There's some background info and a little bit of a plot in here, but this is mostly a straight up dungeon crawl to retrieve a mysterious artifact... basically what being a Pathfinder is all about! I ran this at the low tier for mostly level 1s, and it also serves as a great intro scenario. A few things that could really hurt, but the various treasures you can find along the way help a lot.
The fights were good for the most part (except for following the PFS tendency of squishy end fights)... a nice mix of interesting creatures and PC classes. My table definitely had a lot of fun with this one.
Just got back from running this at the low tier... overall it's not a bad scenario. Lots of great roleplaying opportunities and a chance for knowledge skills to shine, but also some potentially challenging combats for the combat folks. It also has one of the coolest-described rooms I've seen in a dungeon (one of the players even mentioned this after the game).
Despite the investigative beginning and dialog options, the players are very much on rails through the entire thing, and it shows. There's also not much the PCs can do to affect any sort of outcome aside from making one fight a little easier.
Spoiler:
The last fight was a letdown for us, but that was mainly on me... completely forgot about the natural attacks on the alchemist that let him threaten adjacent squares. Can't dock the scenario for GM mistakes.
Ran this at subtier 1-2, and despite being a fairly simple dungeon crawl my group had a lot of fun. Between roleplaying Togg, guessing at what the tiny fey creatures were, fighting uncommon foes, and interesting hazards in the boss fight, this was very enjoyable to run.
(Spoilers...)
- Togg is awesome. That's about it.
- The first encounter with a Jinkin (and no one with nature knowledge) left the PCs guessing through the scenario as to what they were.
- The fungus garden encounter was a good chance to throw some uncommon monsters at the PCs. My group had a very easy time with it, but asking for a Will save heightened the sense of danger.
- The last encounter was probably the weakest point. On the plus side, there were some hazards to keep (yet another) caster BBEG (TBEG?) from dying on the first turn. We had someone with an ioun torch to keep the darkness at bay, but the encounter dragged on due to the damage reduction.
I ran this at subtier 1-2 with a group of 6 (two 1s, two 2s, two 3s), and though the group made quick work of pretty much every combat I thought it was a pretty solid scenario. A lot of the combat is split up by discussions with the NPCs (which was a little rough with my PCs, all of whom didn't have much interest in anything beyond the combats), but with a good group of roleplayers and a GM knowledgeable about Pathfinder lore they'd make for some good roleplaying experiences.
I ran this last night with three PCs and me playing a premade, but aside from a smaller table size than we would have liked we all had fun with this one!
I've heard a lot of naysaying about chases, but we really enjoyed the one in this scenario. Instead of just laying out the diagram and playing Pathfinder: the Board Game, using descriptions and story-telling as the PCs encountered and overcame each objective worked really well.
I also didn't mind (most of) the faction missions happening right at the start. They felt sort of tossed-in, but on the other hand it was nice to have them out of the way and the PCs focused on the task at hand instead of spending most of the scenario trying to figure out what they should be looking for.
The only down side to the scenario was what felt like a lengthy, combat-heavy dungeon crawl at the end. Even without having time for the optional encounter, the last section felt somewhat sluggish with different combat encounters all in a row with largely the same enemy... nothing interesting to split them up.
I just got back from running this tonight. I'm all about open, non-dungeon-crawl scenarios that encourage roleplaying, but this one stretched that a little. Most of it plays like an investigation, but for all the investigating the PCs do it always ends the same. Despite the numerous pitfalls, the scenario is actually pretty fun overall, though. Once the investigation gets under way, the PCs really enjoyed venturing through the ship, interacting with the various crew, and trying to piece together what happened. I lucked out and got a table full of roleplayers, and I could tell they appreciated the opportunity to actually use dialog to get through the story instead of countless dice rolling.
In order for things not to spiral wildly out of control, the PCs need to be railroaded into certain situations (lengthy spoiler ahead)...
Spoiler:
Just getting started with the first combat proved to be a huge challenge. Trying to keep 6 inquisitive people cooped up on a part of the ship away from the person they're supposed to watch for 6 months? Everyone wanted to run off and do their faction missions right as they got on the ship. It'll take a firm hand from the GM (or a crazy amount of creativity that I sadly don't have yet) to keep the scenario running as written.
The elf attack is so easily misinterpreted as a diversion that half of the PCs tried to get below deck as fast as possible to keep an eye on Sethriel. And the ship might be occupied by the most inept crew to travel the seas.
The numerous red herrings were a good touch... the smell of perfume, Marzack leading the PCs astray, Killik's disguise self (although low Bluff rolls tipped the PCs off... lucky for me he was the last person they talked to!).
But no matter how much investigation they do, the killers reveal themselves at the end. Why?
In the end, there's probably a lot of info that the PCs don't know that allows them to enjoy it more than the GM. My players said they had a lot of fun, so I can't knock the scenario too much. Definitely a tough one to run... especially as my first game I've run for years!
