[OOC] Heart of Darkness (Part II)

[Mindsiege]

I've certainly not been in the position to counter an imperceptible (or hardly perceptible) stalker before. I agree that it's a unique challenge, and very problematic.

[secretID]

I know you're in no rush, but just FYI, I'm just taking some time to allow a creative idea for approaching Darce to surface.

[Mindsiege]

That's all right. It will be a few posts though until we get to Darce. You'll have some more time to get creative even if we proceed, so Jimmy definitely has the time to come up with his plan after the rest cycle.

[Mindsiege]

No worries about your plan with Darce, I'm perfectly fine with the chosen approach, though I'll check in with my NPCs one more time to see if they have any input.

Speaking of their input, Ilala would not be happy with your watch order, and it's something that she would get into an argument over. She would insist on sharing a watch with her sister. However, if you can present me with an argument that would address the issue that she takes, there is an opportunity to pacify her with a successful Persuasion check. It's not any other argument though (like in the Simpsons example). The challenge is to pry apart the reason that she's being difficult in the first place. So a Persuasion check will only be possible if the core of the problem is addressed.

I'm fine with abstracting this without playing through a lot of dialogue, just let me know from what angle you'd like to come at it.

@edit:
As for Surprise with Etherealness, there's really only one way to abstract it (that I see). It would be a Stealth vs. Perception contest to determine if Glynn would be able to apparate in a way that allows her to get the jump on your group.

[Mindsiege]

To be clear, we can also RP it out, to give Jimmy more of an opportunity to respond in the same vein of the tone that Ilala would be using. After being brought to tears from their last argument she'll certainly avoid forcing a repeat, but this isn't something that she feels like she can let slide.

[secretID]

I ended up just editing my watch order to something that probably makes more sense anyway. Jimmy will just have to find another opportunity.

[Mindsiege]

Would you say that Ilala's protests are canonically or did Jimmy never bring it up?

[secretID]

Whoops - sorry I lost track of that question.

Great dream!

What does Jimmy know about hags? - Arcana +7, History +2, Religion (?) +2

[Mindsiege]

Good question.

Soo, this one is a bit tricky. You've probably already identified OOC what kind of hag Glynn is, but it'll be tough for Jimmy to catch up, because this type is pretty obscure. We've already established that Kosev and Jimmy took a day at the library to check out the most iconic fey, so we know that Jimmy has definitely heard about hags at least. The check that you can make for his concrete knowledge will be a History check with advantage for Jimmy, because of his research. That said, you don't need to expect to get all the answers. Jimmy is not high enough in level and did not have the resources to match the DC that will identify Glynn to the tee. But making the roll will still be worth it, I think. I don't typically deal in false positives.

[secretID]

Hm. It occurs to me that I was interested in initial impressions/memories for purposes of this post, but a little later, when actually probing his recollections, Jimmy may want to use Guidance - but casting Guidance here would strange, if it's even possible. I don't really need the impressions for the post - I think just for any realization that this is likely a coven, and then possibly the realization of kind of hag. What do you suggest?

[Mindsiege]

Mmm, yeah, this is a really meta-gamey question that has really tied knots into my brain before. If some checks, especially knowledge checks are rolled only once, why would the player ever roll without casting Guidance first?

The answer that I've seen other GMs come up with is that failed knowledge checks amount to "your character can't recall, yet". Which is pretty elegant, considering that it matches how IRL you sometimes only remember stuff at a later time too. That said, I don't think the GM should allow rewarding players that attempt to repeatedly roll the same check in order to get different outcomes, so the situation would need to change significantly before the reroll.

Sorry for ranting, I know you prefer if I give you the ruling straight, but I already wrote the above before remembering that. So this is what we'll do in this case:

Jimmy can't cast Guidance inside the dream, because it works differently than what Almavalesh does. I'm giving you the realization that this is a coven for free, because Jimmy has plenty of enough reason to believe so and the information to connect the dots should be available to him. The realization about the kind of hag would require a successful History check. Since I've already revealed that it's a DC that's too hard for Jimmy as is, you should just make the roll with Guidance after waking up.

[secretID]

Cool. He'll just go with the knowledge about covens for now, then. "Coven of hags" is already a big piece of news. Anything short of very specific info re abilities probably won't make much difference.

[Mindsiege]

Yeah. For now, just consider that they are witches with magic, stronger together, and generally extremely awful. Since Jimmy isn't in full control of his faculties right now, I think not keeping it specific works even better. I'm not even sure if Jimmy knows that the meeting right now isn't real. I'll leave that to you whether you think he would.

[Mindsiege]

Would you please add a Persuasion check for Jimmy's last post? Let's see if Glynn has an ear for this train of thought.

[secretID]

Dice Roll:

1d20+8

(9)+8

Total = 17

(17)