Practus's page

Ouch - that's a bad beat right there.

I know... I'm just kidding...

My group started the AP at the EatBK, and they all have died (all but 1 character - the Bard) in the Arena in the CB module.

PC Name: Sir Octopussy, Former Ilithid Fighter/Paladin (deceased as a Human Paladin 10)
Adventure: Champion's Belt
Location of Death: Arena
Catalyst: A hungry Froghemoth
Long Description: As soon as the combat started, the Paladin jumped in front of the beast to show the beast the power of his faith. After the first round which the beast was surprised (due to being exposed to clarity after being kept inside it's closed cage), he lost his initiative roll, and on the beast's first attack, it grappled the poor Paladin, who ended up on the beast's stomach. After trying several times to escape it's guts via damaging or grappling back to it's mouth, the brave Paladin ended-up dieing from bludgeoning and acid damage, leaving no way for a raise dead spell.

Sir Octopussy was an Ilithid who have eaten a 1st lvl Paladin Brains, developing a conflict of intelects in the process, Despite being an ilithid, he always roleplayed as an L/G character who though we was actually a Paladin (very funny moments). After having an epiphany moment when he had to choose between killing Zyrzog and all his girynes, embracing his Paladin side, or giving up his faith to embrace his nature, by choosing the first option, Helm (his deity) changed his form to a Human Paladin 8th.

PC Name: Betsy, Dryder Sorcerer 2 lvl
Adventure: Champion's Belt
Location of Death: Arena
Catalyst: Grapple from the Froghemoth
Long Description: After the Froghemoth swallowed the Paladin, it went to the largest creature available. The dryder was able to do some great ammount of dmg to the beast trough use of True Strike, but ended up being grappled by the creature, who could not swallow it since the dryder was only one size category smaller. With constant constricting dmg from the grapple, and additional dmg from attacks with the other tentacle and the tongue, dryder's death was just a matter of time, thanks for the +35 grapple check the Froghemoth had (this is a thing I would change on this combat... No way a simple 9 lvl char can overcome such a high grapple check).

PC Name: Cristinary, Doppleganger 8th lvl
Adventure: Champion's Belt
Location of Death: Arena
Catalyst: Froghemoth attacks
Long Description: After doing some serious damage to the Froghemoth with a longbow during his battle with the Dryder, as soon as the beast got in melee range, the poor Doppleganger stood no chance against the beast.

PC Name: Can't remember the name, rogue 8th
Adventure: Champion's Belt
Location of Death: Arena
Catalyst: Two crazy and anger dwarf barbarians
Long Description: As part of their strategy, as soon as the fight began, the dwarfs jumped both in melee range with the rogue (to eliminate the easiest and smaller enemy), completly destructing the rogue in no-time.

There were two other characters who have also died in the froghemoth battle, but their performances on the fight were too weak to worth a obituary... poor souls...

Three characters were raised from the dead by Celeste (the Paladin was not one of them, since he was completly digested by the Froghemoth) as a favor requested by Eligos should anything terrible happened with the group, since Eligos intended to have the group investigate further all the plot concearning the Age of Worms path (I gave Celeste access to some raise dead spells)

The only survival - a Bard who had not joined the Gladiator's team - end up paying all the group's coins on raise deads for the other two characters.

Probably they all will die again during the battle with the Ulgurstasta... time will tell...

Wow... Black Fox gave excellent suggestions indeed, and Phrennzy reminded a crucial point about the ritual completion...

... but I just ran yesterday CB from the beggining, and the group went up to the fight with the Frogemoth (they did not investigate the arena's undergrounds completly - all they did was investigating the Cenobie lvl, finding nothing which could indicate that Bozal Zahol was creating the Ulgurstasta)... During the with the Frogemoth, they all were killed, leaving the Frogemoth with only 3 HP.... The Paladin suffered the worst fate being swallowed by the Frogemoth and not being able to get out it's stomach... He died inside his gut, being completly devoured by the monster, which left no room for a raise dead spell...

The group had a Bard who did not join the Gladiator's team, so he was able to "buy" two raise dead spells from a Heironeous cleric, wich consumed all their gold coins in the process... As for the rest of the group who died (3 players), I've made Celeste raising them as well as a favor requested by Eligos should anything terrible happened to the whole group during the games (afterall, Eligos were concearned with all the findings related to the imminent comming of the AoW, right?)...

So, depending on how they behave on the next session, probably the Ulgurstasta will rise from the middle of the Arena only to eat one of the warriors without too much of resistance...

Next session will take a while to happen, but I'll keep you guys posted on the updates...

Thanks a lot!

Yeah... it is... But the idea of the adventure is having the PCs finishing it, right?

Well... I'll run this module this weekend... lets see how far they go and how they deal with the situation... Thanks!

Interesting...

That would work if my group didn't have a Paladin with them... And that's one of the problems... The fight with the Ulgurstasta and later it eating a champion is very epic to be avoided... But having a Paladin in the group, and releasing thousands of wights in the city, this would mean a terrible failure to the Paladin if not a situation wich Helm (his deity) wouldn't be paying attention to... That being said, maybe Helm would send any kind of help, maybe he would punish his Paladin due to his failure...And as a Paladin, this player would never flee from the city on a situation like that... he would probably end up getting killed trying to save the city...

Hello everyone,

I'm running AoW AP to my team of players, and right now I'm about to begin the Champion's Belt module. After reading several threads here, gathering some good tips on the overall AP related to some bugs and ideas to customize the AP, I've come to a couple of topics I'd like to mention and ask for your opinions/ideas on how you've dealt with them:

Ulgurstasta: I'm very tempted on running the module so that the Ulgurstasta is released, and I'm planning to have it eat one of the fighters (anyone will do, since Lorian had proclaimed all competitors as Champions of the Free City for the duration of the games - :-)), but as it's written, as soon as it swallows a champion, it becomes completly healed to it's full HP. Also, considering that almost all the public has 0 lvl (as commoners) and that they will instantly become wights due to the loss of 1-4 lvl, it wouldn't be a lot for the group to handle having both thousands of whights set loose on the arena, plus the Ulgurstasta completly healed? Also, since I have a medium-to-high high lvl paladin on the group, this wouldn't be something his God (Helm) would be paying atention to? Maybe even send an Avatar to help? On the other hand, having a paladin on a group tasked to prevent this tragedy from happening, that essencialy have failed (given that I'm planning to have the Ulgurstasta accomplish his task), wouldn't be enough for Helm to end up penalyzing his paladin for his failure?

Manzorian: On other module (Spire of Long Shadows), after the group asks all the questions they want to Manzorian about their quest, Manzorian asks to have the Rod fragment in return to any magic item up to 40k in value to each of the players. And as a bonus, he offers to cast polymorph any object on the magic itens to change their appearance. Isn't this too much for an archmage to waiste several 8th lvl spells (1/each item) on itens just to please the player's. And also, this spell does not works on magic itens, as PHB indicates.

Any suggestions/comments?