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Since I cannot get the search feature to work, I will ask my question of the great community here.

Does it say anywhere what the magical effects of the Basalt Bastions are? I would suppose it prevents some type of teleportation and could possibly harm demons who come close to it, but I have no documentation on this (that I can find).

Am I the only one having difficulties with the search feature on this forum?

SPOILER ALERT

Hello all,

I'm an admitted lurker around here, only posting when I see the need or when I have a helpful comment; however, I just wanted to share an awesomely fun Siege of Redgorge scene.

Quick Backstory
After Vaprak's Voice, the party battle Nabthatoron and the insanely powerful urban ranger, Korvain, nearly bested the demon. Truly, it was a case of great dice rolls, wielding Alakast, and a zillion attacks per round that gave Korvain so much advantage (all the other PCs were taken out of the fight by a few nasty abilities and a reverse gravity spell).

Nabthatoron barely got away and ever since then has dedicated a scry-a-day to keeping tabs on Korvain (and Alakast), who so nearly killed him.

The PCs traveled to Occipitus and, as luck would have it, Korvain ended up throwing Kaurophon into the plasm and gained the Smoking Eye template (I like to call this type of character "chaotic everywhere" instead of "chaotic good" since, when something is going on, he has to be there).

Last Game
The party travels back to the Material Plane, gets to Redgorge to see that it is under siege (however, the siege has not started), parley with Skellerang and try to persuade him to "cease this madness," and overall are doing really well.

Now, I was a bit intimidated by the whole point system and event driven scenario of the Siege of Redgorge that I have (from RPGenius); however, I was willing to run it as written. Fortunately, the PCs sped up events and made it an all out battle royale (keep reading).

After meeting with the Chisel, the PCs decide to play diplomats. Two go to the human encampment, one stayed in town to formulate defensive strategies, and the other, Korvain, went to the half-orc encampment to parley with them. Remember, Korvain is on the deep doo doo list of Nabthatoron. The reason that Korvain wanted to talk to the half-orcs was that, during the fire elemental attack in Cauldron, he befriended a couple of them and thought that would get him far in this situation - not a bad idea.

The Blue Duke is informed that Korvain is in camp and, having been in league with Nabthatoron, he knows immediately to send a runner to the demon's minions carrying the news that Korvain is in camp - alone.

The Blue Duke meets with Korvain and the urban ranger begins to try to bribe the leader to leave the battlefield - again, not such a bad idea! The Blue Duke stalls and the talks go on for a good 30 minutes until one of the half-orcs steps into the tent and says, "Sir, your guests have arrived."

As Korvain brings his attention back to the Blue Duke, he notices the man is smiling...

Tent walls drop, the Blue Duke polymorphs into true form, and in the shadowy darkness Korvain sees dozens of figures, both demon and half-orc.

Needless to say, Nabthatoron took revenge. Korvain died and Nabthatoron broke Alakast. Over the next minute, Nabthatoron gave an inspiring speech as to how the demons would raze Redgorge and Surabar's curse was lifted. However, Korvain has the Smoking Eye template and so, after that minute, his body was transported back to Occipitus. The time? 10pm

Fast forward slightly:
Midnight - The party wonders what is taking Korvain so long.

1am - The demons, in a bloodlust frenzy, attack the human Cauldron forces as Nabthatoron retreats back to the jungle to rally more demonic support for the upcoming razing of Redgorge.

1:15am - As the party bard is playing in the Redhead Miner's Inn and the remaining PCs are enjoying the atmosphere, a scream is heard in the night. Then all hell breaks loose.
Running outside, they see citizens and Cauldron solders (humans) running through the streets madly. A screech is heard from above and the head of Skellerang splats on the ground next to one of the PCs. A second glance verifies that, what the PC thought was the spinal cord, is actually a broken half of Alakast...

The demons do not attack anymore for tonight... they regroup and the planning begins.

Meanwhile, the PCs find out that Korvain has been killed. They head to Occipitus, spend several hours (wind walk) getting to the skull, raise dead, plane shift, spend a full day traveling back to Redgorge (wind walk) to arrive as the city is under siege from demons and half-orcs.

End game...

The city, with its boost in numbers and siege weapons (salvaged off the battle field) can last 1.5 days (according to my math). Next game is gonna rock!!!!

Well, I need some advice.

Let me give a brief synopsis of the group. There are 4 PCs: 11th level Cleric of Pelor, 11th level bard, 11th level urban ranger, and 11th level rogue. The 9th level cohort paladin was banished back to the prime material by a hezrou last game. Oh... and Kaurophan is with the party, but they totally suspect something.

Anyhow, they were 40 miles from the entrance to the tube that leads to the final test. The cleric decides that wind walk would be a great idea (and I somewhat agree). The problem: he can only affect the other three PCs and they don't trust Kaurophan enough to take him with them anyway. Kaurophan, being determined, tells them that he'll try to keep up (flying and pushing it).

The sad thing is that Kaurophan has been personable, extremely helpful, and I even had a "fake" character sheet for one of the PCs to use so they could run him. The problem is that the urban ranger is sooooo dark and mistrustful. This is just pissing me off.

Anyhow, the PCs make it to the ulcer field, are seen by the black dragon on their approach, and immediately make for the acid bath where Saureya is pinned. They land next to Saureya (dragon hot on their trail), and begin to change back to non-misty form. This takes 5 rounds. Luckily, the dragon was about 7 rounds behind them. They didn't have any time to roleplay with Saureya as they all jumped into the acid pool after healing the angel. Saureya followed... and so did the large dragon who can easily fit through the tunnel. The dragon grabs the urban ranger, flies out of the tunnel to a height of 80 feet, and drops him. Meanwhile, the rest of the PCs come out to save their friend.

A short battle begins and the PCs are definitely outmatched at this point - not because of power level, but because of their poor tactics. Saureya, written as a creature who could care less, takes the opportunity to get out of town and he flies off. The dragon successfully drains the strength on 2 PCs and, due to poor maneuverability and an angel moving at a slow speed in front of him, decides to take out Saureya.

The PCs dive back into the acid pool thinking all is safe and Kaurophan catches up to them at this point. They spend about 5 minutes on the inside of the tunnel (just out of the acid pool) interrogating him and making him out to be a bad guy. They move up the "throat" about 100 feet when a commotion from behind tells them that the dragon is back and is ready for seconds.

Now, they are in a 15 foot diameter tube with a dragon blocking the way out! Kaurophan buys some time with a wall of force and they rush up the tube to... anyone have a guess?

That's right!!!

All the commotion has warned the tube's other two inhabitants, the rakshasa and the fire giant, about the PCs presence.

So... I have a group of 4, generally tough, PCs pinned between a black dragon (which, in the air could likely demolish the group) and these 2 bad guys (which I have thought for some time will be VERY tough for this group as the giant will likely mow through them). I asked that we stop the game early before things get too out of control.

I don't want a TPK, but I have to be honest... I don't see too many options. One thing that might save them is if they don't wade into battle with kitty and the giant and instead ask to join forces to battle this dragon "less both groups perish."

However, both groups will also know that they are contenders for the ruling hand of Occipitus. Hmm....

Hey all,

I've recently been using DM Genie with SCAP. Currently, I have all of Zenith Trajectory inputted along with the maps, the creatures, and links to music (using RPGSoundMixer). Anyone else using DM Genie or RPGSoundMixer with their campaign? Any suggestions or interested in sharing DM Genie files?

So I have had an interesting and somewhat frustrating week with one of my players. Here's the background info:

There are 4 PCs in my campaign. We are playing through DelvesDeep's Demonskar Ball side adventure (top notch btw). Today is our last session involving the Ball and then we are off into "Zenith Trajectory."

Now, I wanted a little more realism in my campaign, so I told the PCs that, after the Demonskar Ball, they would have a long time to recup, train, and do mundane "life stuff." In fact, I told them to plan for two years' worth of activities (but I was only going to give them 14 months and then interupt it with the Umber Hulk attack).

Each of the PCs came to my house, individually, to run through there "inbetween" time so that very little of our campaign time together would be sacrificed. Three of the four PCs did exactly what I suggested - mundane things like rebuild the shrine of Pelor, train, learn languages, develop love interests, etc. The 4th PC... ugh...

It happens that this 4th PC, we'll call him Korvain, had died way back in Life's Bazaar because he has an innate ability to piss people off. The party has had to save his bacon several times, in fact. During the raise dead sequence, I thought it would be cool (because he's playing the demonscarred trait) to have a "dream/death sequence" wandering through "a mysterious and horid plane of existence." The atrocities he witnessed, the screams he heard, and the pain he went through during his death experience has really made him a dark character. I'm fine with that... except... during that death experience, he glimpsed into a room where he overheard some demonic language being spoken. A group of hellish beings were gathered around a table arguing about something, but what really caught his eye was 12 figurines on the table and 2 more off to the side. Something was very familiar about one of those other two figurines, but he still has no idea what. He then heard one of them say, "We have twelve, all we need is one more and the ceremony can begin." At that, one of them noticed him and, with a sudden rush, as if falling backwards, he was sucked back into his revived body. The experience was confusing and left him, obviously, shaken.

"What does this have to do with his time off?" , you ask. Well, the first thing he decides to do on his time off is visit Embril at the Cathedral of Wee Jas to discuss this death experience of his. Who would know more about death than a preistess of death? Innocent move on his part, but the description he gave her sent red flags everywhere. She knew he was in a now somewhat popular adventuring crew so she couldn't just kill him then and there - it would arouse too many inquiring minds. She told him she would research some texts and get back to him.

As I saw it, I had only 3 choices:
1) Ignore it and hope that Korvain would stop snooping. However, Korvain is an Urban Ranger and he is the biggest and best snoop around so that would not work. With plans coming to fruition soon, the Cagewrights could not risk having someone like that around.

2) Kill him outright. However, then his ragtag band of heroes would investigate and that just might lead back to Embril and the Cagewrights.

3) Send him to Sasserine to read through some texts there. Once he leaves Cauldron, she could teleport to the Ebon Triad HQ in Sasserine and inform them that one of the members of the band that eradicated their cohorts under Cauldron was coming into town. She knows that the Triad would completely demolish him and it can't really be tied to here OR the Cagewrights. It's just an evil group exacting revenge for a loss.

Of course, I didn't want to kill one of the PCs. Especially for such an innocent mistake, but my hands were tied with the reality of the situation.

I had the Striders contact Korvain and inform him that, after his party's recent success in the Kopru Ruins, the investigated and found that the Ebon Triad had a HQ in Sasserine. This gave Korvain TWO reasons to go to Sasserine. So... the next day, Korvain and Fellian head off to Sasserine.

Upon arrival, they hole up in the closest inn and are soon attacked. Fellian dies, Korvain lives to be a torture pet for the goons of Hextor. They use him as a practice dummy for months, allowing him wooden "swords" so he can show his worth. As we roleplayed it out, he began to become even darker and now is considering changing alignment to evil... ugh...

If that's not enough... I need to save him and somehow make sure that he doesn't suspect Embril as the set up person. Moreover, what would Embril do? I mean, she's PISSED that the Triad didn't just kill Korvain and she knows that the party will eventually go looking for him so do I have her somehow approach the party with a concerned look and say, "The last I spoke with Korvain was several months ago and I am worried. He went to Sasserine, but my sources say he never arrived at his destination. I have done a scrying and found that he has been captured by the same cult that you helped defeat under Cauldron."

This diverts suspision away from Embril, allowing her to circumvent the party thinking she set Korvain up. When they come back to Cauldron after saving Korvain, I'll go straight into the Cusp of Sunrise invitation (perhaps having Embril announce publicly that this band is, again, the heroes of Cauldron for defeating such vile creatures). Thus, I would totally skip the Umber Hulk showdown.

Any thoughts? I need help on this one big time...

I am toying with the idea of allowing the characters more time between chapters to "rest" and "level up." I'm not so much a fan of the simple farm boy becoming god-like in one year. It just is too hard to fathom (and yet a floating, talking eyeball is realistic... go figure). My party is just about to finish Flood Season and I thought that it would be nice to allow a passage of 6 months to a year. The reason for this is manyfold, but the top reasons are:

(1) It allows the PCs to get more involved with the town and its politics. Several of the are considering buying homes. One is a priest of Pelor and he wants to do some major improvements on the shrine. Another is thinking about possibly starting an Aquirers Guild. All these things take time and the investment into the PCs is well worth it. The gnome is the party is in talks with the local governemtn to rebuild Jzadirune and that will take time.

(2) Advancement! Like I said before, it's just too much for me to grasp that a few weeks ago these guys were wimps. Now, in just under 30 days (in game), they can perform feats most of the town can't. Even the best celebrity fitness gurus can't promise that. The time off would add the element of "training to perfect those skills." This could also lead to some cool contacts within (and outside of) the city.

(3) REALISM! I know, it's a fantasy game, but... the PCs have mentioned a few times that, with all the stuff that happens around here and all the denizens below, WHY would ANYONE ever live here? Letting things "cool down" a bit may lessen that feeling of, "Ok, what's next?"

What do you all think?

Any comments would be appreciated...

Sorry DD for the shouting of your name in the subject line, but I am curious if you've completed the storyline modifications for your alternative AP. My players are thoroughly enjoying the adventure, but I'm afraid they are going to reach a point where my lack of time and resources may start to show.

Thanks for all the hard work,

MathemAddict