Derek Poppink's page

Who's considering playtesting one of the Advanced Player's Guide classes in Society play?

My primary character (cleric) will probably be sixth level after this weekend, so I'm contemplating making a Cavalier or Inquisitor for other tier 1-5 scenarios I haven't played or run.

Josh, have you considered making some higher level pregens of the new classes available? I wouldn't mind eating a few scenarios to beta test a 7th level version of these classes and I know we're having trouble filling tier 7-11 tables at our open game days (because most of the players with characters of that level have played most available scenarios already).

Feedback appreciated...

The Trap Smith’s Vault

Dwarves from Highhelm tracked the infamous rogue and trap smith Torra Darkgold to her hideaway near Falcon’s Hollow. When their expedition becomes trapped, the Pathfinders must race the Lumber Consortium to the site and survive Darkgold’s deadly traps to uncover the trap smith’s prized secrets.

Introduction

Torra Darkgold is no conventional dwarf maiden. Although she grew up in a respected and wealthy merchant family, she displayed a disregard for authority and a love of pranks that confounded her elders. Some say it was her early contact with other cultures. Others claim it was idleness and boredom. Whatever the reason, it wasn’t long before Torra absconded with a significant portion of her family’s wealth.

Torra began stealing from nobles and merchants. At first her targets were dwarves of the Five Kings Mountains, but eventually she travelled throughout the Inner Sea region. Torra particularly enjoyed tweaking the nose of her victims by stealing heirlooms and other symbols of power and prestige. She has even snatched a few interesting finds from the Pathfinder Society.

Torra maintains hideaways in several countries, including a vault in the woods near Falcon’s Hollow. She also uses this retreat to design traps, a craft she developed after a close encounter with bounty hunters. Unfortunately for Torra, a dwarf cleric of Abadar visiting Falcon’s Hollow recognized her when she passed through town. The cleric and her companions decided to track Torra and return with the location of her lair.

The dwarf party succeeded in finding the vault, but were unprepared when a forest drake attacked and slew the cleric. The others retreated into the vault, suffering further injury from the trapped entry corridor. The party’s wizard resorted to sending a whispering wind to The Sitting Duck tavern, hoping that other adventurers would hear it and send help. When both Pathfinders and Lumber Consortium agents hear fragments of the message, the race is on to reach the vault.

Summary

Unfriendly Lumber Consortium scouts and lumberjacks comb the woods between Falcon’s Hollow and the vault. Perceptive and stealthy parties may avoid them entirely with repeated successes. Persuasive Pathfinders may scare them off with intimidation or avert combat with bluffs or bribery. If made helpful, they warn the party about the local forest drakes. If not, they attempt to follow the Pathfinders to the vault.

The forest drake, wounded by the dwarves, waits outside the vault along with the cleric’s body. Pathfinders must fight or run for entrance corridor (automatic arrow trap, CR 0/0/3 by tier).

The expedition survivors (ranger, wizard, and unconscious rogue) are holed up inside the first room of the vault. They are suspicious of strangers, but respond favorably to healing and the return of the cleric’s body and gear. If made friendly, they share what they know about Torra. They will not accompany the Pathfinders into the vault due to fatigue and depleted resources.

A locked door separates the dwarves from the second room of the vault, where Torra keeps statues and other cumbersome trophies. It is guarded by a statue of Torra she received from an admirer. The statue attacks those who do not unlock the opposite door within a limited time.

The third room of the vault contains Torra’s trap-making workshop. There appear to be several doors, but three of four are experimental traps (magic, melee, and pit traps, CR 0/2/5 by tier). An optional encounter with a mimic may also take place here.

Beyond the workshop lies Torra’s personal chamber. The trap smith has fled down a secret escape tunnel with much of her portable wealth, but her accomplice Mudrym Runerock remains to deal with intruders.

Encounters

This information was laid out in a table in the doc

Tier 1-2 Encounters

• 1. Ranger 1, Warrior 1 x2 (CR 2)
  
• 2. Forest drake (young, wounded) (CR2)
  
• 3. Ranger 1, Wizard 1 (CR 1)
  
• 4. Small earth elemental (CR 1)
  
• 5. Medium animated object (CR 2)
  
• 6. Wizard 3, small earth elemental (CR 3)
  

Tier 3-4 Encounters

• 1. Ranger 1 x2, Warrior 1 x6 (CR 4)
  
• 2. Forest drake (wounded) (CR 4)
  
• 3. Ranger 1, Wizard 3 (wounded) (CR 3)
  
• 4. Caryatid column (CR 3)
  
• 5. Mimic (CR 4)
  
• 6. Wizard 5, small earth elemental (CR 5)
  

Tier 6-7 Encounters

• 1. Ranger 4 x4 (CR 7)
  
• 2. Forest drake x2 (CR7)
  
• 3. Ranger 5, Wizard 5 (CR 6)
  
• 4. Caryatid column x3 (CR 6)
  
• 5. Mimic x2 (CR 6)
  
• 6. Wizard 8, small earth elemental x3 (CR 8)
  

Conclusion

If the Pathfinders succeed, they will recover numerous heirlooms stolen by Torra. If they fail, she returns to empty the vault before moving to another hideaway. Pathfinders may also earn the enmity of the Lumber Consortium and/or the respect of Highhelm.

Grench Teppish is wearing heavy armor without the Heavy Armor Proficiency feat (seems to be a trend for clerics of Groetus).

His aura of madness needs to go away on Tier 1-2 as well.

Are there scenarios with encounters that reward taking a non-combat approach more than a combat approach?

I've run several scenarios with encounters that reward taking a combat approach more than a combat approach:

When I asked my players for feedback about the campaign, one of them wrote:

"My least favorite moment was

It was the moment we were getting experience and gold, and I found out that we were essentially penalized for talking our way out of the situation instead of using violence. I didn't expect an XP bonus for finding a nonviolent solution, obviously, because of the structure in place for giving out XP. And I don't know how to fix this problem.... it was just a bummer that it felt like we were penalized for not fighting. I think just knowing about the gold we missed took me out of the moment."

Now that I think of it, I do remember one counter example:

Hi Josh,

I'm having trouble reporting session #4 of event #699 Pathfinder_MI2. I initially entered the wrong date, and after I went back to change it and hit the Save Changes button I got the following message for all participating characters (except for the first character in the list):

Player has already run scenario at session # 4 of event # 699 Pathfinder_MI2 on August 20, 2009.

I went back in and tried changing the date back, but that didn't work. Going back and hitting the update cleared the message for most of the characters temporarily, but the message is now displayed again for all but the first character. I tried adding an additional dummy character using one of the extra Pathfinder numbers I downloaded (8921), but that did not resolve the problem, and I am unable to remove that character by making the fields blank and hitting Update.

I can't figure out how to fix things on my end. I'd appreciate your help. If it's easiest to remove that scenario and reenter it, I'd be happy to do so.

I also noticed that as I switch between sessions using the Find button that it often leaves the scenario name and date fields unchanged, even though the new session should be different than the previous one. This makes updating sessions very hazardous.

Sincerely,
Derek

Hi All,

My Deck of Many Cards blog has been on hiatus for far too long, but I put up galleries for Adventure Gear 2 and Rise of the Runelords decks recently. Enjoy!

I've got Curse of the Crimson Throne cards and more Map Packs (Slums, Tournament) at home to be scanned. I'll post here once they're up.

Sincerely,
Derek Poppink
Former GameMastery Uberfan

Here's my first attempt at a 4e conversion of the sinspawn.

Sinspawn Level 2 Brute
Medium aberrant humanoid XP 125
Initiative +2 Senses Perception +2; darkvision
HP 44; Bloodied 19
AC 13; Fortitude 14, Reflex 13, Will 13
Immune fear
Speed 6
M Claws (standard; at-will)
+5 vs. AC; 1d0 + 3 damage, and the target is marked until the end of the sinspawn’s next turn.
M Wrathful Bite (standard; recharge 5/6)
+5 vs. AC; 2d10 + 3. If the bite hits, the sinspawn makes a secondary attack against the same target. Secondary attack: +3 vs. Will; the target is dazed (save ends).
Alignment Evil Languages Thassilonian
Skills Stealth +7
Str 13 (+2) Dex 12 (+2) Wis 13 (+2)
Con 14 (+3) Int 10 (+1) Cha 12 (+2)

I went with brute because of the connection to wrath (and favored class barbarian). I used the numbers in the 4e DMG for hp, defenses, attack, and damage values. I kept the 3e sinspawn ability scores and adjusted the defenses accordingly.

I split the wrathful bite effect up into the at-will power and the encounter power, and decreased the damage slightly to compensate. Being marked seemed a useful way to model being overcome with rage. Being dazed is supposed to happen less often, so it made sense to make it a recharge power. Overall the effects are a little less severe in 4e, but the damage is a little higher.

Immunity to mind-affecting effects became immune fear. Spell resistance seems to have gone away entirely in 4e (one option would be to bump the non-AC defenses slightly). Fast healing 1 seemed too trivial to track (regeneration in the 4e MM generally comes in increments of 5).

Let me know what you think!

I was very encouraged today to see a thread on En World by someone who both liked 3.5 and was looking forward to 4.0. I was doubly encouraged to see plenty of others who refused to see themselves as anti-4e or anti-3e. And since the Paizo messageboards are my favorite posting grounds, I decided to share the thought here as well.

I've really enjoyed 3.x. I got out of D&D for a few years (college), but came back when third edition came out. In 3.x I've run or am running campaigns in Middle Earth, Krynn, Spelljammer, Greyhawk (including parts of all three Dungeon adventure paths), and Ptolus. I'm playing a warlock/binder in Eberron who's about to get a psychic warrior shifter cohort, and I hope to see him reach his full potential.

I'm also really excited about 4.0. I like the things that I'm hearing about roles, talents, power sources, powers, and tiers. I am very hopeful that the new edition will dramatically reduce DM prep time and combat game time. Even the cosmology has me thinking about the game in new ways.

Ultimately, I'm a gamer, and I have found things to enjoy in hundreds of different games (from Settlers of Catan to World of Warcraft, from Munchkin to Mass Effect). While I've learned some things from both sides of 3e vs 4e debate, it took me a while to remember that there's plenty of room in the middle.

Cheers,
Derek Poppink
GameMastery Uberfan

Hi All,

I've added posts for all the item cards in Elements of Power and all the locations in Map Pack: Temples to my blog, Deck of Many Cards. I also updated the Item Card and Map Pack indexes with the new information. Come take a look!

Until the next item card and map pack sets come out I think I'll post a little more about my Ptolus campaign.

Sincerely,
Derek Poppink
GameMastery Uberfan

Hi All,

I just finished posting images of the Map Pack: Sewer tiles (I'll put up a composite image later today or tomorrow).

I also created a single blog post to serve as a master index of Item Cards along with links to the various galleries. So if you're looking for, say, a Periapt, you can quickly find that there's one in Hero's Hoard and one in Dragon's Trove, compare the two images, and find its set number. Let me know if you have an comments or ideas for improving the index.

I put together a master index of Map Pack locations a while ago, but I think I forgot to mention it on this board.

I'll start posted Elements of Power galleries next week. Enjoy!

Derek Poppink
GameMastery Uberfan
Deck of Many Cards
dpoppink@yahoo.com

http://maxminis.com/Forums/tabid/104/forumid/51/tpage/1/view/Topic/postid/7 46735/Default.aspx

It sounds like this mini (hard to say that with a straight face) may never get sold, which is unfortunate. I think it would be awesome to have my PCs negotiate with the demon lord with it sitting on the table.

The tough thing would be topping it for the battle with Demogorgon.

Or maybe this is Orcus after become Prince of Demons, since he's Gargantuan and all.

Hi Jason,

Who won the contest? Inquiring minds want to know.

I know Elements of Power is out now (I'm eagerly awaiting my shipment). I'm sure you're all still decompressing from GenCon, but could we get a set list on the product page?

Sincerely,
Derek

Hi Paizo,

The two tiles which make up the Mushroom Glade location in Map Pack: Campsites are exactly the same. When one is rotated they line up well enough, but the symmetry is a little weird. Was this duplication of a tile intentional?

Sincerely,
Derek

Does anyone have a suggestion for storing assembled Map Pack locations? I taped my two, three, four, and six tile locations together to increase their in-game sturdiness, but I haven't been able to find a nice way to store and carry them. With the exception of the Wizard's Guild from Map Pack: City, they are all less than 16" x 16". I thought I could find a nice multiple pocket portfolio or file holder at an art or office supply store, but I've struck out so far.

Hi All,

After a long summer break to take care of my kids, I'm back at work and back on my blog, Deck of Many Cards. I'm currently posting images of the item cards in Dragon's Trove (armor and weapons are up) and the locations in Map Pack: Campsites (three of nine locations are up). I'm looking forward to tackling Map Pack: Sewers, Map Pack: Temples, and Elements of Power in the next month or so. Enjoy!

Derek Poppink
GameMastery Uberfan
dpoppink@yahoo.com

"Razor sharp" (ok, two words)

At least three weapons in Dragon's Trove are described as "razor sharp". Quite a lot of the weapons and armor are also gold, golden, gold-hued, or banded with gold.

The word of Relics of War was "oily", a term applied to at least six items in the set (not just potions, either). "Oily" was also used for three items in Hero's Hoard.

It's fun to notice when wordsmiths get repetitive, like my freshman instructor who LOVED the word "genre".

Anyone else have a favorite word from the item cards?

Hi Paizo Crew,

Dragon's Trove looks fantastic! I opened my deck this weekend, and already set aside a few cards for my Swordsage/Warblade.

While entering the cards into Excel this morning, I noticed some discrepancies between the set list and the cards themselves.

These three seem to be errors with the set list, because they are inconsistent with previous sets:

07 Platemail is "07 Plate Mail" in the set list
33 Shortbow is "33 Short Bow" in the set list
34 Shortsword is "34 Short Sword" in the set list

Then there are three cards which seem like they should have spaces, but don't:

01 Banded Mail appears to be "Bandedmail" on the card
09 Splint Mail appears to be "Splintmail" on the card
14 Bastard Sword appears to be "Bastardsword" on the card

And there's one card which has a space which seems like it shouldn't:

21 Greataxe appears is "Great Axe" on the card

Cheers,
Derek

Hi All,

I've amassed quite a hoard of item cards over the last six months, and I'd like to clean it out to make room for some dragon's trove. I've got multiples of 76 different Hero's Hoard cards and 82 different Relics of War cards available for trade or purchase.

For the details, see my GameMastery Item Card Extravaganza

I'm willing to do favorable trades for these Hero's Hoard cards:

4 cards for 1:
14 Tower Shield
39 Warhammer

3 cards for 1:
10 Studded Leather
12 Steel Shield
37 Spear
51 Potion
78 Staff

2 cards for 1:
08 Scalemail
38 Spiked Chain
54 Potion
55 Potion

and these Relics of War cards:

4 cards for 1:
94 Bracers

3 cards for 1:
08 Platemail
12 Steel Shield
34 Shortsword

2 cards for 1:
06 Leather Suit
23 Longbow
93 Boots

I'm also open to trading non-foil cards on my trade list for any foil cards.

Sincerely,
Derek Poppink
GameMastery Uberfan
dpoppink@yahoo.com
Deck of Many Cards

Hi Jason,

Thanks for the Dragon's Trove preview. I love the box and the cards. It's great to see the bastard sword and morningstar (I was just mentioning to my players that those were two of the weapons that did not get any love in the previous sets). The pistol is nice, too. I don't suppose we're getting a rifle? One of my PC's is a Dwarf Urban Ranger who uses a dragon rifle and hydra rifle from Monte Cook's firearm rules.

Looking at the box, I see a yellow scroll, a black longsword, a brooch?, a shuriken, some darts, a yellow dagger?, some rectangular object behind the darts, a warhammer, the bastard sword, a blue gemstone, a forked dagger, something that looks like a kite (under the forked dagger), and two things atop the bastard sword.

All good so far!

Sincerely,
Derek

Hi All,

I did some analysis of the Critical Hit Deck with Excel. The results are posted on my blog, Deck of Many Cards.

Here's a few tidbits that are not on the blog, to whet your appetite:

Bludgeoning attacks are most likely to do normal base damage (29 of 52), but they frequently inflict a status on the opponent with no save (17 of 52).

Piercing attacks are most likely to do double base damage (29 of 52), and also feature the only 2 results to do triple base damage plus ability drain or bleed.

Slashing attacks are most likely to do double base damage (29 of 52), and cause bleed damage more often than other types of attacks (11 of 52).

Magic attacks are most likely to do double base damage (30 of 52), and many of them inflict extra damage or benefit the attacker in some way (28 of 52).

Sincerely,
Derek Poppink
GameMastery Uberfan

Hi Jason,

According the advertisement card in the Critical Hit deck, Dragon's Trove is coming in May. Is this correct? The product page still says approximately June.

Are we going to see some previews soon?

Sincerely,
Derek

Hi All,

I decided to start adding some low-resolution images of the GameMastery Map Packs to my Deck of Many Cards blog. If you're interested in previewing some of the tiles before purchasing them, check it out. I'm starting with the Village set and will take requests for what comes next. Comments are always welcome.

Derek Poppink
GameMastery Uberfan
dpoppink@yahoo.com
http://itemcards.blogspot.com/

Hi All,

I have an artificer in my AoW campaign, and he's very excited about the retain essence ability. For those who aren't familiar with the class, the ability allows artificers to break down existing magic items to a craft reserve (a pool of XP) for creating new magic items.

All seemed well and good until the party defeated Telakin and were deciding what to do with the mind clone machine. The LE duskblade wanted to keep it and use it, but the artificer and others thought it would be better to destroy it by retaining its essence. After a few minutes of thought, I decided it was worth a 8000 gp magic item. What should I do with scenic magic items (that don't have a price) in the future?

Looking ahead, I'm thinking he's going to have a field day with the cursed magic items in Zyrxog's Museum. The unholy +2 dagger alone is worth 32,000 gp. That's a lot of XP for crafting, although he might need to save it until he's a little higher level (the craft reserve goes away each time you level). DMs, have you allowed players to sell those cursed items for their market value anyway? Is giving the artificer a huge pool of XP for crafting going to be a problem? A friend who also DMs has warned me that artificers can be very dangerous given enough time and money.

Sincerely,
Derek

Hi All,

I'm putting up scans of the Adventure Gear cards on my blog. Everything through 42 Saddle is up now, and the rest should be up by the end of the week.

I'm also doing a series on other products in my DM toolkit. Come check it out and leave comments.

Sincerely,
Derek Poppink
Item Card Uberfan
dpoppink@yahoo.com
http://itemcards.blogspot.com/

From the beginning it was obvious that you could track Wand charges on an item card.

The Paizo staff started doing the same with Potions, for adventures where the party receives 23 shield of faith potions (http://www.hordelings.com/frontend/forums/postView.php?post_id=39960&v iewPage=0#41858). The party gets 3-4 cards to represent a common potion, and tracks the number of doses on the cards. This is easily extended to Scrolls.

As I look at some high-level adventures I'll be running, I think I'll be doing the same thing with other gear. If my party fights 8 orc pirates who each have a +1 greataxe and +2 hide armor, I'll be giving them 1 greataxe card and 1 hide card with 8 ticks on each, rather than 8 greataxe cards and 8 hide cards. I assume they'll sell the lot anyway. If there are twin monks with matching amulets, rings, boots, and gloves I'll give out 1 amulet, 1 ring, 1 boots, and 1 gloves (unless multiple characters claim a particular item).

What do you all think? Is anyone else already doing this?

So we discussed different ways of marking cards (sleeves, stickers, etc) in another thread: http://paizo.com/paizo/messageboards/gameMastery/general/whatsOnYourItemCar ds (remove space)

The related question is what do you or your players write on the Item Cards? Item name? Charges? Anything else?

I put a code on the cards before handing it out that identifies what adventure it was found in, what page # of the adventure, and what item on the page it was. For example, TF.19.1 means the first magic item on page 19 of the Three Faces of Evil. After a character identifies the item they write the name on the card.

I'm hoping to do a little more in the future by printing removable labels in advance. For example, I could include the market price (useful for market time), the caster level (for dispel magic attempts), and/or a short description of the item's powers (unfortunately there's only so much room on the sticker and card). For unidentified items, I could include the item's magic aura strength and school.

What do you all think? What additional information, if any, would you put on an item card?

Derek Poppink
Item Card Uberfan
http://itemcards.blogspot.com/

With the Adventure Gear Preview #1 giving us every fourth card, we have an opportunity to make educated guesses at the remaining items.

http://paizo.com/store/byCompany/p/paizoPublishingLLC/gameMastery/itemPacks /v5748btpy7u5o

I'll put what I think are likely items first, followed by other options from the SRD:

Between 01 Acid and 05 Bag:

Likely: Alchemist's Fire, Artisan's Tools, Backpack
Other: Antitoxin, Artisan's Outfit, Alchemist's Lab, Ale

Between 05 Bag and 09 Blanket

Likely: Bedroll, Bell, Barrel
Others: Barding, Basket, Bit and Bridle

Between 09 Blanket and 13 Candle

Likely: Caltrops, ??
Other: Bucket, Block and Tackle, Bottle and Wineglass

Between 13 Candle and 17 Dice

Likely: Chalk, Crowbar, Climber's Kit
Others: Cleric's Vestments, Cold Weather Outfit, Courtier's Outfit, Carriage, Cart

Mosaic posted this URL in the Adventure Gear Preview #1 thread, and I thought it would be fun to discuss it in a separate thread.

http://www.vincentdutrait.com/dotclear/index.php?2006/10/12/819714-mais-jus qu-ou-s%20-arretera-t-il

Here are my guesses for these items:

Artisan's Tools
Rations
Saddlebags
Thieves' Tools
Thunderstone
Backpack
Bedroll
Disguise Kit
Grappling Hook

What do you all think?

Derek Poppink
Item Card Uberfan
http://itemcards.blogspot.com/

Along the lines of the Called Shot thread I started earlier, here's another borrowed tradition that would be fun for Item Cards. Posters on the maxminis.com messageboards champion a single miniature that they want to see created (I'm the Champion of the Spell Weaver). When that miniature appears in a future set, they become vindicated champions and have minor bragging rights.

So what ONE item would you most like to see appear in a future Item Card set? For armor, weapons, and wondrous it may be enough to champion a specific item. For potions, rings, scrolls, rods, staves, and wands pick a theme, color, or description.

I'm going to champion the Morningstar. Gotta love a weapon that costs less than a mace, does equivalent damage, and counts as both piercing and bludgeoning damage.

For a limited time I'm willing to offer multiple cards from my have list for certain cards on my want list.

4 cards for 1:
HH
36 Sling
39 Warhammer
100 Cloak
RW
94 Bracers

3 cards for 1:
HH
11 Buckler
78 Staff
93 Book
98 Bracers
109 Periapt
RW
08 Platemail
34 Shortsword

2 cards for 1:
HH
09 Splint Mail
14 Tower Shield
22 Dagger
37 Spear
38 Spiked Chain
51 Potion
61 Ring
104 Gauntlets
108 Necklace
RW
23 Longbow
25 Longsword

These are other cards I want currently:
HH
01 Banded Mail
08 Scale Mail
10 Studded Leather
12 Steel Shield
13 Steel Shield
15 Wooden Shield
28 Longsword
32 Shortbow
34 Shortsword
48 Potion
53 Potion
54 Potion
55 Potion
72 Scroll
85 Wand
95 Boots
97 Bracers
102 Crown
103 Crystal Ball
105 Gemstone
110 Robe
RW
06 Leather Suit
10 Studded Leather
12 Steel Shield

Anything not on my want list is on my have list. Thanks for looking!

Derek Poppink
Item Card Uberfan
http://itemcards.blogspot.com/
dpoppink@yahoo.com

Hi All,

I'm starting a blog about Item Cards and other Dungeon Master aids. Over the next week I'll post images of the cards in the Relics of War expansion by subset. Come check it out and leave comments.

http://itemcards.blogspot.com/

Sincerely,
Derek Poppink
Item Card Uberfan

Kyle Baird and I had the privilege of trading in person on Saturday, and one thing we discussed was the best way to mark cards. We're both interested in finding stickers or labels that can be easily removed and/or reused.

How is everyone marking their cards? I've been using pencil and eraser for the most part, although I used pen on a few cards when I didn't have a pencil handy.

On the maxminis.com forums, participants offer Called Shots of the minis they expect/hope to see in upcoming Dungeons & Dragons Miniatures sets. Anyone care to offer a Called Shot for the Adventure Gear card set?

My called shot is Rope. Not only is it a staple of low-level gear, but it would be great for several magic ropes that don't have a proxy currently.

Derek Poppink
dpoppink@yahoo.com
Item Card Uberfan

Interested in Paizo's new Item Cards, but wary of the random distribution? Want to get exactly the cards you need to run your next adventure? Consider an unofficial Wormy Item Set.

Wormy Item Sets contain all the item cards necessary to run one of the Age of Worms adventures. They also include a sheet listing all the magic items in the adventure, their location and page number, and a code to put on the item card until it is identified by the PCs.

Wormy Item Sets are also available in a Lite version, which excludes potion and scroll cards. These are the most expendable items, and the most reusable cards, so you may not need a new set with each adventure.

....
The Whispering Cairn Complete (36 cards, $17): 2 armors (chainmail, chain shirt), 2 weapons (shortsword, greataxe), 19 potions, 1 ring, 2 scrolls, 3 wands, 7 wondrous items (pearl, goggles, circlet, talisman, cloak, brooch, amulet)

The Whispering Cairn Light (15 cards, $7): 2 armors (chainmail, chain shirt), 2 weapons (shortsword, greataxe), 1 ring, 3 wands, 7 wondrous items (pearl, goggles, circlet, talisman, cloak, brooch, amulet)
....

Wormy Item Set cards are drawn from Item Pack 1, Hero's Hoard, and Relics of War. Item cards will be unique within a Wormy Item Set, unless requested (matching potions) or thematically appropriate (paired weapons). Proxy cards will be supplied for items which do not have an exact match in existing Item Card expansions (talisman -> rod, brooch -> amulet). Shipping is $2 for a Lite set and $4 for a Complete set.

Please post comments and questions in this thread, or send them to me via email: dpoppink@yahoo.com

For more information on Item Cards, see the Paizo product page: http://paizo.com/store/byCompany/p/paizoPublishingLLC/gameMastery/itemPacks

For other custom Item Card sets, see my post on maxminis: http://www.maxminis.com/Forums/tabid/104/forumid/54/postid/685196/view/topi c/Default.aspx (remove the space)

More precisely, the Mike Mearl's adventure the Three Faces of Evil is an Item Card Hog. By my count there are 114 magic items in that adventure, including 77 potions! At two potions per Item Card booster, you'd need 39 boosters (or more than three display boxes) to cover that. Granted, the DM can have every Labyrinth Dweller (14, 1 potion each), Grimlock Archer (2, 2 potions each), Tiefling Guard (7, 3 potions each), and Acolyte of Vecna (4, 4 potions and 2 scrolls each) burn through a lot of their resources before the party gets their hands on it, but you'll still have a lot of cure light wounds potions lying around.

I absolutely loved running the adventure (I'm a tactical DM at heart), but it wasn't until I did a full magic item count that I truly comprehended why I had already recycled all 26 of my Potion cards (2 Item Pack 1's and 1 Hero's Hoard display box) multiple times. Future DMs, be warned!

This list was discussed in the Item Card Trading thread, but I figured it was worth posting in a separate thread. These are the 34 items from Item Pack 1 that are reprinted in Hero's Hoard.

Hero's Hoard # Name (Item Pack #)
03 Chainmail (02)
06 Leather Suit (04)
07 Platemail (06)
13 Steel Shield (07)
15 Wooden Shield (09)

16 Axe (10)
18 Arrows (11)
22 Dagger (14)
27 Longbow (17)
29 Longsword (19)
33 Shortbow (23)
35 Shortsword (24)
37 Spear (25)

41 Potion (26)
43 Potion (27)
45 Potion (28)
47 Potion (29)

59 Ring (30)
61 Ring (31)

64 Scroll (33)
66 Scroll (34)
68 Scroll (35)
69 Scroll (36)

76 Staff (38)
82 Wand (40)
84 Wand (41)
86 Wand (42)

90 Amulet (43)
91 Bag (45)
95 Boots (47)
97 Bracers (48)
101 Cloak (50)
106 Gloves (52)
107 Headband (53)

Interested in Paizo's new Item Cards, but wary of the random distribution? Want to get exactly the cards you need to run your next adventure? Consider a Savage Item Set (unofficial).

Savage Item Sets contain all the item cards necessary to run one of the Savage Tide adventures. They also include a sheet listing all the magic items in the adventure, their location and page number, and a code to put on the item card until the item is identified by the PCs.

Savage Item Sets are also available in a Lite version, which excludes potion and scroll cards. These are the most expendable items, and the most reusable cards, so you may not need a new set with each adventure.

.....
There Is No Honor Complete (41 cards, $20): 2 armors (chain shirt, leather), 1 weapon (rapier), 32 potions, 1 ring, 5 wands, 2 wondrous items (brooch, collar)

There Is No Honor Lite (11 cards, $5): 2 armors (chain shirt, leather), 1 weapon (rapier), 1 ring, 5 wands, 2 wondrous items (brooch, collar)
.....

Savage Item Set cards are drawn from Item Pack 1, Hero's Hoard, and Relics of War. Item cards will be unique within a Savage Item Set, unless requested (matching potions) or thematically appropriate (paired axes). Proxy cards will be supplied for items which do not have an exact match in existing Item Card expansions (collar -> belt, brooch -> amulet). Shipping is $2 for a Lite set and $4 for a Complete set.

Please post comments and questions in this thread, or send them to me via email: dpoppink@yahoo.com

For more information on Item Cards, see the Paizo product page: http://paizo.com/store/byCompany/p/paizoPublishingLLC/gameMastery/itemPacks

For other custom Item Card sets, see my post on maxminis: http://www.maxminis.com/Forums/tabid/104/forumid/54/postid/685196/view/topi c/Default.aspx (remove the space)

http://paizo.com/store/byCompany/p/paizoPublishingLLC/gameMastery/itemPacks /v5748btpy7m6a

The Item Pack 1 Product Page lists 33 Rod and 37 Scroll, but I'm looking at a 37 Rod card (and I assume one of my players has a 33 Scroll card). Scrolls come before Rods in Hero's Hoard and Relics of War, so I assume they were accidentally switched in that list.

There's a Withered Hand card in the GameMastery: Relics of War expansion that will be perfect for Library of Last Resort.

Overall, I'm very pleased with the latest expansion. The Wondrous Items show a lot of creativity and usefulness. Books, Cube, Pearls, Demon Fang, Unicorn Horn, it's all good. If you can afford it, I'd recommend picking up a display box.

If anyone wants a Withered Hand without buying boosters, I'm selling singles and sets on maxminis: http://www.maxminis.com/Forums/tabid/104/forumid/54/postid/685196/view/topi c/Default.aspx (remove the space)

P.S. If I was still in Three Faces of Evil, I'd be tempted to give the players the Shrunken Head card when they find the preserved drow head in the Tunnel. It's not magical, but it's evocative.

There's been a lot of interest on this messageboard in buying items cards in non-random sets and singles, so I bought 10 display boxes of Relics of War and did some collating. Here's what I have to offer:

Complete Relics of War Set (1-110): $55 (2 available)

Complete Potion Set (39-56, 18 cards): $9 (7 available)
Complete Ring Set (57-61, 5 cards): $2.50 (8 available)
Complete Scroll Set (62-71, 10 cards): $5.00 (6 available)
Complete Rod/Staff Set (72-77, 6 cards): $3 (4 available)
Complete Wand Set (78-87, 10 cards): $5 (8 available)
Complete Wondrous Item Set (88-110, 23 cards): $11.50 (2 available)

Matching Potion Set (6 identical): $3.00
Variety Potion Set (6 unique): $2.50

Matching Scroll Set (5 identical): $2.50
Variety Scroll Set (5 unique): $2.10

Variety Wand Set (5 unique): $2.10

Individual Cards: $.50

Shipping will be around $1 for individual cards or small sets (rigid card holders in envelopes) and up to $5 for complete sets or large numbers of cards (deck holders in boxes).

I cross-posted this message on maxminis.com, where I have an established reputation for trading miniatures: http://www.maxminis.com/Forums/tabid/104/forumid/54/view/topic/postid/68519 6/Default.aspx (remove the space)

Please contact me if you have any questions or comments.

Thanks,
Derek
dpoppink@yahoo.com

Hi All,

Is anyone else thinking about using their Gargantuan Black and Colossal Red dragon miniatures in the Age of Worms campaign? I used the Huge Red from Giants of Legend for Hookface and Moltenwing in Shackled City, but it would be great to put one of these monsters on the battlemat.

The biggest drawback seems to be that in the rules as written black dragons are not Gargantuan until they are wyrms (CR 20) and red dragons are not Colossal until they are great wyrms (CR 26). Ilthane is only a Large adult. Dragotha is only a Gargantuan wyrm, and a dracolich to boot. I haven't checked the main dragons in Kings of the Rift, but I bet most of them are a little smaller.

However, I'm certainly willing to play with the rules a bit in order to use these minis. I'm considering making Ilthane a larger dragon using the advancing a monster by size rules rather than just increasing her age. Dragotha would be just +2 CR as a great wyrm, but he might not even need to be upped to use the colossal mini. Dragotha could be using illusion of some sort to appear as a red dragon in spite of his skeletal nature.

What do you think?
Derek

Did Sean Reynolds customize the ability scores for Kushak and Shesht? Despite being a warrior, Kushak is has scores a little better than the nonelite array. Despite being a druid, Shesht has scores a little worse than the elite array.

I don't know that I've every looked for this before, but do the Dungeon editors expect writers to use the elite and nonelite arrays or not?

For those Dungeon readers like me who don't subscribe to Dragon, I'm excited to share that the "Toughest Critical Hit Ever" has his own mini in the upcoming D&D Minis War Drums set. The mini was previewed in the latest Dragon, and is discussed here:

http://www.maxminis.com/forums/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=15023

The pose is straight out of Dungeon #105. I'm eagerly awaiting sending this guy at my Shackled City or Age of Worms PCs.

I know D&D Minis have some detractors on these boards. If you haven't seen the last few sets, you might want to revisit your opinion. The line has come a long way in two years, and some of the latest commons and uncommons are as gorgeous as the best of Harbinger's rares.

Dungeon 132 arrived in the mail yesterday. The second thing I did (after reading Downer) was skim Library of Last Resort, the 9th episode in the Age of Worms Adventure Path.

Wow

This Adventure Path continues to shine. The artwork is gorgeous. The encounters with advanced creatures reminds me of the best parts of Clash of the Titans and Jason and the Argonauts. The new creature featured in the appendix is as intriguing and well drawn as the Wind Warriors and Kyuss creatures featured in earlier episodes.

But the coolest part has got to be the artifact. The campaign has already worked in a piece of one famous artifact. We have reason to believe we will see another in the future (based on a certain talisman from the first adventure). But the planners and writers have found an excellent way to incorporate a third storied relic of D&D in this episode.

By the way, it looks like this campaign is headed for epic territory. The PCs are expected to reach 18th level by the end of this episode, and there are three more adventures in the path.

I'm finally at a point where I want to read the character backgrounds Erik wrote for his playtesters, but I can't find them. Did they get deleted? Does the messageboard drop obsolete threads? Am I losing my mind?

Thanks,
Derek

Life's Bazaar took quite a twist in my campaign. The party found the elevator to the Malachite Fortress quite quickly (while still 1st level). Despite being mauled by the Stone Spike and Xukasus, they escaped back up the elevator. They poked around in Jzadirune a little more (until hitting 2nd level), then returned and slew the two guardians.

Pressing on into the fortress they slew the guards in the Forge and then headed right into Kazmojen's chambers. Things looked really bad, but Vhalantru's appearance gave them a breather and a lucky color spray took out Prickles. Kazmojen still knocked down two party members before seeking reinforcements.

At this point the party was its own worst enemy. The mage and rogue wanted to take the kids and run. The paladin and the bard wanted to stay and fight. One group would spike a door and the other group would remove the spike. Kazmojen ran to the Guard Barracks, the Main Hall, and the Main Barracks in turn and ordered the hobgoblins in to the fray. The mage and the rogue got away with the kids. The paladin, bard, and cleric were all captured alive.

The mage and rogue were smart. They got help (volunteer and paid) from several parties in the city (Alex Tercival, Skylar Krewis, the Stormblades). Ike Iverson was even willing to help, as the party cleric is a cleric of Wee Jas. They prepared to storm the Fortress the next day.

During the night the slavers decided to release the cleric of Wee Jas by escorting him up to Keygan's shop and turning him loose (without explaining why, although I decided they were contacted by Ike). The slavers also nabbed Keygan and ransacked his shop. When the rescuers arrived the next day they discovered that Kazmojen and crew had abandoned the fortress, leaving the two other PCs and most of the townsfolk behind (they took the cook & Keygan with them and finished torturing Coryston Pike to death before leaving).

I know I let the party off very easy, but now they have several mysteries to resolve. My assumption is that the party cleric of Wee Jas has the Carcerian sign (the backstory he wrote plays perfectly into that idea), and that Kazmojen got word from Ike that the slavers' cover was blown. Ike may also have paid a ransom for the PCs (they are from noble families, and he might be able to use that against them in the future).

Now the group is cleaning out the rest of Jzadirune while I try to bait them with the Mad God's Key (altered as mentioned in another thread here). Kazmojen may return once the heat has died down. The party is interested in purchasing Keygan's shop, which reverted to city property. The Stormblades are taking a lot of credit for helping rescue the townsfolk.

Any other ideas about how I might twist this outcome? I made a lot of snap decisions so the players of captured PCs could rejoin the game as quickly as possible (I didn't want to spend a long time GMing one group of prisoners and one group of free PCs, and they had no intention of "recruiting" other second level characters to join the rescue attempt). In retrospect I could have had them roleplay the rescuers (Alex, guardsmen, Stormblades, but I think it is better to keep those NPCs somewhat mysterious).