Glad when she heard the trumpet-blast that each time so far had heralded sudden stasis for many foes, Aria got a sense from the sudden lack of motion who had been paralyzed; five of the topless girls.<br/><br/>Aria swatted her other hammer in-hand across the whip-wielder's other temple, knocking her to the stone of the dais with a cracked-in skull. With a hard wing-twist she spun in place aerially, tossing the hammer, and then another at the other tabard-topped woman, who similarly crumpled with a bashed brain. Aria phased out as she flung another at a still-moving topless girl, and reappeared just as she kicked the head of the one of the first-seen topless girl right beneath her. The girl slumped down, out cold but alive, as Aria flung another hammer at the girl she'd missed, striking her down into stillness.<br/><br/><br/>For verisimilitude I prefer to keep the recent Snowflake Wardance use (which I think was carried over from the battle prior anyway?) I'm fairly sure I gave you the full text of the feat when I first suggested it (I don't care if you forgot, I just don't want to appear to you like it's a bait-and-switch, even accidentally) and IMO it's not that big a deal, the wand charges are only 15 gp a pop and later on, if you want, you could buy/commission some custom item to cast it X times per day (360 per charge) or use so-called 'eternal wands' (2/day for a wand; roughly same price for charge IIRC). I wonder if there's an item somewhere for fatigue/exhaustion immunity. Also, the penalties are not even that bad for Kass (-6 Str and Dex, half speed movement) since the slippers let her use Cha instead of Str for attacks, and it doesn't affect spellcasting at all. So it's basically -3 AC, reflex, initiative, and half speed. Worth covering with lesser restoration when you can, but not devasting if you found yourself having to fight exhausted.<br/><br/>You get one surprise action, then (assuming that the foes become aware as the result of it - as with most any attack) roll initiative. What I meant was that:<br/><br/>Once an ally 'blows the cover' with an action (almost any attack, a failed move silently, etc.) that's their surprise round action (The last thing they do pre-initiative.) Each other PC also gets one, assuming they are also aware of things and can sync their own action with the first PC's. You don't get a(nother) surprise round action *after* your cover-blowing action. Although of course you might win initiative and get to act next anyway.<br/><br/>In general the DMG recommends doing these in rounds, like a series of 'surprise rounds' during which each PC does an action (rather than one PC doing many, then the other doing many), since you never know when one PC's preparatory actions might blow things. For example if I'd known Kass wanted to do more than one action, I might've broken Aria's over several posts. (But in this case it's clincher and Kass wasn't even close to being detected before the spell.)<br/><br/>As an example, Aria took an action to don the blindfold, then to fly (w/ drawing hammers) for one move action (with blink, fly speed is down to 45' from 60'), so far undetected b/c move silently and the darkhidden 'invisibility'. Then she attacked (which alerted the woman.) If the moving silently had failed, her movement would've been her 'surprise round action'.<br/><br/>Without something like Invisibility or Camouflage or Hide in Plain Sight you can't hide in the open (i.e. without cover or concealment), so in order to melee attack as a surprise action, for example, you normally need to be within range of one move action (a surprise round charge lets you move 1x speed + attack as one action) from some place you were undetected from (such as by hiding, or being somewhere you don't need to use Hide, like around the corner of an opaque wall). In this case a Darkness spell effect pervades the sanctuary, which provides concealment, and so Aria could've used that to Hide even while moving into the room, if she'd lacked 'invisibility'. Although of course invis makes you much harder to Spot than 'mundane' Hiding.<br/><br/><br/><br/>Also - the Hide/MS text is weird b/c it says 'less than full speed' and then jumps to 'run', sort of skipping over regular speed (and a dramatic -5 to -20 somewhere at that). You may be right that the thing to do is go down 5' (and you did the right thing reading it litrally), but IMO you can go normal speed for -5 (it's a weird discontinuity and maybe you can go infinitesimally less than normal speed?) for simplicity is nothing else. Maybe there's an errata/FAQ/Rules-of-the-Game-article somewhere that addresses that.<br/><br/><br/>Kass successfully casts w/o being heard and moves 50' west and 15' north also undetected,<br/>Robed women both save; 5 of 8 topless girls fail (marked with * )<br/><br/>Init<br/>Aria 27<br/>Kass 21<br/>NPCs 3<br/><br/>Aria:<br/>begin full attack w/ melee attacks against whip-woman using the other hammer (they are light melee weapons with a 20' range increment for throwing)<br/>Since her attacks may depend on previous attacks here, I will roll them sequentially, using a 3d20 for each attack (first d20 is the blink miss, where a 1-4 is the 20% miss, second is the attack roll, third if needed is confirmation if 2nd was a threat)<br/>1 atk 30+2 (includes +1 for higher ground), dmg 11+64, slain<br/>5' step southeast (to directly over the 'first' topless girl) - to be w/i 30' of the southeast woman (for both blindsight and sneak attack)<br/>draw mw hammer(s) w/ the crystals<br/>2 atk 24+8, dmg 9+61, staggered<br/>3 atk 21+12-2 (range increment) dmg 10+82, slain<br/>mw hammer at east (unparalyzed) topless girl<br/>4 blink miss<br/>(3/7 mw hammers used)<br/><br/>off hand: unarmed at girl directly beneath her<br/>1 atk 29+12, dmg  8+67 nonlethal, knocked out (includes +1 for higher ground)<br/>mw hammer at east (unparalyzed) topless girl<br/>2 atk 23+12, dmg 8+60, slain<br/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: courier;"><br/><br/><br/>                                     . . . . .<br/>                                   . . . . . . .<br/>                                 . . . p*. . . . .<br/>                               . . p*. . . p*. . . .<br/>                               . . . . . . . . . . .<br/>                             . . p*. . P'. . p'. . . . . . . . . .|<br/>                             . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|<br/>                             . . . p . . . Ap' . . . . . . . . . .|<br/>                               . . . . p*. . . . . . . . . . . . .|<br/>                                 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .| <br/>                             . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|___|_ _|___ <br/>                             . . . . . . K . . . . P'. . . . . . ./. . . . . .|<br/>                             . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ./. . . . . . .|<br/>                               . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ./. . . . . . . .|<br/>                                 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|<br/>                                   . . . . . . . . . . . .=. . . . . . . . ./<br/>                                   . . . . . . . . . . ./. . . . . . . . ./<br/>                                     . . . . . . . . ./. . . . . . . . ./<br/>                           ___ _ _ _________ _ _ ___/. . . . . . . . ./              <br/>                          /. . . . . . . . . . . . .\. . . . . . . ./<br/>                        =. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ./<br/>                      =. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .=. . . ./<br/>                    /. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .\. ./<br/>                  X. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .X<br/>                    \. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ./<br/>                      ---- - ---------   --------- - -----<br/></span>