[Pathfinder] Efficient Communal Transit for a 6th Level Party

[Nahmer]

In the Pathfinder campaign I'm playing in the party is currently 6th level. The campaign features a temporal mechanic where the party can travel in time but always lands in the same fixed location - a temple in a jungle on an island. Any historical events we want to meddle with occur in locations geographically distant from the temple, so we have to get to those places in a timely fashion (pun-intended). This is very much an Odyssey 5 scenario, i.e., a fixed time limit, with all the timelines yoked, e.g., On March 4th we can travel to March 4th of any year, but if we spend a day there and then time-jump, we'll arrive at our destination year on March 5. In other words, we have access to the entire past, but can never visit a calendar day that has already past (after a year in-campaign we lose our ability to time travel and/because the universe is destroyed).

Temporal mechanics aside, the issue I'm concerned with is how to use the party's level 6 resources to travel efficiently: The Druid has access to all Pathfinder druid spells of 3rd level or lower and the ability to wildshape into a large flyer with 60 ft fly speed, e.g., large falcon, for up to 12 hours; the Barbarian has fast movement, i.e., 40 ft, the ranger also has 40 ft movement via longstrider; the witch has access to the mount spell, so could provide the party with mounts for 24 hours if needed; the fifth party member doesn't have any relevant features.

My thoughts are that the druid, as a large flyer could take a passenger, and set up a relay system to get the party to the coast. We have a disassemble-able boat in a bag of holding. The witch could summon some mounts, the druid could cast sea steed (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic/all-spells/s/sea-steed) on them and they could pull the boat. The problem is the sea stead spell's duration is 1 hour (10 min x 6). So we can only keep one mount charged per day or several mounts for a portion of the day. Self-rafting near the coast to get to the mainland without any tricks takes everal days.

Does anyone have suggestions for improving the ocean crossing (sea stead mount) ans jungle crossing (large flyer relay) beyond what I've suggested?

[Coidzor]

A bunch of undead or construct flying creatures is generally the way to go for efficiency. Or one that's big enough for the entire party to ride in/on/in something carried by it.

What's the limitation on size/volume/type of stuff you can take back?

How much gold+goods+resources can get pooled together?

[Maxrim]

Step 1. Travel back to the beginning of a successful and benevolent empire.
Step 2. Convince them of the stakes.
Step 3. Ask that they create/acquire, stash, and protect potions/scrolls of teleport to have ready for you, as well as maybe any other items that you need.
Step 4. Travel forward to when they've been acquired.

[Nahmer]

A bunch of undead or construct flying creatures is generally the way to go for efficiency. Or one that's big enough for the entire party to ride in/on/in something carried by it.

What's the limitation on size/volume/type of stuff you can take back?

How much gold+goods+resources can get pooled together?

Neither the Druid nor the Witch are capable of creating undead or constructs. The Druid has Dominate Animal, but unlike other dominate spells, its duration is only rounds.
The temporal transportation limit is the party, what they're carrying, and any creatures that are class features (animal companions and familiars).
Resources are fairly limited - the party is well under the recommended wealth by level. The transportation and wealth limits more or less preclude, say, shopping for a bunch of hippogriff mounts and taking them through time. It's also a fairly low-magic setting, so there are very few places in the world where exotic winged mounts would be for sell.

[Nahmer]

Step 1. Travel back to the beginning of a successful and benevolent empire.
Step 2. Convince them of the stakes.
Step 3. Ask that they create/acquire, stash, and protect potions/scrolls of teleport to have ready for you, as well as maybe any other items that you need.
Step 4. Travel forward to when they've been acquired.

It's a low-magic campaign where, in the context of history, spellcasting is a relatively recent innovation. In the current 'present day' (i.e., history is subject to change do to our meddling), magic is a tightly regulated commodity largely controlled by a magocracy; in the previous century, magic was controlled by an inter-faith theocracy that greatly obfuscated the details and hewed to the line that spellcasting was solely the domain of the priesthood. The current era is a result of a rebellion that attempted to wrest magic form being the sole domain of the priesthood and bring it to the masses; instead the revolutionaries ended up bringing about a magocracy.

In most of the history we have access to (i.e., everything prior to the last 150 years), people have neither spellcasting nor magic items.

In a sense, I'm fairly sure that any transportation solution has to come from the magic that rangers, druids and witches are capable of.

[Seward]

The most effective low-level means of rapid transit is the Mount spell, combined with healing spells. Your witch and druid should be able to team up and accomplish this.

You can force-march the mounts, healing up their damage as needed or just letting them pop and summoning more (depending on what is efficient) for 8 hours a day, doubling your overland speed.

If you extend the healing to party members (lesser restoration+healing nonlethal damage) you can continue your force march 24 hours a day, multiplying your overland speed another 3 times. Given the need to rest and refresh spells for the Witch, your practical limit is probably 16 hours/day of force marching, so you will travel at 4x the speed of a typical mounted party. If some of your party members are heavy, some spell slots devoted to Ant Haul may be needed to keep the speed up to 50'. The Druid's animal companion might be able to help in this by serving as a mount, requiring only healing and being able to accept spells like Longstrider, etc if it isn't as fast as the horses.

If you are having to go over water, at level 6 your options are limited. Really a sailing craft is the best way, it sails 24x7, you can sleep in shifts etc. While Fabricate isn't an option yet, Wood Shape plus some crafting skills might help here. Just some rope, an axe and crafting skills might be enough to cross a river with a raft. One advantage of the Mount spell is you don't have to worry about getting horses past nasty terrain, you just cast the spell again when past the obstacle.

If you had characters other than ranger, druid and witch you'd have a few more options. Should you somehow get the Restoration (healing subdomain) on your druid, you could remove fatigue 3+wisdom times/day, enough for the whole party, and save a boatload of L2 spell slots. Heroes of the Wild has "Nature's Paths" a L1 druid, ranger or witch spell which will let one creature per level (like your mounts) travel across wilderness like it's a road.

Basically burn a lot of low level spell slots and move faster. Use pearl of power 1s to help with the load, or possibly wands (especially on the healing side, for the transport spells you want level 6 durations) if you know how far you need to go and have enough charges. If magic is new somebody may need to invest in a craft magic item feat to help out.

[Nahmer]

The most effective low-level means of rapid transit is the Mount spell, combined with healing spells. Your witch and druid should be able to team up and accomplish this.

You can force-march the mounts, healing up their damage as needed or just letting them pop and summoning more (depending on what is efficient) for 8 hours a day, doubling your overland speed.

If you extend the healing to party members (lesser restoration+healing nonlethal damage) you can continue your force march 24 hours a day, multiplying your overland speed another 3 times.

Depending on the party mix this can be a bit less brute-forced. Infernal healing's a bit more predictable and efficient than cure light wounds. Paladins who can remove fatigue with a Mercy, or rack lesser restoration in a first level slot (for pearl power 1) or clerics with restoration domain (who can remove fatigue wisdom+3 times per day) help quite a bit on the spell load, as does cleric channeling in general.

If you are having to go over water, at level 6 your options are limited. Really a sailing craft is the best way, it sails 24x7, you can sleep in shifts etc.

Thanks for the heal-assisted forced march idea Seward. The primary obstacles are the jungle from the temple to the coast (where mounts don't help), and the water-portion to a mainland where it doesn't seem possible to enspell the mounts to be sea worthy long enough for them to greatly contribute to the boat's speed (the Druid has enough spell slots to cast Sea Steed 7 times, so for 7 hours / day the boat has an additional horse power.

[Coidzor]

Sounds like you really need to establish a cult that lives on that island and has as its holy duty maintaining the temple, a clear path to the sea, and some kinda boat.

Since the rubes several centuries ago don't have any magic, you have an easier time of this, especially if you can get some kinda immortal cohort to stay behind and lead it.

Of course, an immortal cohort or simply one that's very long-lived could also go back in time to well beforehand and take the time to make a bunch of clockwork or robot flying creatures the long way.

Too bad the magocrats don't like having a place to keep all their stuff, though, this sort of thing really depends upon external support to work well.

[Nahmer]

I've had a thought regarding the ocean component: The Druid could be the mount, wildshaping into a narwhal or giant pike with a swim speed of 60 ft for 12 hours. She could cast greater longstrider every 6 hours to boost her swim to 70 ft and further hustle to boost it to 140 ft. For some of the time she could cast slipstream to add another 20 ft. We'd be essentially traveling 5 times faster.

[Seward]

Nature's Path is the way to deal with the jungle, assuming Heroes of the Wild is allowed. Otherwise there isn't much that helps, although force marching will still speed whatever rate you can manage in the jungle by the same percentage.

Agreed that using wildshape+animal companion to tow your boat is probably a good idea. You only need to heal/lesser restore the druid and you can do the force march thing there too. Ditto on whatever rate Sea Steed can go.