Fireside Chat: Level 10.5

On a cold and snowy Thursday afternoon, I sit by the open fire and worm my toes deeper into my furry slippers. Noticing your approach, I put down my source books and brandy, then welcome you over to a vacant, but supremely comfortable, armchair...

So after long deliberation as to whether or not I wanted to continue playing in Barovia or end ASAP, I've decided we will be spending more time claiming the Forest Fane, disrupting Aldric, resurrecting Izzy and finding the Sunsword.

Can you believe I initially thought we'd be out of Cadavera by the first week in January? Sometimes these plots take on lives of their own, and with added complexity and two new PCs things take more time to do right. As long as we continue to have fun, and there are stories to be told, I don't see a problem with remaining a while longer to complete our three quests...

1. Foiling Aldric and the devil cult
2. Resurrecting Izzy
3. Restoring day to Barovia via the Sunsword

Of course, we all had grand plans for a Paragon Break and an in-game year to reach level 11. That is all still good to go, and your plans will come to fruition, but there is work yet to be done in Barovia first. Thing is you've already surpassed the experience requirement for level 11. It wouldn't make sense to just up and assume your Paragon-related powers without that year's passing, but I do want to reward you, so at Josh's suggestion, I present to you...

LEVEL 10.5!
You get to increase your hp and choose your next feat, but save the PP stuff until 11 proper. Once we reach the Paragon Break (after the completion of the remaining 3 quests), then you can level up fully to 11. I will be keeping tabs on all the experience you earn, as well, so that once break hits you can apply it all. So nothing you do during 10.5 is wasted. It's still accumulating on your ultimate experience totals.

Shorter Summaries
While I have you, I also wanted to let you know that for the time being, summaries will be just a few paragraphs. You have no idea how daunting it becomes to create such long summaries (almost like retellings, honestly). And for the next few weeks, I'll be having a lot of stuff going on between work and a t-shirt project I'm doing with a friend.

Earn LOTS of Experience
And as an incentive for you all, any previous session that is missing a complete summary is up for grabs for you all to complete. Check back through your logs, write up either a few paragraphs or a long, chaptered summary, and earn experience for the entire group. My goal is to eventually have 61 finished summaries. A few paragraphs summary (and please, still be thorough enough where I can get the gist and important details) will net each player +500 xp, so the equivalent of a standard 3500xp encounter! Full blown chapter summaries earns 1000 xp each, or a 7000xp motherload! I imagine there's at least 2 levels worth of unfinished summaries buried in the blog for the taking.

Claim Your Spoils!
Over the last two months of so, you guys have come into possession of a number of magic items and valuable loot. I'd like people to actually claim these things and list then on their sheets, or else I feel they will be forgotten and never used. At the very least go and sell them!

Unclaimed, we have...
Chiropteran Robes (61)
Unusual Magician's Ring (61)
Talisman of Terror (56)
Rimerought Plate Armor (56)

Other than that, hope you're all having fun! I'll see you Tuesday!