The wiz was casting and her heard it. I called it a DC 40 to notice it had he rolled a 41. His perception is crazy. It was not high enough to put him in a square but close enough for glitterdust.
My PCs just finished the stairs of the moon and were hot on the trail of Auren Vrood. He has been watching the party with scry and invisible outsiders so he knows what they are capable of.
My party likes to fly in on the druid and skip everything and deal with the BBEG first. AV cast planar ally several times and had a lot on air elementals over the city used a scroll of control weather to make it foggy if you are more then 100 feet of the ground.
The party see this looks for another way to bypass encounters and realizes that the druids new elemental form has earth glide and bag of holding IV can hold the rest of the party. Life bubble took care of the rest. The sneak into the basement the Vrood had prepared as a trap with could kill and wall of earth but that does nothing to them except trigger the alarm spell.
The druid goes up the tower and spot now distant flying invisible vrood from the top of the tower. Vrood see this but really wants to get his buffs up so casts and goes higher. Sorc casts glitterdust and rogue shoots him. Cleric casts fly on cavaliers mount. The druid turns into terridon and chases down the blind glowing wizard and grapples him. Cav charges and Vrood crumples.
Lesson is that you should cast eyebite before buffs.
Should have had him just run away and buff up and comeback on the party.
Wizards really need to know that peaple are coming.
So far I am liking wall of earth and bend in the stairs to prevent a charge is the way to go. It will be hard but should only take a round for the party or two or three for on PC to burst out.
I do not have spell sunder but the cav can dish out enough damage to hurt a wall of force.
I am soon going to be running the end of broken moon with Vrood. I want him to lead the PCs into the basement of the tower and trap them there with him in a cloudkill. I need Vrood to be able to have poision immunity and a way to trap them in a basement.
They will see any trap that would collapse the stair so I need a spell that he can cast to accomplish this.
I am thinking some sort of wall spell. Wall of stone might work but he knows that the cleric always has stone shape at the ready.
Wall of fire could work and I could make circle 40 feet around with side looping passages for him to hide in. Protection and resist energy make this viable but it is evocation and the PCs could just suck up the damage to escape.
Wall of Force might be to much of a trap and i am sure the fight will be over in 11 rounds. My PC can can hurt the wall but he would need several charges to get through and dispel magic fails.
Wall of Earth might be the way to go but stone shape would on the floor supporting the wall would still destabilize it and one cav charge would burst it. I could but it on a bend in the stairs to prevent the charge.
I do not know raw but I as a DM would go with a str check on the part of the tree of even a knowledge: engineering on the part of a PC to break ceilings, walls and floors. I would see this a generally up and down tactic and would make much harder to use this to bust a door and the wall you just broke would now have tree in the way.
Stone and less I would break but metal would be a no go in my book. Failing the skill or str check could lead to going in other ways or exploding into shards of other things the PCs find unpleasant.
I did not know that rule for PFS so the ones where I said buy at higher level are not so great. You are also right on enlarge person.
As for 2nd level buffs or things you will only need occasionally I would go with scrolls.
Slipstream plus longstrider makes you speed 50 while feather step ignores difficult terrain so that can be quite useful. air bubble and glide can get you flying and swimming so that is handy.
If the rest of the group is equally optimized then I vote for harder encounters or more encounters. My group is 7th level and outside a dungeon where they will not have long string of encounters I set the CRs at 9-13 by using more monsters in the correct threat range. I have no problem throwing 10 hill giants at them. On the other hand I keep CRs at the more typical ranges in dungeons the players know that they need to get through 14-20 and still have enough for the boss at the end. This makes a high DPS character more requirement then anything else.
If the rest of the party is not as optimized as you i would stop going full buff most of the time. Let the buffs go to the others and you pass them up and that will likely solve the problem.
See this thread for a similar discussion.
go to link
Teach you dm about cover, concealment, wind, protection for arrows and other ways to defeat you.
Use your turns giving the bad guys warning shots or waste time offering them a surrender. Monologue. "Forget" a buff or two until in combat. you could even call that conservation of spells.
I am DM who faces a similar issue in my game. I have caviler who does 46 min on a charge and stupid amounts more if he uses his challenge. The rest of the party is also very heavily optimized but not to the point that almost anything hit by the cav just goes away.
My solution has been to either start the encounter at very long ranges so the the flying spellcasters with long range spells get thier licks in or use lots of difficult terrain. Neither one of these stops him for long but it is worth it slow him down for a round or two.
BBEGs usually know that party is coming try to fight the party in small twisty underground passages that really only allow the rogue to shine and hurt every one else.
I do have to have to say that that these often turn into how can we get the cav into charge position. This has lead to creative uses for the shatter, blink, follow the leader, earth elemental summons and of course dim door.
I do not deny the cav the chance to one shot the BBEG, but I do make sure that it very hard to do on round 1. As for mook encounters, I just use alot of mooks. It does not matter that he will overkill the mook by 40 HP, the fireball will do the heavy lifting here.
On a different note, i would talk to antipalidin because if he is meant to be a front line guy he really should be better at it.
Just make sure that every one has something they are good at in combat and have different encounters play to different types.
I need to build the leader of the primals from the third book of the Carrion Crown AP.
I want him to be an 8th level NPC archer And I was thinking of using 7 levels of ranger and 1 of barbarian. This would let him use the eagle eye spell to see the PCs coming and target them at great range. I was think of also having him use gravity bow to shoot what is essential a huge longbow in his hybrid form. Combine that with +1 bow and bull str I can see his arrows doing 3d6+10 with bonus +13 to hit.
This far from a complete build but I really need a powerful archer who can see and threaten flying PCs from a long way off.
I an planning on having his wife be a 7th level NPC that is either a cleric or bard.
Along with this there will be 4 of the barb 5 dire werewolfs that the book mentions.
Just recently I read some articles discussing how Argorn might only be 5th level and Gandalf comes in around 7. By the same measure Conan would only be around 10.
Based on this idea and that PCs leave the realm of mere mortal behind at around 6th level, what kind of impact would can 7th level character have on the world? What about 11th? 15th? 17th?
Based on these power levels it makes it a little harder for me to see the 7th level fighter as just bodyguard to some merchant or the 12th level wizard being only 3rd most important wizard in a guild in city other then absalom.
How do you justify people not having heard of these incredible powerful people around the world? How do you explain the explosive growth in power of PCs as they go through an entire AP in what might be less then a 3 months? (carrion crown)
As and aside, what would the levels of different superheros be? I am just throwing it out there but I would guess that superman is 20th level monk.
Sorry for the rant, but this realization made think that the captain of the guard in major city might only be 4th level and the 12th Paladin is superhero covering a whole county instead simple the head of town guard.
sadly the bag of holding portable hole trick would only suck it into the astral. That might be enough to get the hoard with out combat but a dragon will figure a way out then come for you.
Hallway fights can seam a bit dull as there is almost no way to move around. I would recommend you make the hall 15' wide with pillars down the middle.
In room 3 roll the number of skels at top of the round and have them animate and roll init at the end of the round. If a PC takes standard action while next or in a square they can keep the skeleton from rising. Allow creative ways do the same thing at range. Since the new skeletons are flat footed until they go the rogue can sneak attack if his init is high enough.
I would add a plot room like 5 before 3 so that if the PCs open the door the thugs have to rush over from 2 fight them in 2a instead of just blocking the door. Just make room 2a really creepy to explain why they guards not stay in it after locking the door to 3.
The short story is that they won. Everyone except the cleric used a scroll of freedom of movement. The Druid used spider climb on both animals and they climbed straight up to the roof. Once there they waited for AP to break out and then went to town while superbuffed. As it turns out two cav charges really does the trick. That did about 140 HP while the rest of the group did the other 40 HP.
Scarabs of Golem bane and druid sucking up the AoO so the cav could withdraw made all the difference. Still the FA on the Cav left him with only 7 HP and the druid went down to -11 but did when it was his turn to get hit.
All in all it was hard for them but with planning not all that hard and they did not even need any of the help I offered from the stormcaller.
Thanks, they do spent a lot of time looking at the prof has done and found his notes on the AB. They know what they are facing and I think they plan on facing him on the roof. Once they touch down on the roof I will have the AB try and break through the shutters and succeed when the time is right. I think that most of them will will try and control the machine while the cav and dino take it on in melee. Since the rogue has a high UMD I am going to allow operating that machine as a move action if you take a -5 penalty. That will allow him to SA with XBow if the AP is blind. They also obtained a scroll of teleport and I thing they are going to send someone on shopping trip to Absolum to gear up. Scarbs of golum bane and it might occure to them to buy a couple of scrolls of freedom of movement to avoid being grappled. They will at least have grease. I am not giving them the LAntern archon idea.
The sorc will probably also use the device as a move and cast grease or keep it slowed. The cleric may not even use the device if his healing is more needed.
Henry, what they named the flesh golum will save thier bacon if things go south but they think he already dead since they saw the AB toss him from the top the lightning tower.
My PCs are are going to be facing the Aberrant Promethean soon and they are fully aware of how tough he is. They are level 6 and will not make 7 by the time they face him.
I have halfling Cav who is devastating on his wolf and does not have to worry about AoO on his charges due to Ride by attack.
Rogue Xbow user trained in UMD
Sorc trained in UMD
Cleric with the freedom domain not trained in UMD. Good at healing bad at combat.
Druid Gish with Dino companion with 29 AC.
The problem is that the PCs will under no circumstances compel their friend from court to do anything and as far as they know the AB already took him out, twice (fell off the lightning tower). I figure that the fight will actually take place on the roof instead of L3. I want the Bondslave thrall to effect the AB as well but be harder to use.
I figure that 4 PCs will use it and the cavalier will engage the AB along with the druids dino. The dino will only be good to take hits and to flank due to low damage output.
I want different effects based on how many PCs can make the DC 15 check to use bondslave (will find all the clues). I know they will also want to use it as move action so I was thinking of allowing that with a -5 penalty.
I was thinking flat footed for the first effect. (rogue can SA with Xbow) and no AoO if the Cav has to reposition to charge again.
I was thinking of using stunned for the third level effect and Dominated for 1 round for the fourth. I am not sure what DC for will save should be if they try and have it harm itself of jump of the tower.
I do not know what the second condition should be since staggered will come from the sorc.
The lightning will be big factor since their is thunderstorm going on (3d10). The sorc has grease so getting out of grapples will be easier and the AB will have time starting them if he takes the -20.
The flesh golem from town is my get out of TPK free card. If things look very dire he will show up and sacrifice himself to save them. He will also catch the first PC to fall of tower after they fall 40 feet to his level.
Had a group of players that was on the standard "Stop the bandits" mission. Well the had the rogue disguise himself as a peasant and drive a wagon up the road to the bandits. After the caviler took no damage from about 30 arrows (glamored plate mail made to look like leather), the rogue tossed off the covers to the wagon and the bow ranger FAed the leader to death (two longbow crits). The Caviler decided to intimidate the group and got a border line result. I had one bandit run and the caviler did about 45 damage to a 1st level warrior (lance crit).
The Bandits surrenders despite still having a huge numerical and tactical advantage. 24 level 1 warriors and 2 third level characters surrendered to 4 fourth level PCs. The 3rd level wizard snuck away.
I second the above answer, try and have stories that can be finish in one session. The PFS mods work great for that. Many of them link together to tell greater stories. You can also delve into the faction stuff to add extra material.
Just remember that a two level difference is the most you should have between PCs.
For leveling I would go with the with every 2 adventures you complete you get a level and if some one gets to far a head have them make another character they can play.
Have the society take all of their all treasure gained on the missions but grant them 55% of their wealth by level and the opportunity to but any item they find on the mission for half price but only if they can afford it right after the mission. This allows you to have them find and use really high level stuff but they do not get to keep it. A +5 Vorpal sword is great fun at 4th level but it will ruin a game if the PC can keep it. The response to "My character would not turn this over." is the Pathfinders would not send some one on this mission would not turn it over.
New PCs come in at 95$ wealth but can be up to two levels less then the highest level PC at the table.
Looking again, Dragons are in the right place, but the one level tax will stand for the rest. Thank you all for helping me make my decision. Please carry on if you want. I will keep following this.
I think I will use the rule for making monster PCs instead of the rules for monster cohorts. I might institute a one level tax on top of that but not the +3 or +4 from the charts.
I am just not sure if single wolf with and int score is the equal of a 1st level melee character or a 2nd level melee character.
On the same comparison is a troll equal to 5th level melee or 6th level melee character.
By equal I mean witch will add more to party not witch can kill the other better. If a there is doubt I will charge the tax.
I have a cavalier that wants to awaken his wolf mount and take it as cohort with the leadership feat.
I also have rogue that wants a troll as a cohort.
What does RAW say about this? If it is not allowed but I went ahead and did it anyway, what would the best way be? I can not find anything for level adjustment so not sure how to go about it.
The main reason the PC wants to do this is that it would be cool. Snakes are not immune to their own venom, if a copperhead bites itself it will suffer the venom. The snakes fort save gives it a pretty good shot of avoiding the venom but it is not cinch by any stretch. On another note, the damage from the snake's bite (2d8+13) is better then the PCs attack (1d4+3d6+1).
Since the rogue is two weapon fighter, this tactic is probably less then optimal. That is one of the main reasons I want to find a way to make is plausible.
I get your point but if I make it a CM check she can only do it on nat 20. Small rogue with low STR vs a huge critter is not going to work out well. She wants slight of hand to represent that she does not actually grab the tail until the last second.
I am going by the rule of cool. The first time you do it is awesome, second not so much. I am willing to be lose with the rules because it is the first time any one has tried it. Letting CMD set a DC for skill check is okay but the using CMB is right out.
At the end of my last session one of my PCs ended up hiding under a corpse as giant sea snake slithered up the shore. Since she is there and the rest of the party is 100 yards distant I had the snake surround her while still not knowing that she is there.
The PC wants to trick the snake into biting itself when it tries to attack her. Normally I would call that a CMB vs. CMD type thing but that is the same as saying no. The PC asked if they could use bluff to make the snake attack and then slight of hand to put the snakes tail into its mouth instead of herself.
I was thinking that the PC could ready a slight of hand check vs an attack of opportunity. Then they could make a bluff vs sense motive to draw an ill timed AoO.
If the bluff fails the AoO the readied action is lost.
Slight of hand target will be the snakes attack roll.
The PC is currently prone but does not suffer for that due to feats.
She is not trained in handle animal but i was thinking of letting her try it anyway instead of bluff.
The three adventures in this series seam like the a lot of fun but my party is already level 5. I do not need this mod to be a full adventure but I would like have at least 4 challenging encounter and a chance to explore the same puzzles. The goal will be to set the group up with a hatred of Razmir.
For the hook I was thinking of having the mayor send a bunch of kids on the quest as normal but have them befall horrible fates instead of meeting success. When the kids do not return and their is no word from those who went to prepare the crypt ahead time desperate town asks the party to find out what happened.
For the party of kids I was going have them include a Dwarf fighter, Human Rogue, Human Cleric, and a Human Druid. Below I will detail how each step of the journey went for the kids and what is there now for the PCs. I have only included a CR if it is at least a 5.
Journey to the Crypt:
First Fight: Tracks show that kids fought a battle here but there is no sign of the foes presence at all.
DC 10: The kids got into a fight
DC 12: The Kids had confidence in their ability to handle whatever they were facing.
DC 15: There is no sign of their foes on the battlefield and no sign of any injury to the kids
DC 20: There were 3 foes and the kids fought them as you would humanoids.
DC 25: The Fighter suffered a mighty wound based on his footwork and the rogue got hit as well. The cleric channeled positive energy and engaged in close combat. The druid and its bear also engaged at close range. The trail of Holgast can be found (DC 15 if searching outside the battlefield.) [+5 to DC reveals that he cast]
Eyes in the Dark: The sharp eyed rogue saw the wolf and the druid cast charm animal on it.
Unfortunate Bandit [CR 7]: The cleric and druid pieced together what had happened from a distance and chose to avoid the snake. They did not discover the bandit camp. If the PCs investigate the body a Giant sea snake will attack.
Treacherous Hillside: The Cleric Tumbled all the way to the bottom the the cliff but avoided serious injury. The Fighter went through a briar patch but the druid, rogue and bear never fell.
Outside the Crypt: The Rations are missing but the scene is otherwise the same. 3 graves with headstones have been dug for the 3 villages that perished in the crypt. The door to crypt is wide open.
The Upper Level:
All doors are made of Iron
Entry Hall: The kids overcame the skeletons and gave the villagers a proper burial outside the the crypt.
Maze of Pits: The fighter fell into the first pit but after that the kids solved this room with little trouble. The kids opened each pit, found the treasure and closed each pit up after they were done. To help in bridging the pits the kids found a log long enough to cross a pit and cut it in half lengthwise. One half can be found crossing the southernmost pit and the other is holding the southern door open. The kids intended to remove these from the crypt when the left.
Wailing Survivor: The kids made it here and stashed most there extra rations in this room after calming down Rodare. Since so much time has past he is once again in the same state the kids found him in.
Hungry Beetle: Dead Beetle plus add a door to the bottom of staircase that is opened by the key found in the pool, DC 30 to open. The stairs go over the hallway in area 12 and connect to the stairs in area 9.
Shadow Shapes: The kids beat a hasty retreat and shut the door after encountering the shadow. This room is unchanged.
Key Pool: This room is unchanged except that the key is gone and large rock is at the bottom of the pool. It took the kids several tries to recover the key because the only swimmer was fighter. Eventually the light was cast on 60 pound rock and the cleric held on to this to get to the bottom. Once the key was recovered the rest of the party hauled him out of the water with a rope.
Room of Reflection: The rogue found some masterwork thieves tools in the vault and, along with a guidance spell, was able to hit the DC 30 to open the lock. They locked the door after themselves.
Gauntlet: The kids had no trouble with this. Unchanged
The Shield Guardian: Deactivated and no sign of the shields. The fighter is a grappler and was able to deactivate the golem with the key. After the opening the vault with the key the kids put the key back in the golem just for the sake of style.
The Supply Vault: Locked but empty.
The Pillar of a Thousand Arrows: The Rogue used his new found potion of invisibility and that combined with stealth allowed him to get close enough to the trap to disarm it without setting it off. Just in case the kids left the shields just outside the the south door. Unfortunately for the PCs the disarm was temporary and they will have to deal with the trap. For the sake of added challenge the trigger the trap will have static perception of 30 (stealth DC 30 to bypass) and some sort of concealment will be needed. Cover will not work because the trap will see the cover and start shooting. To make it even worse the disable DC will be a nice 30 due to the rogues first disarm. Last but not least the trap will stop firing if nothing is detected so waiting outside the room will not work.
Chamber of the Bloody dead: The kids defeated but did not destroy these skeletons. They should pose little threat to a 5th level party but the Undead will be on alert if the battle takes more then 1 round or has a particularly noisy action taken. 1 round of standard battle will not alert the foes downstairs due to distraction.
The lower level:
The story so far: The rogue scouted areas 17, 18, and 19 while invisible but fell pray to the trap in 19. His screams brought the the bats and zombies down on them at the crossroads but they managed to defeat the zombies and evade the bats by taking shelter in area 11. After they explored the eastern wing of the complex an opening the portcullis they proceeded to area 22 and triggered Asar's ambush. On the made flight out the fighter fell into the pit where he lays dying, the rogue and druid ran to 14 and took shelter with the help of befriended animals, and the cleric is using the his faith in conjunction with the power in area 17 to keep the undead at bay.
Crossroads [CR 5]: Asar has sent out a force of undead to deal with the kids in 17 and 14 but so far they have been unsuccessful and have set up camp here. Along with the animate dead are the corpse's of the plague zombies and several dozen bats. A Wight mans a post in the eastern hallway and Ghast is does the same in the southern. 2 skeletons lurk in the hallway between 14 and 15, while a 3rd is just north of the bend in the hallway to 17. If they have been alerted to the presence of the PCs they will move into are 18 and attempt ambush the PCs by pretending to be interred corpses. None of the kids will brave the room unless contacted by the PCs first.
Angry Frogs: When the kids first past through here the druid befriended the frogs and now he is using this as defensive redoubt to hold of the undead. While food is not a problem the PCs are on borrowed time because the rogue has attempted to climb out the way the frogs got in and has gotten stuck. The rogue can not free himself and the cold water has sapped his strength. Once he falls asleep he will drown. To reach the rogue the a PC will need to make a DC 25 Climb check followed by an escape artist check DC 20. 3 climb checks and 2 escape artist checks are needed. Failure of a climb check results in sliding back down the tube and taking 2d6 damage. Unless the it is the first roll the tight squeeze stops the fall. Once the rogue is reached a DC 15 str check is required to free him and failure by 5 or more causes a d6 HP to the rogue. The squeeze that the rogue is stuck in is DC 30 to get though but after that getting to the surface is time consuming but not difficult. The surface can be reached after 2 hours.
Azure Fungus: Add two skeletons to the dead bodies but otherwise unchanged.
Wheel and Woe[CR 6]: The skeletons have be vanquished but the pit now contains a much worse danger. A slime-infested Basilisk has made its way up from the underdark where a hole in the bottom of the pit leads to an aboleth's dark realm. The beast will hide under water and try to attack from surprise.
Chamber of rest: At the bend in the hallway there is pile of broken skeletons from the cleric's turning. Any rebuke undead done in this room gains 1d6 extra damage +2 to the save DC and benefits from the turn undead feat for free. While this has worked out well for the cleric so far and the intelligent undead fear coming in hear, he will eventually need sleep. Once asleep he will be easy pray.
First Catacomb: No Zombies but the pack is still here. If the undead from 13 move here they gain +5 to their stealth checks if they hid in the alcoves.
Reflections in terror: Unchanged, the portcullis is currently closed.
Second Catacomb: Unchanged as the bat swarms have reformed.
Guardian Statues: Unchanged other then the fighter who currently awake but not healing normally. He is at negative -12 HP and will die if he has to spend one more day in the tomb. He will not reveal his presence for fear of the undead. The other kids know that he is here.
Kassan's Tomb [CR 9]: Asar is brooding here and has beaten Dimera almost to death. Any further damage and she will die. Asar has 3 more levels of Fighter and is accompanied by 3 skeletal champion archers and skeletal Mage +1 AC from bracers. The mage will only use the wand after he is out of spells. Kassan also gives out his full plate and sword but only if all of the children are safe.
Village's Crypt: Unchanged
Raider's Crypt: No dead wizard but all skeletal mage carries it all.
I would love it if I could get help some help leveling up Asar. I need names and personalities for all of the kids as well. Please feel free to comment on my ideas. Remember that the idea is not to have a full adventure but to be able to get all of the story in this one.
This group as been doing mostly episodic stuff until now but would like to switch to something more story focused.
The group is very RP heavy and will have just as much fun finding a way to bypass an encounter as they will fighting through it.
They are not motivated by altruism would prefer to go to the adventure.
Fewer hard encounters is better then many moderate ones and easy are seen as a waste of time.
They do love turning a hard encounter into an easy one through strategy.
This party is willing to use consumables beyond normal and will retreat.
Over top NPCs go over very well with this group.
An NPC Betrayal would great fun at the table.
They have a desire to see Galorian and experience its history and culture.
They are based in Absolum but willing to travel anywhere.
Party consists of a
NG Assimir cleric of Pharisma whose is part of mercantile family and loves to be beautiful.
CG half orc fighter who is a merc and loves his weapons more then life itself.
CG Human Fighter/rogue who detests authority is trying to do the right thing but keeps falling back on old ways.
CN catfolk sorc with the aquatic bloodline and climb speed. Acts very much like a cat and steals for the joy of it.
CN goblin rogue who is very much a goblin despite the hat of disguise. She loves the color pink and very excitable.
Small side quests similar to faction missions would go a long way with this group.
I was thinking a 6th level mod instead of 5th level due to the op nature of the party and 5th member.
Since every players name (ooc) starts with J anything that uses that letter would worth and extra half point. The group is kinda meta about it.
When an animal companion reaches 7th level (in many cases) it becomes large. Since it mentions modifications to str, dex, con and natural AC I assume you do not change these again for the new size.
It does not mention a to hit penalty or stealth penalty for the new size, do these change as well correct?
What else changes?
Why do some animals only gain +2 natural AC? (wolf)
Does the reduce animal spell give you all of the benefits of a smaller size for the minor cost of 2 str and and smaller weapon die? These would apply to stealth as well correct?
An amulet of of reduce animal would cost 12K correct?
Markus, I like the idea of pirate harbor instead of another trade city. Raptor island in the Shackles or something near Mediogalti island are good possibilities. Will look more into both of these ideas.
I plan on having some nearby islands for that exact purpose but I intend them to be more for side quest then the main show.
I love the idea of Cheliax being one of the nations but I want the other to be not so great either. Not who would be a good rival that would just be a different flavor of bad/neutral.
As to the interior, I will be going with dinosaurs and rats. That means I need to move the island out of the inner sea and closer to the equator but I am thinking of moving closer to civilization then originally planned. at first I was thinking 2 weeks by boat but 3-5 days might be a better choice. Might go near the maelstrom, not sure yet.
I am working on sandbox for my players to have fun in. I hope to add enough stuff that they can have adventures from 1st to 7th-10th level. By the time they reach the end of that I want them to be the most powerful thing in the sandbox or darn close.
My idea so far is to locate the PCs on a small island far from and major shores but with solid trade back to the mainland. Geographically I want the island to be 40 miles by 15-20 miles and consisting of 2-4 mountains/volcanoes and wooded dangerous interior. Located on this island will be two small colonies/towns on the coast, each from and rival nation, and dwarven trading consortium. The main economic engine is the growing and importing of food to trade with dwarfs for metals. The dwarfs will have started with a small farm specializing in surface food but it switched trade when it was discovered by some adventures around a century ago. This quickly lead to colony and mutually beneficial trade. Twenty to twenty five years later a rival nation founded its own colony to trade with the dwarfs. Neither side is happy with the other but no one want to start an all out war with the other nation.
Also on the island will be several villages that have been founded by strongmen and hardy settlers. While only a few (4-6) are currently active there are dozens of failed settlements on the island. Some of these will be aligned with on nation or the other but some will be going it alone. I think one of the villages will be based on fishing while another will be focuses on an orchard.
I want this be somewhere in Galorian
Questions
1. Where should the island be?
2. Witch nations should own the colonies
3. Why is the interior so dangerous?
4. What settlements are on the island?
5. What neat geographic features are one the island?
6. What are failed settlement on the island?
7. What other points of interest are on the island?
8. What other questions should I be asking?
Thanks for this input. I think I will use guide with knees if there is ever a need for the sorc to have both hands. I will also use the fight with combat trained mount but it can be replaced with a fly check from the druid. Two chances at the same effect.
Thanks for the advice, i was think that as well. I know that they are not organized play legal but this is just a once a month game. I have them on the fast track so they can see more levels sooner. My problem is that I can not seam to find a clear list of all the society adventures that links them in arcs and whatnot. Thanks for the ling to the season thing though that seams like a start. Also not sure what to do with factions in a home game and how to introduce them. If i am going to run the scenarios what should I read to get the most out of it. Is the first steps stuff any good? Sorry for rambling.
I am running a first level game that takes place in Absalom with the following PCs.
CN Fetchling Bard who is a professional storyteller
CN Goblin Rogue who masquerades as gnome but still acts like a goblin yet hates them. Motivated by pretty things and pink things.
CG Half Orc fighter whose great joy is getting attacked and not falling down
CG Catfolk sorc, aquatic bloodline with scent and a climb speed and motivated by shiny.
NG Assimer Cleric of Desnia with wings (randomly rolled)
All PCs have darkvision or scent and all speak Orc.
I know it is an odd group and I would say comedy is great diver of RP so far but only 1 session under out belt. I am running them through Master of the fallen fortress and intend for them to become pathfinders but i am not sure witch adventures would be a good fit. I am not opposed to travel if that fits with the story. I think with a this menagerie the harbengers might take and interest but i am not sure where to go with that.
