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Hey, everyone!  I'm back.  Looking forward to seeing you all in-game!

I agree that this would make them less-than-perfect druids, but I think that actually makes this a lot more interesting than a group of insulated tree-worshipers.

Imperfect representations of classes and faiths are usually way more interesting than safe, down-the-middle rehashes.

The best paladin of EFU:R fell, and the best guard of EFU:R was booted out unceremoniously!

To me, the toughest part of the level-up experience is 6-7.

At least when you're at 8, you're not really in a hurry because you can compete in combat with other PCs well enough.

But 6-7, especially on rogues, clerics, bards, etc. is a nightmare, just waiting for that second attack per round...

Just a piece of advice for getting over that hump for players who have trouble - don't try to inch across with low level quests.  It'll take forever.

Get a strong group together and crush a really hard, high-level quest.  Your XP reward will be substantial.  I generally make it a rule on my PCs to try to slingshot with XP from quests that are over my head, and buckle down and try to survive them, rather than spending days sprinting around getting 300 xp per mid-level quest.
 

Just keep in mind that paladins aren't idiot berserkers, either.  A paladin isn't going to see an evil adventurer and attack him on sight for having some evil in his heart.

He isn't going to help that adventurer either, however.

I think it's frustrating to play a paladin when you apply modern 21st century sensibilities to it.  We all intuitively know that most people are complicated, with both good and bad, and that there is a very good reason not to be overly judgmental in life because you'll end up hating everyone for the tiniest of flaws.  There's a cynical and realistic reason why most people don't think of others in black-and-white moral flavors.

Paladins don't work like that.  A paladin is a closed-minded holy warrior who is 100% positive that he is right and those who disagree with his deity and his beliefs are wrong.  They are worse than him.  They are a danger to innocent people, and need to be stopped, but without compromising the paladin's sense of honor and morality to do so.  If you want to see characters as complex, vibrant, and flawed beings with good and bad, you're probably not going to want to play a paladin!

Paladins should be really hard to play.  They're stick-in-the-mud holy warriors with zero tolerance for wicked behavior.  No one wants to have an opium party with a paladin, but when bandits are savaging your town, the paladin is the one hero who is guaranteed to lay down his life for you with no expectation of payment.

A paladin would not adventure with an evil soul, period.
 

I wish we could do all min rolls, honestly.  A world is a lot more interesting when that scummy vagabond can put a knife in you and you don't just flinch it off like a bee sting.

Calc and I be rocking the DOTES, but the coolest kids in town don't need no goats

I've known multiple diabetics who have suffered from similar depression issues.  I really don't think most people realize just how much diabetes interferes with normal brain functioning, and how crushingly difficult it is to live with.

Not really sure what to say in response to this, except I'm glad his attempt failed and that someone was quick and alert enough to keep him from suffering severe damage in the process.

All I can say in terms of advice is it would be good to figure out exactly what triggers led up to the attempt so he can try to avoid those in the future (whether it was visiting a specific place, feeling a specific emotional response, etc.).

I guess it would be good for him to know that not only is he not alone suffering from depression, he's really, really not alone suffering from depression as a diabetic person.  It's disturbingly common, so there's nothing uniquely wrong with him or aberrant about him.  Hopefully he uses this as an inflection point for his life decisions and uses his second lease on life to beat the depression.

I think the concern is a good one.  Here's an alternate way to think about it, though:

Without a deep pocket of supplies, a mission can either be a success (everyone lives, objectives accomplished) or a failure (deaths, lack of objective success, etc.).  This line can be razor-thin in a lot of encounters.

The more supplies you have to draw on, though, the more you are able to move that needle toward success, but at great cost.  In a lot of cases, players will adopt strategies that are entirely suboptimal and still come out on top, specifically because they used cartloads of supplies to do it.

If you find yourself blowing through an extreme amount of consumable material, you might try adjusting your strategy to a more cautious or efficient approach.  Simple things like packing an Imp Invis instead of a Stoneskin or bringing medicine bags or forcing the risk-free buff mage to cough up some of his healing cache can all add up to turn an expensive event into a rather affordable one.

I rather like that players find themselves in situations where their coveted supplies can be burnt up as a "get out of jail free" card.  It forces them to focus on their long-term presence vs. the immediacy of succeeding in the short-term, and do a quick cost-benefit analysis.  If you are burning all of your supplies on every event (not just the really large ones), you might need an adjustment in strategy.

Finally, if you really, really hate having to farm up more supplies at all between events (which is a very valid point of view, I'll add!), then you might consider playing a concept that is either less reliant on being in active combat situations, or at least participates in those active combat situations in a more renewable way.  The poorest level 8 bard in the world without a trinket to his name is always welcome in a party.

Honestly, a wizard can earn his keep with his prepared spells alone.  Healing and other various consumables beyond that are just gravy.

There's nothing wrong with beating up low level people.

It's just annoying when someone is clearly hunting for level 2's because they want to flex some ego on them.

If you don't want a painful experience, you should avoid playing a sentient plant-fungus-thing!

I like it when the warrior calls out the hiding wizards for being useless and demands they cough up some potions to help the war effort.

If they refuse to pony up any help, sheathe your sword and quit the quest.

After all, the warrior takes all the risks and is expected to share the rewards.  The least the backline can do is soak some gold costs upfront.

I was the DM overseeing this (the one who gave you a rather large XP bonus for the success of the original PVP).

You voluntarily let the opposing character out of custody, thus ending the PVP incident.

That player chose to have his character heal himself up and return to initiate a new PVP incident, which you promptly lost.

The other player had full rights within the rules to return and start a new fight.

I can't say I would have done the same thing, but do you really want DM's micromanaging everything players do?  Do you really want us arbitrarily making decisions about how classy different legal actions are and intervening from on high?

You did the cool thing and let the person go, and then you got wrecked.  If you were on the other side of the equation, you'd be pretty upset if a DM punished you somehow when you didn't actually break a rule!

For what it's worth, I love when your bloodthirsty characters tear things up like they do, but it sort of diminishes the cool factor when you inevitably surface a dramatic reaction to it on IRC and on the forums.  The real reason you lost the fight is not that the other person was being uncool, or that the DM on site was cruelly indifferent.  You lost the fight because you lost the fight, and that's on you!

[BIG ORC MANEFU:A]

BIG ORC MAN

EFU:A

Hevzibah Gretch - Old, disgusting female Talontar priestess who crooned after Saood because she was barren and had no children of her own.  Vomited constantly.

Walter Hodgeton - Waukeenar priest in the Docks and Son of Sabuth seeking to bring Keynesian stimulus to the slums and to dismantle the Dominion for raising trade barriers/tariffs.

Baklak Trollspike - Fat, foul-tempered dwarven rogue who (somehow) became a Stygian despite being horrendously inept.  Routinely took bribes, oppressed the weak, and threw beautiful women into the stocks for making him feel insignificant.  He himself was turned into a gorgeous elven lass permanently before meeting his end.

Horace Highwall - Azuthan robo-paladin (thanks, Mort!) who served the Conclave to bring abusers of magic to justice (or at least try).  Met his end to VP's excellent character Kosef.

'Hack' - Halfling gangster who took a lot of political power in the Slums for a short while before an unlucky acid bomb critical sent him to the great halfling in the sky.  Partially made to test my theory that even a PVP moron like myself could do well with a halfling rogue/fighter.  Turns out, I was right!

EFU:R

Angelo Trusk - Fat, greasy, dishonest Watcher who was trying to get the Mongrels gang under his thumb and bust the Ora tribe for being beasts.  Then it all went wrong.

Blue41 is legend and you will all show some goddamn respect.