Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 aoth Feb 28, 2008 17:12:01	Ok how does this work? In the skill description for Treat Injury it says that a player may remove the dazed, stunned, or unconscious condition with a first aid kit. Are first aid kits permanent items that never run out of whatever allows the player to do this? Sleep Pistol says it fires spheres of frozen somnall designed to render rioters unconscious without dealing damage. Any living creature in the affected square must make a DC 15 Fortitude save to avoid falling instantly unconscious. unconsciousness lasts for 2d4 rounds. How is this affected by the Treat Injury skill? How long does the somnall stay in the air when released? If the person tried to treat in the same round should they make the save? There is also a grenade which covers an area of 20ft, how long does that last? I had a group of enemy (11 in power armor) shooting my party with these and tossing sleep grenades left right and sideways and with Treat Injury I was unable to knockout the party even when they were surprised to start with (the party defeated the enemy which is a pain). I am considering the expedient of just telling the party that they were drugged during the night and wake to find items missing, which I hate doing, I like to at least give them the illusion of a chance. Aoth
#2 closet_nerd Mar 03, 2008 17:01:25	In my game there's one PC with a sleep pistol and he uses it sparingly. The way i've ruled it the somnall cloud lingers for at least a few rounds. If you watch videos (or have ever been in the military) clouds of gas from grenades and the like linger. They also blow around. How did 11 guys miss the DC10 to hit a square? Why didn't they shoot the medic or whoever was reviving everyone? Try midnighter grenades next, my party *loves* those. Also good for immobilizing pc's is the compression gun, super-adhesive grenade, & the Ketch-all pole. Alternatively any or all of the above.
#3 aoth Mar 03, 2008 22:33:50	They hit every round and many times hit the damn medic. Unfortunately they made that DC15 and DC18 save more times than anyone failed and the medic never failed. The medic also has such a high Treat Injury that it was a sure in that the person he was tending would awaken. Aoth
#4 closet_nerd Mar 04, 2008 17:05:21	Then hit them with non-lethals. What do they posess, and who wants it?
#5 aoth Mar 04, 2008 19:12:22	They are sleepers from 300 years in the past. They have PL6 and PL7 equipment from the bunker where they recently awoke. The average PL for most people is 4 with some as high as 6. The enemy chasing them has access to PL8 equipment, but to insure their ability to take over the area they need to steal the equipment the players have, but most importantly the computer cards they have which links them to the worlds last military AI which currently controls every orbital asset ever placed into orbit by any country. Aoth
#6 closet_nerd Mar 05, 2008 17:00:50	steal it while they're in real combat? Knock them all unconscious and leave them for dead? Have them revived by the pl4&5's.
#7 aoth Mar 05, 2008 19:06:11	Trust me I have tried. When the sleep grenades failed to do the job I had my 11 enemy in PAT1 armor start using their secondary weapons. Half of them were using Gravity Snares, and the other half were using Concussion Rifles. The DC13 of the snare was just too easy for the PC's to make. Now If I had armed them all with Concussion Rifles I might have done in the party. I knocked quite a few out with falling damage by being thrown into other objects. But in the end the party was able to kill all the enemy and if the ship had not been remotely driven and the enemy weapons and armor wired to clean up any signs of the enemy I would have just given them a bunch of new equipment. Aoth
#8 closet_nerd Mar 06, 2008 8:50:07	how are they at grappling? there are a few monsters (usually dog like) in the monster manuals that are excellent grapplers. Chances are if they're ready for ranged combat they won't have any light weapons handy for fending off a dog at their throats. There's no reason most of those monsters couldn't be specially bred for it in what... 300years? The only one i can think of off the bat is the bearhound in MM3, but i know there's one in MM1 or 2.
#9 rhialto Mar 06, 2008 14:15:19	With a lingering cloud of sleep gas, that DC should get progressively higher as more and more sleep gas grenades are thrown in there. Sooner or later a check has to fail. Kobayashi-maru them
#10 aoth Mar 07, 2008 15:13:59	That is one of my current pet peves about the Sleep Pistol and Sleep Grenade. Neither lists a duration for the somnall staying in the air, unlike the descriptions for the smoke style grenades. Aoth
#11 closet_nerd Mar 11, 2008 14:34:41	That is one of my current pet peves about the Sleep Pistol and Sleep Grenade. Neither lists a duration for the somnall staying in the air, unlike the descriptions for the smoke style grenades. Aoth I house ruled it to 1d4+1 rounds. Provides limited cover depending on how concentrated it is as well. It was indoors so I didn't need to compensate for wind.
#12 strange_person Mar 18, 2008 10:08:48	Do the same thing again, but this time, once you feel like they've gotten a good fight in (say, 4-6 rounds) start to ignore the result of the saving throw and just say "You're unconscious. The residue from all the other grenades and pistols raised the DC." Even at that point, you're still giving the PCs some options: they can still retreat, and they can still (conceivably, at least) destroy their assailants. If the brute-force attack fails twice, the enemy can go for stealth, or diplomacy, or even both at once. Use the opportunity to hammer home how much the Big Bad needs this gear. If you really want to get nasty, you could mix in un-errata'd Tear Gas. DC 25 or blinded and stunned for 2d6 rounds.
#13 aoth Mar 18, 2008 12:57:09	I love that teargas idea! Of course my players will hate it! I started with stealth, but one of my players is a Helix warrior. He is allowed a listen check even while asleep, and every time he woke up which complicated everything and allowed the players to win once again. I like the players to control what is happening in the game, but sometimes the script calls for something to happen, and I have now had to try three times to make it and failed every time. My next try is to break the party into parts. Two of the main characters along with a main NPC will be taken away to visit with the leaders of the place they are now. Of course they will not be allowed to take weapons of wear armor to visit the leader. While they are gone I will have the bad guys attack again with a massive attack of gas and maybe the teargas. When the party is immobilized they will remove the evidence of their earlier visit, the advanced equipment of the players, and then disappear into the night. Hopefully this will allow me to then advance the script into the next section. If not I will have to adjust the script and change what is going to happen. Aoth
#14 strange_person Mar 18, 2008 16:08:05	Point of order: everyone is allowed a listen check while asleep. Somnall doesn's put the target to sleep; it causes unconsciousness, which is far more serious status condition, not least because it doesn't dissipate with a simple skill check. I love that teargas idea! Of course my players will hate it! This rather strongly suggests that you are GMing in an antagonistic style, which is unpleasant on many levels. Perhaps you should find a way to make the players want to participate in the story, rather than railroading them?
#15 closet_nerd Mar 18, 2008 18:26:38	This rather strongly suggests that you are GMing in an antagonistic style, which is unpleasant on many levels. Perhaps you should find a way to make the players want to participate in the story, rather than railroading them? I disagree. It has dangerous undertones. But it is a good idea, so long as this group doesn't want to kill them. They would definitely consider using teargas. If the PC's scourmished against a standing army and the army tracked them down- would they not be destroyed?
#16 strange_person Mar 19, 2008 12:17:54	Not if they had something the army wanted.
#17 aoth Mar 19, 2008 14:35:01	Sorry I am not running an antagonistic style against my players. In most cases I allow the players complete freedom to go and do as they would where ever they would. I am trying to get them into a position to acquire the information they need to figure out what is going n in the world around them. You do not know because I have not said that the players have awoken 300 years into the future with no knowledge of the current social/political situation. On top of that the biggest problem they face comes from an enemy from their own time that they do not realize is gaining power again. As for the Listen check when asleep the Helix warrior does not suffer the ordinary -10 that others asleep would suffer. This means when he rolled a 28 listen check he could hear my sneaking attacker moving into position who only rolled a 25 move silently. Hence he was able to wake up and make his save vs. the somnall and begin shooting his own grenades into the location he thought the attacker was in. The loud explosions of course woke up the party thus ended the stealth attempt to subdue the party and get those links. The Enemy really in the end could care less about the party or their equipment if they did not think that they had access to Watchdog the military AI I spoke of before. Part of the story line is that the players do not know currently what is going on. They think the people behind the attacks are evil (which is true yet false) and would fight them if they were A) not so far away, and B) not obviously technologically Superior. In truth the enemy they face is very evil but is actually hiding behind the people they think are the enemy. The Enemy is using the one group to allow them to accomplish their mission to control everything, while most people in the group do not even know they are being used.
#18 ben_fox Mar 19, 2008 18:31:23	If that's the case, why not lock down their medic with tangler guns? House rule they only need a ranged touch attack to hit, since its perfectly logical given how the weapon is described as working. Combined with the Burst Fire feat, you should be able to get the medic immobilized in short order, then sleep/nonlethal the rest of the party til they drop. That should give you a perfect hook; one player is awake and aware to get some clues as to the nature of the front group or even the identity of the true enemy, but is helpless to do anything else but observe his/her comrades getting stripped of their gear. You could also pincer attack the party; a few rounds after the frontal assault begins, a second, smaller group armed with tanglers, nausea wand/guns and/or electrified ketch-all poles hits them from the back with the intent to neutralize or grapple any support characters they can. If you can put the characters in a situation where their choices are surrender (and be stripped of their high-tech gear) or have a party member killed, so much the better. It gives you the same type of clue hook as the first option, only (most) everyone's awake for the info. Either way, it should do a pretty good job of advancing the plot while also driving home to your group that they're up against a well-equipped, well-led and resourceful enemy, one that is not to be underestimated.
#19 aoth Mar 20, 2008 13:26:52	Not a bad idea at all and I might incorporate some or all of that into this weekends game. Part of the equation is that the party is outside the PL6 city which means the aggressors have to get in, get what they need, and get back out before the city can gather its forces to counter. I am going to try the party split and then if that fails I will move on to trying to over whelm them when they are booted from the city. Aoth