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Amiri & Friends #46 - Corridor Dart Trap

Artist: @sheastandefer

The random nature of card-based games allows for staggering repeat playability, but also so bizarre and entertaining combinations. Sometimes you find a Longsword at the Armory, and sometimes you fight the Hammerhead Shark at the Tengu Rookery. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And sometimes, you are strolling through a dungeon hallway, acquire a Dart, and then encounter a Corridor Dart Trap, like Zetha did. Who says fate doesn’t have a sense of humor?

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #45 - Middle of Nowhere

Artist: @sheastandefer

Adventure 5 of Wrath of the Righteous is pretty merciless with it’s labyrinth-themed movement confusion and restrictions. Even after getting through the two major maze scenarios, minotaurs are still popping up as henchmen, and a bad roll against them can land you...well, in the Middle of Nowhere,  a useless location that is very hard to leave!

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #44 - Transmogrification Central

Artist: @sheastandefer

One of the loot rewards in Wrath of the Righteous is a spell called Transmogrify. It is intended to allow a caster to weaken a powerful monster (usually a henchman or villain) by reducing its difficulty to defeat by your Arcane or Divine skill +1d6, so it is easier to combat for the win. Sometimes, you don’t have any other options, though.

With the prevalence of demons and undead in Wrath, Kyra got a little too reliant on her laser powers (recharging any spell or blessing for a powerful attack...but only against those creature types), and encountered a monster with no conventional means of fighting. Rather than take it on the chin, she used Transmogrify on the middling Cultist archer.

The trouble is, by the time you earn this loot spell, though, you are so powerful that casting it is a fairly ridiculous bonus, even against beefy villains. Against a standard monster, it was messy. Thanks to skill feats, mythic charges, and the Black Robes, Kyra’s Divine static bonus was already +12. After rolling max on d12 + d6, the Combat 14 archer had its difficulty reduced by 30. Needless to say, Kyra had no trouble then rolling her base strength to defeat it. 

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #43 - BEEFCAAAAKE!

Artist: @sheastandefer

Some names are forever associated with a specific celebrity, character, or song. Guys named Luke is always told to use the Force or complimented on their cool hand. Girls named Becky are always being told to look at that girl’s butt. Poor Michael Bolton in Office Space has to endure comparisons to that no-talent ass clown of a singer.

And I’d wager there is nary a game of PACG goes by where Master Cartman hits the table and the South Park jokes don’t start spilling out. MAAAAAHM!

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #42 - Unearthly OP

Artist: @sheastandefer

When we started playing through the old boxes, I thought adding in Ultimate Add-On decks would be a fun way to spice things up on a replay (for me) and see a variety of interesting cards for my new friends. However, we seem to keep finding little card combos that were likely unintentional.

In Wrath, our Hunter Adowyn had been having trouble recharging spells, so with the Riffle Scrolls came along (which lets you place spells on it instead of banishing them, and then bury the Riffle Scrolls to recharge all spells on it that could be recharged with a check of a skill you have), that seemed like a great solution to not always be losing her Cure.

Then we found Unearthly Aim, a (supposedly) one use card that banishes to add 10 + AD# to your Ranged combat check. A really powerful card, but it has no recharge check, so you just have to banish it to use, and hope it comes up to acquire again.

Except, if you place a spell on Riffle Scrolls, and then never bury it to recover those spells, all spells left on it are buried. Meaning, they go right back in your deck! It requires you to sink two cards to keep, you have to be a caster who also makes Ranged attacks, and you need to have the Riffle Scrolls out before you can play Unearthly Aim without losing it, but a once-per-game +13 (or +14 or +15 or +16) is pretty good insurance in the villain fight!

Despite his comedic objection in this comic, I feel like Mike Selinker would approve our ingenuity. :)

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri and Friends #41 - Too Easy

@sheastandefer

The “cock. roach.” was easy joke fodder, but some of the monster art in this box just ridiculous in is phallic resemblance. “Here you go Kyra, fight a bag of dicks-- er, I mean, a “maggot swarm.”  Or this “worm demon.” That’s what they call it. Sure. The “spice” must flow.

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #40 - A Phallus by Any Other Name

Artist: @sheastandefer​

You knew we’d be back with a dick joke, right? Kyra encountered a monster and inserted a strategic pause between syllables in announcing the identity of the Giant Cockaroach, and art was born! :D

We have to make light of the monsters because this box is BRUTAL early on. Let’s hope we survive to finally hear the call of our mythic paths!

[amiriandfriends]

Welcom back, friends of Amiri! Apologies for the hiatus, but our artist is a working artist, and she has had, well, work, and not felt like drawing as much in her downtime. Understandable! In the meantime, Damiel, Oloch, and Lini successfully defeated the Hurricane King and have become reigning pirates in the Shackles, so we are off to the ever-brutal box Wrath of the Righteous! Goblin cutpurse Ekkie, human hunter Adowyn (and her faithful wolf Leryn), and Sarenrae’s devoted cleric Kyra are off to defend (and dare they hope, close?) the Worldwound as all manner of demons attempt to invade our world. No doubt hilarity will ensue!

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #39 - Showoffs

Artist: @sheastandefer

In a party full of support characters, Damiel, with his ability to Dimensional Step into any fight and through any potion as a bomb to help out, has probably been the most aggressively helpful member of the party. As we have advanced to Adventure 6, though, we have all developed more powerful abilities to assist each other (especially Oloch!), and apparently Damiel does not appreciate being upstaged. Only an incel would be so jealous of being offered an overwhelming amount of helpful support. :’)

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #38 - Cephalo-pawed

Artist: @sheastandefer

Dagon’s Jaws is a location of paired islands that looks like, well, jaws. Mechanically, the location cards are split into a stack of 6 and 4, and while the stacks are treated as separate locations with the same text, the location isn’t closed until BOTH stacks are dealt with.

After the party grouped up at he larger of the two, taking it down, Damiel wandered over to the smaller stack by himself to explore, despite having a mostly depleted hand. He had some bottled lightning, figuring it would be good for a fight, and then be done. Instead he encountered a Giant Spyglass Octopus, which requires two fights, as well as before- and after-you-act checks, and basically gets pummeled while Oloch and Lini can only stand by and watch (making Spyglass jokes at Damiel’s expense).

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends Side Quest #1 - Separately Together

Artist @sheastandefer

Since our party has moved on to the Skull & Shackles box, my friends asked to borrow Rise of the Runelords to introduce to their friends. The indoctrination spreads!

In their game, Lini vehemently argued in favor of the party all sticking together location by location, despite the Stone Head henchman damaging everyone at the location when fought. The party relented and stuck together at the first location...where Lini proceeded to encounter and acquire a Pteranadon, which only lets you explore again if you move first. So Lini flies away on her dinosaur to explore new and different frontiers, meanwhile, the next player explores, hits the Stone Head, and everyone left behind promptly gets clobbered. THANKS LINI.

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #37 - A Little Punchy

Artist - @sheastandefer

Our most recent adventure required a lot of repairing hazardous shipwreck surrounding our new island (yes, we own an island!). Unfortunately, encountering them was random, and Damiel is really the only one with any Craft skill. Naturally, that meant Damiel encountered NONE of them.

When Oloch encountered one, Damiel offered assistance, but Oloch’s response was effectively, “I got this.”

When Damiel quipped, “What are you going to do? PUNCH the boat back together?” And with the help of the Topaz of Strength, allowing him to use his Strength instead of a listed skill, that’s pretty much what he did. 

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #36 - Possessed

Artist @sheastandefer

As the heroes attempt to reclaim their new island domain from the natural (and supernatural) wilds, one of the players has the option to replace their role card with that of a ghostly mage for one game, becoming possessed by wizardly haunt while clearing out the ruined fortress for their own use. Damiel gave it a whirl, but quickly realized it was not a good idea, the cards in deck not lining up well with the powers of the new spirit guest. Damiel kept asking if there was a way to voluntarily get rid of it, but that wasn’t part of the deal. Instead, the alchemist got hammered hard pretty early on by failing against a monster, and wasn’t able to draw up to hand size.

Luckily the possessing spirit reads that when you die, you shuffle your discard pile back into your deck and regain your old role card, as if nothing happened. We did not get the bonus cards for completing the scenario with the possessing poltergeist, but Damiel was much happier to have his normal powers back. Before encountering the dooming monster, there were a lot of jokes about beating yourself up to get the spirit out, resulting in this comic.

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri and Friends #35 - Worth it!

Artist: @sheastandefer

Whenever you start a new adventure, it is always exciting to start seeing boons from the new deck; higher level loot to add to your arsenal! Sometimes, though, we get a little carried away trying to acquire it.

The Wishing Well is a haunted location where boons are easy (automatic) to acquire, but they come with a different price; for each one you pick up, you also gain a Pirate Haunt, which follows your character around distracting them with a -1 to all your rolls. Each. So the more free loot you pick up, the harder your checks against actual monsters becomes. The location banishes all your Haunts when you close it, so it is best to let one person “tank” it, collecting all the haunts, then closing and banishing them all at once.

But once someone (*cough*Damiel*cough*) gets wind of a shiny new Item 4 potion, they are hard to derail. Despite Lini trying to take one for the team by tanking the Well dragging five Haunts behind her, as soon as Damiel saw the new potion, he came racing over. Despite having to live with two of his own Haunts for the rest of the game, he repeatedly replied “Worth it!” while cuddling the new bounty. 

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #34 - Cruise to Victory

Artist: @sheastandefer

To wrap up the first half of the adventure path, our crew competed in a regatta against several other pirate crews to win the Pirate Council’s favor. By the time we rolled across the finish line, we were in great shape, and made jokes about cruising to victory in style, lounging on the deck like we were on a yacht. I’M ON A BOAT!

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #33 - When Life Gives You Cannons...

Artist: @sheastandefer​

...make Cannonade! Among the new features in the Skull & Shackles adventure path are ship combat and ship-related hazards. Failure at these tasks results in Structural damage to our ship, which can be negated by the party collectively discarding cards equal to the damage or your ship is wrecked (spoiler alert: bad things happen when your ship is wrecked). This damage can’t be negated or reduced the way armor and other cards can reduce other damage, which makes the rare card that DOES reduce structural damage VERY useful.

Oloch picked up a loot we earned a while back called the Buccaneer’s Breastplate, and it reduces Structural damage by 1. Since then, he’s been saving our ship left and right, which mechanically is awesome, but thematically is somewhat ponderous. Is he diving in front of the ship every time we get shot by a cannon? Do we tie him to a buoy so we can reel him back in after? In any case, it make for a hilarious mental (and now actual) image. 

[amiriandfriends]

Amiri & Friends #32 - Good Weed

Artist: @sheastandefer

Since we mixed in the Ultimate Wilderness Add-On deck into the box, Damiel has been discovering the amazing powers of all the alchemical plants available. Meanwhile, Lini and Oloch have “other plans” for the “good weed” Damiel has discovered.