A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for 4th-level pregenerated characters.
For several years, the Pathfinder Society has enjoyed a mutually beneficial alliance with the Sewer Dragons, the dominant tribe of kobolds living beneath Absalom. When an elite patrol discovers a wounded member of the Society with a desperate message, the Sewer Dragons must move quickly intercept an extraordinary threat from seizing their territory—if not Absalom itself! In this special adventure the players portray kobolds as unlikely defenders of the City at the Center of the World using 4th-level pregenerated characters.
Written by Thurston Hillman.
Product Availability
Fulfilled immediately.
Are there errors or omissions in this product information? Got corrections? Let us know at
store@paizo.com.
True Dragons of Absalom is a rare PFS scenario to be found offered for play, as it can only be run by 5-star GMs. I was lucky enough to get a chance to play in a game at PaizoCon AP in 2019, and it was a memorable experience. There's a couple of big things that sets the scenario apart. First, it was written by Thurston Hillman, one of the best PFS writers in the stable. Second, instead of regular PCs, everyone plays a pre-gen kobold! The scenario has memorable NPCs, some really clever encounters, and makes good use of the setting. I think a couple of the plot premises might be a bit shaky, but otherwise it's an all-around winner. If you get a chance to play it, seize the opportunity--it might not come around again for a while!
SPOILERS!:
The PCs are members of Absalom's Sewer Dragon tribe of kobolds, a group that has a mutually-beneficial relationship with the Pathfinder Society. The PCs are ordered to traverse the sewers and find Hats, a (hilarious) otyugh who says he has an important captive. The "briefing" proper starts when the PCs meet Hats' prisoner--Venture-Captain Drandle Dreng! Dreng explains that enemies of the Society known as the Onyx Alliance have been building a portal to the Shadow Plane in the sewers nearby. Dreng says the Onyx Alliance will clear out all perceived threats in the sewers, including the Sewer Dragons, and that he needs their help to stop the portal before it's too late. Dreng himself, however, was badly hurt in a battle against the Onyx Alliance, so it's up to the kobolds to save the day! It's a fun, original concept for a briefing and one thing that's particularly cool is that with a sufficient bribe (one of the PC's magic hats) Hats will join the kobolds for the first half of the adventure.
Finding the portal isn't hard, but overcoming the defenders is far more challenging. In addition to several fetchling rogues, there's a shadow mastiff whose baying can easily send some of the PCs fleeing in panic. I remember it being a hard but fun encounter that made good use of sewer terrain to complicate things.
The next encounter is the most clever in the scenario, and makes excellent use of the fact that the PCs are kobolds. The idea is that the PCs know that Onyx Alliance reinforcements are on their way so it's time to switch from offense to defence and build some traps! There's a wide variety of traps that can be built (with successful skill checks) and there's a really fun, cooperative strategy element involved in figuring out how to best funnel the incoming waves of attackers and destroy (or at least soften them up) before they get into combat range. I wish more scenarios could contrive this sort of "reverse dungeon crawl". It was used perfectly here.
Soon after the portal is secured, it opens from the other side. It turns out that the Sewer Dragons are going to have to venture forth to the Shadow Plane to figure out how to close it. I thought it was a bit unrealistic that a handful of sewer kobolds would tackle a mission like this, but I placed that thought to one side and moved on. The rest of the adventure takes place in Shadow Absalom, a dark and fascinating alternative version of the city. The scenario does a great job making the place feel strange and somewhat creepy, and good GMs (and they better be good if they have 5 stars!) will be able to add to the atmosphere of the setting. After some open-ended exploration and information-gathering, the PCs will be approached by a member of the Light-Weavers' Guild (an organisation opposed to the Onyx Alliance) who explains what needs to be done to permanently close the portal. It turns out that the PCs need to take on an umbral wyrmling dragon!
The confrontation with the umbral dragon takes place, quite cinematically, at the top of a massive spire. Getting to the spire holds some additional challenges (traps and potential encounters). The wyrmling, Shadrixis (cool art!), can actually be negotiated with to give the PCs what they need to close the portal--but it's far more likely that a battle ensues. It was a thrilling, difficult battle. Afterwards, the PCs can close the portal after jumping through one last time.
The pre-gen kobolds all come with backstories and full-colour art, and they were fun and distinctive. The scenario has a sidebar for GMs that gives some guidelines on how far is too far if players decide to go crazy with running PCs with an evil alignment. There's a pretty cool boon for completion that allows you to play your kobold once the next time you need a 4th level pre-gen for a scenario--I'm saving mine for a special occasion.
I thought True Dragons of Absalom was a real treat. It continued to advance the long-running storyline of the Onyx Alliance, had some original encounters, and provided a unique opportunity to see life from a kobold's perspective. If I get another 100 or so tables under my belt someday, I'll return the favour and run it for another group!
I enjoyed this scenario tremendously. There are some very entertaining NPCs (thanks in part to the thespian capabilities of our 5-star GM), and the pre-gens were written in such a way as to encourage player to role-play as kobolds.
There was a uniquely kobold-ish mechanic for the 2nd encounter that, while time-consuming, fit the scenario perfectly and was a lot of fun for everyone at the table.
I suspect that many tables only get to enjoy the first half of the scenario, and never even set foot on the other side of the portal, which is unfortunate. It took my group EIGHT HOURS over two sessions to complete this scenario. We loved every minute of it, but if you don't have that much time, I'd recommend another adventure.
True Dragons is worth playing just for the large encounter in the middle section, but the rest of it is pretty good too. If you get a chance to try this one, I strongly recommend it. The only real caveat is that you need to keep an eye on the time a bit, because it is a scenario that can get away from you depending on how long the PCs decide to take on some things.
It's unfortunate for us too because we only just got a 3-star last month. Maybe someday we can run this in our little burg.
What you need to do Kevin is organize a game day and sweet talk Myron Pauls from Winnipeg into coming out and running both of the exclusives for whomever wants to play them. Bribing him might be good, putting him up in a nice hotel or something might go a long ways too. If you could talk Scott Young into coming with him, he could run Serpent's Rise while Myron runs True Dragons.
Something to think about. Back when we only had one VO/5-star in Michigan, Doug Miles would go all over the state to run the exclusives for people. If you reach out to them, they just might be willing to help you out. I know I really enjoy running both of the exclusives and if someone offered me a place to stay and maybe a meal I'd be willing to drive a few hours to run them for a group.
We've got a Gamesday coming up next month, and could provide free pizza, but Myron and the others will be running the exclusives at their Convocation this weekend. Because of the limited number of 5-stars, the players were drawn via lottery. We'd likely have to do the same thing.
Pathfinder Adventure, Maps, Starfinder Accessories, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Is there any way we could remove the watermark on the pregens we hand out? For security purposes I don't like to give out my paizo.com email address to people at conventions.
Spoiler:
Especially because I bet players will want to keep their pregen.
Is there any way we could remove the watermark on the pregens we hand out? For security purposes I don't like to give out my paizo.com email address to people at conventions.
** spoiler omitted **
Heya, we just pushed through a fix for this, and the pregens are now provided to folks who have this scenario as a separate unwatermarked file. If you redownload, you'll be able to grab them :)
I'm looking to buy a copy and don't understand HOW CAN A DOWNLOADED PDF COPY be UNAVAILABLE...! Did someone hack your files and delete it? WTF gives????
True Dragons of Absalom is an exclusive scenario intended only for 5 Star GMs in the Pathfinder Society organized play campaign. It is not purchasable as other PFS scenarios are.
So what's your point?
You know, TriOmegaZero, if you click on the name of the poster, then on their profile (if not already there) it will show you the number of GM stars they have, if any. You should try it sometime.
Anyone at Piazo have a better reply?
So not to resurrect a dormant thread, but I was curious...
When applying credit, do you apply the credit when the character hits the tier (3-5) if not there already or do you wait until the character hits level 4 (the level of the NPC)
Is there any way we could remove the watermark on the pregens we hand out? For security purposes I don't like to give out my paizo.com email address to people at conventions.
** spoiler omitted **
Though this got fixed. the easy option for similar stuff i use is
The field commission, can it be used on characters other than the one the chronicle is applied to? I have a character who has leveled to 7, so technically cannot play as a 4th Level pregen. Can I cross off the boon and use the pregen on a separate character?
Pathfinder Adventure, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Zaister wrote:
Any chance this might one day get "declassified"? It's been more than four years, and it's the old edition...
That would be really nice. If nothing else, I darn sure would like to just be able to READ it. But I know a lot of players who love kobolds. Idk how doable it will be for me to ever get to five stars at this point with the whole new edition thing. :( If it at least lowered to 4, four stars MIGHT be something to striveable and still attainable with work, if its as fun as people say. I sure would like to have it and see for myself. This also sounds like it would be awfully fun to run in a home game.
