Rappan Athuk (Inactive)

Game Master Olaf the Holy

Many hundreds of years ago, the forces of good allied to destroy the main Temple of Orcus in the ancient city of Tsar. With their temple in ruins, the surviving high priests of this accursed demon-god fled the city with an army of enemies on their trail - an army of heroic fighters, clerics and paladins - led by Zelkor, a powerful wizard. The exact fate of these evil priests was then unknown, for not only did the remnants of the followers of Orcus disappear from all human reckoning, but so did the army of light that followed after them disappear as well. Some said that in the eternal scales the loss of so many good men was a fair price to pay to rid the world of so much evil.
The evil cult, however, had not been destroyed. The surviving priests and their followers instead settled on a hill near the Forest of Hope, a sylvan woodland near the Coast Road. They found a vast underground complex of caverns and mazes, carving out a volcanic intrusion beneath the hill. There, the priests of Orcus found the perfect lair to continue their vile rituals. For many years, they carried on in secret, hidden from the light and from the knowledge of men.
Many years later, their underground delving completed, the evil priests erected a hideous mausoleum and a sunken graveyard atop the hill. It is believed that these graves are in fact the final resting place of the pursuing army of heroes that had been destroyed to a man. Soon after the mausoleum was erected the peaceful creatures of the wood began to disappear. Though many rangers and druids investigated these happenings, the cause of the creatures’ disappearance was not immediately determined. Some years later, a powerful group of adventurers, led by Bofred, a high priest of Pelor, investigated the evil happenings and found the sunken graveyard leading to a labyrinthine complex. Bofred and his companions found great hordes of evil creatures in the complex. Though some of his companions returned from their expedition, telling tales of fantastic treasure and ferocious monsters, Bofred was never seen again—lost in the catacombs beneath the cursed mausoleum.
For the last one hundred years, ranks of adventurers swarmed to the newfound dungeon. Many fell prey to bandits and monsters in the surrounding wilderness. Of those who survived to reach the mausoleum and the sunken graveyard, rumors suggest that most were slain by guardians of green stone before they even entered the dungeon or perished on the very first level. Those rare few who return from deeper treks speak of horrible undead and creatures that cannot be slain. All who have explored Rappan Athuk offer this one universal piece of advice,
“Don’t go down the Well.”

-The Legend of Rappan Athuk, as told by a wandering bard.

So. Rappan Athuk. I thought it was neat enough that I'd try to run it on the forums. It's supposed to be difficult, which I think it will be. So you might want to keep that in mind, and enter with more than one idea for a character.

Setting
You're in a homebrew setting. The game itself will take place in the wilderness just south of the human kingdom of Scorland.
North of the stretch of wilderness that houses the infamous dungeon of Rappan Athuk is a small town called Clarvunne, which is the southernmost town that might be considered part of Scorland. The town lives off of fishing & trade, both by ship and by road. It also has the dubious honor of being the closest outpost of civilization to Rappan Athuk, and so it sees its fair share of adventurers. Those lucky few who make it out alive retreat to Clarvunne as fast as they can.

Far to the south of the wilderness lies the port town of Greenshore. It's said to be a pirate port, a wretched hive of scum and villany, but it's probably not as bad as all that. Clarvunne plies trade with them, after all, and the two townships work together to keep the Coast Road open. Still, it's true that Greenshore does not recognize Scorland rulership.

Religion-wise, we're using the Greyhawk Pantheon. Most humans worship Pelor. Other gods are venerated as saints, of sorts, demigods who patron aspects of life. Evil deities are considered demons.
There exist clerics who follow deities who're not part of Pelor's entourage of saints, but they're looked down upon by the established church. That won't matter much where you're headed, though.
Wilderness Map.

Character Creation
-4th level.
-34 point buy.
-Max hp at first level, roll for subsequent levels.
-5400gp starting gold.
-Any LA +0 race, no templates apart from Dragonborn & Necropolitan.
-Predominately good alignments, Evil should be played tastefully, and instigating pvp will get you booted.
-All official 3.5e sources are allowed, including dragon magazine. No 3rd edition or pathfinder sources are allowed. No homebrew aside from what's in this post.

Homebrew Rules
-Track is no longer a feat, but a function of the Survival skill. Rangers gain Skill Focus: Survival at first level, and PRCs and feats that required Track now require Skill Focus: Survival.
-I run diplomacy as magical tea party, with bullcrap made up DCs. So diplomacy is nerf-batted that way.
-Everyone recieves a bonus feat at first level, in leu of flaws.
-I have control over what sort of cohort and follower Leadership or other feats like it provides. I might entertain general suggestions. I might saddle you with something arbitrary that you didn't want. You have little ability to find out which it will be beforehand.

Banlist
-Persistent Spell(noone ever use it without cheese anyway.)
-Sanctum Spell
-Flaws
-Bloodlines from the d20srd.
-Kobold Cheese (i.e. Punpun & sorcerers with epic feats and +3ish level of sorcerer casting.)
-Other Cheese
-Dragonfire Inspiration ceases to work if anyone attempts to use it in conjunction with Words of Creation.

*Running Rappan Athuk*
"NO CHEESE"

This graveyard bout to get a whole lot bigger.

*Running Rappan Athuk*

"NO CHEESE"

This graveyard bout to get a whole lot bigger.

Hmm. I take a somewhat narrow view of cheese, I think, especially compared to PFS and stuff. Like, Divine Metamagic is not neccesarily cheese, but DDM:Persist is.

Do you want to join up, or just adding some observations? :)

I love a bit of 3.5, and I would be delighted to be considered; but I should mention that I have an application in for another Rappan Athuk game at the moment to.

I'll probably make a Paladin, need to brush up on my 3.5 books first though!

Glad to have you! Might want to consider the crusader instead. 3.5e paladin is a little bad, unless you're planning something special.

I confess I never really warmed to TOB, and while I largely agree on Paladin's I think splatbooks make them fairly powerful, their spell casting in particular gets surprisingly badass, they have naturally great defences, and can get some great mount choices that can be summoned in when the dungeon opens up for battles against larger foes - I kind of assume that this will happen at higher levels semi frequently when large+ foes are more prevalent.

That said I am well aware of the dungeons legendary lethality, so I'm also pondering a druid, though I am wary of having a low AC in Wildshape forms.

Would using age categories, and eventually using wildshape to pretty much ignore the penalties, be cheese? I wouldn't normally ask, but Dungeon of Graves and all that :)

Sure, you can use age categories. Keep in mind that you'll need to survive to fifth level, won't have Natural Spell until sixth, and that your hp do not rise with your increased constitution from wildshape.

But yes, you can use age categories. They might help you out.

Are you planning to do the Battle Blessing & that Sword of the Arcane Order feat? That can be fairly cool, although you're still MAD.

As Tawny Knight, I'm in another recruitment for Rappan Athuk... but consuder this a dotting with the intention of being a righteous crusader dragonborn!

Which means I'm totally playing a dragonborn, probably a "divine" one. Not necessarily crusader, but crusaders are real cool.

I looked the other recruitment thread over. I'm a little confused as to how level 2 characters are supposed to be able to survive anything. Maybe he's using a different version of the dungeon, or something? I haven't checked if they updated it to pathfinder, might be that they've leveled it down a little, or put in an introductionary adventure.

Or maybe they just figured that you'd catch up eventually. Although pathfinder xp progression is a good bit slower than 3.5e, as I recall.

Yes to Battle Blessing, probably no to Sword of the Arcane Order, since getting Into high enough and getting a spell book/access to a spell book would be problematic.

Getting more tempted by the druid though, Fleshraker animal companions are just nasty, and even first level summons can use Wall of Thorns with Green bound summoning - I wouldn't use that in a normal game, and mention it for possible nerfing, but it seems like it would be tremendously useful in RA - though I am not sure how you would legitimately instruct them to use the ability outside of speak with plants, which balances it somewhat.

Edit: definetly Druid if we have a Crusader, and other than dire warnings I am not familiar with the adventure so I cannot comment on the Pathfinder level thing :)

Count me interested. Haven't done any 3.5 in awhile BECAUSE of how bad cheesing can get, and the MC combos that can come from so many splat books. I'm sticking to a more Martial-focused character. Nothing too crazy with magic or ToB dipping. Just a skilled Fighter that can take as good as he dishes out.

Lemme just go ahead and roll my HP for the character I'm thinking up.

1d10 ⇒ 5
1d12 ⇒ 4
1d12 ⇒ 10

Yes to Battle Blessing, probably no to Sword of the Arcane Order, since getting Into high enough and getting a spell book/access to a spell book would be problematic.

Getting more tempted by the druid though, Fleshraker animal companions are just nasty, and even first level summons can use Wall of Thorns with Green bound summoning - I wouldn't use that in a normal game, and mention it for possible nerfing, but it seems like it would be tremendously useful in RA - though I am not sure how you would legitimately instruct them to use the ability outside of speak with plants, which balances it somewhat.

Edit: definetly Druid if we have a Crusader, and other than dire warnings I am not familiar with the adventure so I cannot comment on the Pathfinder level thing :) ** spoiler omitted **

Going to be banning Greenbound Summoning, I'm afraid.

Count me interested. Haven't done any 3.5 in awhile BECAUSE of how bad cheesing can get, and the MC combos that can come from so many splat books.

Do remember though that this is specifically a terribly hard adventure designed to murder your characters, almost every reference you find advises both high levels of optimization and that you prepare multiple back up characters :0 The advice seems to be to prepare especially survivable characters that can last through many more encounters than the standard adventuring day!

And good idea, I'll roll HP to :)

1d8 ⇒ 8
1d8 ⇒ 8
1d8 ⇒ 7

Edit: Nice!

Do remember though that this is specifically a terribly hard adventure designed to murder your characters, almost every reference you find advises both high levels of optimization and that you prepare multiple back up characters :0 The advice seems to be to prepare especially survivable characters that can last through many more encounters than the standard adventuring day!

Oh I always make sure to optimize and make sure my character's are solid crunch-wise. It's why my character is rockin' a +4 Str at the moment, along with a few key feats, gear, and bein' a badass Dwarf.

I just can't stand single-dip MCs which are prevalent in most 3.5 games I've seen recruiting for. And I've already got a couple back-up characters waiting in the wings.

No, I'm with you there, I literally played in a level 15 game with another player who's character had 13 different classes - his character sheet was a mess :p

We-ell, sometimes you just gotta play that bard/druid/divine oracle/arcane heirophant/sublime chord/fochlucan lyrist build, you know?

Admittedly, that's one of the only cases where it's nearly okay to do that.

I'll throw in....dust off the ol' e-tools :)

Never did go in for all of that multi-classing, but i guess I'm a traditionalist :)

Well, don't let me stomp on your single-classed fun. I'll only step in with the banhammer when I think something is getting out of hand, elsewise you can do precisely whatever you want within the rules laid out.

TawnyKnight here :) And here is Glem, a bad tempered old whisper gnome with enough bad habits to gag a stoat.

@Olaf the Holy, how should I handle my animal companion's HP? I can never remember the proper rule. I am kinda assuming base is the creatures then roll for extra HD when they come up?

I don't believe proper rules for it really exist. We're just going to go with it getting average hp, so 4.5+con per die.

Couple things.

-Greenbound summoning is banned. I believe I did say so earlier.
-The rules make no mention of lowering stats giving you more points to spend in a point buy, and so having 7 starting charisma does not give you an extra point to spend.
-Remember to pick tricks for your AC. It's pretty much your only means of effective control over the thing, so it's kind of important.
-Your spells appear to be pathfinder sorcerer wizard spells, but that's probably a copying oddity.

Works for me :)

I added a banlist and houserules/homebrew to the campaign tab. I'll keep that one updated as I add to it.

Ah, missed that, on greenbound summoning, yes probably wise :) Hmmm, what is the stance on crafting in this adventure, is it viable, not encouraged, etc.? Thinking of taking Craft Wondrous Item.

If not I'll likely take Beckon the Frozen to enhance summons - Frostburn gives summons the cold subtype and +1d6 cold damage.

Crafting can be viable. I'll let you know that, in the default "home town", the max value of magic item or craft material that you can purchase is 2000gp. So you could buy a +1 bonus for a weapon, or the materials to craft a +2 cloak of resistance by yourself.

Beyond that, the town will have specific valuable items for sale, and you'll be able to scrounge up more crafting materials with some searching.

It's a downtime thing, and with this being a dungeon crawl, you're responsible for creating your own downtime.

Edit: you also don't seem to be proficient with heavy armor, but that might be intentional.

The heavy armor and lack of proficiency is intentional, the only downside is a minus on attack rolls which does not matter for this character. The acp on skills is a pain, but proficiency does not fix that. I tend to think this happened plenty in the real world, plump nobles wearing fancy armor they were not really trained to fight in, etc.

Thanks for the information on crafting, I suspect that I'll take Beckon the Frozen if you are okay with that feat?

Sure, it's fine. If something you mention is banned, I'll make sure to tell you.

Keep in mind that proficiency actually does remove some problems;

A character who wears armor and/or uses a shield with which he or she is not proficient takes the armor’s (and/or shield’s) armor check penalty on attack rolls and on all Strength-based and Dexterity-based ability and skill checks. The penalty for nonproficiency with armor stacks with the penalty for nonproficiency with shields.

Notably, ride does not normally take an armor check penalty, but does if you're nonproficient, and Initiative is explicitly a dexterity check. This is good for things like the Marshal's Motivate Dexterity, but less good for nonproficient people wearing armor.

Ooooh, I never knew that, I like it though makes sense and is a nice substantial penalty. That said I recall an old friend telling me that always going last is the same as always going first in the second round :) Plus I am a lot more comfortable with a 21 AC going last than with 14 AC I can manage without it.

I'll adjust init accordingly. As for ride, its really only going to come into play when/if a 20ft. speed would slow the party so I am not too concerned about it, plus again it becomes less and less relevant from next level.

Right. That makes 1 character, more or less. Given the percieved popularity of 3.5e, (I've had maybe 5 people express interest, more likely 3) I suspect that I shall take the first six people to post characters.

If we get four or five people posting characters, with no sign of more showing up, I'll probably add an NPC or two and call it good.

Alright! Allow me to introduce Yuroak Nalard. A Dwarven Fighter from a big family, he ran from home in his informative years after being heavily involved with Smuggling and Prostitution in order to rescue two of his Sisters from thugs and lowlifes. He finds himself in this strange new land, looking for new chances for adventure and making some coin. Along with finding something that'll put up a good fight, and die well to his Falchion.

Looks good, although I think you forgot the bonus feat. Would also like a little bit written up on his personality & description.

Count me interested, I'm currently out of town but I got a computer for a bit, I might put in a Warmage/Warlock into Eldritch Theurge, or Ranger/Scout or Swashbuckler/Rogue (if invisible blade is made playable by not requiring point blank shot)

Not changing IB. You've your bonus feat for a reason.

Someone with trapfinding would certainly be useful.

Ah, okay, I was looking at the unofficial errata from the creator of the class. I'll find the blog post later, but it was from the creator of the class because originally IB was a 10 level PC in Dragon Magazine that had master thrower mixed into it. The fix removes point blank shot as a prereq and allows unfettered defense to work with light armor but only while wielding daggers, kukris, punching daggers, or any weapon that qualifies as a dagger.

Gotta fix my external, in the meantime I'll have to find my spare usb with complete scoundrel and complete adventurer on it, a ranged scout/ranger with the swift hunter feat could be useful. Probably an elf, although I might look at the various other races available.

Quick question: Would you allow someone to use savage species?

I would like to try my hand at RA will try to post a character tomorrow

More grist for the mill. He he

Quick question: Would you allow someone to use savage species?

No, I would not.

Putting together my scout/ranger, what would you recommend as a favored enemy? I haven't read too much about it but Undead is almost always useful.

Are you going for swift hunter? If you are, then undead, elementals and constructs.

Otherwise, as I understand it the dungeon is pretty balanced.

All right. So far we have

Glem Shrenan, whispergnome druid.
Yuroak Nalard, dwarf fighter/barbarian multiclass
Rumors of an (elven?) Swift Hunter, i.e. a scout/ranger multclass.

Also some other people who expressed interest.

I'm working up a couple NPCs to choose from, depending on what other people decide to make. One of them shall be Sooth, I think. He's a NG lesser aasimar cleric of Pelor who specialises in healing and making undead explode with his turning.

Sorry, for whatever reason the swift hunter isn't coming together, I can't piece it together in my head, although I am piecing together something. It'll probably die because hey, it's a bard, but bard into lyrical thaumaturge into seeker of the song has always been something I've wanted to play.

Rission

hp: 3d6 + 6 ⇒ (4, 3, 6) + 6 = 19 +8=27 hp, above average so I'll take it.

Also have to rework skills because I said seeker of the song, but I meant sublime chord.

Not that you have a choice, really, but good.

Yeah, I thought that was wierd, someone focused on bardic magic going for the music-focused-and-no-casting prc.

That said, a little surprised not to see any of the usual bard optimization things.

What are you planning for Rission to do for the party, exactly? I'm getting a healer and skillmonkey vibe off of him.

I'd like to see where those dead level things are from, if you don't mind.

Dead Levels

Yeah, he's a bit of a healer/skill monkey, but come level 9ish will start going more arcane cannon.

Think I'll be going with a monk. Been terribly busy with work, hope to have it done in next couple of days.

Ooh, a monk, those are always fun. What kind? I got to play exactly 1 monk, and then I was told to never play one because it had zero monk levels. It was a Psychic Warrior with Tashalatora, since it technically doesn't require you to have any levels in monk.

Okay, after thinking things over, I will be playing a Dwarven paladin named Ingrid Axdottr. She'll be a lower level version of the Dwarven paladin that I played when my group recently killed Demogorgon. I should have her posted shortly.

Ooh, a monk, those are always fun. What kind? I got to play exactly 1 monk, and then I was told to never play one because it had zero monk levels. It was a Psychic Warrior with Tashalatora, since it technically doesn't require you to have any levels in monk.

Just a regular monk, but might go Tattooed Monk at 7th level.

HP rolls: 3d10 + 26 ⇒ (9, 10, 8) + 26 = 53

haruhiko88 wrote:

Ooh, a monk, those are always fun. What kind? I got to play exactly 1 monk, and then I was told to never play one because it had zero monk levels. It was a Psychic Warrior with Tashalatora, since it technically doesn't require you to have any levels in monk.

Just a regular monk, but might go Tattooed Monk at 7th level.

Always good, best monk I saw in play back in the day was a monk/rogue with ascetic rogue and kung fu genius. I think he only took like 2 levels in monk but kept all his ac and unarmed damage, but because he went heavy into rogue he got a lot of sneak attack and skills. The nail in the coffin for everything he fought was he took the decisive strike feature and the dm let him double his sneak attack damage.

Here's how combat worked. We would invis the rogue/monk, he would sneak up to the bad guy, stunning fist (with ability focus so he netted a +6 on top of his 10 + 1/2 level + int mod because kung fu genius) and murder it. If it survived it was probably stunned. Party would wipe the mooks, and we all had fun.

I think Rission is more or less finished. I have to go through the 10 levels of thaumaturge but I think it'll be good.

Edit: was it kung fu genius or carmendine monk that lets you add int to stunning fist dc? This is going to bug me.