A Pathfinder Society Scenario designed for levels 1–5.
In the port of Senghor, it is taboo to even speak of the accursed ruin of Boali that sits on the other side of the bay, let alone to set foot in its rubble-strewn streets. Yet rumors have reached the Pathfinder Society that the Aspis Consortium has sent agents to search through this forbidden city. Although few people willingly travel to its shores, Boali is far from quiet. It falls to a small group Pathfinder agents to get the bottom of the Aspis plot without falling prey to the ruin's dangers. Can the PCs bring the Consortiums' true motives to light?
Contents in Signs in Senghor also contribute directly to the ongoing storyline of the Exchange faction.
Ok, the caffeine has kicked in so it’s time to write a Pathfinder review! I played Signs in Senghor online through play-by-post. It didn’t make much of an impression on me, but reading through the scenario, I can see it has all the elements for a solid adventure. It has an interesting plotline, great artwork, interesting NPCs, strong attention to detail, and some exciting bits. Perhaps playing it a little bit at a time over the course of several weeks kept all these elements from coalescing for me.
SPOILERS!:
Signs in Senghor is set in the Mwangi Expanse. The backstory is really interesting, as it ties into the ancient cyclops empire of Ghol-Gan. Apparently, a type of powerful evil spirit called an asura was imprisoned by the Ghol-Gan. Now, millennia later, the seals keeping the prison intact have started to weaken and blasphemous tablets called the Twelve Rites detail a way to set the asura free. It’s a very trite plot in a way (great evil is about to be set free and the good guys need to stop it!), but the scenario gives it an interesting spin at least. I think the scenario must tie into some others in the season, but I haven’t played much Season 9 and can’t confirm one way or the other.
The scenario starts in the city of Eleder with a briefing by Venture-Captain Finze Bellaugh. Bellaugh explains that the Pathfinder Society would like to expand its activities in the region. But this is difficult due to the Aspis Consortium’s stronghold in nearby Bloodcove. If the Society could gain influence in the city of Senghor, however, the Aspis grip over trade in the region would be weakened. Reports have recently come in that the Aspis is conducting operations in the forbidden ruins of Boali, a city across the bay from Senghor. So V-C Bellaugh wants the PCs to travel to Boali, find proof of Aspis activities there, and use that proof to persuade the leaders of Senghor to ally with the Pathfinder Society against them. It might be slightly convoluted, but it all holds together.
A cool-looking Pathfinder named Mirian Raas provides the group with transport to Senghor and tells them that from there, they can take a fishing boat across the bay to Boali. Why Raas doesn’t just drop the PCs off there, I don’t know. A variety of skill checks allow the PCs to speed up the trip across the bay, and although they don’t know it at the time, the time it takes them impacts the difficulty of later challenges in the scenario.
Once in the ancient, ruined city of Boali, the Pathfinders will quickly pick up the trail of the Aspis Consortium. The city is overrun by boggards, and they present the first combat encounter in the game. Afterwards, the PCs will find a member of the Consortium named Gideon Wren who has been left behind by his fellows (in a vault containing some of the tablets of the Twelve Rites) because he’s stuck in a cunning and ultimately deadly trap! The PCs presumably extricate Gideon from the trap in exchange for information, but how long it takes them to get him free (and how wounded he gets in the process) affects the difficulty of the next encounter. I thought having an enemy member trapped and in need of rescue was a clever and original plot point.
But just a few minutes after getting out of the vault with Gideon, the Pathfinders encounter an enormous three-eyed winged frog beast called a mobogo (the pic verges on the silly). This is supposed to lead to a chase scene (with the PCs getting chased), though I think the scenario needed to do a better job explaining that this was not the sort of thing that should be fought. Anyway, there’s a good variety of skill checks and a good array of consequences depending on how well the PCs do in the chase. The scenario incorporates a lot of attention to detail which I appreciate, but there might even be too many little bonuses and penalties to keep track of.
Once back in Senghor, Gideon can provide the name and location of his boss in the consortium—a woman named Shinri Dells. She’s an aasimar monk/sorcerer, and fights the PCs with several low-ranking Consoritum members. I don’t recall this fight being particular difficult or memorable. There’s also an optional encounter if the scenario is running fast that involves a fight against some tripurasuras (a type of shapechanging lesser asura, I guess). We didn’t do this encounter, but it’s nice for the GM to have options depending on how the game is going.
The finale is a skills challenge to try to persuade the leaders of the city to back the Pathfinder Society over the Aspis Consortium. This plays out in a familiar way, with each leader having a distinct personality and set of skills that are useful in persuading them. Still, I thought it was handled well.
Overall, the scenario makes use of all the core elements of gameplay: skills, role-playing, and combat. The storyline is solid, and the setting is interesting. It’s perhaps not outstanding, but definitely worth playing.
I adored this scenario. Absolutely loved it! There's a great collaborative chase scene, plenty of NPCs to role-play with, enemies you can try to befriend, moral dilemmas, dynamic battles, and the option for your players to use multiple methods to get things done. Just awesome. I have both GMed and played this scenario as a player and had a blast on both sides of the screen.
In addition to being great fun for adults, I would like to point out that I've even GMed this scenario for children, and they had an absolute blast. Those of you looking for a scenario that is enjoyable for younger players or whole families, definitely give this one a shot!
Just like Ascalaphus, I GM’ed this scenario at low tier and just like him, I enjoyed the straightforward plan and mechanics that were involved. It took a bit of preparation and note-taking during the session, but it wasn’t too bad. The cheatsheets on pfsprep really help as well and I really recommend them. They’re easy to use and incredibly helpful, so be sure to check them out.
The combats and skillchecks were okay. There’s plenty of opportunities to roleplay and players will be forced to make multiple important decisions that will influence how the rest of the scenario plays out. I like that. It’s like being forced to pick road A or B, without really realizing it has a major impact. It’s subtle, yet effective. I'd definitely like seeing these kind of choices more often.
There were, however, a few things that did bug me as a GM. There’s an opportunity to talk to some interesting opponents, but you require a language that is really rare. I like the fact there’s that option, but it just felt weird to me as it’s just not going to work. Some alternatives could have been interesting, though with an extra difficulty perhaps. The optional encounter, depending on the way the story unfolds, might also make little to no sense to the players and there’s a chance it doesn’t get explained if the players don’t have the appropriate skills. That would personally haunt me and would leave me annoyed were that to happen to me. That said, I'm really nitpicking here.
In short: this scenario did a great job starting/continuing a storyline and I’m curious to see where it’ll lead to. Given the fact that the players were having a blast of the time (and at some point were laughing uncontrollably), I think that it caters to everyone’s needs. It’s a bit straightforward, but also offers some freedom to the players on how to tackle certain situations. Choices you make throughout the scenario really matter and indeed influence the potential outcome of other parts. It’s simply a solid scenario.
I think this scenario does "taking the offensive against the Aspis" well - it's got a straightforward plan and reasonable mechanics. And of course no plan ever survives contact with the not-so-uninhabited ruin.
Afterwards the scenario very deftly anticipates the players taking different approaches to completing their mission and either of them is "correct", making this scenario much less of a dumb railroad than many of its peers.
The combats I found to be fair but challenging. Likewise for the other mechanics; the difficulty seemed to be at a sweet spot where a regular party can do what is really needed but it takes something extra to get 100% score, and only the hopelessly incompetent or bitterly unlucky party should court total disaster.
Set-up stories often get a bad rap because they feel like they don't have a satisfying conclusion of their own. This scenario elegantly dodges that problem. When you finish it you'll feel like you accomplished something.
There's a lot of backstory in the GM preamble that the PCs won't find out, but in this case I don't think that's a flaw. I'm pretty sure it's being saved for a later installment in this story arc, but the GM is being clued in a bit so he actually understands the context of this story.
My experience was only 2 or 3 stars, but I can tell the module is better.
When I played through this, it seemed obvious that the GM had merely skimmed the product. I could sense that this scenario was trying to be much more fun than the GM was allowing. The chase scene and social challenges? It was all boiled down to 5 minutes of quick die rolls. Very anti-climatic. But enough of that, let's review this!
Your PCs are going to the abandoned village of Boali, in the Mwangi Expanse. It's the jungle, baby! Here's the basic quest/idea. The Aspis guys are digging up Boali, looking for relics, but probably without permission. The nearby town of Senghor would likely frown on that. So go find evidence that the Aspis dudes are trashing the place and get Senghor worked up about it. Then the Pathfinder Society can swoop in and say, "Well WE would do things legally, so you should kick out the Aspis Consortium and let us in!"
There are a lot of mini-games in this product, which is partly why I felt like it was supposed to be a 4-star module, even if I wasn't getting that experience. There is a skill check thing at the beginning, and there are the usual chase rules, another diplomatic schmoozing mini-game, and a sort-of "rescue" mini-game. Oh, and some combat stuff, which I found to be far more exciting when I read the product. There are cool terrain issues that could materially affect the encounters -- I didn't really see much of that on my play-through, but reading it I can see it could make for some good challenges.
A note for GMs: one encounter in particular was bugging me even before I bought & read the product. Just playing it I knew something was off. It turns out, I was right. So if you are GMing this, please read this:
Spoiler:
There is a fight with some boggards in a bog. These boggards have AC 15. Yet, in my game, we were asked to hit AC 24. Why? Well, it was +8 for the cover rules that are granted to creatures in water, and +1 because reasons. And yet... the module directly contradicts this. According to the module, you are mandated to use the shallow bog & deep bog rules. By those rules, a medium boggard can only have a +4 from normal cover. To get +8 to AC, the medium-sized boggards (high tier) would need to use the "crouch as a move action" option that the bog rules provide. However, using that option also imposes a -10 to attack rolls on the crouching person/monster, and you can bet our GM didn't accept a -10 on his attack rolls.
In other words, the boggards (high tier) should have AC 19 if they're fighting normally, as per the bog rules for a "deep bog." Now, low tier the boggards have the "young" template, which makes them small size. They get improved cover (+8 to AC) according to the bog rules, which weirdly makes the low-tier fight harder than the high-tier fight. High tier: AC 19, 61 HP per monster. Low tier: AC 23, 16 HP per monster.
In both tiers, the boggards have Swamp Stride, which allows them to 5' step regardless of whether it's a deep bog or shallow bog. The PCs probably don't have Swamp Stride as a class/race ability. So unless the PCs have swim speeds, it's VERY likely that the boggards are super-mobile compared to the PCs. This should help a bit with controlling the battlefield.
Overall, I enjoyed this game -- more from reading it than playing it, but still. I'm dying to run it. I think the chase scene could be spectacular. I think the social scene could be hilarious. I think the fights could be very dynamic, with lots of terrain issues to explore (both for the monsters and for the PCs -- lots of fun options listed in the product). If your local Pathfinder Society branch is offering this game and you know the GM is good at all the Paizo mini-games, then go for it and have a great time. If you hate these mini-games then maybe stay away from this product (although to be fair, you could play this product just for the fights -- if your GM does it right, the fights are enjoyable regardless of whatever happens with the rest of the adventure).
I jumped with excitement when I saw that we are going into Boali! This was one of the most fun pieces that I added to our Skull and Shackles campaign. Can't wait!
I enjoyed playing the module, except for the numbers and DCs for low tier seemed like they were for min max +2. I mean, an 18 save at first level means: 18 stat, +4. Best save, +2. So that is a 60% chance of failure straight away. Pretty ridiculous. Asked my vo for a copy so I could analyze the numbers and change this review. But I'd say a module that only gives min max characters a 40% chance of survival is designed to kill characters. Especially of the normal variety. We played with a group of 5, and three went down (one was due to critical). I shook the hand of the new player at the table (who would have been dead if not for the die hard bonus from buying stuff at the game shop) and said "Welcome to PFS."
