Goblins Will Totally Eat You

[Michael Silverbane]

I've been meaning to put up a thread in here for quite some time about the campaign that I've been running online using Maptool. It is a (slightly modified) D&D 3.5 game, using Maptool 1.2b32.

I just ran the fourteenth session of the campaign, in which the players (a Dwarf Fighter, a Human Scout, a Human Wizard, a Gnome Druid and an Elf Monk) set fire to a Goblin nest (a giant bramble patch, about four hundred feet in diameter), destroyed two Goblin Powered Armors, and defeated a dozen goblin spearmen, their sorcerer leader, and his two pet rat swarms.

Here's a pic of the goblin's nest



If you notice, the bramble patch (nest) is sitting in the midst of a forest. For the forest, I took (someone from here, I don't recall who, but thank you) a repeating forest tile, and laid it over the repeating grassland tile to make an unbounded forest map. Then I used the grassland texture to pain out the trees I didn't want to make clearings and whatnot, and squared in topology where I wanted tree trunks to block the visions of my players in the 'playing area.' This ened up being an area about eight hundred feet wide (160 squares west to east) by about a thousand feet high (200 squares north to south). It was a LOT of tree trunks... But the end result was totally worth it.

Here's a zoomed out view of the area immediately surrounding the goblin's nest (in the players view, again).



I'm using pretty much all images scavenged off the internet for my tokens, textures, and objects. Inlcuding thing staken from the gallery here and from RPG Mapshare, the Dundjinni forums... and all over. In particular, I've found lots of good monster pics at the Rackham Miniatures website.... Including this gem...



Which the players have not encountered yet, but hopefully will during the next session.

Here's what the stats (and macros) of a goblin juggernaut and a goblin power armor look like...


Goblin Juggernaut (Goblin Mutant 3, Fighter 4)
Size / Type: Medium Humanoid
Hit Dice: 3d6 + 4d10 + 28 (70 hp)
Initiative: +0
Speed: 30 ft. (6 squares)
Armor Class: 19 (+6 goblin plate, +3 large shield) touch 13, flat-footed 19
Base Attack / Grapple: +6 / +10
Attack: Shield Bash +10 melee (1d6+4 / 20)
Full Attack: Shield Bash +10 / +5 melee (1d6+4 / 20)
Space / Reach: 5 ft. / 5 ft.
Special Attacks: Shield Charge, Shield Slam
Special Qualities: Unstoppable, low-light vision, darkvision
Saves: Fort +8, Ref +3, Will +2
Abilities: Str 18, Dex 11, Con 19, Int 11, Wis 10, Cha 6.
Skills: Climb +8, Escape Artist +4, Handle Animal +1, Hide +0, Jump +8, Move Silently +0, Ride +4, Survival +4
Feats: Power Attack, Improved Overrun, Improved Shield Bash, Shield Charge, Shield Slam, Shield Specialization, Shield Ward
Environment: Temperate Plains, Temperate Forest, or Underground
Organization: Blah
Challenge Rating: 5
Treasure: Goblin Plate, Small Steel Shield
Alignment: Always Chaotic Evil
Level Adjustment: +0

Macros:
Target Archers /me lowers its head and rushes at the Mounted Archers.
Target Asteria /me lowers its head and rushes at Asteria.
Target Bilmig /me lowers its head and rushes at Bilmig.
Target Foot 1 /me lowers its head and rushes at the first unit of heavy foot.
Target Foot 2 /me lowers its head and rushes at the second unit of heavy foot.
Target Gerbo /me lowers its head and rushes at Gerbo.
Target Lolindir /me lowers its head and rushes at Lolindir.
Target Sander /me lowers its head and rushes at Sander.
Target Woolf /me lowers its head and rushes at Mr. Woolf.
Attack Shield /me bashes with his shield. [1d20+10] attack.
Attack Shiled Full /me bashes away with his shield in a full attack. [1d20+10] attack [1d20+5] attack.
Attack Shield Slam /me makes a devastating shield slam [1d20+10] attack.
Charge Shield Slam /me charges, making a devastating shield slam [1d20+12] attack.
Hit Shield /me hits with his shield, dealing [1d6+4] points of damage.
Hit Charge /me hits with his slam, dealing [1d6+4] points of damage. His Shield Charge feat allows him to make a free trip [1d20+4]. Make a Strength (or Dexterity) check to avoid falling prone. Make a Fortitude save versus DC 17 to avoid becoming dazed as a result of his Shield Slam feat.
Hit Slam /me hits with his shield slam, dealing [1d6+4] points of damage. Make a Fortitude save versus DC 17 to avoind being dazed as a result of his shield slam feat.


Goblin Power Armor (Construct 6, Fighter 2)
Size / Type: Large Construct (augmented humanoid)
Hit Dice: 6d10 + 2d10 + 30 (89 hp)
Initiative: +0
Speed: 20 ft. (4 squares)
Armor Class: 16 (-1 size, +7 natural), touch 9, flat-footed 16.
Base Attack / Grapple: +5 / +14
Attack: Chaingun +6 ranged (1d12 / x3)
Full Attack: Chaingun +4 ranged (1d12 / x3) and Chaingun +4 ranged (1d12 / x3)
Space / Reach: 10 ft. / 10 ft.
Special Attacks: Stomp, RollOver, Convert, Explode
Special Qualities: Low-light vision, darkvision, blindsense 60 ft., construct traits
Saves: Fort +5, Ref +2, Will +2
Abilities: Str 21, Dex 11, Con --, Int 13, Wis 10, Cha 9
Skills: Intimidate +13, Jump +0, Move Silently +4
Feats: Powered Armor Proficiency, Two Gun Fighting, Power Attack, Improved Overrun
Environment: Temperate Plains, Temperate Forest, or Underground
Organization: Blah, blah blah
Challenge Rating: 4
Treasure: None

Macros:
Attack Chaingun /me blasts away with his chaingun. [1d20+6] attack.
Attack Full Chaingun /me blasts away with both chainguns in a full attack. [1d20+4] attack [1d20+4] attack.
Hit Chaingun /me hits with his chaingun, dealing [1d12] points of damage.
Critical Chaingun /me scores a critical hit with his chaingun! He heals [3d12] points of damage.
Target Bilmig /me points his chaingun at Bilmig.
Target Asteria /me points his chaingun at Asteria.
Target Lolindir /me points his chaingun at Lolindir.
Target Gerbo /me points his chaingun at Gerbo.
Target Sander /me points his chaingun at Sander.
Target Woolf /me points his chaingun at Mr. Woolf.
Target Archers /me points his chaingun at the Mounted Archers.
Target Foot 1 /me points his chaingun at the first unit of heavy foot.
Target Foot 2 /me points his chaingun at the second unit of heavy foot.

It has been a good time so far. My players seem to enjoy it. Hopefully I will be able to post up even more of their exploits, as the game progresses.

Thanks for your excellent tool
silver

[trevor]

Thanks for the write up, I love the screenies, It's amazing how big these maps can get

And dang, I need to make a simple way to copy all those macros and properties directly into a token instead of having to type it

[Michael Silverbane]

And dang, I need to make a simple way to copy all those macros and properties directly into a token instead of having to type it

That would be awesome. I usually come up with the stat-blocks and macros on openoffice when I'm at work. The stat-blocks copy into the GM notes area just fine, of course, but retyping the macros can take some time. It is especially combersome for spell-casters, who generally have even more options for what they can do.

Still, I love the tools. This campaign could not exist at all without them.

Later
silver

[PillBox]

Thats pretty cool. Does it lag when you run it?

Thats the problem I am having, though that may be down to the fact that I am using the latest development build.

[Hawke]

Thats pretty cool. Does it lag when you run it?

Thats the problem I am having, though that may be down to the fact that I am using the latest development build.

I bet being able to set individual vision from infinite to large (100 ft? 200 ft?) would solve a lot of this... though may be imperfect "solution." Am I correct on that?

[Michael Silverbane]

Thats pretty cool. Does it lag when you run it?

Thats the problem I am having, though that may be down to the fact that I am using the latest development build.

There was a little bit of lag when I had the characters visions set high (around 200 feet or so). So I cut their visions down to 60 feet, and at that point, there was no lag whatsoever.

That is a pretty rare occurance, though, due to the fact that there is a TON of topology on this particular map. On most maps, keeping the vision set at 240 generates no significant lag. I am quite looking forward to seeing how a map like this would perform on 1.3 with its infinite vision.

Oh. It may also be of interest that I (and all of my players) are running strictly off of the web-start... So 256 M of memory, max, and I have not yet maxed it out.

Later
silver

[PillBox]

I bet being able to set individual vision from infinite to large (100 ft? 200 ft?) would solve a lot of this... though may be imperfect "solution." Am I correct on that?

Is there an option to actually do that, or are you speaking in general ?

[Phergus]

Everybody keeps saying infinite vision but it isn't.

Under 1.3b20 it is 1000'. Less than a quarter mile.

[Hawke]

okay...


I bet being able to set individual vision from 1000 ft to large (100 ft? 200 ft?) would solve a lot of this... though may be imperfect "solution." Am I correct on that?

[trevor]

okay...


I bet being able to set individual vision from 1000 ft to large (100 ft? 200 ft?) would solve a lot of this... though may be imperfect "solution." Am I correct on that?

the smaller the range the smaller the number of things to compute.

[Double King]

question about topology with regards to above. in one of our recent games, one of the players recommended using squares for topo saying that it cut down on processing. is that correct?

[Phergus]

Using squares as the topo for tree-trunks and such definitely cuts down on the CPU load. Fewer vertices, less load.

[trevor]

Using squares as the topo for tree-trunks and such definitely cuts down on the CPU load. Fewer vertices, less load.

_highly_ recommended to use squares for tree trunks

[PillBox]

How much lag does the fog-of-war cause? Don't know if its just my PC, but when its on, the lag is pretty bad ...

[Phergus]

The Fog of War doesn't cause the lag. It is the vision/topology calculations.

Fog of War used without vision is very speedy and usable even on old P3 systems.

Throw a bunch of complex topology down with multiple light sources and things will start bogging down.