invisibility is often all one needs to successfully flee. Consider this if you are rich.
- You may think to flee long distances between entire regions, pitting your endurance against that of your pursuers. But often, as you are usually already badly wounded, tracking you is easy, and you will be ambushed as you arrive. Note that this nearly always breaks the Law Of The Roads, and you will be held accountable.
- For inexperienced travelers, purchase an ox as soon as possible. Oxen are not merely useful as pack animals. They can also be a critical distraction while you flee. And do not be surprised when sneaking back to the place of your ambuscade (in vain search for your ox’s pack), you find your animal grazing happily beside the corpses of the creatures that overwhelmed you. Oxen are not to be trifled with. Mine has killed panthers. Please note that ox cannot fight while tied down, and they will charge anything, preventing stealth in retreat as an option.
- If you become injured, heal yourself quickly. Do not be cheap, because you never know where your next blow is coming from, or how hard it will be. Rest often as well, in safe areas. And purchase healing-essence drenched bandages. Even by the bundle they are cheap, especially considering that death is the alternative.
- Take care not to assume that simply because you killed some creatures in an area, that more of the same will not arrive unexpectedly. If you have decided to explore a place, remember to account for the difficulty of retreat when judging how far to go.
- Remember, finally, that no one plans to die. Death nearly always comes via underestimation and surprise. So remember: arrogance is entertaining, but it is also a weakness and hallmark of inferiority. Do not be weak, or inferior, and you will be allowed to survive.
[SIZE=16] The Law Of The Roads
[/SIZE]The Law of the Roads, a tradition that stretches back to antiquity, states that no traveler shall ever bring trouble on another, or more generally, upon civilization. You are a beneficiary of this Law, for it means that you are not subject to sudden ambuscade as you travel. Many willingly break this law. But even those who are not predators on civilization may find themselves unintentionally in violation, by fleeing for their lives from some horror which follows them into potential contact with the traveling public. And, may I say, how dare you consider your own worthless life in higher regard than the law! Certainly, death is a painful experience, and having a bite taken out of you by the "Soul Mother" even worse, but it is your duty as a Rolfereinite paladin to stand and die, stand and die, repeatedly, so that you may leave a particularly young and good looking corpse, if your manner of death actually allows for it. In case you are not a Rolferenite paladin, and have cravenly fled towards a civilized area, you are a lawbreaker subject to jailing. That is, if you don't manage to undo the harm you have done by removing the danger you brought with you. In this situation (which I assure you is entirely theoretical), you should first and foremost stay nearby to warn travelers. In addition, consider sending a homing bird to a friend who is known for their battle prowress (and discretion in reporting things to the authorities). Together, you may be able to clear the danger, or at least lure it away. I, Lady Z, offer myself as a recipient of such birds, as the case may arise. I must finally point out that the Law Of The Roads does not only apply where there are large roads, but also to any trail between regions. If you leave a creature where it might ambush a traveller just arriving to a place, and do so with no warning, then you will be subject to harsh penalties if you are caught. [SIZE=16]
A Listing of Mistone’s Regions and their Relative Safety[/SIZE] [to be continued]
264
« on: April 20, 2009, 08:13:35 pm »
I recently received a Tell from a GM that many types of familiars could not speak, and that this was in the Lore somewhere.
I've done a very thorough search of the Lore, and saw nothing that would even hint at this. In NWN, all familiars are magical, connected to the mage, and capable of speech. This is why a mage can possess them, and speak while possessing them. They also, of course, speak when you click on them. In Layonara, there are even special commands to support speaking through your familiar: "/o f".
I would like some clarification as to what exactly a familiar is, in Layonara. I have been RPing up my own description (that, unlike a ranger's animal companion, which is a normal animal - a familiar is a magical reflection of the mage's own soul embodied by Al'Noth - which explains some of the odder special effects associated with them). But that may or may not be what Leanthar or Ed want, so I'd like a writeup of what they really are. And whether they can speak.
Depending on the answer, this might be the subject of a CDQ.
265
« on: April 17, 2009, 01:27:23 pm »
After reviewing a number of topics on the nuts and bolts of keeping Layonara up, I've come to the conclusion that what needs to be done behind the scenes is for the Administrators to create a house and danger server. Let me explain. At present, the Leanthar has several design goals for his baby. These are: - Make the server RP friendly, including adding many placables that add flavor to the world
- Allow people to see each other, so that RP can occur
- Keep the server lag down, so people don't die inappropriately
Unfortunately, these goals are often brought into conflict by the underlying code, which makes it so that you can't see someone on a different server, and (even more importantly) makes even the simple act of logging in cause a whole bunch of placables to come into existence, which can cause someone else in the middle of combat to die. Putting on my IT architect hat for a second, I see the solution to be very simple: add additional servers that aren't specific to a particular region, but rather for a specific purpose. And so, I'd like to propose a "house" server: house.layonara.com. When anyone enters a private house, they get booted off of west or central, and must log onto house.layonara.com. House could have all sorts of pretty things in it, without affecting the performance of the RP areas of the other servers. The guilds could stuff chests to the brim with no issues. And from an RP point of view, it makes perfect sense that when one is in one's house (sleeping, etc), there is a certain degree of expected privacy. The same thing could be done for dungeons and areas of danger: danger.layonara.com. Again, when you're deep in a catacomb, by definition you're cut off from the world. And because entering such areas do not happen on an extremely regular basis, there would be no substantial lag to deal with. All that would be really required is that there be some staging area that a party could assemble in during the boot/relog process. I understand that this is a long term project, but I think it would actually be pretty easy to implement, and is the way to deal with a lot of the design issues the development team constantly has to deal with.
266
« on: April 17, 2009, 12:05:59 am »
My character was thinking of using the portal to go to the Great Library on Voltrex, to do research (as her way of advancing the major plot in the campaign).
However, I noticed that east is gone. Is that just a crash, or somehow part of the new upgrade? Does Voltex still exist?
267
« on: April 11, 2009, 03:31:40 pm »
268
« on: April 07, 2009, 11:57:20 am »
I was hoping this would get fixed in the update, but it hasn't.
Presently a sewing needle weighs one pound, and does considerable damage (you can actually kill a rat with it).
That's a bit much, unless we're talking Depleted Uranium sewing needles here.
Really it should be, weight 0, 1d10-9 damage.
269
« on: April 06, 2009, 12:50:44 pm »
It does dispel normal invisibility though.
I'm pretty sure this is just an oversight.
270
« on: March 25, 2009, 12:28:04 pm »
I've been weaving various elements of Layonara into my character's RP, and an issue has come up on which I'd like an official public ruling.
Unlike PC Dicebags and Language Ears, Orbs of Rememberance have a fully in-game description that both explicitly state that they are are well known, and explains how they are fully integrated into the "invisible" society of NPCs that aren't displayed by the game engine. When used, they also have been given a fully in-game effect. Not "Character saved" but "You close your eyes and impress your soul on the world". To me, this means that, regardless of other practical effects Orbs may have on the server, they also exist in game. Much like looting a monster has both the practical server effect of transferring gold to your character, while the in-game justification is that you picked coins of a fresh corpse.
There is at least one GM who has recently used a "Tell" to say that he's run this around people and think Orbs aren't in-game.
Whichever way it is, it should be made explicit, both on the website, and in the game itself. If Orbs aren't IG, then the extended description of them should be altered to explicitly read that way, and the save method text should be altered to be explicitly not IG as well.
271
« on: March 06, 2009, 08:42:57 pm »
In game, my character has had a number of experiences in which people have made claims that her invisibility sphere is harming party coordination by either, A] Making everyone invisible, and/or B] Preventing people from healing themselves or each other.
In the LORE, the spell description is as follows:
Invisibility Sphere
(View Printable or Source)
Caster Level(s): Bard 3, Wizard / Sorcerer 3
Innate Level: 3
School: Illusion
Descriptor(s):
Component(s): Verbal, Somatic, Material
Range: Personal
Area of Effect / Target: Caster, 15ft Radius
Duration: 1 Turn / Level
Additional Counter Spells: Invisibility Purge
Save: Harmless
Spell Resistance: No
Material Component: Gum Arabic
The caster brings into being a zone of invisibility that travels with him for the duration of the spell. All allies within the spell's area of effect are rendered invisible, but not to each other. Those that leave the sphere are visible once more. (emphasis added)
- - - - -
From the reading of the spell description, this doesn't match up with what people are saying. Is this an error in the LORE, the game, or people's perceptions?
272
« on: March 01, 2009, 07:22:27 pm »
In many of the maps of Layonara, I noticed a notation on the side stating the following "1 Statute Mile = 3 Miles". I had assumed that this meant that a single real ("statute") mile was equal to 3 Layonaran miles.
This would mean, for example, that the real length of the road between Fort Vehl and Port Hempstead, as measured on the map as about 1300 Layonaran miles, would really be about 430 earth miles. That is a considerable distance, of course; in the real world, the distance from London to Germany. But still, accounting that people on foot can travel about 20 miles per day on good roads, about three weeks apart.
Makes sense, mostly. At least it's in the ballpark of believability.
But now I've come upon the Lore that the "1 Statute Mile = 3 Miles" is reversed. Layonaran miles are supposed to be three times as long as earth ones. This means that the length of the road from Fort Vehl to Port Hempstead is 3900 miles, approximately the distance between London and Chicago, USA. Even assuming the roads are good, this means it takes 6 1/2 months to travel between these two cities. And PCs, even if they burden themselves to the point that they walk the slowest the game allows, still walk the 5 screens faster than most passenger jets fly.
Another way of putting it is that at this scale, most humans will age half their lifetimes just performing the Krandor Package Delivery quest, most kingdoms are larger than the Roman Empire at the height of its power, and every lake drawn on the map is at least as large as a US great lake, being thousands of miles in circumference.
If this really is the intended scale, there needs to be some sort of RP explanation on why characters can travel between cities, spending anything less than years of their lives doing so.
273
« on: February 23, 2009, 07:33:12 pm »
I was looking though the various CNRs and noticed that poison requires weapon proficiency simple or weapon proficiency rogue. This seems odd to me because, among other things, it would mean that many Dark Elves - specifically Dark Elf Wizards (who make up the majority of the male population of Dark Elves) - would normally be unable to brew poisons. Does that seem right to you? It doesn't to me. Since the CNR description seems to point in the direction of using projectile weapons, might that be a better restriction instead? Or if that is impossible, perhaps add weapon proficiency wizard and/or weapon proficiency elf? I fully admit to some self-interest in this, because I would like to take CNR poison for my TN PC wizardress without taking a feat in weapon proficiency simple, which isn't in character for her.
274
« on: February 22, 2009, 10:31:52 pm »
Day 1 - The Inauspicious beginning
I exited the barn and walked straight to civilization. It was hard to miss. A great fortified city lay before me. And beyond it, the sea.
The sea! Its size was unfathomable. I could hardly believe such an expanse of water could exist anywhere but on its elemental plane, but there it was, in the distance. And so I walked towards it.
When I arrived, I was relatively pleased with myself. I had managed to live an entire hour with the wrath of both Qualvarsharess and the Lord of Spiders upon me. Deep inside I had not truly expected such success.
Of course it was still sun-up.
There were two guards at the gate, and a sign. It said orcs, half-orcs (by which, I am sure it meant half-humans), and kobolds were not allowed in the city. They would be warned once, then killed on return. The chosen ones, "dark elves", were to be killed on sight. I walked through the gate unmolested. I am glad for my body paint. I am disguised as pink now as I was disguised black then. Truly in this condition, I don't think my own slaves would recognize me.
Of course I should stop thinking of such things. I have no slaves now, nor any other possession save that which I carry.
So. The city. Port Hampstead. I was doubly glad for the sign. It occurs to me it would have been terribly suspicious to go asking, "What is the name of this city?". Beings of light are foolishly trusting, but such a question would arouse suspicion, even for them, I would think. I walked the place trying to learn it. Could, disguised, I pass myself off as a native? The truth dawned on me that it was quite possible. This was a human city, and humans were indeed, as it has been said, the "people of water" - mixing well with everything. Not just their bodies, human/elf and human/orc mixtures, but mixing culturally. On my walk I must have seen nearly every race I once forced to fight to the death in the Arena, except here they were alive and happy.
Was I safe? I did not know. But there was a park and some benches. The guard did not even blink when I laid out on one. I was exhausted and did not even know it.
I broke from my trance in the evening to the sight of stars, walked to the docks and gazed out at the great expanse of sea. After an hour of staring, I realized I needed to do something. I was thirsty and drank from my canteen. I knew hunger would not soon follow after, so I purchased some hard tack from a merchantman. This led me to realize that I needed to plan what to do next. I had money. But it would not last forever.
I miss my bedroom. My bath. My goblin slave Teva, who kept my secrets so well. I treated her kindly, I think. I miss my father. And mother.
It is weak to sit around pitying yourself. Time to do something. Make a name. So I wandered the rest of the city taking in the sights. It was suspiciously empty. Soon I found out why. From a human named Ferit Pandorn, I found that an invasion was expected. Green Dragon Cultists, whatever that was. Many had clearly decided to leave.
At daybreak, I found something interesting: a woman complaining about something clogging the sewers. And rats. She promised a reward if I killed the former. It did not matter to me. More than the coin, I needed practice using spells for violence and death. Target practice. It would hone my skills.
So I summoned Silence, my most beautiful familiar. Sleek and black and deadly, she prowled about. A large cat to hunt mice. Or so I thought.
In truth, I was lucky to get out alive. Silence could kill a rat or two, but she was no match for many of them in numbers. And they attacked rather than ran away. When she was disembodied, I felt the shock to my very soul. It dazed me for a moment, and then I realized they were after me. I ran for the door and barely made it. But a rat came through and chased me around the docks as the rest of the onlookers just stared. I tried to pull out my crossbow, but it had disappeared, right under the nose of the guard. Magiced away.
Panicked, I cast a spell, and holding it in my mind was able to focus to kill the thing, even as it bit my leg. Fortunately, it died and I did not.
Not exactly the auspicious beginning I expected of myself, but I was alive. That would have been most embarrassing: the end of my story before it had truly begun.
275
« on: January 31, 2009, 02:34:26 am »
This is a test of the cleaning program. This is only a test.
Let's try an apostrophe.
Let us decide to try Ã? reverse over the a.
How about "quotes".
How about these kind of â??quotesâ??.
This is only a test. Had this been a real post, al hell would break loose.
Or something.
276
« on: January 15, 2009, 01:00:58 am »
Hi. I'm very much new here. I have a question about what assumptions that can be made when creating characters. I've been looking at the Layonara history, and I see a lot of things either invented but not common knowledge, or not yet invented by the world creator(s). For example, I know that Deep Gnomes are a "Deep Race", meaning that they're "stoned out of small towns and villages for nothing other than [their] looks", but not why. The little guys are really nice, if butt-ugly. There's no explanation what the problem is. The reason I'm asking is because - again just as an example - before I could create a Deep Gnome PC, I'd have to come up with a reason why, in RP terms, s/he gets the reaction they do. Some war, or misunderstanding between the races, or hell, maybe on seeing one, Layonaran humans think some wizard just animated all their lawn ornaments. (And coming up with such an explanation would be fun for me, if the DMs don't mind too much, because I can make up some cool stuff.) But I don't want to step on anyone's toes either, making up things for the world just as a PC. So how does this work? If I post a new character with some explanation in the background - Tialiar Bloodstone, direct descendant of Sinthar Bloodstone's na'er-do-well cousin, Vinny Bloodstone ("Say, cous', I know you got this whole Dragon God war thing goin' on and all, but can I borrow the horse for the weekend? See, I got this hot date with an elven chick") - how exactly does this get resolved? Does the DM approve it? Is there some pre-approval? I'd like to know before I do anything major, only to discover that our Layonara's world builder has decided Sinthar was far too sinister and angsty to have family troubles. Written slightly tongue-in-cheek, but a serious question none the less. 
277
« on: January 14, 2009, 01:38:41 am »
Hi everyone, My name is Steve Maurer, as you might have already noticed by my account, unimaginatively named "Steve Maurer". I am a compete newbie to Layonara, and a nearly complete newbie to Neverwinter Nights, having missed the PC game while off having a life(*). (*) Which among other things means having a smart and beautiful wife, who I love dearly, but is not intensely enamored with RPGs. My story: A long time ago, I was very much into role playing games. When I was a teen, the California Bay Area was a Mecca of Roleplaying game companies. Combining my natural pushiness and writing skills, I became involved with a number of them. I playtested Gloronthan Runequest with Greg Stafford, Call of Cthulhu with Sandy Peterson (before he made his money with Doom), convinced George MacDonald to put some new powers into Champions (which became the Hero System) and wrote scenarios for Hero Games, played Cyberpunk with Mike Pondsmith in Berkley, and wrote up some Secret Societies that got into Paranoia (I met the West End games staff at a Con). Tiring of the Chaosium never delivering HeroQuest, I went and wrote my own and published it on the usenet; you can still find it out there. The only D&D stuff I ever did was generic. I wrote a single article, called "Pitfalls of GMing", that got published in the Dragon. But that was about it. (And a long time ago - I don't expect anybody is going to recognize any of these old games or gaming companies.) I already told you the end. I got married, became a dad, moved away to clean, rainy, wild, Oregon. What little gaming I did was not pen and paper, but by myself on console systems. I'm probably older than a lot of you, but if you don't hold that against me, I promise I'm a pretty good gamer, all in all, and a lot of fun to play with. I'm hoping to just be a player here. At least in the real world, I always ended up being roped into being the GM for some reason. Some time in a week or so, I'll submit a character with a long background. (Warning: I do like to write.) Anyway, thanks for your time and attention. 
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