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I swapped out the Spawn's feats for the following:

1.) necrotic reserve (libris mortis) -- I was liberal with my interpretation of this feat, allowing the spawn to have a reserve if its worms had drained any INT from a victim. The tactic here is to have the spawn fall at 0 hit points, but this feat allows it to "play dead" until its fast healing takes it back to fighting shape. When a spawn you thought you killed rises up behind your party's wizard, completely unhurt... now THAT's terrifying.

2.) improved turn resistance (libris mortis) -- possibly overkill, but with the spawn's existing turn resistance, adding this feat makes the spawn very difficult to turn for low level characters (turns as 10 HD)

I also use a variable point-buy for my monsters depending on how many points the PC's have for abilities. Shuffling a couple points into strength allows the spawn to hit more often, and shuffling a couple points into charisma boosts the aura of terror.

Don't forget that the 40' radius of terror from 3 spawn is bound to send some characters fleeing in panic. This is perhaps the deadliest aspect of the spawn for a low-mid level party... It trims down the number of hard-hitters, leaving the mages and clerics vulnerable to its slams, worms and disease.

I just read through Encounter at Blackwall Keep (#126) and hope to run my party through it this week, but I need some help.

I am confused as to why the PCs go to the Lizardfolk egg chamber. If they make peace with Hishka, I would think they would stop treating the lair as a dungeon-crawl and never get to the egg chamber. As per the written story, Hishka has no idea of the danger that the eggs are in, so Hishka wouldn't tell the PCs any info that gets them to the chamber. If Hishka does suspect that Ilthane is a bad ally to the tribe and that Ilthane is guarding the eggs, that might persuade the PCs to do something. But, a 5-6th level party is not going to attack a black dragon in a egg-chamber.
I am missing some info within the story?
What are other DMs doing?

I asked this question earlier, and James Jacobs offered a good answer to my question:

"If they ally with the shaman but don't want to go into the egg chamber, the shaman can ask the PCs to accompany it down to the eggs to make sure they're okay. Remember that since things turned bad, the lizardfolk haven't been allowed to visit their egg chamber that often, so the shaman certainly would want the PCs backing him up when he goes down there to make sure things are ok. Which, of course, they aren't."

Hello. I'm really enjoying reading the new Adventure Path. Hopefully I'll actually be able to run it soon. I do have some questions about some Spawn of Kyuss game mechanics, and some general questions about the swamp section of Blackwall Keep:

*** SPOILERS... don't read if you're a player, please. ****

1.) Blackwall Keep indicates that the Spawn Worms can't penetrate natural armor of +5 or greater. What about a Barbarian's damage reduction? Since the worms do only 1 point of damage per round until reaching the brain, are barbarians with DR 1/- or greater immune to this effect?

2.) The adventure kind of assumes that the PC's ally with the lizardman shaman. After disposing of the Lizard King, is there even a reason for the PC's to go down into the egg chamber? I'm worried that my PC's are going to sneak in, kill the king, get the prisoners and get out as quickly as possible without learning anything at all about Ilthane, Kyuss worms, etc. What's the hook to get them down into the egg chamber?

3.) Egg Chamber: there are 200 lizardman eggs here. Assuming the dragon egg breaks, how are you DMs handling the resulting spawnlings on the battlefield? How many lizardman eggs are there per 5' square? I am strongly considering just turning the spawnlings into a swarm, with each round adding more members to its HD total. Have any other DM's done this? How'd it work out?

thanks for any replies.

-eric